Tears were streaming down my face and I kept fighting, punching and twisting and trying to find any angle that would get me free. My fist caught his chin and he grunted and turned to look down at me with a glare that had something dangerous sitting just beneath it.
"You do not need to struggle," he growled. "I will make it worth your while."
Cel, I thought desperately. Please.
I could feel her somewhere deep inside me. A faint presence, barely a flicker, but she was there.
Then my ankle gave way beneath his grip and snapped.
The scream that came out of me was immediate and total. He pressed his hand over my mouth to muffle it and the hot searing pain shot up through my ankle and radiated down into my toes and I sobbed against his palm with the force of it. My stomach lurched with nausea. My whole body was shaking.
He was going to take everything from me. My freedom, my dignity, whatever was left of my strength.
