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Day 92
IAM SWATHEDin silence.
The type of silence that has you wondering if you have succumbed to the darkness for good.
It’s peaceful here, and after experiencing nothing but noise for the past ninety-two days, I never want to leave. But as a voice flashes in and out of the abyss, demanding I wake the fuck up and fight, I know this reprieve is only short-lived.
“He’s alive…I know where he is…and I need your help to get him out.”
Those words play on a loop, taunting me with everything they represent. It’s hard to believe they’re true, and a big part of me believes this is Zoey’s revenge. She knowsthisis the only thing she could do that would really hurt me beyond repair.
She’s insulted me, hacked off my hair, and beaten me until I bled, but each blow was nothing compared to this. This is what I’ve wanted to hear since I witnessed something so horrifying, it changed my world forever.
I’m afraid. I’m afraid of every possible outcome.
If Zoey is lying and I accept her words as truth, I don’t think I can handle losing him again. On the flipside, if what she saysisthe truth, then God help him. Her statement has me believing that wherever he is, he’s there against his will.
It’s getting harder and harder to breathe, and the tattoo on my flank begins to burn, singeing his name onto my very soul.
“I don’t have time for this. Wake the hell up!”
“Calm down!”
“Don’t tell me what to do! You gave up that right the moment you traded me in for a shinier toy.”
“Do you blame me? You’re fucking insane! You blew up my house!”
The atmosphere contains so much tension, I’m certain it will explode in seconds. But would that be such a bad thing? I’ve known nothing but sorrow with glimmers of hope since this nightmare began, so maybe ending it all wouldn’t be so dire.
But his image, combined with his words as well as everything he did to save me, crashes into me, and I know there is no choice. All of this can’t have been for nothing because I’ve been given a second chance. A second chance to make this right and savehimthis time.
Hurdling over the roadblocks in my mind, I stagger toward the finish line because it’s time I won this race once and for all. The man whose name burns my very existence is all the fuel I need to pry open my heavy eyelids and gauge where I am.
I’m lying on the cold floor of a small room,myroom. Since I literally had no other place to go, this room has been my sanctuary. I’m a fugitive. We all are.
As I meet the steel blue eyes of my once captor, everything comes to light, and I wince. If it wasn’t for him, none of this would have happened. But on the other hand, if he had never brought me into his world, I wouldn’t have met the man who shook my world beyond repair.
And that man is…Saint.
“Where—” I inhale and exhale deeply as I come to a shaky, half-sitting position. “Where is…he?”
The room falls silent, and if I didn’t know any better, I’d say everyone thought I was dead.
Aleksei Popov, once the most feared man in Russia, has now become the most wanted. And that’s thanks to his former plaything blowing his castle to smithereens. “Are you all right?”
When he tries to help me stand, I wave him off, not interested in his help. He’s done enough.
Sara, my only friend, bites her nails as she watches on nervously. I can only imagine what being here does to her. It’s because of Alek, her former “boss,” that the man she loved is now dead. That she isn’t throttling him to death reveals she’s a bigger woman than I am.
“Are you sure you’re not going to faint again?” And that leaves the last gameplayer.
Zoey Hennessy—Saint’s sister, my arch-nemesis, and all-around psychotic bitch.
“Fuck you,” I spit in a winded breath as I wearily come to a hunched stance.
Zoey stands her ground with her arms folded over her chest. How she’s changed from when I saw her last. From when she was Alek’s pet.
“Just making sure,” she quips with a slanted grin while I grit my teeth. “Are you ready for the truth?”
