Page 87 of Grim

Sophia gasped, the sudden darkness suffocating.

“Move,” he growled.

He dragged her out of the cage, rougher than Viper ever had, her feet scraping the concrete. She stumbled, disoriented, unable to see, unable to breathe right.

Her milagro charm ripped from her fingers as she tried to brace herself.

She didn’t feel it fall.

She didn’t hear it hit the floor.

She only felt the darkness closing in.

She couldn’t see. Couldn’t tell where she was being taken. The hood muffled everything: sound, air, direction.

Her world became hands on her arms, cold concrete under her feet, the scrape of a door, a change in temperature, a shift in the smell, less damp and more chemical. A hum of machinery somewhere distant.

She wasn’t in the same place anymore.

That realization hit harder than the cold.

The hood was yanked off, light stabbing into her eyes.

They had dragged her across the compound again, and she could feel the shift in air, the brief bite of cold, the crunch of gravel under their boots, but not far. Just another building. Another layer of hell inside the same fenced yard.

The room they shoved her into was unfamiliar, colder and harsher, the air sharp with bleach and metal. Worse than the cage. Worse than anything she’d imagined.

A single flickering bulb overhead. A slow drip somewhere deeper in the room, not the same rhythm as before.

They zip-tied her wrists again. The plastic bit into her skin.

The man with the spiderweb tattoo shoved her forward and stepped back into the shadows, leaving her for Viper.

He looked different this time, more unhinged. His eyes were bloodshot, his jaw clenched so tight she could see the muscle twitch. Rage radiated off him in waves, thick enough to choke on.

He circled her slowly, boots scraping against the floor in a rhythm that made her stomach twist.

“You know,” he said, voice almost casual, “I’ve been thinking.”

Sophia swallowed hard. “About what?”

He stopped behind her. She felt his breath against her neck, hot and sour, too close.

“I know what Reyes saw. I know he tried to get to the Saints before my guys took him down. But what did he tell you?”

“I don’t know anything,” she whispered.

Viper slammed his hands on the back of her chair. The sound cracked through the room like a gunshot. Sophia jerked violently, heart slamming against her ribs.

“Wrong answer.”

He moved around to face her. His eyes were flat, dead, but burning with something feral underneath, something that made her blood run cold.

“You know what I think?” he said. “I think Reyes told you something. I think you’re lying to me. And I think the Saints are stupid enough to come for you.”

Sophia’s heart lurched. “They will.”

Viper’s smile vanished.