This was supposed to be my senior year of high school. I should be having the time of my life prepping for college and going to prom and parties with my friends. I should be making dumb decisions like falling in love with the wrong guy. Well, I somehow managed to do that even while my life had been thrust into constant chaos.
The door remained as unyielding as ever and didn’t budge an inch when I threw my full body against it in a burst of pure, desperate spite. The impact sent shock waves through my shoulder, but the door didn’t so much as rattle in its frame.God, there must be something I’d missed. Some tiny flaw in their perfect prison I could exploit.
I dropped to my knees on the hard, uneven floor, my fingers searching along the edges where the planks met the walls. I checked for loose boards or hidden gaps, anything to indicate a weakness in their construction. My fingernail caught on something sharp, a splinter of wood tucked beneath the corner of the bedpost.
I pried at it with growing excitement, but it yielded nothing more than a few flakes of timber. My shoulders slumped, and I stuck my fist into my mouth and screamed, muffling the sound. I couldn’t give up hope. Notyet.
I was turning back toward the bathroom to continue my search when I heard it.
Click.
The noise froze my blood in my veins, every muscle in my body going rigid with sudden alertness. Another followed, closer and more definitive.
Click. Clunk. Clink.
The locks. All three of them disengaging one by one in succession.
My heart shot into my throat as I spun to face the door, my breath caught mid-exhale and trapped in my lungs. Ice crawled down my spine, but I forced myself to take a step back, to set my jaw and straighten my spine despite every instinct screaming at me to hide.
Not today.
Not without a fight that they’d remember.
Whoever was about to walk through that door, whether it was Rusty or worse, they’d better be ready to bleed because I wasn’t the broken girl they thought they’d locked up in here. Not anymore.
I was something harder. Something angrier. Something with absolutely nothing left to lose.
I stared at the door as the handle twisted, and a woman walked through with her head held high. She had cold blue eyes and raven hair pulled into a severe chignon that didn’t move despite her measured steps. A sweet and expensive perfume trailed behind her, wafting into the room.
The fuck?
A woman?
I don’t know why I assumed this was an entirely male operation. Perhaps because my brain couldn’t wrap itself around the idea of another woman subjecting a woman to such inhumanity.
She carried a silver tray balanced on her palm like she was serving afternoon tea at some upscale hotel instead of feeding a prisoner in a human trafficking operation. The contents looked almost mockingly normal, scrambled eggs still steaming slightly,buttered toast cut into precise triangles, and wedges of pink grapefruit, as if proper nutrition mattered inside the walls of hell.
She set the tray down on the vanity, the metal surface making a soft clink against the wood. “You need to eat,” she said, her voice carrying the flat authority of someone stating an immutable fact.
“I’m not hungry,” I replied defiantly, testing her.
She shrugged. “Suit yourself, but starving yourself will only make them angry, and trust me…you don’t want to see what happens when they’re angry.”
Who the hell werethey? I didn’t move. Didn’t even blink. My body remained frozen, every muscle locked in stubborn refusal. “You mean Rusty?”
She smoothed her hands down the front of her pristine white blouse, the fabric stretching taut across her torso. Her black heels clicked against the floor as she shifted. “I understand you had a personal relationship with him, but that ended the second you were brought through that door.”
Personal relationship, my ass. “Trust me, I wish I’d never fucking met him.”
“We don’t use that kind of language,” she snapped, startling me. “You will do well to mind your mouth.”
I blinked. She couldn’t be for real, yet she had delivered the order with a straight face. “I’m sorry. What? You don’t want me to fucking swear?” Was it wise to be so rebellious?
I guess I was about to find out.
She pulled something out of her pocket, and my eyes went wide as I watched her pull the cap off a needle. She gave the syringe a tap with her long crimson nails. “I’d hoped we could get off to an amicable start, but if you prefer to do things the hard way…that can be arranged.”
Did Cruella de Ville just fucking smile at me?
