Page 97 of Lawless

I’ve no idea how he’s even still awake with the amount of it that was running down his body and dripping on the floor when the lights were on. I can’t imagine those vicious wounds have healed all that quickly.

Nothing but hopeless desperation floods through me as I lie here, listening to nothing but Mav’s deep breaths.

I want to keep talking to him, to make sure he’s still with me. But at the same time, I want him to rest.

If he’s right and we’re going to be rescued, then he needs whatever strength he can get.

I dip in and out of sleep. In and out of nightmares of the men who are behind this. Every time I come to, my heart is racing with fear, I listen for Mav’s breathing, and I don’t relax until I hear it.

“Look at you,” Victor taunts, his dark, evil eyes dropping down the length of my body.

My entire body quakes with fear as I stare up at him and the two men standing behind him.

A game of cat and mouse. And the mouse lost.

Isn’t it always that way?

I’m wearing the white t-shirt I slept in last night. But unlike then, it was now covered in mud.

I knew today was going to be bad the first moment Dad looked at me this morning. There was something haunting in his eyes and it sent a shiver of fear skittering down my spine.

It’s a look I’m very familiar with. It’s a look that promises a whole world of pain the second Kristie leaves the house for school.

And I was right because no sooner had I waved her off from the living room window, his large body darkened the doorway leading from the kitchen.

“I’m feeling generous,” he taunted, making my blood run cold and all the hairs on my body lift. “I’ll give you thirty seconds head start.” All the air rushed from my lungs. “Go.”

Without another word from him, I took off, racing through the house and out through the back door.

Really, it didn’t matter which way I went, he—they’d—catch me. It’s how it always is.

If I didn’t think it would hurt more to just stay still, I wouldn’t put myself through the charade, but I have first-hand experience that doing so would be a bad idea.

Without shoes on, I ran over the deck and down onto our grass before attempting to disappear into the trees beyond as my father’s voice boomed his countdown from behind me.

The numbers he barked hit me like a bat to the chest.

I wanted to wish that this time would be the last. That I wouldn’t survive another onslaught but I couldn’t. I couldn’t let Kristie arrive home from school in a few hours and find me gone. I wouldn’t put her at risk like that.

So, instead, I picked up my sore feet and moved faster.

His voice got farther away with every step I took.

I really should have predicted what happened next, but I didn’t and the second a masked man jumped from behind a tree, I shrieked and attempted to dart in the opposite direction.

But it was pointless.

It always was.

They would always overpower me and take what they wanted. It was just how this worked.

They’re the kings, and I’m merely the servant.

The slave.

In seconds, my arms were bound to my body and I was being frog-marched deeper into the trees.

The sun might be out, but with the thick cover of leaves above us, there was hardly any light getting through.