Whatever kernel of will I had left to live shriveled into something nearly imperceptible.
“Think, Shiloh. Someone must know you’re missing by now. Right?”
I startled at his angry, insistent voice, opening my eyes to find him hunched over, inches from my face.
Enoch.
A swallowed back the gag that followed the horrible fear that somehow they’d gotten to him too.
“Think! How long were you at the house after they took you from your apartment?”
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to get my brain to work, to calculate.
“A-a week?” I whispered with doubt. The emotion swelled in my chest, an urge to cry that wouldn’t happen because I had no tears to produce. I was too dehydrated.
“Okay. Okay,” Javi said nodding, pulling back to sit back down. “It was Friday, your friends would have assumed something was wrong when you didn’t show up for book club meeting. And Enoch would have known that evening when you didn’t show up for tv night with Jae and him. Would Enoch have called the police?”
Fuck.“I don’t know,” I mumbled. “I don’t know.”
I tried to conjure Enoch in my mind, but I couldn’t get his face right. Was his dimple on his right check?
Fuck. How could I not remember that?
“He’s not coming.” Something settled over me as I repeated the statement. “He’s not coming.”
A numbness. A resignation. An acceptance.
Javi slapped his hand against the concrete, but I didn’t react.
“Don’t you fucking be a weak puta now, you little shit.”
I ignored his harsh command.
He was just a figment of my imagination. Soon I’d be dead for real. Soon I’d be gone forever. I only hoped the end came quickly.
“Open your eyes! Now, dammit!” He shouted, the sound echoing in this small space.
How much longer was I going to have to endure? At least seven days without food now. Without the IV for hydration, how many more days could I last before my body shut down completely?
“God doesn’t want you to die yet!”
The statement rattled around my brain. Knowing that I had been blessed with Enoch’s love, even for just a little while, gave me a sense of peace. It was worth it. It was worth the privilege of getting to love him, my only regret was that I didn’t tell him so.
“You’re going to tell that to his face,” Javi said, slapping the concrete in front of my face. I swore I could feel his breath as he screamed at me. “You’re going to survive this shit. I’ll fucking sew your eyeballs open if I have to. Open your eyes, Shiloh! Don’t you dare fucking die!”
I squeezed my eyes tighter.
“Please, just humor him. He’s giving me a migraine,” Adrian pouted.
I peel one of my eyes open, staring at the smile that transformed Javier’s face.
“Brat,” he muttered.
I stared past him, the sound of scratching filling the silent room. I turned my eyes as far as I could to find mother.
Her hands twitched and she adjusted her position, giving me a better view of the hair pin in her hand that she’d pried apart and was jamming into the metal latched to her ankle.
“What are you going to do?” I asked, the sound loud despite being no more than a whisper.
