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Beside me, Christopher let out a quiet breath that might’ve been a laugh. “That’s what I said,” he murmured, shifting slightly on the mattress.

I didn’t look at him. “I’m not you.”

“No,” he agreed easily. “You’re not.”

Because I wasn't someone who would just accept defeat—I’d never been. I wouldn't start now, not when it felt like her life was in my hands. “What are the worst punishments?” I asked to prepare myself. The hunger pains were starting to settle in and I was close to soiling myself more than I wanted to admit, but it didn’t deter me from the battle I was prepared to fight. I was getting us all out of here, one way or another.

“Resuscitation asphyxiation is probably the worst one,” he answered after a period of silence.

“Resuscitation, what?” I asked incredulously.

“That’s what Liam used to call it. He hangs us from the beam with a thick rope and waits till you pass out. Then pulls you down and resuscitates you with CPR,” Christopher said, the chains above him clanging against the brick. My heartbeat was drumming loud enough that I was sure he could hear it from beside me. “Then there’s the biting,” he said. “He bit my pinkie clean off, and Evie stitched the hole up with black thread afterwards. Not the prettiest, but got the job done, I guess.”

Evie, who was afraid of needles, did that?

“What…else does Evie do?” I didn’t know why I asked. What she’d been forced to do in captivity wouldn’t change how I felt about her, and I knew I had no right to hear about the depravity she’d been subjected to unless she wanted to tell me.

“She’s his assistant,” he whispered, as if afraid of my reaction. “When I first woke up after being taken, he came downstairs and did exactly what he did to you…to me. She stood behind him and kept her head down,” he recalled. “She would feed and clean me and Liam like she was a nurse and we were her patients. I’ll admit, I hated her guts for the first two months. I thought she was in on it,” he recalled, as if my heart hadn't just stopped.

“But then…last week he pushed her down those stairs. She smashed her head pretty badly and she could barely stand up.” I clenched my eyes shut and leant my head back against the brick wall as the tears finally fell from my eyes.

“He put her on the hook and…” He trailed off. I opened my eyes and turned towards him, squinting through the darkness to see his silhouette.

“And what?” I pushed, even as my stomach turned, something sour rising fast enough to make me regret asking.

“He tasered her severely, then afterwards…he held her in his arms while she cried. It was so fucked up. Then he just left her on the floor afterwards, and didn’t come back to get her for a couple of days. That’s when I found out who she was,” Christopher said, his voice quieter now, like even he knew he was stepping into something heavy.

“Evie Rosen. I mean…I didn’t put it together at first. She was just another version of him to me,” he whispered, dropping his voice even lower when we heard a creak above us. “Didn’t realise she was that Evie. The one I'd see on those late-night cold case programs where they reckon she ran and staged the whole thing. You know? The fake letter⁠—”

“It wasn't fake,” I cut in, sharper than I meant to.

Evie had become a poster image for women that went missing after her abduction. Her remains never being found created conspiracy theories that were insulting and ridiculous. Most people believed she was a runaway who faked her death by creating a fake letter from The Skinner and putting it in the mailbox herself. But they had no fucking idea how wrong they were.

Good things come to those who wait. And my patience has rewarded me greatly.

I’d never forget those lines. I’d never forget the feeling when I saw that letter. It was like…in that moment, everything stopped. There was no sound, no summer breeze, no warmth against my skin, just…nothing. Even the moonlight felt like it had been pulled back, like the world had decided to leave me alone with it. Just me and that letter, and the sick, creeping understanding of what I was actually looking at.

“No…no, this isn’t…” I choked, shaking my head frantically. “N-not her. Not Evie,” I stammered, clenching my eyes shut as I paced the sidewalk. “Not now, not after…” Everything. After the way she kissed me. After the words we finally said to each other. My legs gave out before I even registered it happening. One second I was standing, the next I was on my knees on the cold pavement, the impact barely registering through everything else tearing through me. The letter slipped slightly in my grasp, but I clutched it tighter, dragging it back in like it was the only thing tethering this nightmare to something real.

A sob broke through, sharp and raw, ripping out of my chest before I could stop it. I bent forward, shoulders shaking, the paper crumpling further beneath my grip as I pressed it against my chest like that would somehow make it untrue. “This isn’t real,” I whispered, over and over, like repetition might make it stick. “This isn’t…”

“She didn't do that,” I said, quieter now, blinking away the past.

Christopher nodded slowly. “Yeah, I figured as much.” He shifted slightly beside me. “She’s not what I expected,” he added. “Took a while to get her to talk. She barely said anything at first.”

I swallowed, my throat tight. “That sounds like her.”

“I told her about my son,” he said. “Theo. Figured it might…I don’t know. Make things feel normal for a second. She listened, then she started talking too.”

“About what?”

“I’m assuming you.”

My breath caught before I could stop it.

“She spent hours talking about this Jackson guy.”

“What did she say?” I asked, even though my tongue suddenly felt too big for my mouth.