Chapter 46
CHAPTER
FORTY-SIX
EMMA
He strangled me.
I fought so hard to stop him, but he was stronger.
Being restrained by a man like him felt like being trapped by a brick wall. Any fight I had in me was pointless. I didn’t stand a chance.
As I started to come around, the first thing that hit me was how sore my neck was and how dry my throat felt.
I coughed, trying to swallow to ease the pain in my throat, and felt resistance from the tape that’d been bound over my mouth and around my head, pulling at my skin and hair. I couldn’t even scream for help.
Instinctively, I tried reaching up to touch my neck, but I couldn’t do that either. My hands had been tied behind my back, and my shoulders ached from being forced into an unnatural position as I lay on my side.
There was darkness all around me, and I could hear the hum of an engine as my body rocked and swayed against the hard walls of where I was trapped.
It was a car. I knew I was in the boot, so I tried to kick out, but like my wrists, my ankles were also tied together.
I could kick, but it wasn’t as forceful as it needed to be to take out a rear light or have any impact on my current predicament.
Where the hell was he taking me?
And what would he do to me once he got there?
Sharp, excruciating pain stabbed me in my stomach and heart as I tried not to think about what lay ahead, or the horrors I’d seen him inflict on others.
I couldn’t bear to torture myself with what could happen, and yet, little details kept invading my mind, piercing like arrows, reminding me that he’d cut out tongues, gouged out eyes, sliced Achilles heels, and on and on and on.
I didn’t want to be a statistic.
A headline on the front of the newspaper.
Another name that people would utter and say, “God, wasn’t it awful what happened to her.” Before they got on with their day and forgot I ever existed, because things like that didn’t happen to them. It was just a newspaper story. A nightmare. Not real life.
But it did happen.
And it was happening to me.
Right.
Fucking.
Now.
Eventually, the smooth bumps of the road he was driving along turned to rockier, bumpier terrain, and the tyres crunched as they drove over what sounded like rocks. Then we came to a stop, and he switched off the engine.
I lay deadly still, my eyes darting about in the darkness.
My heart beating so hard against my chest that I could hear the pounding pulse in my ears, but I tried to stay calm, to focus and breathe steadily so I could hear what was going on outside.
The calmer and more focused I stayed, the better chance I had of escaping and surviving.
I would never stop fighting.
And I’d never give up hope.
I heard the car door open, then a harsh bang as he slammed it shut.
His footsteps were slow and measured as he walked towards the back of the car, and I could hear twigs and branches snapping under his feet.
Then, a rush of cold air hit me as he opened the boot and shone a torch into my eyes, making me squint, shuffle my body backwards, and close my eyes.
“Oh good,” he mused, like this was all a game. “You’re awake.” And he put the torch between his teeth as he reached forward to grab the tops of my arms and pull me out.
I tried to resist. My mind screamed at me to do something, anything, but there was little I could do with my arms and legs bound and my mouth taped shut. I fell at his feet with a thud, twigs scraping against my face as I lay on the cold, wet floor of the forest where he’d brought me.
“It’s just over here,” he snapped, and I felt him pull at my arm as he dragged me across the floor, the ground scratching and ripping into my flesh as I scrambled to stand up, to do anything to give myself some leverage.
I tried to dig my feet into the soil, and I clawed at the ground, dirt gathering under my fingernails as I desperately tried to stop him and slow myself down.
But I was powerless.
It was nighttime now, the moon and stars were the only ones bearing witness to my plight.
Roughly, he pulled me through the forest until, eventually, we came to a clearing where torches had been set up to offer some light amongst the darkness of the trees that surrounded us.
Trees that stood like the devil’s guards, keeping me trapped in hell.
My eyes frantically scanned the area, and when I saw what lay ahead, I gave a muffled scream and tried to clamour away.
He'd dug a deep hole in the ground.
A grave.
My grave.
He continued to drag me across the clearing, and I cried out, terrified that he was about to throw me into that grave. But he didn’t. He pulled me towards the trunk of a tree and forced me to sit against it.
I blinked through my tears and gasped for breath, my eyes darting around to try and find a way out. But he just laughed to himself and then leaned down to stare in my face and grin like the lunatic he was.
I stared back...
At a face that had become as familiar to me as my own.
At green eyes that I’d got lost in more times than I could count.
At a smile that always set my heart fluttering.
And a man who had turned my world upside down.
Only...
It wasn’t his face I was looking at.
Or his eyes.
The smile was so similar, and yet, it wasn’t.
He had the same tattoos on his hands and neck, only different.
And in my mind, I screamed, ‘Who the fuck are you?’
He tilted his head and said, “You can see it, can’t you.”
I nodded, snivelling as pieces of the jigsaw started to fall into place, but the pieces didn’t fit, and the picture looked so wrong.
“I was going to compose something for you, to explain it all, but then I figured, fuck it. I may as well tell it like it is. I didn’t want to waste my precious time on you. You don’t really appreciate my words, anyway.”
He stood up and stepped back, keeping his eyes on me as he did. Then he walked over to a nearby tree and said, “Let me just check this is working,” before adjusting something he’d set up there.
I couldn’t make out what it was, but I spent the time that he was distracted trying to prize my wrists apart, dragging the plastic cable tie against the rough bark of the tree and pushing at the restraints on my ankles.
But the cable tie on my wrists only cut deeper into my skin, and the bark of the tree just scratched and tore at my flesh.
The duct tape around my ankles was bound so tight and so thick I couldn’t shift it.
And when he turned around and saw me struggling, he laughed.
“You’re going nowhere, Emma. I suggest you save your energy for later.
” He pointed at the tree beside him. “The numbers are always higher when there’s a struggle.
” And knowing I had no idea what he meant, he added, “We’re currently streaming live on the dark web.
The sick fucks there love violence and depravity. I know we’ll give them what they want.”
I felt sick, and I tried to roll onto my side, desperate to do anything to get away.
He strode towards me, grunting as he leaned down and grabbed me, yanking me back into a sitting position. And then he got right into my face, his nose pressed against mine with a flaming fire of anger in his eyes.
“You need to be sitting comfortably for the story I’m about to tell. Show some fucking respect.”
I glared back at him, panting each breath through my nose as my head screamed. ‘Fuck you and fuck your story. I won’t ever show you fucking respect.’
He stood up, sighed, and then smiled as he took his jacket off and folded it over his arm.
He turned his back to walk away from me, heading over to a tree opposite where I sat, and he draped his jacket carefully over a branch.
Then he turned to face me again, walking forward slowly as he rolled his sleeves up, first the left, then the right.
“This,” he suddenly announced, his voice booming and echoing in the dark void of the forest. “Is the story of Elizabeth and William Kingston.”
He stood with his legs slightly parted like he was giving a lecture, his hands on his hips in such a casual way it made me feel sick.
“A couple who, to the outside world, looked respectable and honourable, pillars of the community. Picture perfect, some might say. But all was not as it seemed.
“You see, Elizabeth loved William more than anything in this world. And William, he loved Elizabeth even more. They lived for each other. They’d have died for each other.
There wasn’t room for anyone else in their life.
It would always be them, together, against the world, forever.
They didn’t want anything else. They had everything they could ever need in each other.
“Elizabeth loved to travel, and William would’ve followed her to the ends of the earth. It was on their travels that they encountered different cultures, tribes, philosophies, and ethics. It was also on their travels that Elizabeth found out that she was pregnant.
“At first, she thought it was the end of the world. She didn’t want a baby. Neither of them did. A baby would ruin everything and take their attention away from each other. They didn’t want that. So they decided to make a plan.
“They arrived back home and made an appointment with their doctor, but in a fit of despair, Elizabeth broke the promise she’d made to William before they’d returned. She’d broken down and told her housemaid what had happened. No one else was supposed to know. It was supposed to be their secret.
“Why are you upset?” the housemaid asked.
“This is wonderful news. You love each other so much, and you’ve made a whole new life from that love.
Why would you want to end that?” Elizabeth wasn’t sure.
Everything was becoming confusing. Her judgement was clouded.
She didn’t know if she wanted to end it or not.
The baby was a part of both of them. If they destroyed it, would it destroy a part of them too?