Chapter 22
Brooke
Blue water. Lungs. One hundred twenty seconds.
Elliot leans forward the moment he sees the shift in my face. His smile widens slightly, like this is something he’s been waiting for.
“You know, professional swimmers can hold their breath for what, five, six minutes?” He tilts his head, thinking it over. “Average person?” A small shrug. “Not even close. Maybe a minute. Less, if they panic.”
His eyes lock onto mine.
“So… how long do you think you can hold yours?”
Then his gaze drifts past me, toward the pool a few feet away.
“Before we start,” he adds lightly, like it’s an afterthought, “we have a guest.”
He reaches for a remote on the table beside him and clicks it.
A massive screen on the far wall blinks to life. The image sharpens, and Kristie Talbert appears.
Perfect hair. Perfect makeup. Diamonds at her ears. She looks like she is sitting in a private office somewhere warm and expensive. Like this is just another meeting on her calendar.
Elliot gestures toward me. “Kristie specifically asked to see how you are adjusting to the manor.”
The guards force me upright so I face the screen.
Kristie’s eyes travel slowly down my body. She takes in the bruises, the torn fabric, the way the guards hold me like a prisoner.
“Brooke,” she smiles, her voice smooth and vicious. “You stupid bitch. You’re lucky my son even looked twice your way.”
My hands clench despite the guards’ grip.
“And now you’re going to suffer,” she continues. “As soon as we find Seth, we are going to kill him on sight. We don’t need to wait for some public execution in a prison cell.”
She leans slightly closer to the camera.
“After he’s dead, we’ll let you see the footage. Then we’ll kill you too.”
Her lips curve.
“You fucked with the wrong family, you little slut. Now let’s see if that mouth can stay shut long enough to not drown.”
The room feels colder.
Elliot gives a satisfied nod. Kristie settles back in her chair, watching.
I don’t realize the guards have shifted until their hold tightens.
One yanks my arms behind my back. Another locks an arm around my waist and drags me toward the pool.
“Don’t fucking touch me!”
I twist hard and drive my heels into the tile, but my legs give out almost immediately. Pain rips through my ribs and spine. I kick once, but I can’t break free.
They haul me forward. My wrists burn. The restitched skin along my back pulls tight with every step.
I can’t do this.
Not with her watching. Not with Seth’s life hanging in their hands.
Not with our baby inside me.
The edge of the pool looms closer. The water glows an artificial blue beneath the fluorescent lights. It looks clean. It looks harmless. It isn’t.
I turn my head toward the screen. Kristie is still there watching.
Before I can scream, the guards shove me forward.
I hit the water hard. The cold slams into me and knocks the breath from my lungs before I can seal my mouth.
I break the surface choking, hair plastered to my face, arms scrambling for balance.
“Hold her,” Elliot says calmly.
Sophie steps in without hesitation. She grips the back of my head.
“Hold your breath,” Sophie calls sweetly.
Then she shoves my head under.
The water seals over me like a tomb. I thrash once, instinct, but then I force myself still. No oxygen. No wasted movement. I clench my jaw tight and hold it.
The cold bites into every inch of exposed skin, turning pain sharp. My spine arches as the temperature shocks my system, but I lock down.
Hold. Just hold.
The lights beneath me shift and shimmer, warping my reflection into a thousand broken pieces. The pool is beautiful. It doesn’t look like somewhere someone should die.
But it can be.
My chest burns immediately. A heavy ache behind my sternum, like something is slowly inflating where air should be. My heart kicks harder, faster, already frantic.
Seth’s voice slides into my head like muscle memory.
You’re okay baby. You’re still here. Slow it down. Count your heartbeat.
I count.
One.
Two.
Three.
The water muffles everything. The room becomes distant, distorted. Sound reduces to a low, hollow hum. My thoughts float strangely, detached, like I'm watching myself from somewhere else.
I can do this.
I have to.
Then my lungs twitch.
A reflex hits, small and involuntary, like my body is testing me.
No.
Not yet.
Water slips past my lips. My throat clenches violently, sealing shut. Panic flares.
I thrash once.
Sophie tightens her grip.
Muffled voices reach me, warped through the water.
“—thirty seconds left—”
Thirty.
My lungs are already screaming.
The burn intensifies fast and sharp, spreading outward like fire licking the inside of my ribcage. My diaphragm spasms again, harder this time, trying to force an inhale that can’t happen.
I kick.
Another set of hands joins hers.
Elliot.
His grip is brutal, his palm pressing the back of my skull. They force my face deeper, angling my mouth downward so if I gasp, I inhale water instead of air.
My chest convulses. My body stops listening to me.
The need to breathe becomes everything. Louder than pain. Louder than fear. Louder than thought. My throat burns. My ears ring. Pressure builds behind my eyes until it feels like they might burst.
Seth’s voice slides in my head.
I try to picture him. The way he presses his forehead to mine when I can’t breathe through a panic attack and says, I’ve got you baby. You’re not dying.
My lungs seize again, harder this time. I can’t stop it.
My mouth opens.
Water floods in.
It pours down my throat, tearing at my airway as I gag. My body arches against the hands forcing me down. My chest convulses, trying to pull in air, and only drags in more water instead.
No.
The baby.
Panic rips through me, sharper than the burning in my lungs. I try to clamp my mouth shut. I try to curl inward, as if I can shield something inside me from what I have already inhaled. I can’t think of anything except that my body is failing, and I am taking it down with me.
Fire explodes in my chest.
I swallow again and again, reflex after reflex betraying me. Water fills every space that should hold air. My vision flashes white, then shatters into dark spots that swarm and multiply.
I can’t breathe. I can’t think.
My limbs thrash once more, weak and useless. My fingers claw at nothing. The hands on me don’t move. My stomach twists violently. I think I might vomit underwater. I think I might choke on that too.
Please, not like this.
The fight drains out of my muscles without my permission. The burning dulls into something heavier, deeper. A crushing pressure wraps around my ribs and squeezes. It feels like my chest is folding in on itself.
My heartbeat staggers, then slams hard enough to hurt.
The world dims. The blue light above me blurs into a pale smear. Sound disappears completely, replaced by a low, distant ringing.
I am dying.
Blackness creeps in from the edges of my vision, slowly swallowing the light inch by inch. My thoughts begin to blink out. Panic. Pain. Fear. All of it fading under the weight of the dark.
Then even the fear slips.
I don’t feel the water anymore. I don’t feel anything. I just hear his voice in my head.
And I let it carry me into the dark.