by Hazel Grace
“The fuck!” Hollis hollers, making another go of rising, but instead, he’s yanked up, stumbling forward and into the blackness that I can’t filter into color or characteristics. “Get the fuck off me!”
A heavy thud resonates off the floor, followed by another metallic clack of a weapon. My hands instinctively go up to defend myself, trailing my gaze to find that Hollis isn’t standing anymore, and two black bodies move towards the kitchen.
My breaths echo in my ears, but it’s all I hear for the moment. Until I’m following Hollis by being tugged off the couch.
My chest hits another. My palms locate solid muscles under a cotton tee, and an arm wraps around my waist.
“This is private property.”
Dad.
My body immediately tremors in fear. I’ve watched too much TruTV at my college’s coffee shop, and my first thought is that this is a robbery. A random heist to grab whatever they can carry to make money off of.
They can take that TV along with the porn.
An ear-splitting gunshot rings out again, blistering my ears, and I instantly go to cover them. That’s when I’m wrenched from my spot and lugged towards the front door.
“Wait!” My plea, I’m not sure how loud it is, but in my head, it ping pongs like in an empty building.
The coolness of the April night hits my frame as I’m dragged across the wet grass of our front yard, soaking my socks. A dog’s deep bark breaks the stillness of the neighborhood somewhere as the streetlights hover over the cars parked along the curb.
“Where are we—” Another stern tug to shut me up and make me follow quicker.
A sharp word. A hard pull or glare—that’s all I need to remain silent. To be obedient for anyone to step on and take advantage of.
With Dad, Hollis, any of his friends who eye fuck me from across the room and have grazed at least one part of their bodies against mine.
When I’ve dated, I was always a docile and faithful partner. I had no voice, never found it. It’s always been lodged in the back of my throat.
A soft pop of a trunk opens, gaining my full attention to the black car positioned in front of the neighbor’s house. My captor makes me jump the curb towards it when I suspend, soaked socks rubbing against the cement.
I expect the trespasser to pull back on me, to threaten or order me to move.
Instead, he pivots and bends down to throw me over his shoulder. Striding the rest of the way, he promptly crams me inside the compacted trunk. My back hits scattered items left before it closes overhead, leaving me in the dark—alone. Where I wanted to be moments ago but—
“She screams,” a deep male voice conveys. “Shoot her in the leg. She continues, knock her out.”
My eyes widen in the darkness before a hefty thud hits the top of the trunk.
This is serious.
This is really serious.
My night just jumped from worse to—I think—possibly life-threatening.
A forceful wind blows through my long hair and cuts a chill throughout my entire body. I shiver against it with my back to a thick, metal beam, searching for warmth when the night promises none.
It also doesn’t help when there is nothing to block out the winter-trying-to-turn-spring temperatures because there are no windows in the abandoned space I’m in.
Random garbage litters the floor, while electrical wires hang from the ceiling. Aimless arrays of colorful graffiti are the only thing that decorates the setting with people’s names and words that mean something to someone.
And the only way out, besides tackling the large dude that hasn’t stopped staring at me since I was dragged up several flights of stairs, is to jump out the barren spaces to my untimely death.
Tall buildings, to where I can see the tops, allude to how high up I am. This building used to be something, an office maybe, and it’s being renovated or torn down.
Regardless, it’s depleted of bodies or a phone to call 911. And with zero bravery or ideas of suicide, the odds of me hurling myself out of this high building—not going to happen.
I’ve contemplated screaming to see if anyone would hear me, but silence encompasses everything. I haven’t heard traffic or people bustling outside. The large man standing in the room’s corner will only stop me, and I don’t know how that’ll happen, so that bottles up that idea.
Curling my toes in my still damp socks, my brain begs for another idea to filter through.
I don’t know what I did.
I’ve never been in trouble with anyone before. The closest I’ve gotten was when I tripped, and my lunch tray flew into four perfectly placed girls in the cafeteria at school. One threatened to beat my ass while the other three threw out slurs of names at me. But that was last year and who kidnaps someone over tripping so that idea is out.
The soft scuffs against cement sound behind me, and I freeze against my metal support. My eyes flick to the man in the corner, but he’s gone.
Every hair on my body stands on end as I back up closer to the piece of hard beam that provides the only promise that doesn’t threaten to hurt me.
My heartbeat is erratic, strumming against my eardrums loudly, and bashing into my chest cavity.
I shouldn’t be here. I did nothing.
Going home isn’t my first go-to destination, but right now, it is. I want to put on my half-working headphones and listen to Fleetwood Mac because Stevie Nicks gets me into a zone. I remember Dad blaring it a few times when I was young and—
Where’s Dad?
My nostrils flare as I force tears back. I heard his voice, then the clack of a bullet registering into the barrel of a gun.
The gunshot...it was so loud and distinct that I know I didn’t imagine it. Perceptions of blood and a giant wound in Dad’s chest flood my brain.
Oh my God, did they shoot him?
I’m not worth anything, so if these people want a ransom, they’re not going to get one.
I’m a nobody.
Literally, an alive ghost that no one ever notices. If people said my name, the response would be “who?”.
So, what did Dad do? Is he in trouble? Did he owe someone money?
Oh, shoot, Dad.
I pray to everything holy that he didn’t. That he isn’t involved with a gambling debt or something worse.
He did come home with a gold watch the other day...
A black figure appears out of my peripheral, but I dare not look at it—I can’t.
Clenching my eyes closed, my first hope is that he won’t see me. That my invisibility will work on him too. I’m afraid that if I peer over, this will be real. That I’m not locked away in a never-ending nightmare.
Please wake up.
Please…
I can sense the static vibe off the person’s body as a panic attack builds up in my chest.
I chastise myself for never watching any shows about how to escape a situation like this. There are plenty of crime shows and documentaries of people getting abducted and how they escaped. The ones where women who have survived explain all the details.
Myself—I have no clue what to do right now.
Besides jumping out of this abandoned building, it’s all that comes to mind. I guess I’m an easier target than I thought because I practically followed the man who jerked me off the couch to go outside.
Meaty fingers suddenly wrap roughly around my jaw before pressing into my cheeks. The pressure makes my jaw open in response as my face is craned towards my captor.
But I don’t crack my eyes open, breathing through my mouth with a high-pitched screech brimming over my vocal cords.
“Who hired the hit on Reagan Lockwood?” His voice—it’s warm, delicious.
Deep.
Grave.
I can feel his words and warm exhale hit my skin, maybe because I’m so cold.
It causes not only a violent shudder to rack throughout my body, but I get the sense that this isn’t a hostage situation after all.
“Open your fuc
king eyes,” he growls, the pads of his fingertips driving deeper into my gums.
I immediately listen because—well, I’m as compliant as a law-abiding citizen, and he’s the voice from outside the trunk.
The brute who lifted and planted me over his shoulder.
The edge of his stubble catches my cheek, releasing a sharp gasp from my lips against his ear. The hard lines displayed on the side of his face foretell that he’s upset—livid.
If the hostility in his voice didn’t hint to it, his facial features surely do.
“Who?”
I swallow off my “what?” attempting to pull myself out of his clutches, but he clings firmly to my face, keeping me where he wants me.
I don’t remember the name before I catch sharp dark eyes boring into my soul. The moonlight casts shadows over the angles and lines of his face, but I notice the tick in his jaw. He responds with more pressure, setting a fresh wave of fear coursing through my veins.
I don’t feel the pain. I’m too locked into that one emotion. It causes everything else to take a backseat.
“I don’t enjoy repeating myself, sweetheart,” he spits out. “And I’m also not the one you want to play with.”
“I—I...don’t kno—” My baggy t-shirt is gripped into a ball, yanking me from the beam I’m resting on, just to crash right back into it.
The back of my skull is the collateral damage, slamming against the hard surface to where I start seeing colored specks of black and blue in my vision.
I rapidly blink, trying to deplete them so I can focus when a shiny glint catches my eye.
A knife.
A really long and jagged-edged knife.
“You wanna scream?” he taunts, pressing his hard chest into mine. “Feel free...it makes my dick hard.” My chest convulses against him. Ideas abruptly come to the forefront of my brain.
He could violate me, and I don’t think anyone would hear me.
Actually, I’d bet on it.
I’m not sure what kind of hidden mark I have written on my forehead, but only men see it, and they always believe they can touch me without asking.
“What do you know...about Reagan Lockwood?” The dip in his tone alludes that this isn’t a game. That his repeated question is a serious one, and I better get the answer right.
Except, I don’t know it.
“I...I never—” The very tip of his blade meets my flesh, clearly not happy or satisfied with my response.
At first, I think it’s just to scare me. He just wants information, but he quickly erases that thought when I feel the ridged edges cut into my cheek.
My immediate reaction of jerking away is halted by his vice-like grip still locked onto my chin. It’s steel, as he continues drawing a line down my face.
“Stop,” I scream through closed eyes, slamming a fist into his body and not thinking about the consequences before the words tear from my throat.
And just like that...I feel nothing.
His weight disappears, the blade that I swear just severed my cheek is gone. Tears seep through my eyelids, and I don’t stop them.
There’s no use.
What are a few tears going to do, show him I’m scared? I’m sure I’m already doing a fabulous job of that. I haven’t stopped trembling like a leaf on a tree since I heard him come up from behind me. My voice sounds like a mouse being toyed with by a cat who’s just playing with its dinner before it snaps its neck.
A broken sob shakes my fragile frame, right to my core. One of my hands reaches to the place where he just cut me, finding exactly what I thought I’d find—blood.
Pulling it from my face, I examine the bright color on the pads of my index and middle finger.
This man—he’s going to hurt me.
There’s no denying that now.
He doesn’t know me, and that makes this more desperate now. There is no emotion attached, and that creating me into the easily discarded victim.
“I’m ready to play a little game.” His voice cuts into my chaos, and I really don’t like the amusement I heard laced in his words.
He sounds distant, which gives me the courage or stupidity to glance over at him.
Hesitantly, my gaze crawls up the length of his body. Each inch creates a new form of dread into me.
Blue jeans, a gray T-shirt hiding what looks to be a sleeve of tattoos, doesn’t conceal his arms or chest size.
He’s huge.
And not like Hollis huge where breakfast, lunch, and dinner is a six-pack of beer and fast food. But big like he lifts cars and lives off protein shakes and bars.
The black ink along his forearms and upward hint that pain doesn’t matter as long as it looks good. The veins that pop from his biceps and neck lead me to where I meet his eyes that are blazing at me with such rage and disgust that I somehow put there.
I’ve never been looked at like this before.
Again, I’m imperceptible most of the time, so his misplaced animosity makes me believe I really did something terrible.
I shake my head at his comment. “Sir, I don’t know what...I didn’t do anything. You have—”
“That’s what they all say at first.” He takes a menacing step in my direction. “Until you give them a reason to talk.”
“I–please, believe me. I—”
“Shut up.” My lips snap closed off his command before he’s yanking me away from my safe spot and forward to walk in place with him.
The moonlight brightens the space as we pivot around, nothing left behind, just like the courage I so desperately abandoned somewhere in my lifetime.
A black garbage bag that has been cut out to lay like a blanket on the ground catches my eye as well as a bag full of metal tools, a couple of buckets, and...a saw?
“Take a seat,” he orders, then releases his hold on me. I stare at the back of his head.
He is out of his freaking mind?!
The saw was all I needed to see to make me not accept his offer.
Hunching down to look for something in his, what seems to be a tool bag, I inch away from him and his picnic setting of random hard and sharp things.
This isn’t romantic nor inviting.
My gaze falls on numerous knives, a sledgehammer with dark spots along the wooden handle.
What would someone do with all of this?
Oh, you know, Stormi. This man is clearly a psycho.
He must sense my easing away because his neck snaps over his shoulder.
“If you wanna run,” he voices. “That’s fine. But when I catch you, I’ll—” I pivot, already in a full sprint towards the stairwell where the faded red words of “exit” were painted there once upon a time.
I hear his grunt behind me, and I’m not a total idiot to think that he wouldn’t chase me.
Around another steel beam, the rest of the floor ends in just void space and missing windows.
My head snaps to my right, finding the staircase with my heart in my throat.
I don’t think I’m breathing as I round the pillar to see him inches from me out of the corner of my eye.
If he reaches me, I’m finished. I won’t be walking out of here. I’ll be murdered at a young age, tossed God knows where, and that’ll be it for me.
All my dreams gone, at the snap of a finger or pierce of a blade.
I push my legs to move faster because this isn’t a friendly game of tag.
This is my life.
But it’s my knees I feel hit the concrete first, then my palms, followed by the solid weight of what feels to be this entire building descending on me.
I only realize that I’ve striked the ground for a moment before I’m spun around. My back is the next thing to slam into the cool concrete before his knees splay out on either side of me.
“You didn’t let me finish my sentence,” my stranger leers, leaning over me and placing both of his palms on either side of my head. “I was going to say that if you run, I’ll make it hurt.”
Make what hurt?
>
Clasping my hands together over my sternum, he doesn’t bother keeping most of his heaviness off me.
Why would he?
He had no problem sliding a notched blade down my face.
“Please,” I stammer quietly. “I didn’t—” His hand seizes underneath my jaw again as he turns my head to the side.
“Aw, sweetheart...you don’t have to bother lying to me anymore.” His mouth drips malice as he looms in closer to my ear. “I’ll just rip the truth out of you.”
“I—” His tight grasp loosens, surprising me before falling down my throat in a soft abrade against my heated skin.
It’s a sea of red flags, battering on each parameter of my brain.
Pulling himself away from me, his touch doesn’t stop until he lands at my collarbone.
“You’re fucking beautiful.” He sounds shocked as he takes the time to thoroughly study me underneath him.
The density of his stare initiates a wave of goosebumps up my arms. The stir in my stomach is a mixture of nerves and anticipation as his touch moves back up the column of my neck like a predator seeking the best spot to strike.
“I think it’d be a shame to fuck this part of you up.”
My chest begins to spaz in seizure-like influxes. I can’t suck in a breath to calm myself, and his skin burns against mine, leaving a trail of threatening warmth behind.
“You were getting finger fucked by Hollis Evans.” My next tremble is a mixture between a flinch of remembrance and loathing.
He says it like I wanted it.
I would rather have an aneurysm over being stroked and felt up by Hollis.
If he only knew that he walked in on something entirely different from what he saw.
“The man who was waiting by the truck for you to be done.” I catch the smell of his cologne or deodorant—a citrus musk that I think I’ve smelt before at school. “So you’re either his girl…or you guys just like to fuck. Regardless—” I suddenly thrash my head from side to side.
“No, no, I’m not. He—”
“Are you saying that I was seeing shit?” The sudden adjustment in his octave makes me shrink back against the hard ground.
