through.
Tied to a bed in a dark room.
And for what? That I still had no idea.
But I was praying it wasn’t the obvious.
“Shotgun will find us,” I promised her, wishing I could see her face, or touch her, somehow reassure her that things would be okay. “But for now, we need to fight for ourselves and try to get the hell away from this place, to somewhere safe.”
Her soft sniffles caught my heart. “I don’t know how long I’ve been here. The only time they turn the lights on is to cut my hands and feet free and take me down to the bathroom then to tie me back up again.”
My heart stopped. “Who is they?”
Garrett wasn’t working alone. He had help, and that did not bode well for us getting out of here on our own.
“Some guys. Young. I think they live downstairs. The music is always really loud, and they all have shirts with two B’s as the logo on the chest.”
College kids?
Two B’s.
God, no.
The Beta Beta frat house?
This was bad.
Well, I already thought it was bad—this though, much worse.
There was a question instantly floating on the tip of my tongue. One I just had to know the answer to so I could prepare myself. “Did they…” I swallowed the bad taste in my mouth, sucking in a deep breath through my nose. “Thayleah, did they touch you.”
“No.” Her answer sounded confused, but it was like music to my ears. If she was confused by what I was asking, it meant she hadn’t been abused. “I’ve uh… I’ve actually had the same clothes on the whole time. It’s really gross. I just want to get out of here. But if I do get out, where am I going to go? Emma’s gone. He made me listen as he killed her. My mom is still living out of the trunk of her car. I have no one left.”
She was crying now, shaking and panicking.
“Listen,” I whispered, knowing my tone was a little harsh but wanting to make sure she knew I was serious. “Just listen to me. We are going to get you out of here. And we are going to keep you safe. I promise I will not let you end up with no one.”
Her soft sobs broke my heart.
This poor girl has been in and out of hell, and when she finally felt like she had that safe space with her sister, that was ripped from her by Garrett. Just like it was ripped from Gage. And that man was going to pay for it.
Shotgun would have noticed me gone by now.
He would find me.
Find us.
But we had to stay alive for him to get to us, which meant we needed a better plan than just laying here.
I was a fighter.
Not a damsel.
I twisted my wrists, trying to feel exactly what was bound around them. The plastic zip ties were sharp and cutting into my skin, one wrapped around each wrist and threaded together while another was threaded through both and was looped around the squeaky metal bedframe, tying me to it.
“When you said you still have all your clothes on, do you have shoes?” I asked, my brain skipping through all the ways I’d learned how to break zip ties courtesy of self-defense classes Myth had started teaching at his gym at Laken’s request.
I knew I would have to work around things, given my body was still not as strong as it should have been. I could feel the drugs making me dopey and slow, and my bruised ribs meant any kind of movement in my stomach made me want to vomit.
“Yeah,” she whispered, and I heard her quietly tap them together.
“Do your shoes have laces?”
“Mm-hmm.”
The shot of adrenaline I got in that second was like nothing I’d ever felt before. I could feel it pulsing through my veins, my heart rate accelerating. It was telling me that there was a way out of this mess, but speed was key. Who knew when Garrett would come back or his obvious minions that Thayleah said he was using to do his dirty work?
I could feel my feet bound, but they weren’t tied down like my hands were. “Is there any way you can lift your feet to your hands and undo your laces?” The sheets shuffled, a soft whimper leaving her lips. “Thayleah?”
She cleared her throat. “I got them. Sorry. My zip ties cut through my wrists, and they hurt so bad.” Her voice broke, the pain