“Cal’s been taking me for years. You know, just in case.”
“For fuck’s sake…” I groaned.
Vox pointed to Naomi’s suitcase, then gestured over his head to where the bedrooms were. He was clearly telling everyone to get settled in.
“Fine. You’re so bossy.” Naomi sniffed, grabbing her big pink suitcase and rolling it down the hall.
Cass snorted, then turned to Theo. “I guess you might as well show me where I’m staying.” She gave my sister a critical up and down. “Better not smell like a fucking gym.”
Theo just smirked and grabbed Cass’s massive Louis Vuitton bag, heading toward the kitchen.
“Let’s go, princess. I’ll need your help moving all the free weights out of your room.”
“Is that a fucking joke?” Cass snarled, though she at least was following Theo.
Once we were alone, Vox gestured for me to follow him, but I shook my head.
“Wait, tell me where we’re going first. Are we going to get Cal?”
Vox gave me a pitying look and shook his head. He leaned over the desk to write me another note.
‘Gun range. You need to learn how to shoot.’
The words seemed to burn on the page before me as the reality of the situation sank in. I had never had any interest in learning how to shoot a fucking gun, but in that moment, knowing that some faceless villain had my psycho and washurtinghim… I suddenly wanted to know how to shoot a gunreallyfucking badly.
I crumbled Vox’s note in my hand and gave him a nod. Something close to respect twinkled in his silver eyes, and hejerked his head toward the door, indicating that he wanted me to follow him.
Cal’s bright, smiling face swam across my vision, and my throat felt tight at the thought that he was somewhere hurting right now, and I had no way of going to him.
Iforgot how weird time behaves during recalibration. It was impossible to tell if I had been chained down here for hours or days. I was beginning to suspect days after the seventh time I nodded off, only to be blasted back into consciousness by excessively loud dubstep.
Damian made sure I was given water to drink, but I wasn’t permitted food for way longer than my body could handle.
After an undetermined amount of time, I was so weak from hunger, exhaustion, and relentless torture that I couldn’t even make fun of McGreggor anymore.
You win this round, asshat.
I fought for as long as I could, but submission was inevitable. It always was. Damian was a master at psychological conditioning.
At first, he would punish me no matter what I said or did, so when he started rewarding me for saying the right thing, it hit that much harder.
I started to crave his praise, and the best way to do that was to convince him that I believed whatever it was he was forcing me to say.
The focus of most of my sessions was Ryan.
Apparently, Ryan texted my phone constantly. Damian never let me see the messages, but every time the dubstep started up, and Damian walked in with McGreggor, I found myself praying Ryan hadn’t sent me any new texts.
He always had, though.
The entire time I was chained in that tub, not a single session passed where Ryan hadn’t left me a new message.
It was making it difficult for me to convince Damian that Ryan wasn’t someone I cared about, and I was punished relentlessly for it.
It made me resent Ryan, which was exactly what Damian wanted.
“Callum, it’s inappropriate, you know. For you to have led this man on to this point. You know better.”
“He’s nothing. Just a good lay,” I croaked, despite the fact that I knew that wasn’t true. Damian brushed my hair back out of my eyes, looking at me with an expression that meant I might have finally said something right.
