But that’s over now.

In another week or two, once she’s had a chance to settle in, she will go to a normal school. Go to normal classes. Try to make normal friends.

Now, she has her very own computer.

She can go anywhere online. Read anything. Watch anything.

But once she opens the Google web page, her fingers type the words automatically. Simultaneously, she feels a sudden weight pressing against her upper back. She figures she’ll just find pictures she’s never seen before, that’s all. But that’s a cover story for a need she’s too afraid to identify. She wants to know more, the things she’s sure her father never shared.

She wants to know what she went through.

Fingers trembling, she lifts her hands to the keyboard and types her mother’s name.

“Hailey?”

Not her name.

Someone else’s.

The voice is smooth and confident, the tone reserved. He’s measuring every word because he’s convinced his words have as much power as the restraints he put her in while she was out cold. Charlotte knows better than to mistake his tone for humility; it’s quiet, dangerous arrogance.

She blinks, unsurprised by all of it. The gag in her mouth, the fabric hood plastering her hair to the crown of her skull, the pressure on her wrists and ankles, and the hard, unyielding surface under her back. For another woman, an unprepared woman, these would be implements of terror, no doubt. And they should be. But she’s visited hells like these before.

There’s a bright light shining on her face that prevents her from seeing anything beyond the dark shadow of her captor sitting next to whatever she’s tied to. When he leans forward, she sees his trimmed salt-and-pepper mustache, his deeply set puppy-dog eyes under heavy dark brows. He’s still wearing the baseball cap he wore to the movie theater. It’s Cyrus Mattingly, for sure.

Behind him, she can just make out a patch of flat concrete wall. Are they on his property in Waxahachie? Cole and his team know it backward and forward, but she insisted they not share any of the details with her. She’s willing to bet this is some sort of storm cellar. How long does he plan to hold her here?

He reaches forward and gingerly tugs at the straps of her gag. It’s all for show. The thing’s firmly in place, but he’s demonstrating that the ball gag inside her mouth is attached to a more extensive contraption that covers the lower half of her face, even wrapping her nose, save for two slits that allow her nostrils to take in air. She’s not sure but she thinks it might be leather. The sedatives are wearing off in stages. Now she can feel her hair bunched up and smashed to the top of her head, covered by the top half of whatever this bizarre face mask is. It’s meant to do more than silence. Only her eyes and forehead are exposed. Her ears are covered by the sides of the hood, but the fabric’s not so thick that she can’t hear through it.

“Can you hear me? Blink once if you can hear me.” His tone’s so casual he could be asking her for directions to the nearest grocery store.

She blinks once.

“Good,” he says, but he sounds distracted. “I’d like to tell you a few things about what you’re wearing. It was made just for this so it probably feels strange. Does it feel strange?”

Your wording’s also strange, she thinks. It was made just for this, not I made it for this.

She blinks once. He nods, tightens a strap against the side of her head.

“I need you to understand something, OK?” Again, that unnervingly calm tone. Like he’s bringing her in on a secret that will benefit them both. “There’s something you need to do here. It’ll make all this better, promise. It’ll make you better, too. I know that might be hard to believe, but it’s the truth. You’re not going to have to wear this thing much longer, but I can’t take it off you just yet. So, while you’ve got it on, let’s agree to some things, OK?”

She blinks once. But she’s busy taking in details. The deadness in his eyes, the fidgety but consistent way he keeps securing the mask’s various straps. There’s also what he doesn’t do: he doesn’t caress her. He doesn’t kiss her. His manner suggests she’s not some sexual plaything he’s brought here for his twisted delight. For now, he remains invested in her submission to the strange implement designed to silence her. The sedatives are wearing off in stages like they did with the last two monsters who drugged her. For the first time, she feels a slight tickle against the back of her throat. At first, she thinks it might just be saliva or postnasal drip. But it’s not. It’s solid. And with a jolt of fear, she realizes there’s some sort of rubbery extension attached to the gag’s solid rubber ball and it’s lying against the back of her throat like a sleeping snake.

Gooseflesh sweeps her reawakened skin. For a second, she’s sure she triggered. But when she goes to ball up her fists, the plastic flex-cuffs on her wrists don’t break.

She’s running the lyrics for “Angel of the Morning” through her head and it calms her some, but Mattingly noticed her jolt of fear, and now he’s studying her with a patience and reserve that suggest supreme confidence.

“Hailey? Blink once if you’re listening to me.”

She blinks once.

“The thing in the back of your throat—you can feel it now, I can tell. You need to be very careful of it, OK? I don’t want it to hurt you. I really don’t. But if you scream, something bad will happen.” He sounds as if some godlike force is inflicting these indignities upon her, and not him, not Cyrus Mattingly. “If you scream, you’ll probably throw up and I won’t be able to get back in time to get the thing off you before you choke. And I don’t want that to happen and you shouldn’t, either. Now, a lot’s going to happen tonight that you might not understand. Not right away anyway. For now, I need you to embrace your silence. Can you do that for me, Hailey? Can you just breathe? Can you just stay silent? It’ll be good practice for the rest of the night. ’Cause we’re going to spend a lot of time together.”

She’s not surprised when he places a gloved palm against her exposed forehead. He is, however. He’s surprised she didn’t flinch, and for a moment, some look passes through his otherwise dead eyes, some vague suspicion that it seems like he’s trying to put words to but can’t.

Shit, she thinks. It’s too late to flinch now. It’d be obvious she’s faking it. So, she puts as much fear as she can into her wide eyes, blinks madly as she tries to see him through the light. He leans forward, blocking out whatever light source is blinding her, staring into her eyes without any trace of evident emotion. His breath still smells like popcorn; she’s grateful for this marker of the passage of time, however sour.

When his gloved fingers caress her exposed throat, gently but without any tenderness, she does flinch, and he nods as if this was confirmation he needed. She prepares herself for some mad, lunatic speech intended to enflame her fear, but all he says is, “Your silence is your strength, Hailey Brinkmann. Forget everyone who’s ever told you otherwise.”

She blinks once.

He nods and pats the side of her cheek gently.

Then he’s gone, and she’s alone with the blinding light.

A few seconds later, she hears what sounds like double storm doors creaking open directly overhead, but she can’t see anything past the lamp’s fierce white blaze. Then she notices a strange feeling in the last place she wants to feel anything right now. An intrusion in her most sensitive parts, which makes no sense, given that she’s not naked. But it’s clear he had no trouble sliding off and then replacing her pajama pants.