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5

J udith didn’t lie about the snowstorm—I guess I’ll give her that much. When I step out of the cell, the torture room is freezing, and snow has already piled up on the stairs I used to stare at while he whipped me and raped me, mocking me with the promise of freedom.

“See?” Judith says archly. “Don’t try to run. The highway is a mile away, and it’s not busy. You’ll freeze before you get help.”

I look at her sideways, already numb from the cold and from everything her husband has done to me. Numb and wary.

“I’ll let you go first,” she says. “As a show of trust.”

My wariness swells and turns into a dull, accepting fear. “So what?” I say. “You can throw one of those knives at my back? Cut my legs off with an axe?”

“I’m not my husband,” she says. “I didn’t know he was doing this.”

“You don’t seem too surprised by it.” Or disturbed. Horrified. Any of the things I’d expect from a normal person.

“Trust me,” she says. “I’m surprised.”

The wind pushes more snow into the cellar or basement or whatever this place is. I wrap my arms around myself, my muscles aching from being chained up.

“I’ll be right behind you,” Judith says. “And then we’ll go into the house—you should see it, once you’re up top—and I’ll get you a change of clothes. A bath. We’ll address that cut and anything else. Are you hungry?”

It all comes out too fast, and I consider that maybe she’s more upset than I give her credit for.

“He hasn’t fed me,” I say flatly.

“And how long have you been here? At least a few days, I would guess?”

The way she talks about this, like it’s ordinary, is terrifying. I nod, hoping that will shut her up.

“Then I’ll heat up some broth to start. You don’t want to overdo it. Now go. Before the storm gets worse.”

This still doesn’t feel real. I still expect him to step out of the shadows with that manic, terrible grin. I expect to hear his shrill, Honey I’m home! and the scrape of a knife against metal. I expect to feel his hands around my throat.

Judith stares at me, her pretty face an unreadable mask.

“Where is he?” I whisper.

“In Pennsylvania.” Her eyes burn. “I assure you, he’s not here. You’re safe, at least from him. That cold will kill you, though.”

She’s right. I know she’s right; I can feel it slicing through my skin, even down here, out of the elements. The cement floor sears the bottom of my feet. My body won’t stop shaking. Although that might not be from the cold.

“And what about you?”

“I’m not going to kill you.” She hesitates. “But I do plan to kill him.”

I’m too numb to react to that, except for a small, sizzling spark deep in my chest. Surely you’d like some revenge?

Do I?

“Are you going to fly to Pennsylvania and do it?” A stupid question to cover up my fear and confusion.

“This conversation would be much more comfortable in the house,” she says. “Please. Go.”

I turn to the stairs. I would hear them, sometimes, creaking and grinding beneath his weight, a terrible announcement of his arrival. Then he would appear in the doorway of my cell, blades gleaming in either hand.

The wind blusters across my face, dusting my cheeks with little stinging dots of snow. I still think this is some kind of trap, that I’m being corralled upward by his perfect wife so he can attack me in the cold. But at least I’m not bound up by chains. At least I might be able to run.

So I go up. Every time I put weight on my left leg, pain shudders through my body, but I keep telling myself I will run as soon I’m outside. I can fight through the pain. I’ve just got to get out of here.

The cold cuts through me. Snow blows into my face. And when I finally peek my head outside for the first time in three days, all I see is snow. He’s not here.

But I also realize that Judith is right. I can’t run. I’m barefoot and dressed in lingerie. The cold sears through me, cutting straight to my bone. For a moment, all I can do is stand on the frozen slab of concrete, shivering wildly, staring out at the frozen landscape. A dead forest. A house glittering like ice. A field of snow.

“You can’t be out here much longer.” Judith’s voice makes me jump, and when she wraps her fingers around my forearm, I screech and try to pull away. But I’m weak from her husband’s torture and starvation, and she’s stronger than she looks. “Do you think you can make it across the yard?”

Tears burn at the edges of my eyes. It feels like freedom, but I know it’s not.

“I don’t want you to freeze to death,” Judith says sharply. “I am not my husband.”

“He didn’t want me to freeze to death, either,” I mutter. But when she pulls me forward into the snow, I go with her, shaking uncontrollably. The snow feels like fire. The wind feels like his knives, slicing me open, so sharp that I barely feel the open wound on my leg.

But I make it across somehow. Judith pushes me through a sliding glass door, and suddenly I’m enveloped by a velvety warmth on the edge of a sunken living room.

I collapse onto my hands and knees, gasping through the pain and the cold. I can’t stop shaking.

A blanket drapes around my shoulders, and I know I shouldn’t, but I pull it tighter around myself, trying to trap my warmth.

“Let me start a fire,” Judith says. “Then I’ll get you a change of clothes and some chicken broth. Wrap up that cut.” A pause, long and weighted. “Then we can talk.”

Surely you’d like some revenge for what my husband did to you?

My head buzzes. I lift my gaze just enough to see her cross the living room and kneel beside the fireplace and turn a knob. Immediately, a blue-white flame flares to life. She glances over her shoulder and gestures for me to move closer.

There’s no fire poker, not with a gas fireplace like this one.

I crawl forward, limbs shaking. I’m aware that I’m smearing blood and snow and filth across her plush cream-colored carpets. But who gives a shit? It’s her husband’s fault.

She watches me with that unreadable expression, waiting until I’m situated in front of the fire.

Then she leaves me alone.

She leaves me alone, but she doesn’t tie me down with chains. She doesn’t slam the back of my head against a wooden table until the world goes dark. She just—leaves me alone.

I could leave.

But I don’t move. The fire feels too good, like it’s thawing me out from the inside. I snuggle deeper into the blanket as if I can burrow away from the nightmare that’s been my life the last three days. Ever since a man with blond hair and a brown mustache slipped Axel, the owner at the Red Blossom, $400 for a private session at the Sunrise Tide Motel down the street.

I’d done it dozens of times, and usually for half that amount. Before, the worst-case scenario was the guy was gross or boring. Best-case scenario, I had some fun.

Not this time. And I doubt Axel even reported me missing.

I squeeze the blanket more tightly around my shoulders, watching the flickering gas flames until I doze off, drifting on a kind of grey haze until I feel a light hand on my shoulder and I snap awake, screaming my throat raw.

“Shhh.” Judith’s lips are next to my ear, her breath warm on my cheek. “He’s not here.”

I gasp down a choking, terrified breath and crawl across the carpet, away from her. She doesn’t move or chase after me, just stands there holding a steaming mug.

“Chicken broth,” she says. “Drink it, and we’ll see how you do.”

I breathe deep, shaking a little. Judith sets the mug on the coffee table and steps toward me cautiously, like she’s approaching a cat. “You’re safe,” she says. “He’s not coming back for a week.”

“What if he does?” The question surprises me a little because it makes me realize I don’t fear her the way I think I should.

Not even when Judith smiles at the question, her expression as cold and cruel as the snow whipping around outside. That should scare me, because it almost reminds me of him. At least until she says, “I’ll take care of him before he lays a hand on you. Promise.”

“You?” I laugh and shake my head. “No offense, lady?—”

“Judith,” she interrupts. “Please. And I’d love to know your name.”

“Judith, fine.” I glare at her. “No offense, Judith , but I don’t think you fully appreciate what kind of monster your husband is.”

Judith kneels on the carpet and pushes the blanket away to reveal the throbbing, glistening cut on my thigh. “He’s not a monster. He’s a man.” She lifts her gaze to mine. “And I know exactly the kind of man he is.”

I swallow. For a half second, I see it: her rage flaming up in her big green eyes. And it sparks something frightening inside me.

“I realize I don’t look like it, but I know exactly how to handle a man like that.”

And although it feels absurd, I fucking believe her.

“I’ll take that broth now,” I say shakily. Then, a beat later, I add, “And my name is Gloria.”

Judith smiles as if we’re at some rich ladies’ luncheon. “Gloria,” she says. “It’s lovely to meet you. I’m sorry it couldn’t be under better circumstances.”

I resist the urge to roll my eyes.

Judith stands and hands me the mug. “Drink it while I get my First Aid kit.” She tilts her head toward the sofa. “I brought you a change of clothes, too. But wait until I get that cut cleaned up before you change.”

Then she’s gone again, leaving me alone with the fire, which hisses strangely instead of filling the room with the crackle of burning and collapsing wood. I take a short, hesitant sip of broth—and then immediately gulp the rest of it down, my hunger flaring to life.

Along with my own burning rage.