Chapter18
West
Come on. Come on.
The longer it took for the red light, the more anxious I became. I stalked the small room like the predator I was. Causing mayhem was the only thing I cared about. Blood. Death. I craved both, but even it wasn’t enough. There was only one person I wanted to kill. Where I had looked forward to it before, it was only a speck of what was going through my mind.
Eleven would pay. I was certain of that. I knew he was still in the room. I’d waited and watched for the guards to retrieve him and so far they hadn’t. He was mine. As for my plans afterward …
An evil smile came as I kept my focus on the small window that sat in the door.
Come on. Come on.
The phrase repeated—a mantra mixing amongst my madness.
They were going to kill me. Maybe not today. Maybe not next week or even next month. But eventually, the Main Masters would want me disposed of. They were traitors. All of them. I’d demanded Master Kunken’s council, but they just laughed and said something about him being gone. Dead? It appeared so. I was doomed. There was only one person who could save me. It didn’t matter that it was her fault I was here. Everleigh would set me free. If she looked inside herself and realized she loved me more than she hated me, she’d put them in their place. Then, we could leave here. Fuck Whitlock. Fuck these Masters. Together, we could try to live a normal life. Well, if one considered us normal. On the outside, we could appear like everyone else. Behind closed doors was a different story. We could do this. I could control the urges. I fucking had to if I wanted us to be happy.
“Hurry. Up!”
My voiced boomed and echoed around the small room. It fed my impatience, leaving me twitchy. How long had I been here? Hours?
“You ready, motherfucker?” I lunged for the wall, slamming the side of my fist again the cement. The light laugh left me hitting it harder. “Where’s your Mistress, Eleven? Where’s my wife, now?”
“She’s coming. She’ll be coming all night long.”
“Ahh!” My palm slapped against the barrier and pain was no longer something I cared to focus on. I’d been aching all day. The agony was feeding me. Leaving me going even crazier as the trapped feeling grew. I hate being confined and this was too much. The light flickered and I blinked, not sure I was seeing things correctly.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Before my door could shoot open, I was already crashing into the metal surface. The jarring impact left my shoulder locking up. Before I could gain composure the door shot open and I was racing forward. Slaves poured from the cells, but I saw no one but the one person I knew I was going to kill first.
My hand swept down and just as I grasped the handle to an axe, Eleven was sliding and picking up a large butcher knife. A smile exploded on my face while he stayed crouched low. For seconds our eyes stayed locked. Screams were pouring from further down and a dark skinned woman swept in beside me to pick up a weapon. Her nearness and distraction unleashed my need to slaughter. I spun, slamming the axe against the back of her head as she dove for a smaller knife. The crack was like splitting open an egg. The pop reverberated through my hands and blood sprayed and oozed along the thick metal buried deep in her skull.
With a hard jerk, I ripped it free, pausing as I caught Eleven sprinting in the opposite direction. Adrenaline spiked and where I wanted to run, I knew better. There was nowhere for him to go. Carelessness would only get me so far. Probably dead. There was no way I was dying anytime soon.
A high pitch squeal overpowered the repeating alarm and I glanced over my shoulder as a woman came running up behind me. She wasn’t as young as some of the females here. Maybe upper twenties from what I could tell by the red glow illuminating her light skin. Terror had her dark almond eyes wide as she kept looking behind her. Within seconds she passed and the growl that rumbled shortly after came from the man I’d heard at the beginning of my walk-through. Chunks that resembled bites were missing from his arms and he was galloping behind her as if he were some sort of animal.
My brow drew in as I watched her dart behind a man with a machete. The human shield wasn’t having it. He grabbed the woman’s dark hair and for the smallest moment, I could see Everleigh. The slave, Everleigh. Her hair had been longer than this woman’s, but it was so close. When she moved just right, I could picture my wife. I could see the slave I longed for more than anything.
And it fed me.
Everleigh put me here. She was probably sitting so sweetly on our sofa waiting for Eleven to arrive. Sipping her fucking lemon and honey tea and eating those goddamn cranberry scones she indulged in when she thought I wasn’t looking. How did she think they got in our kitchen? I didn’t buy them for myself! I knew she prided herself on her strict diet and I knew she couldn’t help but fall into the temptation I provided. I knew everything there was about her. I tried to make her happy when I wasn’t fucking it up. Had that meant nothing?
“Everleigh!”
I swung the axe, barely seeing the man feet away. I didn’t even notice the woman anymore. These prisoners were nothing more than bodies for me to slice through. To massacre as I hunted down the slave who provoked my killer. Where had he gone?
My arm shot out, pushing a man back far enough so my axe could embed in the side of his neck. The connection of the blade hitting flesh and bone was heaven for me. From the grunt, to the man choking out his gurgled last breathe … it fueled me to go faster. To shed even more blood.
“Help me! Help!”
The tips of fingers clawed at the floor as I approached another door. Everyone was going crazy either running or chasing. I got even with the entrance, only to see a man holding to a woman’s hips as he fucked her on the floor. His thrusts were hard and fast. Savage, like mine would have been. The sight sent a roar pouring from my throat. Everleigh. Everleigh. Everleigh. Raping her was the best feeling in the world. Seeing her struggle against what she’d never win was better than murder. It was better than choking and fucking women while I let their life slowly slip away with every slam of my cock. Fuck, I had to get out of here. I had to get back to her.
I pushed myself to a jog, scanning everywhere for Eleven. There was nowhere to hide. He clearly wasn’t in the hall so that meant he was hiding in one of the rooms. As well as he should have been. Whether it was from fear or the fact that he meant to catch me off guard was irrelevant. I was watchful. Even as I approached each cell, I was calculating my next move. If he was going to attack, I was ready.
“Master Harper!”
I glanced over my shoulder, fuming as guards ran in my direction. It only drove me faster. Were they trying to protect me? Were they taking me out of here? I didn’t want to know. Not yet.
Dark wetness spotted the floor before me and I stepped over the blood, swinging my weapon up to block the blow of a bat from a young man positioned not feet away. My fist reared back and I smashed it into his nose causing him to stumble back. Weight immediately connected with my side and the slickness of the tile left me sliding and falling. The axe fell from my hand and I grabbed Eleven, pulling him down with me.
Yelling got louder in the distance, growing closer as I grasped the slave’s wrist, slamming it repeatedly into the floor. The knife fell away, but he was far from weak. Eleven’s hips shifted underneath me and I knew there was no way he was throwing me off. Not with all the training I’d undergone my entire life. I was bred to kill. Bred to fight in the most extreme situations. With my father as the High Leader, he made sure I had endured hell to the most extreme conditions. This was nothing. This was a kiddy ride in an adult amusement park.
I brought my elbow down, slamming it into his forehead twice before I drove my fist into his cheek. Eleven’s eyes rolled, but he didn’t stop fighting. He managed to get ahold of my forearm, but that only had me bringing the brute force of my elbow down, again, this time over the bridge of his nose. Over and over, I pounded everything I had into him, trying my damnedest to crush in his face. He was getting desperate, not to mention, winded. He gasped and choked on the blood, trying to turn to the side for relief.
“You want my wife, now?” Crack! “You’ll never have her. You’ll never touch her!”
I grabbed the knife, spinning off and ripping him to his feet as the guards came to a sliding stop before us. Eleven’s legs almost gave out, buckling while he swayed. Blood poured over my bicep as I fitted it under his chin to hold him up. He didn’t fight. He could barely stand.
“What!” I pushed the tip of the blade behind Eleven’s ear as I eased back away from them. They wouldn’t take this from me. I wasn’t going to let them.
“Just calm down and throw away the knife.” A man’s hand shot up almost in surrender, but it was Jarrett I glared at. Fucking traitor. Hadn’t I knew he’d be, though? “Please, Master Harper. Just hand over the slave and we’ll leave you to whatever you wish to do.”
“Who the fuck are you? My wife’s new bitch? Was my High Leader not enough for her?”
“I’m no one’s bitch,” Jarrett yelled over the alarm. “Why don’t you put down the slave and you can fight me if that’s what you want.”
I smiled, pushing in the knife enough to make Eleven jolt in my arms. “Oh, you’ll get what’s coming to you. But not today. Today it’s his turn to die. Isn’t that right?” My arm tightened and the guard who had talked before, circled around. I could see his fear for the slave, even if I couldn’t understand it. He wanted Eleven alive. And badly.
“Tell me again how much you want to fuck my wife. Tell me again how you’re going to be sleeping in my bed. Tell me!” A groan was all he gave and it did little to sate my need for revenge. “I want you to look at these men. Look at them and know they’re here to save you. Now let it sink in how they’re too late.” I moved in until my lips were level with his ear. “Know the only place you’ll be lying anymore is on a stretcher as they carry you down to burn your body. You’re dead, and you just died for a woman who belongs to me.
Eleven’s body went rigid as I forced the blade up through his brain. Blood raced over my hand and I let the guard’s horrified expressions soak into my memory. Whatever their order was, I knew in that tiniest moment, they’d failed in carrying it out. Jarrett didn’t seem as upset as the other who was screaming, no. But he was affected, nonetheless, and that gave me satisfaction. I took something away from them. Away from Everleigh. I still had the power. They’d come to realize soon enough that wasn’t the only thing I had.