Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 81279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 325(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 325(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
He starts walking through the snow, back to the car. “Now let’s go where no one can hear you scream—No. That didn’t come out right.” He laughs. Fucking laughs. “You know what I mean.”
Do I?
Chapter 11
Rowan
Shame should be the least of my worries in the current circumstances, but I burn with it when Saint makes me sit on a thick sheet of plastic, since my pants are soaked through, and he doesn’t want to get his seat wet. I’m unable to do anything, gagged and strapped in with a seatbelt, yet I still worry why he even has large sheets of plastic in his trunk. But that makes me think too much about the torture he could inflict on me, and as tears streak down my face, I make myself breathe through my nose.
I should have shot him when I had the chance. But no. I hesitated. He felt too familiar, I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and now here I am, approaching his murder cabin deep in the woods.
“You have good instincts,” he tells me as the vehicle rolls down the narrow road with snow piled on both sides. “You drove toward my place. This way we won’t need to waste much time. I didn’t get to eat earlier,” he said. The because of you is silent.
I curl my shoulders, helplessly trying to make myself smaller. Why would someone like him even focus on me in a sexual way? Is it the power play? Did he enjoy lying to me? Is this why he’s put in a gag that makes me dribble down my chin? To show me how powerless I am?
I grunt at him, but stare ahead, trying to remember landmarks in case I do manage to escape, but it’s all trees, and they all look the same in the cold glow of the LED headlights.
But then, a wooden cabin emerges from the darkness like some pioneer fever dream, with a small porch and a stone chimney on one side. He parks with a soft sigh and turns toward me. I can’t see his face when its shadowed, but my nape tingles, reminding me that I’m in the clutches of a predator, strapped in with a safety belt, cuffed, gagged, and with my legs bound. There’s no fucking way for me to escape in this state, so I need to be smart about it and hope for an opening in the future.
“Wait here,” Saint tells me and gets out of the car, slamming it shut behind him as he rushes for the door.
I’d laugh if I wasn’t so terrified. How the fuck would I not wait?
I hit the back of my head against the headrest. I should have known a guy like Saint was too good to be true, but what point is there to contemplating my hurt feelings when he might be about to disembowel me, or put me in a cage and make me eat dog food? How the fuck would I even know what he wants?
My thoughts come to a sudden halt when in a flash of lights, the house in front of me comes alive. Strings of colorful LEDs make the thick layer of snow on the roof look like a cozy comforter, and a reindeer figure twinkles at me from the front porch.
What kind of festive torture is this supposed to be?
Have I become a character in one of those Christmas horror movies? Will he split me in two in a Santa costume and use my skin as gift wrap?
I flinch when Saint opens the door and reaches in, pulling my legs out first before dragging the rest of me into the cold. “Here we are! No one for miles, but we have everything we need,” he says and throws me across his shoulder again, as if any of this was perfectly normal.
Christmas abduction. Yay.
My brain can’t quite comprehend the eerie clash between the reality of my situation and the warm, cozy glow transforming the cabin and its surroundings into a scene straight from those cheesy Christmas commercials that always rang so false since I lost my family. I shake my head and shout into the gag, but Saint ignores me and enters the warm interior smelling of pine and wood.
“There’s no need for this. Just calm down, and we can talk in peace,” he tells me, carrying me across the wooden floor. With my face against his back, I can’t see much, but colorful lights flash at me from every corner, and I swear I spot decorated stockings hanging above the fireplace.
Seeing all of this Christmas cheer upside down is very fitting, because I feel like I’ve entered a different dimension altogether. One in which it’s normal to hunt someone down in the woods, like he’s just game, and enjoy eggnog by the fire while your victim writhes on the bearskin rug.