Page 216 of Reaper

I stomp toward him, wanting to punch the fucker and wail on him so badly, but the chain jerks my body back before I can reach him. The fucker is standing right outside of my reach and his smug smirk just adds to my anger. He leans forward so that he’s inches from my face and my fingers twitch with the urge to ball my hand up into a fist and punch him. His eyes dart down, clocking my twitching, and he shakes his head.

“See, this is another reason why I needed to get you away from those fucking bikers. You’ve become more violent and that isn’t you, Lark. You’re pure. You don’t need to be surrounded by the darkness that follows the Steel Archangel’s everywhere they go.”

I throw my arms up in the air as I roll my eyes. “I’m not ‘too pure’ as you call it. You don’t even fuckingknowme, Zac! I haven’t changed at all! I’ve always been like this! Me! I’ve always been true to who I am! I would never, everchange who I am just because someonedemandsit,” I snarl, purposefully drawing out the word ‘demands’ because if he’s anything like Darren, then he wants to break me too.

Not once have I ever been described as ‘too pure’. Besides, if he only knew what I’d done to his cousin then he’d most definitely know I’m not ‘too pure’. Then again, I don’t know how close he is to Darren. If he knew what I’d done to him, that could cause him to become even more unhinged.

“Yes, you have! You were sweet and pure before you let that bastard and his friends into your life and allowed him to put his hands on you!”

“No, I wasn’t!” I yell back at him. “You’ve been stalking me for years from just a quick look at these pictures. In all that time, you’ve obviously neverreallywatched me. You only sawwhat you wanted to see! You’ve built me up in your mind to be someone that isn’t even remotely close to who I am in reality!”

In the back of my mind, I know I shouldn’t be riling him up like this, but I can’t help it. The bastard is as thickheaded and as crazy as his cousin.

“What makes you think you haveanycontrol over my life? Only I am the one that decides what I do or who I am friends with or who I am with in a relationship. No one else. So, if you think kidnapping me is going to suddenly make me like you, you’re even more insane than I thought you were before!”

God, this is like Darren all over again!

His eyes darken further and he steps closer. “I didn’t kidnap you! I’m rescuing you!” he bellows.

I scoff and roll my eyes as I purposefully shake the leg that’s shackled so the chain rattles. “Yeah, chaining me to the floor of an abandoned warehouse with a bucket to piss in sure screams ‘rescued’ instead of ‘kidnapped’,” I reply using air quotes.

“I only did that so you wouldn’t run back to those murderers,” he snarls before turning away from me and running his hands roughly through his hair. “Those fuckers raped and killed my sister for fuck’s sake! I couldn’t watch them do the same to you!”

I frown and play innocent. “They aren’t rapists. They aren’t murderers. Not one of them has ever harmed me or anyone else. Ever.”

He gives me a disbelieving look and I cross my arms, standing my ground. They’d never rape a woman. To them, women and children are to be cherished and protected. As for the murdering part, the guys don’t go around killing whoever they want or for no reason at all. They only do it when someone they love is in danger. As for Luscious, she very much deserved her death for what she did to Mae. She would have been sold off as a sex slave and then killed when she was of no use to them for fucks sake.Yes, Luscious definitely deserved her fate, but I can’t exactly tell Zac any of that.

Zac takes a couple of large strides forward and is hovering over me again. “Yes, they did! They killed Jenna!” he screams in my face.

I shake my head. “No, they didn’t kill Luscious,” I reply, purposefully using Jenna’s club name. “They didn’t rape her either. She was a club bunny and voluntarily had sex with the men. Then, she quit and left town when the guys made it clear they weren’t going to take her for an Old Lady. It’s not our fault if she never contacted you again after she left. Maybe she had a reason to never contact you to tell you where she was going.”

I know for a fact that there was a reason Luscious stayed away from the family her mother married into. Every one of them is an abusive asshole.

He spins on his heel, stalking away from me towards a table he has nearby, grabs a wrench and tosses it across the room. His breathing deepens and his shoulders visibly rise and fall with each breath.

“No,” he finally says. “I know the truth about Jenna just like I know the real you. Thatclub,” he says, snarling as he says the word ‘club’, “has brainwashed you and changed you. I’ve been watching you for years, Lark.Years. And now I’ll finally have what I’ve worked so hard for.”

“No, you don’t. I’ve never liked you, Zac. Never. Hell, I could barely stand to be around you when you were dating Khloe! I mean, why the hell would I want to be with someone that drugs me, tases me, and chains me to a fucking bed?” I say as I once again shake the leg that’s shackled so that the chain rattles again and I scoff again. “No, I’ll never be with you. Ever.”

He gives me a knowing smirk as he turns back towards me and a chill races down my spine that has nothing to do with the coldness in the room.

“Soon, my Little Songbird. Soon you’ll see that you will in fact be mine. Now, I suggest you rest because my guests will be here in about an hour.” With that he turns on his heel and heads towards the door. “Oh,” he says, calling over his shoulder. “And don’t even think about activating the tracker you let those biker scum inject into you. There are jammers all around this warehouse.” He says as he twirls his finger in the air as emphasis and my stomach sinks. A second later, his maniacal laughter fills the air as if he can sense my dread.

My fingers go to my hip instinctively and a moment later, the door slams shut as he leaves and the sound of his boots clomping through the warehouse slowly fades. My lips thin as my gaze roams around the room, but I can’t spot anything that could be a jammer. Python showed me what some of them looked like just the other day. I hum as I look around again, this time looking for cameras. A second later, I decide to say screw it and press the spot on my hip three times just in case the asshole was lying. I don’t see my phone anywhere so I’m guessing he ditched that along with my boots.

I gasp as I remember the jewelry I put on this morning. Python gave me a few different sets so that it wouldn’t look suspicious if I constantly wore the same jewelry. My hands go to my ears, feeling the little diamond studs still there. Then my hand lowers to my neck, grasping the little bear pendant like a lifeline. There are now three ways to track me. My body slumps as I scowl. So long as he really doesn’t have a jammer, that is.

Chapter 81

Lark

Eyeingthepictureboardswarily, I trudge back to the bed and sit down cross legged before pulling the thick comforter around me. The bedframe squeaks under me and my body stills as my mind whirls. I carefully shift so that my knees are closer to the edge of the mattress. Keeping my hand under the blanket, I reach down under the mattress and bite my cheeks to keep from smiling.

How did I not notice that before?

Probably because you’d just woken up from being drugged and tasered?

I roll my eyes at my sarcastic internal self. Shifting the blanket, I look down at the shackle and trace my finger along the keyhole. I wonder if I can pick the lock? Razor started showing me how to do it yesterday, but unfortunately, I haven’t had much practice. I bite my lip as I debate if I should even try it. On one hand, I could screw it up, but on the other hand, I could be able to get free.