Page 12

Ten

JAXON

T he silence is like needle pricks to my skin as we head to Dirt Lane Road.

Knox’s focus is unwavering as he drives while Dimitri keeps checking his knuckles.

Honestly, I didn’t expect that out of him.

Sure, I told him to do something and I was ready to beat the crap out of his dad with his own nameplate, but Dimitri apparently had a lot of pent-up shit.

I shift in my seat and clear my throat. “Sorry, man,” I finally say while keeping the map Hope drew open on my lap.

“Sorry for what I said,” he snorts. “I was pissed and should have walked away.”

I hum. “I wouldn’t have let you. It was fair. Better you gave me some words than the beating you gave your dad,” I say. “He deserved it, by the way.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Dimitri mutters.

“The GPS will get us to the road in an hour,” Knox informs.

We’ve been driving for an hour and a half already. We stopped at Hope’s old house to clean up and change clothes, but I still feel disgusting. Nothing about this sits right with me. We need to get to her.

Right now, there isn’t anything to say.

We already filled Knox in on what we found—including her mother, the videos, and everything else. He told us about the diary but had obviously left things out. That was the new trend, only sharing the necessary, hiding the unnecessary and terrible.

Has anything fucking changed since school?

Leaning my head back, I think of Hope smiling, her laughing with the guys on the team, looking so confident and assured, not flinching away anytime someone raises a voice.

Plenty has changed. Hope isn’t going to be fighting alone anymore.

She isn’t going to have to cross her fingers and pray that someone’s going to believe her, listen to her, free her.

We’re on our way. She’ll be ours by tonight. She’ll see how important she is to us. We left everything for her, everything we’ve worked hard to achieve. We won’t choose anyone’s side except hers. We won’t doubt her again.

“Do you think they’ll still be there?” Dimitri finally asks, breaking the tense silence.

“He thinks he’s safe there,” Knox says with the kind of conviction that hints at more.

If he’s that sure, it’s because he’s either known someone like Coach, been in a similar position, or knows way more about Coach than I want to believe.

I take a slow breath and nod. “He has no reason to leave and trying to transport her when she doesn’t hesitate to fight is more dangerous… for him.”

“Shame she hasn’t killed him yet,” Dimitri whispers.

Knox’s hands tighten on the steering wheel.

I don’t blame Dimitri for the thought, but it’s too dark for Hope. I don’t know if I could do it. I don’t know if she could. Hell, I’m ready for a fight and I know Dimitri is too based on what he just did to his father, but could any of us really kill Coach?

For Hope, I could , I think, surer of that than anything. For Hope, I could do a million terrible things and never regret a single one if it made her safe.

Knox hit the gas, the roar of the engine being the only sound that fills the car.

I just hope we aren’t too late.

HOPE

I stare at my empty plate. It wasn’t enough to sate the hunger, but I had to eat. My dad sits across from me, his gaze shifting around the room, his leg impatiently tapping. I wonder what he’ll do next.

I fought him off once, but now that he has the shackles on me, I can only go so far from the table. I can’t even reach the chair myself.

“You have more energy now,” he comments with a nod, almost seeming proud he took care of me.

I glance at my thumb and recall all the movies I watched, how easy it looked for someone to dislocate their thumb and slide out of the cuffs. I don’t think it matters. I can’t even try with him watching me.

My eyes land on the knife next to his plate. Could I get it? Would I know what to do with it?

His gaze flicks to the corner and I follow until I see it. A camera on the tripod, looming in the shadows like a fucking person.

“What…” I swallow. “Why is there a camera?”

He looks from it to me, then sighs. “I’m not the only one who likes the way you fuck. You should know that. Why do you think Knox, Jaxon, and Dimitri got involved?”

My throat tightens and the bit of food in my stomach rolls. “Y-you record it?”

He hums with a nod. “And publish it. You make me a great deal of money, Hope. Of course, you wouldn’t if you weren’t so sweet.

Your mother was better. People liked how she screamed and yelled, how she’d break and do exactly as she was told.

They liked giving me ideas too. Funny how hobbies can become income. ”

I’m going to be sick.

“Y-you… you did that with Mom?” I whisper, not sure he can even hear me.

He drops his fork and stands, rounds the table until he’s behind me. His fingers gently stroke through my hair and I flinch. I try to move away from him, but the shackles keep me in place.

“That was the deal,” he replies, no hint of kindness there. “And when she forgot that… well…”

His hands curls through my hair, he grips tightly and jerks back. I gasp as the chair moves back. My arms are stretched in front of me and I whimper as I try to pull away.

“What deal?” I ask.

He shoves me forward and a scream rips from me. He presses my face on the cold, empty plate and tears the chair away. The smell of potatoes and beef invade my nose as tears well in my eyes.

“I don’t think that’s what you really want to know,” he answers and pats my hips as he steps closer.

I can feel the roughness of his jeans graze against the flimsy fabric of my dress and nausea rises higher.

“She doesn’t matter anymore—you do. Right here, so soft.

They tried to take you from me, Hope. And you were going to let them, weren’t you? ”

My heart beats rapidly against my chest, my body trembles. I can’t move, I can’t run. I claw at the wooden table; my legs kick back but I can’t seem to hit him as he keeps himself close.

I stammer as the panic spreads. “Tell me—tell me about Mom. We… we haven’t talked about her in a long time,” I say, trying to distract him. “Don’t you have any good memories of her? Like when we’d go to the cabin and go fishing?”

Please, someone hear me. Please, someone watching… help me.

His other hand bundles up my dress, pushing it over my hips until the brisk air tickles over my bare skin.

“Look at that,” he muses. “Just as pretty as I remembered.”

I shake my head. “Please, please, don’t do this. Let me go, I won’t tell anyone, I swear.”

My pleas don’t get a reaction. They never did.

I move my body, or I try to, at least, but he pushes my head harder against the plate until I hear the crack.

“Beg harder,” he sneers as his hand scrapes over my lower back.

My body heaves, my insides curl, and I clench my eyes shut. I don’t want to see him; I don’t want to hear him as he takes a part of me.

I have to believe it doesn’t matter, that he’ll never fully have me, or break me.

I’m stronger than I was all those years ago. I have to be. My eyes flutter open, tears clouding my sight.

“Let me go,” I grit and kick down. My dirty feet slam onto his boots. My shoulders move just enough for his grip on my hair to falter slightly. The broken plate scratches my skin and blood drips down, staining the shattered white platter.

I can’t stop, I have to fight, I have to try—

My breath falls silent, my body goes rigid, and sobs tear from me as he forces himself inside me.

“Not that much fight in you, huh?” the monster behind me mocks with a groan.

I have to escape.

Those four words repeat in my mind, over and over as he moves and speaks, but the words don’t register as I find my escape. Locking the present away.

I have to escape.

“Let me take care of you, sweetheart,” Jaxon whispers in my ear. “Be mine. I promise I’ll never let you go.”

I sniffle. My eyelids are shut tight as tears fall on the empty plate. With every thrust, the table scratches on the wooden floor, the sound almost drowning the groans and grunts from behind me.

I nod my head into the memory, changing it by giving into what happened that day, seeing it as the escape I needed then, and now.

I said no that day, but now…

“Okay,” I whisper, changing the past and accepting who it made me into. Accepting who they are to me, who I want them to be.

I’m tied to them as they are to me.

“Good girl,” Jaxon whispers and his hand snakes around me, grazes over my perked nipples. “Open your legs, let Dimitri have a taste.”

I know I fought that day; I know they ripped my legs open, bruised my skin but it has to be different, it has to be. I have to make it better.

I part my legs and watch as Dimitri crawls between them. His tongue sweeps over his bottom lip as he grips my thighs to keep them open.

The warmth of his tongue forces my lips to part as my core quivers. First, he flicks over my clit, earning a buck from my hips, then he moves lower and teases my pussy.

“Doesn’t that feel good?” Jaxon asks, his voice low and husky.

A moan spills but I need something else. I need the roughness, the pain. Everything that they can give me. Everything that keeps me away from my current nightmare.

Dimitri’s fingers dig into my skin, harder, rougher until I whimper from it. My teary stare flicks up and I watch as Knox rests against the door, waiting like the predator he is.

The monster.

My monster.

Pleasure spikes as he steps closer, his bare chest glinting in the soft light above us. He crouches down, the burn scars on his back staring back at me. Dimitri flicks his tongue over my clit, again and again until I’m panting in Jaxon’s hold.

Knox’s fingers graze over my wet upper thigh and move around Dimitri’s play before thrusting two fingers inside me.

I arch my back and moan as Knox pumps his fingers in and out, curling them to hit that sensitive spot inside me. Dimitri sucks hard on my clit, making my legs tremble.

“That’s it, let go for us,” Jaxon growls in my ear. His hands roughly knead my breasts, pinching and rolling my perked nipples between his fingers.

Pleasure coils tighter and tighter in my core as the three men work my body.

I’m climbing higher, the sensations overwhelming me, pushing out all thoughts of where I am and what’s happening beyond this room.

There’s only Jaxon, Knox, and Dimitri. Only their hands and mouths on me, bringing me to the brink.

“Come for us, Hope,” Knox commands darkly. “Now.”

His deep voice sends me over the edge. My pussy clenches around his thrusting fingers as my orgasm crashes through me. I cry out, my body shaking and writhing against their strong holds. Wave after wave of intense pleasure washes over me, blanking my mind in blissful oblivion.

As I float down from the twisted memory, slowly coming back to myself, reality seeps in again—the cold, hard table beneath me, the shackles on my wrists, the cruel man violating me. Tears escape my eyes.

Sharp breaths ring in my ear and I try to move again. My restrained hands can’t go too far, but as my sight sharpens, I see it. The knife.

My fingers crawl up the wooden surface, closer to the handle, even as the shackles won’t give me much room. I reach with everything I’ve got.

I can still feel him inside me, but my focus lies ahead.

Almost.

Another deep thrust, the table rattles, and the knife rolls slightly. My fingers graze over the handle and with another push, I wrap them around the wooden base and tuck it between my hands.

My heart stammers, adrenaline courses through me. One way or another, I’ll get out of here. I’ll heal from this. And the monster behind me will pay for everything he’s done. That thought, that determination, is the only thing that will keep me sane, keep me fighting.

I won’t let him break me. I’m stronger than he knows. I just have to hold on a little longer and wait for the right time.

The sound of a vibrating phone makes him stop and he steps back. I glance over my shoulder, trailing him with my eyes.

He curses something and picks up the phone. “What?” he barks, and I automatically flinch.

“What? You told them? You’re fucking worthless.” He slams the phone and it crashes against the wall.

He shakes his head and stomps towards me, his pants still open, his boxers hanging low.

“Don’t,” I plead and lean back as he grabs my chin.

“You think you’re done? You think you’ll deserve anything better than this?” With his touch leaving my chin, his other hand slams into my jaw.

“Do you think they want you?”

The taste of copper fills my mouth and he punches me again against my cheekbone.

“You’re a filthy whore!” He spits in my face, his fingers claw at my mouth as he tries to pry it open, and with his other hand, he pushes down his pants.

I keep my lips clenched shut, move as much as I can away from him. He closes in and his scent invades me. I grip the knife tighter and with the little motion I have, I cut him. He hisses and reels back.

“Stay away from me,” I grit, and his tense brows soften as laughter spills from him.

“Or you’re going to nick me with that tiny knife of yours, stupid girl?”

I swallow as he rounds me. “You can’t catch me here, dirty slut.” With his hand in a fist, he slams against my thighs and I cry out in pain.

He does it again and my legs give out, leaving me hanging on to the shackles.

“You think I was hurting you before?” He chuckles. “You have no idea how much pain I can give you. If I can’t have you, no one can.”

His hand curls around my neck and squeezes.

Hard and relentless.