Chapter Thirty-One
Carly
My mouth is painfully dry as I peel my eyes open, squinting at the harsh light above me. My shoulders scream with a searing pain and tingles shoot down my arms and into my hands. Where am I? I try to turn but my body stays rooted to the spot and I look up, fear spiking my heart. My hands are tied above my head, strung up in the air with a thick rope. It’s thrown over a bar before disappearing behind me and my legs are tied to the legs of the wooden chair I’m seated in. It squeaks as I wiggle and I start to tremble as my head pounds. This is all too familiar. The dry mouth and pounding head remind me of that night, or more specifically, the morning after when I woke up in my bed, covered in bruises.
No.
This can’t be happening again.
“Look who finally decided to rejoin the land of the living,” a familiar voice says and I gulp in air as I scan the room, searching the concrete walls for the source of the voice. The damp, stagnant air stings my nose and my stomach rolls as my heart thunders in my ears. “Those drugs knocked you out longer than I thought they would. I’ve been getting impatient over here.”
“What the fuck do you want?”
The voice laughs, a truly evil sound that sends goose bumps racing across my flesh, and Julian steps out of the shadows. The mask is gone; showing the monster I always knew was underneath. “Oh, I think you know what I want, Carly.”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I shake my head as a bead of sweat rolls down the side of my face and the hair on my arms stands on end. When I open my eyes again, I pray this will all just be a bad dream. I’ll be at the clubhouse with Chance, safe in his arms, and not trapped in this hell with a demon I know all too well. But my prayers go answered. I open my eyes and Julian smiles at me. I bite my tongue to hold the cry that desperately wants to break free.
This can’t be happening.
“What are you going to do? Hold me hostage until she comes back to you?” I ask. He nods, wagging his finger at me.
“You are a smart girl, I’ll give you that.”
I shake my head, a deep hatred burning away some of my fear. “It won’t work. She won’t ever come back to you.”
A smile curves his lips and I break out in a cold sweat. “See, that’s where you’re wrong.”
He stalks over to me and holds his hand up between us, letting it hover over my skin for a moment and my jaw clenches as I watch him. He leans in closer and trails his fingers over my cheek, his eyes darkening as he bites his lip.
“Once your sister realizes I have you, she’ll come running home because she knows what I’ll do to you if she doesn’t.”
“This isn’t her home,” I bite out as I lurch away from his touch and jerk my hands, shaking the rope above me.
“Ah, ah,” he taunts, pulling a large hunting knife out from behind his back. I freeze, watching him as he takes a deliberate step toward me and a fresh wave of terror blooms in my chest. I jerk again, the need to flee overwhelming my common sense. When he reaches me, he kneels down and moves the knife toward my legs. I squeeze my eyes shut and try to picture this morning when I was in bed with Chance or last night as he made love to me, anything to get me through what comes next. The swoosh of the knife cutting through something fills the air and when the pain doesn’t follow, I open my eyes.
One leg is free of the ropes binding it to the chair and Julian moves to the other, slicing through the rope with ease. I frown. Why would he free my legs? Licking my lips, I study him as he stands and moves behind me, my belly quivering as I twist in my seat. When he gets to the wall, he stops and smiles as he unties the rope from a hook and jerks it down, pulling me into a standing position as I scream in pain.
“God,” he groans, doing it again as pain lances through my body. My toes barely touch the floor and the constant pain in my shoulders is making me woozy. “I love that sound.”
My stomach rolls as I drop my head and suck in a breath. I didn’t understand, not until this very moment, just how deranged Julian is. But I could see it on his face as I screamed… it turned him on. He’s a sadist in the purest form of the word. With a gleam in his eyes, he ties the rope back around the hook and stalks toward me, holding the knife in front of his face.
“There,” he whispers, inching closer to me. “Now we can talk.”
My gaze flicks over to the knife, hovering inches away from my face as light glints off the flat part of the blade. “Okay, let’s talk.”
“You took something from me,” he accuses as he tilts his head to the side and narrows his eyes.
“Ivy is not a thing and she left; I didn’t take her.”
His lip curls back in a snarl and his nostrils flare. “She wouldn’t have left. I made sure of that.”
“No, what you did is exactly what drove her away,” I snap and he rushes forward, wrapping a hand around my throat as he presses the tip of the knife to my cheek.
“She knew the consequences for leaving and if she doesn’t come back to me, it will cost you your life.”
A chill blankets me and my chest tingles as I raise my head and meet his eyes. “Go ahead and kill me. It will be worth it as long as she’s free.”
He throws his head back and laughs, releasing my throat as he takes a step back and pulls the knife away.
“Sweet, innocent, Carly,” he muses, tapping the spine of the knife against his hands. “We’re not going to kill you.”
We?
“Who’s we?”
His lips stretch into a grin that makes my heart stop. “Wouldn’t you like to know? Don’t worry, you’ll find out very soon.”
“Fuck you,” I spit. I’m done with these games. His smile grows and he steps closer, reaching up and dragging his fingers down my arm.
“So beautiful when you’re angry. I can almost see the appeal.”
“Get your hands off me,” I hiss, my skin growing clammy as memories rush back, things I’ve never remembered before about that night twelve years ago and I squeeze my eyes shut like I can somehow stop them.
The boys circling me…
Their taunts as they closed in around me…
Austin smiling as he pulls out his phone…
“I won’t hurt you, Carly. As long as your sister comes back to me,” Julian assures, his voice cutting through my memories. I shake my head and open my eyes.
“She won’t.”
“Oh, I think she will. You are the one person in the world she would do absolutely anything for and I’m counting on that.”
Without thinking, I grab the rope above my head and grit my teeth as I pull myself up enough to kick my legs out in front of me. I hit Julian in the knee and he roars as he goes down, the knife clattering to the floor next to me.
Fuck.
Now what?
He howls in pain, clutching his knee but recovers faster than I thought he would. I jerk back as he lunges to his feet and lands a fist to my belly. As I gasp for breath, he wraps his fingers around my throat.
“You stupid little bitch,” he snarls, his fingers constricting more. His face is flushed and his nostrils flare as he stares me down. I can see the ideas churning in his gaze, all the things he wants to do to me and I start to tremble. “You’ll regret that.”
Releasing me, he leans down and grabs the knife before placing the tip against my chest. I close my eyes and he pulls down, cutting open my t-shirt as I suck in a breath, my eyes watering.
Oh, God.
No.
No.
No.
My lip wobbles and I gulp in air, trying to focus on anything other than what he’s about to do to me when white hot pain blooms from my chest. Crying out, my eyes fly open and I glance down, watching the blood stain my shirt. The cut isn’t deep, not enough to worry about but just enough to burn like hell and stain my shirt red.
“Such a gorgeous sound,” he rasps, reaching down to adjust his cock and my stomach rolls. “Do it for me again, sweetheart.”
He drags the knife over my skin again and I whimper as I bite down on my lip in an act of defiance. I won’t give him what he wants. Dropping the knife on the floor, he frowns and grabs my face.
“Why do you have to be so difficult, Carly? Just give me what I want.”
A few tears slip down my cheek and he grins before leaning forward and licking them off my skin. My stomach rolls again and I gag. Releasing my cheeks, he trails his hand down my face and neck until he gets to the first incision. He drags his finger along the side of it and I bite back another scream as it burns. When his gaze meets mine again, he growls.
“So fucking stubborn but we’ll break you eventually.”
“No.” I shake my head and he laughs, stepping away from me.
“Yes, we will, Carly, and I, for one, can’t fucking wait.”
Without another word, he picks up his knife and walks over to the far wall before light floods into the room. There’s a staircase just past the door but other than that, I can’t see anything. As soon as the door shuts and the lock clinks into place, my shoulders sag and a sob rips through my throat as pain radiates through my body and my stomach rolls.
I’m in Hell.
* * * *
Time doesn’t exist down here in the musty darkness, except to torture me with the awful possibilities of my immediate future. Seconds bleed into hours and it could be minutes or days since Julian left me all alone. Each sound that manages to pierce the black nothingness of my surroundings sends me out of my skin and the pain is so intense I’m not entirely sure I’ve remained conscious the entire time I’ve been locked away. My t-shirt is drenched with sweat and blood and my legs are growing weak from standing on my toes, waiting for the devil to return. I can only hope Ivy’s smart enough to stay away.
Before today, before I woke up in this… dungeon, for lack of a better word, I thought I had experienced the worst thing humanity had to offer. I was so consumed with my own pain and I thought no one could ever hurt me the way they had but it only took ten minutes with Julian to make me realize how wrong I’d been. I would go back and relive that night a hundred times if it got me out of here now.
The door opens and I jerk, my head flying up and my eyes widen as a figure blocks out the light. It’s not Julian. This man is taller and wider in the shoulders than Julian. My body trembles as I watch him. He closes the door and remains in the shadows as he makes his way around the room to me. My hammering heart makes it difficult to judge how far away he is from the sound of his footsteps. I suck in air and try to back up, despite the fact that I’m stuck in place.
“Hello, Carly,” the man says as he steps into the light and I gasp, jerking on the rope harder, desperate to flee as ice cold fear fills my belly.
“Damian.”
He smiles, taking a step toward me and I see the same evil glint in his eyes that I recognized in Julian’s earlier. My chest tightens and my thoughts screech to a halt. What is he doing here? All the puzzle pieces rattle around in my brain and I can’t make them fit together. What does Damian have to do with Julian?
“It’s lovely to see you again,” Damian purrs, his gaze dropping to my chest and he frowns as he runs a finger along the first cut. “I see Julian decided to get started without me.”
“What are you doing here?” I ask, flinching as he traces around the wound again. He licks his lips and meets my eyes.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to wait for that answer.”
I jerk on the rope again despite the tearing pain in my shoulder. “No. You’ll fucking tell me now.”
“Will I?” he asks, his eyes lighting up and a slow smile stretching across his face. “I don’t think you’re in a position to argue. I do love your fire, though.”
I remain quiet, staring him down as I wait for answers and finally, he sighs.
“All right. I suppose I could give you some answers while we wait.”
I blink. “Wait for what?”
“Ah, that’s not one of the questions you’ll get an answer to. It would ruin all the fun,” he says, laughing, and I turn away from him. “I suppose I should start at the beginning, huh?”
Silence stretches between us and as I look back at him, he nods. He peels his suit jacket off and tosses it over the chair next to me before slowly rolling the sleeves of his dress shirt up.
“I was born here in Baton Rouge and my daddy, he was a mean old bastard. He loved to smack me around just to hear me cry and he did it often. When I started school, I was different than the other kids. I never fit in with anyone and kids can be so mean, but you already know that, don’t you?” He smirks and I wonder just how much he knows. “Even back then, I had… certain tastes and it got me expelled on a few occasions, which only made my daddy beat me more.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, hoping I can appeal to his emotions somehow but the wry smile he flashes me makes my heart sink.
“Oh, don’t worry about me, sweetheart. See, it all got better when I met Julian. He was different, too, and we became friends merely out of necessity. It wasn’t until we were in high school that we realized we both were into the same thing.” His gaze drops down my body and he runs his tongue over his teeth.
“Which is what?” I ask, despite the fact that I’m sure I don’t want to know. He grins.
“Aren’t we impatient? Hold on, I’m getting to that part.” He steps up and places his hand on my ribs. “See, we realized we were both really intrigued by the idea of sharing a woman but more than that, we both fantasized about hurting them.”
I suck in a breath and he grins, shaking his head.
“I mean, what are the odds, right? It would have been rare to find someone who wanted to share a woman but to also find someone who liked the sound of her screaming in pain? It was fate. Our imaginations were endless and we finally had someone to share our darkest thoughts with. Things just grew from there. Alone, we were vulnerable but together, we realized we could rule this fucking city and get everything we’ve always wanted.”
“Meaning?” I already think I know the answer, but I need to hear it.
“You… and your sister. You belong to us now and we’ll do whatever we damn well please with you.” He runs his fingers down my neck to my breast and I shudder.
“We don’t belong to you.”
He laughs, nodding. “Oh, but you do, actually. We bought you.”
“You what?” I ask, my mouth going slack as my head swims. “You can’t buy a human being.”
“Technically, you’re right but who’s going to come after you? Your mother is the one who sold you two off like prized pigs.”
I shake my head as I struggle to breathe. “No. That’s not true.”
“It seems that the men of this town have caught on to your mother’s games and they refuse to play anymore so she needed to find another way to make money. The poor thing is broke. Julian and I overheard her at a fundraiser, complaining that her daughters couldn’t find good men and well, we jumped on the opportunity. She was so eager to give us any information we needed about the two of you.”
“No,” I whisper, my mind fighting to understand everything he’s saying.
“Oh, yes. I’ve even seen the lovely little tape you made in high school,” he whispers, pressing his nose against my cheek as he releases a breath. His breath fans out over my skin and I fight back a sob. “I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve gotten off to it. Planning this whole thing took months and I didn’t know if I was going to make it.”
I still can’t wrap my mind around it. The money sent to the account in the Cayman Islands and the burner phones, it all makes sense now but how could she just sell us like things she grew tired of? Sure, she’s always been single minded when it came to getting what she wanted but this… this is taking it to the next level. I can’t help but think of my daddy watching over me right now, his heart breaking. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. Maybe I should have expected something like this all along. My mind drifts to Chance.
“Chance will come for me,” I whisper, shaking my head again. Damian’s mood shifts in an instant and he grabs my face, his lip curling back in a snarl.
“I never want to hear that fucking name again; do you hear me? You are mine now and the only way you leave here is in a fucking body bag. If you ever try to leave, I’ll hunt that bastard down and take my time killing him.”
“No,” I gasp, unable to stop an image of Chance lying dead on the floor from entering my mind. My heart explodes with pain and I gasp for air. I’ll do it. I’ll live an eternity of this if it means he gets to live.
“Yes,” Damian hisses, his breath washing over me and I gag when the smell of tobacco floods my nose. “Since the moment I first saw you with him at the gala, I’ve wanted to take my knife and sink it into him so don’t think I won’t. It won’t be a slow death either. Maybe I’ll nick a lung and watch as he slowly suffocates or I’ll set him on fire just long enough to make the end of his life excruciating.”
“No!” I scream, tears pouring down my face as I pull at the rope again. “I’ll stay.”
“Damn fucking right you will. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough, but you are mine now. Well, ours.”
My lip trembles and I nod, accepting my fate. With any luck, he’ll just kill me.
“God,” he groans, grabbing my t-shirt and ripping it open the rest of the way. “Do you know how hard it’s been to wait for this? As soon as your mother showed me your picture, I knew you were the one and it’s been killing me to try and woo you.”
“It never would have worked.”
He laughs. “Yes, I can see that now. I’m not bothered – that’s more Julian’s speed. He loves the chase. I prefer something a little… different.”
“I don’t care,” I whisper, my eyelids drooping and my shoulders going slack. I’m quickly running out of steam. Damian moves behind me, gripping my hips as he buries his nose in my hair and takes a deep breath.
“But you should. It involves you, after all.”
Before I can say anything else, the door bursts open and my head lifts as light floods the room. Julian pushes Ivy inside and slams the door closed behind them. She has a fresh bruise on her cheek and blood trickles from her eyebrow, mixing with the tears as it streaks down the side of her face. My throat feels tight.
“Vi,” I call to her.
“Shut up,” Julian growls at me, shoving her farther into the room and her eyes lock on me.
“You see,” Damian whispers, pressing his palm flat against my belly and I struggle against him. “Ivy is in big trouble for leaving and now she has to be punished.”
The glee in his voice sends my stomach rolling again and I shake my head, unable to figure out how I ended up here when only yesterday, my life was damn near perfect.
“No.”
Julian shoots a look in my direction and Damian clamps a hand over my mouth, his lips brushing up against my ear and I recoil.
“Just watch, sweetheart, because as soon as he’s done, it’s your turn.” His erection presses into my ass and I sob, my stomach turning and my heart turning to stone.
When Julian gets Ivy a few feet away from me, he stops and nods to Damian. “Grab me that chair, will ya?”
Damian releases me and I suck in air, panic clawing away at me but unable to do anything about it as he grabs the wooden chair and carries it over to Julian. Once Damian sets it down, Julian moves it to where he wants to and shoves Ivy into a sitting position. With her hands tied behind her back and a gag in her mouth, she is essentially helpless and I start praying for a miracle.
Julian moves in front of the chair and I squeeze my eyes shut, dropping my head. A hand fists into my hair, yanking it back and warm breath fans out across my neck. Chills races across my bare flesh and my stomach rolls again.
“Watch,” Damian hisses in my ear, excitement in his voice, and I shake my head. “Watch or he will make it ten times worse for her.”
Sobbing, I peel my eyes open and meet Julian’s eyes. His lips part and his tongue darts out, wetting them, as his fingers twitch with the desire to touch me. His cock strains against his slacks, growing harder as his gaze traces the tears pouring down my face. I was wrong before… this isn’t Hell. This is a deeper level of purgatory reserved for the most vile, heinous demons and somehow, I’ve ended up here by mistake.
“Do it,” Damian urges from behind me. “I’ve waited long enough for this.”
Julian nods and turns back to Ivy, balling his fists and my breath stutters. The first punch lands on her cheek, sending her head snapping to the side as she whimpers and I scream. Julian drops his head back and sighs, his body trembling as a low groan rumbles in his chest.
“Scream again, Carly,” he rasps as he glances over at me, his eyes shining and his cheeks flushed. When I shake my head, he hits her other cheek and I give him what he wants. I fight against the rope, struggling to get free as I scream.
“Mmm,” Damian hums in my ear and I stop, my body locking up. “Don’t stop, sweetheart, you’re making my cock so hard.” He runs the tip of his nose up my neck and bites down. “I hope you struggle like this when I finally get to hold you down and fuck you the way I’ve been dreaming for months now.”
Something in me breaks and I wail, jerking on the rope more. I don’t care about withholding gratification from them anymore. All I want is to end this, anyway I can.
I can’t survive this again…
I just can’t.
“Fuck, this is even better than I imagined,” Julian whispers, cracking Ivy across the face again and her head slumps.
“Vi!” I bellow, kicking my feet out behind me and Damian’s grip in my hair tightens. Julian looks down at his fist, clenching it and unclenching it as he examines the blood staining his knuckles and smiles. He glances up and walks over to me.
“Did he threaten your pathetic little boyfriend if you ever left?” Julian asks, his gaze flicking to Damian and I nod. “Good. In addition to that, this will happen to your sister again if you ever try to get away.”
I nod. “I understand.”
“Not yet,” he says, laughing. “But you will.”
Turning away from me, he walks back over to Ivy and picks her up, hoisting her over his shoulder before marching out of the room. When the lock clicks back into place, Damian runs his tongue up my neck.
“And now we get to have some fun.”
I close my eyes, trying to block it all out but it’s no use. This is bringing back memories I’ve kept buried for so long that it doesn’t matter if my eyes are open or not. I’m surrounded by hellfire no matter where I turn.
“You want to know a little secret?” Damian asks, releasing me and stalking around my body. I open my eyes and he grins.
“No.”
“That’s too bad because I’m going to tell you anyway. See, Julian up there, he loves for his girl to be unconscious when he fucks her. His favorite thing in the world is the way she screams when she comes to and discovers he’s inside her. In fact, I would bet that’s what he’s doing right now.”
A knife shreds through my heart and more tears fall down my face as I picture what he’s doing to my baby sister right now. It’s an experience I know all too well.
“After their first date, he snuck into her apartment and knocked her out with the same stuff he used on you today before fucking her. You should have seen the look on her face when she learned that.” He laughs and I sob, shaking my head.
“But I love the fight. That’s why I chose you, baby, because even in the photo your mother showed us, I could see the fire in your eyes and I knew you would give me what I crave most.”
He steps toward me, his eyes darkening and my stomach rolls.
“And you know what else, Carly?”
“No,” I utter.
“If you don’t give me what I want, if you don’t scream and fight me through everything, we’ll bring your sister back down here and I’ll take my anger out on her. See, that’s why we chose sisters. Because you both will do whatever you’re told to save the other.”
He’s right. I’ll do whatever he asks of me; I’ll give him anything he wants if it saves Ivy from any of this. Letting out a breath, I hang my head and nod.
“Okay.”
“Damian!” Julian’s voice pierces through the room and Damian peeks over his shoulder before growling.
“I’ll be back for you.”
He spins on his heel and stalks out of the room, fuming. As soon as the door closes, my body goes lax and it strains my shoulders more, excruciating pain shooting down into my ribs. I try to go to a happier place, in bed with Chance as he holds me close and whispers in my ear that he’s got me. If I close my eyes, I can almost hear those words and feel his breath caressing my ear.
“I love you, Chance,” I whisper into the darkness, hoping that he already knows the words I’ll never get to say to him again. And that, whatever he does, he stays the hell away from here. I have no doubt in my mind Damian will do everything he promised if Chance ever tries to save me and the thought robs me of breath. I’ll remain here in this hell as long as the people I love are safe.
“Carly?” a soft, melodic voice whispers through the dark and my head jerks up, my heart racing as I scan the room.
“Ivy?”
Rosie tentatively steps out of a little nook in the wall and I sigh, dropping my head back down. She races over to me and reaches into the pocket of her apron, pulling out a small utility knife.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know where your sister is.”
I glance up. “What are you doing down here?”
“Freeing you,” she states, looking down at the knife in her hand like it should be obvious. Maybe it should be, but my mind isn’t performing at one hundred percent right now.
“How long have I been here?”
Her gaze flicks to the watch on her wrist. “Thirteen hours, give or take.”
Thirteen hours…
Chance must be frantic.
“If they catch you down here…” My voice trails off and I shake my head. I don’t need to tell her what they’ll do because she probably knows better than I do.
“Don’t worry about me. You have to get out of here, Carly. Now.”
“They took Ivy somewhere. I need to find her.”
Shaking her head, she reaches up and cuts the rope. My arms drop like they’re filled with lead, taking me down with them as pain floods my body and I scream.
“Shh,” she whispers, kneeling next to me as I whimper and sob on the cold concrete floor. She cuts my wrists free before slipping the knife back into her pocket. “We have to go.”
I nod, pushing up off the floor as my body shakes uncontrollably and I wonder if I’ll even make it to the door. Rosie wraps her arm around my waist and helps keep me up as I stumble across the room. When we reach the door, she cracks it open and peeks out for a moment before opening it all the way. We pause again, silence greeting us and after a moment, we ascend the stairs with my heart pounding in my ears.
“Where would he take Ivy?” I ask when we reach the hallway at the top of the stairs and she shakes her head, her gaze darting from one side of the hall to the other.
“I don’t know but you don’t have time to look for her. Julian’s father stopped by and it’s the only reason they’re not down in that pit with you right now.” She drags me down the hall and I’m not strong enough to fight her no matter how badly I want to turn around and search for my sister.
“I can’t leave without my sister.”
“You have to,” she hisses, pulling me along with her as she marches to the front door and I struggle but it doesn’t slow her down. “I’ll look for Ivy, I promise.”
“No. I’m not leaving without her,” I snap, my voice getting louder and her eyes widen as she presses her hand to my lips. Damian’s voice drifts into the hallway and my heart stops.
“It was nice seeing you, too, Mr. Henshaw. We’ll have to grab a drink next time.”
“There’s no time,” Rosie gasps as we reach the front door and she pulls it open.
“Ivy. I need to get Ivy.”
Rosie’s face crumples as she shoves me out onto the porch. “I’ll find her, I promise. Now please go before you get us all killed.”
She shuts the door in my face and pain pierces my chest, radiating out to the rest of my body as a lump forms in my throat and I sink to my knees. Looking back up at the house, I clutch my throat and cry, unable to move.
I can’t leave her.