I was screaming when I jerked out of my nightmare, my throat straining, burning. My lungs were on fire, screaming for oxygen, but my ribs protested every movement, racking my entire body with pain. Choking, gasping, I tasted blood in the back of my throat, and I remembered the last time I’d felt like this, unable to breathe, my mouth filled with my own blood.

“Shut up!”

I sucked in another breath and gagged, coughed. I wasn’t yelling anymore, but I wasn’t exactly quiet either. It was hard to be quiet when I felt like I was coughing up a lung.

“Shut up!”

Suddenly, I was off the floor and being slammed into the wall. The little bit of air I’d managed to get rushed out, leaving me gaping like a fish and wondering if I was going to pass out. Serge put his face right in front of mine, his eyes icy.

“I told you that if you behaved, we would not need to talk again.” His voice had dropped from shouting to something flat and much, much scarier.

He was going to hurt me again, and this time, it wouldn’t end with me in pain, but I’d be broken. Probably dead. I didn’t want to be dead. I needed to convince him that I would be quiet.

But I didn’t want to be quiet. If he was going to kill me, then I sure as hell would go down fighting. I hit out with my bound hands, catching him on the chin. His head snapped back, then slowly came down, his expression stony.

“Let me go!” I twisted, trying to get free, trying to kick him. All reason had fled. I wasn’t thinking like an FBI trainee, methodically trying to break free. I was scrambling, desperate.

I didn’t want to die. Not now. Not like this.

I hadn’t survived my father to die like this.

“Stop.”

He shook me, and my head bounced off the wall. Pain shot through my skull and sent stars flashing in front of my eyes.

Serge shouted something over his shoulder, seeming oblivious to my feet bouncing off his massive thighs. I wondered if he felt anything at all. Pain. Excitement. My nightmare came back, and I knew I’d prefer violence to excitement.

“The first time was a lesson,” Serge said. “But my employers will be upset if you are marked up.”

Oh shit.

That didn’t sound good.

Shit. Shit.

“Why not?” I asked. “Why will they be upset?”

I was still trying to squirm, but I was rapidly losing strength. A sandwich and a couple hours of sleep were no match for what I’d been through. I’d thought I could handle it because I’d spent nearly three months at Quantico. What a joke.

I was a joke, thinking I could do something.

The scrawny guy came running in, carrying something in his hand. I couldn’t see what it was, but I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like it.

Serge dropped me to the floor, then crouched down next to me. “I had hoped you would be a smart one, learn from your introduction that it would be better to let things happen.” He shook his head and held out his hand to the other guy. “But since you decided to be problematic, I must now do something I don’t want to do.”

My eyes widened. He’d had no problem beating me. How bad did it have to be if he didn’t want to do it?

I cursed as something sharp pierced my arm. I looked down even though I knew what I’d see. A syringe sticking out of my arm.

“What the fuck?!” I tried to jerk my arm away, but I knew it was too late. Whatever had been in the syringe was now in my bloodstream.

Wonderful.

The ceiling was swirling.

Round and round and round. Bright colors. Shiny colors. I liked the colors. The room was better with the colors. Instead of gray, they were red and green and blue and silver and orange. Swirling like circles and triangles.

I shifted on the floor, and the swirls went with me. That was new too. I liked it. Before, when it had been dark, I’d been bored. It wasn’t dark now, and I wasn’t bored. I was playing tick-tack-toe with the swirls.

Green won first and got cocky. Red didn’t like that and got distracted. I beat red and then played yellow. Yellow cheated by putting a unicorn in the center, and that was when things got crazy. The colors took sides and then everything else started fighting too.

The triangles on my wrists hurt so I rubbed them together until the triangles turned into rectangles, and I threw them away. I pumped my fists in the air and cheered on the buffalos until I fell asleep.

Running. Running. It was dark, and the trees were scary, but they weren’t chasing me. They cheered, yelling bad words and things in other languages that I couldn’t understand. I wanted to tell them to talk to me or stop yelling, but I was having a hard time breathing. My sides hurt. I was out of shape. But I shouldn’t be out of shape. I ran all the time. Lifted weights. Boxed.

But it hurt to breathe. Ribs and stomach hurt too. Why?

It was hard to run, not just to breathe. My feet felt funny. Tingly numb, like I’d sat on them.

Whoever was chasing me needed to stop because I couldn’t run anymore.

I was too tired.

I turned…and screamed…

My eyes popped open, and I stared around the room. The colors were gone, but he was still there.

Standing against the wall. Those dark eyes boring into me. Watching me. Daring me.

“Get away from me!”

I held out my hands, pointed at him.

“He shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t be here. He’s not here. No. Not here. Can’t be here.”

He took a step forward, and I scrambled backward, my head thumping against the wall. It hurt, but I didn’t care because he couldn’t be here.

“No. No. No. You’re not here. You’re not here.”

I shook my head, then dug my hands into my hair. I closed my eyes, pulled my hair. He had to go away. He wasn’t here. Not here. I never had to see him again. Never again.

“Look at me, Rona.” His familiar voice cracked and warbled. “Look at your father. Don’t be a bad girl. Look at me.”

“No, no. I’m not hearing you. You’re not here. Go away.”

“I’m here, and I’m going to finish what I started.”

“No!” The word ripped out of me, and I screamed it again and again until the colors came and wrapped me up.

They were soft and nice. They invited me to play again. Hangman this time. I said yes. I was always good at hangman. I liked words. I always thought of great words that no one ever guessed.

Quixotic.

Lackadaisical.

Ambiance.

Chivalrous.

People were always surprised at that last one, like no one ever thought about chivalry anymore. I supposed it was as dead as everyone said. Dead as I wished he was.

But he wasn’t dead.

Green nudged me. It was my turn to pick a word.

Eight letters.

Red chose E.

Two of those.

Yellow chose R.

Three of those and now the end of the word was there.

“Cheaters.” I glared at them. “You’re in cahoots.”

Cahoots was a great word too. Maybe I should’ve picked that one.

Brown guessed the word was murderer and laughed when I called it names.

“You can pretend all you want, but I’m not going anywhere. I’m inside you, girl. You have my blood, and you can’t get away from it.”

I shook my head and picked another word. Red said I couldn’t take another turn. I told him to fuck himself and went anyway.

“You’re going to destroy everyone you love. Kill them like I killed the ones I loved. That’s why I didn’t kill you, you know. Because I didn’t love you. I loved your mother, and I killed her.”

My head whipped around, and I pointed at him. “No. You don’t get to say that.”

I saw the knife, and then he raised it, ran toward me, and I couldn’t run away. I raised my arms over my head and screamed. And screamed. And screamed.

The door opened, and I kept screaming because he was cutting me, sawing into me, breaking me.

Then a pinch and the colors came back again, soft and warm. Comforting.

I stopped screaming.