Five years before
Men, in general, scared me. They never used to, but they did now, now that I had experienced every sick and depraved thing they were capable of. Actually, it wasn’t just men, women too. Neither sex was worse than the other in this place. They wanted one thing from the girls that had been forced to live down here, including me. Nothing was off limits and there were no rules.
Blood was spilled and pain delivered like currency.
I never expected to meet a man I’d start to trust.
Hunter seemed different from the rest. The fact that he was like us, a captive, I guess helped me trust him a little more. It seemed odd that he had been forced to share my room, but what happens in this place was anything but ordinary, even if I’d been kept separated my entire time within this Hell.
Every day that passed was another day I lost myself. There was barely any shred of who I used to be. Hate, anger and a wish for vengeance was starting to make me into a new person. I had held out long enough, kept small parts of who I was before alive, but they were dying slowly. Every day I lost more and more.
What would be left once it was all gone?
I could hardly remember Kingston’s face anymore. I couldn’t remember my apartment or how it looked or even my school, who my friends were or what classes we had together. All I truly knew was the pain. The pain of the badly healed fractures and the bruises, both old and new that littered my skin. I had both old and new scars, some worse than the others, and for the last god knows how long, I’ve been waiting for the next step. For the next part of my Hell but it never comes. Was it really the plan to just keep me down here and use me like this? I’d heard about rings like this, but I thought girls were sold, not kept like cattle. After the first six months in this place, I’d lost count of the days, weeks and even months that passed, it had to be years now, it had to be more than a year? Maybe two?
It had been a long time since I saw the sun or felt the wind on my face. Been a long time since I tasted anything other than ham and oats and water. My showers were cold, the soap scentless. I couldn’t remember what it felt like to soak in a bath.
It would be one of the first things I’d do, I think to myself, when I get out of here, the first thing I’d do would be to have a bath.
“What are you thinking about?” Hunter asks quietly. He sits on the dirty floor, back against the wall. His whiskey-colored eyes watch me where I sit on the bed, knees against my chest.
I didn’t share things down here. I had once and it had gotten me punished.
I shake my head, dismissing his question.
“You can trust me, Isobel,” he says gently, “I won’t tell anyone, we’re friends, right?”
“You can’t have friends here, it will only hurt you later.”
“But we are friends.” He counters.
My lips threaten to pull into a smile.
It had been a constant argument between us since he had entered my room God knows how long ago.
“I suppose.”
He grins and the smile does something to my gut. It twists me up inside, making me both burn as hot as the sun and chill me to my bones.
“So, you can tell me what you’re thinking.”
“I was thinking about how I would have a bath when I got out of here. With bubbles that overflowed the rim and spilled onto the floor. It would smell like cotton candy, and I’d sit in it until it went cold and then I’d run another and sit in it for a little longer.”
“You miss having a bath?”
I nod, “There’s a lot you take for granted and then it’s taken from you.”
He nods.
“If you could have anything, what would it be?”
He shakes his head, “I can’t think of anything right now.” But there is something in his eyes, something that tells me he isn’t necessarily telling the truth, but he is also not lying. I didn’t know how to press on it, so I let it drop.
Days and days must have passed since he turned up inside my room. He left often, summoned by those who ran and owned this place, but he never spoke about what he did for them. He always came back though.
He’d set up a bed in the corner of the room, made up of old blankets he’d stolen on his many visits out of the cell and limp, old pillows. He never complained that I had the bed.
Guilt gnaws at my stomach.
“Do you want to sleep with me tonight?”
His burning gaze collides with mine.
“That bed doesn’t look comfortable.”
“It isn’t,” he agrees. “But that bed is hardly big enough to fit one, let alone two.”
“We can make it work.”
I didn’t want to admit that I had grown quite attached to Hunter. He was a constant I didn’t have before. Wanting or enjoying anything in this place meant it was instantly removed.
“Actually, maybe it’s a bad idea.”
“You don’t want to?” He asks.
“No, it’s not that,” I shake my head, tightening my arms around my knees, “I don’t want them to take you away.”
“They won’t ever take me away from you, Isobel.”
“You can’t know that.”