Page 37 of Tainted Blood
“Fight them, Thalia!” she says angrily, turning her frustrations onto me. “Why the fuck aren’t you fighting them? What’s wrong with you? You’re not a pussy, you’re a goddamn tiger.”
“It’s going to be okay… I’m going to be okay.” I catch her face between my hands and force her to look at me. Attempting to convey a thousand comforts with my calm. Pleading with her to trust me.
She doesn’t need to know that I’m selling her paper-thin assurances.
Not yet.
Truth is, I’m a nineteen-year-old woman who’s scared to death—displaced, confused and drowning. But I’m also a daughter born into violence, and a wife married to sin.
I was a fool to think I could hold off those influences forever.
Tonight, I need to run headfirst at them. Embrace them. Turn them into a weapon of my own. Whatever shadows are lurking inside me need to come out to play. Whatever tainted blood fills my veins needs to bleed its truth. It’s the only way I’m going to be able to survive this hell.
I was right. The whole auction was a farce, and there’s been a change to protocol. Monroe Spader has me for the next five days to torture to his rotting heart’s content. The only screams coming from that maze this week will be mine.
He won’t be kind to me. Liars inflict pain to Band-aid their black souls. He plans to hit, beat, brand, rape…
“Get a move on, puttana,” snaps one of the guards.
“My brother will destroy you for this.” Lola rips her face away from my hands. “If you hijos de sus putas madres think your Black King is scary, you have no idea what Santi Carrera is capable—”
Her threats are cut off by disbelieving laughter.
“You live and die in this place, señorita. You’re ghosts now. Fantasmi. No one will ever find you here.”
“I will come back to this room, Lola,” I say, grabbing her arm, forcing her attention back to me. “I won’t leave you alone. I promise.”
“I know.” She flings her arms around my neck. She knows I have no choice. “You’re a Carrera now,” she whispers. “Strength and sacrifice bonds a family tighter than blood. Loyalty runs through your veins, Thalia. Just like it does ours.”
Her words echo around my head as I’m dragged into the hallway.
I’m a Carrera and a Santiago, Lola. Tonight, I’m part El Muerte, part scorpion.
There’s no one coming to rescue me. Lola’s locked away. My father’s influence can’t reach me here. Even my prince of darkness won’t be able to storm this castle in time.
I think of Edier’s mother as I count the thirty-one winding steps to the ground floor. I think about what she overcame after being trafficked by the worst kind of sadist in her twenties. How even after everything she went through, she still managed to put all of her pieces back together again.
That’s what fearless firebirds do. They shed their burning feathers and rise from the ashes. They’re reborn from their tragedy…
I’ll find my true strength in the flames. I’ll fight. I’ll claw. I’ll sting. For every hurt Monroe Spader gives me, I’ll be returning it, two-fold.
Tonight, I am my father’s daughter.
Tonight, I am my husband’s wife.
He’s waiting for me at the gaping green entrance to the maze. Up close, the yaupon holly hedgerows are at least ten feet tall—a perfectly manicured screen for whatever he has planned for me. The sweet scent of summer heat is in the air, intermingled with red anticipation. Alice is about to tumble down a rabbit hole that’s spiked with broken glass.
He’s not wearing his cheap blue suit anymore. He’s swapped it for some nerdy-looking khaki military fatigues.
All the better to hunt me with.
With his short stature, he looks like a short fat kid playing dress-up. But my derision is short-lived when I glance at the lacquered antique table next to him. It’s strewn with cruel-looking implements and devices—some sexual, some medieval… Some still bloody.
“Mrs. Carrera,” he greets expansively, his beady gaze oozing over my body like the toxic gunk at the bottom of a trash can.
“Spader, you lying piece of shit.” My next words are lost to the stillness as my left cheek explodes in pain.
“Silenzio!” the guard growls. “You keep your mouth for screaming and sucking, puttana. Anything else is a disrespectful waste.”