She wouldn't be lighting a match with those things on her, and she'd be out long enough for him to do a search of her apartment. He had to make sure she wasn't hiding anyone else like herself in there, after all.
Chapter Two
Cindy groaned as she surfaced out of the foggy dream she'd had. A dream that left her with a nasty headache and a sore face. She couldn't even remember falling asleep, and she didn't want to open her eyes or move either. It was still dark. When did she take a nap? Had she missed her dinner date with Jamie?
What a weird dream. Very weird and scary with all the struggling in the dark, the sense of claustrophobia, and being unable to move. At the same time she was kind of glad for it because in her dream Jack had been alive. Her chest felt a little lighter just thinking about it.
He'd been alive. He's also been angry with her. Angry enough to attack her. That was the scary part. The fact that in her dream he'd been a hunter, and he'd hunted her.
Cindy shivered. She believed the dead could communicate through dreams, and if there was something of Jack in that dream, well, she couldn't blame him for his actions.
Too bad she couldn't tell him that now, or say she was sorry.
Cindy tried to stretch her hands above her head, but something hard and metal was there, like a door or a ceiling, and she punched her fists into it.
"Ow!" Cindy yanked her hands back to her chest and her eyes snapped open, but there was nothing but pitch black all around.
Even in her apartment with the curtains closed, she should've been able to see something.
There were heavy metal bracelets around her wrists that hadn't been there before.
Cindy tried to pull her hands apart, but she couldn't separate them more than the width of her chest. Her breathing picked up, and her heart beat a fast and dull drumming sound in her ears as every tiny clue clicked into place.
She tried to tilt and turn her body, only to be met with cold, metal walls all around her. It was like she was trapped in a fridge with the light burnt out.
This wasn't supposed to happen to her. It happened to other paranormals who were careless or open with their powers, but it wasn't ever supposed to happen to her.
Some paranormals called these boxes coffins, because now that she was inside, she was as good as dead.
Cindy banged her shackled wrists against the metal walls. She twisted back and forth, slamming her body against every surface. The banging was loud, and the noise was louder still when she screamed, but nothing gave. She couldn't even summon a flame to see with.
Nowhere to move. No windows. No air!
Cindy's heart rate and breathing spiked. It felt like she wasn't breathing at all as the sense of claustrophobia from her dream sucker punched her a hundred times worse than what she'd felt before. Not a dream. Not even close to being a dream. It was real. It was all real.
Terror gripped her heart and squeezed it nearly to the point of popping, and the mind numbing panic worsened as she screamed and kicked and punched around all sides of her until her feet and fists were aching.
She couldn't think and couldn't breathe. The box could be underwater and she wouldn't even know it. She could die in here!
The top of the box opened without warning. Bright light streamed inside and blinded her. She had to close her eyes and turn away from it, covering her face as the pain in her head flared.
"Will you cut that out already?" demanded a voice that Cindy never thought she would hear again.
"Oh my God," Cindy panted, lowering her hands from her face. Now that she could see again, could look up and out of the box and know for certain she wasn't being held underwater, or even underground, her lungs were able to open and close once more. She could breathe.
Better than that, Jack was above her, holding the metal door of the box open and staring down at her. Her heart fluttered at the sight of him.
"It's you."
She would've reached out to touch him, to make sure he was real and solid, if her arms had the strength. This wasn't joy. It was stronger than that because it was like someone had taken a needle and injected her with liquid happiness. "Jack?"
Jack's hands reached in to grab her, yanking her out of the hunter's box by her arms. It hurt a lot as his strong fingers squeezed too tight on the soft flesh of her upper arms, but she didn't mind since she was at least out of that damned coffin.
She was still wearing her dress from the night before, but her heels were gone. The cement floor was cold on her bare feet, but her entire focus was fixated in on Jack's face like a homing signal was calling her to him, his hands, his body. She needed to drink in every part of him. No dream could be this detailed. She could see the bags under his eyes, that he hadn't shaved in a couple of days and needed to comb his blond hair. Or at least give it a wash.
"You...you're alive," she said.
Jack's mouth thinned. His blue eyes were frosty, and his face was solemn as he reached into the tan leather duster he wore and pulled out a set of folded papers.
With a snap, he opened them and shoved them in front of her face. The logo of the hunters was sealed in gold on the top corner. A hawk in flight.
"Do you know what this is?"
"I...yes," she said, and then stared back up into Jack's face. His blue eyes were no longer cold, but incredibly, frighteningly, angry.
The brain-cell-killing panic from before slowly started to creep back under her skin, making Cindy shiver. Her dream hadn't been a dream. Jack had attacked her, he'd put her under with the hunter's drug of choice, and then he stuck her inside a metal box.
Maybe it was obvious, but her brain was having trouble processing everything and she asked anyway. "So, you became a hunter after all?"
Jack tucked what was essentially written permission from a judge for him to hunt and capture paranormals-and do whatever he wanted to them until they were collected-back into his inside pocket. Did he keep his badge in there, too?
He actually sneered down at her. Cindy never thought she would see such an ugly expression on his boyishly handsome face. In fact, he looked ten years older than when she'd last see him.
"So long as we're here, you're not going to speak to me unless absolutely necessary," he said as he grabbed her by the arm and yanked her along.
"Ow! Jack! What are you doing?" Cindy yelled at his too-tight grip on her sensitive flesh.
Jack squeezed even tighter. "I said don't speak. You don't get to say anything to me."
"I didn't do anything! I never hurt anyone! You know me!"
"Shut up!" Jack yelled, and he shoved her. It was so harsh and unexpected that Cindy couldn't even brace herself for it, and her back and skull hit a concrete wall.
It hurt. A lot. Jack was strong. He always had been. Cindy yelled out from the pain as she slid down to the floor, clutching her throbbing head. She wasn't bleeding, but she couldn't stop her breathing from picking up either.
She panted for air like she was back inside of that box as she shook her head.
This couldn't be real. This wasn't her Jack, the Jack who got offended when a man didn't so much as open the door for a woman, or help another guy get his car started when he was stuck on the highway. He would never do this to her.
Cindy had to brush her hair out of her face. It was all over the place now, and a dull, painful ache started up at the back of her head that got stronger and stronger. Jack was staring down at her, his bright blue eyes wide and his mouth slightly parted.
Whatever that expression was vanished fast as he kneeled down and grabbed the steel chains that were holding her wrists so close together. There were metal loops in the concrete wall, and he began shackling her in place.
"Don't speak to me again," he said softly.
"Jack, if this is about your father or Aidan and Liam, then I'm so sorry. You have to-" Cindy's body slammed back into the concrete wall when Jack's palm came down hard on the side of her face.
She was absolutely still. She didn't move, and she made sure to keep her eyes down so as to not look at him and provoke another hard slap.
"I said don't speak to me! You don't get to talk to me about that! And you for damn sure don't get to talk about my family or say their names! Do you understand?"
She dipped her head in a tiny nod, but that wasn't enough as Jack grabbed her shoulders. She squeaked as he forced her to look at him
Cindy's heart raced. Blood rushed into her ears, and her cheek, and the sound of her breathing seemed so loud all of a sudden as she stared into Jack's hateful gaze.
"Do you understand?" Jack asked, his voice calm again. His hands trembled on her shoulders.
Cindy nodded quickly this time. Her body was shaking now, too, just like Jack's hands, but that couldn't be helped. Her eyes burned like she was about to cry. She hoped just hoped to hold it in until he was gone.
Jack pressed his lips together in a firm line. Those were the same lips that had kissed her tenderly all over her body. The back of her hand, her mouth, her cheek, her back, and even between her legs, everywhere. The same mouth that had comforted her when she cried in his arms and told him what she was.