slip offered no protection. She shivered violently, her teeth clicking together in the dark. Her arms, bound tightly behind her back, ached with a dull, throbbing intensity. Her fin

mpty dirt yard, her min

The sudden, blinding white light flooded the dirt yard, turning the night into a harsh, artificial day. Haley squeezed her eyes shut against the glare.

the bright red hair immediately. It was Lily Evans, a backpacker from Texas who had been in the cage with her in Miami. Lily's clothes were torn.

p cry. "Please!" Lily screamed, her voice cracking with pure terror. "I won't run again! Please, I swear!" The sound of her begging scraped again

Lily with an expression of profound boredom. "This is what happens to assets who try to leave the Obsidian Estate," Bea announ

s were four massive Canary Mastiffs. The dogs were pure muscle, their coats pitch black, their eyes wide and frantic. Thick strings of saliva dripped from their jaws. They smell

, continuous shriek of absolute, primal horror. She scrambled backward in the dirt, her hands clawing at

wanted to look away, to drop down from the window, but

hem," Bea

wed were indistinct, a horrifying chorus of low, guttural growls that made the air feel thick and heavy. A sudden, violent motion near the ground s

he visual of the red light and the auditory horror triggered a violent physical rejection. Haley rolled onto her side, her bound hands useless, and vomited. Her stom

all she had built to protect her sanity shattered into a million pieces. The edges of her vision tunneled into blackness. Her exhausted, traumatized brain simpl

black, her stomach cramping so violently she thought her ribs might crack. The metallic scent of bl

and agonizing, born from the sheer physiological demand to keep breathing. Beneath the crushing weight of the terror, in the very center of her chest, a tiny, dark seed of

ge of Axel Sterling's cold, dead eyes filled her mind. He was a monster. He was a warlord. But he was the only power in th