Page 36 of Glutton for Punishment

“Well,” he says, setting the glass down on the desk, “that’s actually why I brought you both here.”

His gaze moves between the two of us, thoughtful and calculating.

Then he smiles.

“Tell me, Ryker… are you ready to get more involved in the family business?”

Chapter 11

Arwen

The clang of metal jerks me back to consciousness on the table.

A harsh white glare of fluorescents fills my vision while the scientists move around me in a blur, with the quiet efficiency of people performing a routine procedure. They’re still calling it “test” but I stopped pretending a long time ago.

This is nothing but pure torture.

Wires trail across my skin, adhesive pads tugging against bruises and half-healed cuts as they connect the machines that hum beside the table. The restraints around my wrists digging into skin that had only barely finished knitting itself together hours earlier.

“Let’s try again,” someone says in a monotone, clinical tone.

I close my eyes and try to find it.

Somewhere inside me… buried beneath the exhaustion and pain—there should be something violent and powerful waiting to break free. I felt it before. That surge of lightning beneath my ribs, the impossible force that ripped through the room the first time they pushed me far enough.

I reach for it the way someone drowning reaches for air.

All I find is a faint, useless flicker.

A weak pulse that sputters and disappears before it can become anything real. Surely using your sin power isn’t this hard. There must be something wrong with me.

The monitor beside me emits a flat, unimpressed sound.

“That’s it?” one of them mutters.

Before I can respond, the voltage rises, and electricity tears through my body.

My back arches off the table, muscles seizing as the shock rips down my spine and into every nerve. The pain is bright and consuming, exploding behind my eyes. The metallic taste of blood hits my tongue when my teeth slam together.

When it stops, I collapse back against the metal, breath tearing through my lungs.

Nothing…

“Please,” I beg in a whisper. I hate these humiliating moments when I break.

The machines remain silent.

“No reaction,” Dr. Plinth says, disappointment and frustration creeping into his voice.

They continued the fear tactic after it worked the first time. Continued threats whispered inches from my ear about what they might do to Sadie if I didn’t cooperate.

They kept trying to recreate it.

Again.

And again.

And again.