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Sleep fled slowly, inching away, like a blanket being pulled, inch by inch, off my body. The first vestiges of consciousness returned, but in fuzzy splotches. Flashes of memory that fit into my mind in disjointed ways. Drake and me fucking on the boat. The screams and blood as we killed Marco. A dead cat nailed to a door. The feel of Blaine’s cock in my hand right before Drake took him.
Speaking of Blaine, was he still tied up in the den? How had I ended up in bed? Rolling over, I reached out for Drake, feeling nothing but smooth sheets, and thick blankets. Very smooth sheets. Expensive. Distinct. Familiar.
My eyes snapped open, and what I saw sent a jolt of horror and fear through me the likes of which I’d never experienced in my life. I was in the Playhouse. The room my bed sat in was an exact match for the room I’d woken up in all those months ago. My breath hissed in and out through my nose, as madness tried to descend on my mind.
For several seconds I worried that everything had been some fever dream. Had Drake and I really escaped? All the things that had happened in Europe and Haiti? Could I truly have dreamed all that? And if so, what did Sam have planned for me today?
With rising dread, I lifted my right arm and almost gagged at the sight of the watch device on my wrist. A little green light on the side telling me it was fully charged and ready to shock me into submission.
“This isn’t happening,” I whispered to myself as I sat up.
Eyes darting like a caged animal, I scanned the room closer, my mind working better now that I was fully awake. That was when I noticed the change. The clock above the door. It used to be an analog clock, the three hands ticking around the circle in a constant rhythm. This clock was a big digital clock with bright red numerals. Hours, minutes, and seconds clicking by like smears of blood. This wasn’t the playhouse. At least it wasn’t the old playhouse. The fucker had created a new one.
My fear burst apart like a firework on the Fourth of July. I gritted my teeth and let the rage fill me. I could picture Owen now. The events of the night before coming back in hazy remnants. I could remember the sound, like a gunshot, of the door being kicked open. Drake and I had both turned to find Owen pointing a strangely shaped gun at me. There’d been a shot, then a painful sting on my shoulder, followed by darkness.
Tugging my shirt collar aside, I saw an angry blue and purple bruise on my upper arm, and in the center a bright red spot like I’d had an injection with a large gauge needle. The fucker had tranquilized me like a god damned animal.
Bong.
Instinctually, I flinched at the familiar sound. A Pavlovian response to an ingrained fear.
“Good morning, Dahlia,” Sam intoned over the speaker in my room.
“Fuck you!” I screeched back at him.
Either he didn’t have the hidden microphones in my room on, or he simply ignored me. “Breakfast will be served in the dining room. You have three minutes to dress before your door opens. I strongly suggest you not be late.”
Every ounce of my being wanted to tear around the room, throwing a pissed off tantrum, but I knew how this all worked. I knew what Sam was capable of. Grudgingly, I slid off the bed, put on the familiar gray sweat suit and sneakers, and peed before the door to my room clicked open.
Outside, the hallway looked quite similar to the original playhouse. Owen had done a fairly good job of recreating, but I noticed some things that weren’t exact. The craftsmanship for one thing. Where the original had been a beautifully crafted mansion, this had the look of more haphazard and rushed construction. A few spots where paint or stain hadn’t been applied perfectly, a small gap between the wainscoting and baseboards, a small bubble beneath a section of wallpaper. All minute things that I would never have noticed before, yet they stuck out like flashing red light to my eyes now. It seemed Owen had been busy while Drake and I had been running across Europe. As busy as he was, he was nowhere as meticulous as Drake had been.
On heavy, sluggish feet, I made my way down the hall, bracing myself for what I would find in the dining room. No amount of bracing could have truly prepared me, though. Nothing could have.
A table with two people already sat, as though waiting for me. Bri, facing the door, smiled sweetly at me as I rounded the corner and entered. Beside her, a face that should have been familiar but wasn’t looked up at me through hooded eyes. A face pink and twisted with burn scars, the bottom lip pulled taut by the disfigurement. I gasped as a faint memory swam to the surface of my mind. A man in a hoodie bumping into me at the market, a twisted and awful face, masked by scars and pain. A man I hadn’t recognized in that situation, but now, through the twisted and ugly face, I saw him for who he was.
“Payton?” The word came out of my mouth in a confused and breathless sigh.
He didn’t respond to his name. Instead, he lowered his eyes, looking down at the table. “I’m sorry,” he muttered.
“Stop being such a little bitch,” Bri hissed at him.
She looked at him in disgust, then turned her gaze upon me. “You look well rested, Dahlia dear.”
“What’s going on?” I asked. “Why didn’t you just kill me?”
It was the easiest and safest way to do things. They should have actually shot me, or cut my throat, or fucked me to death with a steel rod or something. Anything would have been less messy than this…whatever it was.
“Oh, well, that’s easy,” Bri said, and took a bite of toast. “You see, that was on the menu originally, but things have changed.” She tilted her head back and forth. “You might say they’ve escalated. That was a very naughty thing your walking dildo of a boyfriend did back there. Owen was quite fond of his nephew. What Drake did means that what was going to be quick and clean, will now be long and dirty. I hope you’re ready for some fun.”
Drake had killed Blaine. That much was obvious from what Bri said. Something must have happened in the house after I was tranqed. If the only person Owen cared about really was dead, then Bri was right. I was in for a world of hurt. The question was how long would he drag it out, and what would he make me do before finally torturing me to death?
Bri lifted a strawberry from the bowl and took a delicate bite, chewing and moaning in almost sexual ecstasy. “Are you ready to play?”
Chapter 17
Drake
I sat in the darkness, still and unmoving, watching the front door to the apartment building. I’d parked the truck in an alley that overlooked the last place Owen had lived. Part of me knew he wasn’t there. He’d taken Dahlia, and would not in a million years bring her to this place. It was too small, and too close to prying eyes. No, he’d have taken her somewhere else, but still, after all that had happened, and how closely he’d managed to track us, I forced myself to be even more cautious than normal.
