Escaped: The Pierced Series, #2

By J. C. Mells

Oscar Alvarez de Sevilla was living the American dream. Attending a prestigious law school in New York City and madly in love with the girl downstairs, who he was pretty much going to marry as soon as he graduated. Everything was going as planned and life was good.

Twelve years later he is the centerpiece in a daring plan to help two young girls escape from the ruthless psychopath who has had them locked up for most of their lives. The same man for whom Oscar has been working for several years now.

His actions will guarantee he will be dead in less than a year, regardless of whether or not he and the girls are recaptured.

How did things go so wrong?

• Language: English
• Publisher: J. C. Mells
• Release date: May 21, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301308644

Book preview

ESCAPED

A Novella – Book 2 of the Pierced Series

By

J. C. Mells

Text copyright © 2013 by Justine Mellows

3rd Edition

Escaped is a work of fiction.  Characters, names, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.  Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Disclaimer: This novella is narrated by a character with a heavy Spanish accent. To help convey this, his voice uses few contractions. In other words, you will notice a lot of I will not vs I won’t or would not’ vs wouldn’t." I just wanted to point out that this lack of contractions is intentional.

––––––––

PIERCED SERIES

Book 1: PIERCED

Book 2 (novella): ESCAPED

(this is a short story/novella meant to be read after

Pierced.  It is not intended as a stand-alone piece).

Book 3: PINKED

Book 4: PERFECT

Book 5: (novella) NAPOLEON

(Napoleon is a stand-alone in terms that it can be read

and enjoyed without having read Books 1-4. Having said that,

events from this novella will be referred to in Book 6)

Book 6: KIDNAPPED

––––––––

Also by J. C. Mells:

HEAVY (New Adult, Contemporary Romance)

For more information on the series and/or the author, please visit

http://www.jcmells.com

––––––––

For my Dad,

who I would like to think

would have been proud of me –

despite all the curse words used

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1 – The Mark.

CHAPTER 2 – My name is Oscar Alvarez de Sevilla.

CHAPTER 3 – Planning and preparing for an escape takes time.

CHAPTER 4 - My first dinner with Sara and Reyes Alfonso.

CHAPTER 5 - Then we will be careful to make sure he does not find out.

CHAPTER 6 - Business as usual at Casa Alonso.

CHAPTER 7 - You ladies ready to get the hell out of here?

CHAPTER 8 - It is okay to be sad, Oscar.

CHAPTER 9 - Don’t leave us, Oscar.

CHAPTER 10 - Brunch at the Yaffa Café.

CHAPTER 11 - What the hell were we going to do now?

CHAPTER 12 - I had waited this long—what was another six months?

CHAPTER 13 - I did not have it in me to share the news.

CHAPTER 14 - ¡Lo juro que no fue mi culpa!

CHAPTER 15 - You have twenty seconds to get from this door to that one.

CHAPTER 16 - How come you don’t date, Oscar?

CHAPTER 17 - Staff would be minimal. Rush hour started at midnight.

CHAPTER 18 - Just do it already!

CHAPTER 19 - We have to help him escape.

CHAPTER 20 - You can’t tell Reyes or anyone else either.

CHAPTER 21 - I was beginning to get a very bad feeling.

CHAPTER 22 - Never was never an option.

CHAPTER 23 – Trapped.

CHAPTER 24 - The world was a perfect place.

CHAPTER 25 - Dorian’s men were just a few minutes away from us now.

CHAPTER 26 - ¿Has visto a Sara?

CHAPTER 27 - I will feed the vampire.

CHAPTER 28 – The grief I saw in his look took my breath away.

CHAPTER 29 - We don’t have ten minutes!

CHAPTER 30 - It was two whole days before I was able to see him.

CHAPTER 31 – I have Dorian to thank for my unbending suspicious nature.

CHAPTER 32 - I was almost unrecognizable as the person I had been.

CHAPTER 33 - I want a chance to say goodbye.

EPILOGUE.

CHAPTER 1 – The Mark.

As soon as I saw that mark on her, I knew I was going to die.

Es curioso como éso occure. Yes, it is funny how that happens.

I knew I would not continue to ingest the blood that had been keeping me alive. I knew I would not eventually be turned—that I would never become an immortal.

I was done. Finished. Hombre muerto. Pure and simple. Y ayí se fué la paz y tranquilidad.   I'm not saying that it was going to happen immediately—but I knew it was going to happen soon.

What was unexpected, to me at least, was how little I actually cared about it.

Maybe it would have happened like that even if I had not seen that mark.

Maybe.

All I know is now that I had seen it, game over.

What’s that on your back, Pierce?  Mia’s voice was filled with curiosity. Look, Oscar, look at Pierce’s back.  She turned to make sure I’d heard her.

Mierda.  La niña has seen it too.

Pierce, who had been standing with her back to us, spun around as if burned by fire. She dropped the book she had just reached for like a hot coal. She now faced Mia and me directly. I thought I’d detected a new level of nervousness in her lately—but this was Pierce we were talking about. ‘Nervous’ was her middle name.

Nothing, there’s nothing there, Pierce stammered.  Her guilty look and trembling bottom lip screamed out to us that she was lying.

Let me see your back, Pierce. I kept my voice low and quiet.

She didn’t move, but looked from me to Mia, swallowing hard and obviously trying to think of a response—one that might get her out of this current predicament.

She had nothing.

"Mia, go play over by the window, querida. Let me talk to Pierce for a few minutes." I used the tone that neither one of them would question. The little girl obeyed with only a worried look as I turned back to Pierce.

Turn around and show me your back.

I can’t, she whimpered as she pressed it up against the bookshelf behind her.

"No llores, míja. I'm not going to hurt you. I need to see your back. I promise I will not touch you." I spoke slowly to prevent any hint of impatience from creeping into my tone.

Pierce looked at me with glistening eyes. She bit down hard on her lip to stop it from trembling. She swept her two long, dark chestnut braids so they fell to her front and then, with shaking hands, she lifted up the edge of her shirt as she turned.

Joder. I had seen marks like that before but only in drawings.

Dorian’s drawings.

I don't know what they mean exactly, but if Dorian is researching marks like these, it can't be good for Pierce.  I might be his Head of Security, but he keeps very private all the intricacies of his... interests.

But I’ve been with him long enough to have picked up on a few things.

Long enough to know that if he sees her markings there’s a chance she’s going to end up down in his basement laboratory.  For what purpose, I don't know.  But I'm certain it won’t be for anything good.

Over my dead body will that happen.

He can't find out about the mark.

I gently pulled down her shirt to cover her back. Placing a hand on each of her shoulders, she jumped nervously from my touch.  I slowly turned her around to face me. She had tears on her cheeks now and I ran a thumb across the slightly swollen one to wipe some of the wetness away.

What is it, Oscar? Is it bad? Am I going to die? What does it mean? She sobbed breathlessly between each question.

I paused before I answered this beautiful and terrified young woman before me.

When did it first appear, Pierce?

Last week some time. I noticed it on Thursday.

"Don’t worry, mí angel. There’s nothing to be frightened of, trust me on this. But prometeme, esto tiene que ser un secreto entre nosotros. No one can know. You can never let Dorian see it. Entiendes?"

She looked up at me through wet lashes.  Her eyes were a dark, unprecedented shade of cobalt blue.  Those eyes were a reminder to just how beautiful this young woman had been—and still was—before Dorian’s abuse had permanently marred one side of her face. She nodded to tell me she understood everything I was trying to convey to her without voicing things that Mia should not hear.

I turned to Mia, who was sitting quietly in a corner reading a book. Her blonde eight-year-old head was bent in concentration as she focused on the words in front of her. Did I even want