Chapter 43 SAGE
SAGE
Iwoke with a body that didn’t feel like mine.
It felt like I had been ripped apart and stitched back together by unsteady hands. Every bone was out of place. Every muscle screamed in protest. A wrongness radiated from deep inside me, as if something vital had been stolen and I was only just beginning to realize it.
Pain bloomed in sharp, searing waves as I tried to shift, sending lightning through my limbs.
My arms were wrenched behind me, tied so tightly they’d gone numb—empty sacks of flesh hanging useless behind the chair.
I couldn’t feel my fingers at all. It was as if they’d been cut away, leaving phantom echoes in their place.
I sucked in a breath, but even that was agony.
My ribs screamed in protest, a hollow cracking sound echoing in my chest. My head pounded with a steady, brutal rhythm, each throb like a hammer crashing into my skull.
The light above me was blinding—brutal. Cold fluorescents stabbed at my retinas with ruthless precision, boring holes straight through my eyes and into my brain.
I squinted. Blinked. Failed to focus.
Where am I?
Panic bloomed like fire in my chest. My stomach churned, bile burning up the back of my throat. The sharp metallic sting of it mingled with the heavy weight of fear, thick on my tongue. I swallowed it down because I had no choice.
There was nowhere for it to go.
I tried to move again—willed my legs to shift, to do something—but they felt leaden.
Disconnected. Like I wasn’t even inside them anymore.
The ropes dug deeper into my wrists with each tiny motion, tearing into flesh that was already raw and pulsing.
I could feel warm blood slicking beneath the cords.
It made no difference. I wasn’t going anywhere.
The chair beneath me was metal. Cold. Ice-cold. Its chill seeped into my skin, deeper, until I could feel it leeching through muscle, finding the hollow of my bones. It was a kind of cold that didn't just exist on the outside—it made itself inside you. It hollowed you out. It waited for you to die.
I was drowning.
Not in water but in this.
In helplessness.
In terror.
And then I heard them.
Footsteps.
Measured. Deliberate.
Echoing in a room I couldn’t see, couldn’t map out.
I didn’t need to see it to know.
Concrete walls. No windows. No escape.
The footsteps stopped.
A door groaned open on unoiled hinges.
And then it slammed shut, so violently it sent a physical jolt through me. Pain spiked down my spine, my pulse roaring in my ears as nausea swelled again.
A shadow broke across the floor in front of me.
The door handle turned.
I couldn’t breathe.
And then…there he was, my nightmare.
Klay.
My heart didn’t even bother to speed up.
It simply skipped beats, sputtering out like it was going to give in.
He stepped through the doorway with a grin that carved its way into my flesh. Slow. Leisurely. His hands tucked into his pockets like we were meeting by accident on the street. His gaze settled on me with a heatless familiarity that turned my stomach to glass. And then he smiled wider.
Like he’d won.
"Good morning, little whore," he drawled, his tone slick with amusement. "Miss me?"
The voice that had haunted my dreams, coated in mock affection, like he was catching up with an old friend.
I shrank into the chair instinctively, but there was nowhere to go. My chest hollowed as his boots dragged a slow, deliberate line toward me.
He circled me, like he was savoring it.
Like a vulture deciding which piece to tear off first.
And then he spat.
Once and then twice.
The third splatter hit my cheek and stuck.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Don’t flinch.
Don’t give him the satisfaction.
"What am I going to do with you?" he mused aloud, a performance for his own amusement.
His voice turned false-thoughtful, dripping with sickly sweetness.
"You really did get yourself into trouble, didn’t you?
" He bent at the waist, his face lowering closer to mine.
"But I have to admit..." His breath washed over me, hot and foul. "...this worked out perfectly for me."
He laughed then.
Short. Sharp.
Each bark like a strike of lightning in my skull.
And then his hand twisted in my hair.
Without warning, he yanked hard, snapping my head back so fast my neck cracked.
Agony exploded through my scalp, my vision flaring white.
I tasted blood.
My throat burned.
The ceiling spun.
"Why?" I croaked, my voice rough, like broken glass scraping down my throat and making me regret even speaking.
I barely recognized the sound.
He let go.
My head sagged forward.
The sudden release made nausea spike so violently I nearly vomited.
Tears stung my eyes, hot and useless.
And then I saw it.
The tattoo.
On the back of his neck.
The same mark.
The one Reich and Castor bore.
My blood turned to ice.
No.
This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t real.
Were they with him? Had they known? Had they brought me here on purpose? Did Reich leave me at the house for Klay to find me?
I tried to make sense of it. Tried to fight the scream building in my chest.
But doubt was already coiling itself around my spine, cold and sure.
Klay turned toward me again, something black clutched in his hand.
I squinted and my heart lurched.
My music player.
The last piece of Reich I had.
The last piece of me.
He held it up between two fingers, dangling it like a trophy.
"Did you think this was going to save you?" he sneered.
Something inside me cracked.
Not a clean break.
A fracture.
Jagged and deep.
And I knew—I knew—my fate had been sealed a long time ago.
The night those men broke me.
This was just the echo of that destruction.
The aftershock.
Klay crouched low again, his voice sliding under my skin.
"Shaking now, aren’t you? Like a child?"
I clenched my teeth. "I’m cold," I said, because it was the truth.
He smiled—but his eyes narrowed just for a second before his fingers tangled in my hair again.
He dragged me close, his lips almost brushing mine.
"You’ve always had a piss-poor attitude," he murmured. "Good thing I spared Reich from having to deal with you any longer."
The sound of Reich’s name—it cracked through me like thunder.
Too loud. Too much.
Klay saw it.
He felt it as he laughed, a cruel and bitter sound. "Oh," he breathed, savoring the realization. "You like him."
Then, with brutal finality—"You know he brought you here, right? For me."
I shook my head.
Because I had to.
Because if I didn’t, I’d break apart.
But it didn’t matter.
Klay yanked me sideways, the chair skidding across the floor before collapsing beneath me.
The ropes bit deeper.
My ankle twisted.
Pain exploded up my leg, making me scream.
He stood over me, towering, like he had all the time in the world.
And then I heard it.
A second voice.
A laugh.
"Well, well. If it isn’t Sage." I turned and my jaw dropped.
It was one of them from that night.
My body went cold.
Numb. Gone.
"You remember Hugh, right?" Klay asked, like he was asking about an old friend.
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t because I wasn’t there anymore.
Not in the present at least.
I was back on the cold ground in the middle of the woods.
My body broken.
My mind screaming.
Klay’s fingers closed around my arm.
He dragged me across the floor like I weighed nothing at all.
My skin scraped the tile, burning.
I didn’t fight.
What was the point?
Hugh followed closely, grinning the entire time. "Good thing I like them young, brother," he said.
And I knew.
I knew what was coming next.
I sobbed. Completely broken.
There was nothing left of me to save.
They stopped in front of a massive metal freezer.
Hugh opened the door.
Cold air spilled out in a rush, wrapping around me, biting deep.
I didn’t fight when they shoved me in.
I didn’t move. I barely breathed.
Klay leaned in, close enough I could feel his breath on my ear. "See you soon, whore," he whispered.
I saw something flash in his eyes, something not human.
And then the door slammed shut.
Darkness. Silence. Nothing.