Page 56 of Terror at the Gates

I curled my fingers into fists, my anger making me sweat. I didn’t understand how they could all be so carefree after they’d just committed a horrible crime and against someone who was so…innocent.

I sat through two more sing-alongs before the SUV finally came to a stop.

I was relieved, tired of being squished between these two hairy men, tired of smelling my own breath, tired of being their prisoner.

The man with the gun grabbed me by the arm and dragged me from the SUV. I stumbled, disoriented, in the dark, but before I could fall, he jerked me to my feet.

“Take her bag,” he ordered. “And her phone.”

I wrenched away, but the man grabbed me and shoved his gun into my jaw. Hands settled on my shoulders and swept down, groping my breasts. I shoved whoever was touching me, but the man tightened his fist in my hair.

“Calm down, sweetheart. All we’re gonna do is look,” he said, and the two snickered.

A second later, I felt a faint, pulsing desire stir.

My stomach turned.

“The phone is in my jacket pocket,” I said between gritted teeth. “On theleft.”

“Go ahead, Kane,” said the man holding me.

Kane, Kane, Kane, I repeated in my head. I would remember him.

“Fucking buzzkill,” Kane muttered as he slipped his hand into my pocket and retrieved my phone. The contact gave me a better impression of his lust, which felt almost…superficial. Still, I latched on and held it like a leash as I was pushed forward.

“Walk,” the man ordered, keeping his hand on my neck.

The ground was flat, thankfully, so I didn’t stumble, but at some point, the air changed, and I knew we’d gone inside.

“We brought you a snack, boss,” said one man. I thought maybe it was Kane, but his voice sounded far away and a little echoey.

“She wanted to know who we worked for,” said another. “So we thought it best to show her.”

Suddenly, the hood was gone. I squinted against the light but quickly focused on the man in front of me, and my confidence was knocked out of me like a blow to the stomach.

I hadn’t been taken to one of the families.

I’d been taken to Archbishop Alarich Lisk.

My stomach churned, stirring the anxiety that had roared to life as soon as I met his watery blue eyes. I couldn’t look at him without thinking of all the terrible things he’d done to me since the moment my mom allowed him to be alone with me.

And I knew by the feel of his own lust he did too.

“Miss Leviathan.”

I clenched my teeth as his voice slithered over me. I loathed the way he said my name, with cold judgment. I felt words building up in the back of my throat. They tasted like venom. I wanted to poison him with the same feelings he’d injected into me—guilt and shame and embarrassment—but that wish was futile.

Archbishop Lisk did not feel.

He was a fucking sociopath.

“She interrupted our justice,” said one man. “She called the dissenter a friend.”

I glared at the one who spoke, a man with short, blond hair and a beard. I tried my best to commit his face to memory, though it was hard to retain anything when I stood in front of the man who had abused me for most of my life.

I knew what I should do.

I should inject my magic into his veins. I should instruct him to cut off his penis and swallow it whole so I could watch him choke to death. Then I would finally know what it meant to feel safe.