Chapter 20
Piper
I’m starting to get annoyingly used to punches in the face. Also to duct tape around my wrists and ankles, and rags stuffing my mouth.
I experienced the punch just a short while ago, and now, I’m experiencing the rest while returning to consciousness as I’m shoved into the trunk of a car.
Well, fuck.
I haven’t experienced being stuck in the trunk of a car yet. That’s something new, and I’m not at all sure I’ll like it.
Claustrophobia is just one of many of my phobias, and sometimes I wonder if I’m not just as much of a nutcase as Quill is, with his tic of doing everything in multiples when he’s stressed.
In my case, nothing freaks me out as much as being in a big space with lots of people, if not being in a small space with no one.
I guess Quill is to blame for at least some of those fears.
School became the scariest thing in my day because of his bullying.
Plus, he did push my head into the toilet bowl a few times, and it just so happens that the first time we kissed, I was soaking wet because he’d previously been torturing me by dunking me repeatedly in Astley Lake.
Okay, he definitely is insane.
And I’m just as bad for being hopelessly in love with the boy who’s done so much to hurt me.
The farther we drive away from Devil Tower, the less likely, I know, it will be for Quill to find me.
Maybe Logan would be a different matter.
One of the all-powerful Devils should be able to find me, no matter where I am.
But then again, the fact that the mafia was able to steal me right from under his nose gives me the uncomfortable feeling that he’s not half as powerful as I might have thought.
And anyway, I’ve gotten so used to pinning all my hopes on Quill over the years that my mind automatically goes to him.
All I can do is desperately hope for him as I close my eyes, a tear winding its way down my cheek.
He destroyed my life, and yet I still want him so bad it hurts.
_
Hours later, it feels like, I’m startled awake when the trunk pops open. It must be about noon, the sun high in the sky casting the three men in front of me in back light, three creepy silhouettes, only the white of their eyes and their equally white teeth glinting menacingly.
I try to speak, but I can’t get a word out with the rag still stuffed in my mouth.
Before I can do much more than try, one of them grabs me, and I’m half dragged, half carried toward a thick forest. I have no idea why I’ve been brought here.
There doesn’t seem to be much around, and I wonder, a sick feeling in my stomach, if I’m about to be shot, execution-style, against one of the trees.
Instead, one of the men lifts me up and I fall with a thud over his shoulder.
I shiver, the position reminding me of the time Quill had put me over his shoulder before going to dunk me in the lake.
Back then, I felt powerless and humiliated at the hands of my cruel bully.
Now, I’m all that too, but this bully is far worse than Quill, because I suspect he’s planning to kill me.
For the moment, though, I’m still alive.
They carry me for a while through the forest, its foliage so thick the place looks gloomy and dark, even though the sun is still high in the sky.
After a while, they stop at a very large boulder.
I frown in confusion, only for my eyes to widen when, after one of the men manipulates something, a concealed door suddenly swings open.
Okay, what the fuck. Since when did my life turn into a story straight out of Indiana Jones?
I’m not much of a movie person, but I definitely remember watching Indiana Jones while Quill was going down on me, and I have fond memories of it.
I can only wait in shock and apprehension as we enter into a web of tunnels that take us into what feels like the pits of the earth.
We go through the cramped stone passageways until we reach a surprisingly large space. Large enough to fit the more than one dozen men who are crowded inside it. None of them are speaking, but with the flashlights some of them are holding, I can tell their ominous faces are turned toward me.
It feels like I’ve just interrupted a cult meeting. My fear melts somewhat at the absurd weirdness of this situation.
I definitely have started to feel more like I’m in a Nancy Drew book than in an Indiana Jones movie.
It’s like a scene out of The Secret of Red Gate Farm, my favorite Nancy Drew book, which I definitely read until I was way too old for it. Like, this is a book I was still reading in college, not that I would ever admit it to a single soul.
In it, Nancy had found a cult in the middle of the woods at the back of the farm, hiding out in a cave. But this place feels even cooler and more unlikely. A freaking boulder with a secret passage behind it? Insane.
It’s like a Nancy Drew-Indiana Jones mashup, and the excitement of my bookworm dreams meeting my spicy Indiana Jones memories has me all but forgetting the danger I’m in, until the man carrying me abruptly pushes me off him, and I tumble onto the ground.
“So that’s her,” I hear whispered by some of the men, as my captor tears my gag off me. I spit out the rag in disgust. Then I open my mouth, because I’ve had time during the hours-long car ride to push through my freeze response.
Though clearly, my brain cells are lacking, because rather than ask any of the obvious questions, I blurt out, “What the hell is this place? How did you even carve the door into the boulder? Did you actually dig all these passages? How long did it take?”
The men glance at each other, visibly surprised.
“It’s a through cave,” grunts one of them. “The boulder’s fake.”
“Oh.”
I guess we are firmly in Nancy Drew territory, because Indiana Jones would never.
“Why is she acting like that?” breathes a guy uncertainly. “Doesn’t she know we’re going to kill her?”
Right.
Any hope I’d have, given the cool hideaway, that the stakes were just about as high as those in a Nancy Drew story, are dashed. Okay, Piper. Get it together. Stop fangirling. This is real life.
Life never felt so real when my captor shoves me to my feet a second later and punches my face again, this time, utterly crushing my glasses. I spit out a stream of blood, groaning, while he turns me around, forcing me to face the others.
I blink as the fog in my vision, coupled with the darkness, prevents me from seeing any of them. But they clearly see me.
“No doubt about it, huh? That’s her?”
“She looks exactly like Lia,” agrees one of them.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to say that he could have removed my glasses without punching me, but I realize I’ve already spoken far too much today.
So I bite my tongue, forcing my words down.
“We can’t do a thing until Coltello gets here.”
“Yeah. Take her next door. Put that gag back on her. Why’d you take it off?”
“Figured she didn’t need it all the way out here. Who’s gonna hear her anyway? Plus, we had to identify her.”
“Gag her again.”
“Fine.”
“Wait.” Another voice speaks up and I inhale sharply.
With the gag back on, there’s just no way I could ever alert Quill that I’m down here. Though I know there’s no hope he’ll find me anyway. But I’m only human. I can’t help but search wildly for some hope to cling to, no matter how bleak things feel.
“No need to gag her. Give her a good beating, that’ll do the trick.”
Fuck.
“And if she makes any noise, I’ll gag her with my cock instead,” speaks up yet another voice, and some of the guys chuckle.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“Careful,” says someone. “Coltello wouldn’t like it.”
“Yeah, yeah. We’ll wait till he’s here.”
“When’s he coming, anyway?”
“Not till nighttime.”
Nighttime. Okay. Another little glimmer of hope forms in my breast, as I’m dragged toward another, tiny space.
There’s just enough room here for me… and my captor, who, after dropping me to the ground, follows me inside.
Fuck. Is he planning to…?
I never thought I’d feel relieved by the punch that lands once more on my face, but I am, because at least he’s not doing… the other thing.
My relief is of short duration, though, because that punch is just the start.
I’m forcibly reminded of their threat to give me a good beating when my captor punches me in the stomach.
I fall to my knees, but he kicks those out from under me, then kicks me repeatedly in the stomach, the back and the face, while I whip my arms out uselessly, incapable of putting a stop to the torture.
By the time he’s finished, I’m a wheezing mess, feeling like there isn’t a part of me that’s not bruised and bleeding.
It hurts to breathe, and I find myself fading in and out of consciousness, at first too shocked and in pain to do anything but lie there.
After a while, I manage to remain conscious for longer bouts of time, and I begin to cry, low, strangled sobs that make the pain that’s already wracking my body worse.
It hurts so much I wonder if he’s injured me internally. But I guess bleeding internally is probably a kinder fate than whatever Coltello has planned for me.
Then I stop thinking altogether, the pain so intense that I’m reduced to a shuddering pile of nerves, hoping desperately for sleep, or unconsciousness, or even death. Anything to keep from feeling the pain.
The last thought I do have, as I thankfully feel myself sinking into one of those three states—which one of them, I’m not sure of—is for Quill. The pain I experience from realizing I probably won’t see him again before I die is far greater than the one currently wracking my body.