Page 25 of Capo

“No!” I run toward him, trying to push him out of my way, but it’s like trying to move a boulder.

“Don’t make me hurt you again, girl,” he growls, tossing the towel to the floor a few feet into the room. “You better learn to obey, and fast, or you’ll be in for a world of pain.” He shoves me back. I stumble to remain standing and charge toward him again, but he slams the door closed. Our eyes meet through a little hatch in the door.

“Never!” I scream.

“Then I pity you,” he says and closes the hatch, leaving me in deafening silence.

My heart pounds wildly in my chest as I stare in disbelief at the closed door, then I throw myself at it and slam my fist on the cold metal surface. “Don’t leave me here!” I scream to no one, my voice weirdly muffled, as if the noise is somehow swallowed as soon as it leaves my mouth. Glancing around me, I take in the padded ceiling and walls and my blood runs cold at the implications. No one will hear me scream. This part of the house already seemed silent and abandoned, and to top it off the room is soundproofed. Kneeling, I pick the towel off the floor and try to wrap it around me. Twisting and jerking, I finally manage to get it up over my chest, clenching it under my arms, still cuffed. The chain hangs heavy across my ass and I can’t stop shaking.

The room has no windows, no light switch, nothing to sit or lie on. The floor is somewhat soft, though, like a gym carpet. A shudder runs through me. I doubt it’s to make the room comfortable. It’s probably also meant to muffle any sound. In the floor in the center of the room sits a sunken down small metal square with tiny holes. I squint, looking at it, then I widen my eyes as I realize it’s a drain. What… would they need that for? I make a slow lap along the walls, nausea rising in me as I stare at the rings that sit high up on three of the walls, and the hooks in the ceiling. I think of the drawer of horrors in Salvatore’s office. This must be the room to go with it. A sob rips through my chest and bursts out as new tears fall. I feel sick and the little stomach content I have threatens to make its way back up.

When nothing happens, no one comes for me, I finally sink down along the far wall, in the corner, somewhat grateful for the padding. It’s not soft, but it’s not concrete either and the difference is huge.

My mouth is dry, my stomach is a gnawing hole. I can’t remember when I last drank or ate anything.

In the silence, my heart finally calms a little and the tears dry on my cheeks. Waves of panic crash through me, but my mind can only take so much and finally I curl up on my side, holding my broken arm in its deformed cast the best I can. The cuffs have chafed the skin on my wrists, but it doesn’t hurt badly. My arm pounds, a dull pain that comes and goes. My ribs feel as if the broken ends gnaw at my insides, an ever-present company. But that’s not the worst pain.

The worst pain is the agony of not knowing what lies ahead, of fearing I’ll never get out of here, that I’ll be raped, beaten, and killed, and no one will ever know what became of me.

I don’t care to try to wipe my dripping nose, or the tears that fall again.