Page 96 of Their Cruel Love

“It must be two-thirty by now. If a message gets through, how long do you think?”

“Before they get here? I’m sorry, Phoebe. I don’t know. If we even had a boat to use temporarily…but anything to keep away from them. Anything.”

“The far side of the island. Past the hill and the ruins?” I take in his angular face, how the moonlight glances across the white streaks in his hair. I try to discern his eyes. It’s too dark out here, but I smile and bump my head into his solid shoulder. He grabs my hand and I close my eyes, inhaling the scent of this man. It’s a comfort I need. “If we go there, it will mean we’re boxed in.”

“Or we could hide inside that room.”

“The secret one?” I shiver. With the table and memories of what happened in there. The deaths. “I suppose. It would be the last place they’d look.”

“Also hard to escape from if they find us there.”

“The other side of the island then. Let’s go. They’re getting closer,” I whisper, and pull at his hand as I rise.

We sneak along, watching the ground, freezing when anyone seems close, then a flashlight arcs over the shrubs beside us then over our faces. I fling up an arm to shield my eyes, but my night vision is gone. Razor jerks me sideways and I stumble and run after him.

“There they are!”

“Stop or we shoot!”

“They won’t,” Razor rasps out. “They want us intact.”

Me. It’s me they want intact. Suddenly, I’m afraid for Razor more than for myself.

We pound along, risking falls and sprained ankles because stealth has lost its appeal.

The route to the right-hand side of the hill angles toward aridge where the trail runs but Razor has taken us leftward. We’re on a rougher part of the island where whatever flourishes is hardy and grows wild. Rocks and fallen branches are underfoot, and someone is using the path we recently left to sprint ahead of us.

“Where?” I gasp.

“Keep running. The sea?”

There is a crocodile there, but he knows this. His running slows, becomes ragged, stops. “Fuck.”

A wall of rock looms before us. Although before this I could see the blackness of it ahead, this is an impassable obstacle. A cliff rises toward the heavens.

We could go right again and hug the hill until we can ascend, but the men chasing us are also there. Their voices and the crackling of their shoes in leaves and gravel draw ever nearer. The way the land rises like a sword from the earth makes me suspect this hill is an ancient volcanic plug. To the left it’s a cliff that drops into the ocean. Far above there is where I once sat on Razor’s lap to be spanked.

Razor seems unsure of what to do, and I cannot blame him.

“Come.” I tug on his shirt. “Back to the resort. It’s the only choice.”

A thunder of feet and a much closer crack, as a branch snaps, makes us both spin to face whoever comes. Flashlights pin us to the darkness, blinding us. Two people stand there and two more walk in from the direction of the resort.

“Got them!” one of them yells.

The lights silhouette and halo at least two raised guns.

“Turn back around,” a man chugs out between his panting. “Hands at your back. We will shoot. Especially you, Razor. Her, we’ll just beat on until she cries.”

Panic tries to surge, a churning mish-mash of fear of being hurt and fear of dying, of strangers ruling me. I start to count to one hundred in my head. I drag in deep breaths, attempting some semblance of control of myself.

Panic is pointless. My heart still bashes away at my insides. My mouth is dry. My muscles stiff as I move.

Neither of us says anything. Words would only communicate despair. Though maybe Razor is trying to see an out, a way to escape.

I never find out. We turn and they cuff us both, their guns aimed and unwavering. Neck twisted, I look over my shoulder at them, trying to ID them, though all are just men I want to hate on, and when I get the chance, to kick and dismember. They throw me to the ground and hold me there, waiting for someone new to arrive. When they do, something is jabbed into my ass. I curse them, over and over, fuming as they laugh and pin me with their boots on my back and neck.

“Your mother will be getting such a surprise in her inbox,” someone says, sneering.

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