31. Miles
“I texted our girl,” Austin says, his voice casual as his thumb moves mindlessly across the screen of his phone.
He doesn’t even look at me while he does it, like this is just another normal conversation between two people who somehow ended up in the same room.
After a few seconds, he slips his phone back into the pocket of his jeans and finally turns his attention back toward me.
The way he says our girl makes every muscle in my body tense.
“Well, really, I shouldn’t call her yours because she never should have been with you in the first place.”
There’s something so unsettling about the certainty in his voice.
He doesn’t say it like an opinion or like he’s trying to convince himself.
It’s almost as if he believes Maddie was never a person who got to make her own decisions and was simply something that belonged to him, and I was just someone who stole what was rightfully his.
He lets out a slow breath, shaking his head slightly before looking back at me.
“She was always supposed to be mine.”
The words settle over me, and for a moment, all I can do is stare at him. This fucking guy actually believes Maddie belongs to him.
My stomach twists when I finally understand how deep this goes.
This isn’t some simple obsession or someone who got their heart broken and couldn’t move on.
This sick motherfucker has created an entire reality in his own head where Maddie is the center of everything, where every choice she makes is somehow about him, and where anyone who stands between them is an enemy.
He doesn’t love her. You don’t do this kind of fucked up shit to someone you love.
They don’t take away their fucking choices and hurt the people they care about. He’s convinced himself that someone else’s pain is proof of his devotion to her. What he thinks is love, is actually just possession, and what makes it worse is I don’t think he knows the difference.
Austin watches me quietly, his head tilting slightly to the side as he studies my face. His brows pull together, and his eyes widen almost like he’s confused by something he’s seeing.
What the fuck is he looking at?
“Are you going to say anything,” he finally asks, sounding almost irritated, “or are you just going to keep staring at me like that?”
I don’t answer. I don’t want to give him the satisfaction.
The truth is, there are a thousand things I want to say.
I want to tell him exactly what I think of him and remind him that Maddie is not a fucking thing he can just take.
I want nothing more than to tell him the second I get out of this chair, he’s going to regret every single thing he has done.
But I don’t say any of that, because Austin isn’t looking for a conversation. All he wants is control, and every word I give him, every reaction, ounce of anger, or fear he can pull from me is another reminder that he still has power over the situation. And I fucking refuse to give him that.
He already took enough from me. He took my freedom and my ability to protect Maddie. And the thought that he has her somewhere right now, alone with him, makes something inside my chest feel like it’s being ripped apart.
I haven’t spoken since he ripped the tape from my mouth earlier.
At first, I thought he kept it there because he didn’t want me screaming, but that wasn’t it.
He wanted me quiet until he was ready to hear me.
He wanted me to understand that he was the one deciding when I got a voice and when I didn’t.
Now that he’s given it back, he’s waiting for me to use it. He wants me to beg and ask him questions, give him some sort of acknowledgment, but I’m not going to.
A scoff leaves his mouth as he walks closer to me, clearly annoyed by my silence.
“Well, you’re no fun.”
He stops in front of me, looking down at me with that same unsettling curiosity he’s had since he walked into this room. Then, slowly, he reaches out and places his hand against my face.
My entire body immediately reacts, the gentleness of his touch making all of this worse. He runs his fingers along my cheek before flicking my nose like this is some kind of joke between friends.
I flinch away from him before I can stop myself, a low growl leaving my throat.
The smallest smile pulls at his lips. “There you are.”
I stare at him with every ounce of hatred I have left inside me. The second I get out of here, he’s going to learn exactly what happens when someone threatens the people I love. But for now, I have to wait.
“Let’s just see if I can get you to squeal,” he says, laughing quietly to himself as he turns away from me. “Maybe then you’ll be a little more fun, huh?”
The casualness of his words sends a chill through me, like he’s not taking any of this seriously. Everything happening right now is just some kind of twisted game to him. He disappears around the corner, and for several seconds, the only thing I hear is the sound of him shuffling around.
Something heavy scraping against the floor, metal clanging together, the sound of objects being moved around with no urgency.
The fact that he’s so calm is what freaks me out the most. Someone who kidnaps another person should be nervous. They should be scared of being caught and have a sort of desperation about them, but Austin isn’t any of those things.
I pull against the zip tie binding my wrists together, ignoring the sharp sting as the plastic digs deeper into my skin. The broken pieces of glass underneath the chair shift with every movement, cutting into me, but I barely register the pain.
Nothing matters except getting back to Maddie.
I force myself to look around the room, searching for anything that could help me. Anything sharp, heavy, or that could give me even the smallest advantage.
Because Austin made one mistake. He doesn’t know what I’m willing to do to get back to her. And he definitely doesn’t know what happens when someone takes away the only person in this world who ever made me feel like I had something worth living for.
The banging eventually stops, leaving behind a silence that feels almost unnatural.
My entire body stays tense as I wait for whatever comes next because I know Austin isn’t finished.
People like him don’t walk away from something like this.
They don’t spend hours planning, kidnapping someone, and dragging them into some abandoned building just to suddenly decide they’ve had enough.
He has something else planned, and I need to figure out what it is. Fast.
The silence stretches long enough that I start listening for anything that might give me a clue. Any movement or footsteps, anything that tells me what I’m about to deal with. That’s when I hear it.
A loud squeaking noise echoes through the building, slowly getting closer in my direction.
The sound is uneven, almost broken, like one of the wheels on whatever he’s pushing is struggling to turn properly.
I stop moving against the restraints but continue searching the room with my eyes, looking for anything I can use, anything that could give me some kind of advantage.
There’s nothing, at least, nothing within reach or sharp enough. Nothing that could help me get out of this fucking chair.
That realization pisses me off more than anything.
I’ve spent my entire life making sure I’m never helpless. I’ve always been the person who steps in, protecting everyone else, and figuring a way out when things go wrong. But sitting here, tied down and completely at someone else’s mercy, there is nothing I can do except wait.
And I fucking hate it.
Austin comes back around the corner, and the first thing I notice is the smile on his face. He isn’t angry or nervous. He’s acting like he believes everything he’s doing is something Maddie would actually appreciate and nothing he’s doing is wrong by any capacity.
He’s happy, giggling to himself like some fucking psychopath as he pushes a medical cart toward me, the same squeaky wheel spinning loosely every time he moves it forward.
So that’s what I was hearing.
My eyes immediately drop to the cart, and the second I see what’s sitting on top of it, my stomach twists.
There are medical instruments laid out across the surface, things that belong in a hospital and should only ever be used by trained professionals trying to save someone’s life.
But mixed in with them are things that have absolutely no medical purpose.
Things that don’t belong anywhere near a person unless the intention is to cause pain.
Austin didn’t just decide to hurt me. He didn’t lose control and grab whatever he could find. He thought about this. He collected these things and prepared for this moment.
What the fuck does he plan to do to me?
I force myself to look away and stare down at my lap, refusing to give him the reaction he’s clearly waiting for. I’m not going to let him see fear. I’m not going to give him the satisfaction of knowing that he got inside my head.
The truth is, I’m terrified. Not because I’m afraid of what he can do to me. No. I’m afraid because I know what he has already done to Maddie. And if he’s capable of planning something like this and enjoying it, then I don’t even want to think about what he could do to her.
“Aren’t you going to ask me what I’m going to do to you?”
His voice pulls me out of my thoughts. I lift my eyes to him but don’t say anything, I just stare.
Austin studies me, waiting for some kind of response. He wants me to ask and give him the opportunity to explain his twisted reasoning. He wants to feel like he’s in control of this situation, but I refuse to give him anything.
A slow, unsettling smile spreads across his face.
“No?” he asks, almost amused. “Well, I’m going to tell you anyway.”