Prison Princess (Paranormal Prison) - CoraLee June Page 0,2

offenses. I wasn’t sure if the warden purposely kept me on this level because he didn’t want me making any connections or because he wanted to keep me with the less hardened criminals.

When I was younger, a few of the prisoners were granted even shorter sentences in exchange for taking care of me. Some of them were nice. Most of them weren’t. None of them stayed. Either way, I was thankful for the calm. I’d heard screams from the other floors and had seen some of the torture that went down. My life might have been mundane and boring as fuck, but at least I was safe.

I’d no sooner had that thought than someone grabbed me, a hand practically shooting out from the darkness to swing me around. A scream bubbled up my throat just as thick, long fingers wrapped around my mouth. I braced my hands against the chest of the person holding me and jerked my head so I could look up. I gasped in shock. A man. In the female ward! I slipped my gaze over his tall body, seeking the familiar guard uniform but finding nothing but black pants and a black shirt. He wasn’t a guard? What was going on? This never happened. Maybe he was an escapee?

He was tall, dark-haired, with a neatly cut beard on his strong jaw. His eyes were as black as his hair. They were intense, piercing and angry. Though he held me, there was a cockiness about him, as if he held the world in his hand and willed it to spin on his terms. His grip on me was cocksure and hard. A light shiver rocked my body as he stared at me. We exchanged a silent standoff. He challenged me with his eyes to fight—to scream for my life. And when he removed his hand from my mouth cautiously, questions immediately spewed from my lips.

“What are you…”

The stranger brought up his hand and slapped it against my lips once more, effectively stopping me from speaking. “Quiet.” His voice held command. He wasn’t a person used to being disobeyed. “You’re out of your cell. You’re not supposed to be right now.”

I struggled in his hold, effectively pushing him away. “You’re no guard,” I whispered while giving him a look up and down once more. He wasn’t wearing the traditional prisoner’s garb, either. “Who are you?”

I’d grown up in this prison, but I’d been relatively safe the whole time. The warden kept people away from me, almost as if the idea that I could be hurt was a problem for him. I lived with people who committed crimes, and mine seemed to be that I’d been born at all. I learned long ago that the punishment for asking questions wasn’t worth the blank stares that always answered me.

“Quit struggling. You’re Layne Montgomery, correct?”

I opened and closed my mouth in surprise. Layne Montgomery. Layne Montgomery. I rolled that name around my tongue, trying to feel a sense of familiarity within the syllables. Momentarily shocked by this information, I blurted out my answer. “Montgomery?” I asked in confusion. “I don’t know my last name. I’ve never had one. Who are you?” I looked up at him defiantly.

“But you are Layne, right?” he asked, this time with more intensity.

“Yes, but—”

“Good,” he cut me off, like what I said made him pleased. At the very least, some of the nasty intensity in his gaze lessened. “Your last name is Montgomery. You can call me Cypress. I’ve been sent here to get you.”

“Who?” I asked. “Who sent you?”

“Your parents.”

My what? “I don’t have parents. Get your hand off of me before I…”

He raised an eyebrow. “Before you what?”

Was that amusement in his tone? I stomped hard on his foot, but he didn’t even seem to notice. “Before I scream. How’s that? I can have every guard in here arriving in seconds. I don’t know who you are or what your game is, but you’ll get your hands off me immediately.”

He shook his head before speaking under his breath. “Doesn’t know who she is and still speaks with a tone of authority. Must be in her DNA.” I didn’t know what that meant, but he had me curious. “You’re not going to scream,” he then added while tightening his hold on my arm. “Because you’re out of your cell, and we both know the punishment for escaping isn’t worth it. Why are you out, anyway?”

He wasn’t wrong. If I was caught with Louisia’s key and