Vengeful Soul by Emma Creed
I dropped my fearless persona the second Julian’s phone rang, hoping the person on the other end might hear me. But now my throat feels ripped raw from screaming and I’ve come to the realization that even if they did hear me, they wouldn’t be able to find me.
I’m in some kind of basement. Judging from the walls, the place is old, and there seem to be more rooms leading off the one I’m being kept in, which suggests the place is big. More than likely remote, since Julian doesn’t seem to worry about me screaming. I also can’t forget the fact that I’ve just been ‘missing’ for a month and no one from my life had reported me. Why would this time be any different?
“You wanna know who that was?” Julian says as he steps back into the room after finishing with his call. I refuse him the satisfaction of my curiosity, shifting my body around so I don’t have to look at him.
“Now, don’t be like that.” He crouches in front of me, making me shiver when his finger brushes along my cheek. “It turns out that taking you lured the rats from the sewers.” Suddenly he has my attention, my head turning around so fast that I almost give myself whiplash. “That was your do good fucking boyfriend, and he sounded pretty upset.”
My stomach flutters with hope, if that was Brax on the phone, it means he knows I’m in danger. If Brax knows I’m in danger he’ll be looking for me, he will have Maddy working on finding me… and there’s no one out there I want seeking me out more.
Now, I just have to stay strong until he can get here. Julian backs off with a sneer and disappears into one of the other rooms.
Time drags so slowly. The water dripping from the pipes onto the concrete floor makes it impossible not to time the seconds that pass… and then the minutes. Julian comes back into the room and begins pacing over the same spot, he suddenly seems a lot less confident than he was before.
We both look up when the huge steel door screeches open. The guy who steps inside is in a tailored suit, and looks a little older than Julian.
As he moves closer and looks me over, his lip curls as if I offend him.
“You’re telling me this is what's been causing all this trouble.” He moves his unimpressed stare to Julian.
“Not just her, she had help,” Julian answers him, he’s acting differently now, submissive. If I wasn't in such a horrific circumstance, I’d laugh at him.
“I thought you had the situation maintained.” The man speaks with an accent that I can’t quite place, it’s clipped and unforgiving, and sends a chill through me.
“I did, she disappeared after the funeral. We tracked her to a run down place on the other side of town. The guys that went in got taken out. After that, we lost track of her. And, Sir, it seems she’s been doing some research while she’s been away,” he adds nervously.
The guy steps closer to me, taking my face in his hand and forcing me to look up at him. Then his other hand pounds me so hard in the side of the face that my brain shakes in my skull. I hold in my scream and remind myself that help’s on the way.
“You scared?” he asks me, as if the confirmation of my fear will get the sick son of a bitch off, and I shake my head and wait for another blow.
“You should be scared.” The grip of his fingers squeeze deeper into my cheeks.
“Why? I’m way past legal age, you sick fucks aren’t interested in me.” I fight the words out of my mouth against his strain and he smiles, his head shaking almost like he admires me.
“You made a mistake poking your nose into my business,” he warns. “I’m going to kill you, and then I’m going to go kill your friend.”
“You’re the one making the mistake, you don’t know who you’re fucking with,” I correct him, pulling back my head enough to spit at him. Taking a hanky from his pocket, he wipes off his face with a sneer.
“You’re going to tell me who your friend is, and where I can find him. Then I might just kill you quickly. But…” his fingers fist into my hair and he yanks my head back. “Continue to try my patience and this is gonna be a long, very painful experience for you. Now, I will ask you nicely, one more time. Who killed the people who work for me?”
“Who killed my parents?” I respond to his question with one of my own, keeping my eyes narrow.
“You don’t know?” A wicked smile pulls at his lips, then his head turns to Julian. “You didn’t tell her?”
When Julian looks at me, I wonder what I ever found attractive about him. How had I never noticed the sadistic glint in his eye or the evil in his smile?
“She was getting too close, she had to go,” he shrugs without a single shred of guilt, and a surge of anger has me yanking on the ropes to get to him.
“We warned your mom what would happen if she didn’t give up, we offered her money, we even threatened to hurt you. But she was a stubborn woman,” the guy says with a smirk on his stupid face. “She left us with little choice.”
“You’re monsters, all of you!” I shout through my tears.
“And what you did to my friends, that wasn’t monstrous?” He straightens himself up and backs away from me.
“I suggest you tell Julian everything you know,” he points down at me, then looks at Julian, “Do what you need to do,” he tells him, walking out and slamming the door behind him.
Julian looks at me like he’s waiting for some kind of confession.
“I’ll tell you one thing,” I manage to speak, every muscle in my body tense with hatred for the man in front of me. “Hell’s coming for you.”
“It’ll come for you first,” he threatens, grabbing my elbows and dragging me up to stand. I stumble on my bound together feet as my back gets slammed hard against the wall with the weight of his body forced on to it. “I spent years on you Grace, being kind and gentle, treating you like the precious little princess you thought you were.” His fingers slip over my cheek and clasp my jaw. “What Grace wanted, Grace got. Did he treat you so tenderly?” he asks, the tension in his fingers increasing. “Did he make sweet fake love to you like I did?” His cold touch falls to my neck, sliding over my tits. “Or did he fuck you like a whore. I always wondered if you might like it like that,” he admits, and bile rises into my throat when he shoves his hand into the front of my panties. Closing my eyes, I try to block him out of my mind, pretend his touch doesn’t exist.
“Just one more, for old time’s sake,” he suggests, pressing his hand on to my pussy. My body automatically attempts to fight him off. With my wrists and ankles bound I only have my body, and I use every scrap of fight within me to try and get him off me. He flips me around and I feel my cheek crack against the bricks when he slams me hard into the wall.
Julian forces his other hand into the back of my head, pushing so hard it feels like my skull will shatter in his palm, and I’m convinced it has when a loud crash vibrates from the wall. He quickly releases me and when I turn around, I see the guy in the suit again. This time with two other meat heads beside him.
“Adriano?” Julian sounds startled.
“Sorry for the interruption,” Adriano smirks sarcastically.
“I was just—”
“Save your shit, Julian. I thought you’d had your fill of the girl.” He turns his head to the huge guy on his right. “Sit her on the chair,” he orders. The guy moves forward, grabbing my upper arm and yanking me over to the chair, slamming me down hard on to the seat which sends a painful jolt up my spine.
“We can start with you telling us what you know about the agency.” Adriano stands in front of me and pins his eyes on to mine like a cobra ready to strike.
“I know that you’re all a bunch of sick assholes,” I say bravely, then feel all the air exit my lungs when he punches me hard in the stomach. “I see you didn’t teach the little slut any respect while you were fucking her,” he says to Julian, grabbing my hair and forcing my head sideways.
“What do you know?” I feel cold metal touch my skin, and my panicked pulse beat against it.
“Speak,” his palm hits my cheek.
But a distant noise distracts us both, and the sound I hear causes my stomach to flutter. Adriano quickly turns his attention away from me to the big guy.
“Check it out,” he orders, clearly irritated.
I know the sound and I know who it belongs to. I’d recognize the sound of Brax’s bike anywhere. Somehow he’s found me, and shit here is about to get really fucking messy.