Tangled

142 Lisa: Chained

The sound of water dripping is the first thing to break through the darkness of my mind.

Plink.

Plink–plink.

Plink.

It’s an erratic rhythm that leaves me uncomfortable.

The voices come next, soft, sibilant whispers. Evil. Whoever they are, they’d be the villains in any story.

Eventually, I realize the darkness is really just pain. Pain that throbs and aches in half my face. But why?

Vampires.

That’s why.

My eyes fly open when I finally remember, and I struggle to sit up, blinking into the darkness.

I can’t see anything.

Are my eyes open?

My hands won’t reach my face, yanking against

17:36

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142 Lisa: Chained

something cold and hard around my wrists.

Manacles?

Swiping my hands around, I can feel the heavy, rusted chains holding me down, bolted to the floor.

Fuck.

This is…

Really not good.

Ava. Is Ava here?

I whisper, but there’s nothing.

plink–plink

voices are

Plink.

Plink–plink.

Plink.

sound slithers into my mind, coiling around my heart and squeezing with a mania of isolation and fear. I try to move again, the chains rattling like mocking laughter. Frustration

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142 Usa Chained

and I scream, the

arms, but I don’t

trickling down my forearms. Sobs wrack my body, each one tearing out of

of me. I can barely stand, the shackles forcing me to hunch over. My muscles burn from the awkward

Plink. Plink–plink.

I try to force my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Shapes slowly emerge from the inky blackness. Rough stone walls, a small window

a

A fucking cell..

142 Lika Chained

up in some vampire’s dungeon like a gothic romance heroine. Except there’s no dashing hero coming to

1. am.

Plink–plink–plink.

mocking my S~ᴇaʀᴄh the Findɴovel.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ

want to scream again, to rage against the

just a human. There’s no magic or super strength hidden deep inside. I can’t shift into a

are weak and helpless against the supernatural.

I hate this.

thoughts drift to Kellan. I’d hated how he was always around. Hated his grim determination to

here to tell me

take his smugness over this any day of the week.

possibly find me when

142 143 Chalice)

where I am?

hot and bitter. I let them

her fierce determination and unwavering loyalty. She won’t give up on me. She’ll tear this world apart to

be enough? Can they really go up against vampires and win?

I don’t know anything about this world.

so fucking scared and I don’t know

Plink.

Plink–plink.

Plink.

head, driving out every other thought. It’s maddening, the irregularity of it. I want to

taste blood and focus

342 LISA Chamed

Kellan and Ava will find me. That Lucas and the Westwood pack will

Because the

around me, his voice in my ear telling me it’s

a moment, just a

Plink.

fills my mind and I can’t stop

kink and the biting. Of how he wasn’t great at foreplay. Of the slightly–better–than mediocre sex and then the aphrodisiac that had