Total pages in book: 39
Estimated words: 37678 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 188(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 37678 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 188(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
The door in question is locked tight, and the light that should be above it is out. All the lights are out. Something feels off, but I don’t know what. I’m about to pull on some zu-gear and go figure out a way to get into the dark corridor through the door when we hear commotion upstairs, echoing down the halls.
We take off back the way we came and follow the sound that gets louder and more panicked with each step we take. Edith, the old female, doesn’t lose her stride. I have long legs and she keeps up easily with me. I take the steps two at a time when we finally reach them. We’ve barely pushed through the door at the top when Hadrian and Lyric nearly slam into us.
The look on Lyric’s face makes me tremble. Upset. Horrified. Disgusted. Terrified. My stomach clenches and my heart flops inside my chest.
“What is it?” I demand, my voice raspy.
“She…oh God…” Lyric croaks, her eyes filling with tears.
Hadrian frowns. “One of the guards has escaped.”
“A Kevin?” I growl, my sub-bones already popping as I ready for battle.
“Yes,” he hisses. “Theron…”
“What?” I bare my fangs at him, ready to hunt down this Kevin and destroy him.
Because I know.
I feel it in Hadrian’s expression.
Taste the bitterness on my tongue.
This Kevin…
“He has Willow.”
The roar that escapes me is harsher, fiercer, more terrifying than any sabrevipe or carnivorous creature on this retched planet. This is the battle cry of a male whose mate is in danger. Furious and powerful.
I sniff the air.
Let my instincts guide me.
I storm back down the stairs, letting my gut lead the way as it was trying to do before. I knew. Something was off and it involved my mate. Now I know. A Kevin has taken her and I won’t rest until I’ve ripped his throat out with my double fangs, sending him immediately to The Eternals.
I’ll bring her back to me.
I’ll claim her once and for all, and we’ll never be apart again.
I just have to save her first.
13
Willow
We reach a point when he can no longer carry me. Frankly, I’m surprised it didn’t happen earlier. He may be the size of a friggin’ gorilla, but he was also recently grievously ill.
Without so much as a warning, he flips me over his shoulder, and I crash into the ground with the force of all my weight. Oxygen is sucked out of me with the same amount of force as I’d imagine it would if I were in outer space without a helmet.
“Get up,” he grunts and that’s when I remember his name. I don’t know if I saw it on his uniform when he was our guard in Exilium. Felix. It doesn’t sound like a last name, so maybe I heard him called it by someone else. I don’t know what a Felix should look like, but already hate the name with a burning passion. Maybe that’s why the morts say Kevin like it’s a disease worse than The Rades. Suddenly all their glaring and posturing when Kevins are mentioned makes perfect sense.
Tears leak out of the corner of my eyes. I can’t breathe, but I can taste the grit from the dirt coated floor. I have enough presence of mind to realize we must be somewhere outside the prison complex. Maybe Zoe was right, and it was safer inside the prison. Wherever he’s taking me, I want to be as far away from that destination as possible.
“Are you fucking deaf? Get up!” Spit flies from his mouth and I shrink away, which makes my lungs scream. I don’t know which is worse: the thought of catching The Rades from him, or going to parts unknown.
Both equal death as far as I’m concerned.
I scramble to my feet, fear of a kick to the ribs energizing my muscles. “All right, I’m up, you don’t have to yell.” The words may come out a bit wheezy, but there’s no way in hell I’m going to let him know how scared I am.
“Then move.” He grabs one of my arms hard enough to bruise and shoves me in front of him. I stumble, then find my footing.
“Where are we going?” I ask, hoping for any bit of information that will help keep me alive. “What is this place?”
He doesn’t answer, not that I expect him to. In all the blueprints of the prison we’d found since taking it over, I’d never seen anything about underground caves or passages, only heard vague mentions in the past by a guard. We’d come across the locked door not long after taking over the prison, but like the doors that led outside, we left it alone because we didn’t have a key and it seemed ominous. Since we never had access, it means no one thinks to try and get through. And if they do, will they be able to even make it through to come after me? The thought hollows out my gut and if I weren’t still winded from being dropped on my back, I might have risked taking the time to vomit up the contents of my stomach.