Page 16 of The Piece You Stole

The same fingers return, angle my head again, and then something cool and soft presses on the right side of my throat. A bandage.

My eyes flicker but don’t want to open.

Hands shift me, and then cotton presses down on the left side of my throat. It doesn’t stop the ache or quiet the burn, but it’s the thought that counts.

A presence moves closer. Male. Definitely.

When lips touch mine, hope sinks its claws into me and drags the last of this desperate need to sleep away. “Kade?” I whisper.

I screamed for help, screamed it so loud that even at the top of a high-rise building, someone had to hear me. And rescue me.

Please let this be Kade come to save me.

His fingers whisper over my cheek, grip my chin, and jerk my head up so hard that I cry out.

I wrench my eyes open.

Nathan’s blue stare pierces me, the shock of it stopping my heart. “Time to get up, sleeping beauty. We have a date.”

No.

I don’t believe it.

I must have fallen from one nightmare into another,I tell myself.It was Kade. It had to be. He released me from my handcuff, bandaged my throat…kissed me.

This is a nightmare. I’m seeing Nathan when I should be seeing Kade. If I just close my eyes and re-open them it will be Kade or even Aden crouched beside me, nothim.

Nathan isn’t gentle, and he doesn’t know the meaning of tender. He would only release me from my handcuff if…my eyes slide past him and to the wall of glass.

Hours have passed. What was once a hazy but light-filled day is now a rich, inky night sky. There are no stars. There’s too much air pollution in the city for that, but that’s okay, there are plenty of neon signs, flashing bright, in place of the stars I think I’d rather have.

Is this the same day or a different day?

I can’t be sure.

And I can’t trust the man leaning on the wall of glass to tell me anything but lies and cruel things that kill pieces of my soul.

He’s dressed, the way he always is in a tailored white shirt and black dress pants, with his back against the glass, cell phone in hand, tap, tap, tapping away. As if he feels my attention, he raises his head, and his eyes lock on mine.

For the longest time, he doesn’t speak. Just stares blankly at me, and then he straightens before turning to Nathan. “One week.”

As he walks toward the bedroom door, it suddenly makes sense why he wouldn’t be in his office working from there, and why he’d want to be around to see me wake.

“I won’t change,” I call out, my voice still husky from sleep, or is it hoarse from screaming? “It doesn’t matter how many times you bite me; I will never change. You can control everything else but you can’t control this.”

But I don’t tell him to kill me because I want something more than I want to die. They killed my dad. Just because they haven’t admitted it, doesn’t mean it isn’t true. It feels as real to me as if someone had taken me by the hand and led me right to his body. He’s dead. Every part of me knows it as fact.

I’m not leaving this world until they pay for it.Bothof them.

Rylan doesn’t even slow.

Something acrid and bitter swirls in my gut, a sick churn I have to swallow hard so it doesn’t force its way up my throat the way it wants to.

Is this what it feels like to have hate eat its way out of you?

If I could get up, I would. But I can’t move. For me to be this sluggish, my head like someone stuffed it full of cotton wool means hours have passed. Maybe an entire day. Or more.

My neck flares bright hot if I twist my head more than an inch to the left or the right. As I sit with my back against the wall and my legs stretched out in front of me, I’m conscious that I’m naked and cold, but I don’t care about that anymore.

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