Page 115 of Shattered In Darkness

He just smiles. “I like you better when you’re angry, Brody. That’s the real you.”

His shoes click away on the cement. He’s done with me. For now. They leave me in the chair, wrists leaking blood, mind feral with her name:

Lola. Lola. Lola.

Every heartbeat is a promise. I will get her back, or I will die in the process. No in-between.

Snow howls outside. The warehouse sits in its own ice-bound silence, but somewhere close—maybe just a wall away—she’s waiting.

I’m coming for you, Bambi. Even if I have to chew through bone to get there.

Nothing else matters. Not aching hands, nor the blood on the concrete. Just her, hunger, and revenge.

37

LOLA

What the fuck happened?

I come up from nothing, like surfacing under ice, my entire body frozen, and nerves crackling as sensation slams back into me from all sides. Colder than the walk-in at the old club.

I try to huddle deeper, but I can't move; ankles locked, wrists burning. My arms are pulled out along metal, shoulders screaming where they twist against the restraints. Every inch of skin throbs, layered with pain. Dull bruises, cuts, the deep, sick ache of somewhere busted inside.

My clothes stink. My shirt rides up on one side, showing blossoming black-and-blue over my hip. I can see a smudge of blood near my thumb.

The room jerks into focus in strips and starts, like old crime scene photos. Bare concrete. Barred window overhead, dirty glass. The light coming down is sickly white, flickering fluorescent, the kind that gives headaches after five minutes. It’s the only light in here, everything else is shadow.

Metal desk, bolted to the floor. No clock. No sense of time. No sound but my own gasping for air and⁠—

No. That's not right. There's something else.

I go still and listen.

Voices on the far side of the door. Men, talking, low and controlled. Occasionally a static pulse. A radio, maybe. Heavy boots scrape the floor, I feel the vibration through the chair legs, like machinery running somewhere below, a big diesel engine.

I try to move, test the limits. The cuffs dig into the meat of my wrists, bloodless and numb at first, then pins-and-needles. I can flex my toes but nothing else. The chair is cold steel. I shift. The whole thing grates, making a noise that feels way too loud.

Behind me, to the right, is the sound of breathing. Not mine. I don't dare look at first, but I already know.

It’s a guard. Woman, I think, but all I can see is the shape. Wider than the door, arms crossed, gun at one hip, baton at the other, keys clipped and swinging. Her face is blank. Not bored, not angry, not even curious. Just somebody built her to be impossible to move.

“Where am I?”

No answer. I ask again, just air.

She walks forward, inspects my cuffs, gives them a yank. Tightens one, just because she can but says nothing. The gun flashes in my periphery, matte black, heavy, waiting.

My voice slides out again. “Please⁠—”

She steps back. A door slams behind her. I shudder, alone again. No, not alone. Never alone. I can’t tell if she's on the other side or if she left. The radio goes again, words cut off by static.

Somewhere far away, somebody screams. The sound gets under my skin and sets me shaking.

I wait. Time loses meaning. One minute, I’m shivering so hard my bones might crack. Then, I’m numb, floating outside my body, watching the stains on the concrete crawl and shift.

The door opens. Everything inside me tenses, cinched tight.

It’s not the guard this time.