SAGE
Iawoke with a start, the soreness of my arms reminding me where I was. With a groan, I tried pulling my wrists free again. I had been pulling at the cuffs for…I didn’t know how long I’d been here for. But the sun was up, which meant it was a new day. Both my wrists were handcuffed to the iron bed frame with my arms raised near my head. I could sit up and scoot down a little if I stretched, but it was impossible to get comfortable in any position.
Eric had come in twice to let me go to the bathroom, and he brought me food, which I ate with one hand still cuffed to the bed. My wrists were raw and bruised from trying to slide and pull out of the restraints all night. My head was still aching from Eric dragging me by the hair and then slamming me into the wall. The blue comforter had fallen off the bed at some point during the night, and the pillow behind my back didn’t help soften my position at all.
Footsteps started to come down the hall. The creaking floorboards were my alarm that someone was coming into the room. I sat up as straight as I could while the door opened.
“Hey, baby,” Alex purred quietly as he closed the door behind him.
I glared. He was taunting me by calling me that. By now, he knew I hated it. I was surprised it had taken this long for him to come see me. I had expected him to make an appearance last night. Fear was coursing through my veins, but I focused on the rage instead.
“It didn’t take long to find you at all this time. I can’t believe we found you at our house. What were you doing? Trying to spy on us?” he asked as he sat at the end of the bed.
I stayed silent.
“You’re not going to start saying you want to marry me again, are you?” he asked with a smirk.
“Fuck you.”
“At least that made you say something. I need to ask you some questions, and I need answers.” His eyes turned cold and threatening.
“Or what? You’ll kill me?” I scoffed. “You’re going to do that anyway.”
He frowned. “You’ll want to do this the easy way, Sage. There are men in this house who want answers, and they’re going to get them. One way or another.”
My gaze went to the door, wondering how many men were here. I didn’t want to talk to Alex, but I sure as hell didn’t want to see anyone else in this house either.
“What questions?” I asked through clenched teeth.
“Let’s start with—how you found this house.”
“I watched you put your passcode into your phone for the last month. Memorized it and searched through your phone while you slept and found the address.”
“Where’s your car?”
My heart raced. “I didn’t drive it up here.”
“So how did you get here?”
“Hitched rides from the rest areas.”
He raised his eyebrow. “Pretty gutsy of you to trust total strangers when you’re on the run.”
“I decided I had a better chance if you couldn’t get a hit on my car,” I said as I tried to stretch my burning arms. “And I wasn’t running away. I wanted to know more about the society.”
“Look where that got you.”
“Still better than playing pretend with you.”
He ignored me. “Where’d you get the keys?”
I sucked in a breath. If they knew I had those, then they might realize I had come in and taken the book. Alex was reading my face, and I snapped my teeth together, realizing I’d let my guard down. He got up and scooted closer before sitting back down while turning a little to face me. He was close enough that if he leaned in more, his leg would touch my hip. I tried to move away, but the cuffs prevented that.
“The keys. How’d you get them?” he repeated impatiently.
“I made copies of them while you were passed out,” I answered. For once, it was the truth. I didn’t know what else to say.
“What were you planning on doing with them?”
I could have sagged with relief. He didn’t know the book was gone. They didn’t know I’d been in the house before Eric had found me. Suddenly, Alex grabbed my thigh. His grip turned painful when I struggled against him.
“Don’t touch me—”
“Then answer me. What were you going to do with the keys?” he asked menacingly.
“I don’t know. I hadn’t gotten that far. I didn’t even know if those keys were for this house. I just made copies of all your keys.”
His hand stayed on my leg as I tried to control my breathing. I hated that I was so vulnerable right now. I knew there was a possibility of getting caught when I first started this. And I was okay with that. I’d gotten the evidence I’d come for. But I hadn’t expected to be cuffed to a bed and threatened by Alex. I thought they’d kill me and get it over with. This was much worse.
“That wasn’t so hard.” He squeezed my thigh. “Next time, answer the question the first time I ask it.”
I tugged against the unforgiving cuffs as I glowered at him.
“How did Eric find me?” I asked my first question.
His chuckle lacked humor. “You really thought you could come straight to our house and not get noticed? He walked down the path and could easily see where someone went off the trail and into the trees. He’s lived up here his whole life. He tracks and hunts. Finding your path through the shrubs and trees was easy. But it was a shock when he found you. He thought it was some tourists that had come in from the beach.”
I leaned my head back on the iron bars. I had thought of everything. A few broken branches and crushed leaves were the reason they’d caught me. I’d been so close to being free. I would have been long gone if I hadn’t come back to watch them. But regret would have burned through me if they’d had killed another woman.
“Are we done?” I snapped. “I told you everything.”
“Not everything,” he murmured, meeting my eyes.
“What are you going to do with me?” I asked, avoiding whatever else he wanted to talk about.
“You know what’s going to happen.”
“No, I don’t,” I lied as terror slid over me. “How are you going to do it?”
Alex didn’t say anything as he turned his gaze to the window.
“You realize tonight is the last day of the full moon?”