Page 58 of Kiss of Seduction (Court of Chains #1)

She thought the daylight was safe. She thought Sam was safe. Evie had believed she could have something normal with her, just a regular friendship. It made the betrayal hurt even more.

“You have to go.” Sam’s eyes were pleading, and she grabbed Evie’s hand. “I’ll say you caught on and ran. Just go. Go to the back and leave .”

Evie couldn’t move. She was frozen in place. In her periphery, she saw Flea stand up.

Behind him, two men were standing next to a black windowless van. They were looking at her and Sam. They looked cruel.

Sam’s nails dug into her hand. “Evie, go!”

Evie staggered to her feet, backing away from the table.

She moved inside the bar, pushing through the room towards the back where the kitchen was.

She didn’t think as she walked in, stumbling through and almost knocking over a stack of plates.

Her phone was ringing, and she pulled it out of her pocket as she pushed out of the back door into an alley.

It was Natalya. She knew Evie was scared. But she didn’t know where Evie was. She hadn’t told anyone about going to a different bar. She hadn’t thought there would be a need.

She’d just answered the call when she noticed she wasn’t alone in the alley. A big man wearing sunglasses and a mean expression stood a few feet from the door. When he saw her, he put a finger to his earpiece.

“Target is in the alley.”

Target . She was a target. And they’d planned for this. They’d set up by the exits in case she tried to escape. Sam may not have known they would be this thorough, but Evie should have. Varro didn’t take half-measures.

She started back towards the door but didn’t make it more than a few steps before the man grabbed her. She dropped the phone as he put an arm around her neck and a hand over her mouth. She screamed against his palm and clawed at him, fighting to get free.

She wouldn’t let this happen. She couldn’t go back to Varro. She’d rather die than feel his hands on her again.

Where was Flea? He’d been moving towards their table when she went into the bar. He should be right behind her. Maybe those two men by the van had stopped him. Or delayed him, at least. Maybe he wouldn’t make it to the alley in time.

The realization that help might not be coming made her fight harder. She bit the man’s palm, and he shifted so he could muffle her with his sleeved arm rather than his hand.

He started half-carrying, half-dragging her towards the mouth of the alley as the black van screeched to a halt by the curb. A man jumped out of the driver’s side and quickly opened the vehicle's side door. He looked grim. Unfeeling and professional.

They were just like the guards Varro had working security at his estate. Brutal men. Monsters, no better than the vampires.

The man got her into the van, holding her forcefully as the driver made to close the door on them. It was already sliding shut when there was a loud thump, and the driver cursed.

“Rotten moves, fucker,” a familiar voice said. “Your guys cut up my face. If I didn’t heal fast, I would be offended.”

The door slid open, revealing Flea. There was a deep cut on his cheek, and he was leaning awkwardly to one side. Blood had stained his shirt red.

“Another fucker. Fantastic.” He hopped into the van, punching the man who held Evie in the face. The man’s grip loosened, and she clambered away.

“Get out of here!” Flea yelled at her as he whaled on the man who’d held her.

Evie fell out of the van. The driver was groaning, but he was still standing. From the alley, the same two men who had been by the street rushed towards them. They both looked bloody. Like their faces had met Flea’s fists more than a few times.

She started to run, but the driver caught her almost immediately. He dragged her back, and rather than attempt the van again, where Flea was still turning a man into mincemeat, he pushed Evie into the alley. One of the other men caught her.

“Hold her down while we deal with this!” The driver pulled out a knife and jumped into the van. The man who’d caught her pushed her down on the ground.

Evie’s hands and chin scraped against the asphalt. Before she could try to get away, the man was on top of her. He grabbed her arms, pinning them down. His weight pressed against her back, and then his mouth was by her ear.

“Stop fighting. It’ll be over soon.”

The words made her freeze. Not just stiffen, but freeze . She was paralyzed. She couldn’t move.

It was all too familiar. A heavy body on hers. Cruel, violent fingers digging into her skin. A man’s groin pressing against her from behind. And then those words.

How many times had she heard those words whispered in her ear? Sometimes said softly. Sometimes cruelly. No matter how they sounded, they were horrifying.

Her mind went blank. Her body stopped feeling anything. Even the fear vanished as Evie left herself behind because her mind knew feeling nothing was better than feeling what was about to happen.

She wasn’t there. She was far away. Her body was a husk that terrible things happened to. To dissociate from the present wasn’t a choice. It was a practiced survival mechanism she had no control over.

She had no idea how much time passed. She wasn’t aware of anything. She didn’t feel anything. She couldn’t. It would be too awful if she did.

Weight was pulled off her. There was a thumping sound of flesh against flesh. Someone cursed and then called out. There was the sound of an engine starting and then a car driving away.

“Bastards!” someone yelled. If Evie had been present, she would have recognized it as Flea’s voice. Right then, she didn’t recognize anything at all.

Someone touched her. She didn’t react. She didn’t even feel it.

“You alright?” Flea asked.

She didn’t move. She was lying face-down on the ground of the alley, unmoving and staring at patterns in the gnarled asphalt.

“Evie, can you hear me?” Flea shook her. She didn’t respond. He gently pulled her up so she could lean against the wall.

Flea was a mess. He was bleeding from several cuts to his arms and chest. It would be obvious to anyone he was in pain.

It wasn’t obvious to Evie. She stared right through him.

“They’re gone. Evie, they’re gone.” Flea stroked her arms, trying to get her to look at him. “Evie, are you— dammit .”

His phone was ringing, and he quickly answered it.

“You have impeccable timing, Natalya. We just—” Flea stopped, listening to the caller and frowning. “How did you know… Yeah, there was a situation. Evie? She’s out of it, but I think she’s fine. We’re in the back alley of a bar.”

Flea’s face twisted. Confusion and pain wore on his patience. “I don’t fucking know what it’s called. Old Lonnie’s or Donnie’s or some shit. I haven’t even had a chance to call backup. I—”

Flea put down the phone, looking baffled.

“Fucking fiend hung up on me.”

Cursing from pain, Flea eased out of his jacket and put it around Evie’s shoulders. There was blood on it, and it was hot enough that she didn’t need it, but when someone was unmoving and pale as a corpse, it was a safe assumption they needed the comfort of warmth.

Flea had just finished calling the Court of Chains, explaining where they were, when a blur of dark hair and furious, scarlet eyes rushed past him. In a blink, Natalya was crouching in front of Evie, her anger vanishing in favor of intense worry.

“Fucking hell!” Flea yelled. “Natalya, a little warning.”

“What happened?” she snapped.

“Someone tried to take her. Four guys. Humans. Definitely knew what they were doing. And they fucking stabbed me. A lot . How did you know to call?”

Natalya ignored the question. Her eyes were violet again, and she carefully put her hands on Evie’s.

“Darling? Can you hear me?”

Darling . The word, said so softly in Natalya’s voice, pulled a part of Evie back to the present. She blinked, making eye contact with Natalya, and under her gaze her body came alive. Horribly so.

“They…” No more words got out. She started trembling, then shaking violently as all the terror she’d just suppressed welled up in her. Pain from her hands and chin. Panic roaring in her chest so powerfully it hurt.

Tears rose in her eyes, her body shook, and she started hyperventilating.

Natalya started to lean in, arms extended to embrace her, but she stopped herself. She didn’t know what had happened exactly. She didn’t know if Evie wanted to be touched.

Evie didn’t. If somebody had tried to touch or hold her in that moment she would have hit them and screamed. But Natalya wasn’t somebody . She was Evie’s friend and lover. Her Mistress and protector. She was who Evie felt safe with. Whose arms she fit perfectly in. The person she loved.

It didn’t matter that she shouldn’t think that way. It didn’t matter that she knew Natalya couldn’t care about her like that. Evie was too terrified to feel anything other than relief at seeing the woman she’d come to love more than anyone.

Right then, Evie didn’t need to be held by somebody. She needed to be held by Natalya.

She leaned against Natalya, crying and shaking, and Natalya hugged her tightly. She noticed, distantly, that Natalya’s hands were shaking too.

“I couldn’t feel you.” Her voice was uneven. Near a whisper. “I thought you were dead.”

She kept repeating that sentence, over and over, as Evie sobbed into her shoulder.