Wraith Captive, page 2
Fucking hell. This isn’t good.
My feet bring me past one dead man. His eyes are still open. Blood runs from his mouth and someone, or something, has torn him to shreds. I pass one more body, two more bodies. By the time I pass a sixth body, I’m sweating. This is strange, even for me.
What the hell could have killed all these big men? And is it still in the shadows of this park?
Energy crackles in the air. I sense the wisps of these people, not quite their spirits or their souls, but the white clouds that bubble out of them. After a moment, the clouds form and then curl around me. And that odd feeling, like I’ve drank ten cups of coffee at once, comes over me. So much so that I feel like a person must after a lightning strike. Stronger than anything I’ve felt before.
But then, I’ve never been around this many freshly killed people at once.
I hate this feeling. For days afterwards I can’t sleep. My movements are too fast and jerky, and I feel a need to release the energy. Usually through sex, which isn’t always a good thing.
But I’d take the energy and deal with it, if it meant I could leave this place. Now. Because a deep sense of foreboding is shadowing me. A sense that everything about this is wrong.
I’m brought to the edge of the bodies, and instantly I see the man. The one who called to that dark side of myself, to that inhumane part of me. His eyes are glassy. Blood bubbles from his lips. And I know he breathes his dying breaths.
My knees collapse next to him, and I see the shred marks in his chest. Could he survive this? I can never save anyone, but I tear my jacket off and try to staunch his bleeding. His eyes are filled with so much pain and so much fear. I need to help, if I can.
“I’m going to call an ambulance,” I tell him, reaching for the pocket of my messenger bag.
He snags my wrist with a movement that is too fast and too strong to be human.
Oh hell, these guys aren’t human? That sense of dread increases.
“They took her,” he mumbles as his eyes close. “All is lost.”
And then, he dies. I feel it, because suddenly I could leave if I wanted to. I could get far away from this place as fast as I can. But the cloud rises from his lips, and I linger, watching it surround me before it sinks into my skin.
That sense of energy inside of me is overwhelming. But my logic fights through the overwhelming feeling.
I need to go. I need to get out of here, now. Before whatever killed these men kills me too.
“Stop right there!”
My eyes widen and I jerk my head toward the sound. Men in black uniforms with black gloves and shaved heads are heading toward me. They don’t hold guns, but they don’t need to. They’re Supernatural Enforcers, police for the non-humans, and they’re dangerous as hell.
If I move right now, whatever magic they hold will kill me, so I stay still. Perfectly still. And I swear my life flashes before my eyes. My mom’s smile. My years spent keeping my head down and trying to stay out of trouble, at least as much as I was capable of.
And now, despite all that, I’m pretty sure I’m going to die.
One of the men stops right in front of me. His face is somehow familiar, but it could be the shadows playing tricks on my mind. He looms over me and speaks, his question containing an unspoken threat. “Where is she?”
Sweat rolls down my spine. She? Who are they looking for? And why doesn’t this man seem concerned about all the dead people around me?
“Where’s who?” I ask, my voice trembling.
Is there any way I can survive this? Any way they’ll let me go?
A terrifying anger twists his expression and my blood runs cold. “If you think you’re going to get away with this, you’re wrong.”
No, they can’t blame me for this. I just have to get them to understand. I just have to get them to see the truth, without telling them what I am.
“Get away with what? I didn’t do this. I just—“
“Showed up at the scene?” His voice holds mockery. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
I shake my head, terrified out of my mind. He looks familiar, but I can’t quite pinpoint how,
“I was there for one of your other situations when you just ‘happened’ upon a body.”
My gut turns. Of course. He didn’t speak to me, but he was there the one time I was dragged to the body of a supernatural being. Men in these uniforms had come; they’d questioned me for hours, and then finally let me go.
As terrifying as that experience was, it gave me hope that soon this would all just feel like a bad dream. Like the day with the shifter. I just needed to stay calm and make it clear that I had nothing to do with this.
“Since that day, I’ve watched your file, Elizabeth. You’re found around a lot of bodies, aren’t you?”
What can I say? That’s part of what I am. Not that I can tell him that. “It’s bad luck,” I lie.
He smirks. “Yeah right. The thing is, showing up at a bunch of human deaths didn’t matter to us. Even the fucking shifter I found you with didn’t matter. We couldn’t prove anything, and their lives were… insignificant.”
I stare, waiting for the but.
“This time is different,” he continues, and his words hold a chill that has nothing to do with the autumn night. “This time you’ve gone too far.”
“I didn’t do this,” I argue, trying to sound firm and not terrified out of my mind.
He simply looks down at me with cold, cruel eyes.
“Should we kill her?” another Enforcer asks from behind him. He lifts his hand and flames dance along his flesh.
Kill me? Suddenly all I can picture is how those flames would feel burning my flesh.
“No, what?” My voice takes on a hysterical note. “Shouldn’t you question me? If you do you’ll see that I don’t know—“
“No,” the man above me says, cutting me off, his gaze never leaving me. “I have a better idea. A place she can go that will be worse than anything we could do to her tonight.”
Worse than being murdered by them in the park? This doesn’t sound good, not at all.
A chill moves down my spine. “Listen, I didn’t do this. I just came and they were all already like this.”
“And you’re totally human, right?” His eyes hold mine.
I squeeze my mouth shut. I could die for what happened here, but I would die if he knew what I was.
“Nightmare Penitentiary seems like the perfect place for someone like you.”
Nightmare what? I shake my head. “Any judge would rule—“
“Your judgment will be over in one minute, girl,” he snaps back. “We supernaturals don’t worry about all those things like reasonable doubt or innocent until proven guilty, we just get rid of anything that threatens our society. And you, you threaten our society.”
“I don’t—“
“Cuff her,” he commands.
“But sir, shouldn’t we find out what she knows first?” the man behind him asks, the flames fading from his hand
He nods. “First, we’ll get some answers from her, then we’ll turn her over to the warden.”
But the way he says it…it kind of sounds like however they plan to get answers from me won’t exactly be pain-free.
“Please, I’m just a TA.”
The man lights a cigarette above me, and the smoke curls around his face like a nightmare. “Say goodbye to that life, Elizabeth, and hello to life as a prisoner in the worst place our kind could create...”
Two of the men move forward and grab me by both arms. One wrenches my arm behind my back.
Which is the moment all of it hits me. The moment I realize that this is really happening. That I’m being dragged off, accused of a crime I didn’t commit. A crime that I’ve, apparently, already been found guilty of.
I fight them. I scream. I thrash and twist.
But in the end, they capture me. And the life I’ve known is snuffed out in an instant.
Chapter Two
Elizabeth
I’m the only prisoner on the small bus. Two guards sit behind me, and the driver sits in front of me, staring up ahead, waiting for the massive gates of Nightmare Penitentiary to open. I lick the cut that’s still healing on my lip from one of the Enforcer’s punches. And I lift my shackled hands and shift them to the other side, still stiff from the beating I took, even though it’s been days.
I close my eyes, fighting the memories of the weeks spent in the Enforcers’ cells. Weeks where strange creatures would come in, touch the side of my head while I screamed and fought, and pour lava into my mind until my world would go black.
They said they were searching for something. Information about someone who was missing.
But after a time, I think, they realized I didn’t know anything. At least nothing of use.
And the pain had stopped.
They’d readied me for travel. A few of the Enforcers had tangled their hands through my long red hair and asked things like if the carpet matched the drapes. After a few comments, I’d fought back.
And lost.
But at least the beating was better than the painful creatures tearing my mind apart. Anything was better than that. When they’d said I was off to Nightmare Penitentiary, I’d been glad. Jail, boredom, and three meals a day I could handle.
Not the mind creatures.
“Don’t see a lot of women here,” the driver says to me in a lazy voice.
My eyes flash open as I’m pulled back to the present. My gaze pours over the middle-aged man with greying hair and a significant belly. I catch his gaze in the rearview mirror. “Really? At least that means the women’s side of the prison might not be too full.”
The guards laugh behind me, and I frown.
In the rearview mirror, I catch the guard’s wince. “Sorry, sugar tits, but this ain’t no fancy human prison. Women and men… they’re in the same place.”
I swear I feel like the floor drops out from under me. “No, I—“
The driver gives me a sympathetic look. “It’s going to be bad. Just find yourself the biggest motherfucker in the prison and let him do what he wants to you. Better to be one guy’s fuck toy than the pussy for the entire prison.”
I look back at the guards. “He can’t be serious.”
One of the guards lets his gaze roam down to my breasts, which are encased in an orange jumpsuit. Without a bra. Because, apparently, I could use it as a weapon.
“You guys really let that happen to women?”
The other guard shrugs. “Criminals don’t exactly get the red carpet.”
I look straight ahead of me, feeling sick. “If anyone tries to touch me, I’m going to rip their dicks off.”
The guards laugh, but the driver locks eyes with me in the mirror. “What are you, girl?”
I don’t know what to say. “I’m just a human.”
Something flashes in his eyes. “There had to be a reason they put you here.”
“Wrong place wrong time,” I lie.
His eyes narrow. “Are your powers useful at all?”
They’re not. “I don’t have powers.”
“Fuck,” he mumbles, looking at the gates as they slowly open. “Definitely give that pussy of yours to a big guy. Life in the prison doesn’t have to be all bad, if you line yourself with the right giant asshole.”
I’m going to be sick, but damn if I‘m going to show them that. “You guys ever heard of a pencil dick?”
“A pencil dick?” the quiet guard repeats. “Never heard of it.”
“A pencil dick is when you shove a pencil so far inside a guy’s dick hole that even the doctors can’t remove it.”
Every guy shifts at once, and I sense their mood change. At least none of the bastards are grinning now. But my reprieve from them only lasts a moment.
“No one better give her a pencil,” the obnoxious guard says behind me.
And then they all laugh, and their tension fades away.
My hands curl into fists. It doesn’t matter what I use, I’ll find a way to stay safe here. I’ve survived this long; I’ll continue to do so. No matter that everyone here is probably bigger, stronger, and deadlier than I am.
The driver pulls into the prison, beyond the massive brick fence, going slow. On each side of us are barbed wire fences that look out into empty prison yards. And around the outside of the huge brick fence are lookout towers. Guards stare down at my bus, and they carry guns, but guns unlike any I’ve ever seen.
I wonder what those do against supernatural beings. Probably nothing good.
And yet, there’s still something inside of me that hopes this prison will be better than the Enforcers’ cell. No more mind creatures at least. But more than that, there will be a different set of leaders, and I’m hoping, maybe foolishly, that they’ll be more reasonable than the Enforcers. That even if they won’t let me go free, they’ll tell me when I will be. Or even…or even just let me call my mom so she knows what happened to me.
My throat closes at the thought of how worried my mom must be. I have no doubt that after she didn’t hear from me for a few days, she flew down to my college. But what did she do when no one knew what happened to me?
Did she suspect? Or will she spend the rest of her life wondering?
I blink away the tears that fill my eyes. I need to be tough right now. So the last thing I should be thinking about is my mom. If I played my cards right, if I was a good prisoner, I hoped my sentence wouldn’t be too long, and that I’d get to see my mom again soon.
The thought might have been foolish, but I had to hold onto that small hope or I’d completely unravel.
Our bus stops in front of huge metal gates at the side of a prison that seems to stretch out in all directions. The guards behind me stand, and I do too. They look surprised, as if they thought I’d fight, cry, or plead. But they push me forward, and the driver opens the doors.
I look down at the older driver one more time.
He actually looks a little sad. “It’s a shame to die so young.”
“I won’t die,” I tell him, stiffening.
Prison is probably miserable, but I doubt I’d die here. Right? Unless they plan to lead me to the electric chair or something…
“Nowadays everyone dies,” he says under his breath, then looks away from me.
And the way he says it… I kind of believe him.
I open my mouth to ask more, but the guards shove me forward so hard I nearly stumble down the steps. If the driver’s hand hadn’t caught me, I’d be eating dirt.
“Fuck,” the guard mumbles. “Maybe she is human.”
The other guard shrugs. “Some supernatural are weak. They wouldn’t send a fucking human here.”
I hear the driver say a prayer for me under his breath, which doesn’t exactly scream of his confidence in me. I manage to make it down the stairs without tripping, and then the guards shove me along, a bit more gently, until we reach the door. More guards take my paperwork, sign it, then flash a card that opens the massive doors.
We continue through twisted hall after twisted hall of dimly lit areas and through more security checkpoints. at the fourth checkpoint my cuffs and chains are removed and my old guards are replaced by new ones. We pass cells, all of which are empty and open, in a huge room that seems to go on forever, with cells lining each side of us.
They take us to the other end of the room, flash a badge, and open the door into a slight hallway. Across from us is another door. There seems to be the briefest moment of hesitation between the two men behind me, but then they push me forward.
Instantly, I’m overwhelmed by sound. Prisoners in orange jumpsuits eat in a large room. There’s easily 50 massive men, and not a single woman. Guards line the walls with huge guns clutched in their hands.
Butterflies fill my stomach. Should I take a tray? Find an empty area in the back to sit at and hope not to be noticed?
Suddenly, the guard behind me shouts, “Fresh meat! And this one’s of the female sort!”
All the sounds in the room die down, and every eye turns to me.
Holy hell. What now?
Chapter Three
Elizabeth
I don’t know what to say or do, so I stand frozen, knowing this moment is important. Really important. The driver’s words ring through my mind. There are so many eyes on me, burning through me, that I can see the logic in his words. Of picking one of these assholes and hoping he might offer me protection.
But maybe I really am my father’s daughter, because there’s no way I’ll bow to one of them.
Keeping my back straight, I go to the cafeteria line and grab a tray. When I hold it out, the man on the other side just stares at me, his ladle unmoving in his hand.
“What are you waiting for?” I snap at him. “A girl’s got to eat.”
“I got something you can eat,” a guy says behind me.
I turn slowly around and see a huge man rise from the table. I have no doubt he’s some kind of shifter, probably a bear, lion, or some shit like that. He’s got long hair and hair sprouting from every visible area of his body. He’s also easily the size of six of me.
“Sorry,” I say. “I’m kind of picky about my food.”
Anger burns in his eyes. “What, I ain’t your type, princess?”
Don’t back down. “Not even close.”
A smirk curls his lips. “We’re going to have to do something about that dirty mouth of yours. Come here and show me how you use it,” he says as his hands grab at his crotch.
My gaze slides to the guards. I notice they seem to be working really hard to pretend not to notice me. No help there.
Back down now, and you’re screwed.
I take my tray and walk right up to the massive man, hoping no one can see my legs shaking. “If you even try it, you’re going to regret it.”
“I’m going to make you very sorry you didn’t obey me.” The big man’s words hold a dark edge as he reaches for me.
I hit him in the face with my tray, kick him in the nuts, and sweep his feet out from under him. He hits the ground like a tree crashing down. There’s one beautiful moment when everyone stares at me in shock, and I feel like I’ve made myself clear, when the big man roars from the floor.
