Page 3 of Promises in the Dark

But just when I was ready to give in, the bastard yanked me back, pulling me upright like a puppet. Air flooded my lungs, burning like acid, and my body spasmed with pain, but I was alive. Barely.

The darkness slipped away, but the agony didn’t. It stayed, digging into my soul.

I looked up at the prick towering over me, his grip loosened but still strong enough to remind me I was at his mercy. His eyes—those fucking empty eyes—bored into me, cold as ice.

“Not yet,” he hissed, his voice dripping with malice.

My fists clenched, body stiffening as I fought to stay conscious. His weight crushed me to the floor, every breath another slice of pain through my ribs. I couldn’t help it—I whimpered. A fucking whimper. But my voice was barely a sound. It wasn’t fear anymore, just pain. The kind that grinds you down until there’s nothing left but the will to keep fucking breathing.

I glared up at him with dead eyes, every breath an excruciating reminder of my mortality. I managed to suck in another painful breath, and forced out words through gritted teeth.

“You’ll have to try a hell of a lot fucking harder,” I wheezed, defiance lacing my voice, even though my body was begging for mercy.

My words hung in the air like a challenge, and he just stood there, his eyes still dead, breathing heavier now. That sick grin spread across his face again, eyes gleaming like ice picks ready to stab right through me.

“I was hoping you’d say that.”

His smile stretched wider, his breath foul as hell, choking me with its stench. My own breath came in short, painful bursts, every muscle in my body screaming in agony.

I glanced around, trying to piece together how the fuck I ended up in this shitstorm. Everything was a blur—chaos and violence all mashed together in my head. One minute I was on a mission, and now this lunatic was trying to choke the life out of me.

I could hear distant shouts, a rush of air past my ears, but it didn’t make sense. Nothing did. My head was spinning, vision a goddamn mess.

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to clear the fog in my brain. Darkness pressed in, my ribs aching, and a faint ringing buzzedin my ears. My throat throbbed from where that prick had nearly crushed it.

“Where’s my team?” I gasped, voice barely a whisper.

“They’re dead.” The words hit like a hammer to my gut, knocking the breath out of me. I tried to inhale, but the bastard’s grip on my throat made it impossible. Pain ripped through my chest.

“All of them,” he hissed, leaning closer, “and there’s not a goddamn thing you can do about it.”

His dead eyes bore into me, the weight of his words crashing down like a ton of bricks. My mind spiraled out of control, faces of my team flashing before my eyes, broken bodies, shattered lives. The prick’s words echoed in my head, mocking me, suffocating me under their weight.

Rage started to boil up inside me, the kind of fury that makes you want to tear the world apart. It surged through me like wildfire.

I glared up at him, my eyes burning with hate. “You want me to talk?” I growled. “How about you ask something fucking worth answering, like why your mom was such a cheap whore, or why you turned out to be such a sad, pathetic piece of shit?”

His face twitched with anger, but before he could react, I heard it—a sudden rush of air past my ears.

Then everything exploded.

The blast hit out of nowhere, shrapnel flying through the air. Smoke filled my lungs, thick and suffocating, burning like acid. I coughed, choking on it, my vision blurring in the sudden bright flash of light.

Screams echoed around me, but they were distant, like I was hearing them from underwater. I tried to stand, but the pain in my ribs was unbearable, each breath a dagger in my chest.

It was too late for forgiveness, not that I gave a fuck about that. I never prayed, and I wasn’t about to start now.

Religion was bullshit anyway. If God was real, He didn’t give a rat’s ass about what happened to us out here. He wasn’t gonna stop my team from getting slaughtered, and He sure as hell wasn’t gonna bring these sick bastards to justice.

I’d been a sinner from day one, my soul rotten as fuck, and I was fine with that. It gave me purpose—a reason to keep fighting, to survive. To live with the darkness inside me.

I let out a bitter, ragged laugh, the sound barely a wheeze. In that split second before the darkness swallowed me whole, I felt the sharp burn of a bullet tearing through my flesh, the pain ripping through my body like lightning. My head spun, thoughts racing in a frantic attempt to stay conscious.

But reality slipped away, and all that was left was darkness.

I was going straight to hell.

And I couldn’t fucking wait.

---