25. Anastasia
Ithink days have passed, though it might be weeks. Time is peculiar in this place. It mocks and torments, and the only way to get through this is to pretend time doesn’t exist.
I’ve been trying to write a letter, and it’s distracting me from the lonely hours. It’s like I can pretend there’s someone here; that I’m talking to someone.
Rhett, I don’t know how we got here?—
No—too grim.
To Rhett Kaiser?—
I scratch that out in a messy scribble instead of using the eraser. Stupidly formal.
Rhett motherfucking Kaiser, you’d better stay the fuck alive, because I haven’t been searching for you just for all this to be for nothing?—
I sigh, snap the pencil, and reach for a new one. I only have one whole left. By the end I’m sure there won’t be any, and that seems fitting.
At least it gives me something to do. I want to get this right, though I don’t know what exactly I’m writing this letter for. It’s not that I’ve given up hope. I stare at the blank page each time with the opposite of lost hope swelling in my chest. I didn’t get the chance to tell him how much he means to me before we were torn apart, and now I have all this stillness to decide how to do it. Maybe it’s silly and wasted time. Maybe it should come in the moment, from the heart.
But this might be my only moment, and he’s always in my heart.
Dear Alistair, see you in fucking hell.
I tear off that sentence and decide not to shred it. I slide it to the top of the table, and my hatred grows at seeing his name.
I engross myself in words, scribbles, paper, and this last 2B pencil.
My next train of thought is to write words desperately, my hand aching to keep up. So when the tip breaks mid-sentence I know I’ve been here far too long with words, scribbles, and this last damned pencil, because I lose it.
The chair knocks back as I stand, furious with this stupid fucking pencil for failing me. I break it, let it go, and stand around the four pencils I’ve made into eight. I stuff my half-finished letter into my pocket. I’m still wearing exactly what I wore in Lumina. There’s a bucket where I’ve been forced to relieve myself, and I’ve cried several times, as silently as I could, at the fact I have no privacy.
This is inhumane. So deplorable.
I turn and glare up at the camera, imagining Alistair enjoying my spiral to madness, waiting for me to beg for forgiveness, plead for his company, promise to do better ... I’m fucking livid.
Dragging the chair over, I stand on it. My hands wrap around the neck of the camera, and I step off with gritted teeth. It’s more robust on the wall than I anticipate, so I let go.
I stand, grab, and jump off this time. Something snaps. One more time.
Stand, grab, jump.
It snaps from the wall, and I heave breaths of exertion.
“Show fucking over,” I say, tossing it to the side.
Part of me is crawling with nerves over what Alistair might do in response to my act of rebellion. A larger part doesn’t care. He’s a damn coward to not have faced me at all since locking me in here.
It doesn’t take long for someone to come. I wonder if they’re worried I’ll do something to myself, and I can’t deny I’ve thought of it.
I’m so, so tired. My heart is in pieces, and it’s easy to want it all to stop in the moments of weakness. The pain won’t be over if I manage to get Rhett back. In fact, I think it could get worse, and what if we don’t know how to make the new sharp edges made of us fit together anymore? I can’t bear the thought.
And so some days ... just for a moment ... I want to give up.
You’re not allowed to give up, little bird.
I hardly react when the metal door groans against the stone. I have a flicker of hope it’ll be Jeremy, but it’s not. I haven’t seen him again since the first time I woke, and I don’t know how many days have passed since then.
Instead it’s a man I’ve never seen before, but I can tell by the way he smiles, feline and hungry, he’s seen me. He has a wicked black eye and a split lip that makes him all the more menacing.
“I’ve been most looking forward to seeing you at last, Miss Kinsley,” he says.
“Can’t say the same.”
“You might soon.”
I highly doubt that, but I say nothing more.
He stalks in, and only then does fear trickle over me. What crumbles my composure is his glance down at the broken camera, and then I realize with cold horror what I’ve done.
No one is watching.
No one would know if he?—
I cry out at his sudden lunge for me, managing to slip from his loose grip. Grabbing the chair is my first instinct. I swing it, but he manages to wrap a hand around the leg, pulling it from me. Then it almost feels over.
He can’t win.
He can’t win.
The man barrels into me, so we knock into the desk. He’s too tall. Stronger and far more feral than me. I fight with all my months of training, as hard as I can. I remember everything Rhett taught me in self-defense last year, but it’s as if it was all a game, and when faced with a threat as vicious and unrelenting as this, I never stood a chance.
I block his first attempt to slap me and manage to jab his throat. He chokes, and I spin, but I only get one step away before he circles my waist and his hand slams the door shut that I was so close to escaping through. His hand grips my hair, but I don’t get out a yelp before he slams my head against the metal door.
I become boneless to the sweep of darkness.
I’m overpowered when he straddles me on the floor, and an animalistic growl vibrates close to my neck as he pins my wrists by my head.
I fight to stay awake. Keep fighting, little bird.
His hand grips my jaw tightly, and tears well in my eyes at the bruising hold. His disgusting breath fans across my cheek.
“My name is Micah,” he says, so low and hungry. “I want you to cry it out when I fuck you.”
No. NO.
I strain against him with everything I have, but he’s managed to reach a hand down to undo the buttons of my shorts, pulling the fly down too.
I’m crying now.
I’m too hot. Heavy.
I’m drowning and suffocating.
When I come to enough, I feel his hand dipping down past the waistline of my shorts. His guttural moans tighten painfully in my stomach, and for a moment I want to disconnect. To let my mind drift far away from this nightmare until it’s over.
He can’t win.
He can’t win.
Don’t give up, little bird.
My hand flexes, arm stretching out, as he can’t hold me and finger-fuck me at the same time. His fingers slip out of me to reach for his jeans button.
Then I feel it. Absolute rage and disgust gripped in my fist in the shape of a broken 2B pencil.
I don’t contemplate. I don’t hesitate.
With a scream, I plunge it into his neck.
He chokes, immediately clutching the eraser tip only just peeking through his fingers as they flood crimson. So much blood pours out of him, onto me, and I push him off. Rolling away, I gag at the sticky crimson. My chest heaves with breaths of such volatile fury that my whole body shakes with it as I stand, fastening my shorts.
“My name,” I say, needing to pause because my throat is so tight, caught between the need to break down in uncontrollable sobs or stab him again and again to leave him there like a fucking pencil holder. “My name is Anastasia Kaiser. Remember it, and this face, because I’m coming for you worse in hell, you vile piece of shit.”
He can’t respond. His mouth flounders and he coughs blood. Terror starts to creep over me, my adrenaline dwindling. Those wide, cold brown eyes will always haunt me.
Don’t let him win.
I heave the door open and slip out, trying to hold myself together, but the realization of what just happened turns me cold. Vacant.
Blinking consciously, I try to reorient myself to figure out how to get out of here. The sound of voices turns me into a deer in headlights. They’re advancing fast, and I’m disoriented, trying to look around for a place to hide. I spy a cleaning cart and duck behind it, clamping a hand around my mouth, close to releasing the emotions straining in my chest.
The men don’t pass me—they continue straight. I jump back up and keep walking, trying to focus my hearing. The ceiling is low, with long bar lights. The stone walls have no decor. It’s like an underground stone maze, and I could be trapped, never to find a way out.
I’m trying not to let my thoughts rouse a panic that will make sure I never get out of here.
Breathe. Breathe.
Rhett’s eyes are blue.
A beautiful ocean kind of blue.
I turn another corner, then another.
Soon I’m jogging, tormented I’m tracing the same halls over and over and this place is mocking me. I blink hard when my sight starts to blur, and now I’m running. Recklessly. All I need is air—it’s too thin down here.
I’m going to suffocate.
I turn the next corner, and my steps shuffle to a stop. Every nerve in my body freezes still.
Rhett’s eyes are blue.
A perfect ocean shade.
And they’re right in front of me.
Down a few meters of hall.
He looks so worn and tired. Beaten and bruised. But his eyes still light up at seeing me.
I wonder if I’m still in the nightmare, still pinned to cold floor, and I’ve successfully managed to take my mind to a better place to survive it.
Until he speaks . . .
“Ana.”
One word. My name. And it’s enough to shatter everything I am.
“Rhett,” I barely say. It feels too good, too hopeful.
“Oh, Ana.”
He moves toward me, and then I can’t stop. I run, because if this is a dream, it’s better than the hell I’ve been living anyway.
We collide, fracturing and becoming whole at the same time as my legs wrap his waist, my arms clamp his neck, and ... this is real.
I break into an inconsolable mess of tears and sobs, wondering what we’ll be when we manage to make it out. Not just out of here, but all of it. It doesn’t matter as long as we’re together. We’ll fix our broken pieces one by one and know that we’ll be one soul, one heart, one mind.
“I’ve got you, little bird.”
I sob at that. I didn’t think I’d ever hear it again.
“How?” I croak.
His fingers brush tangled strands of my hair when I pull back enough. Then they continue down, and a frightening look flexes his eyes. I follow. I don’t remember when Micah tore the front of my shirt. I’m not fully exposed, but the damage is enough to be obviously intentional. And the blood ... I want to peel my skin off to be rid of his blood on me.
My hand wipes at my chest as if it might make some of the blood disappear.
Rhett takes my wrists, snapping me from my ghostly trance. “Are you wounded, Ana? Is this blood yours?”
I shake my head, which feels hollow. “Not this, but I ...” I reach to the side of my head with the throbbing that returns at his question.
“Who the fuck did this to you?” he asks in a slow, deadly calm.
“He didn’t— I mean, he almost, or he-he could have, but I?—”
It’s as if his hands are on me again now, and I try step out of Rhett’s hold. It’s too firm and warm.
“Shh, baby. I’m right here,” he soothes, stroking a hand down my hair. I wish I could keep it together, but I’m falling apart where we stand.
He leans down, and I let him carry me because I think I might not make it out otherwise.
“I want to go home with you,” I whisper.
“We’re going home, baby.”
I nod, fighting more tears, because we’re still in the devil’s basement, and I don’t know how Rhett is here. I don’t care about anything but his heart beating under my palm as I slip it over his chest.
This is real.
My senses feel sure, but I’m so tired that logically I’m struggling to believe it’s really Rhett. Right here. Then I break a little more ... because I was supposed to come for him.
He was the one who was lost and held captive for months, and I didn’t come for him.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m so, so sorry.”
Voices echo ahead, and my terror spikes. I grip Rhett’s shirt, but he doesn’t try to hide us. My head turns only enough to catch a glimpse of Rix jogging toward us and my whole body caves in relief. Two other guys stand by a stairwell.
“Where’s Jeremy?” I ask.
“He’s not here. We’re not sure where he is yet,” Rhett says, pained.
“He was here. I-I met him.”
“You did?” Rix presses when he reaches us. “Where? When? Shit. We must have missed him.”
“A few days ... it could have a been a week. I-I’m sorry, I don’t remember.”
“We need to get the fuck out of here—now,” Rhett orders.
It’s as if he never left. The way he sounds. How focused and authoritative he can become. But I know by now adrenaline is a powerful, deceptive drug. Sometimes it even feels like a superpower to get us through the worst.
Right now, I’m soaring in Rhett’s arms. I press myself to him as tightly as I can. As soon we’re out of here, when survival mode and the high of finding each other dwindles, divulging the dark and bloody details of what we’ve been through will begin our fight to live.
“This way!” Rix hisses.
I squint at the light flooding toward us around the next bend. A way out. It feels too good to be true, and I lift my head enough to peer back over Rhett’s shoulder.
When I see the absolute horror of a gun pointing at Rhett’s back I grip his shoulder with a gasp. He reads my reaction right as a shot fires, and I scream, flinching into him.
My feet meet the ground, and I’m pushed behind him as Rhett pulls out his own gun.
“Get her out of here!” Rhett calls to those behind me.
There are two men shooting, and we barely have cover in a small dip in the wall. I don’t know who tries to take my arm, but I’m glued to Rhett.
My hand falls down his back, and I still at the second gun I feel in his waistband.
I can’t think logically in this moment as I pull it free.
Like I said, adrenaline is a powerful, stupid drug.
Ducking so Rhett and the others are their prime visible focus, I take a deep breath and peek out to spot one guy dipping around the bend. I wait for his next attempt to shoot, then I fire once. Twice. Three times.
One of them hits him as he cries out, and Rhett twists out of cover fully to take out the other assailant. I can’t quite believe I hit him. Unlike Rhett’s fatal bullet in his target, mine only wounded my guy’s knee, and he army-crawls around the bend. My gun in still aimed, my arms still outstretched.
Rhett’s hands cover mine, taking the gun from me. He pulls me back to standing, and I snap my wide eyes from the body to his face.
I don’t know what to do about the disturbance that crosses Rhett’s face. Is he horrified by what I’ve become? He met a woman who had never held a gun before. One who never would have been able to pull the trigger no matter the wickedness it was pointed at. What if he can’t accept that all that has changed?
Rix drapes a jacket over my shoulders and Rhett helps me into it, zipping up the front. I’m glad it hides the blood.
Wordlessly, he takes my hand and our fingers entwine. I grip him for dear life as he leads us out the door. A car speeds up to us, and there’s chatter, commotion, but I barely register it. I climb inside the back when Rhett yanks it open, and to my relief, he slips in with me. Rix is driving. Someone I don’t know is in the passenger seat talking to him.
“Come here,” Rhett says softly.
I’m reminded all over again that Rhett is right there. The high of the escape is cooling my body, and I’ve turned so cold I’m afraid to even look sideways at him.
“Ana.”
His hand touches my thigh, and my trembling fingers reach for it.
Then everything I’ve packed against a straining dam finally breaks.
I bite my lip hard as I shuffle over and end up sitting on his lap, feet on the seats. All he does is hold me, and my sobs are painful as I try to suppress what I can.
“We obviously can’t take you to your parents, though they should hear from you,” Rix says. “I was thinking we’d go to the Den in the meantime.”
“I want to go home,” I say.
Rix looks at me through the rearview mirror. “Alistair knows your apartment.”
“You got your apartment,” Rhett says, more to himself, and my heart cleaves at the distance in his tone. It’s the first cry of agony in my chest for the things he’s missed. I know he’ll blame himself for not being here, but I’m ready to show him how much he always was. That I’ve kept him so close to me every day since we were torn apart.
“I got it for us,” I whisper.
His hand cups my cheek resting against his chest, and he presses his lips to my head. I clutch him tighter. This still feels like a dream riddled with corners of terror.
“Take us there,” Rhett says. “I want to see our home.”