Page 3 of Bend
I can’t make sense of anything, except for the peppermint—the scent of my childhood. Of warmth and home and fires in the fireplace during the holidays.
And then he speaks again.
Candy canes and the idea of comfort vanish.
His simple words change my world forever.
“No one has claimed you yet, no?” he says, pausing as a hand covers my mouth to prevent the scream I tell myself to emit but never really sounds. “Bene. You are mine, then.”
A shiver of terror ricochets through me and takes ownership of my every nerve. It permeates through the miasmic haze closing in on my consciousness, but it’s too late.
Darkness wins the battle.
Consumes me.
My world slips away.
Chapter Three
I hear my breath first.
Not the beat of my heart.
Just the ragged, stuttered rasp as I breathe in and then the uncertainty in it as I exhale.
My heart is quiet. Frozen with fear. Silenced by the unknown.
I’m concentrating, trying so hard to not move—to pretend to be asleep so that whoever did this to me still thinks I still am. I’m so focused on not moving that for a moment I don’t register the pressure on my eyes, don’t realize I’m blindfolded.
My thoughts scatter.
The only one I can grab onto is about the drink from the bar. The one the brown-eyed man bought for me. Then blacking out in the alley. Now feeling completely different than a hangover. The inability to think, to grasp complete thoughts tells me my mind has been altered. That I’ve been drugged.
My head is still in a haze of chemicals, but it recognizes one thing and one thing only—fear. Empty, panicked shouts ricochet around in my brain but cannot escape, cannot manifest themselves into a scream.
The bed beneath me is luxuriously comfortable. The thought flashes through my head, and I struggle to comprehend why in the midst of my chaotic emotions my mind picks to think about this, to concentrate on this. But I cling to the thought, hold onto something tangible to fixate on rather than the unknown that surrounds me.
My mouth is dry and my jaw feels sore, tired. I struggle and break through the fog momentarily, then frantically dive back under when thoughts connect, synapses fire, and realization hits. Something is lodged between my front teeth. I’m bound and gagged. Fear mixes with anxiety as my mind emerges from the haze. I immediately move my hands to remove it and realize I can’t. My arms are stretched out at my sides and restrained at my wrists, as are my legs.
A gentle strain on them from an unforgiving hold.
My heart thaws only to be overtaken by a new sensation.
Terror.
Unfettered panic begins to reign. Body wracking tremors attack my limbs as I begin to struggle, fear owning me, the need to escape overwhelming me. I try to yell for help but all that comes out is a muffled sound as I thrash my head back and forth. I buck and writhe my body, my head still groggy but my body on high alert, consumed with the unknown and the never-ending darkness I see. I struggle to breathe, to think, but all I can focus on is that I’ve been kidnapped. That I’m going to be raped, killed, and who knows what the hell else, but I’ve watched enough true crime television shows to know what happens to women in situations like this.
I struggle again, yanking against the restraints with all my might. The only results I have to show for my efforts are aching joints and muscles screaming just as loud as the despair in my soul.
Nothing gives.
Nothing gives except for my first strands of hope.
A tear leaks out. I wait for the feel of it sliding down my cheek, but it doesn’t because it’s absorbed immediately by the cloth covering my eyes. I attempt to swallow and gag on the bile wanting to escape, just like I do. I try to calm myself down, flee the mind-numbing fear that takes hold but I can’t. Not only have I been taken and held against my will, but so has my most important sense: my sight.
No one knows I’m here, wherever here is. Not a single soul.
Oh fuck!
