Andrew grins. “Of course.” He starts to slice the knife across the top of my feet, and I let out a little scream which has Baldie laughing.
“Hey, Franny, you think your mum called you that because of your giant vagina?” I call breathlessly.
Andrew steps it up a notch then. When he slices across my stomach, I have no time for talking, all I can do for the next however long is breathe and scream. When he moves back, my head hangs as I struggle to hold in my tears, so being the crazy bitch I am, I twist my wrist in the barbed wire, cutting it so the pain pushes back the waterworks.
They can have my screams, nothing else.
When I’m more me, I raise my head and spit blood at Baldie and laugh. “That was fun, what’s next?”
“Tell me how to get into their apartment?” Andrew questions. Ah, so they don’t know that much.
“I don’t know, they like to blindfold me, the kinky bastards.” I grin.
He stabs me again, and I groan but breathe through it, the agony surging inside me now. Shit, shit, shit. Do not fucking pass out, Roxy. When I feel like I’m not going to, I smile at him, my lips feeling a bit numb. “Can I call a friend for the answer?”
He sighs and wipes the blade. “Come on, Roxy, it would be a shame to waste such a woman. Tell me what I need to know. Tell me everything about the Vipers.”
“Yeah, I’m gonna hard pass on that one. No passing go, no collecting your money, bitch, those fuckers are insane.”
He crouches and grabs my knees, peering up at me. “More scared of them than me?”
“Hell fucking yes. Did you not hear me? They are insane, and they like me! Imagine what they do to people they don’t like…” I grin wider then. “Imagine what they will do to you for touching me. Last time, they broke the guy’s hands and ripped out his tongue…I wonder, will you scream?”
I watch as he lifts the knife covered in blood. It reminds me of Diesel, and weirdly, my pussy clenches…like, really, ho? Now is not the time.
Yeah, I’ve successfully pissed Andrew off.
He backhands me, and my head snaps to the side as blood fills my mouth. Spitting it out, I turn back around with a laugh, grinning widely at him, blood undoubtedly covering my teeth and lips if his disgusted sneer is anything to go by. “You call this torture? My foreplay is harder. Come on, you can do better,” I taunt.
“Tell me!” he roars in my face, impatient now that he’s realising how hard it will be to break me.
Licking my lips, I look between his eyes. There’s no way I’m betraying my guys. They tell you under torture to reveal information that’s not important and is close to the truth, but no way am I risking that. Diesel would murder me, love or not. I know it’s going to bring a world of pain, but I can take it.
I can survive it.
Sucking in a deep breath, I nod seriously, my whole body aching, blood dripping down my curves, and agony ripping through my veins. “Okay, okay, I’ll tell you…”
They both wait expectantly as I try to make myself look meek and broken, even letting tears fill my eyes, real ones from the hurt. Sucking in another painful breath, my ribs protesting, I belt out, “And I will always love you…” Andrew flinches from how loud I sing.
He backhands me again, cutting me off mid-song, so I spit the blood out and spin back to him. “No? Not feeling it? What about some Metallica? No, what about Tay-Tay? You look like a secret Swifty fan!”
Baldie steps forward, aiming his gun at me. “Make her talk,” he demands. “We don’t have long before they come for her.”
I grin at that. “Franny, they already are, and you’re so fucked. Now where was I? Oh, Tay-Tay—” I start to sing and, with a growl, he rips open the door and storms off. “Wait!” I call. “We were having so much fun, Franny! I didn’t even get to my originals yet!”
Andrew sighs as if he’s disappointed in me. “Roxy, this could have been so easy. You could have died quickly.”
“Yeah, I never liked the easy option. What can I say? I like them hard.” I grin at him.
He rips off that calm mask now, though, and I know I’ve got a world of pain coming. Let’s hope I can survive this shit, because my Vipers are coming, I know that, and if they find me dead…the city wouldn’t survive their wrath.
The time passes slowly, excruciatingly slowly, like the pain flowing through me all over my body. He’s masochistic, not as good as D, but it still does the trick. My screams ring out around us, and tears finally fall, covering my cheeks. Blood pools beneath me, my fingers slippery with it. He pulls some toenails, breaks some toes. He snaps my finger. He stabs, slices, and cuts. He covers my head in a bag and pours water across it until I can’t breathe, until I think I might drown, and when he rips it free, water flows from my mouth to my chest, my lungs burning from the icy liquid.
“Thanks, I was thirsty,” I croak.
He’s trying his hardest. His job and life are on the line if he doesn’t get the information, but here’s the thing…I would die before I betrayed them, before I betrayed anyone who gave me a chance, who was kind to me…and my Vipers?
They love me.
And, weirdly enough, I fucking love them too.
So if I die here, alone in a goddamn nasty room, then so be it. I’ve been flirting with death since I was a kid, and dying for the people you love seems like a good way to go.
Andrew can’t change that. He can break my body over and over again, he can make me scream and cry, he can make me beg for death, but not one word about my men will pass my lips. I think he’s beginning to realise that when he sits back and watches me.
“I have to admire your loyalty.” He sighs. “Irritating, but impressive. Tell me, did they really buy you?”
I nod, wetting my lips.
“So, why the loyalty?” he asks curiously.
“’Cause we started off badly, but now they are my everything.” I shrug. “You know how it is, let’s face it, every romantic story is fucked up in some way. Romeo and Juliet? They were fucking kids, and they died. Don’t even get me started on that atonement, Jesus, I cried like a baby. Loyalty is earned, not bought.”
“And they earned it?” he queries.
I don’t answer, and he nods. “I have to update my boss, think on that.” He stands and leaves, and I watch him go, the slam of the door and click of the lock loud in the dank room.
Have they earned it? His question reverberates in my head.
There is no question we are all messed up and our love is weird…but loyalty? Yes, they earned it, and they will continue to, because I know they will do anything to protect me. Save me. Give me anything I need.
When no one else did, they saw past the attitude and scars, and kept going until they got to me.
I’m not a child or stupid. I know if I betray them they will kill me, even if they love me, but that’s not why I don’t do it. It’s because I couldn’t stand to hurt them that way, even to save my own life, and if that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.
Sometimes in life, you meet people worth dying for, and they are usually the same people who are also worth living for. But you can’t always have both. If all I can offer them now is my silence and death, I’ll do it.