Page 26 of Torment

“I don’t know!” she said, her frantic voice muffled by the fabric over her mouth.

“Wrong answer. Try again.” I added more water, then removed the fabric again. “How about now?”

“Mason, I swear, I’m not lying,” she choked out. “I don’t think I ever really stopped lov—”

With a roar of frustration, I picked up the bucket and dunked half of the cold water over her. “Stop it with that fucking shit!” I shouted. “I told you, I’m not gonna fall for your manipulation! Just answer the fucking question. Where is your father?”

She went quiet. I fixed the strip on her face and dripped the dishcloth on her again, my insides coiling with dark satisfaction as she writhed and spluttered.

“What do you have to say for yourself now?” I said in a warning tone, sliding the fabric away from her mouth yet again.

“Fuck you,” she spat.

Ah, there they were. Her true colors, finally showing themselves.

I slapped her. She moaned, head lolling dizzily to the side. With a sigh, I removed the fabric from her red face. She was about to pass out from hanging upside down for so long.

I swung the cross the right way around and watched as the blood drained away from her beautiful face. Her eyes were red-rimmed and puffy from all the crying, but she still hadn’t given in and told me anything I needed to know. She was withstanding everything I threw at her with steely resolve.

I suppose it was due to the years she spent being tortured and beaten at New Eden. Nearly a decade later, she was still used to it.

Frowning, I untied her and let her down from the cross, my mind whirling with frustration. Clearly, I needed a new strategy to get what I wanted from Jolie, but right now I couldn’t think of a damn thing.

I knew I’d come up with something eventually, though. One way or another, she was going to open that pretty pink mouth and spill all her secrets, and when that was done, I’d finally make her pay the price for her betrayal. Her sinful debt to me would be wiped out in flames.

It was exactly what she deserved, but for some reason, the thought no longer filled me with exuberant satisfaction like it used to. All I felt now when I imagined Jolie’s death at my hands was the same numbness that affected all the scarred areas on my face and body.

Lonely, empty, nothingness.

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