I’m hysterical, and I know I’ll regret this outburst tomorrow, but right now there’s nothing I can do to stop it. I just can’t. He needs to know what he’s doing to me. He needs to know he’s ruining me. He’s destroying everything I’ve fought so hard to create. He’s breaking me. Slowly, but surely, he’s tearing me to pieces.

“You’re nothing to me,” he thunders, and I feel the warm drops of his blood drip onto my cheek. “Nothing!”

That hurts. It hurts more than I’m willing to admit. Letting me go, he takes two steps back, and I look up at the monster that was once someone I loved. He’s got blood pouring down his face, and his eyes are red and glassy with rage and emotion. His fists are clenched so tightly they’re going white. I can see his hate, and it’s a hate I don’t understand. My father might have hurt him, but I didn’t...I was just an innocent child who adored someone that came into her life.

“Why me?” I croak, slumping down. “I didn’t do anything to you, Axel. In all this, I was the one constant in your life, the one person who didn’t let you down.”

“You’re wrong,” he growls. “You did let me down.”

I shake my head, feeling a tear slide down my cheek. “How?”

He turns without answering me, and he walks to the door. When he gets to it, he looks back at me, and in a broken, angry voice, he growls, “You stopped trusting me, and you made me the enemy.”

CHAPTER 10

MEADOW

Heroes can only save those who need them. I don’t need them.

I’m sitting in that same position he left me in, unable to make my body move. I don’t know what there is to say. I stopped trusting him...I made him the enemy. I close my eyes, and I try to think back, to think of everything that went down, and it hits me like a brick to the face. I did make him the enemy, and I stopped trusting him, because I ran. I never stopped to let him explain; I just ran.

I stopped believing in him because my father did.

“Axel said to give you this.”

I look up to see a girl standing at the door. She’s got blonde hair, big boobs, and a curvaceous body that most women would die for. The tiny skirt she’s wearing is riding high up over her backside, and the red top squeezes tightly against her breasts. I wonder who she is? I watch with curiosity as she walks in and places the food on the table beside me.

“Who are you?” I ask, my voice coming out scratchy and pathetically broken.

“Miranda, and you’re Meadow,” she says, and then I’m sure I here her murmur “his Cricket” under her breath.

“Why did he send you in?”

She gives me a hard look, placing her hands on her hips. “Because he can’t stand the sight of you.”

My heart feels like someone stabbed it, and I feel sick. How do you pick who is wrong and who is right in a situation such as this? He killed my father, so I should hate him. I gave up on him, so he should hate me.

“Axel isn’t the kind of man you want to mess with. I would strongly suggest you give him what he wants, and run as far away as you can.”

I stare at her for a long moment. “What would you know about me, Axel, or this situation?” I snap defensively.

How dare she thinks she knows what’s best.

“Because I’ve been fucking Axel for six years now, and he’s all kinds of fucked up. You have no idea what lurks in the darkness. None. He doesn’t need someone like you in his life; you’d never understand his level of sick. You’re just a constant reminder of why he’s so fucked up to begin with.”

Me? What would I have to do with it?

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say, but my voice wobbles.

“I know more than you think, Cricket,” she breathes, and even that sounds like a snarl.

She doesn’t give me a chance to answer. She just turns and walks out. I stare at the door for a long moment, mulling over what she said. What would I have to do with any of this? I never did anything to anyone. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and sent on a mission I really didn’t deserve.

I turn my eyes to the tray of food she placed down, and, regardless of my anxious stomach, I’m starving. I lift the tray off, and see some sort of stir-fry made with plenty of beef, vegetables and noodles. I lift the fork, and I begin gulping the food down, hardly chewing. I’m so hungry it’s embarrassing how I’m eating right now, but there’s nothing I can do to stop the way my hands tremble with need, or how my body desperately needs to be fed.

Mid way through, I feel my throat beginning to tickle. I cough, and lift a glass of water and swallow it. Maybe it was too hot. The tickle increases, sending warmth up into my cheeks. What is happening? I take another sip of water, but the warm feeling begins increasing, and my throat starts to itch. I realize what’s happening then...I’m having an allergic reaction. I gasp for air, and panic fills me. I stare down at the food. I can’t see any seafood in it, but that’s the only thing that causes this kind of reaction in me.

“This is your last chance,” a voice comes from behind me, and I spin to see Axel walking in, a hard expression on his face. “You tell me, or I will let you die.”

“You’d let me die?” I whisper, feeling my throat beginning to swell and close in.

“No point in lettin’ you live if you’re never goin’ to tell me where that USB is, so yeah, I’d let you fuckin’ die.”