Page 89 of Resisted

SILAS

The scream torefrom my throat before I could stop it. The pain was so fucking intense that for a moment, my eyesight blanked out before it roared back to life with vivid colors dancing in spots every time I blinked. My breath was staggered when I inhaled, sounding wet when it was released.

“So a burning hot rod to the abdomen is what makes you cave? Days and I swore I would never hear you scream in agony, yet here we are. I finally broke you.” The fucker, Russ, sounded almost proud of himself. I knew he would pay.

“It’s just a scratch,” I said on a groan, but my vision was already growing weaker as I fought not to pass out.

“Then you wouldn’t mind if I tore it out?” Before I could even gather the energy to open my eyes, pain ripped through my body as he removed the burning rod that had already cauterized the wound and healed in place.

The shout of torture echoed off the brick walls around me, and my vison grew black on the edges, ready to take me under.Do not… Do. Not. Pass out, I yelled in my mind, but I knew I was fighting a losing battle. My body had grown weak. The abuse over the last few days was extensive. My vision was fading, and though I knew I would heal from this wound, I might not from the next one. I’d lost a lot of blood over the past few days, more than I would’ve liked to admit, and I was fucking weak like a damn newborn pup, barely able to use my own fucking limbs.

Do. Not. Pass. Out.

Fuck. I blinked, trying to force myself to remain conscious, but it was no use. I was being pulled under by the pain-free allure the blackness offered, and even though my mind fought it, my body was ready to have the relief.

My eyes fluttered before drifting closed. Then they popped back open at what I swore was Bella’s voice in my head. It couldn’t be, could it? She would have to be close enough to communicate with me, and the boys wouldn’t have been fucking stupid enough to bring her along. And to communicate with your mates? She would have had to accept us, and she—

Silas, where the fuck are you?

Fuck, her voice sounded amazing. I fought against the smile that was threatening to curl my lips and lost.

“What the fuck is so funny?”

I blinked again, remembering that I wasn’t with her. I was here. Probably hallucinating. Maybe I was closer to dead than I’d thought.

“Only thing…” I took a breath, and it wheezed, “funny is how fucking ugly you are.”

Where are you? Come on, answer me, Silas.Her voice broke through the fog in my brain again, and I froze, my body taut, as I really questioned my sanity.We’re here.

The iron rod, coated in my blood, struck across my cheek so fast, my head whipped to the side, but I didn’t feel the pain. I was numb to it. My mind was solely on the words that drifted through me in the sweet melody of Bella’s voice.We’re here.I knew in my core that someone was here for me. I could feel them. I heard the shots in the distance and felt the disturbance in the air. But Bella? My spicy little slice of heaven?

Belladonna?

My communication was weak, but then again, I wasn’t convinced that I wasn’t hallucinating. Didn’t people hear or see what they wanted most in the minutes, the very last moment, before they died? Maybe I was truly a goner, because the fates knew Bella was the one thing I wanted most, even if it took me too fucking long to figure it out. I might be too late, and if I was, I could only hope she knew the truth.

You can hear me?

The question came through, and I might’ve already been close to death, but not close enough to not hear my own thoughts.

Yeah. I hear you, Belladonna.My soul would always hear you.

There was a pause, one that stretched on so long, I questioned if I’d really heard anything at all or if it was my consciousness jumping rope from lucidity to insanity. Then the sweet, calming melody drifted back to me, and my heart jumped with the possibility that this was real.

We need to know where you are.

This was a trick, this had to be a fucking trick.Who?

Had they injected me with something? Was it screwing with my mind? Maybe it was the blows to the skull that had finally fucked me up.

Vincent and Gage.

I blinked a few times, my eyelids feeling like lead. Staying awake was becoming harder by the second, and I worried that if this were a dream, some sort of figment of my imagination, that if I closed my eyes, I might never wake up. If that were the case, what would be the harm in giving away the information they wanted? I looked around me, trying to figure out where I was, but the surroundings were bleak. The information I could provide wouldn’t be that helpful. But maybe they could make more of it than I could.

I’m in a room.

I squeezed my eyes closed tight, then popped them back. Laughter erupted. “He’s pathetic. Is the big bad wolf going to pass out?”

Maybe? “Fuck off.”

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