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Ryan pretended that everything didn’t hurt.

Instead of focusing on how his entire body seemed to be burning from the inside out, he tried to shuffle on his backside toward the man attacking his wife. If he could get close enough to trip him, maybe that would give Jessie enough time to regroup and get the advantage back.

But since the two of them had started fighting, he’d only made it about a foot. And now, as the man used a rolling pin to press the life out of his wife, Ryan found that moving even an inch was impossible. And then it was too late.

The man released his grip on Jessie’s neck, and she dropped heavily to the ground. She was unconscious—or worse. Ryan ordered himself not to believe the worst as he watched the man methodically drag her over to the butcher block. He pulled out a zip tie, attached it to her wrist, and then to a leg of the block.

“Don’t worry,” the man said. “She’s still alive. I can hear her breathing. You should be less worried about her than yourself. She’s here for the show. And you’re the show.”

Ryan wanted to kill the guy but knew that was a pipe dream. Breathing was hard. Thinking clearly was becoming more difficult with each passing second. And if his situation was anything like the prior victims, he estimated he had about an hour and a half left to live.