Page 28 of Serpent King's Prisoner

“Damn it!” The curse slipped out as I reached for her again. This time, there was no holding back. One hand clamped around her throat, not enough to crush, but enough to show I meant business. The other hand drew my gun, the cold metal a stark reminder of what was at stake.

“Look at me,” I commanded, forcing her gaze up.

Her eyes, those striking green windows, locked onto mine. Not just any eyes, but the kind that had seen too much and still managed to hold a spark of life. They were fierce, unyielding, and in them, I saw the reflection of a soul that refused to be tamed.

I should have pulled the trigger. It was the rule of our world: you see something you shouldn’t, you pay the price. But the price tonight seemed too steep, too irreversible. As I peered into her eyes, a silent battle waged within me.

Could I snuff out that spirit, that challenge?

“Abby...” I started, but the sentence hung between us, unfinished.

Her throat constricted under my grip, but she didn’t squirm or plead. Instead, her voice was calm and sure, cutting through the tension like a knife. “You won’t do it,” Abby said, her breath warm against my skin. “You’re not going to hurt me.”

I froze, the gun heavy in my hand but suddenly feeling as light as air. No one had ever looked at me quite like that—like they saw something worth sparing. It was a foreign sensation, unsettling yet not entirely unwelcome. In the underworld I called home, trust was more valuable than gold and just as rare.

“Trust me,” she whispered, and there was something about the way she said it—no fear, no doubt—that made me pause. That confidence, where did it come from? How could she be so sure when she was staring down the barrel of my gun?

Then the sound of footsteps echoed in the distance. Alex and Knuckles. My mind raced with the possibilities of their return. They couldn’t find her here, not like this. It would mean death for us both—her for witnessing, and me for hesitating.

In a split second, I made my choice. The butt of my gun connected with her temple, and she crumpled without a sound. Her body went limp in my arms, a silent accusation of what I’d done.

She trusted me, and I knocked her out cold.

“Sorry,” I muttered, though the word felt hollow even to my own ears. As I scooped her up, preparing to move her before the others arrived, I knew this was only the beginning. Abby had sparked something within me, a question I wasn’t ready to answer.

But for now, survival was the only thing that mattered.

I glanced back at the darkened alley, the shadows stretching long and ominous. The night was far from over, and I had a feeling that once Abby woke up, we’d have more than a few words to exchange.

Chapter Fifteen: Abby

Iwas waking up.

It should have been a relief.

It wasn’t. I had never been more scared in my life.

The pounding in my head was relentless, a drummer gone mad against the inside of my skull. I blinked open my eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling, the early morning light creeping in through curtains I didn’t recognize. My brain felt like it was wrapped in cotton, thoughts emerging sluggish and disjointed as I tried to make sense of where I was.

“Stay down,” a deep male voice commanded from somewhere in the room. I…knew who it was, and it sent a shiver down my spine. His voice snapped me back to reality, or at least as much as my concussed mind could muster. I couldn’t place the voice, but I knew that I knew it, and there was no mistaking the authority behind it.

I obeyed without thinking, lying flat again as a wave of dizziness threatened to pull me under. The nausea that followed was a sharp reminder of my vulnerability, that whatever happened last night had left me in this state. As I fought off the urge to vomit, fragments of memory started piecing themselves together—a mosaic of horror that I wished I could forget.

I saw it all again: the flower shop’s backroom, the stark finality of a lifeless body sprawled on the floor. An unidentified man leaving with some guy as if they hadn’t just exited a scene straight out of hell. Then there was Nate—or whoever he really was—covered in crimson, his hands methodically dismembering what once was a person. My breath hitched at the recollection, every detail etched into my mind with sickening clarity.

Abby, I reminded myself silently. Keep it together.

My training at Quantico hadn’t prepared me for this—not really. No amount of simulations or case studies could have simulated the cold dread that filled my veins now. I had to stay alert, play it smart if I wanted a chance to get out of this alive. I had to remember who I was—an FBI agent, not just a scared girl in over her head.

Even if I was also that.

Taking a steadying breath, I focused on the present, trying to anchor myself in the now rather than the terrors of last night. I was wearing an oversized t-shirt, not the dress I’d been knocked out in. A minor detail, but one that told me someone had changed my clothes. That someone had cared enough to do that—or maybe it was just a necessity for them.

Maybe it was just a necessity for him.

“Who are you?” I dared to ask, my voice a mix of fear and feigned ignorance, hoping to gain some insight into the man who seemed to hold my life in his hands.

“You know who I am, Abby,” he said. He sounded tired.

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