God of Monsters (Juniper Unraveling #4) - Keri Lake Page 0,15

same tight order in which he ran his military unit. Not that it was much different when he was gone, except, before the church became her focus, my mother happened to be a fairly independent woman. Smart. Skilled in sewing and the use of medicinal herbs. It was because of her that I took an interest in it, having accompanied my Nan a number of times to the clinic where she volunteered. I often dressed wounds, administered medicines, and familiarized myself with the most gruesome injuries a child my age could ever endeavor to lay eyes on.

My mother certainly had her good points, at one time.

As the ache at the back of my head flares to life again, I close my eyes, breathing through my nose. A concussion, I’ll bet. I need rest, an opportunity to settle the injury.

“It’ll be dark soon.” Gwen scoots herself down the bed of the truck and curls into a ball beside me. “We should try to get some sleep.”

A soft tickle brushes across my ankle, and with a smile, I kick out at it. “Stop it, Grant.”

At a tick-tick-tick and growls, I snap out of my dream and scramble backward.

At the opposite end of the truck, illuminated by the soft beams of moonlight streaming in through the opened flap, a gruesomely-deformed figure crouches.

Its black, soulless eyes stare back at me.

Hungry.

Violent.

A scream in my throat fails to break free, the air locked tight in my lungs and choking my voice. I stretch a trembling hand toward Gwen, who, a quick glance tells me, remains unwittingly asleep. The brush of my fingers across her shoulder startles her awake. She lifts her head, and a scream bounces off the walls of the truck as she kicks back beside me.

The Rager shifts, as if excited.

Another hops up inside the back of the truck.

And another. This one female, with long, straggled hair, and sagging breasts beneath her tattered shirt.

The three create a wall, blocking our only chance of freedom.

Only one thought consumes me: I’m going to die.

Chapter 4

Cold metal scrapes over my belly and chest, my nails clawing for purchase, as the Rager drags me by my ankle. Gwen’s screams outside the truck add a terrifying soundtrack to the fear thrumming through me.

I still can’t scream. Can’t make so much as a sound, my body too focused on escape.

The lip of the truck disappears from beneath me, and my face slams into the dirt below. Pain shoots up into my sinuses, rendering me momentarily stunned, and I raise my shackled wrists to my nose in an effort to thwart the acidic pulses climbing into my skull.

Somehow, I manage to twist around, and the earth grinds into my back, the jagged rocks tearing at my skin. Ringing inside my ears mutes Gwen’s screams, and I stare up at the black sky, with its diamond stars twinkling down on me. Calm. Peaceful. If I die tonight, it’s inconsequential to those stars, which shine in spite of it.

The world blinks to blackness.

I open my eyes to a gravelly bed of jagged stones beneath me. The rough surface chafes the very tips of my toes.

Screams slice through the hazy confusion that clings to my brain. Pressure pounds inside my fingertips, and I tilt my head back to find the chain of my binds trussed over a rusted stretch of twisted rebar that sticks right out from the wall of rock behind me. I trail my gaze over a wooden structure overhead, which seems to be a support for the surrounding stone. Man-made. A mine shaft, maybe?

Memory trickles in too slow for how desperate I need to remember.

The stars.

The black eyes of the Rager.

Ragers.

I snap my head forward, the screams from before coming into sharp focus as I stare across the cave. On the gritty, mine floor, a mutilated, naked body moves over another beneath it. Rutting against her like an animal in heat. All I can make out are the back of her calves, bent beneath its hunched form that swallows the rest of her body. The dark hair trapped beneath its bony arm gives some indication it might be Gwen.

The others. There were others.

A tremor vibrates beneath my muscles as I scan the cave for other Ragers.

Nowhere.

Stretching to reach the ground, I can hardly balance on the tips of my toes, as I attempt to wriggle the chain over the ridges of the rebar. Pushing off what little surface my toes touch of the stones below, I jerk my body forward. Each

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