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I glance up at the cameras positioned in the corners of the room. They stare back, mocking me. I want to be stubborn and refuse to eat, but I’m too far gone for that. We - me, my captor, and the cameras - already know I’m going to fold.
Beside the food sits a bottle of water, the seal already broken.Drugged. Of course, but then the food probably is, as well. I start to cry as I pick up the water bottle. I’m so hungry. So thirsty. So fucking scared that Rome is already dead.
I contemplate my next move. Do I eat the food and leave the water? Is everything drugged? Is nothing drugged, and I’m just hallucinating? Maybe I did die in the bathtub and I’ve just stepped into the afterlife, where they serve endless bags of fried chicken burgers and curly fries in tiny prison cells in hell.
Fuck it.If whoever has me wants to drug me, let’s hope they put in enough to fucking kill me. I snatch up the bag and the bottle of water, taking it over to the mattress. I sit on the edge, dizzy as fuck. I’m shaking so hard I’m going to pass out if I don’t eat something soon.
I tear open the burger wrapper like a savage. Fried chicken with apple slaw, hold the pickles. I glance inside the bag. Curly fries and an extra container of blue cheese dressing. Great. It’s almost as if this psychopath knows me on an intimate level. Then again, he could be one of the countless delivery dudes who brings my weekly lunch order to my office. I am nothing if not a creature of habit.
My breathing quickens as I stare at the burger. It’s the same thing I always order. The thing Jennifer tells me I’m a freak for eating. Not the weirdest order. But not the standard.
My blood - what remains in my body, at least - runs cold. I put the burger back in the bag, my appetite gone. I try to think back to the last time I ate from this place. Months ago, before I started dieting to fit into the ridiculous dress I wore on my birthday. The dress that now sits in the far corner of this tiny room, dirty and bloody and cut to ribbons.
How long has this person been following me?
Were they following me at all?
Or do I already know them?
That’s when I remember the last time I ate this meal. The only “date” Joshua and I ever went on. He wanted to take me to New York in his private jet for dinner, and I couldn’t have been less interested. Instead, I visited Will first, arrived an hour late to the airstrip with I-just-got-fucked hair, and my tardiness, plus approaching bad weather, meant we were stuck in San Francisco. Joshua was not amused when I demanded fried chicken, and now I have to wonder if this is some kind of revenge.
I stare at my hands. I didn’t wear Joshua’s engagement ring long enough to miss the weight of it on my finger, but now it’s all I can think about. Was it him? Is this his way of punishing me for being a shitty fiancée? It makes zero sense. I mean, the guy stands to be one of the richest motherfuckers in the world, after we get married, and if we don’t tie the knot, he loses all of his stock options in the Capulet family dynasty that stretches far and wide, across the globe. He’s the person least likely to do this.
And yet.This fucking burger.
I’m grasping at straws. Joshua didn’t do this. But whoever did, knows me in some way. I just need to figure out how - and who - before it’s too late.
CHAPTER THREE
ROME
“Put these on,” the fucker in the mask says to me, throwing a set of cuffs my way. “Time for a playdate.”
Aplaydate. I’m pretty sure that means he’s taking me out of this room.
He’s standing in the doorway of our little dungeon of horrors. I’ve been watching Avery sleep, which sounds a lot creepier than it is. Honestly, I’m just making sure she doesn’t fucking die on me. She’s breathing, sure, but when I put my fingers to her cold throat, her pulse barely registers. Her heartbeat is slow, so slow - and I’m terrified of her dying down here.
So the visit from our deranged kidnapper is almost a welcome relief from the endless hours I’ve spent watching Avery’s chest rise and fall, rise and fall. I might go mad if I have to keep watching her like that, floating in the space between life and death. If the girl doesn’t get some serious medical attention soon and a giant blood transfusion, I don’t know if she’s going to survive.
I stand, wincing as I push up on the wrong arm. My shoulder screams in protest, and I’m sure I feel a fresh spurt of blood ooze from my bullet wound. That worries me, too. The damn thing should be healing by now. What did they shoot me with, a fucking bacterial infection in a bullet? All I know is that I’ve seen that movie with James Franco, and though I do claim to be somewhat of a badass, sawing my own arm off to stop gangrene from setting in is probably above my skill set.
I cover the wince with a half-hearted cough, bending to pick up the metal cuffs on the floor, halfway between the mattress and the door.
“Tight,” the guy says. I mock-salute him as I affix a cuff to my left wrist and close the loop, the metal teeth catching with a sickening click-click-click. “You got it, Darth Vader.”
The guy lets out a barking sound that I can only assume is a laugh, followed by a swift punch to the side of my head. I stumble, still holding the cuffs, as I wipe blood from my mouth with the back of my hand. He resumes his stance as if nothing is amiss, waiting as I spit blood on the floor.
“The other one,” he demands. Reluctantly, I acquiesce, looping the second cuff over my right wrist and squeezing it shut. The finality of that action isn’t lost on me. As soon as I’ve closed the locking mechanism, I regret it. I should have fought him. Should have done something. But my gut told me that the only way out of this room and to the possibility of escape for both of us, is to seem as if I’m going along with our kidnapper’s demands for now.
Turns out the basement of horrors isn’t where the show stops. Not in this hellhole. While Avery sleeps, I’m blindfolded and dragged upstairs to a new realm of hell. I think about fighting the guy off, but I also want to see what’s beyond this room, to see if I might be able to plan an escape for Avery and me.
“Try anything,” the guy says, his modified voice robotic and bizarre, “And I’ll gut that bitch in there while you watch.”
I will not try anything. Not while I’m not in that room and unable to defend her. I’m scared as fuck for Avery. I haven’t told her, and I still fucking hate her for what she did to me, but seeing her fall apart today just kind of … broke me. I don’t know. Can you hate someone and still care about them? I mean, it’s not as if I want her to die for what she did to me all those years ago. I just want her to suffer a little for it.
Thing is, the girl has already suffered more than enough for her lifetime. I don’t know if this experience cancels out the rage I carry for her betrayal, exactly - but I do know I want to get her the fuck out of this place.
Which is easier said than done.
