Page 8 of Beloved Sacrifice

A woman crying. “So much blood. I don’t know what to do.”

Caden’s blood.

Then the godforsaken flight attendant, who didn’t know and didn’t care that Caden was dying, dead. “Ma’am, we’re about to take off. You must end your call and put your phone on airplane mode. Ma’am?”

Her phone slid to the floor. Fingers and lips numb. Cold. Cold all over. Numb.

She didn’t cry.

She’d listened to him die. Sat still, silent, and cold all through the flight to Boston.

She’d landed and then…

Then the grief took over. Pain and disbelief and revenge. Revenge. She’d taken her revenge on the trinity who’d killed Caden and on the Trinity Masters.

She’d been ready to die, in that tunnel deep underground, a fitting tomb, but…

But she’d been pulled out. Put in a van, then on a plane.

Everything was coming back now, and events were starting to reorder in her mind. That had been days ago. She’d woken up the first time tied to a chair and seen…

“Who are you?” Her voice was ragged and scratchy, a blindfold covered her eyes.

No reply.

“Where am I?”

Her wrists were bound to the arms of a chair. The familiar feeling of rope and the restriction of bondage triggered her submissive training. She fought against it.

“Where?” Laughter. Male. Rough. Gritty. “You’re not in Kansas anymore.”

“Devon?” She must have been captured by the Trinity Masters. The voice wasn’t Juliette’s, and Devon was the next most likely person. Plus, there was something familiar about it.

No answer.

“Where am I?” she asked again.

“Keep your voice down.”

Behind her blindfold, her eyes closed. She dipped her chin submissively. “Yes, Sir,” waited on her lips, and Rose hated herself for it.

The blindfold loosened and fell away. When Rose could focus, she looked up. It couldn’t be. “I thought you were dead.”

“Dead? Maybe I am.”

In between one breath and the next, it all became too much. Rose yanked against the ropes, screaming and crying. Her head felt like it was going to split open. She closed her eyes and screamed—the pain needed an outlet.

A familiar rubbery sphere was forced between her teeth. A ball gag.

No. No. Don’t make me keep the pain in. I can’t hold it inside anymore.

The gag muffled but didn’t stop her screams, but when a strong, rough hand caught her jaw, that familiar voice hissing at her to be quiet, she shut down. The part of her that was Rose tucked up into a corner of her mind, safe there. She let the training take over. She went still and quiet. Obedient and waiting.

“Rose, I have to leave you alone. I don’t want to, but there are too many things going on right now.”

A small click and then a prick of pain in her leg. Then sweet, numbing sleep took her.

Rose opened and closed her mouth, testing her jaw muscles, which seemed none the worse. He must have taken the gag out right away. There was a sore spot on her thigh from the needle. After that, she’d woken a few times in this small room. Once, she’d woken and he’d been there, helping her to the bathroom, urging her to eat. When she woke alone, she’d sipped from a bottle of water left for her then turned over, closed her eyes, and gone back to sleep.

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