(Blood and Bone, #2) Sin and Swoon(31)

It’s almost comical to me, and clearly her, that I am back here.

I’d gotten away. I had to run for it.

I’d thought the vehicle was him, the one I’d heard coming up the hill. But it wasn’t. When I snuck down the hill and stole a truck, he was waiting at the bottom of the hill for me.

At the turnoff to Granger Mountain.

I just made it to the road when he rammed me with the Jeep, flipping the truck down a small ravine. The last thing I remember was rolling down the ravine and then waking here, hands bound and hanging over his shoulders. He was carrying me down the staircase. I passed my old door, my eyes half open and my heart completely broken. It was the strangest sensation. I wanted to go back in that cell. It was a safe place for me.

Now I hang here, waiting to be freed like Jane has promised, but certain that even death will not free me from here.

My eyelids grow heavy, too heavy. Maybe the loss of blood, maybe the exhaustion, maybe the torture. I don’t know which, but one of them claims me, and my eyes close.

Cold surrounds me, opening my eyes, but I don’t see. Jane is there. She cups my face, saying something, but my ears don’t hear. Everything is blocked and plugged and bursting. She lifts my face, and instantly in the light that’s above us, I see him. He’s covered in blood, but he’s not clear. He’s fuzzy, no . . . blurry. He washes his hands in the water above my face, looking directly at me. A sick smile crosses his face, his face that I can’t make any clearer than it is—even though now I see him for exactly who he is.

It’s then that my lungs try to explode inside of my chest and I realize I’m in the water. He’s washing his hands and watching me sink.

I start to thrash, kicking and screaming for the surface. Jane helps, I swear it. She pulls me to her, pressing her lips against my panicked mouth, and offering up air. The current catches me, dragging me away from him.

The sick smile vanishes as he watches me sail away, away to a freedom he doesn’t know I will find. He doesn’t know she has stayed behind to help me.

Jane—no, Bethany—presses her lips to mine again, filling my mouth with air.

The world goes dark and then light, and it flashes so many times I don’t know if it’s day or night.

But suddenly there’s sand and a man, and he tells me it’s going to be okay. I close my eyes, and see Bethany who called herself Jane one last time. Everything swirls and vanishes. I open my eyes to a sky filled with clouds shaped like horses. I blink three times but they remain, so I whisper to them, “Tell me about the swans, the way the swans circle the stars and shoot across the sky.”

I gasp my way out of Ashley, sputtering and coughing and choking from the river. Anger has built right up inside of me. The poor girl has relived every minute of that horror, and I don’t have a clue as to who the man is.

Before I get a handle on myself I quickly blurt out in a croak, “Granger Mountain. The cabin’s at Granger Mountain. The cabin with the huge detached garage off the side. Really fancy. The other girls are there still.” Then I cough again and sputter a few more times as my body realizes it’s not in pain and it’s not drowning. The girl’s monitors start going crazy. I turn my head, opening my eyes, and watch as a smile curls upon her lips, and the heart monitor stops completely, just flatlining.

A tear slips down my cheek as I watch her go.

“You all right?”

I blink, shocked to see Dash, but grateful. He wraps himself around me, lifting me off the table. “You’re shaking. Last time, Jane. You can’t do a mind run again after this one.”

I hold tight to him. He tries to kiss me, but I bury my face in his chest. I can’t do affection just yet. Not after the last moments of her life being what they were.

Angie comes barreling in, grabbing me and giving me a hard stare. “They need ya to debrief fast. She’s gone, we’ve been keeping her alive, and I was scared shitless she’d die with ya in there. Lord suffering, you look rough. They want answers, Jane.”

“I don’t have any.” The anger comes back fast. I lift my face, giving Dash a look. “You screwed with the results. She saw you and Rory as the bad guys the entire time. I never got a clear look at him.”

Dash’s eyes narrow. “Impossible.”

“And yet not. She never gave up a single clue. The story started with you as the bad professor and moved into Rory, and his being a naughty spy.” I choke a bit on the words. “My story got too mingled up in hers. I need to go with the team.” Dash opens his mouth to argue but I snarl, “If you hadn’t touched the recording—”