Page 4

Chapter

Three

Bloom

Captivity

D ante broke into a run, hauling me like I was weightless. Orren trailed close behind. The van materialized in a blur.

The woman peeled herself off the hood, slid her sunglasses up into her hair, and fixed me with a stare.

“Hello, darling,” she said. “I’m Morrigan. What’s your name?”

I glared at her. I didn’t answer kidnappers’ questions, and she had no right to call me darling.

“Carrot calls herself Bloom,” Orren offered.

I turned to glare at him too.

“Get in, Bloom,” she said, opening the driver’s door and sliding behind the wheel. “Let’s go, guys. We found her. They might be on the move too.”

“Who are they?” I demanded.

“Another group who wants you dead,” she said as Dante shoved me into the backseat.

I tried to kick him in the face, but he grabbed my ankles before I could land a hit. Then he shoved himself in after me, settling beside me with his arm wrapped around my torso, his leg crossed over mine to pin me there.

“Be careful with her, Dante,” Orren warned. “She isn’t some package we’re delivering. She’s a person! Damage a hair on her head and you’ll have to answer to Nero.”

Nero? I’d never heard of him. If he was the mastermind behind this…

I shouldn’t think about how I’d teach him a lesson when I met him. I needed to deal with the situation now, so I wouldn’t have to meet the big bad.

“Why don’t you sit by Carrot and take care of her?” Dante snorted.

“No, thanks,” Orren said, getting into the front passenger seat. “I can take a few punches from her, but I don’t want her spitting on me.”

“She spat on you, Dante?” Morrigan laughed.

“This is the wrong approach,” Orren sighed. “If we just talk to her nicely instead of scaring her…”

“We’re running against the clock,” Dante snapped. “We need to get the fuck out of here before the other team arrives.” He turned to give me a side glance. “Believe me, compared to the other party, we’re the good guys.”

I swallowed, my heart pounding wildly. Two groups wanted to kidnap me, and this trio had gotten to me first. Where were they taking me? Was there some kind of sick game going on? I doubted they’d enlighten me, so I didn’t waste my breath asking.

The vehicle started with a purr. A raven flew by the window, cawing a warning.

“Please lift your leg off me,” I barked.

“Will you behave if I do?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said, my lips pinched.

He gave me a suspicious look, then released his arm and leg, but he watched me like a hawk. One wrong move, and he’d be on me again. I slumped in the seat, looking defeated to show him I wasn’t trouble.

Gradually, he relaxed beside me.

“So, Carrot, did you live alone all this time?” Orren asked.

“I’ve been alone for two weeks since Mom died,” I answered to catch them off guard. “It’s just me now.”

From the front, Morrigan and Orren shared a look. I knew what they were thinking; two weeks ago was when their master started ‘sensing’ me.

“It’s dangerous living by yourself near the forest,” Orren said, continuing his attempts to strike up a conversation. While he tried to disarm me with somewhat normal talk, I was doing the same by answering him, even though the situation was anything but normal.

“I was fine,” I said. “I was safe until you lot came.”

“Sorry about that,” Orren said sincerely.

The van picked up speed. Morrigan drove like a maniac.

Just as the vehicle reached the busiest part of the town—it seemed they had to cross the town to take me to wherever they’d planned, and they might even take me out of France—I struck. This was my only opportunity to escape.

I’d learned from books about Kidnapping 101. Once the kidnappers got me to their destination, my chance to flee would be nearly zero.

I drove my elbow into Dante’s temple with all my strength. I had to, though I hoped he didn’t die from it. Dante jerked to the side, appearing dazed, and I lunged across his legs toward the car door.

I pulled the door open a few inches. Before I could pull it further, Dante recovered and yanked me back. I kicked the window and screamed, “Help! Help me!”

A little boy turned toward the tinted window as the vehicle raced by.

Morrigan laughed and pushed a button. The car door locked automatically with a click.

“Let me go!” I screamed, kicking at my captors. “You have no fucking right to do this to me!”

“Calm down!” Dante barked. “Don’t make this difficult, Carrot! I mean it.”

“Bloom, Miss Bloom!” Orren called. “We’re not going to hurt you.”

“Bag her, Orren,” Dante barked. “Now!”

Orren apologized, leaned over, and pulled a gray hood over my head, plunging my world into pitch black. In seconds, my wrists and feet were bound by shackles.

Air vanished. My lungs screamed. I twisted, clawing at the hood with phantom hands. My body convulsed; my skull cracked against the seat as I collapsed. Thrashing, I whipped my head from side to side, desperate to dislodge the suffocating darkness.

Fire burned in my chest, every gasp scraping like sandpaper. This van would be my coffin. Yet a frail comfort remained: I hadn’t been taken far from the French town, from my cabin. Close enough, perhaps, for a ghost, if such things wandered, to find its way back to Mom.

“She’s still convulsing!”Orren’s voice cut through the hood.

“She’s faking it,”Dante said.“Carrot seems shrewd enough to sell hell as a vacation.”

“Look at her. That’s not fake!”Orren shouted.“Something’s fucking wrong!”

The van screeched to a halt.

“Take off the hood,”Morrigan barked.

“But she will—”Dante started.

“For fuck’s sake!”Morrigan’s snarl left no room for debate.

Light flooded my vision as the hood was torn away.

Morrigan hovered above me, her face a blur of cold calculation, but my lungs refused to obey.

My body grew leaden; even my thrashing was little more than twitches.

Eyes rolling back, I clung to one jagged thought: After nineteen years of survival, I’ll choke out my last breath in the back of a van. How pathetic.

Mom’s terror—that I’d never see adulthood—hadn’t been paranoia.

It was prophecy.

“Fuck! Her face is blue!”Orren’s hands hovered over me, useless.“I told you she wasn’t faking. Carrot, breathe, please breathe!”

“Cut her loose.”Morrigan’s order sliced through the van.

Two pairs of hands unshackled me.

Dante’s bravado cracked.“What’s wrong with you?”His voice edged toward panic.“Say something!”

“In… inhaler—”The word barely escaped my lips. My fingers twitched toward my nightgown pocket.If it was gone, I was dead.

Morrigan didn’t hesitate. She plunged her hand into my pocket, yanked out the inhaler, and shoved it between my teeth.“Breathe.”

The first gasp was agony—fire and glass. The second dragged oxygen deep, unclenching my lungs. My body sagged against the seat, tears streaking my cheeks. The wheezing didn’t stop, but the van’s gray ceiling swam back into focus.

Silence. Then?—

“Fuck,”Dante muttered. He hauled me up, suddenly careful, and wedged me against the window.“She’s got a goddamn medical condition.”

Morrigan rolled her eyes.“Maybe check next time before you kidnap someone.”

“Sure, I’ll ask for a fucking doctor’s note,” Dante retorted.

Morrigan thrust a water bottle into my limp hands.“Drink. Slowly.”

Dante snatched it from her, his grip oddly careful now, eyes tracking me like I might shatter.“What the hell kind of condition is this?”He spat the word likeasthmawas a curse.

“Not a disease,”I croaked. My skull throbbed, my lungs still burned, but I made sure the venom in my voice seared worse.“Just faulty wiring. Makes me worthless to you. So let me go.”

Morrigan didn’t blink.“We can’t, Bloom.”She slid back into the driver’s seat, the van growling to life beneath her.“Next group that comes for you? You’ll beg to be back with us.”

The wheels rolled forward. My escape had failed. And if she was right—if there were worse monsters waiting—then this lot had just become the lesser evil.

The town couldn’t help me. No one could. This trio, or the next, would hunt me to the ends of the earth. Exhaustion dragged me under, but fractured voices seeped through the haze:

“She’s fragile. Frailer than?—”

“Shut it. You know the rules.”

“She won’t survive the trials.”

“She has to. Or we’re all fucked.”

“We were fucked the moment Nero got involved.” That came from Morrigan, and the bitterness in her voice made me blink twice.

“Biggest disaster…Doomed from the start.”

“Nero will lose it. He’ll swear the Moirai rigged the game.”

Who was Moirai? And who the fuck was this Nero again?

The trio’s discontent paled next to the storm he’d bring. Were they recruiting me as some kind of fighter?Good fucking luck.A near-laugh bubbled in my raw throat. Served him right for sending amateurs to snatch a half-dead asthmatic.

Unless…

A cold thought slithered in:Sacrificial virgin.My frailty might even fit the job description.

I shuddered, fully awake now.

Orren ripped off his mask and flung it aside.“Masks were a stupid idea.”

Dante copied him, scowling.“Didn’t expect her to be so breakable. Not exactly champion material.”

“She’s not breakable.”Orren stared hard at him.“She’s been alone too long.”

“And hopeless,” Morrigan muttered.

“Don’t write her off yet,”Orren pleaded.“Her instincts will kick in.”

“Aren’t you such a romantic?” Dante snorted.“You’ve always had a soft spot for her.”

Always?We’d met less than an hour ago.

The van suddenly halted. Two pairs of eyes locked onto me, unnervingly still. I held their gaze, cataloging details like my life depended on it, because it might.

Dante dominated the space, his muscular bulk crowding the seat.

Golden braids snaked over shoulders, thick as branches, one side of his head shaved to reveal a tattooed spiral of black flame.

But it was his eyes that froze me: brown irises bleeding into crimson at the edges, like embers smoldering in a pit.

Orren stood shorter but stockier, his build a fortress of muscle. Close-cropped hair, skin the rich brown of oak bark—and those same impossible eyes, crimson circling the pupils like a beast’s glare caught in torchlight.

Morrigan’s fingers drummed on the steering wheel. When she turned, the van’s dim light caught the red rings in her gaze.

Not human.The realization slithered down my spine. Mom’s lessons whispered back:Gods and demons walk among us. So do worse things.

Or maybe I’d finally cracked. After the day I’d had—kidnapped, half-strangled, and still throbbing from that gods-damned dream.

Practicality kicked in. Memorize them. In case I have to file the police report if I ever manage to escape.

Dante cracked his neck.“Done staring, Carrot?”

Morrigan twisted in her seat, fixing me with a nonchalant look.“Ignore these two idiots, Bloom.”Both Dante and Orren bristled.“I told them the masks were overkill, but they’re about as culturally aware as cavemen.”

I blinked. My only exposure tocurrent culturewas decade-old reruns in that dingy sports bar. For all I knew, kidnappers these days wore augmented-reality visors.

“Here’s the deal,”Morrigan continued as the van automatically veered toward a private airstrip.“We’re not here to hurt you. Just a six-hour flight to America.”

“Why?”My voice cracked.“The newspapers call it a paradise?—”

“Exactly.”Her smile didn’t reach her crimson-ringed eyes.“You’ll love it.”

“—for criminals,”I finished, eyeing Dante’s flame tattoo and Orren’s battle-scarred knuckles.“I’ve had enough of felons for one day.”

Morrigan pinched the bridge of her nose, exhaling through her teeth. Anotherlookat the boys—this one translating to You’ve single-handedly ruined the American Dream.

“You won’t be living in some gangland,”she said.“We’re taking you to an academy on Long Island. Safe. Elite. No criminals. Well, not exactly.”

Dante coughed into his fist.“Mostly. The academy has flexible rules about criminal behavior.”

“You kidnapped me just to enroll me in school?” I stared at him, incredulous.“A fucking brochure would’ve worked.”

My ribs still ached from the hood, my lungs raw from near-suffocation. All because these morons thoughtambushwas a valid admissions strategy.

“ What’s done is done ,” Dante said, shrugging.“You’re here. Now, here’s the deal: you flying civilized, or do we break out the sedatives?”

“Try it,”I snapped, brandishing my inhaler.“I’ll stab you in the carotid with this.”

Morrigan barked a laugh. Orren’s chuckle was warmer, almost approving. Dante just dragged a palm over his tattooed scalp, sighing likeI was the deranged one.

“Let’s go,” Morrigan said. “Move.”

“Wait!” I clutched my threadbare robe.“I’m not boarding a plane like this. Can we go back so I can pack a suitcase?”

“Don’t worry, Carrot,” Orren said. “You’ll be provided for in the school.”

I sighed, giving up on arguing.

The thrill of my first flight curdled the moment we landed. No brochure could’ve prepared me for this.