I shook my head athim, closing my eyes and fighting back tears while my fingersnearly brokefromthetension in my fists.
“You have no ideahow wrong you are,” I said, staring straight into his eyes withconviction. “I wouldneverforgive you for this. I will always have a reason to get awayfrom you, no matter what you do.”
“We’ll seeaboutthat.” Hesmirked.
“You can’thonestly expect me to just sit around and let you dothis.”
“I don’t imaginethere is much you can do about it,” he said taking a sip of hiscoffee before setting it back down on thetable.
“Don’tunderestimate me, Darren. That will be your biggest mistake,” Ireplied confidently.
His hand was on mythroat before I could even blink.
“And challengingme will be yours,” he snarled with absolutemalice.
His eyes blazedwith an intense anger as his grip on my throat quickly became avise. I didn’t even bother to try to stop him. I just scowled athim, holding back my tongue as I fought for oxygen, hoping he’d letgo.
After what feltlike hours, he finally released me and stood, putting his suitjacket on over his white dress shirt and black tie. My throatburned as I coughed and gasped for air, tears beginning to build inmy eyes, but I refused to let them fall.
“I have to go awayon a business trip tomorrow. I’ll be gone a fewdays.”
Bye,Felicia.
And then Darren’smouth dropped real low to my ear.
“Maybe if youbehave while I’m gone, I won’t make you watch,” he said, but Icould taste the venom in his words as he spoke about murdering myfamily. He was so good at motivationalspeeches.
“How nice of you,”I answered, my eyes looking straight ahead.
Darren thenroughly gripped my jaw and kissed me hard on the mouth. His tongueforced its way through my lips and tangled with my own. I felt theheat rush through me and melt into my core as his thumb dug intothe side of my jaw while his lips made a victim out of mine. Hethen released my face and looked down at me.
“You’re to remaininside today,” he said and I immediately scowled at him, only forDarren to return the gesture. “Be thankful I don’t lock you in yourroom instead. I’ll see you at dinner.” He sneered and then walkedout the door, Scott and another guard hot on hisheels.
Not more than tenseconds after he left, David came out with my breakfast and placedit down in front of me before walking away without so much as aglance. My plate contained scrambled eggs, a bowl of sliced mixedfruit, and some toast. I had zero intentions to eat any of it,wanting to spite Darren as much as I could, but I had barely eatenanything yesterday and I needed to keep my strength up. I swiggedback my vitamins, the burn in my newly sensitive throat making ithard to swallow, and pulled my plate forward. I angrily ate my eggsand scarfed down my fruit, nearly shoving my plate across the tablewhen I was done.
Since I was nowonce again confined to the walls of the house, I got up and startedto wander around, looking at random things, trying to piecetogether a way to get the fuck out of here. What could I use tosuccessfully escape this place? I needed to break out of thisgoddamn collar like now. I was running out of time, and I needed tofigure something out fast.
I wandered forhours, sat around to think, wandered some more, and thenreluctantly ate lunch in the dining room. Pascal could tell I wasstressed, so he made me a bowl of homemade chicken noodle soup.Hands down the best soup I’d ever had, especially since it was easyfor me to digest.
I then proceededto aimlessly wander the house some more. I passed several guardshere and there and the cleaning staff, but no one paid anyattention to me. Some of the staff even seemed to hurry away fromme when they saw me coming. Didn’t that make me feel special?They’d probably gottenwindof what happened to the gardener and feared any sort ofinteraction with me would create the same fate for them. I didn’tblame them. They were probably right.
I meandered intothe theater and considered watching a movie, but it would onlydistract me rather than inspire a genius escape plan. I left thetheater in a disappointed huff, cutting around a corner too fastand nearly tripped over my own feet. My toes on my right foot beganto sting as I looked down to examine it. It was then that Irealized I had fully ruined my shoe, the thin black rubber sole nowpeeling off the tip of my shoe. And then suddenly Ifroze.
Rubber.
Rubber could blockan electric charge. It might not be able to block a GPS signal, butit might be all I needed to get the fuck out just long enough tocontact my family. My heart suddenly started to pace. Why hadn’t Ithought of this before? I was too focused on getting the damncollar off rather than thinking of a temporary way aroundit.
Rubber may only bemy temporary path to salvation, but maybe that was all I reallyneeded. If I could execute a plan properly, I might be able toescape the estate, but it wouldn’t stop Darren or his men fromfinding me. Unless by some miracle I found something to cut thecollar off before the GPS gave me away. I seriously doubtedit.
I nonchalantlymade my way back to my room and kicked my shoes off by the bed,nearly swiping them underneath it. The only place I could think ofthat the cameras couldn’t see. I then sat down at my vanity andlooked at myself in the mirror. My eyes landed on the giant bruiseon the side of my face, and as I stared intently into the mirror,focusing on everything I currently hated about my life … I finallylost it. I screamed and abruptly stood up, whipping all the makeup,brushes, and tools from the vanity, and knocking them all over thefloor, deliberately managing to get several things under thebed.
I gripped my hairand paced the room back and forth, my chest heaving up and down,and adding further evidence to mypretendtempertantrum. I knew eventually Darren would be watching this, and Ididn’t want to give him any kind of suspicion of what I was doingbefore I was even able to accomplish it. To be honest, though, itwasn’t hard to fake.
After severalminutes of pacing the room and nearly ripping my own hair out, Ifinally collapsed on the chaise and sat with my head in my handsover my knees. I shed a few tears, which was understandably easy,and eventually tried to get a grip. When I felt I’d displayed afine temper tantrum, I began to wipe my eyes with my hands andstarted to slowly pick up all the makeup I had shoved to the floor.I crawled on my hands and knees until every last blush, brush,andpalettewaspicked upand put back neatly on my vanity. Then I bent low to look under mybed to find several missing lip gloss tubes and eye shadows, alongwith my broken nude flats.
I slipped underthe bed until half my body was covered and immediately beganpulling at the remaining glue and strings that held the sole to theshoe. It actually ripped away fairly easy. I quickly removed theother sole with the pair of tweezers and a metal nail file I hadconveniently swiped under the bed. I now had two thin rubber solesin my hands, the possible key to my escape. I placedthembetweenmy collar andneck and they fit perfectly snug around mythroat.
Now, I just neededto find a way to mold them together. I needed some super glue oreven a sewing kit would do. I slipped out from under my bed andstarted rummaging through all my drawers and cabinets, but foundnothing in my room, closet, or bathroom. I tried to make it looklike I wasn’t looking for something, but it probably wouldn’tconvince Darren. Eventually, I wandered back out into the hallsuntil I found one of the offices and started randomly openingdrawers, pretending I was just bored and completely disinterested,yet still found nothing of use. But when I got to the secondoffice, my motives were finally noticed.
