Page 50 of Fear the Reapers
“Look at her.” Cyrus taunted, nodding his head towards me. “I know what she looks like when she’s turned on.” He smirked, eyeing my body up and down. “I’ve seen that shit, firsthand.”
The crunch of knuckles against flesh echoed in my ears.
I moved to stop them, but a muscular arm wrapped around me, stilling my movements. Tristan.
“This isn’t your fight.” Ezra whispered, moving to stand on my other side before pressing his lips to my ear. “They need to figure this out, otherwise we’ll always be fighting over you.”
I didn’t know what to say, but he mentioned the future and that gave me hope.
“Oh, and Angel?” Ez hissed, licking the blood from my throat with a lavish stroke of his tongue. “If you ever try to leave us again, I will kill you.”
He said it so matter-of-factly; I had no doubt in my mind that he meant every single word.
???
After the fight was over, Ezra pulled Atlas away and they loaded up into the front seat of Ezra’s car without another word. Cyrus turned to follow them, but I reached out and grabbed his arm.
“Cyrus,” I spoke up, finally mustering the courage and gaining enough of my feeling back to do so, “I’m sorry.”
“No, you're not.” He said smiling, causing the split in his lip to spread even further. “You aren’t sorry for what you did. You’re sorry you got caught.”
“That’s not true. I-”
His hand struck out, closing my throat with a tight grip.
“Let me make one thing perfectly clear.” He hissed, tightening his grip. “The Cyrus you saw at the house is dead. I may be an idiot, but I’ll never make the mistake of trusting you again.” He growled, crashing his lips into mine.
The kiss was bitter, painful, and angry. It stole the last bits of oxygen I had in my lungs and had spots clouding my vision. I knew I could die if he didn’t relinquish his hold on my throat, yet I wanted the pain. I craved it. The pain distracted me from the ache hurting them all had created in my chest.
After he broke off our kiss, he released me. My chest filled with oxygen and sorrow as I crumpled to the ground. Tears stung my eyes, but I batted them away. I knew I deserved to feel every ounce of the hate he had towards me, but that didn’t stop it from hurting like hell.
It was why I never let people in to begin with. I knew that when the dust settled, the only thing I’d ever get out of letting people in was pain. And even though it wasn’t what I intended, for those few hours, I had let Cyrus in.
“Tris, tie her up and throw her in the trunk.” He ordered, not even bothering to look at me. “I don’t think any of us can stand to look at her right now.”
Chapter 29
Stevie
The days after my escape attempt blurred into each other. The semblance of freedom they had allowed before was gone, and in its place were the very real guards posted outside of my bedroom door.
They only allowed me trips to the restroom and only when Tristan, Cyrus, Atlas, and Ezra were nowhere in sight. Other than that, all of my privileges vanished.
The guys were smart. They changed the guards every day, so I never saw the same guard twice. Not that I would even try anything with them anyway, but they had themselves convinced that the only reason I had messed with Cyrus was to escape. I couldn’t even stomach the idea of them knowing the truth.
None of them would even as much as check in on me. It was like I no longer existed in their world. My room sat between Ezra’s and Tristan’s so I knew they hadn’t completely left. But the feeling of solitude was still very real and was slowly driving me insane.
Every time I’d hear a creak from the hardwood or a little cough from one of their rooms, my heart would pound in my chest and I’d feel the familiar rush of excitement each one of them elicited within me. I became obsessed with hearing those sounds. I knew I needed to change what was happening to me, before I succumbed entirely to the madness.
Day nine of total isolation is when it hit me, I needed to stop eating. I could survive days without eating, but they had no way of knowing that. I needed to get my point across to them somehow. If I could just talk to one of them, maybe I could get them to change their minds and allow me the freedoms I had before.
Three times each day the guards would knock on my door and leave a tray of food outside, and every single time I’d ignore their knocks and refuse to even look at it. I wasn’t completely destructive. I still took the water they brought me, but my hunger for freedom was stronger than any hunger pains I had to endure.
On day eight of my hunger strike, I laid myself out on the cool hardwood floor and tried to meditate the nausea away. The dizziness was hitting me in waves, but I knew I was close to making them crack. So close to having my freedom.
The night before, I’d heard Atlas scream at the guards when he noticed that my food hadn’t been touched again. It was the first reaction I’d gotten from any of them in almost two weeks, and with it, hope bloomed in my gut. They needed to think that I’d rather die than live like this because, in a lot of ways, being alone was killing me.
I closed my eyes as another pang of hunger hit my stomach. I could get through this, I just needed to be strong and distract myself. The first thought that came to my mind was to tell myself a story. It was what I did as a child, to help find peace at night after a tumultuous day with my mother.
