Chapter 3
SHELBY
CHAPTER THREE
After Hannah escapes, time blends together.
Roger boarded up my only indication of whether it’s night or day. I’m sure it hasn’t been too long. Roger’s not stupid enough to leave me here when Hannah will be able to tell someone where to find me.
Nick’s coat is my only comfort, reminding me that people know I’m missing and keeping me warm during the freezing nights.
Tires crunching on the driveway. I shudder.
Gritting my teeth, I prepare myself by putting up the walls in my mind.
My stomach ties in knots waiting for Roger to come down. Bangs and scrapes echo through the near empty basement. He must be moving stuff.
When the locks click, I stand up from where I have been huddled, not wanting to give him more leverage over me.
He walks around the corner with a plate of food. It’s just a sandwich, but it has my mouth watering. I don’t wait for him to put it down. I grab it, then shove it in my mouth. Before I swallow the last bite, my legs weaken, and my head swims.
“This is your fault. If you didn’t let that bitch, go, then I wouldn’t have to move you so soon.” Roger tosses the paper plate into the corner.
He inches closer. Remembering my training, I swing low, aiming for his kidneys. The hit lands where I want, but my arms are becoming numb.
Soon, everything goes black.
Cold water thrown over me wakes me from my sleep.
I try to wipe away the water from my face, but I can’t. I look up, and my hands are chained to the ceiling. I shake my ankle and find no chain attached.
My stomach turns violently. I barely have time to lean away so I don’t throw up all over myself. The tainted sandwich comes back up. That’s when I realize I have no clothes on, and my stomach lurches again.
What could he have done while I was like this? I do a quick check to see if anything doesn’t feel right and sigh with relief; I don’t think he touched me. It’s not his style. He’d rather hypnotize me so I’m a willing participant.
Then it hits me. The jacket and my chance of being saved are gone. Dammit!
“What did you do to my clothes?” I seethe, trying my hardest not to scream at him. It wouldn’t solve anything, plus he would enjoy it.
“You don’t need them. It’s not like you’re going anywhere.” His flippant attitude puts me on alert.
Roger circles me, dragging a finger up my arm. “This could have been avoided if you didn’t let the bitch escape.” His knuckles skim up my bare back. “I hope you like your new place.”
He’s getting a kick out of this, just another one of his mind fucks.
The room appears to be the same as the last place, a dingy, damp, moldy basement, but one without a window. Dusty boxes litter the floor. I swear I hear something scuttling around, a rat maybe, and I shiver involuntarily.
The boxes are discarded in a corner and scattered throughout the room in a few places. He probably wants me to find out what’s in them. However, that’s difficult since I’m chained.
“Lovely,” I deadpan.
Roger pulls my hair to tilt my head back. His blown eyes are glassed over. He leans in to intimidate me, like he’s done this to me many times before in the past, then he says something in Latin. My head tingles, and I fight the hold he’s trying to exert over me.
I will not let him hypnotize me, I chant in my head over and over.
Roger’s face screws up, and he growls.
“I guess you can’t hypnotize me anymore.” I smirk and twist my head so he releases his hold.
His whole face reddens. “I knew you lied to me,” he roars and backhands me, hard.
Fuck, that hurt. I taste copper and spit blood on his chest.
His eyes change to those cold soulless ones. “I never should have listened to you,” Roger snarls. “It was a mistake to let him go. You’re never going just to let me do what I want without leverage.” He paces the room, scrubbing his hands through his hair.
He stops pacing and smiles at me.
It sends shivers down my spine.
He shuffles over to me. He taps my face. “This is what happens when you lie to me.”
He pounds on me. I can’t do anything but hang there and take it.
After a while, he stops, and now, my body is tender and sore everywhere, like he took a meat tenderizer to me.
Fuck, I hurt.
He heads to the corner, pulls out another chain bolted into the cement block wall, and clasps it to my ankle. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a key, and unlocks my arms. I drop to the freezing floor with a thump.
After he storms out of the basement, turning off my only light source, his car peels out.
Everything goes quiet again, but my arms shake from hanging for so long. Tomorrow, I’m going to be black and blue.
I curl up in a ball and blackout.
When I wake, I can’t tell if it’s been an hour or a day with no light. I slowly try to move my arms, working blood back into them. I push to a seated position and stretch and massage my legs, working the pain out of them.
This cold floor is no place to stay. If I do, I’ll be too stiff to move when he comes back. Gently and slowly, I stand, testing my body to ensure I don’t fall.
Sleeping on the cold floor helped a bit. It kept my swelling down in some areas, but everything still hurts.
My eyes adjust some to the darkness, but I need to know what else is down here.
I feel along the wall with my hands, hoping to find a light switch. I make it to the bend, barely able to reach around before the chain on my ankle stops me. I stretch as far as I can, but I don’t feel anything.
Figures he wouldn’t let it be that easy to have light.
Not far away from where I was hanging, I remember some boxes on the floor. I shuffle forward to where I think a box is. My toe hits something hard, and I curse. Fuck, that hurt! I grit my teeth against the pain, feel around again, and find the corner of the offending box before opening it to find it empty.
I continue doing this until I reach all the boxes I can. Most of the boxes are empty.
From the ones that aren’t, I pull out everything in them, hoping I can use something. Roger’s smart and would have gone through these boxes to make sure I couldn’t use anything as a weapon. So, of course, the contents are useless, just some old toys and other pieces of junk.
The last thing I pull out has a long shaft and something soft at the end, maybe some kind of duster. I laugh. He always said he wanted me in a French maid costume. I set it aside, hoping it can be useful.
My search of the area leads me to find some newspapers and a rusty bucket. I take two boxes apart and lie them on the ground, so I have a place to sit that insulates me from the cold. Next, I take the newspaper and lay it flat. I’ll use that to cover myself at night.
I pull my legs up and wrap my arms around them. My body shakes from the cold, and my stomach won’t stop growling. I can’t stay here and be sorry for myself. I need to keep myself warm. I’m still sore from the beating, but I’m not going to let that stop me.
I move to do sit-ups, push-ups, and burpees until I’m so tired I fall asleep.
Not having any light is driving me nuts. Time is unmeasurable without it. It’s all part of Roger’s crazy plan.
Thinking about the guys and how much I miss them, I sit up against the wall. If things go south here, I can say I at least understand what it feels like to be in love.
I glance up to heaven. “Hey, God. It’s Shelby. You and I have never talked. I’ve done some bad things, so I might deserve where I am, but Cam doesn’t deserve to die. He’s a really good guy. If you could, please save him. As for the others, they don’t deserve to be controlled by someone else. If you have any goodwill left after all that, could you help me out?”
I scrub my hand down my face. I’m losing it, talking to God.
I grab what I think is a duster. It’s not like the dusters Cin and I always used. The handle is a hard plastic. I remove the cleaning part off, which leaves me with the handle.
With the remaining plastic piece, I hit my open palm. “Not hard enough to do much damage.”
Hitting him isn’t the only way to cause damage though. I stand up and head over to the brick wall. I rub the end of the stick against it, but it breaks.
“Shit.” That idea is ruined, but the broken end is sharp, so I give it another try. I move my fingers down to give it some stability, and the remaining part remains intact.
I work that end until my fingers bleed from scraping it repeatedly against the wall, giving me some small hope that I can save myself.
Exhausted, I lie down on my boxes, curl up in a tight ball with the newspapers draped over me, and close my eyes, dreaming of my guys.
I’m in a classroom when the door opens. Dom and Carrie walk in. Carrie has a big smile on her face.
“Ew, look who it is?” Carrie taunts. “Aren’t you dead yet?”
I roll my eyes. Is that the best she’s got? Dom doesn’t move a muscle. He stands still, ignoring me.
Mav struts in with two girls on his arms. He, too, waits for commands.
“Do you know how easy it was to pull the boys away from you?” Carrie sneers at me. “I mean, why would Dom Knight want to be seen with a low-life whore like you?”
“What does it say about you, Carrie, that you had to use hypnosis to get them back? What do you think will happen when they find out what you’re doing?” I tip my head to the side, questioningly.
Carrie’s face turns white, but she recovers quickly. “Once you’re gone, they won’t remember you. You’re nothing, No one wants you.”
Cold water is thrown on me again, and I jolt awake. Roger stands in front of me, looking down at me while smiling cruelly at me. “You looked a little too comfortable.”
The box I lie on and the newspaper covering me are soaking wet.
Roger sets down the bucket, then picks up a bag. His hand dips in, and he pulls out a loaf of bread and two water bottles.
“This is all you have for a while. I won’t be able to come back until it’s time to move again. Your stepbrother is posing a bigger threat than I thought he would. I need to keep him off my tail. Oh, someone has been asking about you. I might let him come over and say hi, so you aren’t lonely.”
He laughs as he walks up the steps.
Who would he let down here? As I take a piece of bread, I struggle to think of who the hell it could be, but come up blank.
I sip the water and shift to sit more comfortably, shoving two pieces of bread into my mouth. I only drink half a bottle of water.
How long will I have to wait for more?