Kylee leaned into him, her eyes fixed on the kids, a smile tugging at her lips. “They’re happy. That’s all I want.”
Rio squeezed her gently. “Then that’s exactly what they’ll have.”
Below, in the cold silence of the basement, Jake seethed, powerless, knowing that just above his head the family he once claimed as his own was already slipping further from his grasp and closer into Rio’s.
Jake’s head throbbed from where it had smacked against the glass earlier in his frenzy. The sterile lights above him buzzed faintly, the laughs from Kylee and the kids haunted him. His throat was raw from screaming, though no one had heard him no one ever would. He pressed his palms against the glass, staring at the distorted reflection of himself. His own blood smeared faintly where his nose had bled, drying into dark streaks. He looked like an animal in a cage, and that’s exactly how Rio wanted him to feel.
“This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.” He screamed. But it was.
He thought about Kylee. How she used to look at him when they were kids, back when she believed he was the only man in the world who could protect her. How she clung to him when she was pregnant with Macy, scared and glowing, how she trusted him completely. Now… Now she looked at Rio that way. And his children… Jesus, the kids. He’d seen it on their faces the last time the ease they had with Rio, the way Jake Jr. laughed at his stupid jokes, like he belonged there. Like Rio was already slipping into his place. The thought twisted like a knife. Jake sank back into the chair, chest heaving, and rage giving way to something worse helplessness. He wanted to smash his fiststhrough the glass, to strangle Rio with his bare hands, to drag Kylee away from him… but the truth was there, glaring and unshakable.
His jaw clenched so hard his teeth ached. Every sound from upstairs tormented him. The faint thud of feet on the floorboards. The echo of laughter, high and childlike his children’s laughter. Kylee’s laugh. A life he could hear but never touch.
He rocked forward, elbows on his knees, head in his hands. For the first time in years, Jake Waterman felt it not just anger, not just jealousy. Fear.
As the night dragged on, long and merciless, it gnawed at him until sleep came in short, broken bursts, haunted by the one realization he couldn’t outrun: Rio had already won.
Every detail mocked him. Every sound from above rubbed salt in the wound. He closed his eyes, and all he could see was the moment he handed Kylee those backstage passes.
He thought it would shut her up, distract her from the late nights, the lipstick on his collar, and the gnawing suspicion in her eyes. He thought he was being clever, buying her silence with her favorite band. Instead, he’d handed her to Rio fucking Knight on a silver platter.
A bitter laugh clawed out of his throat, but it broke halfway and turned into a dry sob. “You did this. You. You arrogant son of a bitch.” He cried out. And Rachel… God, Rachel. His stomach twisted. What a pathetic mess. Some young hot slut who stroked his ego in ways Kylee stopped doing years ago at least that’s what he told himself. But now, sitting in this box, he knew the truth.Rachel hadn’t been worth shit. Not her body. Not her attention. Not the way she made him feel young again. Because none of it meant anything compared to what he lost.
Kylee’s face burned into his mind. The look in her eyes when she caught him. The tremble in her voice when she asked how long.He remembered the silence that followed, heavier than any fight they’d ever had. That silence had been the real ending, not Rio, not Rachel. Just that look.
Now, here he was, in another man’s basement, stripped of everything. Husband. Father. Even his dignity.
He slammed his fist against the chair arm, rage bubbling, but it fizzled fast, swallowed by the truth: there was nothing he could do. No words he could spin, no charm, no apology that could rewind what he’d done.
For the first time in his life, Jake Waterman felt the full, suffocating weight of regret not because he got caught, not because he was locked up, but because he finally understood the price of throwing away the one person who had ever truly loved him. And there was no way back.
Jake leaned back in the chair, staring up at the ceiling of the box. His reflection ghosted back at him in the glass, pale and worn, his nose still swollen and bruised from Rio’s fist. He hardly recognized himself.
The worst part wasn’t the confinement. It wasn’t even the humiliation of being trapped like some animal in another man’s basement. It was hearing his family being loved upstairs. It was still hearing Kylee’s loud moans and screams while Rio wasmaking love to her. The silence gave his mind too much room to wander.
He imagined her with Rio, the way Rio looked at her like she was something precious. Jake had never looked at her like that. Not in years. Then the kids. God, the kids. Jake Jr. running into Rio’s arms instead of his, calling him the strong one, the man they looked up to. Macy and Kayla splashing in Rio’s pool, laughing without a care, never asking when Daddy was coming home. A perfect picture of a family, except he wasn’t in it.
And Rio’s words echoed in his skull like a curse: “Your kids will live with me, and I’ll show them what a real man is.”
Jake’s breath caught. Rage flared, but there was no outlet, no release. It collapsed into despair just as fast. Because deep down, he knew Rio wasn’t wrong. Rio had everything Jake had squandered power, respect, love. He was giving Kylee and the kid’s safety. Stability. Something Jake couldn’t even fake anymore.
A shiver went down his spine. He imagined birthdays without him, Christmas mornings with another man at the head of the table. He imagined Kylee’s hand in Rio’s, her eyes shining in a way they never had for him. And the kids, smiling like it had always been this way. Like he’d never existed.
He buried his face in his hands, a strangled sound breaking out of him. He wanted to fight it, to claw back what was his, but the truth pressed down harder than the walls of this glass prison.
This was his doing. His choices. His betrayal. And now, Jake knew what it felt like to be utterly replaceable. Jake sat slumped in the chair, the dim light from the basement bulb casting longshadows against the glass. His throat was dry, every swallow rough, but it wasn’t thirst that kept him awake. It was regret.
Rio’s words kept circling back, sharp and cruel. “I’ll have someone here in the morning to take you. You’ll go far away. You won’t speak to Kylee again.”
Jake clenched his jaw. “Far away.” He knew what that could mean. Not just out of town. Not just out of their lives. Maybe out of this world. He imagined being driven somewhere remote, kneeling in the dirt with a gun to the back of his head. Dumped in a ditch, forgotten like trash. He tried to tell himself Rio wasn’t a killer, that he was just flexing, trying to scare him. But the doubt gnawed at him. He remembered the look in Rio’s eyes, not just rage, but certainty. The look of a man who could do whatever he wanted and walk away untouched.
Jake’s stomach twisted. He thought about death. Really thought about it. What it would feel like. How quick or not quick it might be. If he’d beg. If anyone would even find his body. Kylee’s face rose in his mind again. Not the angry, betrayed Kylee he left behind, but the girl he first fell for. The one who smiled at him like he was her whole world. He thought of her now, curled up safe in Rio’s arms, maybe even laughing, maybe already forgetting.
Jake leaned his head against the cool glass, breathing hard. He wanted to scream, but what was the point? No one could hear him. That was the design of this place his suffering stayed locked inside. He shut his eyes and for the first time in years, whispered a prayer. Not for salvation. Not even for forgiveness. Just for survival.
The morning light cut through the basement window, weak and gray, when Jake heard the heavy footsteps above. His stomach dropped. This was it.
The lock disengaged, and two men in black entered without a word. One snapped a hood over his head, the other cuffed his hands behind his back. Jake tried to ask where they were taking him, but his words died against the cloth gag they shoved in his mouth.
