Page 6

CHAPTER 5

I ’m awake, but I pretend to be knocked out, and I use the time to catalogue my injuries. My head aches, but it’s nothing I cannot handle. Nothing else seems injured, but I have lost nearly all my weapons. I shift my head slightly, as if in sleep, and I feel my wire is still there. I test my hands and feet and find them restrained, which isn’t surprising.

They cannot let me escape. If I went to Commander Vilaran with this, then they wouldn’t ignore it. Black and his unit would be brought up on charges or worse. No, they cannot let their dirty secret get out.

I’m their leverage, and if I had to guess from the damp, rotten smell surrounding me, we are at one of the black sites our unit uses during our hunts to interrogate monsters . . . and now me, apparently.

No one else knows about them, a unit secret, which means nobody will be coming for me. I’m on my own, facing the men I have hunted with for years—men capable of killing, torturing, and using whatever it takes to stay alive.

I need to stop thinking of them as my unit, as my family, because I know they will do whatever it takes to continue, and I am in their way.

“I know you’re awake,” the sharp voice comments. “I know all your tricks, Tate. You forget that I taught you most of them.”

“Not all,” I retort dryly as I lift my head, rolling it back on my sore shoulders, and face the cell. Black sits opposite me, casually sitting on a wooden chair while counting fangs in a bag. The others are spread out before the closed metal cell door. From the smell, the door, and the slightly wet walls, I would guess we are at the hangar, which is fifteen miles from Stalkers’ Rest and one of the most remote and darkest secrets of our unit.

Here, no monster comes out alive, making their intentions towards me clear.

They plan to kill me so no one will ever find my body. “Let me guess, I died on the mission, yes?” I sneer as I run my gaze over them. Eric is unable to meet my eyes, hanging his head in shame. Good, he should be ashamed. Goose looks troubled, but not enough to help. The others are cold and emotionless. We might be family, but it’s clear where their loyalties lie—with Black.

“A hero’s death,” Black says as he pockets the bag. “I’ll give you that much.”

“So kind,” I comment sarcastically as I roll my shoulders. “Don’t suppose you’d free my hands, would you? These bindings are awfully uncomfortable.”

It’s more of an annoyance than anything. If I’m to survive this, then I need to get free. The metal chair is welded to the floor and can hold dragon shifters, so I’m not getting out that way, and my feet are tied to the legs with barbed wire. If I try to free them, I’ll bleed out before I can escape. My hands are tied with shackles, which are the weakest part of this confinement and my only shot of getting out of here alive.

They will not kill me here. I refuse to go out this way.

“I’m not that much of a fool,” he scoffs.

“I’m in a locked cell in the middle of nowhere,” I remind him with an innocent look that probably fools no one. They have seen me face hordes of rogues, take down a dragon, and even fight a kraken, so there is no point in acting weak, but I’ll use any tools at my disposal.

“And you are one of the deadliest people alive. I won’t risk it.” He leans forward as he watches me with dark eyes. I haven’t always liked Black, but I respected him and his drive to be the best hunter there is.

What a fucking idiot I was.

“That almost sounded like a compliment,” I reply, distracting him as I snap my thumb, breaking it, and start to slide my hand free.

“Just the truth. We both know that.” He tilts his head. “I don’t suppose I can get you to rethink your stance on tonight?”

“Not really a rethinker,” I say as I get one hand free, trying to keep my movements slow and small so they don’t notice. “I’m more of a surge into action person.”

He stands and heads my way just like I want.

“Yes, well, that’s what I thought, but unfortunately, that leaves us with few options. Most would lie to save their life, but not you . . . never you. It’s one of the reasons I like you.” He stops before me, and I smirk.

“Good, then you’ll understand this,” I snap.

Reaching up, I grab the wire, ready to use it on them, when Black grips my hand and yanks it back. “Ah, that isn’t very nice. I should have known you would have a trick up your sleeve.” With his cruel eyes on me, he snaps my hand backwards. I feel the bones break and ligaments tear as he keeps pushing, and I swallow my scream before it breaks free. He grins triumphantly, dropping my ruined hand and wrapping my wire around his knuckles as he watches me.

“Cut her hair. She could be hiding something else,” he orders.

Goose pulls his knife out and walks my way. Agony races through me as my ruined hand hangs at my side, but I refuse to show weakness.

It’s just hair.

They are just bones.

It will regrow, and I will heal. Everything is survivable apart from death.

He fists my hair and yanks my head back. I meet his eyes boldly, refusing to look away as he slides the knife under the heavy locks. I feel the sharp edge of the blade across my nape and then he yanks it up, cutting through my hair in one sweep. Goose steps away, holding up the long locks, and I feel my hair barely brushing my neck now.

It’s just hair.

It’s just fucking hair.

Humiliation fills me just like he wants. He’s trying to make me less human and strip me of everything I am.

“You’ll have to do better than that,” I tell them with a wicked grin. “Even bald and burnt, I’m still stronger and a hell of a lot hotter than all of you.”

“You’re right about that. We’ll need to do better,” Black says. “And since we are here, let’s get some answers, shall we?”

I frown at that. “What answers?”

“About why you are really here,” he explains like it’s obvious.

“For the millionth time, I was recruited to join your unit,” I gurgle through my blood.

“Yes, yes, you don’t know by who. You are lying to me, Tate. You know I despise liars,” Black snaps as he wipes his hands with a stained rag, trying to remove my blood, but I know it’s useless. I’ve spilled so much in the past few hours, he will never be clean of what he has done to me.

“The only liar here is you,” I rasp. “I was recruited to be one of you, and I was. I was your friend, your teammate?—”

“You were recruited from the middle of nowhere, plucked directly by a commander. Explain that! I always had my worries about it, but you fell into line.” Black sighs as he sits heavily. “Now that you’re not, well, I might as well satisfy my curiosity.”

“You can burn me, break me, or torture me, but my answer won’t change.” I spit a mouthful of blood onto the floor.

“Burn you . . . We haven’t tried that yet.” Black nods at Goose, who stoically turns to the table of goodies they set out.

I hear him move things around, and I take that time to roll out my aching muscles, ignoring the bruises and cuts. At least four of my bones are broken, but so far most have been survivable wounds. I just need to stay alive.

I run my eyes over the others, meeting every single one of their gazes. I let them see my anger and hurt. Only Eric looks away. The others aren’t even ashamed. Black has their loyalty, and they believe so deeply in what they do, they don’t even see how wrong this is.

A noise has me glancing back at Goose.

I hear the hum of electricity as he turns with two clamps in his hands, the wires connected to a battery.

“Tell us what we want to know, Tate, and I won’t have to do this,” he says reluctantly, but I know better. It’s another trick.

I won’t be leaving this room alive. Either I’ll suffer a lot and keep my dignity until the end or I’ll beg and cry and still die.

I’ll take the pain, thanks.

“We aren’t friends. Only my friends call me Tate,” I say coolly.

He shakes his head as he stops before me, and despite my determination, I jerk back as the buzzing clamps move closer. “This is going to hurt a lot.”

He clamps one onto each thigh, and the voltage slams through me. My body locks up tight and my brain fries until I can’t even think. I am one giant flow of energy.

Suddenly, it stops, and I slump. My lungs scream for air as I pant and gasp. “Cut her legs open and put them inside,” Black orders.

Before I can say a word, Mav steps forward with the same dagger he held when I first met him, and despite the fact that I want to beg, I do nothing, even as he buries the sharp end into my thigh. The agony is like nothing I’ve ever felt before, and then he slices down, cutting through muscle and skin before pulling it free and doing the same to the other one.

It takes a moment for the pain to catch up, and when it does, I have to swallow my vomit. The sight of my pulverised, skinned thighs causes me to gag, so I look away.

I have no time for a reprieve, however, as Goose steps back to my side. I don’t look, but I feel everything as he pushes the ends of the clamps into my thighs, and then the battery is cranked higher.

The voltage courses through me so hard, I convulse in the chair, my bladder emptying involuntarily.

I grit my teeth, holding back my screams even as I taste blood and smell the scent of burning flesh in the air. The odour makes me want to puke, and then Eric does. He turns away, throwing up all over the corner of the room. It makes me laugh loudly, and when the current dies down, I slump.

My head hangs forward, saliva running from my mouth. My whole body aches, and a new pain crops up every second. Suddenly, a fist grabs my short hair, tugging it back, and I laugh in Black’s face.

“You think I’m weak enough to break under you? Your newbie can’t even handle my torture.” I chuckle. “Such big, scary killers, hunting down weak and young monsters and murdering them, and now killing women?”

“You’re not a woman, Tate. You’re a hunter. There is a difference,” Black says as he jerks my neck back harder. “Last chance. Why were you placed in my unit?”

“I told you.” I pant, swallowing around the agony. “I was recruited?—”

This time, my scream slips free, and I watch through narrowed eyes as Eric runs from the room, and my screams turn into laughter, even as I’m fried over and over again.