Page 83 of Deadmen's Queen

I felt a searing pain in my back as he plunged the knife in again, twisting it sharply, making me cry out with the pain.

The masked figure stepped back, allowing me to crumple onto the kitchen tiles. My body convulsed as pain rippled through me with each ragged breath I drew. My eyes flickered towards Paige's limp form. Panic clawed at me, tearing through the haze of agony that shrouded my mind.

“She was never yours,” The masked man's voice was cruelly calm, his words slicing deeper than any blade. “She always belonged to me, and you ruined her.”

“No…” The protest was barely more than a whisper, lost amidst his dark chuckle.

“You did!” he hissed, grabbing my hair and yanking me up. “She was so pretty and pure and you… you took her and destroyed her!” The knife sank into my chest again and again as he screamed at me.

“She was mine and you fucked her! Now all I get is the scraps. Now all she’s good for is fucking and bleeding.”

“No,” I hissed again, struggling against the darkness closing in around my vision. “Leave her... alone.” But my words were nothing more than a choked gasp, my body shuddering with pain.

He leaned down close, the mask next to my face. I hung weakly in his grasp, barely managing to stay conscious, my eyes fixed on the blonde hair soaked in blood.

“I’ll take your scraps, boy. Do you know you can fuck a girl to death? Do you know how they can beg for it?”

Tears ran down my face, the despair more painful than any other wound he’d inflicted.

“Please…” I whispered.

His icy, deranged laughter echoed around the kitchen as he dropped me onto the cold tiles. I tried to fall on my hands and knees, but my palms slipped in my blood, and I fell, hitting the tiles hard.

Dimly, I heard him move behind me, dragging something heavy across the floor, then my heart stopped as he came back towards me. I fought back the urge to beg him not to hurt me again. He didn't. Instead, he dragged a couple of cloths across the tiled floor, soaking up my blood, before turning and walking away, taking the cloths with him. The blessed sound of his footsteps disappearing down the hall, and the slam of the front door had me crying with relief. I could barely lift my head but a flash of blonde in my peripheral vision told me he hadn’t taken her with him.

“Paige?”

There was nothing, just silence. I couldn’t even hear if she was breathing or not.

“Paige?” I choked out her name, my voice barely a whisper as tears ran down my face.

Panic gripped me again, choking me with its intensity.

I had to do something. I had to save her.

Focusing on keeping my eyes open, I slowly reached down, searching for my phone in my pocket. It took several agonising moments to unlock it, the blood on my hands preventing my fingerprint scanner from working, but I forced myself to lick the blood away, and finally the screen unlocked.

The background was a picture of Paige from Christmas crouched down in the snow, playing with Max, her blonde curls tumbling out from under a cream hat, her face flushed pink from the cold. My vision was growing dark, and the image blurred. Pain harsher than anything I’d ever known enveloped me at the thought that I might never get to see that smile again, and I had to take an excruciating breath to steady myself enough to call Bast. I dropped the phone onto the floor next to my face, unable to hold it up any longer. The screen glowed bright, blinding me momentarily, before I dragged my hand up enough to swipe the call icon for Bast’s number.

Please answer.

One ring. Two. Three.

“Please,” I whispered.

“Blake.”

“Bast,” I croaked.

“Hello? Tris?”

I focused on sliding my fingers under the phone and lifting it up closer to my mouth.

“Bast,” I whispered into the speaker, my voice choked with pain. “Paige...blood...Stalker...”

“What? Tris, are you ok? Where are you? Tristan?”

With a weak groan, I collapsed onto my side, the phone slipping from my bloody fingers to clatter onto the cold tiles. In the silence that followed, the only sound was the grotesque gurgling of blood pooling in my mouth.

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