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I took in another breath before I looked up at him with a glare filled with so much hatred. I swore once again that one day I would see him face justice for what he had done. I told myself that I would be the person who made sure he paid for each and every thing he had done to me, and to the others I knew he had already killed.
I knew who he was. I had followed the case on the news before I was taken – The Number Killer. He took three victims at a time. Apparently I was number eight, so I guessed there was a seven and nine somewhere in this huge, empty building some place, but I hadn’t seen or heard them. I also knew I was likely to end up dead on a roadside somewhere, with a number attached to me, but if I did, it would not be because I gave him permission to kill me. I would never give him that.
“Fuck you, motherfucker!” I hissed at him, keeping my voice as steady as I could. I was trying hard to hide the fear that wracked me and channel the strength I had seen so many times in my brothers.
He growled low as he wrapped his hand around my throat and plunged me under the water again. This time I didn’t get the chance to take in a gasp of air, his hand so tight around my throat I wasn’t able to, and as I was pushed down into the water I breathed it in and felt the rush of it filling me as the panic consumed me again.
I jolted awake and instantly reached up for the hand I could still feel at my throat as I gasped for air, but there was no hand there now. I looked around me, terrified I would still be in that dingy bathroom, but instead all I saw was darkness and the dimly lit interior of my car.
“Fuck!” I gasped in relief as I realized it had just been a nightmare. I was panting hard and my hands were shaking badly, a fine sheen of sweat covering me.
Shakily I reached for the handle of the door and opened it, all but falling out of the car, desperate for fresh air and the reassurance I wasn’t back in the hell hole.
I had parked up at a rest stop a few hours outside of Denver, too exhausted to drive any longer. It was dark now, so I guessed I had slept for longer than I intended to. The rest stop was pretty deserted, just one car parked a few spaces away from me, and another at the gas pumps filling up. I closed the door of my car and leaned my shaking body back against it as I took deep breaths. The nightmare wasn’t unusual. They came every time I closed my eyes now, and they usually left me a complete mess, but that didn’t make them any easier to deal with. Each and every one of them took me right back there, bringing back every single detail of what I had endured at his hands.
It had all made me think a lot about Livy. When she first came to live with us I had only been five years old, but I still remembered the nights I had heard her wake up screaming from nightmares. At the time I knew something bad had happened to her and I felt bad that she had to see it again and again when she slept, but I never truly understood what she was going through. How could I? Even as an adult I had never truly had a grasp on all she had been through. But now I got it. Now I understood the times I had seen her shaking and sobbing, her hands shaking violently. I understood the way she had needed to be held and comforted when she woke from a nightmare because I needed that too now. I needed it so much.
Tears trickled silently down my cheeks as I imagined the feeling of my mom or dad, or both of them running into my room to comfort me after I woke crying out. I could feel their arms around me, my mom’s fingers brushing through my hair as she assured me I was safe. I could hear my dad’s voice telling me everything would be okay. I missed them so much.
“Hey. You okay over there?” A voice called, startling me. I turned towards it and found a woman stood beside the car that was parked close to mine. She was around my mom’s age, dressed warmly in a thick, padded coat. She flicked her short dark hair from her face as she looked to me with concern.
“I’m good, thanks,” I assured her, trying hard not to let my voice tremble as my nerves kicked in. I was alone in the dark, in a very quiet parking lot. It all felt way too familiar.
“You sure, doll? It’s late. Not really safe to be alone out here,” she warned.
“My boyfriend’s inside. I’m fine. Thanks again though,” I lied. She nodded and smiled, then resumed getting in her car. There was a guy in the driver’s seat, and they both gave me one last look before they pulled out and drove away.
Taking her warning to heart I got back into the car and locked the doors. I gave myself a few minutes to get it together, then I started the engine. I was a matter of hours from where I thought Harris was living. If I got moving I could be there by morning.
Images of Harris played out in my mind as I got onto the highway. We had been together for almost two years before things fell apart. He had joined our school in his senior year, having moved to Chicago from New York.
I had fallen in lust with him from the moment he walked into that first class. He had the whole tall, dark, and handsome thing going for him. He was almost a foot taller than me back then, and he had been on the swim team at his previous school, so he was toned and built around the shoulders. He ended up sitting right beside me and his confidence had appealed to me when he instantly introduced himself with a smile that had me staring at his handsome features like a love struck fool.
Within two weeks he had asked me out to a movie. After that first date we were inseparable. He was funny and no matter what, he always found a way to make me smile, but he was also incredibly smart. His ambition and desire to take over his dad’s company was also very attractive to me, since I was equally ambitious to become an attorney and work for the justice system.
We just fit together in a way I had never expected to find when we were both so young. Those two years were filled with happy memories and so much joy. If I thought about it I could still feel my body molded around his on the back of the motorbike he rode; my hands clutched around his waist, the smell of his leather jacket as we took late evening rides to see the sun set in summer. I had missed him so much if I were honest. He had been my everything until it all fell apart and in a way I knew I had never stopped loving him.
I didn’t know what version of Harris I would find, if I found him though. I didn’t know specifics of what he had been through during his time in the military, but I knew he had been badly injured, and that had ended his career. I also knew something had happened before that, because he had mentioned it in his letters and how deeply it had affected him, but he had never given me any specifics. His last latter had been months ago, so I didn’t know where he was at now in his life. He could be married for all I knew.
Whatever had happened and whoever he had become, I just hoped that spark of goodness and understanding that had always made him ‘my Harris’ was still there because I needed it. I needed him,
CHAPTER 6
HARRIS
“Boss? Boss? Wake up!” A whispered voice roused me, along with the feel of something hitting at my leg. My eyes snapped open and I instantly groaned loudly as pain ricocheted through my entire body. I looked up in alarm and realized my hands were in metal shackles, clipped above my head, causing the agony that was ripping through my shoulders.
“What the…?” I croaked as I tried to recall where the fuck I was and what was going on. I looked up and instantly locked eyes with my team mate, Rush. Kailan Rush, but we all just called him Rush.
“Boss? You with me?” he asked quietly. He was in shackles too, his chest bare and smeared with dirt and blood.
“Where the fuck are we?” I groaned. The small movement to my head had it spinning and my stomach churning violently.
“Fucking hell,” A voice I didn’t recognize replied. Turning to my right I saw two other guys just like Rush, shirtless, covered in blood and filth, shackled up to the roof of the shitty, crumbling room we seemed to be trapped in.
“Harris! Wake the fuck up, brother!” I jolted awake for the second time to find Rush right in front of me, only this time I was in my bed and he was stood in the doorway of my room. “You’re fucking late! I thought you had that meeting this morning?”
I sat up and rubbed at my eyes, then stretched out as I tried to calm down my racing heart beat from the nightmare.
