Page 20 of Mimic

“Indie—”

“Please just go, Haizley.” I continued to stare out the window until I heard the door softly close. Another tear slipped from my eye as I watched her do exactly what I’d asked her to do. I told myself it was what I wanted.

I just didn’t understand why getting what you wanted had to hurt so much.

Chapter Eight

Mimic

He was back again. Every day he walked in, slid a tray of food into my cell, and stared at me while I ate it. The first day I’d eaten it without thought. I was so hungry that when he sat me at the table with a plate full of food, all I’d thought about was the grumbling in my stomach.

I hadn’t thought about my mother, or my sister, or what this man had done to either of them. I selfishly ate my fill, not understanding there would be consequences for my lack of awareness.

When I woke up, I was in a cell.

For five days, I refused to eat anything else he brought me. First, he’d tried to coerce me. Promising me I’d see my mother. That she was waiting for me and needed me strong. When that didn’t work, he’d threatened me. A tactic as opposite as night and day, claiming he would hurt her if I didn’t do as he asked.

He never mentioned Rose.

In the end, he force-fed me. He hadn’t given me a choice. When nothing happened after I’d eaten the food he shoved down my throat, I realized maybe it was safe.

No, safe wasn’t the right word. Nothing about being locked in his cell was safe.

Now he was back. He had a woman with him. When she saw me, she sputtered at him, “What the fuck, Dakota?!”

Dakota smiled at me. Not a friendly smile, it was a smile that spoke of his evil. Of all the things he planned to do.

“This is my pet, Lisa. My new plaything.”

“Plaything? What do you plan on doing to him?”

“Whatever the fuck I want,” he answered, turning to her and pushing her against the wall. “Right now, he needs to learn how to please a woman.”

“He’s a child, Dakota.” Her protests were weak as Dakota ran his hands over her chest. He lifted her shirt, and I closed my eyes. Something slammed against the bars, and Dakota yelled, “Open your fucking eyes and watch, or I’ll make you take her fucking place.”

My eyes flew open. Fear of being touched and groped, as well as other things I knew he planned for her, made sure I never closed my eyes.

I wasn’t stupid. I’d had an education not long after Rose and I began living on the streets. I’d seen what men and women did with each other. Dakota was bigger than me, stronger. I’d seen boys and girls my age forced to do things children shouldn’t be doing. Things Rose might be forced to do being alone with no one to protect her.

She was so small. So soft and trusting.

Tears for my sister slid down my face, causing Dakota to laugh. He believed it was him who had made me cry.

“Dakota, he’s crying.” Lisa’s voice had an air of mockery. She took the same pleasure in my tears that Dakota took. The two of them ridiculed my weakness.

They would never know who my tears were really for. The only way to protect my sister while I was in this cell was to never tell Dakota about her. It was the only way to be sure he didn’t get his hands on her.

So I watched as he sucked on Lisa’s nipples. I watched as his hand groped between her legs. He narrated every dirty action he took against her body until she was screaming. When he took off his pants and stroked his dick as he leered at her, Iyelled at him to leave her alone, and they both laughed at my outburst.

“Touch her, boy!”

Dakota had pushed Lisa against the bars. Her hands gripped the steel tightly, her breasts squeezed between them, as Dakota fucked her from behind. He taunted me, telling me all the ways I would learn how to make a woman scream, either in pleasure or in pain, while I cowered in the corner and prayed for my mother to find me. To rescue me.

Only she never came.

I sat up in bed. My body sweating and my heart beating fast. Something had triggered the nightmare. I looked around my empty room. There was nothing of value here. I had nothing of value.

Years of living in a cell with nothing but a cot, a single pillow, and a blanket had conditioned me to what the world marketed as a minimalist lifestyle.