by Sonya Jesus
“Where are you going?”
“I have a fitting with a wedding dress designer, and then after, a date with a wedding planner.” She winks. “I knew you’d say yes.”
Because she didn’t give me a choice. “We both want the same thing. Marrying you now or in a year, doesn’t make a difference.” It is just another reason why 327 has to go.
She pouts. “Don’t make it sound so unromantic, Breaker. The sex is good, and we know what’s best for each other. We get each other.”
I give her that. As messed up as it sounds, I don’t have to explain my actions to Magdalena or hide my business ventures. There are no elaborate stories or shielding her from the brutal truth. She belongs in my world.
Hell, she belongs in it more than me.
15
Sigh of Sadness
327
“Where are you taking me?” I scream and kick the back of the seat. My hands are tied in front of me, and my feet are bound, but that doesn’t keep me from moving and whirling around as much as my seat belt lets me. “You aren’t going to kill me,” I announce for some stupid reason and immediately regret it.
Only one chuckles. “She’s smart.”
I recognize that voice. I wait for the other to speak, but he doesn’t. There are two of them, at least. One who I saw first, and the one who came from behind me with chloroform. I don’t know how they got into the sanctuary unnoticed or how they carried me out without—Oh, my God.
“Did you hurt anyone else?” The terror in my voice is unmistakable. They can take me back to The Farm and tie me up again, or send me to The Butcher—I don’t care—but I do care if they took anyone else from there. All those women are prime targets—forgotten by society and hiding out from those who tried to kill them.
Shit. They were already broken, it wouldn’t take them long to be destroyed. I scream and kick with all my might, demanding an answer. “What did you do with the women there? Where are they? Are you taking them to The Farm?” The string of questions is supplemented with repeated powerful kicks.
“Answer me!” I shriek, thrashing my head toward the glass.
“Shit. I’m going to pull over,” the unrecognizable voice speaks again.
No answer again.
The car swerves to the right, and through the blindfold, I can see lights streaming in. They get dimmer and dimmer the farther we go. My heart beats heavily as I struggle against my restraints, slamming my bound head against the headrest and screaming for help. I know I’m not going to get any, but it helps me release the adrenaline pumping through my veins.
The car speeds up, and I scream again. A dramatic turn slams my left side into the window. I’m behind the driver. The thought processes quickly as I slide my feet toward the middle, aiming for the center. I angle my body as best I can in the driver’s direction and kick—but a hand on my ankle slows my aim, just as the car is pulled to a stop.
I’m yanked out of the back seat in a rush. One of them holds my legs together, keeping me from using them, and the other holds my shoulders up. A rope, or cord of some sort, is wrapped around my waist and threaded between my thighs, then wrapped down my legs. I try to jump and shake my head vigorously, so I can shift the blindfold and look the person in the eye.
“Fuck, stop moving or I’m going to hurt you.”
My heart sinks into the pit of my stomach. It pulses around in there, clawing its way up again.
“Hand me that other one.”
Hurt me. He doesn’t want to hurt me, I repeat to myself as I steady my breaths. The other person isn’t answering. Can it be? A moment of relief washes through me. All my muscles feel the effects of the constant movement and go weak.
“Breaker?” I call from the depths of my aching body. “You found me?”
A low sigh breaks through the surface, and it sounds almost like Breaker’s. “I’m not Breaker, Lyla,” the man answers with a growl, and it’s the sadness I recognize. Breaker had the same tone, the same forced-to-be-this-way rumble in the back of his throat. Something you only get from growing up together, and the same one the new girl had when she felt forced into something.
Oh…
I plead with no one, not this time. I scream at the top of my lungs and fall to the ground. “You sent her?” I shout, tears pooling in the corners of my eyes. They dampen the blindfold, one of the kitchen rags by the smell of it. They back up. Their absence if felt in the air around me, but I’m too weak to run. They’d catch me again.
Breaker would let me think I was safe, and then pluck me out of my world.
In my blindness, everything becomes clear. “That’s how you got in and out, and where you knew to find me. Where is she?” Knowing them, she was just a pawn. Someone they forced or blackmailed into hurting me. She’s probably dead, or on The Butcher’s slab right now.
“Not here.”
I kick out, unintentionally hitting muscle for the first time. I try again, and hear a soft curse before he’s forcing me on my feet.
“327, you really need to stop thrashing around like that. You’re going to damage the goods and then Boss-man is going to take it out on me.”
Where did I know that voice from? Déjà vu filters through and starts making sense. It was the guy who met me at the bar. Romolo. The one who apologized when I was dazed out.
“Why are you taking me back there?” I ask, suddenly feeling like all the air is sucked out of my lungs by a vacuum cleaner.
“I have to.” The soft tone is nearly inaudible. “And you should play along.”
“I should?” I scoff and spit at the space in front of me. “So you can take me to The Farm and break me in again? Do you get the pleasure? Or does—”
Romolo threatens, “There are ways of breaking someone without breaking them in.”
“What does that mean?” I ask nervously.
“We have a woman in the car.”
I gasp. “Let her go.” Whoever it is. “Please. These women have been through so much already. You don’t need them. They aren’t very young and some of them have husbands who would know if they were missing.” Abusive ones.
“Relax. We are stocked up at The Farm.”
The man, I assume is Breaker’s brother, comes back. “Breaker’s expecting us. Put her in the trunk. He’s really fucking pissed.”
“Well, tell him to go fuck himself!” I shout out, feeling completely and utterly helpless.
The latch of the trunk clicks open, and I’m hoisted inside. I thrash and scream only to realize I’m kicking a body. My hands run over the clothing, finding the first debilitating article: thin, old jammies. “Addie,” I shout, with a thinned-out voice, just as they slam the hood of the car, locking me in.
My cold and dormant fingers pass over her face, stopping under her nose.
“Addie…” I plead, but I feel nothing. “She’s not breathing!” I scream and scream, over and over again, until I get light-headed and see nothing.
I fight against the darkness, but…
"Mercy!” The soft voice jars me from the pit of darkness. “Wake up. The car has stopped.”
My eyes shoot open. Gasping for breath, I calm my nerves. The overwhelming sensation to barf overtakes me, and I puke the contents of my stomach. The pungent smell drives me back to the hole near the poppy fields. “Shit…” I force myself to open my eyes again, but it’s still dark. The blindfold is still over my eyes.
“Mercy, honey?” Addie’s voice soothes me for a minute, and I focus on the surroundings.
I’m stuck in a fucking trunk. Deep inhales help narrow down the last thing I remember. “You weren’t breathing.”
“Well, I am now.” Her voice is full of strength I can’t match. “Work through. Breathe with me.”
After a few deep calming breaths, the sound of her exhales drive away my panic attack.
“I’ve been trying to kick this damn taillight out since we stopped. It’s not budging.”
“I’m so sorry,” I plead, as the guilt causes me to c
rumble.
“Hey now. It’s not your fault. Last time I checked, there were two assholes trying to take you out.”
I think back again, only remembering the book on my nightstand. It hadn’t been there before. “Did you see Kelsie?”
“Kelsie?” Addie whisper-shouts. “What does she have to do with all of this?”
“She wasn’t there just for the help,” I confess sadly.
“Hmm…” Addie breathes out heavily. “Doesn’t mean she didn’t need it. I knew there was something different about her, like she was forced to be there in the beginning. It was only after she met you that she acclimated to being at the center. I chalked it up to nervousness and feeling out of place, but…where is she now?”
The concern in Addie’s voice catches me off guard. I have no idea where she is. Telling Addie she was probably being hacked to pieces isn’t an option.
“HEY!” she screams out at the top of her lungs. “Fuck head One and Two! Where is Kelsie? What have you done to her?”
“Addie,” I petition softly. “I should have told you the truth. I ran away from this…this place. These guys are awful people, please don’t…they—”
“Shh. Whatever it is they did, I’m sure it wasn’t because you went willingly.” She pounds against the inside of the trunk with her fisted, tied hands and winces in pain.
“Addie, stop.” I shake my head. “They took me to this place called The Farm. Kelsie’s probably there.”
“Where?” Addie growls and shouts, “Where is Kelsie?” She lowers her voice and speaks her thoughts aloud, “Maybe the new guard took her.”
What did she mean? “New guard?”
“That’s how they got in. It wasn’t Kelsie who let them in. I haven’t seen her.” She stops and shuffles around. “That doesn’t matter. We have to focus on getting out of here. Are your hands tied up?”
“Yes,” I confirm as I try to separate them, “and from my waist down.”
“I managed to get my feet loose, and my hands are tied lower down my arm, not exactly at my wrists. Can you find my hands?”
I grope the area between us until I come across her hands. She holds my fingers between her hands for a moment, reassuring me, and then works them toward the knot. “Let me try to unknot you.”
“They tied me pretty tight.” I remain perfectly still as she tries to work the cord.
“Pays to have been married to a navy man.” She chuckles softly and winces. “I must have a couple of broken ribs,” she announces as she undoes one of the knots, but there are a few more to go. “Once we get you untied, we are going to start screaming. As soon as that hood flies open, you run for it, you hear me?”
“What about you?”
“Honey, I’m old, and I haven’t run anywhere in over twenty years. I’m not fast, but I can slow them down. Give you enough time to get away and get help.”
“No!” I nod my head ferociously. “I’m not going to leave you. You’re here because of me.”
“Doll face, I’m here because I’m supposed to be here. Nothing happens by chance, and if anything happens to me, I need you to make sure the sanctuary will be looked after. Women need a safe place to run to, no matter what they’ve gotten themselves into.”
“We aren’t leaving here,” I admit softly. “There’s no point in running, Addie. The Farm…there’s a man here who…he won’t let me get away, not twice.”
“This time you’re going to have help. I’m going to give you a head start.”
I wince. “I had help before, and I barely got away. The Butcher chased me through the woods until I couldn’t run any farther. I should have gone to the police, but these people, Addie, they have ears everywhere. If I go there, I’m…”
“No, you don’t go there.” She remains calm, working on the third and final knot with her shaking fingers. “There’s a man named Elmer Thompson over on West Palm Avenue, near the church. You tell him Addie sent you and then tell him everything. Everything, doll. He’s a good man, and he knows ways to get you safe.”
“I can’t, Addie. If they find out…” I sigh heavily. “There is no safe.”
We hear movement outside the car, and Addie picks up her pace. She lowers her voice to an almost inaudible whisper. “Run, until you can’t run anymore, and then run some more. Don’t worry about me. Don’t wait for me. I can hold my own with men like these.”
“You have no idea what kind of men these are.” The rope falls between us, and I scurry to lift our blindfolds up. In the dark, I struggle to unbind her, but she stops me, and both of us work on the ropes around my legs. I bring my knees up to my chest, and we manage to undo a few.
“The Mafia,” she says softly. “I’ve been around a few girls like you, my dear. They’re all escaping the inescapable and none of them believe in the power of their own strength.”
Then we listen quietly as the two men smoke outside the car. We unfasten all my ropes. It takes forever, or it feels like forever, but by the time the hood opens, I catch them off guard.
Addie screams for me to run.
I run toward the trees like I did before, but this time, it only takes seconds to be captured. The trees are farther and there is no dirt beneath my feet.
Addie and I glance at each other, knowing everything changes the moment you see their faces. Two very angry men look at me. One whose slate blue eyes glimmer under the light. He looks a lot like Breaker, handsome, muscular, just cleaner around the edges. Breaker was full of rough points and stiff movements, never eager to reveal his feelings. His brother, however, looks at me with a mixture of annoyance and downright empathy. It almost makes him feel human.
He shakes his head and glances down my shirt. “You threw up.”
“It happens when you have a panic attack.”
“Let me grab you something from Kelsie’s place and some wet naps. I think she keeps those around to clean up the dog’s mess.”
Addie looks at me when they mention Kelsie’s name, understanding the truth quickly leads to anger flashing through her eyes. Kelsie had indeed been working with them, and wasn’t a victim of violence like the rest of us, she inflicted it. My heart hurts. Recalling the stories she shared in group, I wonder how many of them were truth and how many were lies.
“He did all of this to find me?” I whimper.
Romolo nods his head. “No, he did this and so much more.”
“So now what? He kills me?”
The brother comes back with a large T-shirt and a pack of wet tissues. He cocks his head for Romolo to follow, together they lead me inside toward the stairs. I glance back at Addie, who struggles to climb after me, but I say nothing. If I do, they’ll probably break a few more ribs before they kill her. I sigh and shake my head as I step on the last step of the luxurious house. The long corridor toward the room echoes our steps as we make our way down.
They shove us into a bedroom and tie Addie to a chair. After I wash off in the bathroom and change into the T-shirt, which is too short, I’m given a man’s button-up. They tie me with zip ties. Triple zip ties, in case I decide to escape, and a blindfold.
There is nothing I can do, except sit and spend the last few hours confessing to Addie, because I can’t bear to tell her she’s never getting out of here again.
That and I hate myself for sniffing the shirt, and inhaling the scent, of the man who brought me here. I know it belongs to Breaker.
16
The Surplus
Breaker
“Where is Kelsie?” the old woman shouts in the opposite direction of where I’m standing. Her blindfold is on again, tightly secured thanks to Stone, who thinks I’m going to let this woman go after she saw their faces and has been in my home.
Disappointment seems to be my specialty lately. The thought evokes a grunt out of me, catching Stone’s attention.
His eyes are on me, reading me while he’s standing near the window. Every once in a while, he blatantly glances at Romolo, who is tying the woman to the chair again. Stone
arches his eyebrows and curtly dips his head toward the woman, as if signaling for me to intervene. Calm and composed, I simply let him stare.
Even when standing in the same crime scene as I am, moral superiority is his thing. I don’t give a shit. He can be the good brother; I’d rather be the brother who is respected. All the googly eyes in the world aren’t going to save the woman, but 327 is another matter entirely. She’s knocked out on the floor near the closet, of her own doing apparently. None of these fuckers hurt her, or there would be more bodies to conceal by the end of the night.
Physically, I can’t even look in her direction. Her presence debilitates me, and in front of these guys, I can’t bend. I can’t kneel down beside her and check her pulse, or assure myself she’s still breathing.
Which is absolutely ridiculous because she’s here to stop breathing.
I stiffen and straighten myself, using the motion to ease the tenseness in my muscles. I’m tighter than the zip ties on the older woman.
Stone clears his throat and glares at me while pointing at the blindfolded woman with the muffle in her mouth. The words are on his tongue; he’s smart enough to swallow them.
Finally, I acknowledge his concern, “If you’re trying to pry a soul out of me, you’re going to have to dig deeper.”
The old woman mumbles something incoherent, and I signal for Romolo to remove the wadded material from her mouth. This room is soundproof, my father had it installed when he couldn’t take the noise, so it was just for effect.
“Where are Kelsie and Mercy, you soulless bastards?” she spits out, her voice gravelly and dry.
“Bastards!” I use my hand, palm up, to point toward our guest and address my brother, “Plural…I value honesty.” I smirk in my brother’s direction and stand. “What’s your name?”
At hearing my voice, the older woman tilts her head in my direction and says, “Are you deaf?”
Stone’s lips cant in a smile, and he raises his brow. “He has selective hearing.”