Page 39 of Bitter Rivals (Bitterwood Elites)

“That’s a good girl,” he purrs, still staring at me as he threads his fingers into her hair—then the panel slams shut in my face.

Furious and frustrated, I turn back to the hallway and slap Royce hard across the face, taking my anger out on him. He isn’t prepared for it and holds his cheek, staring at me in utter shock. “Shut the fuck up. Do you want the whole fucking school to hear?” Royce opens his fat, stupid mouth to answer, but I just shove past him. “The question was rhetorical, you moron.”

Pushing him aside, I stand in front of the open panel, looking into vast darkness. Wafting back at me is a smell so potent, so thick and insidious, that I almost lose the contents of my stomach—there’s only one thing that makes a putrid odor like this.

“What is that?” Ben asks, peeking inside.

My poor friend, even he doesn’t realize what lurks ahead for us in the dark.

I step inside and turn back, flicking my gaze from Ben to Royce. “It’s our destiny.”

Stretching my arms out to my sides, I glide my fingers along a narrow hallway, sliding my feet forward one at a time in case the floor gives way or I find a new obstacle to face. “Close the panel,” I bark.

“But—” Royce starts to complain.

I turn back and level him with a sinister sneer. “Now!”

Hands shaking, the fucking pussy licks his lips but does what he’s told. Good. He’s learning quickly I’m not one to be fucked with. As it clicks shut, the light from the hallway fades, leaving us in complete darkness.

“It’s locked,” Royce’s voice shakes, the rattling of the door handle sounding. “Fucking panel is locked!”

The disgust in Ben’s voice is clear as he lowers his tone, the threat clear when he rumbles, “Why were you trying to leave, Royce? You practically begged us to be a part of this team.”

“I… I…”

“You what?” Ben waits for an answer as I smile into the darkness, the smell becoming more foul, more oppressive. Royce doesn’t answer, but his heavy breathing indicates his terror.

Pussy.

Sliding my feet across the floor, my toes sneak over an edge and I lower my foot to find a step. “Stairs ahead, be careful.” My warning is more for Ben than Royce. That asshole can fall down an entire flight and break his neck for all I care. Finally, my searching fingers clasp a banister, making me feel more grounded. I lower my feet carefully, ensuring that each stair is in fact there before lowering the weight of my entire body onto that foot.

Down we move, one step at a time, the air around us growing colder. Quiet sniffles reach us from beyond followed by the loud gagging of someone puking. When the stairs end, a red light flickers on up ahead, and I get my first view of the room we’ve emerged in.

“It’s a morgue.” Ben’s statement comes from behind me, and he’s right.

Straight ahead are rows of metal doors with handles, the refrigerator system that keeps dead bodies ‘on ice.’ The red light flickers off and on again as my eyes trail down the sides of the room to where wheeled gurneys proudly display the rotting bodies of the dead. There must be a dozen—maybe more—partially dismembered, blank eyes staring off into whatever eternity awaits them.

One girl has a bear trap clamped tightly on her leg, her slackened jaw hanging open in a perpetual scream as maggots crawl in and out of her mouth. Another body is missing its head, the naked male body covered in huge bites and long gashes with his dick bitten off, flies buzzing happily around him.

I swallow hard, trying to calm my queasy stomach but struggle as bile rises in the back of my throat. A thud sounds, and I turn to find a leg has detached from its body and has dropped to the floor, a sickening ooze leaking from it.

I shake my head, trying to right myself. “Okay, look for red tags and find ‘em fast. We don’t want to be in here any longer than we have to.”

Ben starts opening up the morgue’s freezer doors as a voice calls out in the darkness. “Help me.”

Pausing, I hold my fist up, stopping Ben and Royce.

The voice sounds again. “Help me, please.”

Turning to look at Ben, he nods towards the open space on my right, just past rows of deceased. We edge forward, my breath stuck in my lungs as we enter the larger part of the morgue and come upon a gruesome sight. Lying on a gurney is a man.

Well...what’s left of him.

His legs are missing below the knee, and tourniquets are strangling his thighs to staunch the bleeding. His arms are chopped off at the shoulder, the stumps seemingly burned to stop blood flow. He’s naked, his flesh covered in open, festering wounds and deep bruises of varying colors that would indicate prolonged torture. A huge gash runs down the center of his stomach, the jagged skin crudely sewn back together, making me wonder what the hell they did to his insides.

His short dark hair is matted in blood, and his brown eyes are sunken into his face, lips dry and cracked. A collar is tightly clenched around his neck, inward spikes penetrating his skin. A leather harness is buckled around his chest and snakes down between his legs where an insidious looking contraption is clamped around his tiny cock.

“Help me,” he repeats, lower lip trembling as Royce runs off to puke, loudly evacuating his stomach.

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