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Shhkkk..

“Oh, fuck—please!” Christopher screamed, his voice breaking apart as he thrashed against the chains. “I won’t tell anyone, I swear! Just let me go! Don’t do this! Evie,” Christopher sobbed. “Please!”

Everything stopped.

The blade stilled mid-stroke.

The sound cut off so abruptly, it rang in my ears while Evie’s eyes widened in horror as soon as her name left his lips. She snapped her head towards Wayne who had paused with his hand on the blade.

“Fuck did he just say?” he muttered and slowly looked towards Evie who was shaking her head frantically. Wayne stood taller and gripped the knife in his hand. The glare he sent her was so lethal, I began pulling on the chains, trying to free my fucking wrists.

“I-I don’t…” she stammered, her voice barely holding together as he drew closer to her.

“Fuck off!” I bellowed. “Leave her⁠—”

“You think I don’t fucking know who she is?!” Christopher shouted over me, his voice cracking under the weight of panic. Wayne snapped his head towards him and tilted his head with a feral grin as Evie looked at me and shook her head so subtly, I almost missed it. But I knew what she was trying to convey.

Keep your fucking mouth shut.

“She’s Evie fucking Rosen, you sick fuck!” Christopher yelled.

Evie looked like she was on the verge of passing out and my heart was beating so fast, I was certain I was about to have a fucking heart attack as Wayne walked over to the desk and stabbed the knife into the wood. The items on the table knocked over and rolled off the edge. I could see from here how fast Evie’s chest was rising as she kept her head down and clutched the material of her dress tightly in her fists. Her knees trembled as Wayne adjusted his belt, pulling a keyring that was attached to the loop in his jeans. Sweat slid down my face as Wayne drew closer to the mattress.

“Sick?” he chuckled and reached out to grab Christopher's hollow cheeks.

“I’ll fucking show you sick.”

I froze as Wayne clamped one hand around both of Christopher’s wrists, hauling his arms together like they weighed nothing. The other reached up, metal scraping loud in the silence as he unlocked the shackles from above. “No! Please don’t!” Christopher sobbed, thrashing wildly as his arms were yanked free.

“Leave him alone!” I shouted, pulling against my restraint. “Fight someone your own size, you pathetic cunt!”

Wayne didn’t even glance at me.

I watched in horror as Evie darted across the room, grabbing the chair and dragging it beneath the hook hanging from the rafters. The legs screeched against the concrete, sharp and frantic as she climbed up, reaching for the chain above it and pulling it down.

No matter how much Christopher thrashed and pleaded, Wayne’s hold never faulted. His strength was relentless, dragging his thin body by his arms across the mattress like he was nothing more than dead weight, hauling him toward the centre of the room, where he draped Christopher over the hook.

“No!” Christopher bellowed, and I would never forget the sound that tore out of him when Wayne grabbed the chain and pulled. Christopher’s body jerked upward, arms wrenched above him as the hook took his weight, feet dangling inches from the ground. My bottom lip trembled as his toes scraped uselessly against the concrete, searching for something that wasn’t there.

“Let him down!” I shouted, voice cracking with something I couldn’t contain anymore. “You sick fucking coward! Let him down!” My body was buzzing, breaths shallow as I watched Wayne step back and stare at Christopher like he’d just hung a piece of art.

Christopher’s breathing came in sharp, panicked bursts now, his body twitching with every failed attempt to ease the strain on his arms. “Jackson,” he gasped, tearing my heart out of my chest. “Please.” I shook my head and tore my eyes away as tears slid down my cheeks. Because there was nothing I could do. Nothing.

“Evie! Don’t let him kill me! Think of my son!” Evie flinched like she’d been struck. “He needs me!” Christopher choked, his whole body trembling under the strain.

“My son needs me,” Wayne mocked in a high-pitched tone, tilting his head like he was enjoying the performance. My skin crawled at his imitation. Evie looked up at Christopher, and the grief in her eyes was unbearable. I sat there and took in the scene with a growing pit in my stomach. Suddenly, everything felt so real. Because this wasn’t theoretical anymore. This was real, and I wasn’t ready. I’d been sitting here, telling myself I’d find a way, that I just needed time to come up with a plan.

But there was no time.

There never was.

Because this was going to happen to me, too.

”Don’t do this to me! Just let me go. I won’t tell anyone, I swear to fucking God!” Christopher cried, and the pain in his voice was gut-wrenching. Wayne stepped forward and viciously punched him in the stomach. I squeezed my eyes shut, as if that could block out the sounds of flesh meeting flesh.

“Come here!” Wayne snapped.

I opened my eyes up and saw him with his hand outstretched towards Evie. She placed her hand in his like it was instinct, like her body moved before her mind could catch up, and let him pull her into him so she was facing Christopher. Evie’s face crumpled the second she looked up at him. Her lips pulled downward as she tried to hold it together.