Prayers by night faoladh.., p.16
Prayers By Night (Faoladh Series Book 2), page 16
You were abducted, electrocuted, and moved. Wake up faster, dummy, and pay attention. She struggled to get her head up off her shoulder, then jerked all the way up and opened her eyes wide. Harper!
Harper was right in front of her, soaking wet and strapped to a table with heavy metal bands around her wrists, biceps, and ankles. She was awake and staring at Emerson, whining softly. The right side of her face was completely swollen and bruised, her lower lip busted open and oozing blood.
Emerson tightened her fists and tugged at the rope. In doing so she discovered a leather belt across her chest, holding her upright in place on a chair.
Are we going to be tortured now? She asked herself.
The stranger in medical garb standing next to Harper glanced up at her too, frowned, but went right back to jabbing a needle into the crook of Harper’s elbow.
Emerson licked her lips again and opened her mouth to demand they tell her what they were doing now.
A woman dressed impeccably in a dark red suit stepped in front of her, blocking her view. Long brown hair lay against her shoulders in perfect curls, not a strand out of place. Her make-up was light and professional. She was short, thin, tanned, altogether beautiful, and put together.
Emerson hated her instantly.
“Nice of you to join us, finally,” said the woman. Her voice was low, almost gentle, and she spoke with a soothing cadence. She even smiled, showing off gleaming white teeth. “Hello, sleeping beauty. Welcome to the pit, I’m Nyx, the owner, and you are?”
You can go straight to actual Hell, she thought, clamping her lips together.
“Oh, don’t be like that. It’s really in your best interest to be polite and cooperate. Unfortunately, your Alpha wasn’t very polite at all and my guards broke her jaw. I’m going to need you to fill in a few blanks for me,” Nyx said and chuckled.
It sent a shiver straight up Emerson’s back. She channeled her inner badass, kept her mouth firmly shut, and glared.
“I really have to tell you; I am delighted to have you in the stable. A female Alpha and a mixed pair? I never could have dreamed my trackers would find such a thing.”
Oh, you’re delighted? Well, that changes everything. Let me just apologize for Harper being problematic and ask what we can do to help you. If she were able to shoot lasers from her eyes Nyx would have been a pile of ashes.
“Alright, well this is going to be boring if you refuse to have a conversation.” Nyx sighed and rolled her eyes. “If you insist on this tough façade, I will simply coerce you. Clancy?”
She stepped away and waved at Harper. Like Emerson needed help to realize she should watch.
The man in scrubs, Clancy, nodded and reached onto his instrument tray. Emerson strained against her bonds, realizing exactly what was about to happen.
Clancy grinned and pressed a cattle prod to Harper’s side. It crackled to life and Harper bowed her back, lifted off the table and slammed back down with a muffled howl. Clancy kept up the pressure, watching with glee as Harper spasmed and thrashed.
It seemed to go on for hours until Emerson couldn’t take it any longer.
“Stop, please stop!”
Nyx waved her hand again and the sounds stopped except for Harper’s ragged breathing. She lay limp on the table, fingers and toes twitching, eyes squeezed shut.
Emerson thought she knew what helpless felt like before. She thought Holt tying her up and forcing her to watch him fight Harper would be the worst memory to fuel her nightmares.
All she could do was watch someone else prove her wrong and try her hardest not to cry.
“Ah, there we are, you’re not mute after all.” Nyx grinned again and clasped her hands together. “I assume you have a name as well as a speaking voice, pet?”
“Emerson.” She worked her jaw and took her eyes off Harper’s pained expression long enough to shoot their captor another hostile, though watery, glare.
“A lovely name, and your Alpha?”
“Harper.”
“Emerson and Harper,” Nyx said and tilted her head side to side, as though she needed to test out the sound.
For the second time in her life Emerson actually wished for someone’s death. Not a metaphorical thought in the heat of the moment in California traffic or directed at some mean girl. She wanted Nyx dead, preferably in gruesome fashion.
“Save your anger, you’ll need it.” Nyx tsked and dared to reach over and move a strand of hair out of Emerson’s face. “Now, Emerson, we have some tests to run on Harper, be a good pet and answer a few questions for me and we’ll make this as quick as possible.”
But not painless. Her fear for herself had fled in the face of her murderous fury, her hands shook with it, with the need to do some damage to that smug face. I can’t let them hurt Harper anymore. Don’t let your temper get the best of you. You can’t do anything right now and they’ll only take it out on her.
She couldn’t compartmentalize, not with the hate roiling through her, she could only nod and continue thinking of ways to commit murder.
“What kind of wolf is Harper?” Nyx asked and moved away to circle up to Harper’s other side, where Clancy wasn’t busy poking and scraping at her.
“Faoladh,” Emerson said through her teeth. She flexed again and bit down on her lip when Clancy took a pair of scissors and cut open Harper’s grimy, soaked tank top from neck to hem. He laid it open, exposing Harper’s skin to the harsh lighting. Her ribs were an angry red on the side where he’d applied the cattle prod. The other was mottled with the wolfsbane scars.
He reached over and ran his gloved fingers down them with a hum. “Well, that’s interesting.”
“Ah, Faoladh, such a noble breed. Foolish, perhaps, but noble.” Nyx smacked Clancy’s hand away and leaned down to peer at the scars herself. Harper rolled her head to side and curled her lip, but Nyx remained unperturbed. “Is she a purebred?”
Emerson shook her head. “I don’t know, yes, I think.”
“Wonderful! Does she have any others in her pack besides the other that was sadly dispatched in your little mountain town?”
The other… Blalock. Harper said they killed Blalock. She took a deep breath to steady herself against the rush of nausea. Blalock was a werewolf too? “No.”
We thought she was alone and that whole time… why didn’t he say anything?
“How interesting,” Nyx said and poked her manicured nails against Harper’s ribs. “And this scarring? Wolfsbane, I believe. We don’t see that too often. How did this happen? Did she have a run-in with one of those zealots?”
There’s so much that we don’t know about. Things we didn’t know to be wary of. Holt seemed like the worst-case scenario. How did we ever think this would be easy? “She – there was a man in town who shot her with it.”
“Very interesting,” Nyx said. She pulled her hand away, finally, and grabbed a bottle of antiseptic from a nearby workstation. Heaven forbid she get Harper’s germs on her. “Some backwater townie found out she was a werewolf and decided to shoot her with wolfsbane, not silver?”
Emerson sneered at her. “I didn’t ask him why he made that choice.”
“Well, he was either very clever or lucky. Not lucky enough to survive, I’d wager?”
“No.” And I’d bet a lot of money that you’re going to end up the same way.
“I would think not. She’s quite fiery. She’ll do well here.” She moved back around, away from Harper and closer to the door. “What do you think, Clancy?”
Clancy shrugged and pointed at the workstation. “Won’t be able to tell until the blood test comes back, ma’am. We’ll need to test her healing factor as well. It’s already considerably slow, seeing as her jaw is still broken.”
He patted Harper’s jaw and she growled.
Emerson felt a strange surge of pride at the small gesture of defiance. They hadn’t broken Harper’s spirit, and that would be their mistake.
“What do you recommend?” Nyx asked and checked her watch.
“The arm should do.”
“Wait, what do you mean –”
Clancy grabbed a hammer off his torture tool set, heavy and metal, and slammed it down on Harper’s forearm with a horrific thud and crunch. She wailed through her broken jaw, a high-pitched sound that dug under Emerson’s skin and littered it with goosebumps.
Harper’s breathing took on a panicked pace, too fast. She squirmed and whined, gold eyes flashed in Emerson’s direction repeatedly.
“There now, my Irish Alpha. It’s for your own good.” Nyx tsked and checked her watch again. “We’ll see how long it takes you to heal between bouts. I take good care of my fighters, can’t have you fighting with a handicap. Can’t have you infecting the others either, so let’s hope the risk of contamination is low.”
Emerson heard their words like they were coming from the other end of a tunnel filled with water. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears, trapped inside her skull. She gagged as she watched Harper’s movement slow to a sluggish pace, her whimpers soften and peter out.
Then she went still. Passed out again.
A small blessing. If she was unconscious, she wouldn’t feel the pain, at least for a moment.
Nyx snapped her fingers and Clancy looked up from where he poked at Harper’s crushed forearm.
“Have the boys take them to a cell in the winners’ circle, get them tucked in and bring me the results when you have them.” She turned and headed out the door, calling over her shoulder. “I’ve got to come up with a name fit for my new contender.”
Chapter Fifteen
Two new goons, just as muscular and unfriendly looking, put Harper onto a flat dolly. Goon One pushed it down the endless concrete hall, grumbling under his breath as a wheel squeaked nonstop.
Goon Two grabbed Emerson none-too-gently by the back of the neck and shoved her along behind Goon One.
“Fucking cart,” Goon Two said after several seconds of squeak, squeak, squeak. “Can’t you get it to stop?”
“No.” Goon One said without turning around. “Also shut up.”
“Prick.” Goon Two squeezed Emerson’s neck tighter.
Neither of them said anything else, and Emerson almost wished they would. It would give her something to cling to. She walked down the hall in a daze, unable to concentrate. Even the squeaky wheel couldn’t hold her attention.
She was cold, confused, and her body ached, but she didn’t know what to do other than walk.
Goon One stopped and punched a code into a keypad next to a heavy metal door. He yanked it open and maneuvered Harper’s dolly through.
Emerson stared at the doorway until a harsh shove nearly sent her sprawling forward.
She entered the room and some function returned – enough for her to look around the new space and take it all in.
The center of the room was large and part of it had been divided into four smaller areas. One on either side of the main door, and then just ahead of her were two more rooms divided from the main area by a glass wall.
Cells. They were cells, not rooms. With thick bars and the same metal doors as the one leading into the cell block. Goon One punched in a code to in the corner, opened the door, and pushed the dolly inside. He picked up Harper and dumped her onto a mattress on top of a raised concrete platform eliciting a subconscious moan.
Emerson’s eye twitched and her breathing came shallower as awareness returned. Goon Two untied her wrists and pushed her into the cell as soon as Goon One removed the cart.
Reality slammed home as the door did. She put a hand to her chest and did her best to control her breathing. With Harper already unconscious she couldn’t afford to pass out, too. Not that she’d done much to help, but if they were both unaware of what was going on that would be worse.
Much worse.
Steady, steady breaths. You’re okay. You’re not great, but you’re okay. You’ve got to keep it together. She crossed their cell and quickly checked Harper’s pulse. It thumped away, fast but steady against her fingertips. She pushed wet strands of hair out of Harper’s face. There was a scratchy, but thick wool blanket folded at the end of the mattress. She unfolded it and pulled it over Harper’s bare skin, mindful not to bump either of her injuries. Not that Harper was ever cold, but it made Emerson feel better to cover her. Okay, okay that’s good. Now breathe and take stock. Where are you, what’s here? Breathe and take in the environment.
Goons One and Two had left already. Through the bars she could see the cell directly across from them. It was far more lavish than theirs. The back of a flat-screen television took up a good part of the cell. There was a small weight set, a pull up bar, mini-fridge, and a far nicer bed than the one she and Harper were expected to share. She couldn’t see the occupant from her current position.
Nor was she sure she wanted to see whoever it was at all.
In the corner of their cell there was a tiled alcove, a tile bench with a toilet seat and a drain in the floor. She looked up and saw a shower head dangling from the ceiling. A short concrete wall provided a bit of privacy. How kind of their abductors.
On the floor just in front of her she saw some sort of tracks. Two of them, side-by-side, and thick chains with shackles on the ends somehow attached to the rails. She had no idea what that could be for, but it was definitely nothing good.
Not that there’s anything good here at all.
She shook her head and peered through the glass-like wall separating their cell from their neighbors. It had open circles along the top – so they could talk? The cell itself was a mirror image of the one they were in, and empty.
The main door buzzed, clicked, and opened. Two different goons came in, holding on to a very angry, familiar giant. A third loomed behind and she heard their favored weapon, the cattle prod.
Emerson nearly jumped off the bed and shouted Griffin’s name. Finally, maybe some good luck!
Griffin growled and struggled against his captors. They jabbed him repeatedly with the cattle prod, but he kept up his rebellion, even though he was obviously not at full strength. She imagined if he were, they’d need more than one jerk with a cattle prod.
They stuffed him inside his cell, tossed a wadded white piece of fabric after him, and left without a word.
Emerson made herself wait until the door closed before turning to check on Harper once more. Still unconscious, though her eyes moved quickly behind her closed eyelids. She tucked the blanket up higher around Harper’s shoulders and then got off the bed and hurried to the glass wall.
“Griffin,” she called and stopped short of slapping her hands against the wall. He turned to squint at her and she leaned against the cool glass, light-headed with relief – he could hear her through the glass. “Are you okay?”
“Not really, but thanks for asking.” He scowled and rubbed at the raw red blotch on his broad chest where the drug patch had been. They’d at least given him a pair of sweatpants. He walked over to the glass and thumped his big hands against the glass near hers and he pointed his chin off to the side. “What happened to Harper?”
“They broke her jaw and her arm,” Emerson said and curled her hands into fists. She didn’t know how, but she was going to get revenge for that. Even if she broke her own hands trying.
Griffin winced. “I saw the jaw. Why’d they break her arm? Did she take another swing at them? She went pretty nuts when you got knocked out.”
I can imagine. She shook her head. “They’re testing her healing factor.”
“Because of the wolfsbane.” He huffed. “Assholes.”
“What did they do to you? Obviously, they removed the patches.”
“Yeah, they did, after they got Harper under control. Still feel weird, but more like myself. Then we all got the pressure hose.” He scraped his wet hair out of his face. “Guess I should be glad they didn’t shave us too. I’ve had my blood drawn, my teeth checked, basically everything checked. Now here we are.”
“At least you’re not drugged anymore,” Emerson said. “That could be a mistake.”
“I think I preferred drugged reality to actual reality.” He shrugged. “Any ideas why they stuck us in here instead of with the rest?”
“Because you’re supposed to be my competition,” someone said from across the room. “I can’t say I’m impressed.”
The mysterious occupant of the cell with the tv. Griffin turned his head and narrowed his eyes. Emerson twisted to see as well.
The mysterious occupant stood against his bars, arms crossed over his chest, and sneered.
He was smaller than Griffin, closer to Harper’s height, and wiry in a way that neither Harper nor Griffin were. Older too, judging from the wrinkles, bald head, and good bit of gray in his short beard.
But the scars that covered his body told a scary story about his experience.
Not enough to impress Griffin, who snorted and asked, “Who are you supposed to be, Hannibal Lecter?”
“Read the sign, dickhead,” he said and pointed above his cell. “I’m the champion around here.”
“Cerberus?” Emerson read and couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. Maybe she shouldn’t antagonize the creepy werewolf, but she’d really had enough. “You can’t be serious.”
“I can’t believe Nyx let you in here, human.” Cerberus turned his sneer onto her and gold flared up in his dark eyes.
Alright. I’m over this.
“Yes, that’s clearly her fatal flaw, letting humans into the cells,” Emerson said with a roll of her eyes. “It ruins the aesthetic.”
“The torture palace is going to get really bad reviews now,” Griffin added. “I’m only going to give it a three out of five stars.”
“Neither you nor the female Alpha should be here.” Cerberus leaned closer to the bars and bared his teeth. “No female, Alpha or otherwise is going to provide a challenge for me. And you, muscles? You won’t last past the first minute.”
With that he went back to his couch, because of course he had one to go with his television set.
“Well, you’ve been a delight, thank you so much for all your help,” Griffin said.
