Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 100470 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100470 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
“Help!”
The voice is definitely male, not female, and older, so I breathe a sigh of relief that it can’t be anyone in my family here. Something crashes nearby. Another groaned plea.
Ziiiip!
Our tent flap opens and the three of us dart our stares over to see who’s joining us. A man bleeding from his eye, nose, and mouth staggers toward us like something from a fucked-up zombie novel. He’s wearing nothing but a pair of boxers and is white as a sheet aside from all the blood spatter covering his naked chest.
“What the fuck?” Logan growls, sitting up and taking hold of the man. “CJ?”
My heart explodes inside my chest, slamming hard at the realization that he’s injured hours after I passed Raegan a weapon. Stifling a grin, I stare at CJ’s bloody face.
“S-She stabbed m-me in the f-fucking eye,” CJ wails, gesturing wildly at his face. “Then she punched me. B-Broke my nose with the lantern, too.”
Logan starts throwing on clothes at warp speed. Then he points a finger at me. “See to his wounds and do not fucking leave this tent.” In another second, he’s gone.
CJ pitifully crawls over to me like I’m his savior. I want to laugh in his face—to tell him he got what he deserved. Instead, I sit up on my knees to closely inspect his wounds. From nearby, Kristen watches wide-eyed but quiet.
“What did you get stabbed with?” I ask, voice soft. “I don’t see anything.”
“I d-don’t fucking know,” he cries out, sniffling. “I pulled it out, though. I can’t see, man. She f-fucking blinded me!”
“Who?” Kristen asks.
CJ turns to hiss at her. “Who the fuck do you think? My wife!”
Raegan is not his goddamn wife no matter how many times he says it.
“Where is she now?” I demand, pulse quickening and blood rushing in my ears.
“She and Sadie and the little b-boys escaped. They’re g-gone.”
Thank God.
I bite down on my bottom lip so I don’t grin at his words. They escaped. Raegan did it. She really did it. Now it’s on me to get myself, Kristen, and Destiny out of here. This, I can do. I have to.
Kristen hands over her pack, unzipping the side that carries bandages and alcohol wipes. Since Logan regularly beats on her, it makes sense for her to carry a stash. I take out what I need before tending to CJ’s wounds. His eye has swollen nearly closed, oozing with blood and some other thick substance. It looks disgusting and there’s nothing I can do for it. I settle for cleaning around the eye and his face before placing a bandage over the creepy-looking thing.
“Your nose looks swollen,” I murmur, pressing on the bridge and enjoying the hiss of pain coming from him. “I don’t think it’s broken, though. There’s going to be a nasty bump here.” I press on the spot again, causing him to sob. “Sorry.”
Not sorry at all, actually.
His lip is split, still bleeding like crazy. As I inspect it, I notice that half his top front tooth has broken off, leaving a sharp point that keeps poking at the cut on his lip.
Raegan permanently disfigured this fool.
Good girl.
“Got anything to stitch him up with?” I ask Kristen. “I need to do something about this lip.”
She scrambles to pull out a needle and some thread.
“Is that n-needle clean?” CJ demands, panic rising in his voice. “Clean it f-first.”
Biting back my irritation, I use one of the alcohol wipes to clean off the needle. Then, without consideration of his pain level, I begin sewing up his lip. He cries hard, whining unintelligible things to me as I work. When I finish, I tug the thread tight, watching his bottom lip pucker in an unnatural way, and then tie it in a knot. He starts to say something and his pointy broken tooth scrapes along the wound, causing him to cry more.
Looks painful as hell, which satisfies me to no end.
“Lie down,” I say to CJ as I guide him to stretch out. “You need to calm down and get warm.”
Kristen grabs Logan’s sleeping bag and tosses it onto CJ. I tuck it around him like I’m a caring doctor, but in reality, I just want him to pass out so I can make my next move. My stare meets Kristen’s, and we have a silent conversation.
We’re leaving.
Get dressed. Grab your bag. Let’s get the fuck out.
She nods once before the both of us are throwing on our cold, wet clothes. I’ve barely pulled my boots on when I hear a man bellow like he’s in pain. I can only hope it’s Raegan jabbing Logan in the eye too.
“Hurry,” I murmur to Kristen. “We need to go. Now.”
If CJ lets on that he hears us making an escape, he doesn’t say a word. The man continues to tremble and cry, ignoring both of us. Within minutes, she and I are both creeping out of the tent.