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CHAPTER1
“Come on,let me out of here!” I screamed into the dark. Nothing replied. Nobody cared. I heard no signs of life other than my labored breathing.
I screamed again, and my voice echoed around the room, off the metal walls, and spilled down onto the damp, concrete floor, where they were absorbed and consumed by the pitch black.
I stifled a sob in my chest, refusing to give into the creeping sense of dread that had been taking hold of my heart.
I didn’t know how long I’d been in there, there was no way to tell the time, and there was nothing left in my cell to offer me any hints.
The cell was twelve long strides wide and fourteen long strides to the back. On the right-hand side was a small metal toilet with no seat. I would squat over it to do my business. Exactly one stride next to that, towards the front of the cell, was a smooth metal sink that sputtered tepid water from groaning pipes. It tasted metallic, too, like blood in the water.
On the opposite side of the cell was the single narrow cot with a flat pillow and one thing, a scratchy blanket for comfort.
The mattress squeaked every time I moved. It was pathetic and set on rows of sagging springs.
Other than that, the floor was smooth, and the walls were smoother.
When they served my meals, I could see up to the ceiling above, and it did have one long, dangling bulb hanging on a wire. But my captors never turned it on.
I could tell when they were about to serve me some of the cold, runny oatmeal when a sliver of light appeared around the edge of the door. Somebody dressed in the dark clothes of a guard, but wearing a black facemask, would open it quickly before sliding a tray inside.
The door would shut before I could move, and I would hear somebody’s shuffling footsteps continue down the hall. No matter how much I screamed, nobody would reply.
Twelve steps across, fourteen steps back, twelve across, fourteen ahead. Repeat over and over until my mind was half lost in the whirlwind of madness that hovered around the edges.
I found myself losing interest in pacing and laying on the cot more and more for what felt like an eternity. I could only pace the cell so many times before I would grind my teeth until they ached.
When I first got tossed into the pit, I could only think about the few stolen moments in the storage room. The way Alexander and I had almost torn each other apart with our passions, both violent and sexual, and the way Luke and Rome had been there watching, encouraging.
I could feel my lips bruised and swollen for some time, and I could smell them on me, their scent clinging to me like a halo of hormones.
That hadn’t lasted long, though, only through three visits. And I couldn’t even tell if the meals were breakfast, lunch, and dinner, thus representing a single day. Or did the meals represent a day each? Meaning I’d been in here three days before I’d cracked?
I wasn’t awake when my captors removed the dishes, and this drove me nuts but also freaked me the fuck out. How did they know when to come?
There must be some way to watch me in the dark, and the thought of me lit up with glowing eyes, like in an infrared camera, coiled my stomach into a tight fist of fear.
And who was watching me? Was it Norris? With his dark, glittering eyes filled with cool, detached arrogance?
Or was it Alexander’s father? The disgusting pig who tried to attack me and force himself onto me.
The one who caused the accident.
That one fact came back to my head time and time again, bludgeoning me like a hammer until it dominated everything and made it hard to breathe. I would have to count backward from ten in my head to release the information, let it go, and survive.
But at times like this, when I was being driven mad by the dark when it seemed to seep into my very soul through the pores in my skin and my lungs as they filled with it.
At times like this, I couldn’t keep myself from obsessing over every little detail of my interaction with Alexander’s father. Rober’s sweaty hands pawing me, the way his fingers felt like spindly spiders whispering against my flesh. The way his voice exploded inside my head as his breath, hot and dank, filled my nostrils with the pungent scent of expensive booze.
What had he meant? Something about a deal? How could I have entered into any agreement with him at all?
I flopped back onto the cot after screaming myself hoarse. I felt sick to my stomach and couldn’t tell if the pain was from hunger or upset. The gruel was always filled with grit, and they forced me to scoop it out of a metal bowl with my hands. I had no soap, so who knew how dirty my hands were?
I rolled onto my side and curled up like a question mark, praying for sleep and hoping against the odds that one of the people I knew at Crimson would come and look for me. Would they even know where I was?
I’d heard more than one of them mention The Pit in my time there. So they knew of its existence. I’d always assumed Uppers didn’t get sent to The Pit, though, so I hadn’t paid it much mind.
How wrong I’d been, alone here in my misery. I could see that now. I’d been so arrogant, believing myself untouchable in the insane world of Crimson.
