Chapter Four - Elise
CHAPTER FOUR
Elise
The sound of metal clinking is the first thing I process when I come to.
I try to open my eyes, but it hurts, and I can’t see anything clearly.
My breathing is labored, and every muscle in my body is stiff.
I try to move my arms, but for some reason, I can’t get them to budge.
I go to roll over but stumble over my own feet, which is when I realize I’m not lying down.
I pull my arms again, understanding now that they are secured above me, holding up my entire body. No wonder my shoulders are burning. I try desperately to regain my vision as another sound seeps through the fog of my brain.
Whispers.
As soon as I notice it, the whispering stops, and terror shoots through my veins as I strain to remember how I got here, but my memories are a muddied mess.
“Good morning, Princess. I hope you slept well.” The voice is familiar—deep and soothing.
A shudder runs through my body, and my vision finally clears enough to reveal the speaker.
Hayden Montez.
Events from last night come rushing back—Hayden coming over, eating dinner, sitting on the couch, kissing… and then I passed out.
No, he drugged me.
“Welcome to the basement,” he says, waving an arm around the room.
I take in the exposed brick that covers every wall of the large room. A set of stairs that goes up in front of me and a door to my right are the only exits in sight. Chairs are scattered around the area, but only one of them is occupied.
The dark-skinned man has an even bigger build than Hayden, and judging by the way his white shirt clings to his chest, it’s all muscle. He has black hair that’s cropped short and a neatly trimmed beard. His fiercely handsome features are currently arranged in a glare directed at me.
Then, there’s the man who stands directly in front of me.
How did I not see it? How could I have been so stupid?
In the dim light of the basement, I see him in a way I never did before.
Those brown eyes that had seemed so warm are alight with malice.
His broad frame no longer makes me feel protected but weak and helpless.
His lips are pressed in a hard line, and it’s difficult to imagine that those same lips had kissed me so gently.
I open my mouth to speak, but it’s so dry that I only end up coughing. Hayden turns and walks toward a table to my left to grab something.
When my eyes drift to the table, my blood turns to ice. Fear grips me so tightly that I can’t breathe. The long wooden table is crowded with devices that I can only assume bring the most violent pain—saws, knives, whips, chains, and countless other weapons that I can’t even name.
I vaguely notice Hayden walking back toward me, but I can’t tear my eyes off the table of tortures. My mind races, imagining all the horrible things he could do to me with the items there.
A rough hand grips my chin, forcing my head to the side as I gasp for air.
I stare into Hayden’s expressionless face and work to get my breathing under control. When I finally have a steady breath, he raises his other hand, and I flinch, but he doesn’t hit me. Instead, he lifts a glass of water with a straw to my mouth.
I shake my head.
He rolls his eyes, guessing my thoughts exactly. “It’s not drugged. Drink.”
My parched mouth begs me to accept it, but how can I? Even if it isn’t drugged, I can’t just do what he tells me. That would mean he wins.
Though strung up in this basement at his mercy, it seems I’ve already lost.
Still, my pride is all I have left.
“Either you drink, or I make you.” His words are sharp, and I have no doubt the threat is real.
My mind is still hazy from whatever he put in my wine, so it takes me a moment to decide if I’m going to obey.
Unfortunately, he isn’t in the mood to wait.
Releasing my chin, he reaches back and grabs hold of my hair, pulling until my head is facing straight up.
I cry out, and as soon as my mouth is open, Hayden pours the water down my throat.
My mouth quickly fills with the liquid, and the excess pours down my face.
I choke and swallow what I can, but most of it spills out.
He lets go of my hair, and I cough, dropping my head as the water drips from my face down my clothes.
When I finally lift my head, he no longer holds the cup, and his arms are crossed over his chest.
“You’ll learn very quickly that when it comes to obedience, there’s an easy way and a hard way. It doesn’t matter to me which you choose, but what you need to understand”—he steps forward, pressing his body to mine—“is that you will obey me.”
Fire blazes in my veins. I never thought that I could be capable of killing someone, but looking into the face of pure evil, I imagine a multitude of ways that I’d like to make this man suffer.
I swing my head as hard as I can, forehead connecting with his face. Hayden grunts, reaching up to touch the blood dripping from the cut on his lip.
I smile, but my victory is short-lived.
Before I can process his movements, his arm reaches for my side, and the most intense pain I’ve ever felt shoots through my whole body. Every muscle goes limp as the inflicted spot burns like a flame to my skin, and I sag into the chains, yanking on my already sore shoulders.
He pulls the taser back, and I gasp for air.
Once the worst of the pain is over, I bite my tongue, willing myself not to cry. This asshole can’t see me break.
“Elise Maya Consoli, you’re not at all what I expected.” He’s circling me now, surveying my trapped body.
“That makes two of us, Hayden,” I spit the undoubtedly fake name.
I can feel his low chuckle against my ear as he stands directly behind me, and a shudder of something more than fear runs through my body. I wince when he, once again, pulls my hair back so I’m looking upward, only this time he’s standing over me.
“I’d watch how you talk to me, Princess.”
“Stop calling me that.” I narrow my eyes, but with my head tilted upward, it only makes me dizzy.
“I’m not sure you’re in a position to make demands.”
“Who the hell do you—” My words are interrupted when the electric burn of the taser meets my side again.
I want to stay silent, but I can’t help the pained yelp that escapes my lips. He releases his grip on my hair but holds the current to my body longer than he did the first time. When he finally pulls away, sweat drips down my face.
“I’ll be the one asking questions, Princess.”
I open my mouth to tell him off, but I halt my words when he raises an eyebrow, daring me to speak.
“The easy way or the hard way. You get to pick, beautiful.”
I want nothing more than to spit on him, to curse him to hell and back, but when I think logically through my options, I reluctantly close my mouth.
“Good girl,” he purrs.
I narrow my eyes to deadly slits, but the reaction only amuses him. Stepping close, his fingertips brush the sensitive skin on my side where the taser made contact.
More than just the discomfort, it’s unnerving to have him touch me, and I feel a whole different kind of electricity. I grimace and try to pull away, but my chains keep me firmly in place. There’s nothing I can do but stare daggers at him.
“I’m going to ask you some questions, and you’re going to answer them. Easy enough, don’t you think?” He walks toward the table of torture, and my heart leaps into my throat.
“Wait,” I whisper.
He turns, raising an eyebrow at me again.
I want to beg him not to hurt me. I want to say I’ll tell him whatever he wants to know, and he doesn’t need to hurt me.
But I can’t do that.
I drop my head, unwilling to beg this monster for anything.
“That’s what I thought.” He grabs something off the table and hides it behind his back as he comes closer. “When was the last time you saw your dad?”
My dad?
Of course, this is about my dad. How did I not understand that right away? That must be why he asked to hang out on Sunday. He must have known I wouldn’t have security. Come to think of it, I bet he timed his visit to the bakery just right so that Kaitlyn never saw him.
The realization hits me so hard that I forget the question.
“Huh?”
That was the wrong thing to say.
I wince at the searing pain on my thigh and look down to see a bright red mark where he’s slashed me with a thin switch.
“When was the last time you saw your father?”
Do I tell him the truth or not?
But isn’t this the reason why I stayed out of everything? So I wouldn’t have any incriminating information?
“Maybe a month ago,” I tell him.
He trails the switch along my leg, and I hold my breath, knowing that, at any second, he’ll strike me again. The action is so nerve-racking that I have to clench my teeth to stop them from chattering.
“You’ve been legally dead for six years.”
“That’s not a question.”
I’m not surprised when the switch comes down hard on my thigh.
“Again, I’d be very careful about how you speak to me.”
Staying silent seems like the safest option, so I do.
He takes leisurely steps out of my view to round me again. “Why did you go into hiding?”
The days leading up to my alleged death aren’t my fondest memories, and I loathe this man for forcing me to relive them.
At seventeen, most girls are going to parties, sneaking out, or failing calculus, but not me. I was packing up everything I owned from my family home in Chicago and moving to Milwaukee to hole up in a lonely apartment while my father and brothers arranged an empty casket funeral.
Ultimately, it was my decision to leave Chicago and the Consoli criminal family behind. At the time, legally dying for my freedom had seemed like a fair price. It wasn’t until years later that I realized I’d given up far more than my name for far less than freedom.
“I went into hiding to avoid psychopathic maniacs who might use me against my father. As you can see, it’s not going well.”
The remark is a risk I know could result in more pain, but he doesn’t strike me again.
When he returns to my line of sight, he regards me with an awe that brings heat rushing to my cheeks, but I don’t look away.
I won’t give him the satisfaction.
Though his eyes don’t leave mine, he tilts his head, shifting one shoulder back to aim his words behind him. “Six years, Ryder. Unbelievable.”
The man—Ryder, I assume—leans forward in his chair with a solemn nod.
“Nobody questioned him when he said she died. They had a funeral and everything,” he says, and his voice is eerily calming, a honey-smooth tenor that makes me want to hang on to his every word despite the shiver running down my spine.
I hate how they talk about me like I’m not right in front of them.
His hand grips my chin before I can pull away. “It’s a miracle no one got to you before I did.”
I match his glare in a standoff, and I know he’s waiting for me to snap, to give him a reason to hurt me again, and damn, I want to give him an earful, but I force myself to keep quiet.
Seconds pass before he releases my chin. “How often do you talk to your father?”
“Maybe twice a week.”
The switch comes down again, and I wince as my thigh throbs.
“What was that for? I answered your question!” My outburst is rewarded with two strikes to my other thigh.
There’s a ghost of a smile on his face. The bastard is enjoying this.
“To remind you that I can.”
“Because the restraints aren’t a clear enough indication.”
Though I expect the lashes, they still bite into my sensitive skin with a force that makes me grimace.
“Apparently not.” He steps in close, dropping one hand to my lower back and drawing me into him in a strangely intimate gesture. “But it will be by the time I’m done with you.”
He releases me. “How many days a week does your father work out of his main base in Chicago?”
“I don’t know.” My answer, though truthful, prompts him to brush the switch along my leg.
“I’d think harder if I were you, Princess.”
“I don’t know!” I expect my insistence to bring on more pain, but he only raises an eyebrow, and I take that as a sign to continue.
“I’ve never been involved in any of my family’s work.
They don’t tell me anything, and I don’t want to know.
I don’t have any information that would be useful to you.
That was the whole point of me ‘dying’ in the first place! ”
His lip quirks up. “Then, it’s a good thing having you is enough to get what I want.”
“And what exactly is that?” I ask as if I haven’t learned my lesson by now, and the switch comes down again.
I have no idea how long it goes on, but by the time Ryder releases me from my chains, I collapse onto the ground. I barely have the energy to look down and see that my skin is decorated with slim cuts and light bruises.
“Stand up,” he orders, but when I try to, I crumble helplessly back to the floor.
“I’ll get her,” Ryder offers.
“No, you get this cleaned up. I’ll handle her.” As he says the words, strong arms scoop me up from the ground.
My mind urges me to resist him, but I don’t have the energy, so I let him hold my aching body against his hard chest. The familiar pine scent that wafts off of him calls to me in a way that I despise because, even after everything he’s done to me, it’s downright intoxicating.
“Yes, Mr. Moreno,” Ryder bids as I’m carried from the room.
Moreno? I rack my over-exhausted brain for any meaning to the name but find none. I truly have no idea who this man is.
I’m taken to a cold, windowless room and dropped onto a lumpy mattress. The door slams shut, but I barely hear it. Burrowing into the flat pillow and scratchy blanket, I fall into a restless sleep.