Chapter Twenty-One

Flame

Ascratching sound wakes me up. I have no idea how long I"ve been here now. I hear the sound again and realize it"s someone releasing the locks on the door, meaning I"m about to have a visitor. The door creaks open, and in strolls fucking Claire with two men who look like they haven't seen a shower recently. They look filthy. Claire, however, looks put together; her dark blonde hair is tied up in some weird updo I don't know the name of. She's wearing a knee-length black skirt with a white blouse and a black blazer over the top. She looks like she just stepped out of a corporate office; she definitely isn"t dressed for where she is.

Strolling towards me with a smirk on her face and her green eyes glistening with glee. She looks overjoyed to have me chained up and at her mercy.

"Hello Hunter, long time no see. I hope you"re enjoying your stay. You"ll be here for a while. You see, I need to collect my other guests. Have you noticed the empty chains around the room?" She stops talking, waiting for me to look around.

"We"re all set up and ready for Jackson and Alex. Then the fun and games can really begin. While we"re waiting, my associates here are going to show you a good time."

God, her voice grates on me. I wish she"d just fuck off and leave me to my fate.

Granting me my wish, she spins on her heel and leaves, leaving me alone with Thing One and Thing Two. That's what I've decided to call her minions in my head anyway.

Thing One walks towards me and immediately starts punching me anywhere he can reach; unfortunately, I can"t do anything to protect myself with how I"m chained, but I can stay silent. I"m not going to give them the satisfaction of making any sounds of pain. I know people like this enjoy the reaction just as much as the pain they"re inflicting. I refuse to give them what they want.

Thing Two walks towards us and starts kicking me, while Thing One is punching away. My body"s going to hurt in the morning. After about ten minutes, they get bored and leave. I guess it wasn't fun for them with me giving them no reaction. I"m just left stuck here, chained up. Slowly taking a catalog of my body, I take note that my head's killing me, probably a concussion from the initial blow that knocked me unconscious. My ribs are sore, but it doesn"t feel like they"re broken, which I'm incredibly grateful for; being stuck like this with broken ribs wouldn"t be fun. The rest of me just feels bruised. I know this is just the start, though, and they"re only going to get worse each time they come and pay me a visit. I"ve made it a challenge by not giving them any reaction, and I've got a feeling they"re going to try anything they can think of to get a reaction. Little do they know, they"ll never get one. I don"t care what they do to me; it"ll never happen.

I drift off to sleep, thinking about Wrath and Cam. I miss them both so much already. I hope they're both dealing with me being taken all right. I"m worried about how this could be affecting them both. I really do need to figure out a way out of here and back to them.

This time, when I wake up, there's a bottle of water and some slop next to me. They obviously don't want to starve me, or maybe they do, because this slop doesn't look remotely appealing or even edible. I know I need to risk eating and drinking what they left me. I need to keep my strength up. I'm just praying it's not fucking drugged. I quickly force down what they've left me, trying not to gag from how bad it tastes, and start to think about Wrath.

There's no doubt in my mind that he knows something happened to me, and he"s doing everything he can to find me. He's got to be going crazy. I know how protective he is of me and how much he loves me, even if he"s never said the words. It's always been there in his eyes when he looked at me, even when he tried to hide it. I sort of feel sorry for Thing One and Two because when Wrath finds this place, and I know he will, they"re not going to know what hit them. Wrath got his road name for a reason. The reason being the wrath he"ll unleash if someone messes with his family. It was his idea for me to burn Ian McGivens alive after he found out about Ian's plan to kill Blaze. People should really be warned not to mess with Wrath's family; it turns out to be extremely bad for their health when they do.

Thing One comes strolling into my prison sometime later with a knife in his hand, smirking. It looks like they"re raising the stakes if he"s bringing weapons in to do damage now. He doesn't say anything to me as he grows closer to where I"m chained up; he's just got a sick smile on his face, which tells me whatever he has planned, he's going to enjoy. I fucking hate being chained like this and unable to fight back. Yeah, I could grab the food they left, but that's the limit of the movement I have. All the skills that I have using my fucking hands as weapons, and they"re fucking useless in this situation; actually, maybe that"s the point of me being chained up this way. Of course, there"s no way that our moles didn't inform Claire of my skills in hand-to-hand combat. Fuck, why didn't that occur to me before now? What else could she know about us?

Quicker than I was expecting, Thing One uses his knife to slice down my top so that my torso is exposed, proceeding to make small, shallow cuts all over my chest. I'm an Enforcer; I know this trick, and it"s going to hurt in the end. The cuts might be superficial, but what he's going to do next is going to push the pain to the max.

Once he's finished making all his cuts, he pulls a small tub of salt out of his pocket. I just take a deep breath. Even though I know this is going to hurt like a motherfucker, I will not give him the satisfaction of crying out. I won"t give him what he wants. He pours the salt directly over all the cuts, and I grind my teeth together and clench my jaw. I'm breathing hard. Fuck, that hurt. He then proceeds to rub it into the wounds, and the pain"s excruciating, but I don"t make a sound. His face shows his displeasure at that fact. However, my body knows what it needs to do to escape the pain, and as he's rubbing the salt in, I feel my vision go blurry, then everything goes black, and I welcome it. At least I can't feel anything while I"m out.

As I"m losing consciousness, I picture Wrath and Cam in my mind to remind me of why I need to survive everything these fuckers have planned for me. I have a family waiting for me. I"ll fucking do and endure anything to get home to them.