Page 88 of The Last Sanctuary

Pain ruptured throughout her jaw. Her lower lip split. Blood trickled down her chin. She tried to keep her balance, but the force of his blow knocked her to her knees. Scorpio ripped the backpack from her shoulders and tossed it onto the ground at his feet.

“You came to us, you stupid little whore.” Dekker bent over her. “We didn’t even have to hunt you down. What a shame. I was looking forward to that.”

Dekker struck her across the side of her face with the back of his hand. Lights exploded across her vision. Her ears rang.Dizziness washed over her in waves. She felt like she was going to vomit.

Dekker kicked her in the stomach. She toppled, falling backward. Flagstone cracked against her skull. She shuddered, gasping, crying. She clawed at the ground, trying to rise to her hands and knees, to crawl away. Pain gnawed at the edges of her mind.

Dekker delivered a savage kick to her ribs. He knocked her down again. Agony lanced her ribs like a razor-tipped spear. She groaned, rising again to her hands and knees.

She licked blood from her split lip. No use. It ran down her chin. She attempted to stand.

Vaughn and Scorpio watched impassively, their faces in shadow beyond the beams of their flashlights.

Dekker pushed her over easily, as if she were nothing more than a sack of grain. He nudged her onto her back, then lifted his steel-toed boot and slammed it down on her ribs.

Something gave with a sickening crunch.

Raven writhed, groaning. White-hot pain blinded her. Pain so deep and wide it engulfed her whole body. Pain without beginning, without end.

The world glimmered in and out of focus. Blackness hovered at the corners of her vision. The moon and stars were hidden now. The sky a mass of dark clouds. A gust of wind swept over her.

She tasted ozone mingled with blood. The storm was almost here.

Distantly, she heard footsteps.

“Is this necessary?” Damien’s voice, sharp with disgust. “She’s no threat.”

“After what she did?” Scorpio scoffed. “She’ll be lucky if we don’t flay her alive.”

“But she’s a?—”

“A what?” Dekker asked coldly. “A girl? Or a cold-blooded murderer?”

“You’re the murderers!” Raven spat between clenched teeth. She could barely force the words out through the agony spearing through every part of her body. It was like a gaping maw of pain swallowing her whole.

Scorpio sneered. “So, she can speak.”

“Haven’t you done enough already?” Damien asked. “Looks like you’ve gotten your pound of flesh, Dekker.”

“I haven’t even started.”

Her entire body hurt. Her ribs like molten lava, knives prying apart her bones. She clung to consciousness with every fiber of her being. The darkness yawned at the corners of her vision, rising beneath her bones.

“I thought we didn’t torture women and children.” Damien’s tone was beseeching. “Come on, Uncle. Stop this.”

Dimly, she saw Vaughn shrug. “Doesn’t count when they murder one of our own, son.”

Damien fell silent. His silence said everything. In the end, when it counted, he would fail her, like everyone else. She’d get no help from him. Or anyone.

No one was coming to save her. There was no one to call for help. She had no parents. No police anymore. No 911. No soldiers keeping the peace.

There was no one. No one and nothing.

This was it, then.

This was the end.

Her eyes burned. She didn’t cry. She refused to cry, refused to give these monsters an ounce of satisfaction.