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I pull away from Seven to look in his eyes, still not believing what I've just heard. This can't be real. I trusted him. I thought that he... I thought he was like me...
“You aresoadorable,” Seven says. “So sweetly trusting. I love it.”
“No! No, no no...” I can't stop the word. It's gotten stuck on repeat. I scramble back to the corner I was in only minutes ago when Declan first stepped into the room.
I'm still trying to put it all together. I had thought Seven was my captor that first day, but I'd become quickly convinced by the lie of his innocence which only became more convincing the more time passed. And after the way he was tossed in the cell all bloody and broken the day we were punished for speaking each other's names in the seemingly safe space of the shower... Did heletDeclan beat him like that?
It's strange having a name for my captor now... myothercaptor. Declan unchains Seven, and the two of them stand together, watching me, amusement on their triumphant faces. It was a game, and Seven won. Good for him.
I seek desperately to put together a new narrative of what really happened these past weeks. Obviously, he did let Declan beat him that day, something I can't begin to comprehend. But it served its purpose. It convinced me we werein this together. That we were a team. Us against the monster. It bonded me to him more tightly than any other play they could have made.
Did they plan and coordinate each move? Did Seven know ahead of time how every last detail would unfold? When Declan was keeping me in his bedroom and blindfolding me to take me to the dungeon... Seven had to have been walking around free outside the cell. Did he watch? Did he become the new voyeur?
I squeeze my eyes shut, trying not to think about the fact that while I worried Declan was starving him and beating him, or had even killed him, that he was just taking a break from thegame.
Whenever Seven was dragged out of the cell, Declan wasn't moving him long distances to punish him or whatever. It was all just a show until he got out into the hallway.
Seven knew there were no real drugs in the syringe the day of the escape attempt. He knew Declan was lying there fully conscious waiting for us to almost get free before pulling the rug out.
Another realization slams into me like a mallet. Seven was never drugged. The food he ate was the same as mine. And every time he was injected with what I thought were drugs, it was only a saline solution. Nothing was real.
Declan told the truth every time he said Seven wasn't my hero and everything was an act and a game. He put the truth right under my nose in plain sight. He openly stated it while I thought he was just taunting me.
“You're going to kill me aren't you?” I say, the tears still flowing down my cheeks. IlovedSeven. God help me, but I still love him.
“No,” Seven says. “We really are letting you go. I mean there's only so long I can live in a cell with nothing else to do. So here's the deal. You will sign a non-disclosure agreement, backdated to the date that we took you. The contract states that you were here of your own free will playing a game with us. You can tell no one about anything that has happened here.”
I wish it was Declan telling me all this because it's so hard to see this change in Seven. I thought he cared about me... I thought...
“You will not go to the police. We own nearly every judge in this corrupt city, and we can guarantee we would get one of those judges should a trial ever occur. And we own about half the police. If you go to one of our guys, he'll just bring you right back to us, and we will be very displeased. You can't imagine the punishment.”
“Master, please...” I can't dwell on this betrayal because starvation is still a real possibility, and I have nowhere to go, and I'm sure the money was part of their sick joke—the carrot they could take away as soon as my greedy little eyes lit upon it. “Please... I have nowhere to go,” I say quietly.
“Yes, you do,” Seven says. “Declan has set up a bank account in your name, and we have all the paperwork and bank cards for you. The account has five million dollars in it. You also now own a penthouse apartment in the city, fully furnished. And a car, a blue Porsche 911 Carrera. You're welcome.”
I shake my head. “It's not real. You're just fucking with me again.” I can't take any more of these lies.
Seven steps out of the cell for a moment, the keypad accepting his thumbprint as easily as Declan's. As if I needed any more proof of his role in this. No wonder Declan made me call Seven,master.
I cry harder now as I'm left alone in the room with Declan. The bad master. The scary one. But they are both utterly terrifying now. They were just playing good cop/bad cop with me, and I was too stupid to see it.
“You're both psychopaths,” I whisper.
“Oh, come now, Pretty Toy. If we were psychopaths, you'd be dead right now. We're sociopaths.”
“What's the difference?” I never actually thought there was a difference. I've heard the terms used interchangeably so many times.
Declan walks over to me. I cringe away from him, my back now pressed against the wall with no more room to run. He sits on the ground beside me, stroking my hair.
“Sociopaths can form bonds with a select few people. And lucky for you, you're now one of those people.”
I don't believe him. I can't. The amount of deceit both men have used with me these past few weeks is too great for me to believe a word out of their pathologically lying mouths.
“Did I ever once threaten your life?” he asks.
“No.” He did mention starving, but I know he means violent immediate murder threats. It's fucked-up that I can read between his lines and know what he means even if he isn't entirely specific.
“No,what? You aren't free quite yet. Let's not get too casual.”
