Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 154037 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154037 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
Anxiety billowed, a queasy feeling that clawed up her throat. “I don’t think this is a good idea. Where is everyone?”
“Probably parking on another street so the cops don’t get called.” Haddie hesitated before she rushed, “I know you’re all up in arms about this, Raven, and I get it, but I chose to forgive him, so I’m going in with or without you.”
Haddie snatched her small purse from the middle console and stepped from the car.
Warily, Raven followed, her throat thick as she trailed her best friend up the crumbling sidewalk that had weeds growing through the cracks.
The front door swung open before they even got to it, and Gideon grinned as he leaned an arm up high on the jamb. “Ah, our guests of honor.”
A flirty giggle rolled out of Haddie. “Were you missing me?”
“Oh, yeah,” Gideon drew out.
“I missed you, too,” she said, pecking a kiss to his lips.
He stood aside to give her room to slip by, then he widened the door for Raven who hesitated ten steps back.
“No need to be shy,” he drawled.
Raven looked around, swallowing around the lump in her throat, before she forced herself to move inside.
Gideon closed the door behind her.
But there was no music.
No revelers.
No party.
Just the malicious stares of the group of men who stood waiting for them.
Ice slicked down Raven’s spine when she heard the lock clicking into place.
And in the flash of a second, she was back in that small room. Her father lurking above, that maniacal grin on his face. His sadistic hunger to inflict pain written all over his smile.
Except her vision was filled with seven faces then.
All Owls who watched them with sadistic, salacious hate.
Panic drove through Raven, and she whirled around to run back to the door. Her hand curled around the doorknob at the same second as Dusty snatched her wrist. She cried out when he wrung it back. “Little bitch…nothing but a cock tease. Been waitin’ for this for a long, long time. Now it’s come due.”
Haddie stumbled back a step, her gaze flitting over the faces of the men before it landed on Gideon. “What’s going on?” She tried to demand it, but it trembled.
Gideon cracked a grin. The same kind of grin Raven’s father used to wear. He stepped forward, angling his head. “Otto and his whole crew have it comin’. And I’m gonna enjoy getting that payback through you.”
Fear weighed down on her body where she hid under her covers. So heavy. Shaking and shaking as she listened to the door creak open. “No, Daddy, no.” But she had no strength, and there was nothing she could do but succumb to her own screams.
Raven fought against it, the terror that wanted to consume, and she lifted her foot and rammed the sharp point of her heel into the top of Dusty’s boot. He howled and she jerked free of his hold.
Raven bolted forward, grabbed Haddie’s hand, and shouted, “Run!”
She hauled Haddie the only direction they weren’t surrounded by the Owls, running through the cutout that led into the kitchen. Raven prayed the back door was unlocked. It was their only chance.
Only they didn’t make it halfway there before a hand fisted in her hair and ripped her back. She screamed at the pain that tore across her scalp, then a sob ripped from her lungs when she was thrown to the ground, her hip taking the brunt force of the impact.
Dusty loomed over her, a malignant smirk on his face as he came to straddle her.
She cried out, kicking and flailing her arms.
The back of his hand cracked across the side of her face. Blood filled her mouth, acrid and foul, and she spit it in his face.
“You fuckin’ bitch. You’re gonna regret that.”
He started to rip at her clothes, and she struggled against him when he yanked at the button of her jeans.
She fought and fought. Kicking her legs and bucking up.
He grabbed her by both wrists and pinned them to the floor.
He leaned in close and licked her cheek, and Raven closed her eyes like it could keep her from the horror of it all. Remove her.
But it didn’t block anything. Not the stench of Dusty’s presence or the bite of his nails or the weight of his body.
Not the agony that was coming from Haddie a few feet away.
Wail after wail.
Raven managed to get one of her hands free and she scratched her nails down Dusty’s cheek. Tiny lines of flesh opened. They bloomed red with the blood she’d drawn.
He struck her again.
And then…
Hope blossomed through the terror.
Because she heard it above Haddie’s sobs and the shout of the men.
Motorcycle engines roared in the distance, growing louder with each second.
Otto. River. Oh God, they were coming. They would save them.
“Fuck. They’re comin’. Everyone get the fuck out and get clear,” one of the men shouted from the living room.