Page 612 of Rage

“I’ve been waiting to have a second alone with you.” His feral grin covers his scarred face and I cringe, writhing beneath him as he pins my arms to my chest. “Lucky for me, I don’t have to waste my time with clothes since you’re not wearing much.” He chuckles, removing his belt with one hand and wrapping it around my wrists.

“FUCK YOU!” I spit, my saliva landing on his face. His fist meets my jaw, the pain travelling from the side of my face to my nose as he hits me again.

“I don’t mind doing this with you unconscious,” he says, hitting me again with a closed fist, my eye swelling up almost immediately as blood runs to the back of my throat. “In fact, I prefer it.”

“Stop!” Hope’s voice is like a beam of light to me right now as I struggle to open my one good eye, my hands working to tear off another piece of my outfit.

A gun sounds, then another when I finally tear off a piece of mirror, wedging it into his chest and toppling him over.

“MOTHER FUCKER!” I climb over him, grabbing the gun from his hand as he groans in pain, clutching at his chest. Aiming it between his eyes, I watch the terror in his build. “I’ll see you in hell, you sick fuck.” His head thumps onto the ground as the bullet enters his brain.

My legs barely lift me to my feet, and I stumble. “H-hope?”

I turn around to blood pooling on the dirt beneath Hope as she grasps at nothing, her breathing shallow.

“Hope,” my voice shakes as I kneel before her, the pounding in my head now a faint buzz compared to the pounding in my chest. “No, no, no, no.” The blood on my hand mixes with hers as she struggles to speak, one hand clutching the bullet wound in her belly.

“M-make...them...pay.”

Chapter Five

Elias Cross

When you plead insanity, there is no erasing that from your history. It’s embedded in it forever. Which is why no one ever does...because to plead insanity, youmustbe insane.

You can’t fake it.

I know because some try and as soon as they see what's in store for the insane here, they beg for the system to imprison them instead.

It was easy escaping that place. The guards aren’t the smartest or maybe they just haven’t met anyone smarter than them. I left in the night, when they were all in a meeting discussing whatever the fuck they were, I snatched the pass off one of the nurse’s trolleys as they all assumed we were all drugged off our heads, asleep. Threw on a white coat and walked out of the fucking place without anyone blinking at me twice.

Headlights approach from ahead and as they get closer, the truck slows to a stop and rolls the passenger window down.

“Aren’t you far from home?” a man likely in his forties asks.

“Get out of the truck.” I walk around to the driver's side and step up to open the door.

“Are you fucking crazy, man?”

“Just fled from an asylum actually.” I pull him out of the truck, he yells as his body hits the ground and I take his seat.

Blood. Pain. No mercy.

I’m coming for you, Liam Schneider.

The hours don’t feel like hours anymore, even the four I’ve spent driving this heavy fucking truck down a road more deserted than a cemetery at night. Funny, when you’re free time doesn’t feel as important, until it’s being taken from you. Squinting, I try to make sense of the image in front of me and as I get closer, I stop.

Two bodies.

One in the passenger seat of the car and the other on the ground.

Don’t involve yourself, Elias.

The voice in my head sometimes has my wellbeing in mind, but the other voice always wins.

Aren’t you curious?

Stepping out of the truck, I scan the area and as I make my way around the car, I spot a woman in a pool of blood when something presses against the back of my head.

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