Page 13 of Off the Rails

Our caged bird gripped the bars of the cell. “I’m serious. You helped me out. Open the door and no one will ever know.”

Sighing, I walked closer. I knew the mask over my face would scare her. But so was towering over her from across the room.

Lowering my voice, I leaned toward the cell, a waft of her sweet orange aroma. “Look, we’re not going to hurt you. We just need a name. We want to run a background check, make sure we can trust you. If we can, we can talk about releasing you.”

Her blue eyes lit up. In the golden hour sun, they glowed like pools of crystal water. Licking my lips, all I could think about was diving in.

She sucked her teeth, her lips plush and full. “Mary.”

I almost laughed. No way a girl like her had such an ordinary name. Something flashed over her eyes, an obvious tell. Even just a few hours of watching her made it easy to read her. It was a lie. An obvious one.

But we’d deal with that later.

When none of us spoke, our captive rolled her eyes. “My wallet’s missing. You already know my name since you jacked my shit.”

Blade sniffed. “Not quite, Trinket. You dropped it somewhere. Your pockets were empty.”

A shiver ran down her back as she realized we’d dug around in her pockets.

Maybe she likes it — knowing that we’d had our hands on her.

I was glad the mask over my face covered the devious grin that took over my face. “You’re a fast little lamb.”

Grabbing the metal bars of the cell, my hands just barely missed hers. My eyes scanned her body as hunger took over. “You seem sweet too. A Sweet Lamb.”

Her nose lifted to a snarl, sparking that fight in her eyes. “Fuck off. Assholes.”

From behind me, Cyrus growled. “Not fast enough to outrun us last night.”

Crossing her arms, our captive shook her head. “Oh right, like that was a fair fight.”

She wasn’t wrong, we knew Feverpoint like that back of our hands. It ran through our veins, like the blood we’d spilled here.

“If you’re so confident that you can catch me, why am I locked up?”

She’d hit Cyrus’s competitive nerve. Despite how well she hid it, I knew that my stitched-up friend didn’t take kindly to challenges.

In a cold, calm voice, Cyrus gave our toy a proposition, “How about a game?”

The hairs on my arm rose at the thought of hunting such a Sweet Lamb. None of us had proposed it in months. Maybe even years.

It wasn’t every day that a woman as delicious as this stumbled into our playground.

My eyes flicked back to Blade, whose pacing had stopped at the offer. Confusion and a rush of excitement pressed through her. Her eyes bulged with excitement.

We loved taking out the trash, disposing of the dirtbags delivered here. But there was something special about the woman who found herself in our midst.

Swallowing hard, my Lamb kept her eyes on Cyrus. “What kind of game?”

“A hunt.” Cyrus spoke.

“Fright Night at Feverpoint, baby.” Blade was eager, running the blade of her axes along the stone walls of this fake prison.

Cyrus leaned her face up to the bars, close enough for our captive to reach Cyrus’s face, to gouge her eyes out if my Lamb wanted to. “You’ll have a five minute head start. Find a place to hide. If you stay hidden until dawn, you win.”

Those were always the rules.

“What do I get?” My Lamb wasn’t just going to let us torture her.