Not trusting my legs, I use my hands to scoot myself across the floor on my less-bruised hip. My eyes burn at how broken I feel—how broken Iam—but I won’t let myself cry any more. I can’t. After I pull out the tacks holding the bottom of the blanket in place, I peel back a corner and stare out at the deserted street.
Without lamplight, I can see the stars, and I run my fingers over the beads around my wrist. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Z used to do the same thing. He said it calmed him when he wanted to use.
Z…I’m so sorry. I never understood you. Not truly. Not until now.
If I had…would things be different? Would I be back in Boston with him? Safe? Cocooned in my own little bubble with Pixel on my lap watchingFireflyfor the fiftieth time?
My lower lip wobbles as I try to shove my emotions back down where they can’t hurt me. If I’d known what Z was going through, would I have met Ryker? He’s the one good spot in my life. The one thing I know I need. Want.
Staring at his face, relaxed in sleep like it never is when he’s awake, I wish I’d listened to him. I never should have gone after Semyon. Maybe then…we’d still have a chance. Because now…I don’t even know ifIhave a chance. Or if I want one.
31
Ryker
The chill at my side wakes me from a deep sleep, and I sit up, looking around wildly until I see her curled by the window, a flap of the blanket pulled back so she can stare into the street.
“Get away from the window,” I snap and claw my way out of the sleeping bag. I’m at her side in three steps, pulling her into my arms. “What the hell were you doing?”
In the dim light from the single bulb, her eyes shine, wide and terrified, the pale green almost gray. “It’s…too much,” she whispers.
“What’s too much?” I smooth a hand over her hair, and she leans into my touch one moment, then tries to scoot away the next. “Talk to me, Wren.”
“Everything. All of it.” Her breath catches in her throat as she extricates herself from my arms and leans back against the wall. Fingering her bracelet—the one suddenly no longer around my wrist—she counts silently, fighting against her anxiety and panic. I scramble for her pill case, find a Xanax, and press it into her palm.
“Take this, sweetheart. Then come back to bed and tell me what’s wrong.”
Instead of swallowing the pill, she holds it up to the light, turning it over and over between her fingers. “It’s worse now. Knowing there’s an alternative.”
She’s speaking in half sentences and generalizations, and I can’t put the pieces together. But I feel like I’m losing her. “What’s worse? What alternative? Baby, you have to tell me what’s going on in that head of yours. You’re scaring me.”
Her entire body shudders as she forces a breath, and the pill falls to the floor. Scooping it up, I try to hand it back to her, but she shakes her head gingerly. “Z had anxiety and panic attacks his whole life. Mine…didn’t get bad until college. I thought…I thought I had them under control.” Gesturing to the pill in my hand, she offers me a weak smile. “Even though Xanax never took all the pain away, never left me feeling…totally calm. But Zion…he found the secret.”
Wren stares up at me, uncertainty welling in her eyes. “What do I do now that I know the secret too? I can’t forget it.” Her voice lowers, fading away to almost nothing. “I was terrified. Kolya locked me to a pipe in his bathroom. And he made me watch. He had his men hold me down while he cooked the heroin and told me how I’d do anything once he had me hooked. I’d tell him anything he wanted to know.”
“You’re—” She holds up her hand and shakes her head before I can tell her she’s okay, that she only had a taste, and she’s strong enough to know drugs aren’t the answer.
Swallowing hard, she presses her lips together, and I spot the tremble. The struggle for control. I can’t move. Every piece of me aches to hold her, but whatever this is…she has to get through it.
“I’ve never been so scared. Until he drugged me. And then…I felt nothing. No fear. No pain. It was like…I was at peace for the first time in my entire life. Nothing mattered.Nothing. And every time he came for me…he’d let the effects wear off just enough so I’d be afraid. And he’d beat me and threaten and taunt, until I’d start to shake or cry or cower, and then he’d dose me, and it felt…so good. Like all my problems went away.”
“But it wasn’treal, sweetheart.”
A tear balances along her lower lid. “I know. But you don’t understand… When I escaped…he was late, I think. I felt…more clear-headed. And I realized the chain he used was so thin, I could probably break it. So I did. But before I got out of his bedroom, he came in with another dose, and a threat. He was going to rape me. Make me his. And I was going to feel everything because he wasn’t going to give me the drug until he was done.”
Rage sparks across my skin, the heat of it setting me ablaze as I ball my hands into fists and try not to scare Wren any more than she already is. I want to destroy Kolya. Piece by piece, and I want to make sure he’s conscious for every fucking second.
Wren stifles a sob. “I fought him off, kicked him in the balls a couple of times.” A little snort, almost a laugh, mixes with her next sniffle. “And then I saw the needle. And, Ry…Ithought about it.Did I want to use it on him and try to escape? Or use it on myself so I wouldn’t care when he raped me?”
Somewhere under my anger, understanding dawns. Why she’s so scared. Why she can’t fully trust that I’ll protect her.
“It’s so much worse now,” she says softly. “Knowing I could make all my fear and pain go away, if I were willing to pay the price.”
For a few seconds, I don’t move. Wren runs her fingers over her bracelet, and I let her finish her ritual before I offer her my hand. “Can I hold you, Wren? I…need you to know about Hell.”
* * *
Wren
