The Barrier Between (Collector Series # 2)

by Stacey Marie Brown

  “Take a number,” I mumbled to myself.

  The room where he led me was only a ten-by-ten, windowless cell. Chains hung from the wall. It smelled of blood, body odor, and urine.

  Oh hell no.

  A guard in the assembly walked over, nudged a firearm into the back of my head, and urged me to continue into the space.

  I tried to glamour, again; to no avail. What the fuck?

  Carlos pulled me over, latching me into the shackles.

  I hadn’t realized how much I’d begun to respect fae’s rules of battle. They still were old school, and few fought with guns, choosing blades instead. There was an honor in that. It was about who was a more skilled fighter. It was about smarts. Guns could render the slowest person a winner in a duel. But in the general sense, I liked the concept of “may the best fighter win.” I went into all my fights with only my fists and wits.

  It rattled my bones to be forced to do something without a fight. Until I jumped, I would watch for any moment their defense went down.

  The metal clasps around my ankles and wrists allowed me to move only a foot in any direction. Carlos rechecked all the fastenings, testing for a weak connection. “Get comfy, bruja.” He and his two other minions walked out and slammed the large iron door behind them, plunging me into sheer blackness. My stomach screwed into a lump, my breath immediately becoming short. Being tied in a dark room brought back too many horrible memories. My first reaction was to soothe myself and go to my happy place. But at the same time, there was a chance if I worked myself up enough, I would jump. Fear seemed to be my trigger.

  I let the dark soak into my skin, focusing on the ties binding my wrists and ankles, remembering my younger self confined in small quarters in utter darkness, left for hours with no food or water. A mist of sweat beaded my forehead. My heart beat irregularly in my chest as I focused on the memories.

  Why am I not jumping? I yanked at the chains in exasperation. Why isn’t it working when I need it?

  Indignation at myself, at my situation, prickled at my eyes, but I was far too angry to cry. The girl who held so much rage for life, for the cards she was dealt, was bounding to the surface again. The girl who could only solve things with her fists growled inside, wanting to break out like a caged animal.

  I seethed for hours in the dark. I’d promised myself I would never be a victim again. Even if I were forced to a wall, they would not possess me.

  The door swung open and dim light leaked into the small room. Maria’s shoes clicked on the stone as she sauntered in with Carlos and the other two men behind her.

  “Not sure if the sight of the Avenging Angel chained could ever get old to me.” Maria’s brown eyes glinted with amusement.

  A slow methodical smile grew on my mouth.

  Maria blinked, glancing over her shoulder, and then back at me. “What are you smiling about?”

  My grin expanded.

  “Stop it,” she demanded. “Why are you smiling? You’re chained up. You have no way out. Your life is now mine. I own you.”

  I only smirked.

  “Stop that!”

  Damn, she was easy to rile. It was one of her biggest flaws. Quick to anger and quick to act.

  “I tell you when to eat, sleep, and shit. Don’t you understand you are mine now?” She grabbed my face, squeezing my jaw.

  In this moment she reminded me of her brother. Marcello’s need to fashion himself above everyone else by control and dominance. The power he felt when someone cried or showed fear had governed his existence. When someone didn’t give him this, he got angry and unsettled. She was exactly the same way. It was amusing to watch. Even if I knew there were reprimands, it was worth it.

  Like the time before, she did not fail me. Her slap whipped my head to the side. The bubbling of rage tickled my gut. I chuckled.

  “Dammit, you bitch!” Maria closed her hand. The punch hit my upper lip and nose, slicing my gums and cracking the cartilage in my nostrils. Fresh blood broke free, sliding over the previous nosebleed, crusted above my mouth.

  Come on, Zoey. Jump!

  My body stayed in place. Extreme emotion was usually the source of my previous jumps. Anger, sadness, fear. I hoped one of these would finally click in and work.

  Anger was an emotion I understood well and was easy to invoke in me. Once I started down the path, it took a lot for me to come back. Like a bull, all I saw was red. The more Maria hit me, the more my emotions narrowed down the tunnel, inciting my wrath.

  “Still can only fight me when I’m chained up, huh?” I taunted her.

  A punch to the stomach.

  I bent over, coughing. “Poor Maria, you were never any good at fighting. Hope you are better at changing diapers. Looks like your brother might need a nanny.”

  Whatever switch I snapped in Maria, it flooded her with a billowing rage. She cried out and came after me with all she had.

  I closed my mind to the pain and centered on escaping. My muscles twitched with the need to act. I could feel the magic in there, but for some reason it was not coming to the surface.

  Another jab to the stomach doubled me over, gagging. A cry mixed with annoyance and agony tore from me, bringing me back to my outer shell. Blood gushed from cuts on my face. My eye already puffed, pulling the lid shut. The taste of blood coated my teeth.

  “Maria,” Carlos shouted over her wails. I lifted my only operational lid, seeing him pull her off me. “Stop.” He wrapped his arms around her, keeping her still. “Detengase, mi reina.” Stop, my queen. He whispered so low I knew I was probably the only one who heard him. Maria’s attention was still locked on me so she didn’t seem to hear or see anything else.

  Saliva dripped from my mouth and I spit, feeling the thickness of the blood mixed in.

  “That was for my brother.” Maria ripped from Carlos’ hold, coming back for me. “And this is for me.”

  I felt and heard the crunch to my cheek as her fist collided with my face. It was the only sensation I had before everything went dark.

  NINETEEN

  A faraway squeak of metal brought me out of my hazy dreams. Right away I wished I had stayed unconscious. My face pounded in sync with my heart, shooting ice picks into my temple. Soreness rumbled over my ribs and tender bruises flickered their own torture over my stomach and face. My head lay on a cold, unforgiving ground, and my body huddled in a tight ball. I shivered from the icy room.

  Soft footsteps on the stone pulled my one lid up. The other partially opened, but it felt better to keep it closed. In the shadows an outline of a girl bustled through the door, her hands full. Two guards stood on the other side, holding the door open for her. The only light came from a flashlight one of the guards held. I had no idea what time it was, but it seemed late night. The girl moved to me.

  I always had sharp senses. Probably something DMG made sure was in my coding. Now with Ryker’s powers, they’d heightened to extraordinary. Similar to someone blind, my senses were tiny fingers, making out faces, bodies, and auras in the dark.

  Human. Girl. Young. Timid. The taste of her fear glazed over my tongue.

  An Asian guard I recognized from earlier, Hiro, pushed around her, a semiautomatic hanging from his side. “If you make any move, I will put a bullet into your brain.”

  I wanted to laugh. I was chained to a wall, beaten, and so cold my muscles decided to go into hibernation. In a few months I had acclimatized to Peru’s heat. I missed it.

  Hiro grabbed my shoulders and propped me against the wall. Air hissed between my teeth. The girl kneeled in front of me with a bottle of water, rags, bandages, and antiseptic. Her hands shook as she dampened the cloth with the disinfectant and reached for my face. I hissed when the alcohol touched my cuts, rearing my head back to the wall. The girl jerked her hand back.

  She was clearly terrified and a pretty little thing, only about fifteen. Naturally skinny, but the sharpness of her cheeks told me she was being underfed. Dirty, knotted beach waves of long dark blonde hair tumbled
over her shoulder out of her loose ponytail. Her light blue eyes reflected in the torchlight as she reached for me again. I bit on my lip and forced myself to stay in place as she dabbed the wounds. She continued to clean my cuts, keeping her gaze away from mine.

  “You’re scared of me.” It was a statement. She set the cloth down, picking up the bandages. I saw her nod. “Why?”

  The guard grunted in warning but didn’t stop me from interacting with her.

  “Why are you afraid of me?” Her fear might also be of the guards or even this place, but I could feel it was mostly directed at me.

  “You are the Avenging Angel,” she whispered, voice shaking.

  So much for keeping my identity a secret. “Yeah, so?”

  She frowned, like her saying my moniker was enough of an answer. “People have told me about you and what you are capable of doing.”

  “Enough talk. Keep working.” Hiro nudged the girl with the handle of the gun. She quickly got back to patching me up.

  “What are they saying about me?”

  She pressed the bandage to my cheek. “That you are a killer. You enjoy the taste of your victims’ blood and drink it after you’ve murdered them.”

  Wow! Okay. Now they had turned me into some dark fable, scaring children.

  “What’s your name?”

  The girl tugged at the bottom of her lip before answering. “Annabeth.”

  “Annabeth, look at me. Do I look like a murderer to you?”

  For the first time, her eyes met mine, and her gaze bored into my soul. I can’t say what it was, certainly not her looks, but something in the way she met my gaze reminded me of Lexie. Like they could see past all the bullshit people used to hide themselves and really see the person underneath.

  Her head shook back and forth. “No.”

  “Not to say I am not capable of it; we all are. But you don’t have to fear me.”

  A smile hinted at her mouth, and she nodded.

  “But only you.” I winked. It was good if most of the others feared me. Kept me protected. For some reason I didn’t want her to be afraid of me. She was already scared enough.

  “What are you even doing here?” I asked.

  “That’s enough.” The guard tapped on Annabeth’s shoulder. “You are done here.”

  She nodded and collected her items. “The water is for you.” She stood and was escorted by the guard. The metal door clanked as he shut it, plunging me back into pure darkness.

  Annabeth stayed in my mind till I drifted off. I wondered how she became a part of this group. Was she kidnapped? Joined willingly? She didn’t have the body language of someone who spent time on the streets. My intuition told me she came from a sheltered, loving world. She could not possibly be a fighter. Skinny and timid, she would be eaten alive out in the ring. Why was she here? What use was she to them?

  I knew I would not like the answers to my questions. But with this one girl, I felt I could no longer run away and forget she existed. I had done that once, and there was never a day that went by I didn’t regret it. I hadn’t stopped the man who abused me from doing it to other little girls. This time I would stop it. Make sure these girls got free of this life.

  When I was awakened again, daylight streamed in from behind Maria as she entered. A frown creased her forehead at seeing me. “You seem to be healing.”

  My fingers reached up, touching my face. The cuts were swollen but closed and on their way to mending back together. My bruises felt less tender and my lid could almost fully open. This might raise questions if she kept hitting me and I kept healing in only a few hours.

  Humans would find a way to rationalize it in their heads till it made sense to them. Air caught in my throat. Did I just call them humans? Like I was no longer part of them? Shit. I’d been with Ryker too long. The thought of him sent a fire to my heart. Damn, I missed him. I wanted nothing more than to feel his arms around me. I needed to believe he was okay. I couldn’t fathom my life without him now.

  “I guess that’s a good thing since Duc will be here tomorrow. He will want to see you healthy and ready to fight.” She motioned with her head to someone behind her to come forward. “You have two options. You can behave and be allowed to go downstairs with the rest of the girls.” A wicked grin curled at her mouth. “They are quite eager to meet their new bunkmate. Especially when I told them who has graced us with her presence. You are quite famous here.”

  Carlos shifted behind her, a frown twitching his mouth. Did he disagree with Maria’s decision? Well, if so, I was definitely on his side. Telling them only would cause problems. Girls would want to take down the legend to become one themselves. The guards were few in number; now they would have to be on constant defense and ready to act. Maria was far more business savvy than her brother, but when it came to me, both of them lost their reasoning.

  “Your other option is to stay chained here with no food.”

  I sighed dramatically. “So many great options... I hardly know what to choose.”

  Maria sprang to me and sank her nails into my neck. Carlos was right behind her, tugging her hands free of my skin. He pulled her back, her chest rising and falling.

  I touched the scrapes around my neck; a drip of blood stained my fingers. “You definitely need to reel in that temper of yours. You make it so easy.”

  Maria took a deep breath. Carlos let her go, but he didn’t back away. “What is it about you?” She shook out her arms, trying to free herself of the anger. “Just looking at your smug, perfect face makes me want to tear you into little pieces.”

  “How sweet.”

  Her lip lifted in a snarl. Carlos put his hand on her shoulder to calm her. “So what do you choose? Eventually you are going to realize you are mine now, and you have nowhere else to go.”

  I was unsure why she would let me roam freely downstairs. I didn’t want to pass up the opportunity to get out of these chains. Free of the cuffs, I had a chance. I pushed to my feet, shoving my hands out to her. “I’ll be good. I promise.”

  “Maria?” Carlos shook his head.

  “No, if she wants to go, we shouldn’t keep her from going.”

  I was being set up, but I didn’t care.

  Maria pulled a key from her pocket and unlocked my binds. “But I forgot to tell you.” Here came the conditions. “If you go downstairs, you have to wear this.” She grabbed an item out of a guard’s hand and held it up.

  It was a leg cuff, the kind you see on people under house arrest.

  “This one has been modified.” She pushed a button and the manacle vibrated with electricity. “One wrong move and every muscle in your body will lock up, and like a block of wood, you will crash to the ground.”

  Fuck. Still, the possibilities outside this cell were better for me than inside them.

  I nodded. She smiled. She was looking forward to pushing the button.

  A brown-haired guard, one of Maria’s first tier, latched it around my ankle. It clicked as he locked it.

  “Every guard, and myself, have a remote to detonate it. Also, it’s rigged to go off if you get too close to the outside doors.” Maria brushed her curly hair off her shoulder and opened the door. “Have fun getting acquainted with your new friends,” she sang before disappearing.

  Carlos heaved a sigh, walked to me, and unlocked me from the wall manacles.

  “You don’t agree with her, do you?”

  He let go of the shackles, allowing them to fall to the floor. “No. Keeping peace here is hard enough. You only bring misery and evil to our doorstep.”

  “So you like me then?” I was easily returning to the life of living where I felt I had to show different sides to each person I interacted with.

  Carlos walked me down the stairs. Counting the guards, more than a hundred pairs of eyes were on me as I descended. As I predicted, there were a few already mumbling I looked more like a little cheerleader than a fighter, scoffing at the idea they couldn’t handle me.

  “She’s the so-calle
d legend? The Avenging Angel?” The girl, Jada, was the first to vocalize it loud enough for everyone to hear. “Please, my eight-year-old niece could take her out.”

  I loved it when they formed the wrong idea of me. It actually helped me more often than not.

  “She’s so cute. Like a Barbie doll.” Jada sniggered, others growing in confidence to join her. “No, sorry, make it a Skipper doll.”

  This is what I lived for. Girls getting lippy in their overconfidence. Their fall was always much sweeter. I learned to stay quiet, letting the insults roll off me. The other girls had a hard time with this. The loud boastful ones hated when their slights were met with silence and calmness. I would only grin like they were praising me. It always provoked them to act rashly. Predictable. First Maria, now Jada. It was getting boring.

  “Jada.” Carlos stared her down, moving me past the hecklers. She crossed her arms, her eyes still roaming over me. She was at least five eleven, thin, but fighting gave her a toned body women killed for and men desired. Her curly black hair was tied back, and her dark skin was lined with scars. All the women were dressed in a uniform of black leggings, a nondescript gray sweatshirt, and cheap white tennis shoes. Duc must have raided a Walmart.

  “I want no problems. Got it?” Carlos yelled out to the group. Only a few nodded. “Go back to what you were doing.”

  The girls in the kitchen area returned to their work, putting food out. My stomach growled at the smell of cooking eggs. Carlos directed me underneath the stairs where there were toilets and communal showers.

  “You have water?”

  “Borrowed by the Red Cross. You can only shower for three minutes. And a forewarning... it’s not heated.” He grabbed a toothbrush, paste, towel, and fabric from the shelf, shoving it at me. “Take care of business and change. Breakfast is in ten minutes.”

  I glanced at the clothes in my hand. Black stretch pants and a gray hoodie. I wanted a shower, but I was already shivering. Icy water did not sound pleasant. I could push it another day. I went into the bathroom and changed. Peeling off the ripped cargo pants and stained shirt was another reminder this was not some screwed-up dream, and I was no longer in Peru.