ADDY
"....never again Rowan."
The words stir me into consciousness, my eyes flutter open and the strained pain of my shoulders made me alert almost immediately. I turn back and find my hands tied tightly together.
My forehead is hot and I can feel the beads of sweat mustering like some kind of mission to send me to a quick death.
A low tired groan leaves my lips and I feel a sharp kick right at my ankle. I mouth an 'ow' and trace the leg responsible.
"Can you keep quiet?" His voice is hushed and I don't know if my vision is blurry or maybe I'm dead but his blonde hair and those forest green eyes — like laying down in a field of grass and the only thing you can see are the birds chirping, flying overhead and landing on the branches of trees whatsoever — does the job already.
My words hangs in my throat.
"Please," his word comes out frantic, like a call for help. My eyes scan his face to find the flying strands of hair scattered, his hands are tied just like mine and his lips are chapped with a dash of crimson at the side.
He was wounded.
"What's going on?"
"I don't know," he whispers and it's almost impossible to hear him speak. He looks around like we're in an apocalypse. "But if we don't find a way out of here, we might not make it."
I squint my eyes in confusion, "we might not make it?" My head bops forward, titling at the blonde young man. "What do you mean, we might not make it?" I ask with a hushed tone.
He leans forward too, a judging look plastered on his face as he looks me up and down. "Are you just dumb, or are you genuinely asking because you don't know what's going on?"
I blink once, twice.
Then I look around, but the place is a bit too dark to make out anything else except for – what seems like – the tens of people sprawled out on the floor all around me and the blonde douche.
"Who's Rowan?" I furrow my brows. That was the name I heard when I opened my eyes. The blonde young man doesn't respond but with the way the whites of his eyes are flickering up and down my face, I know he's seconds away from giving me a choke slam.
But I take it as a sign to just ask again. Because oftentimes, I choose not to read the freaking room.
"Who is —"
He sucks in a sharp breath. Ugh! Why does he behave like such a nan? "Be quiet, would you?."
But my tongue is sharp and there's fear stirring within me. "If you would just answer my question," I'm beginning to hate the guy. "Then I wouldn't have to speak again. Jeez, what's got you in such a twist?"
"Maybe if you weren't so blind to see that we've been taken unwillingly to somewhere I'm still trying to —"
"Wait," I interrupt him but his reaction is just a sharp breath. "Taken unwillingly….you mean…kidnapped?"
"No," I hear a low dry chuckle from him. "Oh no, we most definitely haven't been kidnapped," he's being sarcastic, I know. But I really want to let him finish before I can let fear spread out within me. "We're just here for an orgy fetish."
"Really?" I raise a brow. "I let you have a sarcastic moment and that's what you came up with?"
"Ugh! Just shut up."
"You haven't answered my question." I say looking around. There are so many bodies laying around me, and I have the urge to wake them up. How can they not wake up when total dumbass here and I were having at it?
I move my legs, uncomfortable with whatever liquid was wetting my legs. It was probably someone's drool.
Yuck!
"What question?"
"Who's Rowan?"
"How am I supposed to know that?"
I gape my mouth like a fish out of water. "Well…"
"I'm just waking up. Same as you, doll."
"I am not a doll."
He tilts his head, his voice becoming more calm and relaxed. "You were kidnapped in a flowery print mini dress, and it's yellow so.."
I kiss my tongue against my teeth, wringing my wrist, hoping to loosen the ropes. "All I can hear is you calling yourself out for an obvious lack of fashion taste. Is that jealousy I smell? Or would it be insecurity?"
All blondie does is growl in response
I'm never like this. Never one to speak up for myself, never one to bark back or challenge someone. But here I was, in the middle of a frantic mess, being so clever with my words.
But where were these words when I needed them the most? They disappeared.
They disappeared when my I found my mother lying in a pool of her own blood with her head barely attached to her neck, when her intestines were pouring out of her slashed belly.
They disappeared when my father died few years after, when everyone at school looked at me like some unfortunate kid, when some even went as far as to hit my head repeatedly against the locker when I forgot to submit her assignments — that she gave me to do without my consent.
They disappeared when Seb; that horrid monster of an ex, mocked me and beat me all through our four years relationship, when Noah would ask me if anything was wrong.
Still, these words, it's not like they didn't exist. They were just limited to my brain, and that was a different level of torture.
Abruptly, a loud snap sounds in the distance and I can't help but think if this was an open space. The light bulbs flicker on, pulling both I and Blondie's head upwards and then at each other.
There's no time to note anything because of the loud voice from the distance.
"They're all dead, Rowan. No one made it past the border and that means…you failed." I snap my head to where the voice seemed to come from only to be met with a huge red door.
It's knob twists loudly and I find myself forcefully pulling my wrists, hoping I could ease the pain a little bit.
"What?" It's a sharp exhale from Blondie. I look at his face to find his eyes fixated on the floor. And to no one's surprise, I follow.
Bile rises in my throat and a gasp escapes my lips are the sight around me. Every body is sprawled out around Blondie and I, they're looking breathless but that's not the part that threw me off.
It's the visual realisation that the liquid covering my legs and my dress isn't drool but blood. I look around frantically, my breaths are sharp but heavy as I make out the source of the blood.
It's from everyone around us.
The door opens and my heartbeat skips for two seconds. I sit there, not wanting to even look. I just want to know how I'm in a room full of dead people.
"It's not use, Rowan," a gruff voice calls out. I hear the slow controlled proceeding footsteps but still, I refuse to turn my head. What if whoever's walking towards Blondie and I doesn't have our best interests at heart?
What if they're murderers for a living?
"Rowan, listen to me…" there's another voice that's breathless. Someone's running in and mentioning that name again. "They're all…"
Why'd he pause? What's going on? What prayers do I need to say to go to heaven? Uh..um…hail Mary? Um.. the Lord's prayer? What's Blondie even doing? I can't hear his smart mouth anymore, is he dead? Oh my gosh, no, I was gonna ask him if he wanted to be friends.
The slow footsteps stop and I feel a dark brooding presence before me.
"Rowan, these two aren't dead."
Two. Okay. Whew, that means Blondie's still here. But my eyes are glued to the floor, unable to look up.
"I know that, Deputy. And you address me by my title."
This voice is new, deep, like a male siren. I feel a rush of blood up my face. And that's why I'm miserable, I'm about to blush in the face of uncertain death.
"Do you want to live?" Asks the other voice. Immediately, my head snaps up and I didn't care to consider it might have been Blondie he were asking, because I wasn't looking.
Our eyes meet instantly and I feel a surge pass through me. It tingles and it burns as his eyes remain fixated on me. A certain lavish chocolate brown that makes me feel like a deer in front of headlights.
His face looks like it's been sculpted perfectly, like the Almighty was showing off when he was created. His eyes don't leave mine, his onyx hair is well placed on his head. It isn't styled but I particularly am drawn to how is falls on both sides of his face.
And suddenly, I didn't mind dying.
Well, not until he speaks.
"Take them outside and out them through the border." He doesn't spare a glance at the man behind him.
"But.." the other tone hesitates and my eyes shift focus. "...that would kill them." And my eyes darts to the gorgeous looking man again.
"Well Deputy, that's the point."