Page 57 of Kai's Hunger

“What are you doing?”

He waved the evil thing in the air. “I’ll get my answers, Lily. It can be difficult or easy. The choice is yours.”

“What answers?” I yelled. “I don’t know what you want from me.”

Patterson flipped a switch on the handle, then he jabbed it into my ribcage, sending a current of electricity through me. I screamed and he did again and again. Finally he switched it off and asked, “Now, let’s start over, shall we?” He placed the device aside, then picked up a scalpel sitting on a metal tray. He held it to my cheek. “Kai Ravenbriar, what is he to you?”

“I just met him,” I cried, every muscle in my body twitching from the shock from the prod. “He’s been very helpful. Offered me a place to stay while my van gets fixed.”

He tsked. “Now, now. We both know there’s more to you two than that.” A thin slice was my reward. I screamed, but the sound was drowned out by the laughter from the guard across the room. “Have you two had intercourse?”

Tears streamed down my cheeks. “Please, you don’t have to do this. I’m not who you think I am.”

Patterson gripped my chin and forced my gaze to his. “I have all the time in the world, sweetie. We’re going to get very well acquainted.”

“You’re sick!” I shouted, jerking against the restraints. “What if this was someone you love on this table? Your daughter being tortured!”

Patterson jerked his head back as if I’d slapped him, his eyes wide. “What did you say?”

I stayed silent, unwilling to provoke him further. Patterson’s face had gone ashen, and I would’ve sworn he looked afraid. Afraid when I’d said the worddaughter. Interesting. I stored the information away.

“You will talk to me,” he said, spit flying from his mouth. “You’ll tell me everything I want to know. Everyone always does. Eventually.”

I closed my eyes and clung to the knowledge that Kai would find me. As Patterson’s twisted interrogation continued to include his fists, a monkey wrench, even a ball-peen hammer, I slipped outside myself. Where pain no longer existed. And all that mattered was Kai.

Two hours later, Raymond dumped me on top of the cot in my cell, then shut the door with a loud clang. Patterson was methodical. A psychopath, but methodical. He’d known exactly how to inflict pain without causing me to pass out. Thin, small cuts with a scalpel, followed up with strokes of his hands along my body. The jolt of a cattle prod to my private parts until my screams reverberated inside my own skull, then more fondling, massaging. I was forced to lie there and endure it all. Helpless. And in the end, I’d been forced to listen to the grunts of his orgasm. The only satisfaction was the frustration on his face when he hadn’t gotten the answers he’d wanted.

A feathery touch along my cheek caused my eyes to pop open and fear filled me all over again. I glanced around the small cell and realized I was alone.Kai?I said his name inside my mind, not expecting an answer.

I’m close, Lily. Stay awake.

A shot of adrenaline flooded my system and I forced myself to sit up. Was I hallucinating from the pain? How could Kai know where I was? I slowly got to my feet, cradling my left arm with my right palm. I was certain it was broken, as were several other bones. I stared down at myself. Stripped of my clothes, I had full view of the bruises forming all over my ribcage, abdomen, and lower. I bent and snagged the sheet off the bed, then wrapped it around my body, before gingerly walking to the bars. “Lucian?”

“Lily?” he replied, his voice rife with surprise. “You ... you’re okay?”

“Not really,” I answered, then cleared the emotion from my throat. “Kai says he’s on his way.”

He was quiet for a moment, as if weighing the truth of my words. “Lily, I’ve had visions, too. Patterson has a particular talent for making his prisoners see hope where there often is none.”

No!My mind screamed the word. It was Kai. I was sure of it. It’d been his touch I’d felt. His warmth filling me. “It was him.”

I shuffled back to the cot and sat. He could believe me or not. I closed my eyes and attempted to find that link again. Inhaling deeply, then exhaling slowly.Kai?

Lily?

Your father thinks I’ve lost it.

Something similar to a growl filled my head.Tell him it was I who wrecked the Mustang. Not Trakker.

“Lucian.”

“Yeah?”

I repeated the confession, then waited. Lucian chuckled. “Damn, he really is coming.”

“I don’t know how he knows where we are, though,” I said, voicing my fears aloud. “What if he’s going to the wrong place?”

“He must’ve found something to lead him here. He wouldn’t have given you such hope otherwise.”

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