Page 25 of Bound to a Killer

I don’t respond.

He proceeds to pluck out a beige-colored packet from the loaded bag on the table and waves it at me. “You’ll feel better after you eat.”

Unbothered by my lack of response, he deliberately takes long, measured steps toward me, sending my pulse into a frenzy. My eyes dart around him, but there’s no hope. There’s no escape. I sink deeper into the hard mattress as I lean back on one hand, willing the room to stop spinning.

With the next blink, he’s directly in front of me, holding out a bottle to me. “It’ll get worse if you don’t hydrate.”

I reach for it without thinking, desperate to ease the sandpaper-like scratch at the end of my throat. He relinquishes it, but I fumble the moment it's in my grasp, the plastic crinkling as I struggle to twist the cap.

He tries reaching for it—to help, I assume—but I twist away with a strangled breath, somehow popping the lid free in the process. It rolls across the floor as I bring the bottle to my parched lips, greedily chugging until my stomach aches, not caring as it streams down to my chin and neck.

Once the bottle is drained and my thirst quenched, the world doesn’t feel quite as bleak. It’s clear that for whatever reason, he doesn’t want to hurt me. He hasn’t even tied my hands back up again. Maybe there’s still a chance of escape—or talking some sense into him.

He only needs to trust me.

It’s not impossible, but one thing keeps my fragile hope from blooming. “Who was that guy?”

His jaw tenses as he sets the square packet down on a rickety,rusted metal stool that’s beside the head of the bedframe. Then he swoops toward me, and I snap my eyes shut with a sharp inhale, bracing for impact.

“He’s not your concern,” he says flatly, his voice receding.

I peek back at him through my heavy lashes, but my gaze jerks to his hands, to the ropes pulled taut in his grip.

My stomach knots.

“Please just let me go,” I choke out, my vision blurring. “I’ll give you anything you want—just please.”

“Really?” he asks. “Anything I want?”

Even in my haze, I don’t miss the mockery in his voice, sinking in my gut like lead, heavy and suffocating.

“I have money,” I blurt, knowing damn well I don’t.

“I don’t need your money.”

Acid floods my veins. “Then what do you want?” I push through my thinning breath. “I-I promise I won’t tell a single soul. Just let me go. Please, I swear it.”

“Is that what you did when you ran into my partner outside?” His voice turns sharp. Poisonous. “Kept this between us?”

Any flicker of hope I had is immediately crushed.

There’s no changing his mind.

He loosens the rope as he leans in, but by then, the sobs are already stuck in my throat, clogging my words, my pleas. I should have told Clara about the car ride when I still had the chance. At least then she’d have something, anything, to give to the police. But I said nothing. I left them with nothing.

They’ll never find me.

I might never get out of here.

My wrists burn as he tightens the knot behind my back, the strain ripping through my shoulders until the pain flares sharp and hot. I don’t have the energy to fight. It’s all useless. So I cry instead, choking on the ache and anguish clawing its way through me.

My entire body hums with it. Is overwhelmed by it.

“I know it’s uncomfortable,” he says, “but it’s safer this way.” He wipes the tears from my cheek, and I want to flinch, but I’m too drained to pull away. “You understand that, don’t you?”

I nod, though I’m not sure if it’s me or his hand guiding the movement.

His palm cradles the side of my face, and somehow, I sink into it, into him, wishing the pain would stop. Wishing for the noise to go quiet.