by Logan Fox
Except…I’m in the passenger seat.
My eyes swivel in their sockets and fix on the pair of keys dangling beside the steering wheel.
Will it be enough? Or am I better off trying to get out of the car?
It’s impossible to think straight with the fierce pounding in my head.
Key. Window. Door.
Key. Window. Door.
I’m losing my fucking mind trying to decide, and all the while, the car’s rumbling, rumbling, rumbling under me.
A shit hand, and no choice but to keep raising, right? For sure, I can’t fold.
I snarl and force my hand up onto the armrest with monumental effort. My face is slick with sweat—some of it trickles down my neck. Still grimacing, I push my hand forward and grab the edge of the door handle in its recessed trough.
My fingers slip away the moment I try and draw back the handle.
Fuck!
Again, but they slip.
Again.
I’m weakening. My arm threatens to slide off the armrest. I won’t be able to lift it up again. I’ll die here, just like Dad intended.
Taking the same way out as my mom.
Fitting.
Poetic, almost.
Who the fuck knew Dad was such a melodramatic poet?
Fuck it.
I’m going all in.
I shove my hand forward and press down on the window button.
For a second, nothing happens. But then the window hums as it starts descending.
Time stretches like an elastic band. Everything inside me tenses as the window moves down.
I expected a gust of cool air. Freshness.
I get warm, stuffy air instead.
As the window reaches halfway, I suddenly realize something that had been plaguing me since I regained consciousness.
The engine’s rumbling was too loud. I’ve driven this car—it’s got nothing on my Dad’s newer Merc.
Which is why I guess he wasn’t going to take any chances.
His car is parked less than a yard away.
And he left it on idle too.
Invisible poison gas fills the entire garage. When I opened the window, I’m sure even more billowed into the car.
That’s it, Jo.
Dad’s called it, and wouldn’t you know it, he’s got a royal flush.
What’ve you got, Jo?
Nothing.
Chapter Sixty
Candy
“Do you like that, baby girl? Do you like it when I make you feel good?”
I don’t.
I never did.
Fuck Wayne Bale.
Fuck this sick, twisted world.
I’m not in the study anymore. He’s moved me to the master bedroom. I still can’t believe I didn’t recognize every nook and cranny inside this place when I came up here yesterday. I’ve spent enough time in here that I should have this entire room committed to memory.
But I guess I can’t control what I remember any more than I can control whether I’m in here in the first place.
The deer trapped in that painting has more freedom than I’ll ever have. Than I ever did.
My body clenches. Wayne groans as I climax. Seconds later, I’m dimly aware of him covering me with his disgusting seed again.
All over my skin.
All over my soul.
I’d puke if I had any muscle control. But I don’t. I’m still his puppet. A placid little plaything. Nothing more than a sock for him to come into when he feels the need for release.
“I think it’s time we went all the way, don’t you?”
His mouth is by my ear, but he’s nothing but a blur. It’s always that way when he moves.
That’s why I stare at the deer. She’s the only real thing right now.
What’s creeping up on her?
A wolf?
Or something worse? Something dressed in camouflage. Something she cannot outrun…especially if the hunter is a good shot.
Sensation is slowly starting to wring its way back into me. This time, my mother’s not lying beside me, turned onto her side so she can’t bear witness to the atrocities playing out beside her.
Mom.
If I’d known our last meal had been just that, I’d have savored every last bite. Screw it, I wouldn’t have bothered to eat. We could have talked instead, sat up all night, and relived those brief glimpses of heaven scattered through our hell.
She wasn’t perfect, but neither was I.
And I know I’ll never see her again. There’s a dull ache coming from the back of my head. I’ve pieced a few things together now. Wayne knocked me unconscious while I was kissing Josiah. While Josiah was kissing me.
I have no reason to believe Josiah’s still alive. After all, Wayne found it easy enough to let Emma drown. Or he drowned her, does it matter?
“Wh’ Jo?”
Wayne stops rubbing me. I think he knows I like to look at the painting while he defiles me—he’d often lie to one side so I could do just that. Maybe it freaks him out when the kid he’s molesting maintains eye contact.
Wish I’d tried that sometimes.
But yeah, I didn’t have any control over the situation.
Still don’t.
Not yet.
But soon.
Soon.
“You say something?”
His smile is crooked. He’s taken off his glasses, and squints a little as if he’s struggling to make out my features.
I guess everything’s a blur to him too right now.
“Jo’ah.” I struggle to articulate the consonants, but I manage well enough. “Where’s he?”
Wayne laughs, but the sound cuts off bitterly. “You in love with him now?”
I shudder.
“Yeah, you like that, don’t you?”
“No.”
His fingers stop. Relief washes over me.
I’d said no before. He’d never listened. So why now?
“Where is he?”
A finger taps against my temple. “Forget about him.”
A pair of fingers stabs into me, and I gasp at the flash of pain. My eyes are drawn to my tormentor, perhaps to plead with him again, even if it will only get me a moment’s respite.
A line appears between Mr. Bale’s eyebrows. I used to think they were so proud, those bushy lines. That they made his eyes seem so regal.
Now they turn that gentle gaze into a hawk’s fierce scrutiny. “What the hell were they giving you in that place?”
He pushes away from me, a blur before he disappears.
To get more drugs.
To make sure his little plaything can’t get up. Can’t fight back.
I claw my fingertips into the bed, grimacing at the deer a few yards away.
Run, you stupid animal. You know something’s wrong, but you just stand there, waiting.
Run!
My teeth squeak together. This body weighs a ton. I work my fingers and toes, willing the surge of blood to wash away the lingering traces of whatever drug is trying to keep me down.
Fierce prickles race through my extremities.
It’s working.
It’s working!
With that thought comes a near debilitating realization.
Is this all it would have taken to break free?
Tears race down my temples, then down my cheeks as I prop myself onto my elbows. In a moment of stillness, I can take stock of everything. The glistening trails of drying semen on my stomach, as if a gigantic slug had crawled over my skin.
I retch, but my body’s too weak to push anything up.
My legs are still pushed apart. There’s a faint streak of blood on my inner thigh—he always drew blood even though he never fucked me—but I ignore it.
Ignore everything.
Even the sounds of him coming closer.
Play dead.
Pretend you’re still drugged.
Don’t let him see—
No!
I’m not his plaything a
nymore. I’d rather he kills me than let him put his filthy, perverted hands on me again.
Wayne watches me as I move jaggedly into a sit.
I’m exhausted by that struggle. My body’s numb and electrified at the same time.
Wayne walks closer. He’s holding a water bottle and a towel. Something else too, cupped in his hand, but I don’t know what it is.
I shake my head. “Don’t touch me.” At least my voice is back. It’s hardly a shout, but there is a thread of determination in my words, shaky as they are. “Don’t you dare touch me.”
Wayne smiles, but not pleasantly, and not for long. By the time he reaches the side of the bed, his face is a stoic mask. The only color is the faint flush on his cheeks—arousal, lust, whatever the fuck he feels when he sees me spread out for him.
I retch again, and disgust flickers at the corner of his mouth before he suppresses it.
“That’s not what you said the last time.” He sets everything down on the mattress beside me. Before I can get a good look at what he’s brought, he grabs my knee and hoists it up.
When I try to kick at him, my leg does nothing. I dig my toes into the mattress, and keep flexing and relaxing them, willing my legs to come back to life.
“Do you remember our last time?” Wayne trails a finger over my stomach. “I think you do.”
He leans forward and scoops a tear from my cheek. “There, there. Don’t cry, little girl. Daddy’s gonna make it all better.”
My stomach coils, but I suppress another retch.
I’m regaining control. And, with my demon this close, it’s easier to fight the urge to show him how much power I’ve regained.
The mattress sinks down as he climbs up beside me. He’s put his underwear back on—a striped red and white pair of boxers—and they hitch up his leg as he leans over to slide a pill between my lips. Then he uncaps the water bottle and puts it to my mouth.
Sometimes you have to sacrifice your Queen to win the game.
Before he can tip the bottle, I say, “I want to feel this.”
It doesn’t work. He’s not buying it.
The pill is starting to dissolve on my tongue. I push it into my cheek, and mimic a swallow. He puts the bottle to my mouth, and I take a deep swallow. As he tips it back, I push the pill into the bottle’s mouthpiece.
Wayne doesn’t notice because he’s staring at my eyes.
Even as he caps the bottle and lays it beside me again, his eyes never leave mine.
“So you want to feel, do you?” Something wicked glimmers in his eyes.
My stomach tightens when his eyes flicker down to my belly. I expect them to keep going, roving down over my clit and my exposed pussy. I remember that he likes to do that.
But his eyes stick on my tummy, which starts fluttering under that intense study.
He trails his fingertips over my skin.
Breathe comes too fast. My skin pulsates under his touch.
“Then, I’ll let you feel it.”
What?
Now my heart starts racing too. It takes everything I have not to move, not to give Wayne any indication that the chemicals he thinks he fed me are dissolving into the water bottle and not my stomach lining.
Mr. Bale shifts the towel aside.
As soon as he lifts what was hiding inside its folds, my soul bottoms out.
A surgical scalpel, still sealed.
A scream bubbles in my throat, but I swallow it.
When he presses that steel into my skin, there’s almost no pain.
Not at first, anyway.
Chapter Sixty-One
Josiah
My eyes fly open. The cars are still rumbling.
What happened? Where did my mind go?
Then I have my answer. My lids get heavy. My body sags. I want to sleep—
forever
—and not have to deal with this right now. That’s just what I did. Took a quick nap.
Suicidal, much?
Should be dead, but I’m not.
Got that going for me.
At least.
My eyes track through the Porsche’s interior. I stare for a ridiculous amount of time at the window beside me.
It’s closed.
My arm lays in my lap. I can’t feel it there, but I can see it there.
Rumble.
Wait…did I…was that all some weird dream?
What the fuck is going on?
My heart thunders away in my chest. The fuck am I going to get out of this if I don’t know what’s real and what’s not?
I close my hand into a fist. Stronger than I thought…why?
It was a dream.
Or something close to it.
Maybe a warning.
From the other side.
My lips curl into a sardonic smile.
Thanks, Mom.
I muster what little strength I have and fall over onto my side. Now the Porsche’s ignition is just a foot away. I manage to grab onto the key the second time around. The car dies.
There’s less gas down here.
Guess I haven’t been in here very long. Probably took Dad some time to put this all together.
Just let it happen, Jo.
Go to sleep, never wake up.
And I probably would have. But there’s more at stake than my mind, my ego, my consciousness.
Candy.
If she’s still alive, then I need to save her.
If she’s dead, then I need to avenge her.
And the only way either of that’s happening, is with me getting the fuck out of this catch twenty-two.
Two.
Two cars.
One dead now—
like you’ll be soon
—and the other still idling. Can’t open the window. Can’t open the door.
My thoughts are moving faster now.
Fresher air, better brain.
Prickles—the real shit, not imaginary—make my fingers and toes twitch. He left me the way I was—wearing boxers and nothing else. Is that important? What does it mean?
Hell no. Can’t waste brainpower on trying to figure that shit out.
Brainpower.
Need more of it.
I push back with my hips and maneuver myself forward a little. Now I lean my head into the footwell beneath the steering wheel. Here the air’s even fresher.
He tried to kill me off faster, but instead, he’s sealed me inside this car. A brief respite while I try and figure shit out. There’s still a crack in the window above my head—gas is seeping in through there. And a car isn’t airtight—it’ll be slipping in through all sorts of places.
Air con.
No, too risky.
Then my eyes lift back the pair of keys dangling above my head.
I guess he was in a hurry to get back to Candy. He didn’t think this through. Maybe he thought the second car would be enough.
Or maybe he’s on his way back right now. Done with her. Almost done with me. Just to make sure that I’m well and truly dead.
Every car has a key fob to operate the garage.
This car’s one is still attached to the keyring.
I haul in a huge breath—please, God, let it help and not hinder—and grab hold of the keys. They jangle like fucking Christmas bells. My fingers slip off a second before I can press the button.
Again.
Jangle.
My hand thumps into the footwell.
Jangle.
There’s a click and a loud rumble as the garage doors both start to open. I expect light to come in from outside, but there’s just more darkness out there.
How long have I been out?
There’s less than a yard between my car door and the fresh air. I could wait in here until the garage is filled with fresh air, but—
You’ve already been in here too long.
I have to be quiet. There’s a possibility Dad didn’t hear the garage doors opening. Slim, but possible.
If I can get out of here wit
hout him hearing, I could get to him without him knowing.
I don’t think about it any longer. There’s no time.
I fill my lungs with air. Then I fumble around above me until I find the door handle.
Hot, poisonous air billows over me when I push open the driver’s side door. I try to ignore it. I try to keep my fresh air inside my lungs.
They’re already complaining—hot and prickly and leaden—but I ignore that sensation as I scramble out of the seat. My knees hit the concrete floor so hard that I lose precious air in an ‘oomph’ that’s part pain, part surprise.
Then I drop to my belly and crawl as fast as I can. Only when the air caressing my face turns chilly, do I hazard a quick, shallow breath.
Fresh air.
I did it.
I scoot forward, and push up onto my knees as soon as my hands touch gravel. I’m still too weak to do more than crawl, but at least I’m breathing in regular O2 now.
Something catches my eye.
I lift my head, pausing as I pant in the cool night air.
Far above, a pair of windows bob and weave as I struggle to focus on them.
The study.
He’s in the fucking study.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Candy
The room dips and sways around me. He’s painting me with blood. My blood. It seems to amuse him.
I laugh a little. He doesn’t even look up. He’s smearing that blood all over my pussy.
Is it worse that he’s absolutely fucking psychotic and not just a pedophile who likes molesting his stepdaughter?
It should be worse. It should be atrocious.
My mind stretches like taffy.
Will it break?
Maybe it has already; how would I know?
It’s better not to look at what he’s doing, but without that pill, I can feel everything anyway.
He’s licking my skin now.
I force myself to lie still and bear it. I can already move my legs, but can I run? I don’t think so.
I know there won’t be a second chance if I fuck this up.
“There,” he murmurs. “You ready for me, baby girl?”
In answer, I close my eyes.
Just a few more minutes, and you can run.
You can run and never stop.
Never—
He hoists up my knees.
