Page 60 of Thirst Trap (Carter Brothers)

“DPD!” was yelled loudly over the top of my prone body. “Get down!”

I was already down.

I was stunned.

I didn’t know which way was up.

And not one, but two people stepped on me as they entered what was once my home.

Cops.

Cops in riot gear.

Cops in all black.

Carrying weapons.

Aiming those weapons at us.

Some of them also had shields out, as if they were going to war.

“There’s no one else here but us!” I heard Costas yell loudly.

I rolled up onto my side and watched as the house was literally torn apart by the men coming inside, still stunned.

I felt a trickle of warmth roll down the center of my forehead, and I vaguely wondered if I was bleeding.

The pain I should’ve been feeling after being rammed by the goddamn door was nonexistent, like always. The bane of my existence.

In the periphery, Costas tried to run but was caught before he could make it a few feet.

Costas was thrown onto his stomach, and a man wearing nothing but black, even a black headdress, followed him down, straddling his body.

A man carrying a battering ram turned and knocked my Nonna’s prized plate off the wall, and I lost it.

“No,” I cried, trying to find my feet. “Please, please be careful.”

Before I could get up, though, I was flipped over onto my belly.

My face, the part that had just hit the door when it was thrown open in front of me, was smashed into the ground.

I felt my hands dig into pieces of glass from the stained glass front door, and felt a sense of grief overwhelm me at the thought of never seeing the stained glass door again.

Someone dug their knee into my back, and I groaned as all the air whooshed out of me.

Wheezing now, I said, “I’m not going to move. I promise.”

There was an evil, almost delusional chuckle above me, and then someone roughly whipped me over onto my back. Using my hair.

Pressure at my scalp was the only indication of what had just happened.

That’s when I looked up and saw a smirking Elliette standing over me.

She’d taken pride in hurting me again.

“Don’t hurt me, please,” I pleaded. “I won’t do anything.”

“You already tried, Soleada.” She rolled her eyes. “But you won’t be trying to do that again, now will you?”

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