Angels Have Claws

Prologue

There were red and blue lights flashing all throughout the dusty windows and sirens from the nearby patrol cars cut through the air like knives.

Evelyn was lying alone on the dilapidated wooden floor as she tried to feel everything around her. Her body, numb and weakening, wrapped with fresh bruises - enjoyed the dirty cold gust of wind penetrating from the broken portholes.

She knew that she have been there for days already but she still doesn't know why she was there in the first place.

As she getting her senses back, Evelyn felt a heavy breath around her ears. Her heart felt like it was spinning in her chest, stunned in a moment. Sweat beaded on her forehead as she gasped for tried to grasp for a clean air. It was as if she couldn't get enough oxygen into her lungs.

A man walked away from her back easily forming a growing monstrous shadow along the corner of the house. Broken glass crunched under his feet as he stepped in front of the window. He was looking outside through the window while the a cop registered unclear loud voices from their hand-held speakers.

The man turned his back against them, ignored them once more and wrinkled his nose. Everything is a mess at sigh, the dilapidated wooden floor smelled strongly of rotting flesh and urine. Evelyn, following the trails of the man - took all her courage and retreated in all fours as she caught a sight of a knife on his back. The man who was staying by the window noticed Evelyn as she created a loud thud whose body is now plainly pasted against the bloody wall. Evelyn was shaking and no voice could come out to her dry lips.

The man walked towards her and gave her a hateful look. He slipped his arms under her armpits and dragged her further away from the door. Evelyn fell into the floor and the man quickly opened a gallon of gas and poured it on her, and the rest of the old house. The cops were still outside trying to convince the man to surrender but the man was hesitant and uncooperative.

Evelyn was panting heavily and resisted the urge to vomit. She licked her lips as the cold gust of wind occasionally whistled through the broken windows. She took the chance of crawling to the door while the man was on the kitchen looking for something to light up the gas. Long before she reached the doorknob, a force pressing on her neck surprised her. The man pressed the sharp knife he had into Evelyn's neck until a thin line of red appeared. A pearl of blood grew at the edge of the cut and swelled for a second. It all happened silently as Evelyn shook in fear. She was hardly thrown meters away as a loud force was heard breaking on the other side of the room.

The man ran and locked the other doors. Evelyn knew that the man felt absurd for having locked the door now. She knew that his desperation could offer almost no defense and resistance to his current state.

The man took few steps in front of Evelyn. He slapped her face and knocked her head in the wall. She tried reaching something to give herself a fair fight with the man but all her stretching hand could feel is the empty cold air. She was left breathing heavily for a moment when all of a sudden, slightly warm water hit her face. Looking up, Evelyn saw the man pissing on her. She moved and tried to avoid it but a strenuous kick was felt below her abdomen.
Evelyn felt her veins rejecting the flow of her blood and the tortured breathing was all she could have.

She curled in pain and forcedly closed her eyes. The man once again appeared in her front with chains sounding like a folly. He twisted her hand and chained it, same goes with her feet.

Evelyn cast her hand on the slit on her neck. Her spinning heart ran to her ears when she saw the man trying to light the spilled gas. She knew that any moment when the fire reaches the ground, she'd be a roast human delicacy for a feral hound.

The man was successful in lighting the match and threw it on the corner. The fire immediately ran to any direction where there is something combustible and where the spill of gasoline is. The huge growing fire separated the man from the trapped weak Evelyn. He stared Evelyn as if he was trying to imprint Evelyn's face into his memories forever. His glares were filled with malevolence and hatred that slowly made Evelyn turn the half way.

She had her back feeling the heat of the burning distant fire. Evelyn closed her eyes and smiled before losing her consciousness. She knew that it will be the last moments of her life.

It was not later when a group of cops arrived and took Evelyn's unconscious body outside of the burning house. Outside, the gusting wind still had some of the chill edge of winter. They placed Evelyn inside the ambulance and rushed her to the emergency room. She lost a lot of her blood from the slit of her neck to which she luckily survived. Her body smelled like dead already, only that she was totally alive. Her blue dress was all ripped and turned to red because of her blood. Her arms were swollen from being chained and her eyes were tinted with red blood. The abduction has awfully revealed the worst of Evelyn's fate.