Page 37 of Kylie

“Not that I know of. Why?”

“Then why can’t you take off the blindfold?”

Someone inhaled deeply across the room and then exhaled slowly.

I waited.

A moment later, someone—I assumed it was Allison—reached up and took off the blindfold.

“He said not to do that,” the woman across the room hissed.

“I don’t care,” Allison snapped, dragging the blindfold away from my eyes.

As soon as the cloth disappeared, I popped my eyelids open, greedy to see where I was, only to slam them shut instantly. Pain stabbed my retinas, digging deep. Lights danced behind my eyelids as a dull throb ignited in my skull.

“You’ll want to go slow,” the woman across the room said. “Real slow.”

She couldn’t have led with that?

I heeded her warning and took my time. The minutes seemed to tick by endlessly before I was able to open my eyes and scan my surroundings. At first, everything was blurry, but then it slowly started clicking into focus until everything was clear.

The room was made of concrete. Walls, floor, ceiling. There were no windows at all. In fact, there was nothing in the room aside from the fluorescent bulbs overhead and the bed I was still strapped to. No machines beeping or humming. No chair for anyone to take a load off in.

While the temperature was almost uncomfortably warm, seeing the space made it feel cold.

As I got my bearings, I stole glances at the two women who were in the room with me. I was right about Allison. She was young. If I had to guess her age, I’d say she was maybe twenty. Her outfit wasn’t flashy, but she had style. A red V-neck sweater and a pair of dark blue skinny jeans. With her blonde hair pulled back and her blue eyes glittering beneath the harsh lights, she looked as though she should be heading for school, not coming to help me walk.

And the woman across the room … she was much smaller than her voice led me to believe. Probably not much taller than me, and swallowed up by the dark blue scrubs she wore. Her hair was dark, her face pale. I wouldn’t go so far as to say she was pretty, but she wasn’t ugly either. Plain seemed a more apt description.

Not wanting to stare, I glanced at the walls, the ceiling, and over to Allison. She was watching me, her expression unreadable, her blue eyes intent.

The woman across the room cleared her throat, and it was like she flipped Allison’s “on” switch.

“We don’t have much to work with,” Allison said, her eyes shifting everywhere but on me. “However, we’ll make do.” Her attention turned to the woman across the room. “She will need to have the shackles removed.”

“Five minutes,” the woman said sternly before coming over and freeing me from the restraints on my wrists and ankles.

“Until I tell you,” Allison corrected. “If he expects her to walk, she needs to be out of bed.”

While they traded glares, the first thing I did was rub my wrists. They were sore, the skin abraded from the leather straps. My ankles weren’t quite as bad, but I figured that was because I couldn’t feel my legs.

“Let’s take this slow,” Allison instructed, assisting me to sit so that my legs were dangling over the side, my toes brushing the cold concrete floor.

Well, I guess that was good news. The fact that I could tell it was cold meant I had some sensation, right?

“Put your feet flat, Kylie. Then I want you to stand up. Take your time.”

I felt the presence of the other woman, knew she was moving closer as I attempted to get upright. It took several attempts, but I finally managed, standing tall for the first time in … well, if they were to be believed, it had been over a year.

Someone shouted from out in the hallway.

“It’s fine,” Allison told the woman. “I’ve got her. Take care of that. We’ll be here when you’re done.”

“Do not leave this room,” the woman snarled.

I looked up at Allison just in time to see her roll her eyes.

For the next … forever … Allison assisted me in taking steps. Or she tried to. My body wasn’t working the way either of us expected it to. For one, I was incredibly weak, my muscles unable to bear my weight. I wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but by the time the other woman returned, I felt as though I’d run a mile, not taken roughly four steps. At most.