Chapter 27
Seraphina
Ten hours earlier.
The car door slams shut behind me.
My skin tingles when Gabriel reaches over to click my seatbelt. Surrounding me are four other men, staring at me. I shift uncomfortably, wondering what the hell I’ve just done.
Gabriel introduces them to me in a low voice, his breath against my neck, and I shiver.
“Aaron,” he says, and a tall, Hispanic man with dark eyes, black, tousled hair, and gleaming eyes, nods.
“Noel.” Shorter, bulkier, brown hair tinged with red, currently taking me in while licking his lips and cracking his knuckles.
“Elias.” Bored, on his phone, objectively beautiful with white straight teeth, his eyes continuously flitting up to me with badly disguised interest. “Lazarus.” He nods at a guy who looks surprisingly like him, only about ten years younger.
“My little brother,” he specifies unnecessarily.
Well, those are some very biblical names.
Gabriel turns to me and flashes me another dangerous smile. “And you’re Seraphina Connor.”
I nod awkwardly. It feels strange to hear my full name after having spent the past months being called nearly exclusively some variation of ‘the girl’ or ‘the pet’.
“Where is it?” asks Noel impatiently.
“Shush,” says Gabriel, still smiling, and I suddenly realize he looks more like a snake than a shark. “Everything in its time.”
“Where is what?” I breathe.
Noel, Aaron and Elias stare at me even more intently than before.
“What is this bullshit, Gabriel?” snaps Elias. “Did you make a mistake?”
At once, Gabriel’s eyes flash with fury, and Elias inches back. I push back into my own seat too. The suddenness with which his smile has turned to anger astonishes me.
My instinct is telling me to get the hell away from here, but it’s too late. The car doors are locked.
A moment later, all trace of his fury has vanished.
“No mistake,” he purrs. “Don’t worry.”
He slides a cold, slightly clammy hand over the back of my neck, squeezing just enough to make me hyperaware of his presence and his power over me.
I sit rigidly, barely allowing myself to breathe, let alone ask any questions.
Gabriel’s cold finger starts to trace circles on my neck, and I repress a shudder. His touch does the opposite of what Damien’s did. It doesn’t soothe me, it makes me recoil.
The car continues to drive through the quiet streets of Astley, the neon signs and streetlights occasionally illuminating the men’s faces, and I squirm uncomfortably as I realize their eyes are glued on me.
But their stillness lulls me into a certain sense of security. Which is why, when the car pulls up to a large warehouse in the industrial suburbs of West Astley and Gabriel speaks next, I can’t prevent the sharp gasp that escapes me.
“Take off your clothes.”
“Wh… what?” I manage.
“Your clothes. Take them off.”
The honeyed tone with which he had previously spoken has disappeared, replaced by harshness.
I freeze, unable to wrap my head around the request.
“Last chance. I’ll count to three. Take them off, or I’ll do it for you.”
I stare at the burgundy fabric that carpets the floor of the car, realizing suddenly that it is the same color as old blood. Gabriel’s voice rings in my ear, a distant, unreal threat.
One… two… three…
He clicks his tongue impatiently before wrapping his long, clammy hand around my upper arm and pulling me over his thighs.
He seizes my dress and there’s a large tearing sound as he rips it off.
He forces off my underwear in the same rough manner, while Lazarus grips my feet between his thighs and takes off one shoe after the other.
In just a few seconds, I’m sitting stark naked in front of them, too shocked to react.
Then Gabriel lifts me back up so that I’m sitting on his lap. I’m forcefully reminded of my initial experience with Damien, but this is so different. I’m not secretly aroused, only disgusted.
He puts one hand in my hair, twists my locks around his fingers so that my face is forced upward. The other hand descends upon my left cheek, an open-handed slap so violent it would have sent me reeling if he were not holding me by my hair.
Just as the wave of pain sets in, he strikes my right cheek. This blow is just as violent as the first. My vision fades to white for a second, and the next thing I’m aware of is his two fingers seizing my cheeks in a vicelike grip, and squeezing them together.
“Next time, you will listen to me,” he purrs, his voice sweet again.
I do my best to swallow, my eyes watering from pain.
“Yes, sir,” he says in a mimicking tone.
“Y-yes, sir,” I breathe.
Finally, he lets me go, and I scurry backward, pressing my back against the upholstery of my seat, realizing as I do that it’s also the color of blood.
The entire inside of the car looks like an old, oozing wound.
What have I done?
As I shrink back, my hands touch the fabric of my dress, lying crumpled in a pile, and my thigh presses against a small, hard bulge.
The knife.
My heart palpitating, I watch Gabriel open the car door and get out, his shoes clicking loudly on the pavement.
He makes a sign and the other men follow him.
Taking advantage of a quick moment in which they all have their backs turned, I slip my hand into the pocket, grab the small metal object, and hide it under my armpit.
Just then, Lazarus slips his hand around my hair like his older brother had done, and tugs on it to make me follow.
The cold night air envelops me, making me all the more aware of my nakedness. I fold my arms around my body, keeping the knife trapped under my armpit while shielding my bosom from their eyes.
Idiot. That’s the least of your worries.
I try to retreat into my numbness, to detach from the situation, but these past few weeks of captivity have demolished what I’ve spent an entire life building up. I feel raw, exposed. Only the touch of the knife against my skin gives me the strength to walk into the gaping entrance of the building.
I take the warehouse in at a glance. It’s an imposing structure of old red bricks, and its shuttered windows and generally unkempt appearance make it clear that the place is abandoned.
There doesn’t seem to be any light inside, and as I follow them in, I’m plunged into nearly pitch blackness.
I take advantage of the few moments in which the others can’t see me to rearrange my weapon.
I press on the little button and wince as it snaps open, its blade cutting into my skin.
Doesn’t matter. Nothing matters but getting out of here alive.
There’s a slight buzzing sound as Gabriel flicks on a light switch, and I do my best to study my surroundings while Lazarus, keeping his hold on my hair, forces me forward, across the large, open space.
I’ll need to know this place well if I want to get out of it.
Creaking, rusty metal beams are erected everywhere, as though there was once some effort put into keeping the warehouse from falling apart. But any attempt to care for the structure appears to have been abandoned a long time ago.
The floor is made of rotting planks, slabs of uneven wood, and tangled shrubbery that seems intent on overtaking everything. Small puddles of dirty water make the floor slimy and slippery in some areas.
What with stubbing my toes repeatedly, and grazing my soles on various sharp objects strewn on the ground, my feet are bleeding by the time I’m thrown into a small room, so viciously that I land hard against the back wall, and my knife is nearly dislodged from its hiding place.
Luckily, it stays hidden. At a nod from Gabriel, Noel ties my wrists and ankles behind my back, then to an old pipe, before stuffing a large dirty rag in my mouth that makes me choke and leaves an acrid taste on my tongue. He forces me to hold it in, tying another rag around my face.
“Though she doesn’t seem capable of making any noise, anyway,” he snorts, taking a step back to admire his work.
“She will soon,” declares Gabriel.
“We’re going to torture her?” asks Aaron, and even in the shadows, I notice the cruel glint in his eyes.
“Yes, later. First, let’s see if the nanochip is hidden in her clothes. If it isn’t, we’ll force the information out of her.”
“What if she doesn’t speak?” he questions.
“She will, by the time we’re through with her,” purrs Gabriel. “It’ll be the difference between a slow death… and a slower one.”
The whimper I make sounds muffled against the rag. But the pain of the knife slicing into my armpit, which I’ve somehow managed to keep concealed in spite of my bound position, keeps me focused.
“Can’t believe she came willingly,” sniggers Aaron. “Fucking brain-dead cunt.”
“We would have gotten her anyway,” smirks Gabriel. “But it’s a lot easier this way. If Wells hadn’t been such a fucking tool, we would’ve had to beat the shit out of her before dragging her out. But I’d take any amount of risk to get my hands on that motherfucking nanochip.”
“I would’ve liked to beat her up,” says Aaron, licking his lips.
Aaron, Noel and Elias walk away, then, but Gabriel and Lazarus hang back for a moment. The former lifts his phone and snaps a picture of me.
“For Damien,” he chuckles quietly.
“You’re going to send it to him now?” breathes Lazarus in astonishment. “He’ll figure out where we are.”
“That’s the idea,” retorts his older brother. “But I’ll wait a bit. I’ll send the picture once everything’s ready. I just wanted to take it now, before she’s disfigured.”
I inhale sharply and the filthy rag presses against the back of my throat. I bite down on the wave of nausea that overwhelms me.
“But if he comes and saves her…”
Gabriel chuckles again, then leans over to Lazarus and speaks in a whisper that I can just make out.
“He won’t. Don’t you understand? She’s taking the fall.”
“But you didn’t tell them. The other boys think…”
“Fuck them. The other boys are idiots. It’s you and me, Laz, forever. Remember that.”