Page 59 of Web of Lies
I'm dazed. My head falls back with a hard, nauseatingthunk.
Then it's suddenly too late for me to do anything else because Larken screams and the last thing I see before he grabs my head to smash it on the floor is him whipping around to grin at her. She's still screaming when the room gives way to darkness.
Chapter Twenty-two
Larken
He's dead.
He isn't moving.
Is he breathing?
I can't tell and I can't stop screaming.
And this awful man is just standing there smiling at me while Shaun lays so still at his feet. It isn't fair. After what just happened between Shaun and I, it isn't fair.
“Hello, little wife,” he laughs. “Looks like you've been a bad girl. What's your husband going to think when he finds out you've had your legs spread for some common criminal?”
Adrian. He's here because of Adrian.
Oh god.
What about Wyatt?
“Are you going to stand there and cry?” he mocks, cocking his head and still smiling his disgusting smile. “Most people would run.”
“Where is Wyatt?”
He laughs again. “You don't need to worry about Wyatt. Or this little shit.” He looks down at Shaun's body crumpled at his feet and kicks him hard in the side where blood is beginning to pool darkly underneath him. Shaun doesn't wake up. He doesn't even move.
Oh god, oh god, oh god, oh god.
He's really dead. Wyatt is probably dead, too. And this monster is going to take me back to Adrian.
No.
I bolt for the door, running through splinters and broken glass with bare feet. I make it off the porch and down the stairs before a hand grabs a fistful of my hair and yanks me back. I lose my footing and fall backward, my arms flailing in wild circles as I try not to hit the ground. I switch gears and let myself hit the ground, trying to use the force of my weight going down to dislodge his hand. He doesn't let go and I reach back to dig my nails into his arm and whatever else I can reach. I am not going back to Adrian. I was only just beginning to feel safe again.
To feel like me again.
I'd rather die than go back to Adrian.
I spin, ignoring the pain of my hair being violently ripped from my scalp and kick at his knees with both feet. I hit one leg and he grunts as he staggers, but he doesn't fall. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I hear my father's voice yelling at me to go with the flow and I react on instinct. He tried his best to teach me self-defense tactics from the time I was a little girl, and one of the biggest things he tried to make stick was to go with the flow of the attack. If your attacker is pulling you toward them, go with it and turn it around and become the attacker yourself. I can't get his hand out of my hair, so I lean into his grip. His hold on my hair loosens but I don't take time to feel the small relief that it provides. I immediately bring up my knee, trying to make contact with his crotch.
He blocks it at the last second and yanks me upward, returning me to a standing position. “Fight all you want, little wife. It won't change anything. You'll be home sweet home in a few days. Just where you belong.”
“No!” I scream. “I'm not going back!”
He laughs at me and jerks hard on my hair, bringing me hard against his body and wraps his other hand around my arm in a bruising grip. “Come on, sweetheart. It's time to go.”
He half carries, half drags me across the grass and gravel that make up the driveway and further onto the road. My feet scrape across the rough pavement as I desperately fight against him. “Help!” I scream. “Please help me!” There are neighbors. They're not close, but they aren't far, either. “Help!” I scream again, then I remember something else my Dad told me and change my plea. “Fire! There's a fire!”
The man dragging me stops suddenly and pulls me into his chest facing away from him. His hand is huge and smells like stale, sour cigarettes when he covers the bottom half of my face with it. “If a single person comes outside, I will kill them and it will be your fault. I don't give a shit if it's a mommy, a granny, or somebody's baby sister. Do you understand me? Keep your fucking mouth shut.”
My fault.
It's my fault that Shaun and Wyatt are gone.
