by A. M. Wilson
She doesn’t comply right away and simply stares at me with curious indecision at first. After a moment, she huffs out a breath and turns so the side of her head is facing me. Lifting her hair out of the way, she shows me the gash right above her ear. Seeing the cut and the blood seeping from it has a sharp pain piercing my sternum.
An uncontrollable need to protect and comfort Dani damn near steals my breath. Which is ludicrous because Dani’s had training. She could probably protect me. That thought makes me want to both laugh and throw my fist through a wall.
The gash doesn’t look as bad as I feared. Head wounds always bleed like a bitch. She drops her hair and leans on the wall. It’s then that she notices the collar around her neck. She grips it with both hands and tries to yank it off.
“What in the hell is this?” she asks, panic lacing her voice.
“It’s some sort of collar. Stop pulling at it, or you’ll hurt yourself. I think it has some type of lock to keep it on.”
“Shit,” she mutters. She drops her hands and faces the window again. Her eyes narrow on my neck. “Why don’t you have one?”
“I have no clue.”
I have a sneaking suspicion I know what the collar does, and from the wide-eyed look Dani is giving me, she knows too. I just hope like hell we’re both wrong or we never find out what it’s meant to do.
As if Bolt can hear my thoughts, in the next second, Dani drops to her knees and screams out in pain, clutching the collar.
Bile rises in my throat, and my heart nearly stops.
“Stop!” I bellow to the ceiling before looking back at Dani. “Goddammit, stop it!” I beat on the glass, knowing it’s useless. I feel so fucking helpless.
Just as quickly as Dani starts screaming, she stops. She falls forward on her hands, her back rising and falling in rapid succession. I feel just as breathless as I watch Dani on the floor.
“Dani?” I croak.
It seems like it takes forever for her to lift her head and her eyes to meet mine. Sweat beads on her forehead, and her eyes look dazed. When they focus, they meet mine. Residual pain reflects in their green depths.
“I think I’m okay,” she says, slowly getting to her feet.
I’d give or say anything to be able to wrap my arms around her right now. Being so close to her but not being able to touch her is more torturous than anything Bolt could do to me.
I take a steadying breath, trying to calm my nerves. The best thing either of us can do is to keep our calm. We’re going to need it to get out of here.
“How did you end up here?”
She leans back against the wall, so I’m forced to go to the other side of the window to see her.
“You were reported missing by Jonas Hart when you didn’t show up for work. We were in your neighborhood questioning some of the neighbors when we saw a light coming from your house. While we were checking out the property, I was knocked unconscious.” Her chest rises and falls with a deep breath. Her head falls to the side, and her eyes meet mine. “How did she get you?”
I lick my dry lips and clear my throat. “Shot me up with something to knock me unconscious.” I purposely leave out the part about trying to keep Dani safe. Lot of fucking good it did anyway.
Her gaze moves away from mine, and her head thumps back on the wall.
“Do you know what she wants with us?” she asks after a moment of silence.
“No. But I get the feeling it’s not good.”
Her gaze sharpens and swings back to me. “Why do you say that?”
I look off across the room and take in the dingy space before looking back at her. “Isn’t it obvious?”
She looks around too, and for the first time since she woke up, I see a hint of true fear. “We have to get out of here.”
“We will,” I tell her resolutely. “We just need to bide our time and wait for the perfect opportunity.”
There are questions that have no answers yet, but they’ll come, and when they do, we’ll make our move.
I don’t know when and I don’t know how, but I’ll be damned if Dani and I will die in this place.
No matter what I have to do.
13
Dani
“Hey, Reece?”
My question echoes through the dark, reminding me once again I don’t have a way to track the time.
“Do you have a watch on?” He calls by way of answer, his question eerily close to my own thought.
I check my wrist. “No. She must have removed it along with my cell phone.”
“What’s up, Dani?” He acknowledges my initial question in a terse voice. I doubt it’s intentional, though who could blame him while locked up in a dark, cold cellar.
My mind is all fucked up as I ponder our situation. So far the only thing I’ve done since getting here is sleep as whatever Bolt injected me with continues to make me groggy. At least, I assume she shot me up with something after hitting me in the head, or I might have a bad concussion. The effects are lessening each time I wake, but I have a feeling that even when whatever this is wears off, I still won’t feel normal. Not until I get out of this nightmare of a place.
I rub my arms to ward off a chill, though it’s useless. “Are you awake?”
“I’ve been awake a while.” The soft quality of his voice, caressing and filled with concern all at once, sends a pang through my chest. So much so, I cross the small space to the window and peer into the other side.
“Can I see you?”
A grunt precedes his dark head of hair popping into my line of vision. The dark circles beneath his eyes and the downturn of his lips ignite a fire within me.
“How did she get to you, Reece?”
As he looks away and scrubs the back of his neck, I can sense his shame.
“She found my weakness.”
“Oh, come on.” The words burst forth on a spout of irritation. “Stop with the cryptic answers. We need to figure out what she knows and what her plan is to have any chance of getting out of here. She obviously knew I was at your house looking for you and waited for me there, but how did she get you?”
Even through the grime, as he swings his gaze back to the window, I can feel the weight of his dark irises as they bore into me. His mouth drops open, the sound of his answer cut off by my door flying open and banging against the wall behind it.
Bolt saunters in, carrying a plastic tub with a grin on her face. I lunge at the psychopath. She caught me off guard with the hit to the face, but this time, I’m prepared to attack. Fuck any sort of training. I’m going to take her down and choke the fucking life out of her with my bare hands.
The violent thoughts cut short as a current simmers from the collar around my neck. I drag my foot one step closer before I drop to the dirty concrete on my knees as my control gives out. The shock instantly stops.
“You bitch,” I grit through the pain and cradle my head in my open palm. Her cackle increases the chill in the room. The tips of her clean white sneakers enter my line of vision. They’re out of place in this dirty shithole.
“Princess, you haven’t seen anything yet.” She shucks me beneath the chin as if I’m nothing more than a kid.
Behind me, Reece pounds on the glass.
“Don’t touch her,” he snarls.
“Tsk. They’re always so tough on the first day.” She giggles in a way that sounds nothing like her voice from a few minutes ago. Suddenly, the sound is high-pitched and airy as if she’s acting out a character. “You’re about to see you know nothing about being tough.”
From behind me, she leans down until her mouth is next to my ear. I turn my head slightly—any farther, and we’d connect—when I want nothing more than to recoil from her proximity.
“I will break you,” she whispers, not loud enough for Reece to hear.
Her words speak a challenge that fuses itself with my bones and makes the opposite true. She’ll only break me if it’s the last thing I experience from this world. I refuse to give her the pleasur
e.
“What do you want from us?” Reece’s deep voice is loud enough to be heard but muffled from the wall dividing us.
“It’s not exactly what I want.” She waves her hand in front of her, and I notice the black device clutched in her fist. That must be what she’s using to control the band around my neck. “Your answers will come depending on how long you can survive.”
Reece pounds against the barrier again. I turn and give him a small shake of my head. We don’t know if this woman has a breaking point on her control, and I’m the one hooked up to her shock collar at the moment.
“The rules are simple. You do as I say, or you die. The longer you follow directions, the longer you get to live. And if you find a way to pull some Romeo and Juliet shit, I don’t give a fuck. Do keep in mind that if I don’t get my fill of excitement, I might have to move onto someone else in this town.” She looks away with a crazy look in her eye. “Family members, perhaps.”
My stomach roils at her implication.
I want to ask her what she’s about to do, but I think I’ve said enough. The silence weaves its way through the seconds that tick by. She spins on her heel in a flourish of long blond hair and returns to the front of me.
We lock eyes. Hers appear too innocent for a person filled with so much evil. The excitement there sparks hatred inside me, and I hope she can see it. I hope she feels it too.
Whether or not she does, she gives no indication as her eyes slide down to my feet before returning to my face. Only then does she utter one command.
“Strip.”
My blood leaves my appendages so quickly that my hands turn to ice. I will myself to remain calm and suck in a long slow breath through my nose to keep my heart rate down.
“Turn around, Reece.” I intend the words to sound strong, but somewhere between thinking them and speaking, they get caught in my throat.
“No. I won’t.”
I fortify my tone. “Turn around, Reece.”
“I won’t leave you,” he utters, failing to conceal his helplessness.
“We can hardly tolerate one another,” I snap. Between the crazy woman in my room, the collar on my neck, and being locked in this place with the man who destroyed me, I’m hanging by a thread. “Fucking turn around before you take something from me I don’t want you to have!”
I expect him to curse or bang on the window, but when I glance behind me to check, he’s disappeared from view. My heart stings at the loss of our connection, but I also meant what I said. He doesn’t need to witness this.
When I turn back around, Bolt regards me with a thoughtful expression. Her pretty face fails to hide the ugliness brewing behind her eyes. With my chin raised high, I begin forcefully undoing the buttons of my soiled blouse, starting from the top. I yank the soft fabric off and toss it to the floor before moving on to my slacks. I hastily shed the material without much performance. I don’t know what this sick bitch is into, but I’m determined not to give her what she wants.
Left in nothing but undergarments—plain cotton bra and panties with knee-high stockings—the chill from the basement prickles my exposed skin.
“Better than I would have expected from those frumpy clothes.”
I assume she’s remarking on the condition of my body. Rather than respond, I move only my eyes as I watch her cross the room back to the plastic tub she carried in, and she begins removing several opaque gallon-sized milk jugs.
“Get in, bitch.”
“What’s in those?” The question slips free as thorns of fear prickle just beneath my skin. The collar around my neck shocks instantly without warning, this one more powerful than the last. I fall to my bare knees on the cold concrete as a cry slips free and clutch my neck.
“Dani!”
“I’m…fine,” I croak, hoping Reece holds his position and doesn’t look through the window and see me like this.
“Since you can’t fucking follow directions, you can crawl your ass over here and get in.”
I comply without hesitation. Getting myself hurt isn’t going to help us escape any faster. I need to be intact. The dirty ground forces debris into my knees and palms as I crawl the few feet to the 32-gallon storage container. Bolt’s smile widens with each inch covered until I stand and seat myself inside. The edges swallow my petite frame and come nearly to my shoulders. I curl my fingertips around the sides and brace for what’s to come.
Bolt lifts one of several jugs, tosses the cap aside, and without preamble, she tilts the opening directly over my head. My mouth clamps shut just as the first rivulet courses down my face, and I hold my breath. The relief I feel at not smelling anything harsh like gasoline is quickly replaced with shock as the coldest water I’ve ever felt douses my body. I bite my lips to stifle a cry.
It doesn’t take long for the first jug to empty. Goose bumps race across my flesh as the water stops and the air hits my wet skin. I have a few seconds of reprieve before Bolt starts with the next one. This one feels even colder than the first as water droplets pelt my skin like a thousand tiny arrows burrowing deep.
A gasped cry causes her to laugh.
A shiver races down my spine, and my muscles contract into painful coils.
My teeth chatter as I stare blankly ahead and wait for the next.
“Your fortitude is admirable.”
I curl my fingers tighter around the edge of the tub and brace for more.
Three.
Four.
Five. I count each one.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
The basin holds on to the icy water, keeping it in contact with my skin long after Bolt stops pouring. I shake so hard that I feel like I could snap my own bones from the force. My nipples peak to the point of pain beneath my now see-through undergarments.
“I think that’s enough for now,” she announces after an immeasurable amount of time.
My teeth clank together so hard I can’t form a response, even knowing at this point it’d be near suicide to even try. The games have officially begun, and we’ve entered the race to survive.
The empty jug bounces off the concrete floor as she throws it to join the others. Without another command, she scoops up my clothing and exits my cell of a room. Not before I hear the clank of a set of keys do her footsteps retreat.
A shuddering breath expels from my tight lungs with a cry, and I hoist my soaked body from the confining plastic. My joints scream from both the cold and holding their position for so long. Muscles and tendons stretch as if I’ve been kept in a crypt for a hundred years.
“I’m right here, Dani.” Reece’s voice sounds farther away. I don’t know if it’s due to the cold fog overpowering my mind or that he’s away from the window.
“D-d-d-don’t l-l-l-ook-k at-t me.” I don’t know why I bother saying it. We’re in for a world of hell, and him seeing me in my underwear is probably the tip of the iceberg.
“Come to the window.”
I take slow, measured steps. Every movement feels like walking through quicksand. When I arrive at the dirty barricade, Reece locks his dark eyes on mine. The concern sends a pang through my chest.
“Fucking goddamn hell.” His tortured words burrow deep. With one look, he reveals a layer of vulnerability when it comes to me even after all this time.
“It’s going to get b-b-bad, Reece.”
He nods. “Probably.”
“I can take it-t.”
His eyes burn with frustration as he fists his hair.
“I can,” I implore him to believe me. Because if he thinks I’m weak, she’s going to use that to her advantage. “You don’t know me anymore, but I’m not a weak little girl who needs protection.”
“I don’t know if I can. I don’t know how to sit and listen to her hurt you.”
“Then plug your d-damn ears.”
His scowl ignites a spark of warmth in my chest.
“Don’t. Don’t you dare fucking make a joke when I’m sitting here trying to c
alculate how long you have before full-blown hypothermia sets in and you’re in real damn trouble.”
My breath catches in my throat.
“You’re already turning fucking shades of white and blue. I knew a guy on my crew who got hypothermia just from working in the fucking rain on a seventy-degree day. When he got to the hospital, his body temp was ninety-two. You’re soaked from head to toe in a freezing cold cellar, and I can’t do a damn thing to help you.”
“She won’t let me die that easily.” I hope.
The noise he makes resembles a snarl before he disappears from view.
I move closer to the window. “R-Reece?”
“I need a minute to think. Try to warm up.”
My muscles hurt more as I make my way back across the room to the mattress on the floor. It’s as filthy as everything else in this room, but I hope the material might help chase off the chill. My joints hurt so badly that my fingers lock into my palms and my toes cramp with each step. When I finally make it, I nearly collapse onto the bed and curl into a tight ball as I shake.
Exhaustion sets in, and I think I dip in and out of consciousness, though time is uncountable here. My head swims with fuzzy images of the gray concrete blocks before me each time I open my eyes.
“Dani.”
The voice echoes in my ears as if I’m underwater, and my own response comes out warbled.
“Wah?”
Thud. Thud. Thud.
“Just let me sleep.” I don’t know if he can hear me through all the banging he’s making, but I’m so tired.
“Goddammit, Dani. Fucking wake up!”
Reece’s shouts penetrate the fog, but I’m too tired to lift my head. I give a minute shake before closing my eyes.
“You bitch! I know you can hear me up there! You need to bring her a blanket or she’s going to die. What fun is that, huh? What’s the fucking point if you’re just going to let her die!”
Thud. Thud. Thud
“Reece.”
“I need you to stay with me, Dani. Can you do that? Can you talk to me?”
“Mhm,” I mumble sleepily.
“You need to move around. You need to create body heat.”
