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“I’m beginning to understand that,” I reply with a respectful nod.
“Carrick and Konrad should cover the back exit,” Arden cuts in, moving to stand. “The rest of you spread out amongst the booths.
“Lucky for us, this place ain’t got huge glass windows and the bastards can’t see inside easily, because there’s no way I’d be stepping into an empty cafe. Talk about fucking alarm bells,” Beast remarks.
“You could always pretend to be the waiter,” Leon suggests with a perfectly straight face.
“Funny, mate. Funny.”
“Positions,” Arden instructs, his voice strained as he steps behind the pillar right next to the front entrance, even less entertained by the jokes and banter as Carrick and I.
He’s the most vulnerable where he is, and when I look over at him there’s a tightness around his mouth and eyes that worries me. I narrow my eyes on him. “What is it?” I ask.
“Nothing that can’t wait,” he replies, dismissing my concerns as we all take up our positions and wait for the buyers. Once they’re dealt with, we can take their place and get Cyn back.
Less than ten minutes later, a group of eight men enter the cafe.
The second the last man enters, Arden has a gun pressed to the back of his head and is kicking the heavy wooden door shut behind him.
“What the fu–?” the man begins, only to be silenced by a bullet ripping through the back of his skull, brain, blood and bone exploding out of the front of his face.
Then all hell breaks loose.
12
Cyn
Groaning, I try to blink back the pain throbbing in what feels like every inch of my body as Soren shoves me back into the room I’ve been sharing with Faith. Bruises bloom across my skin and the right side of my ribcage aches where he punched me so hard I felt bone break.
“Cyn!” Faith cries as I stumble into the room, her wide eyes falling on me as she sits up in bed. “I’ve been so worried–”
Fear swims in her eyes as she watches me push up from the floor, her gaze lifting from me to Soren.
“I’m okay,” I manage to say, before Soren reaches over and grabs my hair, pulling the strands so hard I feel some of them rip from my scalp.
“You have a day to recover before the fun really starts,” Soren sneers, shoving me towards the bed, strands of hair falling from his fingers like confetti.
Faith moves towards me, but I shake my head, warning her with my eyes not to help me. We both know that if Soren thinks her condition has improved to a level he’s satisfied with, she’ll be back in his private quarters, and this time her baby might not survive his abuse.
“I have matters to deal with in preparation for the celebration, and our visitors, so why not take one of your potions and recuperate,” he says with an evil smirk, eying the ingredients and equipment on the trestle table in the corner of the room. “I’m sure there’s something you can use to help with the pain,witch.”
He turns to leave but I push myself upright, ignoring the way my head spins and my vision blurs, and move towards the table. Reaching for the vial of dark brown liquid, I hold it out to him and croak, “For the girl.”
My voice is hoarse from my bruised throat and windpipe where he squeezed so hard I honestly thought he’d kill me. Soren drops his gaze from my face to my hand and smirks.
“I don’t think so.”
I take another step forward, hating what I’m about to say but doing it anyway. “Please.”
Snatching the bottle from my hand, he eyes it before twisting his torso and throwing it against the wall opposite. It smashes into tiny pieces, the contents splattering against the wall.
“I said no!” he retorts, rounding on me, his green eyes flaring with hatred and a sick kind of power.
“She will suffer,” I grind out, refusing to shed a tear in front of him.
“There’s no kindness permitted within these walls,” he says, sneering at me before his gaze settles on Faith behind me. “Theonlyreason she’s alive is because she’s carrying my son. I don’t give a fuck about the vessel, only what I can get out of it. That applies to every woman here, including you.”
I grit my teeth so hard together that I can feel a tooth chip, but I refuse to retaliate with words, knowing that’s exactly what he wants. Instead I give him a wall of silence, expressing my disgust and hatred with my eyes.
