The ringing in my ears is the first thing I notice. The bright white lights come next, along with the pounding headache as I moan in pain. My neck is stiff, sitting awkwardly on my shoulder from who knows how long I was unconscious.

Castor. He strangled me. He could’ve killed me, both of them. I was seconds away from death, and they stopped.

Why didn’t he kill me?

A hand pats my cheek, answering my question with the dread that settles in my stomach.

“Wake up, doll.” Baron grabs my jaw, forcing my head up. “We aren’t finished with you yet.”

Slowly, my vision clears. I’m still in the mine. Tables line the edges of one wall and several chisels, hammers and fine-tipped drills are scattered throughout.

Castor stands off to the side, in the shadows of the room while Baron regards me with a sadistic gleam in his eyes. I return it with a glare of my own.

“I was worried Castor killed you,” he muses.

“How sweet of you to be worried.” My voice is cracked and dry and the faintest taste of blood comes up as I cough. I shift in the chair and the ropes grind against my wrists.

“I wouldn’t,” he warns. “We weren’t expecting you. We didn’t have time to get something softer. Those ropes could cut you.” He draws out the last few words with a smile, and if I wasn’t intent on escaping, I’d cut them deliberately just to piss him off.

When I don’t answer, his smile widens and I catch a glimpse of those perfect fucking teeth, blinding in the bright light.

“Don’t be scared, doll.” He tucks a stray hair behind my ear before gripping my jaw tightly. “We just want to talk.”

Doll. That name that they keep using, as if Castor didn’t force it out of me days ago. A debasing name, like I’m some meek fragile thing that can be broken if you hold it too tightly. I’ll kill them just for that.

“I am not scared of you.” I rip myself out of his grip.

Baron sucks in a breath, a dark chuckle vibrating in his chest. “I love a challenge.” He twirls his curved blade at his side, every so often nicking the fabric of my pants but not quite cutting.

Not even close.

The first thing Bane ever taught our group is interrogation resistance. To be selected for special forces is a rigorous course—one I’m proud to have earned—and once the first phase of training is passed and the failed recruits clear out, they offer the more intense training; marksmanship in specialized classes, flight training, advanced combat and interrogation.

They tried everything in their power to break me. The one rule of the program is to teach you not to break. Never break. Never beg. Never plead. To escape or survive 72 hours of their torture. Bane warned me from the beginning, told me I couldn’t handle it, that the program was for their top soldiers, the strongest. But I am strong, and after signing a non-disclosure agreement, they locked me in that house with the senior officers as they conducted every kind of torture imagineable on our group. 72 hours. I bled. I screamed. I had broken bones and I fucking took it. I’ll take this too.

I draw in a slow breath and concentrate until my heartbeat is an even, slow pace.

His gaze hardens, but it’s gone in an instant as he paces, hands in his pockets.

“It’s not like Colonel Bane to ask for help. They’ve been following us since Libya, but not you. You only just arrived a few days ago.” His head cocks with a pointed look. “Why is that?”

“He needed help and I was more than happy to offer,” I snap.

“Bane doesn’t ask for help,” he snickers. “What’s so special about you?”

I’m the one you crossed in Syria and I’m one of the only ones with the skills to find you in the middle of fucking nowhere, you miserable piece of—

I take in another deep breath, concentrating my anger into my tightly clenched fists.

He takes a step closer, his expression not wavering. I match him with an equal stare. Tied up or not, it takes more than a few words and a grating personality to create even a small crack.

“Don’t be difficult,” Baron warns. “I don’t have the patience for it, doll.”

“Stop calling me that!” I sneer. “My name is Helena Kinsley, not ‘doll’.”

Baron laughs quietly, glancing back at Castor, who slowly moves away from the shadows and joining Baron under the blinding lights. When I first encountered Castor, he was even-tempered. He spoke with a measured confidence and each of his movements was fluid and held him under an overwhelmingly erotic aura. Now, he’s darker, mirroring Baron in a silent, menacing stance.

“Captain Kinsley,” Castor finally says, looking me up and down. “You’ve changed quite a bit since the last time we saw you.” He casts a glance at Baron.

“Syria, wasn’t it?” Baron says. “You almost had us, sneaking off with one of our friends.”

My lip twitches.

Don’t break.

Castor takes a slow step towards me, leaning down so his lips graze the shell of my ear, just as he did before. “I can’t imagine you’ve been waiting until now for your chance to get back at us,” he hums.

He’s right. If I’d had my position reinstated sooner, they would’ve been dead a lot faster.

“We’re getting off topic,” Baron cuts in. “Bane sought out for you personally. Why?”

I side-eye Castor, the voice-less chuckle he emits sending a chill down my spine.

“He knows a good soldier when he sees one.” I turn back to Baron as Castor joins him in front of me. “He needed someone skilled in extraction and recon.”

Baron barks out a laugh. “So you decided to go alone?”

“I didn’t exactly have much of a choice after you blew up our campsite, did I?”

“No.” His gaze drops to my tattered uniform. The jacket is all but destroyed, my patches and symbols that I wore proudly from my country were gone, leaving me in nothing but my torn undershirt and pants. “Without any orders, most soldiers would’ve retreated, but you didn’t.”

His words come with an unspoken secret, like it’s some revelation that I’d seek them out after single-handedly killing everyone I ever loved and cared for.

“Consider it a personal vendetta then,” I retort. “You don’t know me as you think you do. I would’ve gone after you regardless of orders. It doesn’t matter if I’m alone.”

“But you’re not alone…are you?”

Castor’s voice sends a volt of cold electricity striking directly through me. They know.

“We did a body count, Helena.” Castor takes a step closer. “We know Bane is alive.”

My pulse rises, my control slipping ever so slightly. Has Alastor already found Bane? Is he here? My mind runs rampant, analyzing each possibility, but if they had him, they would’ve made a show of it.

It’s a game, Helena. Don’t play it.

“Then you’ll know I have no idea where he is,” I say with as much calm as I can muster.

“It’s not Bane we’re interested in.” Baron says. “It’s the information he has. He never sets up anywhere without a backup plan, a place to hide in. He would have a rendezvous he could retreat to.”

Fuck. The embassy.

Baron catches the small slip in my expression and he laughs.

“So you do know where it is.” Baron crouches next to me, eyeing me carefully but I keep my gaze forward, focusing on the pale gray walls ahead of me.

“Come on now, doll.” Baron pulls my chin tightly, forcing me to look at him. “Don’t make this more difficult than it needs to be. Where is it?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I spit. “Bane and I got separated when you bombed the fuck out of our base. For all I know he died in the storm.”

“Oh, I wish that were true,” Castor sighs. “It would make our lives much easier.” He leans down low to me, a soft smile playing on his lips. Bastard thinks he can charm his way to information. “I think this would be a lot faster if we didn’t lie to each other, Helena.”

“I don’t negotiate with terrorists.”

The corner of his mouth twitches.

“Is that so?” Castor wards Baron off with a wave of his hand. “You may find this hard to believe, but we are trying to do the right thing. Bane is a killer. Tell us where he is and we can help each other get out of here.”

My fists tighten and my anger begins to boil.

“The only thing I’ll help you with is deciding where I’ll shoot you.”

He leans in closely, his breath hot on my neck. “You’re not playing nice—”

I throw my head against him with a growl, knocking him off his balance as he stumbles back. “Tell me to play nice one more time, asshole! If you think I’d come close to making a deal with you, you’re out of your fucking mind. The only reason you cocksuckers are alive is because you got lucky, or I’d have a knife shoved so far up your ass, you’d be spitting out nothing but blood and shit!”

Castor goes eerily still, the calm and collected look on his face shifting ever so slightly as his eyes narrow into slits and his jaw tenses.

“What did you just say to me?”

Baron steps between us, a strikingly worried tone in his voice as he tries to pull him off. “Castor, wait…”

Not so even-tempered now, are you?

“Do you want me to speak up for you?” I smirk. “Maybe if you ask nicely, I’ll be gentle. And then your buddy over there can watch.”

The second the last word leaves my lips, Castor’s fist connects with my cheek in a powerful blow. The chair topples from the force and whatever bones I had in my cheek, I’m sure are nothing but dust now.

He leans over me a second later, caging me in with his leg hiked over the chair. His chest is heaving up and down and in his eyes, the same crazed look that Baron has. The smirk I had moments ago is gone with that single look. Whatever has Castor’s body now, it isn’t him. That’s something else, something neither a man nor the devil would inhabit.

The next instant, he brings out a small knife, and brings down the blade inches above my face.

Shit.

“Castor!” Baron catches Castor’s hand before the blade pierces my skin. He wrenches the knife from Castor’s grip, tossing it across the room.

Castor’s eyes soften, his heaving breaths slowing until his voided eyes blink rapidly, like whatever remnants of a soul he has finally forced its way back into his body and realizes he almost killed me.

Baron pulls Castor off me, whispering angrily while I try to force the weight of the chair off my poor circulating arms.

“....need her alive,” Baron whispers.

Castor’s voice is more distinct, barely controlled the way he was before.

“I’m going to cut the bitch’s tongue out if she speaks to me like that again!”

Baron gives a disapproving stare before pointing to the opposite end of the room. Castor hesitates for a moment, hissing about someone named Sammy before Baron forcibly pushes him towards the side of the room, and Castor reluctantly moves back towards the wall, pacing with a poorly contained glare, searing into my spot on the floor.

My chair is yanked upright, the ropes on my hands instantly tightening from the changing position.

“I warned you not to piss us off, doll,” Baron says. “Seems you don’t like to listen.”

The pounding in my head is back, stronger this time. The cuts on my wrist are nearing unbearable and the knot in my head is surely going to form a concussion with the way they throw me around like a fucking ragdoll.

I spit a mouthful of blood at Baron’s feet. If they want to treat me like a doll, they’ll have to try harder to break me.

Baron stares at the pile of blood, a speck or two stained on his cheek but he doesn’t wipe it.

“Be grateful Castor had a change of heart.” Baron unsheathes his white knife, trailing it along my lips and curving up to my ears in a distorted bloody smile. “I’d hate to carve up that pretty face of yours.”

“You think I’m pretty?”

His chest falls in an exasperated sigh. He glances over at his partner, whose eyes haven’t left me.

Castor mouths something I don’t understand, and when he moves away from the wall, my heart skips. Damn him. I’ve handled much worse than being strangled. My training stripped us of everything we had. Soldiers went insane, killed themselves to make it stop. Strangling me isn’t the worst way to get information.

But it’s not the torture that scares me. It’s him. The way his demeanor can change like the flick of a switch. A single second is all it took for him to decide to kill me and another second for him to change his mind. That is what scares me.

Castor crouches in front of me, his eyes surveying the small scrapes his actions provided, but they offer no remorse or guilt.

“Helena,” he says with a disturbing calm. “You’re a smart girl, but you’re out of your depth here. If you cooperate, we’ll let you go.” Castor sighs. “We don’t have a lot of time and we’ve tried reasoning with you. Stubbornness will get you killed. The rendezvous will grant you freedom. So I’m going to ask you one more time—”

I spit in his face.

The same flash of anger crosses his face, and it takes everything in me not to flinch. Dead, or not, I refuse to be a traitor. Alastor may be comfortable selling government secrets, but I’m not the same…and I’m not sure if I’m grateful or more terrified when Castor doesn’t try to kill me this time.

He turns away, pointing to Baron’s knife that he twirls in his hands. “Still want to give her a smile?”

“Not quite.” He holds the knife high, the white blade nearly blinding me as it reflects off the light. “I think it’s time for a proper introduction. Do you know why they call us Baron and Castor?”

“Because Guns N’ Roses was taken?”

Baron laughs before resting the point of the blade under my chin. He drags it down my throat slowly, leaving a thin white line behind on my skin until he reaches the collar of my shirt.

“Why don’t we show you?”

In a single stroke, the knife rips down the middle of my shirt, tearing it in two. The green fabric falls to my sides and the cold air of the mine instantly sparks goosebumps along my torso.

His hand replaces his knife, his palm laying on my sternum. His eyes are no longer on me, but on my exposed skin. They rove over me, my toned stomach and the curve of my breasts, thankfully covered by my bra.

“No scars?” Baron asks. “I’m impressed, doll. You’re very careful with yourself. We hardly see clean skin in our line of work.”

My fists clench around the ropes. I’m not afraid of sex, nor am I afraid of being seen nude. Of course terrorists aren’t afraid to use that tactic to scare women. They’ll do much worse than parade women around nude. The Codex was no different. That was part of our training, especially for the women. Men are cruel bastards, but if he thinks he can touch me and live, he’s in for a rude awakening.

Each time his hand palms over my breasts, my glare burns hotter. Castor doesn’t react, watching with an impassive stare, in contrast to the sadistic pleasure Baron seems to take from it. Baron stops, his fingers moving over the thick unbending wire connecting my bra.

“I hate these things,” he says, tugging at the material. “It’s a shame such a sexy little body has to be hidden by all that armor. It doesn’t suit you.”

His knife reappears faster than I can see, and with a snap, my bra snaps in half, and my breasts fall free.

A growl erupts from Baron’s lips and he replaces the cups of my bra with his own hands. His hands wrap around them perfectly, and he molds them between his fingers.

“Fuck,” His thumb rubs over one of my hardening nipples and I flinch.

It’s the cold. It’s freezing. The sparks of pleasure from each graze and pinch of my sensitive skin is just stimulation. Still, I flinch when he pinches the other, watching with glee as it hardens under his fingers.

His hands move back over to wrap around my breasts before he turns back to Castor, like the bastard is doing me a favor by covering them before he speaks to his partner.

“What do you think, Castor? You think she’d look good on her knees?”

Castor doesn’t answer before I do.

“Over my dead body, you worthless sack of shit.”

Baron responds with a sharp squeeze to my breast while the other grabs my face. “Such a mouth on you, doll. You must really want to find out.”

Fuck. Fine. I’m not scared of Baron in the least. I’ve met more irritating men in the military, and I can smell an inferiority complex from a mile away, but the last thing I want is his dick in my mouth, especially when the constant stimulation on my breasts is making my body not hate the idea.

Fuck him. If he comes near me, I’ll bite it off.

Baron takes in my silence with a laugh

“That’s better.” He retrieves his knife and when it falls onto my skin, it’s much worse. It’s sharper, and the bite turns into a sharp pain on my sensitive skin. “Now…about Bane—”

“I don’t know where he is,” I say through clenched teeth.

He answers by pressing the knife down harder. It digs into the soft skin between my ribcage and my heart beats violently against the blade. “That’s not the answer I’m looking for…” He drags the knife down lower until it reaches the metal zipper of my pants. “...and I’m done asking nicely.”

Castor steps up silently, taking Baron’s place as he kneels in front of me.

“I’ve always liked watching you, seeing how you kill.” His hands caress my calves in slow strokes, up and down, an almost contented look in his eyes. But his grip tightens to a painful level when I try to kick him.

“Behave,” he warns. His hands travel up the length of my legs until they reach the band of my worn tacticals. “I loved seeing you fight.”

He unbuttons them.

I love seeing you tremble under me.”

The zipper comes down.

“I love seeing your fear.”

I’ll kill them both.

“Now I want to see you break.”

He rips my pants down my legs, and they go flying along with my shoes until they clatter to the other side of the room. My breath comes and goes in shaky stuttered pants. I can do this. I was trained for this. I handled worse than this

Calm your breaths, slow your heart. Focus. Don’t break.

I suck in a breath. “The feeling’s mutual.”

“One step at a time,” Castor murmurs.

His hands hook around the line of my panties and I swear, I thought my hands would break from how hard I’ve clenched them.

Calm down. Focus.

The second the fabric falls away from my skin, I can hear Castor’s audible intake of breath.

“Fuck,” he breathes. “Look at you. So perfect…” He forces my legs apart, sliding his palm along my thighs. “Your man is a lucky bastard.”

His assault burns, fingers skating across my skin leaving a trail of fire behind it that I can feel long after they’re gone. Castor only stops when Baron says his name for the third time. I’ll never admit to that bastard that I’m thankful for the reprieve but any second I have without their hands on me is a second I can breathe and attempt to stop my hands from shaking.

It doesn’t last long. When Castor turns, his hands hold up a small clear bottle filled with a cloudy liquid inside. He makes a show of pouring the liquid over Baron’s knife. The thick liquid is like a syrup, and it drips onto the floor as Castor empties the bottle onto the knife.

When he hands over the knife, Baron’s eyes light up and he takes the blade, his fingers running over the liquid to coat it evenly on the knife.

“Last chance, doll.” He leans down so his eyes are level with mine. “Tell me where the rendezvous is. It won’t take much for me to break you.”

“You underestimate me,” I snap.

“Everyone breaks, doll. Even you.” He holds up the knife, the liquid glistening among the white. “Do you know what this is?”

I glare at him. Three guesses it’s not something I want on or in me. It could be acid, or alcohol. It could be just water and they’re bluffing, but until I free my hands, it won’t matter what it is.

“Come on,” he drawls. “I thought you were supposed to be intelligent. After all, we got our names somehow.”

I pause. “Castor oil.”

“Close.” Baron lowers the knife until it’s resting against the inside of my thigh. “Let me give you a hint.” He presses deeply and slowly drags the knife across my skin.

The sharp sting screams across my skin. The blade slices through the tissue and a thick line of blood runs down my thigh, pooling at my feet. I jerk from the sharp pain but Baron holds me in place, with a fucking smile.

“Just wait.” He cuts deeper and I moan in pain. “This is my favorite part.”

It comes on slowly—the sharp sting of the pain turning to a searing burn. The pain sinks deep into my skin, running along the path of the blade like acid. Fuck, was it acid?

He makes another cut and the burn is worse. Hot, like my flesh is burning off, and when he makes another deep cut, a scream bubbles up in my throat.

“There she is.” Baron makes two more cuts on my other thigh. “Come on, you can do better than that.”

I scream until there’s no more air in my lungs. My skin is boiling from the inside out and the burn is steadily creeping up towards my torso and down into my feet. Agony rips through me as he forces another scream out of me, growling in fucking pleasure.

“Music…” he murmurs as I scream. “Are you ready to talk yet, Helena?”

“Go to hell!”

He makes another cut and a sob mingles with my screams.

“Where’s the rendezvous?” He growls. “Answer me!”

Seconds feel like hours and my body twitches and trembles involuntarily. I scream until my throat is raw and after several deep cuts, he finally lets up. It doesn’t last long, Castor taking his place smearing more on my skin with a gloved hand, silencing my screams with the other.

“Ricin is a beautiful neurotoxin and so easy to make,” Castor muses, talking over my cries. “It takes seconds, even less, for them to take effect on the body. Too much of it and your body will seize up and you’ll stop breathing.”

Baron grabs me by my hair, ripping my head back to face them both. “But we aren’t that generous.”

Tears stream down my cheeks and just when I find myself on that precipice, Castor pulls back and wipes the remaining poison off my skin. The burn ebbs to a throb and Baron releases my head, letting it fall forward as I sniffle and cry.

Silence falls on the room, only the ghosts of my screams remaining.

“You look so pretty when you cry,” Baron says from behind me. “Do you really think Bane is worth dying for?”

I sniffle, swallowing the last of my tears. “Bane is like a father to me. I’d die for him in a heartbeat, and I know he’d show me that same loyalty.”

“A wounded dog isn’t loyal.”

I can’t tell who is speaking now, the delirium of the poison clouding my thoughts, but when a sharp slap collides with my cheek, my head jars and I see the both of them standing in front of me, a cold look in their eyes.

“You’re really starting to get on my nerves, doll. This isn’t about you and I have no issue getting what I need.” His lip curls in a sneer as he leans down. “Where is it?”

When I don’t answer, Baron throws me to the ground, the force shattering the remains of the chair. Wood stabs at my skin, splintering and sticking to my arms, but beneath the blood and pain, I feel the ropes snap under me, freeing my wrists.

Baron leans down on his knee, driving his fist into my face, my chest, my stomach. They’re not as powerful or painful as Castor’s but it hurts and even as I try to curl in on myself, Castor is leaning over me, forcing me to take the abuse.

As he rears back his fist again, I shake my head, tears sparkling in my eyes from the repeated blows to my nose.

“Stop…” I choke out with a mouthful of blood.

“Are you going to tell me where Bane is?”

Focus. Think.

I nod slowly, muttering softly through the pain.

“That’s it, doll. Tell me everything.” Baron leans in closer.

With a scream, I drive my foot straight into his dick, ripping my own fist back and sending it straight into his eye. I elbow Castor behind me and as both men stumble back groaning, I jump to my feet. Adrenaline courses through my veins, my fight immediately restored. The door is right there. The gun is propped right up against the wall. I’m so close, I can end this right now if I just—

An arm wraps around my waist seconds later and Castor jerks me towards him.

“You’re fast,” he says before slamming me against the wall. “But not fast enough.”

“Don’t fucking touch me!”

I thrash and kick against Castor, ignoring the searing pain in the back of my skull. Baron slowly rises to his feet, a hand clutching his dick while the other steadies him.

“That was uncalled for,” Baron says. “This could’ve been a whole lot easier, but you decided to play the hero.” He grips my face tightly, forcing me to look at him. “You’re not a hero. You’re nothing more than a thorn in our side, protecting a man who thinks he’s God.”

“Then you’re the fucking devil,” I snarl.

It’s not Baron that smiles this time but Castor. The sight makes me flinch but Baron holds me steadily in place.

“You’re right,” Castor says. “We are.”

“You’re not the first to say it.” Baron grips me tighter, my jaw bruising. “We earned our titles because we hunt like reapers. Anyone who gets in our way is snuffed out. We’ll find you, we’ll hunt you and you’ll be begging for death by the time we are finished with you.”

Castor rips me away from the wall, pressing my back flush against his chest. When he speaks again, the words send shivers down my spine. “You should’ve listened, doll. Never piss off the devil.”