Chapter 38
Ellie
“What the hell do you want?” I ask Frank as he manhandles me down the street.
I try to shake him off, but he’s so much stronger than me. All that Pilates doesn’t count for much when dealing with a man twice your size. He pushes me along, and I dig my heels in. People start to look at us, and I know I could scream right now. I could run. Ask for help.
“Don’t do it, sweetheart,” he says, his voice made of venom. “I can see what’s going on in that pretty little head of yours. If you don’t do exactly what I tell you, then the files I have on your boyfriend go straight to the police.”
He sniggers, and the sound repulses me. Acid rises into my mouth. I nod, tell him I’ll behave myself. He has a firm grip of my arm, his fingers squeezing into my flesh in a way I know will leave bruises.
“What files? You said you’d swap me for the information.”
“And I will as soon as we get where we’re going.”
“And where exactly are we going?”
He glares at me. “Will you stop with the fucking questions? You always were an annoying brat. Took after your mom like that.”
Tears sting my eyes at both the physical and emotional pain.
My mom was a wonderful woman, gone too soon. She passed from cancer when I was fifteen, and our lives were never the same again. They didn’t have a happy relationship, and I’ve wondered since how much abuse she tolerated at the hands of this man, all to shield us.
We walk through residential streets, him occasionally stopping to check his phone. When we pass by a little café that specializes in blinis, I ask him if I can go in and use the facilities. He sneers at me. “No, you fucking can’t. Hold it in or piss yourself, I don’t give a shit.”
He drags me on, and I realize we’re heading down to the Red Hook docks.
I don’t know the area well, and as we leave the well-populated streets behind, I start to get more and more scared.
What has he got planned for me? And what’s to stop him from using that information against Maddox anyway once he has me where he wants me?
Maybe I didn’t think this through, but I’m a smart woman. Smarter than Frank. I’ll figure this out.
The sun is setting over the river, and any other time I’d admire it.
It reminds me of the time Maddox and I made love against the window of my office.
I keep that image in my mind. The way he held me afterwards while we both watched the sunset.
That can be my happy place, I tell myself, as I endure whatever torments this man who dares to call himself my father has in store for me.
Before long we are deep in an industrial area. I wonder if I should somehow have been leaving a trail of breadcrumbs, like in a fairy tale, so my prince can find me and rescue me.
Except I can’t risk Maddox being put in danger. I know he’d come rushing to my aid, no matter what he had to face.
Oh, fuck, he’s probably doing that right now, isn’t he? Going out of his mind with worry looking for me. My poor Maddox. Tears fill my eyes.
Frank gives my arm a brutal shake. It feels like it’s going to come out of its socket, he wrenches it so hard. “What the fuck are you crying for? I haven’t even touched you yet.”
He pushes me forward and I stumble. He laughs, and it takes me back to when I was a kid.
He used to get a real kick out of us falling or hurting ourselves.
He’d often hurt us on purpose. Jayden would be running around the yard, playing, and Frank would trip him up, laughing when he fell and skinned a knee.
Or he’d tell Iris he was going to catch her when she was on the swing, that she should jump.
Then he’d step back at the last minute, guffawing when she landed in the dirt as though it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen.
Evil is what he is. I make a little vow to the universe that if I have the chance, I will hurt this man in return.
We’re deep in the docks now, no people around at this time of day. He walks up to a big metal storage container, the kind that brings in cargo, and checks something on his phone. He types in a code and the door opens.
“Welcome to your new home, sweetheart,” he says, shoving me viciously inside it. It’s dark and damp, and it smells bad. He slaps me across the face, and my lip splits. The metallic tang of blood is on my tongue as I fall to the ground.
I’m bleeding on my hands and knees when he says, “Smile for the camera, say cheese.”
A flash goes off, blinding in this grim space. He’s taken a photo of me. A ransom demand? A proof of life? Or something for his own sick pleasure?
He inspects the screen and grunts in satisfaction.
“All done. Now, daddy has a few errands to run. You be good while I’m gone, okay?
And let’s hope I get what I want, otherwise Maddox is going to be spending the rest of his life in a room like this.
And you? You’re rotting in this thing. Nobody knows you’re here.
Like they say in the movies…nobody can hear you scream. ”
He’s watching me intently, and I know he wants a reaction.
He wants me to whimper and beg and cry. If I thought doing any of those things would help, I’d do them in a heartbeat.
But I have cried for this man before. I have begged him to stop hurting me before.
It had no effect other than making him laugh. I refuse to give him the satisfaction.
All he wanted was me, so he can make a ransom demand. Which means he doesn’t have anything else of note to blackmail Maddox with. I am such a fool.
“You don’t have anything on him at all, do you?”
He licks his lips, leering at me. “Just a name, sweetheart. And I knew he’d beaten him to death in a hotel room. That was all it took, wasn’t it? You always were a simpering little goody-two-shoes.”
I launch myself at him, propelled by rage and injustice. But he stops me easily, pushing me back until I stumble onto the floor again.
I sit back against the metal walls and wipe the blood from my face. Then I wrap my arms around my knees and close my eyes. I am desperate to pee, starving, and so dehydrated my lips are cracked and split. I’m terrified, shaking like I’m made of a million delicate fragments.
But I will not let him have that on top of everything else. No. I close my eyes, and I go to my happy place.
Maddox.