Page 6 of Hell Bound

Maybe it was only right that I died. I had nothing to live for.

“You aren’t dead.” A gruff voice that I recognized as the commander’s echoed in my previously silent abyss. “Though you may soon wish you were.”

I thought he mumbled something after that, but I didn’t catch it.

Trying to open my eyes proved successful this time, but they were only met with fuzzy shadows. I blinked again and again, desperate to clear my sight.

Slowly, the world around me came into focus.

A red-tinged sky above us was almost completely blotted out by the canopy above. I still struggled to make sense of what was happening, and when I looked to my captor for answers, I was struck anew.

Were his eyes truly glowing with fire, or was that just my mind fracturing?

“Where are we?” I croaked. My throat felt like his hand was still clasped tight around it, and I swallowed thickly.

Lifting my head was a difficult task, but I managed after the third try, and now that my eyes had adjusted, I could clearly see the black trees.

The only reason I was able to make them out in the oppressive blackness was the flickers of–was that torchlight?–that shone between them.

Even that tiny bit of illumination threatened to be absorbed by the dark wood.

“You’re home, Lily.” It was the second time he’d said my name, and something inside me twisted at the way his mouth seemed to caress each letter as it crossed his lips.

“This isn’t my home. You’ve got the wrong person. I don’t belong here!” I shoved aside the strange feelings the commander stirred in me because they didn’t matter.

Had I gone through all two decades of my life as a passionless amoeba?

Yes.

Was I feeling things I’d never experienced before in the arms of a captor whose name I’d yet to learn?

Also yes.

But all that paled next to his claim that this was my home.

Dammit, even psychopaths could be hot, but it didn’t make them any less psychotic. Right?

He finally lowered me to my feet. I didn’t bother to run. What would be the point? As far as I could tell, he wanted me alive.

I couldn’t say the same for whatever might be lurking in the deep shadows. The grip he held on my bicep was less like a tourniquet this time, but it was just as unbreakable.

“Come.”

“I’m not a dog.” The retort was out before I could think maybe it wasn’t a good idea to talk back to my inhuman captor.

I still didn’t know what he was, but anything that could rip Eric’s head off could surely do the same, or worse, to me.

Something occurred to me as I took those first steps in the black forest.

Why wasn’t I freaking out about my date being beheaded right in front of me? That kind of violence should shake me to my core… shouldn’t it?

Yet the only thing about Eric that had fazed me—besides his wandering hand that had gotten a little too aggressive—was the fact that he got blood on my lips.

I shuddered again, and in my periphery, I could see the commander’s head turn toward me.

I kept my gaze forward, unwilling to meet those frigid blue eyes again. Not when I didn’t understand my reaction to him.

I needed my wits about me for whatever was about to happen.

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