SCARLET
The Present
Everything fucking hurt. I groaned and tried to blink open my eyes but was only partly successful, seeing as blood and tears had dried and crusted my eyelids shut. The first thing I noticed was that I wasn’t hanging from the ceiling anymore.
Thank god, I thought. I didn’t know how long the human body could live being hung upside down like I had been, but every moment of it was torture. As they took knives to my skin, flaying my body like a fucking animal, I had alternated between screaming and laughing. I knew the screaming was exactly what they wanted. It’s what got their rocks off, but I couldn’t help it. At some point, the pain became too real, too all-encompassing, that I couldn’t ignore it.
But the laughing? The laughing terrified them. I could see it in their eyes every time my mouth curved into a smile. They hadn’t expected that, and if I was honest with myself, I hadn’t either.
I rolled onto my back and whimpered in pain. I must’ve had multiple broken ribs to be in so much pain. Every drag of oxygen into my lungs felt like I was being kicked all over again. I blinked a few more times against the tears welling in the corners of my eyes. The added lubrication let me pry my eyes the rest of the way open.
Looking around, I tried to take in my surroundings. I definitely wasn’t at the warehouse anymore. There were no windows, no tables or chairs, just white walls and a concrete floor, the last of which I was lying on. There were a few fluorescent strip lights on the ceiling that were blinking blue and orange, like the bulbs were about to blow.
Footsteps sounded from the corner of the room, where it looked like there were stairs. I stood no chance of fighting, not in my current state. Every time I made a move, my skin burned and my bones screamed. I had to fucking get out. I just had no idea how to do that after they had been torturing me for god knew how long.
“What did the boss say?” One of the voices trailed in through the door.
“We keep her here for now. They’re going to give up hope and stop looking for her at some point.”
“Did you not see the massacre that happened at the warehouse? They aren’t going to stop looking. We’re going to have to keep moving her, or they’re going to find her and we’ll end up like the sorry bastards at the warehouse.” Each voice had a Spanish accent, and I groaned.
If they had been working for my family, I might have been able to work them over. But the drug dealers that I had a hand in killing? A good outcome was not going to be as likely.
“She’s awake?” They opened the door, and I looked up at them. Their faces were obscured by bandanas from the bridge of their noses down, and they both wore hats that shaded their eyes. Both of them wore long sleeves and jeans and nondescript boots. I wouldn’t be able to pick them out of a lineup with so little to look at.
“What—” I started but then began coughing violently. Each cough felt like someone was stabbing me in the sides, and I begged my body to chill the fuck out because I wasn’t going to survive this amount of pain.
Once the coughing fit cleared up, I tried to wipe the tears off my face, but I couldn’t even lift my arms without wanting to scream. I looked down at them and felt a whimper escape my throat. There were hundreds of cuts all over them, ranging from small little nicks to longer, angrier slashes that were still trying to seep blood. If these assholes didn’t kill me, the infection from all of these cuts would. I followed the length of my body, thanking Hades himself that I still had my pajamas on. At least I wasn’t naked. Life could’ve been worse.
The angry knife cuts extended down my legs as well, some of them much longer than the ones on my arms, and I could vaguely remember those happening. My feet were bare and dirty, covered in dried blood, but I was missing toenails on about six different toes from what I could see. I didn’t remember that happening, thank fuck.
“Taking stock of your injuries, little slut?” one of the men asked.
“There are plenty more beneath the surface. Pretty sure Diego broke about three of your ribs the other day,” the other one chimed in, humor filling his voice.
Fucking pricks.
“You have…no idea…what my boys…are going to…do to your sorry…asses,” I ground out between ragged breaths.
“Your boys are exactly that, sweetheart,” the one on the left said. “Boys. They won’t find you, because we keep moving you. You get moved to a new location every few days. You just don’t remember because we make sure you’re knocked out cold before it happens.”
“Enough,” the other one said. “Stop giving her information.”
“What’s she going to do with it? Report back?” He snorted and placed his boot on my side, putting pressure on my bruised and broken ribs. I screamed and squeezed my eyes shut as blackness threatened my vision.
“Just fucking kill me already, then!” I shouted at them both once his boot left my side.
“That would be too easy on you though, wouldn’t it?” He squatted down and got in my vision, showing me his stupid, ordinary plain brown eyes that could belong to anyone. I would never be able to tell who these people were. “After what you did, you deserve to suffer until we take you to the boss.”
“That’s enough, Aaron!” The one that was squatting next to me must’ve smiled because the skin around his eyes crinkled. He reached out and ran a finger across my lips. My stomach rolled and heaved at the thought of any of these men touching me against my will.
“She’s so pretty though, Diego,” Aaron said, trying to push my lips apart to get inside. I momentarily thought about letting his finger fall into my mouth just so that I could have the pleasure of biting it the fuck off. But I didn’t know where it had been, and I was already in rough enough shape. If I bit him, they would probably beat me until I was near death.