by Dannika Dark
“Brilliant,” he croaked. “Asphyxiate yourself, why don’t you?”
Simon gasped and scooted to a sitting position. The chain stretched about seven feet, and Simon stretched another six. It still wasn’t enough.
“Boris, you vapid little gobshite,” he said gleefully, spotting something within reach.
He’d almost missed it because shadows covered the dirty floor. Boris had tossed the iron shovel into a dark corner, close enough to reach. The only light within the room shone from two bright floodlights. One was on a tall cabinet and aimed at the table, the other was duct-taped to a pipe that ran up the wall by his chain.
It was too good to be true.
He neared the shovel and then picked it up. The only thing that would break his chain was a set of bolt cutters. It wasn’t worth expending his energy on beating it with a shovel.
But at least he could reach his pants now.
He lay back down and wedged his toes through the hole in the handle and used his other foot to raise it up. After he lowered the spade onto his pants, he dragged them toward him. He sat up, his breathing labored. Calling someone to rescue him was out of the question; a man had to think about his pride. His mind switched on, planning a route of escape. Traveling up the main road would be a mistake, so he’d have to take his chances across rough terrain. Talk about flashbacks.
The metal cuff around his neck pinched at his skin, and Simon ran his fingers around every inch of it, including the metal cuff, but grew frustrated when he couldn’t find the keyhole. He crawled over toward the wall, dragging his pants in hand. The chain looped around a thick ring of metal bolted to the wall, secured with a padlock. Not a very sophisticated operation. James had taken his dagger from the sheath as a souvenir, but Simon always came prepared. Of course, he hadn’t anticipated someone stripping him naked.
That only happened on ladies’ night.
Inside the waistband of his leathers, he’d cut a small hole to put a few paperclips and bobby pins. The gap was sealed with black thread to prevent them from sliding around. For this kind of pin tumbler, he removed two bobby pins. He bit the rounded ends off one, straightened it, and then bent one end to use as a handle. He placed it between his teeth while he worked on shaping the other bobby pin by bending it where they connected. He inserted that one into the lock and put tension on the lever.
“Brilliant master plan, Boris. The only people capable of escaping a padlock are primary students and thieves,” Simon muttered to himself. “A millennia could pass and you’d still be an amateur.”
He inserted the bobby pin that had been in his mouth and began working on the lock pins, feeling each one and searching for any that were harder to push. He slowly moved the makeshift pick upward until he heard an audible click. When he found a second pin, he repeated the step, taking his time and making sure not to push them too high.
After a minute, he used the other pin to turn the lock, and it clicked open. Relief swam through him when the padlock dropped onto the floor and he pulled the chain free from the wall.
“I guess I’m ready for a night at Club Hell,” he muttered, realizing it was going to be a long walk with a chain around his neck.
Simon stepped into his leathers, hiking them up as fast as he could and retrieving his knife. He gripped the wall, dizzy and out of breath. He thought about calling Justus, but he was all tapped out of favors. Most immortals didn’t have a throat large enough to swallow pride, so they figured a way out of their own mess. He also didn’t want to put a fissure in their friendship. They’d fallen out of touch once before after Simon had gotten into a jam and Justus had bailed him out, nearly jeopardizing his standing with HALO.
The thought of Boris or his minions returning lit a fire in him to get moving. He shoved open the heavy door, and the moonlight iced over his skin, making the blood that oozed from his various wounds look like ink. He couldn’t flash. His heart would probably explode from lack of blood and energy.
Clouds rolled across the moon and shrouded the world in darkness, but not before he turned around and glimpsed his surroundings. The building had been spray-painted with graffiti and had two stories, which surprised him since he didn’t remember a staircase. He could sense north and south, but without knowing where he was, he didn’t know which way to go.
Simon took a chance and jogged to the right, stumbling over broken concrete and overgrown weeds. Pippi had tossed his shoes across the room, and it hadn’t occurred to Simon to get them until he stepped on a sharp stone. He sure as hell wasn’t turning back now. The chain dragged behind him, so he gathered it up.
“Fucking hell!” he shouted, hopping forward on one leg. He charged through an overgrown bush and got whacked in the face by a slim branch.
He might as well have been blindfolded. After shoving his way through the dense brush, it eventually thinned out until he was jogging across tall grass. Just as moonlight penetrated the clouds, Simon realized the peril he was in when his foot hovered over a deep trench.
Unable to stop the momentum, he jumped and tried to reach for the other end, but fell anyway.
Sharp razors sliced at his skin and he cursed, bouncing slightly and twisting around before realizing the trench was really a trap filled with barbed wire. His flesh ripped in every direction, biting through his leathers, digging into his bare back and dangerously close to his neck. Every movement sent a torrent of pain.
As Simon stared up at a cloud moving swiftly beneath the moon, he realized he was too tangled—too weak—to escape. The trench looked five feet high, and the ground wasn’t below his back, so one false move could send him even farther into the barbs. Coils and coils of wire surrounded him, and his right ankle was twisted up something fierce.
“Couldn’t give a bloke a break, could you?” he asked, grimacing up at the moon. “Karma doesn’t just come back around; it saves up all my payments and delivers them at once like a buffet of misfortune.”
Simon’s phone rang in his back pocket. He stared at the sky, listening to the happy melody. Either it was going to slide out of his pocket or he was going to have to move and try to get it. Simon winced as the barbs snagged and bit into his skin when he reached beneath him with his left arm. The hard case was poking out of his pocket, so he carefully extracted it.
Unable to bring the phone to his face due to the way the wires were tangled around him, he propped it on his belly and activated the speakerphone. Blood trickled down various parts of his body, and his right arm was lacerated so severely that he didn’t dare move it.
“Hello,” he said, his voice strained.
“You’re an asshole,” Levi announced. “Can’t you answer your phone? I’m out here questioning two naked men and worried about your safety, and you’re probably busy getting laid.”
Simon laughed to himself, speaking wearily. “I can’t deny that I’m all tied up.”
“Bastard.”
Simon contemplated his fate. Boris would soon discover Hannah had no use for him, and if he didn’t get out of this hole, he was going to end up dying at the hands of a man who’d once lost his horse because he’d forgotten to tie it to the post.
“What’s wrong?” Levi asked quietly. “You’re not your usual chatty self.”
Simon had the urge to move but stayed absolutely still. His ankle was so twisted that if he fell, it might tear off his foot.
He licked his lips. “Tell Justus that he can have all my files. HALO might find some of them useful.”
Levi’s voice fell to a growl. “Where the fuck are you?”
“In my soon-to-be grave.”
“Location?”
“Abandoned building.” A quiet laugh rose in his throat. “I don’t have a clue where I am, except that I’m lying in a trench with the moon laughing down at me.”
“What’s the building look like?”
Simon furrowed his brow. “As if you know every abandoned building in Cognito.”
“Maybe I do. Now describe it.”
&n
bsp; Simon thought about it. “Two stories, at least ninety years old, dilapidated, weeds growing through the broken concrete, miles of land around it… Who the bloody hell puts a business this far out?”
“Some Breeds used to live on the outskirts for a long time before they moved into the city. People didn’t like driving all the way into town to get their groceries, so a few of them opened up small businesses. What else did you notice?”
“Nothing, you silly Chitah. Just a bunch of graffiti.”
“Of what?”
Simon wanted to burst out laughing when the image flooded his mind. “SpongeBob SquarePants.”
“I’ll be there in ten.”
When Levi hung up, Simon nearly dropped the phone while reaching for it.
He glanced back up at the moon’s pale surface and thought of Ella. Then thoughts of Boris putting his hands on her filled his mind with disgust. Why would Hannah arrange a bonding ceremony after all the progress they had made? It didn’t make sense. Simon needed to find out the truth, even if it meant torturing Hannah by means of rubbing his naked, bloody body all over her snowflake wallpaper.
Chapter 21
When Ella reached the Red Door, she circled around the block, just in case Simon had parked along the street or at an adjacent building. Since it was a Breed club, she also wanted to scope the area and make sure there weren’t any juicers hanging out. Just in case, she concealed her light so that no Mage could detect her. It wouldn’t guarantee her safety since some juicers were so strung out that they’d stoop to stealing energy from humans, but most wouldn’t bother because human light was weak and the risk of killing them too great. Killing a bunch of humans outside their favorite Breed hangouts would attract Enforcers—the lawmen of the Mageri.
She pulled into the parking lot across the street and searched for Simon’s black GTO. That car suited his style, whereas the Maserati matched his ego.
She spotted Simon’s car near the back row of the lot and looped back around to find a parking space. The moon dipped behind the clouds, creating false shadows that moved all about. She emerged from the car, her eyes alert as she approached his vehicle.
When the moon reappeared, the first thing she noticed was the drag marks leading to his open driver’s side door. Ella scanned the inside of his car but didn’t find any clues. The key was still in the ignition, the window down—But wait.
Simon had a small flashlight on his keychain, so she unhooked it from the ring and switched it on. She ran her fingers over a small rip in the seat and shone the light on her hand. Coagulated blood smeared between her fingertips, and she backed away from the car, gathering her thoughts. Someone must have moved in on him fast, and she wondered what could have distracted Simon enough to be so easily caught.
And taken.
Who could have taken him? Ella knew a little about what he did for a living, so he must have hundreds of enemies. Especially with his big mouth.
She searched outside the car for clues, unable to spot any security cameras. Not that she would have known how to go about getting the footage, but a guy like Levi might.
Levi…
She sent him a quick message about what she’d found. He replied that he was still “talking” to the men who’d attacked them and had found a lead. When she asked what, he didn’t reply. She sent him a few choice words and then kicked a tire. Simon obviously had a confidentiality agreement with Levi, so she tried every angle.
Ella reined in some of her anger that was starting to leak. When a message came through, Ella glanced at her phone.
Levi: Keep this between us. Got it? Boris Dmitry employs these men and the other who was following you.
Ella: What other?
Levi: James Dmitry. Know him? He seemed to know you.
Ella’s heart quickened. Boris? First, she’s supposed to bond with him, and now she finds out he’d sent his men to kill her? None of this made any sense.
A shadow crept up the side of the car, and she spun on her heel, shining her light in Hannah’s face.
Hannah clasped her hands in front of her. “I had a feeling you’d run to Simon. I can’t understand why anyone would spend time in a place like this,” she said, looking around.
The Red Door was on the way to Simon’s, and Hannah must have swung by and either saw Boris’s car or felt Ella’s energy leaking.
Hannah narrowed her eyes. “I should have known you could read lips. You were always an astute Learner. I don’t know how much you understand, but you obviously followed my conversation with Boris just fine. You can’t run from your fate, Ella. Sometimes you have to make difficult choices that are in your best interest. Despite your improvements, I fear it will take far too long before you’re fit to live independently, if that’s even possible. I simply cannot take on that responsibility.”
Ella stepped back. She was no match for Hannah, whose light surpassed her own.
Hannah tilted her head to the side, her tight expression softening. “Dear Ella. I do all this for you, with your best interest in mind. You’ve never understood that; you never will.”
Ella’s future had never seemed so bleak. She could either run and face charges of treason for disobeying the orders of a Councilwoman, or she could willingly bond with a man she didn’t even know. And yet despite her immediate dilemma, all she could think about was Simon. It was as if her other half was missing, and she didn’t know if she would want to live in a world that didn’t include him in it. And not because she wanted to be with him, although the thought elated her more than she’d expected, but because Simon was a perfect light—someone with a loyal heart. Someone she admired and wanted to be. Intelligent, self-sufficient, cunning, strong, and capable. Maybe he’d been paid to teach her, but he had done much more than that. He’d fought beside her as an equal—as a partner. That afternoon had been the first time she’d felt like she might have a place in this world where she could hold her own, and Simon admired her strengths and didn’t tolerate self-pity or excuses.
As she stared into the cold blue eyes of her Creator, she realized she was condemned to follow someone because of a law—not because of what was best for her. If Hannah truly had her best interests in mind, she would give her to someone like Simon, not some older man with a skinny mustache who smells like salami.
Fleeing was a powerful temptation, but Ella could never live a life on the run from the Mageri.
Ella dropped the flashlight and decided to meet her fate head-on.
While meditating the pain away, Simon had fallen into a trancelike state with his eyes open, gazing at the moon. He’d tried to free himself once, but one of the coils below him had buckled and sent him farther down, twisting his right ankle and threatening to shear it off.
“Wire cutters,” he murmured, still gazing at the moon. “Need to invent a tiny pair.”
Some immortals wore cargo pants with numerous pockets hiding lightweight tools or weapons. Simon never had, but given his current predicament, he was beginning to reconsider his wardrobe.
The crickets were chirping a steady tune that filled his head and helped him meditate. Until they were interrupted by shouts in the distance.
“Simon!”
As Levi’s shouts grew louder, Simon wanted to flail his arms in frustration. “Why not shoot off fireworks and tell everyone where you are?” he murmured, wondering if Boris’s minions had returned.
Then again, Levi was a Chitah, and Chitahs were Mages’ mortal enemies. When their canines pushed through, a bite with all four had enough venom to kill a Mage. Two caused paralysis, and very few were ever bitten with three to find out what would happen. The venom didn’t seem to have an effect on any other Breed.
“Simon!” he bellowed. “I can smell you.”
“Can you smell my irritation?” he said quietly, having second thoughts about this whole affair. “Take a whiff of those dirty socks on your feet while you’re at it.”
“Don’t be an asshole!” Levi yelled out, drawing closer. “I can smel
l the blood, and I know you can hear me because your scent keeps changing, you dickhead.”
“For the love of all that is holy,” Simon shouted. “I’m down here, you oversized house cat!”
He grimaced when some of the wounds on his back reopened. It wasn’t until the moment Levi’s silhouette hovered over the trench that Simon felt shame down to his core. He didn’t want anyone to see him this way—weak, incapable, vulnerable.
He waited for the laughter.
It never came.
“I got you,” Levi said, kneeling down. “Stay still and let me get a look.” Chitahs could see better in the dark than most, and with a little moonlight, he’d be able to get an eyeful of Simon lying in a bed of barbed wire. “Be right back!”
He disappeared. Maybe he went to get a camera. Levi was the sort of prankster that would do just that.
Simon’s arms and legs tingled to life as the blood in his body was slowly replenished. His energy was a different matter. A Mage without energy was like a battery without a charge.
Levi reappeared and beamed a flashlight in Simon’s eyes.
“Bloody hell! Quit pointing that thing at me.”
“That’s what he said,” Levi quipped.
“You’re a regular comedian.”
“I’m also a man with wire cutters,” he pointed out, holding up the tool in his left hand.
Simon reached up. “Toss them to me.”
“The hell I’m throwing them down there. You’ll lose them.”
Simon’s jaw set. “I suppose you think you’re going to leap down here and be a hero? Brilliant idea. Then we’ll both be tangled up.”
Levi smirked. “Kind of been a dream of mine for years. Now shut up and let me think.”
“The smoke is already churning out of your ears.”
Levi set down the flashlight and pulled off his shirt. Simon listened to the sound of fabric tearing and almost wanted to laugh. This story would either end up great in the retelling or become one of the most embarrassing stories he’d have to endure at every party where Levi was present.