Damaged Queen (Darkness Within Duet 2)

This was Axel’s old home, and she had a feeling his old man liked to look out at the women who were chained up to it.

Touching the wood, she couldn’t help but flinch away, disgusted by what it represented. Moving away from the post, she figured a garden this size had to have some tools. It had to have something that could make her stop this. Even if she was the only woman to have been whipped on it since Hannah, that was still two women too many as far as she was concerned.

No other woman would ever know the bite of a whip while she drew breath, not when she could stop it. There’s no way she could ever let another woman down. So long as she could fight for them, she would, for all the men and women that had come before. She would never lead another to pain and misery.

She kept on walking the grounds, and when she finally found the toolshed, she cried out in victory.

An axe, a saw, and some cutting shears. They were all sharp and kept in pristine condition.

The guard didn’t stop her until she got to the post. As she held the axe in her hand, he stepped up.

“You need to go back home, Harper,” he said.

“No!”

She drew the blade down, cutting into the wood.

Over and over she kept on cutting, and when he tried to get near her, she lifted it up. “The only way you’re stopping me is if you shoot me. If you come any closer, I swear I will hurt you. I have nothing to lose right now. Think about what happened to the last guard who touched me.”

The man paled and took a step back.

He didn’t leave her alone, but he did grab his cell phone and start talking to someone. She went back to work, attacking the post, wanting it down.

She created a little gap in the wood with the axe, and she started to kick it.

Releasing a scream, she kept on screaming, and finally, after another few kicks and attacks with the axe, the post was down.

She heard clapping, and as she turned toward the sound, she was surprised to see Draven standing there, watching her.

She didn’t appreciate his clapping or his round of applause. He was the last person she wanted to see. Dropping the tools to the ground, she stepped up to him.

“I’m the last woman that will ever be whipped on that post. I will fight you. I’m not going to give up easily. One day, you will apologize to me, and when you do, you better hope I’m in a forgiving mood.”

She made her way back into the house and saw her father there, staring at her.

“What are you doing here?”

“Hannah told me what you were doing. I came to pick her up.”

“Will you stop her from visiting, please? I can’t handle all of that,” Harper said.

“She likes you.”

“Ian, I don’t want to get into this.”

“You stopped calling me Dad back then as well.”

Harper grabbed a bottle of water and rested her head against the door. “Will you help me get away?”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“Any dad would help their daughter in a situation like this. I don’t want to die. Not yet.”

“Not yet?”

“I’m not ready to die yet. I have stuff I want to do.”

“You sound a little like your mother.”

“Cool.”

There was a time it would hurt her to hear him say that. Ten years was a long time to get over it.

“When did you get so cold?”

“What do you want from me?” she asked.

“I’m trying here, Harper.”

“Trying? I know who you work for. I know what they’re capable of. I knew all those years ago, and yet you’re still here. You’re still working.”

“I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“Really! Did you not see the evidence of what they did to me on my back?”

“Harper…”

“Why did you work for them all those years ago?” she asked, changing the subject. “You didn’t always have a fancy house, or a huge income. I know you and Mom argued at times about money. I heard you. What changed?”

“You really want to know?”

“My life turned. I’m standing in front of you right here right now, and I think I have a right to know.”

“I got a job offer. Alan Barries needed me to get one of his guys off the hook. He offered me ten grand. It was what your mother needed for a new kitchen. Easy money. Something I could do as there was no evidence of murder. It was an open and shut case. I did the job, and I got the money and it started. Once I did one job, it was another. I couldn’t walk away. When you become part of this, there’s no walking away.”

“And Mom?”

“She begged me not to do it. She hated what it was doing to me. What it was turning me into.”