The Kidnapper's Brother: A Dark Criminal Romance

by Alice T. Boone

  “Wait!”

  The voice, her voice, was almost small enough to ignore. Though, it was so pathetic that I knew I never would. My body was frozen in the doorframe, too tired to stay but too weak to leave, and my hands balled into tight fists. I wanted to snap, to snarl, to sink my teeth into virgin flesh, but when my heart gave another painfully beat against my chest, I felt useless to do much of anything.

  “What?” Her response wouldn’t come, but when my foot took another step out the door, her quiet whimper filled my head. My will weakened, and finally, I stole a glance back at the woman on the bed, the woman who would only meet my gaze for a second before shifting. “What?”

  Her bruised lips parted once, twice before finally choking out a response. “I’ve been by myself for two days.”

  I couldn’t help the hiss that built in my chest, the way my head snapped forward. I’d been alone for years, slugging through this mess with Toby for decades, and she had the balls to complain to me after just two days? Meeting those eyes again made that flash of anger impossible to maintain. As much as I wanted to feel sorry for her, to take pity on her embarrassing honesty, all it really brought up were reminders of how much I’d lacked my own.

  “I just—”

  “Eat.”

  When her eyes were off of me, every nerve in my body screamed for me to leave. When my muscles refused to listen, all I could really do was spit out another hiss. The original plan was to leave her here and let Toby deal with the rest, but nothing had ever worked out so smoothly when it came to my brother. Leaving her now felt like denying a man his final meal, and with a tightened jaw, I allowed myself to turn around. As I stepped into the room, the brunette seemed to relax— a sight which really only pissed me off more.

  When the sound of her fork along the plate started to fill the room, I suddenly lost any ability I had to stand still. A familiar itch skirted over every muscle I knew, and when deep breathes were enough to calm it, I forced my attention to the room around me. Ignoring the woman’s curious glances, I worked to snatch the discarded clothing off of the floor, tossing it in Toby’s hamper across the room.

  Whatever peace cleaned found was gone within moments, washed away the second I started on refolding his sock drawer. The sight of another pipe was enough to turn my stomach, to freeze my muscles. It should have been a common enough occurrence that I could just brush it away, that I could accept the life my brother had fallen into. Instead, all Toby’s addition did was remind me of how this shit started, of the first time I found him strung out on Mom’s couch. When my stomach twisted again, spasming muscles slammed the drawer shut, and all I was left with was the brunette’s burning eyes against my skin.

  A single glance over my shoulder confirmed sick suspicions, and as I turned my attention forward again, I spit out the only thing I could really think of. “Hurry up.”

  “Sorry.”

  With her attention back on the food in front of her, I found a moment to settle back against the dresser, wood singeing my skin. The sound of her fork against porcelain filled the room again, and I almost had a chance to breathe. Until her eyes locked with my own, at least, a new nervousness settling over her.

  Her glance shifted back down to her plate, and as her tongue darted out to lick her lips, the woman struggled with the questions she wanted to ask the most. “You’re Alex?” I couldn’t help the tug at the side of my lips, a grin that vanished when her eyes darted back up towards me. A tilt of my chin sent her eyes downward, and her skin paled a little further. Casually, she attempted to pick at her food. “Do you know when Toby’s coming back, Alex?” My name on her tongue sent a shiver through my body, genuine embarrassment for her the closest thing I’d felt to empathy in years. “Did you eat already, Alex?”

  I couldn’t smother my dark chuckle, the way my hand rubbed at my groggy cheek. With my head tilted down, I watched her through my lashes, and when her eyes finally caught my annoyed grin, whatever colour was left within her vanished.

  “You’re humanizing the wrong brother, Rabbit,” I noted, the grin finally falling and my teeth tightening. “Try that psychology bullshit on Toby when he gets home. He’s stupid enough to fall for it.”

  “I didn’t mean it like—”

  “Eat,” I snarled. When the demand earned only her attention, I hissed again. “I’m not repeating it.”

  When her vision finally fell, so did my annoyance. My gaze danced back ahead of me when the guilt reared its head, and the sounds of the brunette’s chewing was already beginning to make my skin crawl. As heartless as I was, there still seemed to be something sick about hurting something that was already covered in blood, that was already limping, that was already before the reaper.

  “He’ll be back tomorrow night.”

  “Is he—” Desperation strangled the words in her throat, and when I refused to look back to her, Bunny tried again. “Is he bringing someone else?”

  “Jealous?” The comment came so smoothly, so quietly, that I was almost certain it had never left my lips. When I finally looked over my shoulder at her, I knew I wasn’t so lucky. The brunette’s caved shoulders had somehow sunken deeper, her freckles even darker along white skin. With a single word, I’d broken her just a little more, and now, I was locked into place. As much as I wanted to pretend differently, maybe I was just as much her executioner as Toby. “Why the fuck would he need someone else when he has you?”

  The hints of her tremble awakened a disease hiding in my bones. She didn’t need to say the sick thoughts for me to hear them. Within two days, my brother had been able to turn the helpless rabbit in a starved dog. Somewhere, she was hoping for Toby to bring another victim into the mix, for a chance at freedom, for the ability to be able to throw someone else under the bus.

  Though, if I were in her position, maybe I would have too.

  “Please, Alex.” The whimper in her voice refocused my vision. On the bed, still chained in place, the woman had pushed her plate to the side, chest heaving as she looked at her last hope for survival. “I can’t stay here.”

  “What the fuck did I just tell you?” The harshness in my voice sent a shudder through her body, and for the first time, she twitched away from me. “What the fuck did I just say?”

  “I’m sorry!” Her plea came out rushed, the slightest hint of rose tinting her cheeks when she finally realized the misstep she’d taken, the chance she’d thrown away. “You helped me and I just thought—”

  “Helped you?” My chuckle snapped her mouth shut, and once more, her blue eyes rested on me. “When the fuck did I help you?” My hiss wrinkled her brow, stole the last breath from the lungs of the living. “Maybe I just didn’t want Toby to get the first shot at you.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  I wouldn’t have stopped. If I hadn’t’ve caught the glimmer of hope in her eye, the worry that must have shaken her system, I wouldn’t have stopped. Instead, all I could really do was freeze. With Toby, I had been too afraid to use a firm hand. I let him live in a false hope. I’d made the mistake of letting him grow comfortable with the idea that his big brother would get him out of any trouble he ever found himself in. Now, to see that same glimmer of hope in the eyes of a stranger, I felt my stomach twist with a familiar premonition.

  If I let her think I would save her, she’d never save herself.

  All protecting her would ever do was kill her.

  Weren’t my hands bloody enough?

  Sickness pushed me forward, but it wouldn’t lend me the life I needed. Though, maybe only the dead were capable of frightened a priestess as divine as the one shackled before me. She wouldn’t look at me as I stepped towards her, and despite my proximity, her body wouldn’t tremble like it should, wouldn’t shake the way it did for Toby. Her scream filled the room as my hand darted out, as my fingers tangled painfully in her hair, and finally, I found the reaction I needed. Her tired muscles straightened as she lifted herself up onto her knees, desperate to alleviate some of the pain as I lifted h
er face closer to my own.

  It was only when I knew I was in complete control, only when her eyes met my own, that I found the strength to lie to her.

  “No one’s coming for you. You got that?”

  “Yes.”

  Her squeak brought a rush of satisfaction, a wash of self-loathing. My chest tightened, and when I wasn’t strong enough to breath the next lie, I let my eyes wander her face. I let myself drink in her pain.

  “I haven’t even seen your name on the fuckin’ news.” My chuckle sent a shiver over her skin, and when my fingers tightened in her hair, I forced out the statement I knew she needed next. “Toby took you because you let him take you.”

  “I didn’t—”

  Another flex of my fingers brought another cry of pain. Then, another sting of guilt. Breaking her was the only kindness I could really do the woman, and after leaving her alone with my brother, maybe I owed her that much. If I could steal the fight from her, she’d be more willing to go along with Toby’s delusions.

  If I stole the fight from her, maybe she’d have a chance at life.

  “The sooner you accept that, the better.” As my fingers released their grip, the brunette tumbled to the mattress in front of me, scrambling the next moment to put some distance between us. “Or maybe not. Sounds like Toby likes the ones that fight.”

  When I entered the room, I was certain that I’d always see the brunette the way she was in her home, the comfortable doe who skirted so easily around her grandmother’s home. To see her now, to see the well of tears in her eyes, to see the way her chest heaved with the weight of a crushed soul, I knew that was a lie. No matter what happened, I’d always see her broken. I’d always see her for what I’d done to her— that was the punishment I deserved.

  Her cry of defiance didn’t come until I had already started to make my way out of the room, until the door to Toby’s room slammed shut behind me.

  “I did fight him. I tried to fight him, Alex.”

  For now, for another few hours, I would be strong enough to block out the sound of her sob, of her choked sense of hope. I would reassure myself that I had simply done what I needed to. I destroyed a stranger in order to help my brother. Yet still, when I finally made my way downstairs, I had to throw the remaining food into the garbage.

  Dead men don’t eat.

  Chapter Five

  I’d been holding my breath so long that my stomach ached, but my muscles were too terrified to make another move. Any extra sound could be the end, and death by suffocation seemed a whole lot more peaceful than death at Toby’s hands. As a kid, I used to watch Gran do her embroidery in awe. My fingers had never been nimble enough, edges far too fat for my liking, but maybe that was just another excuse. Now that I was left with only time, my stomach gnawing away at itself in the lowest form of hunger, I found myself working on the skill I’d been neglecting for so long.

  My fingers weren’t lazy; they were unmotivated.

  I hadn’t seen anyone for nearly 24 hours, and I’d been working away at the bolt on the bed for 5. Though, hunger had a way of making everything seem so slow, so stagnant. Alex’s claim that Toby would return by morning was wrong, and maybe that’s what worried me the most. It was that mistake that started the whisper in my head, the tickle along my spine. If Alex didn’t know when he was coming home, if Toby was breaking promises to his brother, than what was that supposed to mean for someone like me?

  Alex hadn’t made so much as a peep within the walls of the dying home, and what little food he brought me was gone before I could even taste it. Every sound set me on edge. My muscles remained frozen unless there was an absolute, painful silence, and those moments were growing fewer and further between. I was terrified that the time Alex had bought me wouldn’t be enough, and while the thought of Toby catching me trying to escape was awful, the thought of being stuck here with him was infinitely worse.

  If I was going to go, it had to be now.

  If I was going to die, it had to be on my terms.

  This time, when there was the slightest noise from downstairs, I didn’t let my muscles freeze. My attention stayed glued to the slow turning bolt. As my fingers worked away, finally detaching the bar I was pinned to from the rest of the bed, my eyes welled with relief. I was too close now to stop, too committed to even think about turning back. Slipping the cuffs off of the bed frame, I tried to force the blood back through my legs— at least enough to support the wobbly walk over to Toby’s bedside table. It only took me moments to dig the tiny set of keys out from the back of his drawer, trembling hands providing a new challenge before I finally slipped the metal off raw wrists. Sliding the keys back in my pocket, I rushed for the only real escape option I knew: Toby’s window.

  While I’d spent most of my days staring out the iron bars, I’d never really gotten a chance to look at them before. Now, this image of freedom had twisted into something far more insidious. The voice in the back of my head, the prickle along my neck, reminded me that of all the rooms in the house, Toby’s was the only one with bars bolted in. A quick glance at the rotted frame gave me the spark of hope, but a proper look out the window stole it away just as quickly. While I might have been able to survive the mold spores that would come with prying the damn thing out of its foundation, I wasn’t so sure I could survive the second-story drop to the garden bed below.

  I’d never make it on an injured foot.

  Fear dulled whatever sickness I had left, and I wouldn’t let myself breathe when I glanced towards the door. If I breathe, I was certain, I would scream. If the window was too high for my escape, if the front door had already failed me once, then all I had was a sliver of hope left. While Alex hadn’t left the house, I’d heard Toby come in and out from a door in the kitchen. He smoked out back, smoked something that seemed to set Alex on edge every time, but still, he had gone out to smoke something. There was a door in the kitchen, and if the front door was completely off-limits to me, then I still had one last route to take.

  Make it through the back door.

  Make it to a roadway.

  Make it to freedom.

  Approaching the door was the surprisingly easy part— it was what lurked in the hallway that made me doubt everything I had ever known. I was able to slip out of the bedroom silently, but when my attention turned towards the stairs, when I felt myself retracing every step I had last time, memories of icy hands ran over my skin. I’d be smarter this time, I promised myself. I wouldn’t let him touch me again. If what Alex said was true, then no one was going to be searching here for me— and why would they? If I wanted to go home, then I’d have to make my own path, and in that moment, I was certain it wouldn’t involve feeding into Toby’s delusions.

  I wasn’t his Bunny.

  I was Lilah. And Lilah wanted to get the hell out of here.

  It would only take ten steps between Toby’s door and the top of the stairs— steps I’d counted over in my head a hundred times already. As I finally approached that awful staircase, I let my mind fall silent. Careful footwork carried me down one step, and when that wasn’t met with brutal punishment, I let it carry me down another. By the time I’d reached the fourth step, my entire being had frozen. I waited for the slightest hint that something was wrong, a sound or a chill, but nothing would come. It was only after another minute of silence that I allowed myself to peek down to the floor below.

  I had to be smarter this time.

  I wasn’t going to get another chance.

  The layout looked exactly like I’d remember— every last vivid detail that I clutched to when Toby dragged me back up the stairs by my hair. There was less clutter this time, and the scent of mold was littered with traces of lemon furniture polish. This time, Alex had been stretched out on the couch, his forearm tossed over his eyes as he tried to find the peace he needed. Otherwise, the place looked identical. Including the door pressed against the far wall of the kitchen. It would take another minute of pushing, of prodding, of forcing before I could beg
in the most dangerous part of my descent.

  If he was asleep, then I had a chance of making it to the door without being noticed.

  If he was asleep, then I might actually be able to escape that hell.

  I wouldn’t breathe as I passed the foot of the stairs, wouldn’t let myself blink as I skirted along a newly-polished kitchen table. I didn’t get the courage to suck back a shaky breath until I’d made it to the back door, until I’d stolen a glance back to make sure Alex remained sprawled out on the couch. The breath that should have filled me with confidence, with victory, only filled me with nervousness. Whatever lurked on the other side of the door smelled rancid, like rotting meat and decaying fruit, and while the scent pulled a darkened memory from the back of my head, the sensation of a breeze beneath the door commanded all attention. The door wouldn’t lead outside, I was sure, but it must have led to a kind of mudroom, to a cellar with a basement door.

  Opening it was supposed to bring a new reality.

  Instead, all that screamed at me was the same old nightmare.

  The opened door led to a dark staircase, but it wasn’t fear of the dark that kept me in place. That scent hit me full force now, and when every cell in my body filled with panic, I couldn’t ignore the nagging memory any longer. Whatever was in the basement smelled awful, smelled disgusting, smelled of the same scent I’d worked so hard to block out. It was the same scent I was greeted with when I’d finally returned home last summer, when I tore my front door open with the hopes of finding a welcome party and instead found a funeral. It was the smell of a death, and as desperately as I wanted to scream, I couldn’t even let myself breathe.