Page 18 of Synodic

“No. You need to leave. Before my boyfriend comes back. He…he won’t like it that you’re in here.” I tried to sound strong and alert, but I was fading fast and I knew they could tell.

They were right in front of me now, blocking my only exit. “I don’t think there is a boyfriend, doll, but don’t worry, we’ll take good care of you,” the ringleader said, petting my hair as if to console me. “Make sure we aren’t disturbed,” he ordered to the third man, whose excited expression quickly turned sour. He looked irate to be the one to stand guard while the others had all the fun. “Don’t worry. You’ll get your turn with her.”

My eyes pleaded with him for help, but like the obedient dog he was, he bowed down to the ringleader’s command and left the room.

“Don’t touch me,” I snarled weakly, trying everything within me to stay present, but I was merely a pair of eyes watching through a worthless body that couldn’t move, couldn’t fight, and couldn’t run. Even if I screamed, no one would hear me over the relentless booming of the music.

“Shhh, it’s okay, doll. Just relax. Everything’s alright,” Gel Hair said, crowding me from the front with his stocky frame while Yellow Teeth circled behind me, slithering his finger under the fallen strap of my dress. Their movements were too synchronized, too well-rehearsed for this to be their first rodeo, and the sickening thought filled me with a raging fury I’d never felt before.

I wanted them to hurt.

“Ow!” Yellow Teeth cried, pulling his hand away. “She shocked me!”

“I’ll do it again,” I said, speaking madness. I had no idea what he was talking about but I would say anything if it kept their hands off me.

“Just some static electricity. Hold her still, would you.”

Yellow Teeth sucked at his discolored overbite before reluctantly reaching for me again. I tried to jerk away, but once he realized he wasn’t going to be shocked, his fingertips dug into me like grappling hooks.

Bolder now, he leaned down, pressed his nose to my irregular pulse, and licked the length of my neck, burying his face, mouth, and tongue in my hair.

“Stop! Now!” I begged. If I wasn’t having some sort of debilitating allergic reaction, these men would be doubled over on the floor, clutching themselves between the legs. Beggingmeto stop as I trampled them into dust, into nothing.

Gel Hair pulled up on his pant legs and squatted down in front of me, almost in the exact same position Rowen had been in moments ago. He gripped my chin and angled my face before him like a precious diamond in the light. “Is it just me, or is she glowing?”

I kicked at him but it was a feeble attempt, and he only smiled as he grabbed my leg roughly and held it still. His broad face regarded me with a hungry fascination, and his thumb began rubbing the sensitive flesh of my inner knee. “So soft. You even feel like porcelain, doll.”

I futilely tried to wrench away but his accomplice held me still, trapping my arms by my sides like a straitjacket. Their hands, eyes, and breath were suffocating, holding me down as if I were a small creature caught in their sickening oil spill.

Gel Hair’s sweaty grip crept higher up my leg, and bile burned at the back of my throat. He continued to invade his way up my thigh, bunching my skirt at his wrist as he pushed his revolting touch past my dress. “Now I just wonder what you taste like.”

I opened my mouth to scream bloody murder, but before a sound left my lips, their hands flew from my body amidst cursing howls.

“What the hell? Did you feel that?” one of them barked out.

“I told you,” the other yelled back.

“No, I toldyou,” I said, completely delirious. I had no idea what was shocking them, but maybe I could use the situation to my advantage. “It’s a new phone app, you idiots. It acts as a taser. Every girl I know has it downloaded, frying the dicks off every one of you perverts.”

“You’re a crazy bitch and a liar.”

“Am I?” I said, slurring like a madwoman with my dead phone in my hand. I would fight until my last conscious breath, which was nearing closer and closer by the second. “Care to test that theory again?”

Their faces blanched. “Check her phone!” Gel Hair barked.

They were about to find out my lie, but soon it wouldn’t matter. I wouldn’t be awake much longer, and a part of me almost wondered if that would be better.

“Keira, there you are!” Harlan’s voice bugled through the air with all the relief of day-late cavalry.

The two men jolted upright and slithered from the room like two snakes in the grass. So much for their trusty watchdog, who I was sure would have to face Gel Hair’s wrath sooner or later.

I just wished I could have been the one to scare them away like that, but they had been no more afraid of me than if I was a baby bird, so weak and easily crushed within their grasp. It sent my blood boiling. I hated them. Hated how they made me feel. And Harlan had barely spared the creeps a glance before they disappeared through the beaded curtain. He seemed entirely oblivious as to what almost happened to me.

I hoped I at least got into their heads, made them think twice before they ever touched anyone ever again.

It was only after the men completely vanished from my sight that I gave in, and finally let my body black out.

8

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