Chapter 54
Cameron
The strikes are painful.
The weight of the boulder is hell.
But nothing—nothing—hurts like Lenora's screams.
Every time she yells my name, it carves through me deeper than any lash. Her voice, usually sharp with wit and fire, is cracking now. Raw. Desperate.
I don't lift my head—I can't. The boulder across my back is like a living beast, crushing the breath from my lungs, grinding my spine downward inch by inch. My knees burn against the stone floor. The chains bite into my wrists, the metal slick with sweat and blood. But it's her voice that undoes me.
"Let him go! LET HIM GO!"
I fall to my knees.
The stone cracks beneath me from the impact of my weight and the boulder's crushing presence. Pain floods through every inch of me—my shoulders, my ribs, my wrists—but I bite down hard on it.
Endure.
I don't know how much longer I can do this.
Not because I'm weak. But because her voice—Lenora's—it's breaking.
