Vacant Horizons

by Yolanda Olson

  I probably broke the stupid thing outside of the club, I thought with an inward groan. I’m in the hospital, again, with another injury.

  With a sigh I forced myself to open my eyes.

  The high ceiling of the room I was in was in was white and familiar. I heard muffled sounds and realized that they were coming from a television set somewhere in the room, relatively close by. I turned my head to the left and saw the large flat screen with a commercial playing on it and furrowed my brow. Where the hell am I? Relaxed footsteps started to come toward me and I quickly turned my head to the left to see who was entering the room.

  My blood turned to ice, the air felt like it had been knocked out of my lungs, and I quickly shut my eyes in fear.

  “Finally awake?” he asked with a chuckle as he sat down on his usual spot, the arm of the couch, with his bowl of cereal. I couldn’t fucking believe it.

  I had been taken back to Jaxton.

  Five

  I opened my mouth and screamed as loudly as I could. He laughed and raised the volume slightly on the television.

  “You should know by now that, that never works,” he said, digging his spoon into his bowl.

  If I get out of this, as God is my witness, I’m going to shove that bowl down his fucking throat.

  I stopped screaming and tried to sit up again, but this time he put his bowl down, came over to me, and strapped my right wrist to the table he had me on. I assumed it was the coffee table, but why in here? Why was I in his living room and not in his Alone Room?

  “Stop yelling, Tuesday. It’s giving me a headache,” he said softly as he went back to his spot on the couch. I turned my face toward him and noticed that he was now sitting on the actual cushions and not the arm, one leg arched up next to him, staring at me. “How long has it been? Days? Months? I can’t really remember. I don’t have much concept of time these days.”

  I was frantic at this point. Never in the history of being his own personal torture doll, did he ever call me Tuesday. It was always Riley or Tempest, but never Tuesday. I tugged as hard as I could on the restraints but they wouldn’t budge. Normally, you should never struggle in front of the person you’re trying to escape from, but I didn’t care. Jaxton Whitlock was not a person. He was a fucking monster that was most likely going to use me before throwing me into the Tasman Sea for disappearing the first time.

  Don’t struggle. Be compliant. Mask the pain.

  Those were things that Riley had burned into my mind when we were in the Alone Room together. She knew she was going to die, but she also told me she knew that I was going to live if I just followed those three simple rules.

  “I’m not sure,” I finally said. I decided I would try it her way and see if maybe, just maybe, I’d be able to get out of this again. “Where’s Owen?” I asked suddenly.

  “Gone.”

  Gone where, you mad man? I wanted to scream.

  “Um, will he be back? I have something I’d like to give him,” I said, adjusting myself to get comfortable on the table.

  Jax chuckled but didn’t respond.

  “Do you know Owen?” I asked curiously.

  “I do.”

  “How?” I pressed.

  “We were trained by the same two people. Almost around the same time. He was safer to go out into society and function like a normal person, where as I was not deemed fit to do so. That’s why I barely ever leave this house. That’s also why I’m very good and fast at what I do.”

  I eyed him carefully. He seemed relaxed, like any dangerous animal before they struck and I had to think fast. Somehow I was going to have to convince him to undo these restraints, but for now I guess keeping him talking until I formulated a plan would have to do.

  “Is it like an academy?” I asked curiously.

  He threw his head back and laughed. It was the first genuine, pleasant laugh I had ever heard from Jax and for a moment it kind of threw me. I could almost see the human being in the monster. Almost.

  “No,” he answered when his laughter subsided. “Absolutely not.”

  “Then what is it that made you two like this?” I asked carefully.

  It was like a flip had suddenly been switched, as I watched the amusement leave his face and the light void out of his eyes. I watched as he dropped his leg from the couch, get to his feet, and angrily grab his favorite bowl with his favorite cereal inside, and walk out of the room. A few moments later I heard his angry shout, followed by the sound of shattering and I in that moment, I just knew I had asked the wrong fucking question.

  I took a series of shaky breaths as I heard him opening drawers in his opulent kitchen. Open. Slam. Open. Slam. It was almost like he was taunting me. Finally, I heard him walking quickly back toward the room and I craned my neck as much as I could to get a glimpse of him. As soon as I did I closed my eyes and did something I hadn’t done in a very long time. I started to cry.

  “Open your eyes, Riley,” he whispered.

  “I’m not Riley, Jaxton!” I shrieked. “I’m Tuesday, remember? Please remember!”

  I felt his presence as he stood over me, the long, thick kitchen knife gripped firmly in his hand that had caused my tears was probably poised over my heart right now, but I refused to look.

  “Look at me or I’ll slit your fucking throat,” he whispered dangerously.

  My eyes flew open. If he was giving me an ultimatum, then chances were he had no intentions of killing me yet. I turned my head toward him and stared at the blade for a moment, before I looked up into his eyes. The beautiful brown eyes void of light and full of wild intents.

  “Do you want to know what made me the way I am? Would you like to know my story?” he asked quietly.

  I nodded. The longer I kept him talking like I originally planned, the better the chances that he would drop the knife. Jaxton moved quickly. He used the blade to cut my restraints and then roughly sat me up on the table. I used my shirt to wipe the errant tears away and stayed seated where I was. I didn’t trust him enough to move more than I already had.

  “It started with my mother,” he said as he began to pace back and forth in front of me, the knife now clasped firmly behind his back. “Her name was Sorrow. Kind of fitting if you ask me, considering that I was one of the few things she had and didn’t want. See, she came from a very wealthy family, but she just didn’t know how to handle it. She got involved with drugs and sex at an early age. It took her years to get clean and when she finally did, she was raped by one of her former junkie friends. I never knew her love, though. Once I was born, she immediately gave me away. She never even gave me a fucking chance. I didn’t ask for this, Riley. I didn’t ask to be the product of rape, but I sure as hell deserved my mother’s love!” He shouted, throwing the knife across the room. I flinched and began to shake, but I clasped my hands together firmly onto my lap and listened. Jaxton glanced at me for a moment, dangerously close to tears, and dropped onto the couch again. He put his face in his hands and continued his story. “So I lived with my adoptive parents for fifteen years. They were absolutely amazing to me, but I didn’t for once believe that I was there son. Something inside of me just told me that I wasn’t, you know? Around that time I decided to look for my birth parents. I just wanted to meet them; see who I looked like, ask why I wasn’t good enough to keep. As you’ve probably guessed, I never found my father, but I did get a lead on Sorrow. My adopted parents helped me find her name and information.”

  Jax stopped for a moment and moved his hands away from his face. The tears that I was so sure had fallen behind the privacy he had given himself for those few precious moments, were nowhere to be found. Not one tear stain, not one damp eye was present. He leaned against the back of the couch and used the remote control to turn off the TV, before turning his eyes toward the ceiling to continue his story.

  “I never got to talk to her. I had contacted her a week before I was taken by my mentors and asked her if she would meet with me. She agreed and we set a date. She never showed.
Or maybe she did and when she saw me, I reminded her of my father and she ran; I don’t know. But because she shunned me that day, I got drunk and ended up in the hands of two of the most devious people I had ever met. They didn’t keep me right away. They wanted to see if I could abide by their strict rule of silence first, and I kept my promise, Riley. I never said a word to anyone about what they had done to me. It lasted for three years their grooming. And each day that passed, I found myself liking what I was becoming. I found myself needing the monster, craving the things I was being bred to do. I understand why they picked me. I was an easy mark as a drunk fifteen year old boy who was heartbroken because his mother had rejected him a second time. Anyway, when I turned eighteen, I accepted their offer to live with them and watch the things they did to others until it was my turn. She left eventually, but the older man, he stayed with me. He showed me how to use my anger against my mother and my need to hurt things into a calming activity. Sounds sick, doesn’t it? But to me it was an activity. It still is. Something I do recreationally whenever I feel the need to find Sorrow again. I’m pretty sure that I’ll never see her for the rest of my life, but I think instead of wanting to kill her now, I’d actually talk to her. I can’t be too sure, but it’s just what I would like to think. And that is the tale of Jaxton Whitlock. Have I answered your question?”

  I nodded, unsure of if he was looking at me or not. I didn’t have the words for what he had just said to me and quite honestly, I was terrified that if I did speak, I would say the wrong thing and he’d go off the deep end again.

  “Do you know what I think you need right now?” he asked, leaning forward. My eyes slowly turned up to look at him. Nothing he would say to me right now would be good or warranted, but I let him say it anyway.

  “Come with me,” he said getting to his feet and holding a hand out toward me.

  I took his hand without hesitation and let him help me up from the table, even though everything inside of me was screaming not to go with him. I think he could feel my entire body shaking when he closed his hand around mine because he chuckled again.

  “I’m not going to hurt you, Purple. Not today,” he said giving my hand an affectionate squeeze. I glanced up at him and let him lead me from the living room. Purple was what he called me when he was starting to realize that I wasn’t Riley, then it would be Tempest when everything was calm again.

  “Tomorrow?” I asked like a scared child.

  He just smiled at me as we walked toward his main staircase. When we arrived at the landing he let go of my hand and gestured for me to go ahead of him. It was starting to become obvious to me that what he thought I needed was for him to force himself on me again.

  I held my head high and climbed to his floor remembering Riley’s words of wisdom; don’t struggle. It was true with Jaxton, the less you struggled the less it hurt. Not that he was gentle in any way, but fighting against him only brought out a savage beast. With her first and primary rule in floating in my head, I walked dutifully to his bedroom door and waited for his permission to open it.

  “What are you doing?” he asked curiously.

  I turned around and saw that he had stopped at one of the doors a few down from his room. He was leaning against it with his arms crossed over his chest, eyeing me in amusement.

  “Is that what you want, Purple? I can certainly accommodate that urge if you have it, but I was going to let you stay in this room right here,” he said tapping on the door, “for the rest of the day and for tonight. I figured what you would need right now more than anything else is rest.”

  “Thank you,” I said, quickly walking toward him. I put my hand on the doorknob and Jax placed his hand on top of mine, gripping it tightly.

  “Only for today and tonight,” he leaned down and whispered into my ear, before letting go of my hand. “Tomorrow, I’ll have to break you in again.”

  Six

  It was safe to say that I didn’t sleep that night. Knowing that I’d have to go through the rigorous abuse that Jaxton called training all over again was enough to make me want to jump out of the window. I wasn’t a quitter though, not to mention I was pretty sure the window was coded locked and there was probably a camera in the room somewhere watching my every move.

  I knew that Jaxton was incredibly intelligent but that didn’t stop me from trying to find a way out of the room. Like I had assumed, the windows were coded shut and the door only opened from the outside. I spent a good hour checking every corner, every space of the room I was in for a camera, but didn’t find one. I also knew that just because I couldn’t see it, didn’t mean it wasn’t there so I went back to the queen sized bed and laid down on the pastel purple comforter. I rolled onto my right side and stared at the dark purple stuffed bear that sat behind the alarm clock. That’s weird, I thought with a furrowed brow. I sat up and glanced around this time, noticing all of the purple accents in the room. It was almost like he knew he would find me again.

  I rolled onto my back and stared at the ceiling directly above me. That’s when I saw the pinhole sized blinking red light. Found you, you fucker. I quickly got to my feet and reached up toward the hidden camera. The problem was that I found I was too short to reach it, so I hopped on the bed a few times, my fingers just grazing the ceiling.

  “Why don’t you just kill me and get it over with?” I shouted at the camera.

  I dropped down angrily on the bed like a spoiled child who hadn’t gotten their way, when I heard his bedroom door open. I tilted my head to the side and listened as his footsteps gently echoed down the hall, stopping in front of the door. There was a soft tap, almost as if he were asking my permission to enter the room, before I heard the sound of the key pad as he punched in the code and pushed the door open.

  The door opened slowly as Jax poked his head in and scanned the room. When he saw that I was sitting on the bed he stepped in and closed the door behind him. I couldn’t help but appreciate his form again as he stood there in loose cotton shorts showing off his strong legs and a muscle shirt that seemed drawn onto his body. The man may have been completely deranged, but he was absolutely stunning to behold.

  “May I sit next to you?” he asked softly as he approached.

  I had a half of mind to tell him no, hit him with the alarm clock and run, but I knew there was nowhere to go. So instead, I nodded and moved as far to the side of the bed as I could without actually falling off of it.

  “You’ve asked me to come in here and kill you, so I’ve come in to ask you how you want to die,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I won’t keep anything anymore that doesn’t want to be kept.”

  I looked down at my hands. I wanted to tell him to just do it. I didn’t want to be used anymore. I didn’t want to live in constant fear and pain. But then I had a thought, something that might save me from him once and for all.

  “Then you’d be no better than Sorrow,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.

  Jax chuckled. “No, you’re wrong. I didn’t have a choice. The whore threw me away the moment I came into this world. She didn’t want to keep me. I’d like to keep you, but I won’t force you to stay here.”

  “Just let me go,” I finally said dangerously close to tears. I turned my body toward him and pleaded with everything inside of me. “I didn’t tell anyone last time. I kept up with what you wanted me to do. I thought you were out of the country so that’s why I went to Bondi Beach. Jaxton, please. Just let me go.”

  He got to his feet and looked down at me like a predator sizing up his prey. He gently put his hand on top of my head and began to caress my hair. I closed my eyes for a moment and just let him. If this was what he needed right now to calm down then I would let him have it.

  “No.”

  I let out a sob and just as quickly put my hand over my mouth to stifle the next.

  “You’re not my equal yet, Tempest. In a way, Riley was and she still is. You have to earn your freedom. I let you go because I became bored with you and wanted to
spend a little time in my Alone Room. You’ll see how marvelous it is now in the morning. I’ve got some many new things that I can’t wait to show you. That is the only reason I let you go. You just never realized that it was a false freedom; temporary.”

  I took a few shuddery breaths. I knew what I would have to do to get out of this now. And I also decided in that moment, to accept that the only way out was to die.

  “I don’t want to wait until tomorrow,” I said, getting up from the bed and shoving past him. “Open the door.”

  “So eager to learn again are you?” he asked quietly.

  “Open the fucking door, Jaxton. Let’s get this over with.”

  He turned his head slowly toward me but because the room was dark, I couldn’t tell if he had wild eyes yet. With slow, deliberate movements, he came toward me and leaned against the door for a moment.

  “I will not make this easy for you this time around. Riley was the only thing holding me back,” he warned.

  “Understood.”

  “Turn away,” he said, before he started fiddling with the doorknob. A few seconds later, the door popped open and his strong hand gripped my arm.

  As he led me down the hallway and stairs, toward the hidden doorway to his home, I took a deep breath and glanced out the window once last time.

  I knew this was the last time I would ever see the night sky.

  Seven

  Jaxton

  It took only a few moments. I left Tempest in the Alone Room with a myriad of sharp objects hoping she’d do herself in. It was true what she said, that I would be no better than Sorrow and I didn’t want to have that on my conscience. I couldn’t take anymore burdens to bear.