Page 29 of The Delta’s Rogue (Crescent Lake #4)

“Did Nuncio touch you, sweet thing?” Her voice turns so sugary sweet it makes my teeth hurt, setting them on edge, and raises the downy hairs on my arms. “Did he let his grubby, sullied hands have fun with you while weakened and restrained?”

I blink at her and swallow, forming fists at the memory of his filthy hands freely roaming my sluggish, powerless body .

Butterflies swarm in my stomach. I’m unsure why I’m nervous.

I’m not the one who broke the rules, and I shouldn’t care what happens to any of these disgusting males who captured me.

Especially not the male who fingered me through my shorts and kissed every inch of exposed skin he could find while restraining me so the others could cuff me.

Es un cabrón feo —an ugly bastard, the lowest of the low—and I would love to see him pounded into a pulp.

Hopefully, I will. Hopefully, I’ll be the one to do it.

“It’s okay, sweet girl.” She lifts her other hand to join her first on my face, mistaking my silence for reluctance. “You can tell me. You won’t be in trouble. Just nod once if he played with you when they found you.”

I nod, jaw clenching against the gag shoved into my mouth as pain shoots through me from the silver collar.

Her hand slides up to my hairline, smoothing my strands away from my forehead, and she smiles softly. “Thank you for being honest.” Her focus switches to Nuncio, and she stands, towering over me and waiting for him to say something.

Arms crossed over his chest, he grazes his teeth across his lower lip, eyes raking over me. “Can you blame me?” He chuckles at the end of his question, but it’s humorless, lifeless, and unconvincing.

Her eyes narrow. The air in the room grows colder and thinner by the second as we wait for her response.

Even with the silver binding me and the wolfsbane repressing my senses, I can sense the power rippling from her, coasting through the air like a gliding, soaring vulture. It circles and descends, honing in on its next meal: Nuncio.

He screams, and his hands fly to his crotch to cover his dick. Pain pulses through him, his body convulsing and trembling. He falls to his knees, and his companions laugh at his misery.

My eyes are locked on the female, though, on her collected exterior and haughty expression as she watches him writhe in pain. Her hand extends outward, clenched in a fist that twists tighter and tighter.

Nuncio’s cries grow louder until she unclenches her hand and flicks her wrist in his direction. Nuncio, on the floor, gasps for air.

Her attention returns to me as I realize what she is .

A witch. A powerful one. She’s likely covenless, working and living outside the oversight of the thirteen crones. But even though she punished him for violating my body against their rules, she isn’t on my side. She isn’t an ally.

Ella es mi enemiga. She’s my enemy.

Her eyes scan me again, slower this time. They brighten as they travel my body, shining with approval, and I’ve never felt more naked in my life. I squirm beneath her appraising stare, trying to cover myself with my restrained hands.

Hopelessness floods through me, and I squeeze my eyes shut again. I’m trapped. Defenseless. My body is bound, and they’ve repressed my senses and abilities.

“Take her inside and put her in a cell,” the witch says. Her heels click on the floor of the vehicle, and her voice fades as she retreats. “The others are still making their way back. I’ll have Brenna examine all the girls together.”

Nuncio continues gasping as the other two flank the gurney. They wheel me out of the vehicle, down a ramp, and into a vast, empty white hallway.

I keep my eyes trained on the ceiling, counting the fluorescent light fixtures above me as we travel through the building.

Ten…eleven…twelve…

We turn left then right and then left again, and then they finally stop.

I angle my head subtly, flicking my eyes towards the door on my right just in time to witness Crooked Nose press his thumb against a fingerprint scanner.

The device beeps, the door unlocks and swings open, and we’re on the move again.

Eye Patch parks the gurney parallel to the back wall.

With swift and precise movements, he moves around it, placing new silver cuffs on my wrists and ankles right above where the cuffs bound to the gurney sit.

These new cuffs are heavier, thicker, and attached to the ends of thin but sturdy chains that extend from the wall.

As he works, I conserve my energy, breathing through the sluggishness in my muscles.

Once he’s secured the new cuffs, he unlocks the old ones and unhooks the chains connecting the collar to the gurney.

In a heartbeat, I’m on my feet, lunging towards them with my teeth bared and my arms outstretched. But the chains attached to my cuffs retract, yanking me backwards as I attempt to continue forward. I tug and resist the movement, eyes wildly scanning the room, hair flying and whipping around me .

Crooked Nose sneers. His hand snakes around the door frame, pressing a button out there that controls the restraints in here.

I charge forward again, a growl grinding in my throat, muffled by the gag. But the chains continue retracting. The crank within the wall they’re attached to spirals, and even with all my fighting and straining, I’m too weak to prevent it. I’m pulled backwards with them.

My bare feet slip on the smooth concrete, unable to find traction.

The chains hauling me across the room keep me from falling flat on my face, but my knees slam into the floor with a resounding crack.

Stars explode behind my eyelids at the impact, and if not for the gag in my mouth, my scream would echo off the walls of the almost empty room.

And still the chains drag me backwards until I’m crouched next to a cot that’s bolted to the floor. My nails scrape against the concrete, and I glare at the two males laughing at me from the doorway.

“This one will be fun to break.” Eye Patch snickers as he wheels the gurney out.

Crooked Nose nods his agreement, sneer growing and eyes glinting. “The feisty ones are always the most fun to break.”

The door slams shut, and their lingering laughter echoes in the room, ringing in my ears. The howls of cruel amusement pound into me, twisting my stomach into knots. Despair claws at my throat, mimicking the clawing of my fingers on the floor.

With trembling limbs, I lift myself onto the cot to scan the room—my cell.

It’s small, with nothing in it beyond the cot, which is more like a raised dog bed with no mattress pad, pillow, or blanket in sight.

Even the bolts holding it to the floor are welded into the metal frame.

The chains disappear into holes in the wall, locked into place by the machinery that operates the crank or pulley they’re wrapped around.

There’s nothing to be used as a weapon, nothing I can defend myself with. All I can do is hope the others heard my cry for help through the mindlink.

I scoot backwards on the cot and sit with my back against the wall. I hug my knees to my chest, fingers absently trailing down my leg to the thin, fraying piece of red fabric I’ve worn around my ankle for the last four years, hidden away from my friends by my clothes or shoes.

But it’s not there. It’s gone.

“No… ”

I scratch at my leg, eyes flying down to my ankle. I grab at the cuff, sliding it as high as I can, but all that does is confirm what my heart already knows: the last tangible physical piece I have of my time with him is gone. Gone. Taken from me.

“No… nonono…” The syllables leave me in rushed sobs, all stringing together into one word, muted and muffled by the gag. “ No, no puede ser… ”

This can’t be happening…

The anguish and the sobs rip through me. Air can’t get into my lungs fast enough to keep pace with the panic and the desperation, and the gag isn’t helping either.

I lift my hands to it, tugging at it, but it’s tight and even my best efforts don’t budge it. My fingers travel to the corners of my mouth, where two thick chains extend from the gag. I follow their path to where they’re hooked into the back of the silver collar around my neck.

Grunting and sobbing, I yank and fight with the chains to pry them from the collar, but it’s no use. The silver and the wolfsbane have weakened me, and I wouldn’t be surprised if every restraint on my body is imbued with magic as well, so only certain people can remove them.

I slump against the wall, hands shaking as I cover my face with them. I try to breathe through the agony.

I can’t break. Not now. Not yet.

Nunca. Never.

They took my choker, but they can’t take my memories. They can’t steal his words. Those are mine.

Mine forever. Mine for always. Para siempre .

I collapse onto the cot, my arms wrapping around my middle, fingers brushing against my ribs. They trace over the words he spoke to me that night, the three lines I inked into my skin to mimic their imprint on my soul.

Nosotros somos las estrellas.

“We are the stars.”

Sebastian’s voice echoes in my mind, much like it has in the dark hours of the night or the quiet hours of the morning when I’ve felt too small and too alone.

I cling to his voice now. I wrap it around my heart.

Prometo que te encontraré .

He will find me. He promised.

And the last line, the last string of words. Words he never said to me but I know are true nonetheless. Words that whispered their way into my dreams, night after night, until they were as much a part of me as my brown eyes. Words confirming he loves me too.

Te amo.