28 #3
Then she inhales again and says gently, ‘Well, do you think you’ll get a chance to call me more often from now on?’
Another tear slips free.
I’m shaking my head even though she can’t see, because I can’t make my tongue form anything coherent. The truth is too big; the fear even bigger.
Elias’ hand reaches in, and he takes the receiver gently from me.
He leans closer again, close enough that my skin pebbles as it recognises his heat, even though my stomach turns over.
His gaze stays on mine – inches from me, roaming my face, catching on my mouth, lifting back to my eyes.
Violating without a touch. Claiming without permission.
‘Hi! Annabelle, is it?’ he says.
Anna’s voice changes instantly. ‘Who’s this?’
‘We haven’t officially met,’ he replies smoothly, with a smile as if plucked from a cherub and sewn onto his face. ‘This is Elias. How do you do?’
‘Oh!’ she exclaims, and something falls in the background. ‘Yes—Elias. How do you do?!’
He gives one of those rehearsed, warm chuckles – the low, rumbling fragment of charm he’d used on me once before. The same one he’d hidden behind at the airport, the one that made everyone forget to look closer at the teeth that formed it.
‘I’m sure you already know mobile reception is bad around here,’ he says easily, as if we’re talking about weather and not captivity. ‘I’ll make sure she gets the chance to call more often.’
Like a hatchet to my gut.
My knees, already weakened, threaten to buckle.
I try to assemble the pieces of my composure as Anna and Elias go back and forth over trivialities – weather, the cold, something Anna saw about a winter festival in these parts—
Then I hear a soft laugh. ‘Make sure to make her call me on her birthday.’
My birthday… Wait what date is today?
My mind jerks. His voice shifts; something in the cadence tightens.
He ends the call quickly. Then bends closer. The receiver settles back into its cradle with a foreboding click.
Fury burns behind his eyes, contained beneath the same cold restraint I’ve learnt always precedes something worse.
‘Always plotting,’ he murmurs, deceptively soft. ‘Were you going to call the authorities? And tell them what? You’re a foreigner with no passport, no car. How far do you think you’d get before I found you, Leah?’
Panic dries my throat.
‘Wipe your tears,’ he says, rushed, frantic nearly. As though he can’t stand a single droplet carving paths down my already soaked cheeks. ‘Now.’
I do. Sniffling the rest back into myself.
‘Who were you going to call?’ he asks.
I have no answer. My head can do nothing but shake.
He says it very slowly: ‘You can’t leave.’
That’s all. But it lands differently – far heavier than a simple command.
He isn’t just a kidnapper, a terrifying abuser. He’s intelligent. Calculating. Always three steps ahead.
A memory echoes in my head – you don’t know what’s at stake…
The more I learn, the more questions rise.
‘Why not? You have Inga here. What do you need me for?’
His brows draw together. He blinks once, then again, as though I’ve skipped several steps in the conversation and landed straight on the ending.
‘Inga?’ he echoes with disbelief.
One beat. Two.
Something wicked unfurls across his face. ‘Are you jealous, Leah?’
I scoff, but the sound tastes like fear and heat on my tongue, and I know exactly where this is heading.
‘You are,’ he concludes with a crooked grin – one that might have passed for handsome under kinder skies. ‘Don’t worry, elskling.’ His face shifts, the smile twisting into something far more chilling, and he says through clenched teeth, ‘You’re the only one who gets to abuse me.’
Air stops moving through me.
‘A—abuse you?’ I stammer, staring at him, hoping for the word to rearrange itself into some shape I can understand.
He tilts his head, as if he’s about to impart some dark lesson.
‘“In revenge and in love woman is more barbarous than man.” Nietzsche.’
He always reaches for the old philosophers, hunting for meaning when none exists.
‘You… dare,’ I grind out, voice trembling. ‘You bring me here, violate me—’
‘Who violated you?’
I ignore it, refusing to fall into his web. He hadn’t touched me in the way he meant. But that doesn’t make what happened right.
‘Did you do the same to Melody?’ I blurt out recklessly. Desperately. ‘Did you toy with her, too? Shift the blame because of your own insecurities?’
He draws himself upright. One knuckle pops in the silence.
‘Did you?’ I push.
I know… I know I should stop. I know it’s dangerous, but something gluttonous and heinous deep in my chest demands the truth.
His eyes widen. The walls he’s worked so hard to keep in place crack, exposing a fraction of a rawness painful enough to make me stop cold.
He steps back. And again.
His chest moves in quick, uneven beats. A hand closes, opens, then closes again.
‘Smile and nod. Lie. Scheme. It’s clearly what you’re good at,’ he growls, feeding the panic already climbing through me. ‘Start moving.’
My legs hesitate. But I look at the open doorway and gather what’s left of my sense, then start walking.
And the devil follows.