Kings of Quarantine (Brutal Boys of Everlake Prep #1) - Caroline Peckham ,Susanne Valenti Page 0,113

away and Kyan and Blake’s strong hands hauled me to my feet.

I didn’t look at either of them, my jaw grinding. I was furious with myself for screwing this up, but most of all I was furious at them for making escape so impossible.

“Here,” Saint directed and I was thrown onto the flagstones at his feet. I was kneeling before the old stone altar at the back of the church. Saint was leaning back against it like this place was built to worship him instead of God and fear trickled deep down into the root of my soul.

“Up,” he demanded of me and I pushed myself to my feet, wetting my horribly dry lips as his eyes scraped down my appearance. “You must be thirsty,” he breathed, reaching out and taking hold of my hand. His fingers closed around mine like a vice and he tugged me to one side of the room where a large stone font stood. My muddied reflection gazed up at me as Saint held me before it and I hated how much fear I could see swirling in my eyes. I couldn’t find a way to mask it in that moment; my layers of bravado had been stripped bare by my failure and the horrifying reality that there was no more hope. I was theirs. Wholly, fully, completely. There was no way out.

Saint’s other hand slid into my hair and I had half a second to drag in air before he shoved my face down into the water. Panic bloomed in my chest and I grabbed the sides of the stone basin, shoving backwards in a desperate attempt to get free. Saint was terrifyingly strong and he pushed my head in farther until all of my hair was submerged with it.

One second, two, three, four, five -

He yanked me back out and my scalp screamed with pain as I spluttered and coughed.

His mouth pressed to my ear and made my gut knot with tension. “In the name of the father, the son and the holy spirit. Hallowed be thy fucking name.”

He shoved my head back under the water and fear took me hostage as he held me down, longer and longer. My ears popped and my lungs burned.

I was going to die. This psycho was going to fucking kill me.

A stream of bubbles burst from my lips and I was suddenly dragged free of the font. I hit the ground on my ass, my mind spinning, my thoughts splintering and breaking. I was half aware someone was shouting and it took me too long to realise it was Kyan.

“-don’t want a fucking body on my hands, idiot,” he snarled.

“Don’t be such a drama queen,” Saint laughed.

I scrubbed the water from my eyes as I dragged down lungful after lungful of air. Someone touched my arm and I yelled in fright, throwing a fist out on instinct and cracking them in the side of the head.

“Fuck,” Blake snapped and I bared my teeth at him, daring him to lay his slimy hands on me again.

I scrambled backwards until my back hit the altar and I tugged my knees to my chest, staring at the three monsters before me.

Water soaked through my clothes from my hair and I didn’t know if my trembling had become shivering, but suddenly my teeth were chattering and goosebumps were rushing across my flesh. For half a second I thought, I have a gun in my bag, before realising the implications of that thought were insane.

They couldn’t kill me. They might have been callous enough to do it, but that wasn’t what they wanted. They wanted me chained and bound, forced to submit. And I couldn’t see any possible way that I was going to avoid that fate now.

“Put her in your bathroom,” Saint commanded. “And clean her the fuck up. I don’t want that muddy bitch making a mess of this place.”

Blake didn’t approach me this time. Kyan walked forward and I hugged my legs closer to my body as he closed in on me.

“Get up,” he demanded and when I didn’t he dropped down and gathered me into his arms. I stiffened as he held me against his chest, refusing to look at him as he carried me down a corridor, passing through a bedroom into a large, windowless bathroom. It was immaculate with pristine white marble tiles and a huge shower on one side with a claw foot bathtub in the centre.

He dropped me to my feet, moving across