Chapter 8 Aria
ARIA
Broken fragments of men’s voices rattle through my aching skull, but I can’t piece them together to make sense of what they are saying.
The sounds fade in and out, and I can’t tell if they are real or part of a hallucination, but eventually, my muscles began to ease, and my thoughts stabilize.
I’m no longer drifting with the relentless waves that once threatened to pull me under into their endless abyss.
The harsh murmurs have snuffed out entirely.
I’m able to concentrate.
Although, I’m still stuck in darkness.
Trapped in thick shadows underneath my eyelids that, despite my best effort at straining against them, won’t budge open.
Panic soars within me, knocking out the little breaths I’m already struggling to pull in, but no matter how hard I strain against the paralyzing weight, I can’t get any part of me to shift.
I would have never described myself as claustrophobic prior to this moment, but being unable to control any part of myself is terrifying.
It feels like I’m locked into a coffin where the air is thinning with each ragged breath, my lashes sealed with what feels like super glue, impossible to blink past. I’m blind. Mute. Paralyzed. Half alive.
The only parts of me still functioning are my unfortunate racing thoughts and pounding heart, which might be the next to freeze with how quickly my throat is closing up.
Determined to relax, I concentrate on my fingers until I’m able to make them twitch against the firm surface.
It has a bit of springiness to it, like a mattress—a bed. I’m lying in a bed.
The less I resist, the more air filters in. My eyelids twitch, then part, a stabbing burn piercing through my irises as the bright light floods in. My skull throbs. When I swallow, the back of my throat feels scoured raw, like burlap dragging across it.
Every inch of me hurts, but the physical pain pales against the harsh reality of where I am, back at the heart of the cabin.
Back to him.
My vision, partially blurred, pans across the space searching for other signs of life, but I don’t find him anywhere inside. Using all the strength left in me, I lean to my side to glare at the wooden door.
Then I remember. My heart stills, eyes frozen at the entryway.
My pulse races as more increments of my failed escape come back to me—images of the blond stranger and his stern demeanor. The pungent alcohol-drenched cloth that he held over my mouth before everything faded to black.
I’ve been drugged.
Goosebumps rise on my skin, followed by a burning urge to scratch them away. I’m shivering, yet somehow still sweating through the thick layers of fabric…
Hold on.
I clutch the front of the oversized grey heathered sweater, twisting the fabric in my fists. I wasn’t wearing this when I bolted out of here. The thought alone sends bile creeping up my throat.
Which one of them changed me into this? Do I even want to know?
The doorknob rattles, and I tense as I watch it slowly turn, my pulse racing. I refuse to think about what would’ve happened to me if I were caught when I first ran, but now that I’m here, dread locks me into place. I stay frozen as I watch him saunter in, his expression stoic and unreadable.
My fingers twist the front of the hoodie I’m clothed in as the knot in my stomach intensifies.
We lock eyes. I pale. But his gaze doesn’t linger as he strides over to a narrow closet near what I assume might be the bathroom, a bucket lightly swaying in his hand.
Bringing my attention back to the sweater fisted in my hand, I realize my arms were never tied.
I try to curl upward, but with great magnetic force, my head slams right back onto the mattress, flaring my headache into a deeper, skull-splitting throb.
The closet creaks closed, but before he completely spins around, I snap my eyes shut in an effort to escape the wrath that’s undoubtedly going to be coming my way, this time welcoming the black void falsely offering me shelter.
Each thud of his boots has my stomach rolling. Bile accumulating.
I can’t look.
Seconds later, I flinch at the feel of a cool, wet cloth, and in a panic, my eyes flutter back open with a startled yelp.
His large hand lays the fabric flat over my forehead as he shushes me. “Keep still; you have a fever.”
Wordlessly, I sink deeper into the pillow behind my head as I watch him through the haze coating my eyes. I observe his head splitting into two, and then joining together again in dismay when he goes to wring out the cloth over the bucket next to him.
After placing it back on my forehead, he reaches for a transparent plastic kit from somewhere between his feet, a red cross drawn at the center of it.
I’m about to ask what he’s doing when he inches to sit on the edge of the bed, but a jolt of smoldering pain sears through my knee when he reaches for it, forcing a few strained whimpers from my scratchy throat.
I instinctively try to retract my leg from his grasp, but I’m too weak.
He holds it firmly in place as his other hand inches the unfamiliar sweatpants that match the hoodie higher until it exposes my lightly bandaged knee. Carefully, he partially unwraps it to reveal a mean-looking scab, and turns to lift a tiny tube out of the first-aid case.
I watch him uncap it with confusion.
Tending to an injured knee is not something a person who’s planning on killing you does. It makes no sense.
Using his ring finger, he gently dabs the ointment over it, but despite being delicate, it still burns like hell.
I screw my eyes shut, sucking in my bottom lip to distract myself until he’s done wrapping the white gauze back over the injury.
He should be scheming up some cruel punishment to beat me down with. Teach me a lesson for foolishly attempting to flee. Anything but his tender caresses that only confuse me more.
His hand drifts higher on my leg, causing my breath to hitch, but they quickly lift away once they skim my hip.
Instead, he brings them to my hairline, brushing back a rogue strand of damp hair before adjusting the cloth on my forehead. There’s no trace of anger in his placid expression, only thoughtful care.
It baffles me. Then enrages me.
I don’t want to lower my guard in front of the person who kidnapped me, who committed one of the vilest offenses humanly imaginable.
He can’t be trusted.
No amount of tenderness will ever erase what he is.
A killer.
I push up on my elbows, doing my best to contain the nausea wreathing in my stomach, but I can hardly push through the pain splintering my head. I wince before going cross-eyed again.
“Effects of the chloroform,” he says, picking the damp cloth up from my lap and tossing it into the tin bucket. “It’ll take a few hours to clear your system. Until then, you’re going to feel a bit...unsteady.”
“A bit?” I parrot with a sarcastic rasp that I didn’t know I had in me.
I think I catch his lips curve slightly, but it’s wiped off his face before I’m even sure I saw it. He busies himself with readjusting the contents of the first aid kit before snapping it shut. “You’ve got a sense of humor, I see.”
He pulls to a stand, then moves across the room to put the supplies back where he found them.
My eyes follow his steps, waiting for him to say something else, anything.
I need some form of clarity, even though the pressure drilling into my head makes it nearly impossible to process anything around me.
Once he’s stashed both items in their designated spot, he wheels around to what I can only describe as a makeshift kitchen nook, which essentially encompasses a rusted, enamel-chipped fridge that lacks the usual hum of a functioning appliance, and a stained porcelain sink, crusted with years of grime at the spout.
He yanks the fridge open, and as I expect, it doesn’t light up, but still, he fishes something out of it.
A white, plastic bag crinkles in his grasp, followed by a water bottle in his other hand. He swings the door shut with a raised knee.
“Thirsty?” he asks over his shoulder as he places the bag on a modest little table wedged right at the far corner near the front door.
I don’t respond.
He proceeds to pluck out a beige-colored packet from the loaded bag on the table and waves it at me. “You’ll feel better after you eat.”
Unbothered by my lack of response, he deliberately takes long, measured steps toward me, sending my pulse into a frenzy. My eyes dart around him, but there’s no hope. There’s no escape. I sink deeper into the hard mattress as I lean back on one hand, willing the room to stop spinning.
With the next blink, he’s directly in front of me, holding out a bottle to me. “It’ll get worse if you don’t hydrate.”
I reach for it without thinking, desperate to ease the sandpaper-like scratch at the end of my throat. He relinquishes it, but I fumble the moment it's in my grasp, the plastic crinkling as I struggle to twist the cap.
He tries reaching for it—to help, I assume—but I twist away with a strangled breath, somehow popping the lid free in the process. It rolls across the floor as I bring the bottle to my parched lips, greedily chugging until my stomach aches, not caring as it streams down to my chin and neck.
Once the bottle is drained and my thirst quenched, the world doesn’t feel quite as bleak. It’s clear that for whatever reason, he doesn’t want to hurt me. He hasn’t even tied my hands back up again. Maybe there’s still a chance of escape—or talking some sense into him.
He only needs to trust me.
It’s not impossible, but one thing keeps my fragile hope from blooming. “Who was that guy?”
His jaw tenses as he sets the square packet down on a rickety, rusted metal stool that’s beside the head of the bedframe. Then he swoops toward me, and I snap my eyes shut with a sharp inhale, bracing for impact.
“He’s not your concern,” he says flatly, his voice receding.
I peek back at him through my heavy lashes, but my gaze jerks to his hands, to the ropes pulled taut in his grip.
My stomach knots.
“Please just let me go,” I choke out, my vision blurring. “I’ll give you anything you want—just please.”
“Really?” he asks. “Anything I want?”
Even in my haze, I don’t miss the mockery in his voice, sinking in my gut like lead, heavy and suffocating.
“I have money,” I blurt, knowing damn well I don’t.
“I don’t need your money.”
Acid floods my veins. “Then what do you want?” I push through my thinning breath. “I-I promise I won’t tell a single soul. Just let me go. Please, I swear it.”
“Is that what you did when you ran into my partner outside?” His voice turns sharp. Poisonous. “Kept this between us?”
Any flicker of hope I had is immediately crushed.
There’s no changing his mind.
He loosens the rope as he leans in, but by then, the sobs are already stuck in my throat, clogging my words, my pleas.
I should have told Clara about the car ride when I still had the chance.
At least then she’d have something, anything, to give to the police.
But I said nothing. I left them with nothing.
They’ll never find me.
I might never get out of here.
My wrists burn as he tightens the knot behind my back, the strain ripping through my shoulders until the pain flares sharp and hot. I don’t have the energy to fight. It’s all useless. So I cry instead, choking on the ache and anguish clawing its way through me.
My entire body hums with it. Is overwhelmed by it.
“I know it’s uncomfortable,” he says, “but it’s safer this way.” He wipes the tears from my cheek, and I want to flinch, but I’m too drained to pull away. “You understand that, don’t you?”
I nod, though I’m not sure if it’s me or his hand guiding the movement.
His palm cradles the side of my face, and somehow, I sink into it, into him, wishing the pain would stop. Wishing for the noise to go quiet.
Just for a moment, I let myself believe it’ll be okay. Pretend. Even though I don’t know how it can ever be after today.
“Shh, it’s okay.”
His thumb grazes under my jaw like I’m made of molten glass; too much pressure and I’ll shatter. I hate the comfort it gives me. Hate that it’s coming from him.
My chest tightens as my eyes fight to stay open. Through the haze clouding my vision, I can still make out the sharp lines of his face. He’s beautiful. Undeniably so.
How can I still think that after knowing what he’s done?
There’s a monster curled behind those captivating gray eyes. I can’t forget that. I won’t. Even if they’re deceptively gentle in this moment. Some of the deadliest things in nature are.
But his touch is warm. His whispers low. Almost kind.
The fever must be getting to my head. That has to be it. Because I swear, I almost catch an unguarded flicker of humanity in his eyes. Or maybe it’s just my desperation convincing me it’s there. Either way, I stop fighting.
Foolishly, my stomach flutters as I hold his gaze, searching for the meaning behind it.
“I won’t hurt you,” he says, his voice soft, his eyes contemplative.
Genuine.
They say a person's eyes are a window to their soul. Somehow, in this moment, I believe them.