This is the most degrading thing I've ever done. My mouth—the destroyed side, the side with no cheek, the side where you can see the tendons and muscle working and the teeth are permanently exposed—is pressed against her skin. I can feel her wrist against my jaw. Against the parts of my face that shouldn't touch anything, ever, because they're not a face anymore.
I bite down on the plastic and pull.
Bells shivers enough her teeth chatter. And for some fucking reason, I hope it’s because a monster’s disgusting face is pressed against her smooth, perfect skin, and not because she’s cold.
The plastic resists. I adjust my grip, working the zip tie between my canines, leveraging the one advantage of having a jaw that's more exposed bone than flesh on one side. My teeth can get purchase on things a normal mouth can't.
Snap.
The tie breaks.
Bells yanks her hands free with a gasp, shaking out her wrists, red welts circling both of them. She doesn't waste a second. She's behind me immediately, her fingers working the chains.
"There's a carabiner clip," she mutters. "Industrial grade. Hold still."
I hold still.
Her hands are faster than they should be, considering she was just zip-tied and chloroformed and locked in a cage by a psychopath. The chains loosen link by link, the pressure releasing from my arms and torso in increments that make my head swim with relief.
The last loop drops away and my arms fall to my sides.
Everything is pins and needles. My fingers throb as blood rushes back into them.
Bells is already at the cage door, examining the brass lock.
"This is old," she says. "Really old."
"So?"
She reaches up and pulls a pin from her hair. A bobby pin. She bends it with her teeth, inserts it into the lock, and starts working.
I stare.
"Are you a fuckingraccoon?"
She doesn't look up. "Yup. If I hadn't become a singer, I would've totally been a cat burglar." The pin scrapes inside the mechanism. She tilts her head, listening, her tongue poking out between her lips in concentration. "The criminal underworld's loss is the music industry’s gain."
The lock clicks.
She grins over her shoulder.
Something seizes between my ribs. Not a bullet, either, but I let myself pretend my ribs only feel tight all of a sudden because I’m rising to my full height and my muscles and wounds are cramping and pulling.
"Bells."
She pauses, her hand on the cage door, that grin still half-formed on her flushed, blood-smeared face. Her white hair is a disaster. Mascara tracks down both cheeks. There's a bruise blooming along her jaw and her shirt is torn at the collar where someone grabbed her.
She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
Fuck…
"If we don't get out of this," I say.
Her grin fades.
"I want you to know something too. It's not enough, and I'll spend the rest of my life proving it to you, but… I'm so fucking sorry, Bells. For being a fucking asshole, and adick, and…"
Her honey-gold eyes hold mine. Both of mine. The good one and the damaged one. She doesn't flinch from either.