I don’t understand it. I don’t understand the darkness of his mind, but I realize that I need to. If I want to survive whatever fucked up game he’s playing, I need to make sense of this. Of him.
He removes the scraps of my shirt and bra and allows them to fall to the floor. I squeeze my eyes shut again when he moves to my leggings and cuts through them too.
Nobody has ever seen me this way. Nobody has ever seen me bare. I feel raw. Exposed. Vulnerable. And there is nothing I can do.
The last and final piece to go is my panties. I try to beg him. I try to plead around the gag, but he doesn’t listen or care. He slices through the silky material and rips them away too.
I am naked in front of him.
My body is consumed with fear, and I don’t know what’s going to happen next. I can barely feel my legs as he drags me from the room, a blur of wild roses and shadows.
The floor is cold beneath my feet, and I wish I’d grabbed my shoes. I wish I’d never left my hotel room. I wish I’d done so many things differently.
His strides are too large, and I can’t keep up. My arm burns from his grip, and eventually, he grows impatient with me. Heaving me up like I am nothing more than a feather, he tosses me over his shoulders and clamps his forearm over the back of my thighs.
My head bobs over his shoulder, and my teeth gnash into the rubber ball with every forceful step. I try to count them. To distract myself. To focus on anything than whatever is about to happen.
He stops outside of an open door, and I stop moving too.
I’m gulping down breaths, and my heart feels like it’s going to explode in my chest. I wiggle in his grip and have one last futile attempt at fighting back, kneeing him in the chest while my hands slap at his face.
It does me no good.
He simply grabs me by the throat again and applies pressure with his thumbs in warning. It is the smallest exertion for him. Barely any effort at all, and already, I can hardly breathe.
The resistance flees from my body in the presence of dread. I feel like a well-trained dog already. Bowing to his silent commands in such a short amount of time.
I fear for my sanity if this is only day one. Part of me questions whether it might be better if he did kill me now.
When he sets me down onto my feet, and my breath returns, it is the first opportunity that I have to take in the room around me.
It is simple. Barren. And also, horrifying. There is nothing more than a bucket in the corner. And a piano in the center.
A piano.
The thing that used to be my instrument of choice now terrifies me more than anything.
Javi makes a gesture to the shiny black nightmare.
“Play for me,” he demands.
I glance up at him, and my reply is reflexive. Instant. A mumbled no. I wait for another threat. More terror. But it doesn’t come.
“No?” he repeats. “Suit yourself, beauty. I will play you a song instead.”
I don’t understand what he means. Because he leaves the room, sliding the heavy door into place until the locking mechanism clicks behind him.
I swallow and look around me. At the nothingness. At the emptiness. I’m freezing, and there is no comfort to be found in here.
Not anywhere.
I wrap my arms around myself and walk the length of the room to keep warm. I’m hungry and thirsty, and I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve eaten.
The hunger that has been absent since my father’s disappearance is now back with a vengeance. My body is preparing for a fight. An all-out war.
But after a while, my feet are numb, and the walking isn’t helping. My stomach is growling, and my eyes are heavy, and I can think of nothing else to do. So I sit down in a corner and curl into myself.
The floor is hard. Painful. Uncomfortable. But even so, the exhaustion from earlier events lulls me into a deep sleep quickly.