Page 1 of Beautifully Scarred Omega

CHAPTER 1

Sophie

I’m ready to die.

The thought doesn’t scare me anymore.

I wonder how many days have passed since they brought me down here. A month? Two? The days bleed into nights until I can’t tell one from the other. My only clock is the sound of footsteps above me and the scrape of the bolt when they come.

I try to shift to a more comfortable position on the concrete floor, but my bound hands make it impossible. The rope has dug deeply into my wrists, though I stopped feeling the burn days ago. Lying on my side, I curl up in a futile attempt to somehow protect myself.

Please, just let me die already.

My throat is so dry it clicks when I swallow. My stomach has given up growling; it just aches now, a dull emptiness that matches the cold of everything else in this room. The shoulder wound that Marek left on me with that rusted knife should hurt but my senses are dulled from it all. The older cuts on my stomach, my inner thighs, have scabbed over and cracked open so many times I’ve lost count.

So much pain. It should overwhelm me.

Instead, I feel nothing.

Part of me keeps hoping they’ll just end it already. Put me down like the broken thing I’ve become. What do I have to live for now?

Their words replay in my head. Rourke’s breath, hot against my ear while his brothers held me down. We’ve marked you now. No one will ever want you after this. His fingers would trace the wounds he’d just inflicted, a strange look of fascination dawning on his face, as if he’d created a masterpiece. Every scar we leave is proof you belong to us. Do you hear me? His finger would move deeper into the wound, and I’d bite my lip to keep from crying out.

Even if you run, even if someone finds you, they’ll see what we’ve done. They’ll know that you’re ruined. He’d laugh then, like ruining me was the funniest thing in the world.

Silas, gripping the knife with filthy fingers, dragging its tip across my stomach, not deep enough to kill, just deep enough to scar. And every time I didn’t react, the blade would dig a fraction deeper. You think you’re fighting us, you silly girl? The lack of response only seemed to excite him further. You’re not. You’re just making it more fun.

Marek... the quiet one. He never raised his voice, and that control was what scared me most. He’d wait until the others were done, then come to me alone. He’d stand over me for a long time before he said anything, his eyes dark and devoid of any emotion. His patience was worse than their violence. Your father sold you to us. He sold his own daughter. That’s how little you mean.

Stepfather, I’d wanted to scream. He’s my stepfather. But by then I’d learned that correcting them only made things worse.

I hear footsteps above me.

My body goes still. I listen, counting the steps, trying to identify the gait. They are heavy and deliberate, coming toward the basement door.

Please don’t let it be Marek.

I squeeze my eyes shut. My ribs protest when I inhale too sharply, so I force myself to keep my breathing shallow, trying not to make a sound.

I know it won’t make a difference, but I do it anyway.

There’s only this. This basement, a body that doesn’t belong to me anymore, and the slow, grinding wait for the end.

The footsteps stop at the door.

The bolt scrapes back, and the handle turns.

Harsh, blinding light floods the room and I squeeze my eyes shut against it, turning my face into my arm. The movement sends fire through my fresh shoulder wound and trickles of blood spill toward the concrete. Still, I don’t make a sound.

“I found her. She’s alive.”

But the voice doesn’t belong to Marek or Silas or Rourke.

This voice is deeper and completely unfamiliar.

I force my eyes open.

The man standing in the doorway is wearing tactical gear—black vest, radio hissing at his shoulder. He’s big, blocking most of the light from the stairs behind him, and for a moment all I can see is his silhouette.