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M y heart races as Hayes crudely deposits me onto the hard ground, hips crashing against the earth with a dull thud that reverberates through my bones. A pained groan slips past my lips while I struggle to orient myself, fingers scrabbling in vain against the dirt and blades of grass clinging to my mud-caked skin.

“Should we play with the kitten for a bit?” Jace’s voice drips with a sickening amusement, his gaze raking over my dishevelled form in a way that sets my nerves on edge. Hayes pauses from wiping flecks of mud off his shirt to glance over, the camera lens catching the moonlight while he considers it.

“Not in the fucking mood for games.” The dismissive grunt seems to say it all, but Hayes waves a hand before refocusing his efforts on clearing mud off the body harness.

I open my mouth to protest, only for the words to die on my tongue as Jace crouches beside me, chuckling softly under his breath. He leans in, hot breath ghosting over the shell of my ear as he whispers something but I can’t decipher the hushed murmur over my own panicked heartbeat thundering in my skull.

Doesn’t matter what fresh hell he has planned. The instant his calloused fingertips graze along my damp cheek under the guise of brushing aside stray strands of hair, every muscle in my body tenses with revulsion at his casual touch. I flinch away, eyes growing impossibly wider when the glint of steel catches my peripheral vision.

Fucking hell—he has a blade, idly twirling the curved handle between slender digits while his lips peel back in a mocking grin. Shite, he wouldn’t… would he?

I don’t give him the opportunity to find out.

Instinct takes over, limbs thrashing as I contort to slam my palms flat against the muddy bank, nails digging into the soft earth as I attempt an awkward crabwalk in reverse. Every fibre screams to put distance between us, rational thought subsumed in a tide of blind panic.

Jace moves with startling swiftness, snaring my boot-clad ankle in an iron grip. One sharp yank sends me sprawling backwards, the jarring impact knocking the breath from my lungs in a wheeze, my skull cracking against the soil with a dull thud. He looms over me, lifting and twisting until my calf presses flush against his abdomen at an unnatural angle, effectively immobilising me in a grotesque parody of sexual intimacy.

“Fuckin’ quit your squirming, or you’ll get a much bigger dose than you bargained for.” Jace’s hissed threat slices through my frantic thoughts, piercing the fog of panic long enough for a new sort of horror to take root. A fresh round of chills ripple outward from somewhere deep in my core, cloying nausea churning in the pit of my stomach.

Dose? What the bloody fuck does he mean by ‘dose’? Christ—my addled brain kicks into overdrive conjuring up all the sickest possibilities. Drugs, toxins, poisons… Panic claws icy talons in my chest at the myriad of possibilities. Because of course he couldn’t just physically abuse me, could he?

I push my palms into the dirt, yanking futilely against Jace’s relentless grip as I thrash with renewed desperation to break free. Hayes observes the entire debacle with an impassive mask, seemingly unconcerned either way judging by the indifferent slouch. Clearly, he has no intention of lending assistance—not to me, nor to temper Jace’s antics.

“For fuck’s sake,” he groans, pinching the bridge of his nose as if exasperated by the entire farce. “Stop fucking around, Jace.”

The reprimand only earns a snort of derision, Jace’s brows lifting as he angles an incredulous look towards the bulkier man. “Wouldn’t be so bloody difficult if you’d lend a hand, now would it?” he retorts, lips twisting in a mocking sneer.

With an exaggerated roll of his eyes, Hayes bends at the waist, his hand shooting out to clamp around my bicep. One harsh tug has me flailing upright, gasping as the earth spins in dizzying revolutions while Jace releases my leg, allowing it to drop back into a more comfortable position.

The sudden shift leaves my head swimming, vision blurring while I struggle to regain my bearings. Hayes keeps an iron grip clenched around my arm despite my feeble attempts to yank free, his chiselled features twisting into a snarl of pure aggravation.

“Fuckin’ stop,” he spits, the command punctuated by an open-palmed slap that whips my head sideways with staggering force.

White-hot agony explodes across my cheekbone, radiating outward in pulses that threaten to swallow me whole. I’ve taken more than my fair share of beatings throughout the years, but never before has a single blow packed such devastating power behind it.

My entire world whites out, every rational thought consumed by the blinding flare of torment lancing through my skull. Ringing echoes in my ears, muffling the background noises into an indistinct drone while I blink back tears, jaw clenched against the tidal wave of nausea roiling in my gut.

The coppery tang of blood coats my tongue where jagged teeth have torn into the soft flesh of my inner cheek, fresh crimson trickling over my lips. Somehow, by some miracle, I manage to stay upright—though every fibre screams to simply crumple into the dirt and surrender to the overwhelming urge to vomit.

Hayes’ cruel grip is the only tether anchoring me to reality as my knees wobble, threatening to give out entirely. Clammy sweat beads along my brow, icy rivulets trailing down my back while I fight to suck in ragged gasps of air through a throat constricted by pain.

Just when I think the worst has passed, a new flare of agony lances through my neck, every muscle seizing as Jace buries the needle deep. Instinctively, I jerk away with a strangled cry, panic bubbling up anew as the plunger depresses.

Whatever foul concoction those twisted fucks have dosed me with works with startling swiftness, every inch of my body growing numb and heavy. My frantic struggles grow more lethargic with each passing second, limbs rendered useless despite my desperate attempts to break free.

The world around me blurs into an incomprehensible kaleidoscope, dizzying bursts of colour and shadow swirling together in a disorienting vortex. I’m only vaguely cognizant of the hard-packed earth rushing up to meet me when Hayes releases my arm. My knees finally buckle, every nerve ending in my skin deadened to the jarring impact as I slump into a pile of useless limbs.

Heaving, panting breaths rasp past my parted lips while my head lolls bonelessly back against the mud, gaze roving sightlessly skyward. Distant voices filter in and out, words no more than garbled nonsense drowned out by the thunderous cadence pounding behind my temples.

“… overdosed, mate?” That’s Hayes again, his tone laced with exasperated resignation. Like I’m just another inconvenient fucking obstacle to be dealt with.

Jace’s response drifts in on a wave of amusement, lilting with that detached sort of indifference only a true psychopath can muster. “Nah… just needs a mo for it to kick… yeah?”

What feels like an eternity passes in that drugged, half-conscious state, my body alternating between bouts of hyper-awareness and utter numbness. One blink stretches into an indeterminate stretch of emptiness, only to snap back with a resounding crash—droplets of mud spattering my cheeks, Jace’s taunting leer mere inches from my face.

His lips move in exaggerated shapes, syllables distorted as though underwater. Then the bottom drops out again, plunging me back into the void until only snippets filter back through the disjointed haze.

“… drag her sorry arse back ourselves…?”

“… make our way to Rhys, clock is…”

Each time I fight to resurface, reality remains frustratingly out of reach—always hovering just beyond my tenuous grasp. Until finally, the fog clears enough for a single truth to crystallise with searing clarity.

They’ve abandoned me. Left me to fend for myself in this vulnerable, dissociated hell while off handling more important matters.

An anguished whimper tears past my lips, equal parts furious defiance and abject despair. With trembling arms, I curl tighter around myself, forehead pressed into the damp earth as I begin to scream against the brutal unfairness of this nightmare.

Yet even as my screams give way to ragged, breathless sobs, a flicker of that indomitable spark surges back to life somewhere deep in my core—that same resilience Jace had so callously mocked. Muscles tensing, I dig my fingertips into the mud, knuckles whitening as I anchor myself and begin to push upright once more.

Nothing—no amount of torment or degradation—will ever extinguish that ferocious ember entirely. They can drug me, beat me, leave me for dead… but they’ll never truly break me.

Fuck them. Fuck every last one of those twisted fucks.

With that grim mantra buoying my resolve, I slowly find my feet once more, the world around me seeming to settle back into focus with each unsteady step carrying me deeper into the brush.

They may have broken my body tonight, but my spirit remains as untamed as ever.