Page 41 of Villains and Vengeance
The back of his hand presses against my forehead. ‘Need to bring this fever down. I’ll give you a list.’
Time is nothing.I move in and out of dreams and nightmares, never fully waking up. My stomach hurts and it makes me writhe around, the thin blankets getting wrapped around me. I’m too hot and, at some point, I pull my jacket off, my sweatshirt too, tossing them to the floor.
They have me drink water at first and I think they’re trying to poison me because I throw it all back up. After that, it’s a bland broth and bitter powder, which makes me feel better, so I think it might be medicine. They argue around me, sometimes they shake me awake, but soon leave me alone when they realize nothing I say makes sense. I see worried faces from time to time, but they’re never there for very long.
I don’t knowhow many hours it’s been when I finally open my eyes and my brain is working semi-properly. I hear Iron and Maddox talking about there not being any time, but there are still a few days before the window is due to open, so I’m not sure what the hurry is.
Iron stomps over to the bed and I think about pretending to still be asleep, but their patience has run out.
He kicks the bed frame, jarring me.
‘Fevers broken,’ he grates out, ‘and your breathing is different. I know you’re awake, Victoria.’
I open my eyes slowly and see Maddox leave the room in my periphery. I wonder why. Surely he’d be interested to see the power Iron has like I remember them talking about before. Is that why he’s here? To compel me to tell him what they want to know?
My gaze moves to the fae-demon as I sit up. My arms feel better and I can move them again now, but I’m drained. The hole in my back doesn’t feel right and I wonder if it’s been infected. I try to put all my ailments to the back of my mind though. I need to focus. I’ve been mind-controlled before and when you know it’s coming, sometimes you can fight it.
Iron’s expression is stony, eyes not giving me anything to work with. That was one of the reasons I specifically avoided him at Maddox’s after I met him before. I knew cracking him would take time I didn’t have. But now I wish I’d tried, so I’d have some idea of how to deal with him.
He leans down a little and I have to make myself stay where I am. It’s hard. My very being is screaming at me to run. I feel like a rabbit being stalked by a coyote.
My eyes flick up to his and back down to the floor again. My hands, hell, my whole body is shaking. I look up at him again and see something in his eyes that wasn’t there before. Malice, but there’s desire too. Jayce wasn’t bluffing before. Ironishungry and, for some reason, hewantsme to run. He wants a reason to chase me.
‘Stop,’ I whisper, fighting my sudden urge to jump up and flee because I know he’s putting that desire into my head.
‘No.’
My bottom lip trembles. Fuck. I thought he only had a bit of lower fae in him. I had no idea he could do what the High Fae do. I underestimated himhard.
I can’t take it anymore! I’m like that pheasant inBambi.
I kick off the floor, my flight response making the action strong, so I roll backwards off the bed, springing to my feet on the other side and high-tailing it towards the exit.
I hear his low laugh. This was what he wanted.
He catches me as I get to the doorway, an arm around my waist. He lifts me off my feet and puts me back on the bed.
‘Try again,’ he goads.
I’m breathing hard, practically hyperventilating. My body, ravaged by illness, is dizzy and weak.
He’s watching me suffer, loving every second of it.
‘I don’t want to,’ I plead, wondering why he doesn’t just make me tell him what they want to know.
He’s playing with me that’s why, I think miserably.
‘Do it.’ He backs up a couple of steps, letting me try.
I can’t help it. Ihaveto run. But, this time, I leap onto the bed and I jump with everything I have, trying to get the height to grab onto the edge of one of the holes in the ceiling.
Miraculously, I catch one and gain purchase, getting my other hand up too. My legs flail as I try to pull myself up, the wound on my back screaming as the healing flesh is torn anew.
I look down at him. He hasn’t moved, doesn’t even look nervous. He knows this won’t work. He’s just watching me tire myself out.
I can’t admit defeat though, and, in one last ditch effort, I manage to heave myself up, getting my head through into the blessed darkness. But my bad side gives out and I lose my grip, dropping to the ground.
My feet hit the bed, but I tip sideways, my upper body falling hard onto the stone floor.
