Oh, God.
I’m not here.
I’m not here.
I’d always been the type of person who guarded herself carefully. I supposed that was why my mind had tripped into amnesia when faced with something too hard to handle. I didn’t let emotions overwhelm me—I had a natural defense that probably wasn’t healthy but I couldn’t circumnavigate.
I had the tendency to shut down.
A switch.
And if I shut down, it was over. Done. Whatever happened from that point on couldn’t affect me because there was nothing inside to affect.
“Did you hear that the father is twice the man his son is?” Rubix’s breathing was thick and fast. “Don’t you want to sample the better version?”
I bucked, trying to get him off me. The bikers who’d held my wrists before captured them again, flattening me down, turning me helpless.
“You’ll only embarrass yourself,” I snarled. “Arthur isn’t just twice the man you are—I told you, he’s a hundred times.”
Cobra and Sycamore licked their lips, watching me with over-bright eyes.
“Go on, do whatever you think proves you’re a bastard. But just know the entire time I’ll be laughing at you. Laughing at how worthless you are. How lacking you are compared to a real man.”
Oh, God, Cleo. What are you doing?
I swallowed my terror. I hadn’t meant to say that.
Too late now. I only had myself to blame.
Rubix laughed, bunching the T-shirt higher.
My teeth clamped on my bottom lip. I poured every inch of hate and repugnance into my gaze.
If he wanted me scared—he’d achieved it.
If he wanted me to scream or beg or cry—he’d be sorely disappointed.
I won’t.
Cobra and Sycamore pulled my wrists, jerking me flatter against the table.
“Tell me again … what you said about Arthur,” Rubix demanded.
“Yes, tell us the part where he’s a hundred times more man than us,” Cobra chuckled, blowing a kiss in my direction.
“Yeah, the part where you’ll be laughing at us.” Sycamore’s eyes were luminescent with toxic lust.
Don’t fall into their trap.
I knew they were taunting me, but at the same time, I couldn’t let them talk ill of Arthur.
I looked at all three Dagger Rose bastards and said loudly, clearly, and with utmost conviction. “Arthur is a thousand times the man you will ever be. He’ll find and kill you. And then you will see for yourself how pathetic you truly are.”
Rubix laughed softly. “I guess we’ll see, won’t we, Cleo? We’ll see who wins this coming war.” He placed his chilled hands on the paper-thin skin of my throat.
I froze.
Our eyes locked.
With the barest of voices, Rubix ordered, “Prepare her. The sooner we do this—the better.”
I wanted to ask what would happen.
I wanted to disappear and never open my eyes again.
But Cobra moved so fast.
A blur.
A shout.
What—
Then pain.
Impossible, profound pain.
Cobra struck me with something I didn’t see.
Pain against my temple. Agony around my throat.
I moaned as the agony intensified, casting out waves of black fog. My mind sank deeper into the ink, faster and faster, succumbing to whatever they’d struck me with.
“Again,” Rubix shouted, slicing through my thick haze.
I tried to speak but my tongue wouldn’t work.
I tried to move but my body had disappeared.
There was nothing but thoughts and whispers and pain. Endless, measureless pain.
Cobra obeyed.
The agony struck again.
It smashed through my consciousness, sending me into drunken spirals.
Around and around.
I’m on a merry-go-round.
I’m slipping.
I’m falling.
It came again.
One last strike.
The world turned from solid to swimming; I was sucked down a drain into a whirlpool of sickness.
Chapter Six
Kill
Running away had a certain appeal.
If I knew he wouldn’t come after me, I’d steal a bike and put Dagger Rose in my dust. But to leave, I’d have to cut my heart out, because I’d never be whole unless I was with her.
She’d saved me all while ruining me.
And now I was trapped.
Indefinitely. —Kill, age fifteen
There were approximately five liters of blood in an average man.
Rubix owes me every last drop in his body.
Cleo had been in their clutches for fifty-five hours.
Ninety thousand seconds since she’d slept angelically beside me.
Fuck …
No, wait. That’s wrong.
Three thousand six hundred seconds were in an hour. So that made it one hundred and ninety-eight thousand seconds since I’d last seen her.
A cold sweat dripped down my spine.
Another mistake. Another mathematical solvent I’d fucked up.
Shit.
Had this injury stripped me of whatever gift I’d been given? Were all my trading sequences, tricks, and secret formulas dashed upon the rocks of my useless fucking brain?
My mind was darkness and smog.
My neurons faulty and extinct.
Snippets of knowledge were there, but not in their entirety. The codes were broken—unconnected and fragmented.
Shit, I am defective.
Fear stalked me, closing its claws around my thoughts.
I forced my bike faster.
It doesn’t matter.