Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 84913 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84913 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
"You're lost," he declared, cutting off anything she had maybe been about to say. You know, if she could find a way to make her mouth and brain and vocal cords work in unison with those deep eyes of his staring her down much like prey.
"I'm not," she insisted, finding her voice, even if it did sound croaking and awkward even to her own ears.
"You're lost," he insisted once again, voice somehow even gruffer than before, something she wouldn't have thought possible before she heard it.
Holden
Holden, not used to strangers, suspicious of them, fearful for them, moved forward, pressing a hand down on the girl's shoulder, turning and pushing her back toward the way she'd come. "That way is the road," he added, brushing past her, mind set on going back to the house, making something to eat, trying to catch some sleep before it got dark again.
"Holden Ryker," the girl's voice rang out, making his feet pause. A deep sigh pushed out of his chest, making his shoulders slump a bit before turning.
"Who is asking?"
"My name is Ferryn."
"Means nothing to me."
"Well, no. But my dad might. Or my aunt."
"Ain't getting any younger here, kid," he growled, finding himself more intrigued than he should have been that this girl didn't cower away from him like most would. Like most did.
She was a girl, too. There was no doubt about that. Still had a couple years left before she could even resemble an adult. Tall, skinny, with striking gray eyes and a buzzed head. What girl her age buzzed their head? And sought out men like him?
"My dad is Reign. He is the president of The Henchmen. In Navesink Bank. My aunt is named Lo..." she babbled out the names, but nothing was clicking. "She runs Hailstorm," she added.
Hailstorm.
That did ring a bell.
A paramilitary survivalist sort of organization that was full of men and women much like him, people that had been rehabilitated, people whose skills could be used for hire.
The leader, Lo, had set her sights on him at some point. Judging by her weird fetish for collecting people with skills, he wasn't exactly surprised to find he'd landed on her radar.
He'd quickly put an end to her pestering when her team showed up uninvited one day. He hadn't heard a word from them since.
But he was pretty sure they weren't farming out their dirty work to some slip of a teenage girl.
He could kill her with one blow.
He wouldn't.
Or hoped he wouldn't.
But he could.
Surely, Hailstorm knew that.
Why, then, would she possibly be there?
"And?" he asked, brow arching up.
"And. Ah. Well, I need you."
"For what?"
"So this doesn't happen again," she said, gesturing to her face, drawing his attention to the dark marks he'd missed on his first inspection, her face shaded by the trees.
Then, though, with the sky open above her, there was no mistaking the faded greens and yellows of bruises on her delicate face. His gaze moved downward, looking for any other injuries.
Her wrists were worn raw.
He knew those marks.
Bindings.
Someone had bound her too tight, or she had fought like hell to get out of them. Judging by the stubborn set to her jaw, he figured he would put his money on the latter.
Further down, there looked to be white gauze bandages peeking out of her shoes. Like her feet were wrapped. Wrapped feet meant busted soles. Barefoot running, he figured, not torture like he'd seen, he'd endured, he'd inflicted.
She was the right age for it. Pretty too. Which wasn't necessary. But it jacked the price up.
Judging by the current criminal climate, he figured she'd somehow escaped an abduction or an imprisonment, got herself free from traffickers of some sort.
"Was it bad?" he asked, spit tasting acidic. It was like swallowing back battery acid. It burned all the way down.
He'd lived an ugly fucking life.
He'd seen vile things.
He'd done many unforgivable things.
But he'd never put his hands on a woman who didn't want it.
It was one of the few crimes he didn't feel like a hypocrite for condemning with every fiber of his being.
"It wasn't great," she said, rolling her eyes with all the snark of a teenager. "It was, it was a weird situation. Have you heard of V? That was what she went by."
"Trafficker." Back in the day, he recalled. Before she fell off the face of the Earth.
"Yeah, well, apparently, she was my grandma. And she wasn't dead like I thought. She was alive and hidden away. Until she wasn't anymore. And she took me and threw me in a basement with these other girls."
Her eyes went dark at that.
Bad memories.
He knew those all too well.
Just as quickly as the pain was there, though, it was gone. It was gone and in its place was rage. The kind that boiled your insides, burned holes in your stomach lining.