Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 71852 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71852 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
The devil himself sat in that office and Clover didn’t dare move, afraid to make a noise.
The door slamming open made Clover flinch, but even then he didn’t dare shut his eyes. A pair of combat boots came into view.
“Sir, we’ve got a problem.”
“What now?” Apollo growled, and a short beep had to mean he’d turned off his phone.
“The boy, the albino, he’s gone.”
Clover swallowed a whimper. If they already knew, it could mean that Drake was being questioned. Clover needed to get out of here now.
“Fuck. What’s the other one saying?”
“Nothing yet.”
Apollo got up so abruptly his chair fell over. “I will talk to him myself.” It sounded simple enough, but in Clover’s ears, it was as ominous as if all the dead spiders in the vent had come alive and crawled under his skin.
Clover lay still, keeping his breathing to a minimum until his head got light from the lack of oxygen. He didn’t move an inch, as if his body had been covered with a thick layer of wax and stiffened. The grille kept him hidden, due to the slanted position of the blades, but the frantic movement inside the room was impossible to miss. Feet stormed across the small office, and each time they changed position was marked by the clang of desk drawers.
He swallowed a gasp when Apollo and his goon left, slamming the door behind them. Time was ticking, and none could be spared on hesitation or cowardice.
Clover fought the memory of the rapist fucker threatening him with punching his teeth out, of his thumb trailing between Clover’s buttocks in sick excitement. Clover shook it off by remembering the man who put that fucker down. Drake.
It would only take so long until someone realized Clover had left the impromptu cell through the ventilation duct. Would Apollo blow poisonous gas through the system?
Clover was ready to run, but despite the room being empty, he remained in the same position, thoughts of Drake flooding his mind the moment it had one less thing to worry about.
Was Drake still in the cell? All those people surely carried weapons, which meant that Clover could obtain one, if he were sneaky enough. His men taught him well, and he was positive that he could use surprise to his advantage.
But once he had a weapon, what then? There were only so many bullets in a handgun, he was outnumbered, and didn’t know the building. If he tried to get Drake out on his own, he’d be committing the same mistake they’d made earlier that night.
His heart bled when he thought of what might be happening to Drake at this very moment, but the truth, no matter how much it hurt him, was that he wasn’t capable of helping him now.
Drake’s earlier words came back to Clover like a smack on the head, and he pushed on the grille, to find that it wouldn’t budge beyond the tiniest bit of give offered by the plastic.
Shit.
Panic settled on his shoulders, like a monster about to crawl into his skull, when the metal system he’d crawled through echoed with thumps and knocks. The worst had happened. They were already searching for him.
But Clover needed to keep his cool. He needed to. For Drake. For Boar. Even for himself, so once he realized there was no screws he might try to loosen, he used the last weapon he had. Shifting closer toward the next spot of slightly brighter light, he managed to twist his legs, so his feet rested against the grille, and kicked.
The covering budged this time, and despite the very real possibility of drawing attention with the noise, Clover refused to let fear stop him and dislodged the stuck piece of plastic with another attempt.
Relief flooded his lungs with air, but he wasn’t out of the woods yet.
The edge of the wall opening scratched his battered skin, but he no longer cared about physical pain, and twisted his naked body in an attempt to slide out as efficiently as possible, only to still when the worst happened.
He was stuck.
For the longest moment he stayed still with the majority of his naked body out in the cool room while his head and arms remained inside the vent. It would have been easiest to just stay this way, with the metal digging into his flesh, but then he remembered the torture and the promise he’d made Drake, and a blockage inside his head unclogged.
Determined to leave at all cost, he pushed some of his upper body back in and maneuvered one of his arms out. It was still an extremely tight fit and pulling his flesh through the tiny opening felt like getting flayed, but he pushed until he didn’t have to anymore. The vent spat him out.
Drunk with relief, Clover rolled on the floor. His gaze briefly fixed on the lamp above, but he only had so much time, so he ran past a large desk, to the window.