Damnable Grace (Hades Hangmen #5)

*****

I gasped awake. After many seconds, the room swam into focus. I was familiar with this room now. I tried moving my arms and legs. They still ached, but today it was less. I drew in a long inhale and allowed my lungs the freedom of my chest. It hurt when I filled them to capacity, but not to the extent it had the last time I had awoken. I had no idea how long I had been in this room. I remembered purging. I remembered crying. And I remembered the anger.

But now I felt calmer. The images of Rebekah and Sapphira were a distant memory. Even now, as I stared at the spot they had been occupying for too many hours to count, I saw only a wooden wall and the remnants of a smashed dresser.

I glanced about the room, and then I saw him.

He was watching me. Every time I had woken up—at least lately, in the times I could recall—he had been there. He bore scratches on his skin and bruises on his chest. Yet he had never left me alone.

Something in my chest swelled at that knowledge. I refused to believe it was my heart, as I was not sure it was still there, it had been broken so many times. But I thought perhaps it was gratitude.

I did not know. But this man, the man with the kind eyes, had stayed with me. He had rid me of Meister’s potion. I shifted on the mattress. My dry tongue rolled around my dusty mouth. Before I could even move, the man was walking across the room. As he came closer, I saw deep, dark circles under his eyes, and the roughness of the skin on his face. I wondered if he had slept at all in the time I had been here. I tried to recall where I had come from, but all I could see was Meister and the dark room in which he kept me.

And the potion he gave me. That stood out the most. It was all I could think about.

The man sat on the edge of the bed and picked up the glass of water I had been searching for. He swallowed as he leaned his naked torso over me and cupped the back of my head. Gentler than I could have imagined, he lifted my head and brought the glass to my mouth. I closed my eyes as the liquid lubricated my dry throat. I took gulp after gulp until the glass was drained.

When he laid me back on the pillow, I kept my gaze on him. He dropped his head, breaking eye contact, and asked in a hoarse voice, “How’re you feeling?” His deep timbre settled within me, and I watched as he raked his hair back from his face.

I shifted on the bed, mortification cutting through me when I felt wetness under me, when I smelled the stench of my body’s waste. Tears pricked my eyes in embarrassment, and I tried to get out of the bed. But the male’s arms were immediately on my shoulders, keeping me in place. “Don’t fucking be embarrassed about jack shit, right?” I swallowed back the burgeoning lump in my throat. “You feeling okay?” he repeated, this time not removing his eyes from me for a single moment.

I took in a shaky breath. “I . . . I am feeling much better . . . I think . . .”

The male’s shoulders relaxed, as though my answer was the good news he had been hoping for.

“I . . .” I ducked my head, my cheeks blazing with embarrassment. “I am unclean. I . . .” I brushed away the droplet that had fallen from my eye. “I wish to bathe . . . if that is okay with you?”

I felt the weight of his heavy gaze on me. “Yeah,” he said finally and got up from the bed. He walked out of the room, and I heard the sound of water running next door. I moved to the end of the bed, clenching my teeth at the incredible effort it took to do so. I noticed I was wearing strange clothes that hung from my body. When I looked at my hands, I saw nothing but bones and blue veins. The skin on my arms was marked with red welts and raised scabs. I sucked on my bottom lip to stop it trembling.

Using the wall beside me, I pushed myself to stand. My legs shook. I looked down, but had to close my eyes and look away when I saw that all of the flesh had wasted away from my bones.

I opened my eyes at the sound of someone entering the room. The male was staring at me, running his gaze down my too-thin, ruined body. I wanted to cover myself with my arms, but I could not move. The hand that hung by his side clenched into a fist.

Taking a deep breath, I forced my leg to move. Just a single, small step felt like climbing the highest of mountains. My breath became labored, and sweat broke out on my already hot skin. Yet I pushed forward. I needed to be clean. I had seen what I had done to the linen I had been lying on. Humiliation acted as the perfect incentive to get to the cleansing water.

When I reached the male, he held out his arms for me to take. But I shook my head. I would do this alone. I followed the sound of water to a small bathroom. The steam from the shower clung to my skin and acted as a beacon to my weary bones.

“Towel is there. I’ll be just down the hall if you need me,” the male said behind me.

I did not turn around to reply. “Thank you.”

The door shut behind me, and I dropped to sit on the closed toilet seat. I breathed in the steam, giving myself a moment to gather some strength. I looked at the shower—I craved it more than Meister’s potion right now.

It took me too many minutes to rid myself of the soiled clothing I had been wearing and even longer to step into the shower. But the second the water hit the top of my head, an onslaught of tiredness and hurt came barreling down upon me. I struggled to keep up with the fog that was clouding my mind. Confusion wrapped around me. How had I come to be here, and where was he? Where had I been, and what had happened to me? Why was I so thin? Where was Meister? The thought of Meister made my legs give way. I tumbled down to the shower’s floor, hitting it with a thud. Fear had taken hold and I could scarcely move. Tears flooded my face and mixed with the water raining from above.

Shivers broke along my skin as flashes of Meister tying me down to a chair, hurting me, came slamming into my head. I placed my hands on the sides of the shower and tried to get up, but I could not move. My traitorous muscles had collapsed and left me too weak to move from this spot.

I tipped my head to the spray, trying to wash away the feel of Meister on my skin, to cleanse his memory from my mind. And just as I began to cry harder in frustration, the door to the bathroom opened and the male who had cared for me entered. He darted toward me and bent down, wrapping me in his strong hold. He smelled strongly of smoke. It had not been that strong in the bedroom.

“I fell,” I managed to say when I eventually found my voice. “I . . . I could not get back up.”

“It’s okay, Red,” he reassured me and took me from the shower.

“No!” I protested, managing to add some strength to my voice. “Please.” I stretched out my hand to the shower, yearning to be clean. To feel anything but what I did at present; I felt plagued with dirt, inside and out.