Page 55 of Peripheral Vision (Tethered in Darkness Duet #1)

Chapter

Thirty-Four

FLETCHER

W e had barely made it through the first floor of the factory before we came face-to-face with none other than Callum himself.

Nathan had to hold me back when I charged him with my knife, threatening to cut him into little pieces for stealing Dylan away from me.

But when he admitted to being the one who had been helping us, and that he knew where Dylan was, I had to halt my homicidal tendencies.

I wasn’t entirely sure that we could trust him.

In fact, I was far from it, but we could use all the help that we could get, and I wasn’t too prideful if it meant getting her out safely.

Unfortunately, about ten minutes after he left, we heard crackling voices through the radios of the downed men we had killed alerting everyone else that the bodies had been found outside.

“Fuck, we need to move faster.” We are crouching in the shadows below the first stairwell, the faint glow of light from the floors above raining down on us as well as from inside the loading dock that we are just around the corner from.

“We can’t go up without clearing this area though, first. The last thing we need is to be cornered. Then this was all for nothing,” Nathan reasons .

Before I can respond, voices sound from above us followed by a gunshot and a scream that echoes down the stairwell. Dylan. We’re out of time. “I need you to trust me. I’m going to create a distraction. You need to hide until I give you a sign.”

“What?” Nathan scoffs.

“Just listen to me, I’m going in there and giving myself up. When I do this, I need you to find a hiding place. Listen for a two-tone whistle and then open up hell on them however you can. The only goal…”

Nathan finishes for me, “Getting Dylan out. I got it. You know this can go fifty different kinds of bad, don’t you?”

I nod. “We’re out of options and we’re out of time.

” The voices above us continue to echo down the stairwell and while I can’t make out everything that’s said, it’s obvious it’s not good.

They got caught. That’s why I have to do this.

Standing up straighter, I tuck my hands into my pocket and stroll into the loading dock. “Good evening, boys.”

About twelve different rifles are aimed in my direction at once.

They really keep this area heavily guarded, and it makes me wonder how frequently auctions are held and shipments are received and sent.

“Who the hell are you?” one of the guard’s barks.

His voice is gruff, authoritative. I keep my hands in my pockets, my pace casual as I continue to approach.

Confidence is my best weapon right now, at least the illusion of it is.

“Oh, me? I’m nobody important. I was just in the neighborhood and thought I’d pop in.” My eyes sweep the room quickly, cataloging exits, potential weapons, and most importantly, the position of the guards. There don’t appear to be any other innocents in here. Good. That’s a relief.

The guard, who I assume to be in charge down here, flicks his gaze behind me and I feel myself shoved to my knees, my hands wrenched behind my back before they dispose of my own weapons.

Fortunately, they don't discover the knife that’s sheathed on the inside of my belt.

It’s small, but it can still do some damage.

The leader steps closer, his boots echoing on the concrete floor, and I can hear his other men fanning out around me.

One sounds like he’s on the phone with somebody.

“You’ve got guts strolling in here like that, especially considering you’re likely the fucker who left three of my men dead out front.

” He pulls out a pistol and juts the barrel against my forehead as another guard secures my wrists with what feels like zip ties.

“You heard about that, huh?” Of course, I knew they would. The whole compound likely did.

He hits me over the head with the pistol. “Shut the fuck up. You’re lucky the boss wants you alive, otherwise you’d already be in hell.”

I flash a tight grin. That was quick. “Hell? I thought I was already here. Figured they had just done some redecorating.” He hits me in the eye this time, brass knuckles adorning his fist, and I can feel the bone below my eye crack with the force.

“Just because he said alive doesn’t mean you have to be in one piece, cunt.” He wipes the knuckles off before replacing them in his pocket. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a glimpse of movement—Nathan. He’s just a shadow in the rafters above, but it’s enough to give me hope. He’s in position.

“You pack a hell of a punch, I’ll give you that.” I wet my mouth and spit toward his feet.

Whatever the fucker wanted to reply with is lost on his face as more footsteps enter the area. “Fletcher?”

I turn as much as I can on my knees. “Dylan.” Fuck, she’s in worse shape than I thought.

She’s in nothing but a baggy shirt and some small shorts right now.

Her wounds and her bruises are much more prominent in person, in this light.

Contusions in multiple shades speckle her arms, her neck.

They also extend down her legs, something that hadn’t been super visible in the video.

She has healing scabs where it looks like she’d been cut on other areas of her skin.

She’s limping badly, too. Her ankle is out of sorts along with her splinted arm.

And even though her face is battered too, she is still just as bewitching as she has always been.

They are going to pay for everything they’ve done to her.

They’ve built their empire on hers and so many others suffering, and now it’s time for it all to come crashing down.

I’ll make sure they feel the weight of every ounce of hurt they inflicted—tenfold.

I will pull them apart joint by joint, limb by limb, cutting into their skin down to the marrow of their bones before pulling their muscles and tendons apart until they pass out from the pain.

And then I will wake them up and keep going until they are begging for death and then go a little further.

I will burn them alive so that they don’t go easily and so they can get a taste for what their eternity in hell will be like.

She’s shoved down next to me, her arms bound in front of her with zip ties that are cutting into wounds that are already around her wrists from being bound too many times before. Blood trickles down her arms and I see red at seeing her own. “You’re really here,” she breathes.

I lower my forehead to hers, but she flinches back. “I’ve told you before, little viper, there’s nowhere you can go that I wouldn’t find you.”

“Well, well, well. I was wondering if you had something to do with all this chaos. I’ll admit, I’m a little disappointed that I didn’t get more time with Dylan before your arrival. She isn’t quite as broken as I wanted her to be for you to see.” My blood runs absolutely cold. No .

A growl reverberates in my throat. “Connor?” I’m at a loss for words, the disgust roiling in my gut running deep because What. The. Fuck. “You’re The fucking Wraith?”

“Guilty as charged. Although, I’m quite offended, Fletcher. It doesn’t look like you’re excited to see me at all. We used to have such a good friendship: you, Jack, and I. It is quite interesting how time changes so much, don’t you think?” he drawls.

I glare up at him. “You wanted me? Here I am. You’ve got me. Let her go. ”

But Connor only chuckles, the sound dark and grating. “No, I don’t think I’ll be doing that. We all have so much to catch up on.”

I glance at Dylan, at her downtrodden appearance. I need to get her out. “The fuck we do.”

“Oh, but this is the perfect time to finish telling Dylan everything I know about her mother, and what a better audience to witness that than somebody else who has lost family the same way. Of course, that’s not all I plan on doing…

” His tongue runs along his upper lip as he peruses Dylan in a way that makes me lunge, but a guard shoves me onto my face before I have a chance to do anything else.

“Let’s secure him a bit better. He’s going to want to see this.

Or, I should say, he has no choice but to see this. ”

Two other guards join the first as they haul me to my feet and drag me away from Dylan, taking another set of zip ties over my current set and securing me to a post. Connor steps closer to Dylan, his looming presence casting a long shadow over her and I see the way she stiffens.

“You know, Dylan,” he says casually, as if this were just another conversation.

“Your mother… she had this same defiance. This fire. It was charming, really. Right up until it got her killed.”

Dylan flinches, her eyes wide but burning with barely contained anger. “You don’t know anything about her,” she spits, her voice trembling.

Connor smirks. “Oh, but I do. In fact, I think this is the perfect time to walk through history. I knew her better than anyone else. That is until she woke up one day and decided she wanted your father instead. We had just been getting started in life. Well, I had anyway. At the time she wasn’t quite sure what I was involved in, but she figured out that it wasn’t anything good when I started bringing in the amount of green that I was.

So, one day she confronted me. You’re a lot like her, you know.

Innocent. Naive. She gave me an ultimatum.

That I either tell her what I was doing, or she would leave me.

I couldn’t tell her of course, and it wasn’t enough that I loved her, so she left anyway.

But that’s the thing about this life. Once you’re in, you can’t just walk away, and as soon as I would have told her, she would be in.

I couldn’t let her destroy everything we had built, she would have told your dad.

Probably better that I never did anyway, she proved that she wasn’t trustworthy the minute she left me.