His hair was short and the curly kind of unkempt that made you wonder if he’d brushed it today. The wind played with the inky strands just enough for him to reach up and smooth them down.
Next, I focused on the Jester. Long auburn hair fell down his back in almost ornamental braids. It was almost far too pretty for a man who kissed like the devil and seemed to take pride in the idea ofkillingme.
Bone man was easy to find too, he was the largest, and that made him hard to miss. It was hard to see in the dying light, but I was fairly certain his hair was mousy brown, short on the sides, wild on top.
That meant the man with long silver strands had to be the crying man. Even as he walked with his partners in crime, his head appeared slightly bowed, like the weight of what was about to happen physically dragged him down.
This was yet another reminder, those four werehuman. They couldbleedjust as I did. They coulddiejust as I could. The only difference is they were skilled killers and larger than I was. Imightmake it. Others had. I could do this.
The wind shifted, and once again the crows cawed as the moon shifted high in the sky. It didn’t feel like a normal moonrise, instead it reminded me of a machine on loop, and the entire world seemed to change as it bathed me in its celestial glow.
I’d stopped counting the second I opened my eyes, but it felt like I’d waited long enough. My body moved on instinct, and I started into a full sprint. Rocks and twigs dug into my bare feet, but the fresh dose of adrenaline in my system made the pain bearable. The red velvet of my robe flowed behind me as I darted through the trees, looking for anything that feltsafe. But, when the world felt like it was ripped directly out of a German fairytale, that was impossible.
My legs started to ache, and my lungs burned. That’s when an idea dawned. Any moment, one of the men could appear and chase me, and if I couldn’t bolt at a moment's notice, I could be as good as dead. My feet slipped along the stodgy mud, pulling me forward despite my best efforts to stop. Luckily, I caught myself on a nearby tree branch.
I swallowed a heavy mouth of spit as I gasped in fresh air. I couldn’t run without tiring myself out, and I couldn’t fight until I knew what I had in my bag. I looked up at the tree as I thought, and that’s when an idea dawned. I could buy myself a couple hours by hiding, and the men likely wouldn’t look in the trees. There were too many of them, and that would takeforever.
With that in mind, I reached for the highest branch I could grasp and started pulling myself up.
The action wasn’t as graceful or effortless as I’d envisioned it. To be honest, I’d never climbed a tree and always assumed it would be easy. But, despite my best efforts, I barely scrambled up the trunk. The bark dug into my feet, and the branches caught on my robe and nearly pulled me back to earth more times than I cared to admit. Somehow, I made it what felt like three stories off the ground.
That seemed safe enough, so I settled onto a sturdy-looking branch and let the pine needles shroud me from the outside world. I pulled the canvas bag off my back and planted it on my lap, yanking the zipper open as I did.
In the bare light of the moon, it was hard to make everything out; I squinted and resigned myself to pulling out my supplies one by one.
My fingers first met the metal of a handgun. I shifted it around, letting the light catch on the silver. It was the old type of revolver, the one with a spinning barrel that cowboys used. After a moment of fiddling, I opened it. As promised, a single bulletrested in the chamber. I made a mental note to reserve it for emergenciesonly.
Slipping the gun back in, I rifled through the rest of the contents. A knife, a bottle of water Ididn’ttrust, a small first aid kit, and a length of rope. The wind picked up, causing me to nearly drop the bag and fall in the process. For a beat I considered tying myself to the branch, then I realized I’d potentially trap myself if I did that. So, I re-steadied myself and grabbed the last item from the bag.
A tri-fold paper map. The paper felt thin, like the kind you’d find in a bible. I opened it, determined to look for a better place to hide.
And then the fucking wind ruinedeverything.
A gust blew through, turning the map into a makeshift kite. I tried to grab it out of the air, but I was limited on what I could do without killing myself.
“Son of a bitch.” I growled as I watched the paper float away in the rough direction of the manor.
I heaved out an irritated sigh, softly banging the back of my head against the tree trunk. Whatever, it was just a map. If I was going to survive, I’d do it regardless.
Chapter 3
Ronan
The sting of Seth’s hand across my cheek was powerful enough to send me to my knees, still, I lethim do it. He wasn’t as animalistic as me, or as playful as Cassian, instead his sadism rested in the quiet sort of unhinged. The kind that even someone like me knew better than to tempt. More often than not, he wouldn’t hurt the women. After all, a gentleman never hurt a lady. But, the rest of the boys and I weren’tladies.
“How fucking stupid are you?” he spat, bringing down the heavy heel of his boot onto my shoulder. I nearly buckled under the weight, and I bowed my head. “The women don’t get to know our fucking names! We’ve been doing this for ten years!” His words transformed into a growl. “If she gets out, and tellsanyonewe live here, the same fucked up branch of the government that experimented on us is going to come here and reclaim us like lab rats!” He stomped on me once more before recomposing himself. “Is that what you want?”
My muscles throbbed with his assault, but I sat back on my heels so I could look him in the eyes. Icy orbs so light they almostappeared silver looked at me with a feral disdain. Part of me wanted to remind Seth that we all had jobs, and that meant if the military gave a single fuck about finding us, they would have done it by now. But, I didn’t.
“Seth is a common name,” I said coolly.
It wasn’t like I’d told her his last name and birthdate. There had to be a million Seth’s in Connecticut alone.
“But anameis where it starts.” His gaze hardened. “Ilikedthis one. I wanted to give her a fighting chance. I wanted to make her ourbride.” His anger gave way to quiet devastation. “Now we might not even get to play with her! Sheneedsto die.”
His jaw shook before his teeth locked. They weren’t all sharp like mine. For some reason, they’d stopped at augmenting his canines, giving him a vampire-like appearance. Something about our teeth was supposed to help make us the perfect super-soldiers, but that leg of the experiments died with us.
“And they always do! We’ve had, what, three victors?” I tried to place the nameless women with barely there memories of pretty faces. “Plus, if they get out, we normally hunt them down, anyway! So we have fun with the slut, use her to fill our needs, and then I’ll paint the floor of the manor red with her life.”
