Dark Secrets: A Paranormal Romance Anthology

by Colleen Gleason

  “There’s no point in being quiet. They have us right—”

  Matthison cut me off with the universal gesture for shut up and proceeded to motion toward the trees across the little parking lot. I couldn’t help wondering why, in these types of situations when the person is right next to you, he or she insists on using commando hand signals. Are they the same everywhere? Does everybody know them? I obviously missed the day they taught them at school.

  I stopped a few feet from the protection of our cars, grabbing Matthison’s shoulder.

  “Seriously, we’ve already fallen right into their trap. It’s just a matter of when they’re going to spring it.”

  “Well, that doesn’t mean we make it easy for them, Maurin. I taught you better than that.” Resting a reassuring hand on mine, Matthison gave a little squeeze before letting go.

  “There isn’t enough training in the world for this shit. You’re just going to have to trust me on that.”

  Right on cue, the shadows between the trees began to move together. Huddled in one large, black-robed mass, they moved out from their cover and stood at the curb across from us. There were only six in front of us, but I knew more would be coming.

  “Still think it won’t be easy for them?” Sarcasm saturated my voice.

  “Six on two? I’ll take those odds.”

  “I’d like them a little better if I had my sword,” Grumbling, I edged a little closer to him.

  “Why is it you don’t have a gun?” Matthison handed me his Berretta, keeping a Glock and a 357 snub nose revolver for himself.

  .

  “The gun I had went with the badge I don’t have any more. Remember? Besides, the crowd I’ve been hanging around lately isn’t all that intimidated by guns.”

  “Yeah, I guess not.” Matthison chuckled. “Well, kid, now would be a good time to use some of those amped-up skills that you have acquired.”

  It was my turn to chuckle. “Well, old man, it’s not like I can shoot laser beams from my eyeballs yet, so we might have to do this the old-fashioned way. Most of what I can do is best for melee fighting anyway.”

  “That would have been good to know before I got out of the car.”

  One male voice broke through the monochromatic crowd. “Spare the man and come with us. If you refuse, you both will suffer.”

  I looked at Matthison. The offer was tempting. My odds of surviving a hostage situation were far better without him. If I couldn’t get free on my own, I could definitely hold out longer than he could. It wasn’t fair to drag Matthison any further into this shit storm than he already was. Something in my posture must have shown I was considering it, because before I could even make up my mind he was moving. He took a few steps, arms slightly out from his sides, his hands loose on the grips. I hoped he had a plan because I had no idea what the hell he was doing.

  The unknown voice called out—this time to Matthison. “Our fight is not with you. Walk away, and we will spare you. Why would you want to help her? She’s not like you, she’s not human.”

  My heart slammed against my ribs as I saw what he was about to do. Maybe in a Quentin Tarantino movie with better guns this would be a good plan, but it would never work in real life.

  I felt the Inquisitor move before I saw it. Magic, different from the coven’s, electrified the air. Before I could process how that was even possible, I was in motion. Matthison flicked his wrists, tightening his grip back on the guns and let his first shot fly as I slammed into him. The road rash he’d suffer would be far less painful than whatever the Inquisitors were about to hit him with.

  I rolled off Matthison and was scrambling to pick up my gun when the first bolt of lightning hit me. The fried eggs that were once my brain tried to tell me it wasn’t real lightning, but my body was screaming, 'Bullshit!’ White-hot pain ran through every part of me. For the first time in my life, I prayed for death as the second bolt arced through my body. Magic I didn’t even understand stripped me bare of all my strength and abilities. I couldn’t defend or heal myself. I was completely immobilized except for the screams of agony tearing my throat apart.

  Just yesterday, I feared Matthison was in over his normal head. Now I hoped the same human nature would spare him from the Inquisitors.

  The sound of drums, no, footsteps, broke through the pain. It was drowned back out when I was lifted up by my arms and legs. My head bobbed around, unsupported. I tried to lift it, which my captors mistook for resistance. I couldn’t have escaped their clutches if I had tried at that moment, but I was instantly struck with aftershocks nonetheless. I think I blacked out briefly.

  My eyes didn’t want to work, so I tried desperately to listen for any sound of Matthison. Nothing. I told myself the silence was probably a good sign. They didn’t want Matthison. He’s human. If he cooperated, he might walk away from this. I’m an Other. I’m friends with, and work for, most of the people the Inquisitors want to kill. I had to come up with something quick or I was definitely a goner.

  The Inquisitors were going to move me somewhere. I could hear bits and pieces of conversations, just not enough to figure out where they intended to take me. By the sound my body made when it hit the metal floor, and the sound of two metal doors slamming shut, I figured they had thrown me into the back of an old work van. Panic didn’t set in until I realized I was hog-tied, and I didn’t remember that occurring at all. Of course, that led to even more panic when I couldn’t open my eyes. Had they sewn them shut? I had lost some time after the lightning strike. But how much? I needed to keep my head together. Freaking out wasn’t going to get me anything but a faster death.

  The van pulled out of what I could only assume was my apartment’s parking lot. I fell over onto something I hoped was Matthison as they tore out onto the main road. I tried to measure the distance we traveled, keeping time with the old “One Mississippi, two Mississippi”, but lost track from getting tossed around in the back of the van. They were hauling ass to wherever it was they were taking us and seemed to vindictively hit every bump along the way. The last pothole had me airborne for a second before my back slammed down on the floor and my head slammed into what I thought was Matthison. A familiar grunt confirmed it. Relief flooded through me. He was alive, and I wasn’t alone. It would have been better if he was alive and not with me, for obvious reasons, but I’d be a liar if I didn’t admit a tiny part of me was relieved to have his company.

  I knew from the resistance of my eyelids that they had, in fact, been sewn shut. When the hell had that happened? When had they tied me up for that matter? What were they planning to do with me? None of the answers to these questions running through my head were good. The Inquisitors were going to send another message, and I was going to carry it. The Inquisitors had found a loophole for using their magic. Did they have a witch working for them? If the trail of blood leading to the Inquisitors was any indication of their torture techniques, then it wouldn’t surprise me if they had a witch as an ally. A lesser witch might work for them if it meant an end to the pain and a chance to live.

  The van stopped, and we were unloaded like baggage. The wind stung my face, but the heavy salt in the air was weakening whatever binding spell they had used to hold me. I needed to figure out where we were so I could find a way to escape. The silence here was the first thing I picked up on. There were no cars and no people. There was just the sound of the ocean. A bitter winter wind, salty air, and the ocean? For the love of Goddess, that could be anywhere on the Atlantic seaboard. I needed to unstitch my eyes somehow.

  They hurried us into a building. I could only count three of them. Two of them were shoving me around, and it sounded like the remaining one was handling Matthison. That made five including us. It was going to be pretty tricky getting out of here. I wouldn’t have a lot of time once the ropes were off.

  I needed a plan. If I was going to get Matthison and myself out of this, then I was going to need my eyesight to do so. I tried rubbing my cheek against my shoulder, thinking maybe I could p
ull the stitches out that way. It was harder than it sounds, however, since my arms were still bound. It wasn’t the most subtle tactic either. One of my handlers noticed the movement immediately. I took five strikes to the face—first across my right cheek and then my left joined the party. If he thought that would stop me, then he hadn’t done his homework. After all, I’ve had my ass handed to me by bigger and badder things than a measly witch hunter.

  “If this is your only plan, then I hope that you packed a lunch, because it’s going to be a long fucking day,” I said in the general direction of where I thought the man was standing.

  “Don’t worry, Miss Kincaide. I am looking forward to testing your unusual ability to heal. Until you came along, I believed that particular skill belonged only to vampires and werewolves. Your endurance will be a refreshing change from the witches we’re used to dealing with.”

  It was the same voice from the parking lot. He was evidently the ringleader of this little group.

  A door creaked open and shut. The sound of these footsteps was different. Was it a limp? It sounded like there was a new guest at the party.

  A boot slammed into my back, dropping me to my knees. Someone grabbed a fistful of my hair and jerked my head to the left. Searing pain and the smell of burning flesh, my flesh, followed. I slumped forward, only to be tugged back by the ropes that were still restraining me. I smelled the salt before it was cruelly rubbed into the burn on my neck. The salt would ensure a scar. This son of a bitch was branding me like I was his cattle. I forced my arms apart, testing the ropes.

  “Ah, ah, ah. The bindings are specially designed. You won’t be out of those until we want you to be,” the leader said.

  “Everything has a breaking point,” I said, through clenched teeth.

  “True. Let’s see if we can find yours,” he smugly replied.

  Somehow I was going to get out of these ties and knock that cocky attitude right out of him. Hopefully I would figure out a way to do it soon, too.

  Right next to me, someone was going to work on Matthison already. Minutes ticked by until the sounds of fists pounding on flesh turned to the sharpening of a knife on a stone. Beating Matthison hadn’t worked. He hadn’t given them anything, not even so much as a groan. To up the ante, they were preparing to slice him up. Please let him be unconscious. They had pretty much ignored me while they’d worked on Matthison, giving me some more time to free myself. I think they were betting he would be the thing that broke me. They were wrong. If Matthison could hold out, then so could I.

  Matthison bumped into me as he slumped to the floor now that no one was holding him up. So the blade was for me then. I could feel the butcher’s gaze as all of his attention was focused on me. He grabbed my throat and pulled me to my feet. The brand on my neck felt like it was on fire again as he ground the sweat and dirt on his hand into the burnt flesh. I almost had one hand free as sharpened steel cut through my hoodie and then my T-shirt. My muscles clenched as I wondered what message would be carved in my stomach for the coven to find. The tip of the cold blade began to press into my stomach. I leaned back, creating just enough slack in the ties to finally slip a hand out. I swung wild, still unable to see anyone or anything.

  “You underestimated her strength!” A new, nervous voice cried out.

  “I have underestimated nothing!” A gravelly voice ground out in reply.

  Despite my lack of sight, I was putting things together. Gravelly voice, or Butcher, as I liked to call him, was the muscle and a sadist. The Ringleader didn’t like getting his hands dirty and was quite content to stand on the opposite side of the small room. It was probably to keep from getting blood on his sensible shoes and to keep the nervous Nancy next to him from changing his mind.

  A boot connected with my ribs as I swung wide again. That really hurt. I despised those damned steel toes. His foot smashed into my cheek, tearing the stitches from my right eyelids. Little drops of blood ran together, pooling up in my eye. Finally having it open wasn’t going to make much difference now. Between the swelling, blood, and light sensitivity, all I could identify were vague shapes at this point.

  “This could all end, Maurin. We’re here for the coven. No one else has to get hurt,” Ringleader said to my back.

  I wasn’t taking my eyes off of the massive, shadowy shape looming in front of me to tell the Ringleader I thought he was full of it.

  “That’s like textbook bad guy speech. Next you’ll tell me that you’ll call off the Butcher over here if I tell you what you want to know. He’ll stop hurting me, and you’ll let me go, if I just tell you everything.”

  “Well, something like that.” He laughed with that same annoying cockiness.

  “Go to hell, I’m not telling you shit.” The last bit came out in a rush with the wind that had been knocked out of me by the Butcher’s blocky hand to my stomach.

  He was still close enough to get a shot in. As the Butcher pulled back, I let loose a haymaker, connecting with the side of his head. I wiped the blood from my eye in time to see him stumble backward a little bit.

  Too exhausted to do much of anything, I was only able to heal myself enough to remain standing. . My face was swollen and bleeding. The left side of my face hadn’t taken as much damage as my right. Only a few of the stitches had come lose in the left eye. I needed both eyes. Taking a deep breath, I pulled down on my left lower eye lid until I felt the rest of the stitching give. The Butcher came back and finished the job with a stiff jab to my left eye.

  “Thanks,” I growled, as I pawed at my eye.

  He was shuffling back and forth on his feet, ready for another round. I was ready to get the hell out of here.

  “Come on, Maurin, let’s stop all of this. Tell me what you know of the coven’s hierarchy. Things have changed since the last time I came up against Mahalia Amarelle. There are new faces within the coven. I would very much like to confirm the information that we have gathered,” the Ringleader said sweetly, as if I wasn’t being beaten to within an inch of my life at his command.

  “You should have asked one of the witches before you let him cut their tongues out and kill them.” I feinted left. I should have moved right, all I did was close the distance between his fist and my face.

  “That’s the tricky part, isn’t it, Miss Kincaide? Getting the information out of a witch before she curses you. No, they fulfilled their purpose. And you will fulfill yours by telling me what you know about the coven.”

  I spit out the blood that had pooled in my mouth. “If you had reliable information, then you wouldn’t have wasted all of this time with me.”

  Whenever the man in charge was talking, the Butcher stopped pummeling my face and ribs. If I could keep him talking for a few more minutes, then I might actually be able to catch my second wind and give the Butcher a taste of his own medicine.

  “There are still a few unknowns. You were not one of them, however. It was easy to get to you, what with the mile-long paper trail from SPTF leading right to your apartment door. You probably should have moved. Now, the fiery sisters, on the other hand, are quite the mystery. Or how about the tattooed man that you seem to have taken an interest in? Perhaps you’d like to tell me more about them.” The tenor of his voice dropped, darkening.

  “I’m just the help. They don’t tell me shit.”

  “That’s too bad. If you truly don’t know anything, then you are unfortunately of no use to us after all,” the Ringleader said, sealing my fate.

  “You said that I could keep her! She likes to play my games.” The butcher grabbed my throat and squeezed. He backed me up against a wall until I was almost a part of it. My feet left the ground as he pushed me farther up the wall, bringing me almost to eye-level with him. I struggled to break his grip on my neck before he crushed my windpipe, but his massive fingers were deeply embedded in my throat.

  Between the spots forming in my eyes from the lack of oxygen, I saw him pull back with his free hand. With alarm, I realized that he was preparing to drive
his knife into my chest. I had a choice to make; continue to struggle to free my neck or I could try to stop him from stabbing me to death. I was pretty sure I could heal whatever damage he did with the knife. What I didn’t know was whether or not I could survive the continued lack of air. Maybe if I fought him for the knife he’d have to loosen his grip on my neck. I was as good as dead if my plan didn’t work.

  Grabbing his wrist, I pushed it away from me with everything I had. My gamble paid off. His fingers loosened as I slid down the wall. He hadn’t completely let go of my neck yet, but as soon as my feet hit the floor I pushed my body weight forward, catching him off guard. That little bit of momentum was all I needed to turn his hand and drive the knife straight into his gut, all the way to the hilt. With both hands and every bit of strength I had remaining, I forced the blade sideways through the Butcher’s fatty tissue, muscle and probably intestines, until the knife ripped through his side completely.

  The Ringleader wanted me dead, but the Butcher had just wanted to keep me, like a cruel cat with an injured mouse. I was pretty sure I’d rather be dead than become his plaything. The Butcher fell to his knees, and then finally slumped over.

  A door creaked and I realized the Ringleader and his minions were escaping. I started to run after them, but stopped when I remembered Matthison. He hadn’t moved or made a sound in what seemed like an eternity. I needed to check on him before I ran after the Inquisitors.

  The Butcher grabbed my ankle. Looking down at him, meeting his eyes, one thing was abundantly clear. As long as there was breath in his body, he wasn’t going to stop. If by some miracle he survived being gutted, he would still come looking for me. Not to serve the Inquisitors, but to satisfy his own sadistic hunger. The knife was still in my hand. Switching my grip on the handle, I drove it deep into his chest, aiming for his heart. His hand fell away from my ankle. I pulled the knife out, wiping the blade on my jeans, and watched as the life finally slipped out of his body.