SHELBY MADNESS | ISIAH JESUS [EDITING]

CHAPTER 5

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Harlow stirred, letting a groggy moan escape her dry lips. She tried to stretch, to move. Her wrists were tied together from behind. Harlow felt the hard, wet ground underneath her. The pillar she was tied to dug into her back. She blinked away the drowsiness, the alcohol leaving her body. Nothing else could be seen in the room as she glanced around her surroundings. It seemed to be an abandoned building.

Harlow began to panic. "Where am I," she whispered to no one in particular. Her heart pounding in her chest, echoing through her ears. Anxiety taking over. She attempted to pull her arms apart, pain shooting through her. Harlow let out a whimper.

"They won't find you." Harlow took another glance around frantically, trying to decipher where the voice came from. It sounded familiar, oddly familiar. Darkness surrounding her, only finding light framing, what could only be, a door. The smell of rotting swelling up her nose, nausea swirling in the bit of her stomach.

Harlow closed her eyes tight, straining to hear around her. She could pick up on water, boats smacking off a dock. Then, it came to her. The old warehouse. By the docks, remembering playing at the same docks as a child.

"They have been looking for you all night, with no luck." Jasper. He stepped out into the open, from a dark corner, the frame of his lips quirked up. The little light from the low moon illuminating his bold frame, rolling up the sleeves of his button up shirt. "You Shelbys will trust anyone, won't you?"

"What am I doing here, Jasper? Untie me." She started twisting her wrists once more, the ropes too tight, rubbing into her skin.

He crossed his arms in front of his chest. "I've been watching you for ages, even before becoming a fucking Junior Blinder. I only became one because my father and Tommy knew each other in the war. But honestly, I never wanted any part of it." Her eyes darting uncontrollably with careful curiosity. Nothing he said made any sense. "Still trying to put the pieces together?" He laughed, dryly. "I never wanted sex from you, I wanted you. I had planned to do this sooner. But you had to go and ruin that." He blinked a few times.

"So you wanted more than sex, a relationship?" Her head pounding. Harlow took a deep breath to calm the nerves.

Jasper shook his head, sighing loudly. "No. No, you don't get it. You are worth a lot of money to some very powerful people, Harlow. Enemies of your family."

It finally clicked in her brain. The night she was attacked, how eager he was to leave the girl behind. "You lead Sabini's men to where I was that night."

"Finally! But they aren't the ones that are paying me." He laughed, louder this time, the scornful bitterness echoing in the air. She thought she heard something coming from outside the building, her eyes darting in the general direction. "Isiah just wouldn't leave, and I knew he'd save you."

"Tommy will pay you whatever you want. So why do all this?" She began to have trouble keeping her eyes open. She moved her fingers, the rope creating deeper dents in her wrists. When she moved them, a combination of thick and wet puddled on the ground surrounded her. Harlow knew that texture, blood. The girl must of been bleeding at some point. Or maybe she still was.