59

The only thing I could think of was the pain through my entire body, making it impossible for me to move without screaming in pain.

I felt a blunt pain hit me in the stomach, presumably from the shoe of whoever was in that house. I felt blood climbing up my throat and into my mouth as he kept kicking me. I started choking on the blood.

"Griffin!" The kicking stopped after the same chilling voice called for it.

I forced myself to my side as I coughed up the blood. A sob ripped from my throat as the pain rippled through my body, keeping me down. I slowly lifted my head, looking at the blurry figure that was marching toward me.

I was suddenly forced up and brought to my feet, then pushed back against the wall. The dark, soulless eyes that met mine were chilling. I choked on the cries in my throat.

"Where is Joshua Parker?"

I felt a tear break from my eyes. I was too scared to speak.

"Answer me." His voice became more menacing. "For every minute you don't is another piece of innocence and dignity stripped from you. And I promise you it will be the most painful memory that will haunt you for years to come, my darling. So, tell me where he is."

After a few seconds of trying to gather my ability to speak, I did. "I killed him."

He clicked his tongue. "That's not the answer I want." His eyes wandered my face before he sighed. "Griffin."

A sob slipped past my lips. "Please don't do this! I swear he's dead!"

He released me and backed away, letting me collapse. I felt a hand around my throat, choking me. I clawed at the hand around my throat. My vision started to blacken again.

...

The complete darkness of the room remained until they came in to try for an answer they didn't want then to torture me and end up killing me again.

The worst pain is the bullets stuck in my body still. And the seven more added. I can feel them slowly killing me.

They ended up chaining me to the wall, which is tight enough to keep me from moving my wrists and bruising my skin. Apparently, pulling the bullets out is frowned upon.

I don't know anything except the man who tortures me has a name, and it's Griffin. They're looking for Joshua, but they won't believe that I killed him. I have no clue how long I've been here, but it feels like it's been years.

The door opened quickly, and the man who questioned me walked in first. Behind him was Griffin.

I haven't lost hope. In fact, I've been filled with more. The more they do to me, the more Kai will do to them. He won't stop looking for me until he finds me or ends up dead, and that won't happen until he finds me.

My head felt light.

The man was standing a few feet from me, staring down at me. "How are you?" He asks that right before he grabs me and tries to get an answer from me. It's getting boring. I've lost my fear for these people.

I breathed out slowly. "Just peachy. Bleeding out on the floor is the highlight of my day. My entire life, actually. Thank you for making my dream come true." I forced my eyes open after they fell shut. I looked up at him, leaning my head back against the wall.

For once, emotion crossed his face. Amusement. "I'm so glad you've found humor in your predicament. My only wonder is how. You were begging for this to stop, not even a week ago. You should be terrified for your life because it is in my hands after all, but instead, you're cracking jokes. Why?"

A week. I've been here for more than a week. "You're not going to kill me. You would've done it already."

"Mm." He glanced down as he took another step closer. He squatted down, knitting his hands together as his elbows rested on his knees. He looked at my face, tilting his head. "I'm not going to kill you until you give me the answer I want."

"You're looking for Joshua Parker. You want to know where he is. He's dead. I killed him."

He shook his head once. "No. You couldn't."

I felt a wave of anger wash over me, staying caged in my chest. "Why couldn't I?"

"Because he's a lot stronger than you are. You're just a little girl who happened to turn into a vampire." He laughed breathily. "He is the strongest person in the coven. You're a weak, delicate child who can't even defend herself against me."

In the midst of all of this, it seems I've forgotten what I'm capable of. I tore the head off of a man ten times the size of me. Why the hell can't I even snap the neck of this guy? Why did I let myself be caged by these monsters? I felt a laugh bubbling up my throat. I'm waiting to be saved when I can save myself.

"What's so amusing now?"

"You can't believe the leader of your coven is dead because you don't want to believe he was taken down by a girl. Your misogynistic, backward, pea-sized brain prevents you from seeing me as a threat, and that will be the death of you." I glanced at Griffin before focusing my attention on the unnamed man again. "Not only did you attack me, but you went after people I love. It wasn't just people I love, though. It was the people I wanted to protect most from cowards like you."

"Cowards? A coward wouldn't do something like this."

"Of course you would." I swallowed dryly. "You feel so threatened by me that you had to isolate me from everything. You had to restrain me because it makes you feel powerful. It must be the only thing, too. Having the people you fight on the verge of dying is the only way you can fight them because you're the one that's weak."

If this were a cartoon, he would have steam coming out of his ears, and his face would be red. "I'm going to ask you one more time. If you don't answer me, I'll rip your heart out and feed it to your sister. Where the hell is Joshua Parker?"

"No, what's actually going to happen is this: I'm going to boil your blood and push you right to the edge of dying. Of course, Griffin will come after me, though because your life is being threatened, but he'll end up getting himself killed because I'm going to rip his heart out the second, he steps too close."

"How do you plan to do that," he deadpanned. "You're just a girl."

I stared at him, focusing on his eyes. His dead eyes were drained of any joy. He started to scream in pain as he collapsed backward, moving his hands to his head. I kept focusing on the man but looked at Griffin. He started toward me.

I broke my hands out of the chains and hurried to my feet. I stepped away from him, letting him run toward the wall. I stepped behind him and reached my hand through his chest, squeezing his heart before pushing it through the other side. I pulled my hand back through, keeping hold of the heart.

I ignored the pain in my body and focused on the rage running through me. I grabbed Griffin's shoulder and forced him to his knees. I grabbed his hair and tilted his head back. I forced as much of his heart as I could into his mouth before making him bite down on it. I twisted his head off and then threw it across the room.

I turned to face Griffin, who was lying on the ground, near death. I walked toward him. I stood over him, watching as he tried to reach for me. I lifted my foot, then stepped down on his hand, crushing every bone in it and making him scream in pain.

I watched as tears filled his eyes. I stopped the spell and knelt down beside him. A cry slipped past his lips, and he turned his face to look away from me. I grabbed his chin and turned his head to face me.

"Open your eyes, or I will tear off your eyelids."

A whimper escaped his throat, and he slowly opened his eyes. "Kill me."

"Is that what you want?"

He stared at me, hatred in his eyes. "Do it, you bitch."

"Well, since you asked so nicely..." I grabbed his head, lifting it off the concrete then slamming it back down as hard as I could. He yelled out in pain as he cried.

I grabbed his arms and pulled him to where they forced me to stay. I put his hands in the chains, tightening them as far as I could. I backed away from him. He looked down beside him to see Griffin. He cowered back against the wall, screaming in horror.

He blacked out after a minute. I made sure he was still alive before turning toward the steps. I walked to sit on the stairs. I held my breath as I fished the bullets out of my body. I threw them all toward the nameless man. I sat for a moment, letting my body heal.

I pulled myself up and walked up the steps. I opened the door. I stopped to let my eyes adjust before walking out of hell. I looked around, seeing the familiar hallway. I walked a little further down. I looked at the wall that was covered in picture frames.

We never left the house. I've been kept in Jo and Alaric's basement by Jo's tormentor.

I walked to the front door and walked out. I shut the door behind me. I breathed out a breath of relief as I started walking. I stopped at the end of the walkway. There were people who turned their heads toward me, concerned looks on their faces.

I started walking toward my house. Someone jogging toward me stopped me in my tracks. "Are you okay?"

I walked away from the strange woman, continuing my way down the sidewalk. Almost an hour later, I was at the end of the sidewalk that led to my house. The cars of Caroline and Alaric were both here. Which means they are here.

I stared at the front door, not wanting to walk any further and feeling too physically exhausted. Everything I want is on the other side of the door and all I have to do is walk.

I took a deep breath before walking to the front door. I opened the door and walked inside. I pushed it closed. I could hear talking that died down, then footsteps. I took a few steps and turned to the living room. I felt overwhelmed by exhaustion and solace.

Caroline ran toward me, abandoning her conversation with Stefan, Ric, and Jo. Her arms tangled around me, hugging me tightly. I wrapped my arms around her, unable to hug her as tightly as she did me. I let my eyes close, and my lungs fill with air.

After our moment of reuniting, she pulled away, asking me routine questions. Am I okay? Where was I? What happened? At the speed she was talking it sounded like one sentence.

I didn't know how to answer her. "I'm going to wash the blood off of me." She was quiet for a minute, probably thinking about why I didn't answer her.

Before she could say anything else, I walked out of the room. I didn't address Ric or Stefan. I was only concerned with getting the blood off of me.

After showering and getting dressed, I walked out of my room. I made my way down the steps, stopping at the bottom when Caroline stepped in front of me.

"He's not here yet, but he should be here any minute."

"Thanks." I stepped off the last step. "I'm going to wait outside for him."

She avoided speaking, which was difficult for her at the moment. I could hear the questions she wanted answers to even though she didn't say them.

I walked out of the house, closing the door behind me. I walked to the porch swing and sat down, bringing my legs up to sit crisscross. I held my hand out in front of me, facing palm up. It was like I could still feel them dying in my hands. I pressed my hands together. I moved my hands to press my thumb into my palm, massaging it gently. I sat for a while, waiting for him and trying to keep myself from getting up and going back to those men.

I heard a car approaching. I looked over to see it park by the curb. The driver door opened, and Kai got out. He shut the door as his eyes landed on me. I released the air in my lungs as a cry left my lips. I got up and walked to the porch steps as he made his way toward me.

I stepped off the last step and into his arms that wrapped around my waist. I wrapped my arms around his neck. He buried his face in my neck as he held me tighter. I shut my eyes as tears filled them.

I moved my hand to the back of his head, easing my arm between our bodies as I opened my eyes. He pulled his head back and I rested my hand at the side of his face. His brows were furrowed, and his lips were parted.

"Don't say anything." I looked at his lips. "Please don't say anything." He slid his hand higher up my back. I looked into his eyes again. "I don't want to talk about it."

He nodded, his eyes wandering my face. After a few minutes, I pulled back from him, and he followed me as I went to sit back down. I sat the same way as before and he sat beside me, not touching me. I stared at my hands as I pressed my thumb into my palm again.

He didn't say anything. He didn't sigh as if it were a problem either.

I remembered how it felt to rip out Griffin's heart and feed it to him. I moved my hands to wipe the tears off my cheeks as I looked up from them. I covered my face with my hands for a minute, stopping myself from crying harder. I pushed my hair back behind my ears then folded my hands together in my lap.

"I know you said not to talk, but it's killing me not asking how you feel, Evelyn."

I looked at the porch, thinking for a minute. "I feel like I'm falling apart." I breathed out slowly as I closed my eyes. "I don't... I don't want to keep fighting anymore. I can't do it." I opened my eyes and looked at the front door. "Whenever things get better, they just get so much worse ten seconds later. It's tearing me apart, and I hate it. I don't know what to do." Everything was quiet for a moment. The stillness that settled around me made me feel worse.

"Can I hold your hand?"

I felt horrible for him having to ask. I nodded as I looked down at his hand. He reached for my hand, pulling it away from my own. I stared at our hands intertwined.

"If you need to stop fighting, you can. Give up if you have to because it doesn't matter." His words made me look at his face. "If you can't keep fighting for yourself, I will fight for you. If you need to break into a million pieces, I will pick them all up and put you back together." He brought our hands to his face, kissing the back of my hand softly. He pulled my hand to his chest, holding it gently in his. His eyes poured into mine, making my heart flutter.

I reached my right hand to the side of his head, pulling him forward to kiss me. He wrapped his right arm around me, his hand resting on my hip. He squeezed my hand gently before pulling his head back from the kiss. His face stayed within kissing distance. I let my eyes close as I rested my head against his. I slipped my hand to the side of his neck.

I let his words sink into me, filling me with the one thing I want for the rest of my life: love. After a moment, I realized that's the one thing I can't stand to lose. He's the one person I would lose my mind for if I lost forever.

I lifted my head and looked at him. His eyes moved from my lips to my eyes. I slid my hand to the side of his face again, "I love you."

"I love you." He kissed my forehead before pulling me close to him.

I readjusted to lay my head on his shoulder and lean into him. I kept my legs on the swing. He moved my hand to his lap, keeping his hand around mine. I moved my other hand to rest against his stomach.

My eyes fell shut after being still for a moment. He kept his free hand resting on my leg, his arm around my body.

"Evelyn."

After realizing he said my name, I hummed in response.

"Would you like to go to sleep, baby?"

"No." I breathed out slowly. "If I go inside, Caroline will start talking to me. I don't want to answer any of her questions."

He lifted his head off of mine. "You could just go through the kitchen."

"I'm too tired."

"I'll carry you."

"Mm-mm." He moved his hand from my leg to my head. He pulled my hair back off my neck, brushing it behind my ear. I inhaled as I lifted my head and looked at him. "Just walk with me."

He leaned forward and kissed me before we got up. I held his hand as he walked me around the house, going to the kitchen door. He shut and opened the door. He led me to my bedroom. He turned to face me. He pushed the door shut and I walked to the bed. I kicked off my shoes before falling onto the bed.

I groaned after realizing I had to move to get under the blanket. I turned to my back and sat up. I looked away from him to the bed. I pulled the blanket back.

"You're staying." I looked at him as I stood up. "Right?"

He nodded as he placed his hands at the sides of my neck, stepping close enough for our bodies to nearly touch. I moved my hands to his stomach. "I'll never leave if you don't want me to."

I shook my head. "Don't ever leave me." I slid my hands lower, curling my fingers around his belt.

A smile formed on his lips. "Is that a marriage proposal?"

I smiled as I shook my head. "Just kiss me, Parker."

He laughed as he leaned down to kiss me, moving his lips against mine slowly. He moved his hands to mine, pulling them away from his jeans and placing them on his chest. He pulled back from the kiss and stared into my eyes.

There was a knock on the door. His eyes stayed on me as I pulled away. I walked to my door and opened it. Stefan's eyes found mine after looking at Kai.

"Hey."

"Hi."

"Caroline wanted me to tell you we're staying tonight."

I furrowed my brows. "She couldn't tell me that herself."

He shook his head once, "She feels like she's being too intrusive."

I tilted my head. "She's just worried, I get it. Tell her I'm fine." I moved my hand from the side of the door to the handle. "Goodnight, Stefan."

He nodded, "Goodnight, Evelyn."

I shut the door as he turned away. I twisted the lock before turning around. I walked to the bed, lifting my knee on to it and moving to lay down. I pulled the blanket over myself before turning to my stomach. I lifted up on my arms and looked down at Kai.

"You know why they actually told us they're staying, right?"

I tilted my head, "I'm choosing to ignore it and believe they were just letting me know because they don't want to push my boundaries." He smiled. "I actually wish they would just go home, though. It's really nice not having them here and being able to..." I stopped myself.

He turned to his side. "Being able to what?"

I leaned over, kissing him softly. I pulled away far enough to speak. "Drop it."

He leaned in, kissing me deeper. I smiled into the kiss. He rolled me to my back, moving his body to rest over mine. He lifted away from the kiss, staring down at me. "You locked the door."

I put my hand at the side of his head and pushed him away. "Goodnight, Malachai." I rolled away from him, laying on my side facing away from him.

He moved closer to me, laying his arm over my waist and pulling me back against him. He peppered kisses up my neck, then stopped at my cheek. He moved his lips next to my ear. "Sweet dreams, Evelyn."

I moved my hand to his, lifting his arm. I pulled away from him and turned to face him. I moved my hand to the side of his face. "I don't want to go to sleep."

He moved his hand to mine. "You need to." I leaned closer to him, letting my body press against his. He wrapped his hand around mine, pulling it down from his face. "Close your eyes."

I closed my eyes. He moved his head to rest against mine. He placed my hand on his chest then wrapped his arms around me. His hands rested on my lower back. I moved my hands to stay clasped together between us.