Chapter 1

MINA

I snapped awake. Froze, eyes half open in the gloom.

Shoving ragged, matted hair off my face, I pushed myself to an uncomfortable hunch. The rusty bars above me stopped me from sitting fully upright.

I pulled my legs closer to my body. The movement rattled the chain attached to the bars. Accustomed as I was to the strap chafing my ankle, I barely winced.

My attention wasn't on myself. It was on the barely visible outline of the door.

Every muscle in my body tensed, waiting. A minute past, then several more. Each punctuated by the dripping of water down the damp walls.

Just as I started to decide I'd heard nothing, and it might be safe to doze again, the door slowly opened.

"Miss me, bitch?" Kurt Lasalle strode into the dank basement. He crossed his arms and smiled, as though I should be grateful for his presence. Like he owned the place.

Owned me.

I didn't answer. Instead I focused on a patch of concrete floor in front of his feet.

Could it please open up and swallow him? If it couldn't, I wished it would do that to me.

The floor remained stubbornly solid.

He kicked the side of the cage, making it rattle and shake. "I said, did you miss me, bitch?"

I flinched and swallowed hard. Of course I didn't miss him. Every moment he was absent was a blessing. If there were blessings in a place like this.

Before I could answer, he dropped a slice of bread through the bars at the top of the cage. It landed near my knee.

My stomach pinched at the sight of it. How long was it since I'd eaten anything? The last time he was here at least. Two days, maybe three.

Not long enough, but too long at the same time.

"Eat it," he barked.

Before he could change his mind and take the bread back, I snatched it up and stuffed the whole piece into my mouth. I struggled to chew. With any luck, I'd choke on it.

Kurt laughed. "You look like a fucking animal."

Bit by bit, I swallowed down the stale bread. Parts of it tasted mouldy, but I couldn't bring myself to care. Focusing on chewing kept me from looking at Kurt.

Of course I looked like an animal. He treated me like one. He chained me in here, naked and filthy. He kept me on the verge of starving. My only source of water, most of the time, was the moisture that trickled down the walls and into the cage.

How long was it since I last saw sunlight?

I barely remembered how it looked, how it felt when it caressed my face. Maybe I dreamt that I used to walk in it, to skip around the garden with my sister and brothers.

Sometimes, when I dozed, I dreamt of that life.

Then I woke to this one. Hour after hour. Day after day. How long had it been? I had no idea. No way to tell night from day. All I knew was monotony, broken by dozing and visits from him.

I couldn't sleep here, not properly. Not deeply. I didn't dare. Sleeping was for another life, one that was such a faded memory I wasn't sure if it was real either.

I swallowed down the last of the bread and huddled up against the side of the cage.

Kurt started to pace back and forth in front of it, putting me further on edge. Somehow, he knew what it did to me. That him moving around like he was caged put me further on edge. That was exactly why he did it. He got off on the power trip. On feeling like he had the upper hand on someone. Even if that someone was chained and caged.

"You should be grateful," he said, as though lost in thought about something specific. "After what you did, you should have had your throat cut. You know that, don't you?"

He stopped and crouched down in front of me. "Don't you?"

"Yes," I said. My throat was so dry, my voice was a hoarse whisper. The sound was strange to my ears.

I hadn't had reason to talk much for so long. I only did it answer his questions when he insisted on it. Usually 'yes' or 'no' was enough to satisfy him. He wasn't here for a conversation with me, he was here to remind himself he held the power.

Something must have happened to make him need an extra ego boost. I didn't give a shit what, only that I'd bear the brunt of it. I always did.

"Yes," Kurt echoed. "But here you are. Still alive. Because of me. Because I decided to have mercy on you."

I met his eyes for half a heartbeat before dropping my gaze again. His idea of mercy was fucked up. More than fucked up. He'd dreamt up a nightmare and I was living it.

"You're grateful to me, aren't you Mina? Because I was kind enough to let you live. Look at me." He gripped the bars of the cage and shook it. "Look at me, bitch."

I raised my gaze again and looked into his hateful face.

If he wanted gratitude, he should drive a knife through my heart. As I was dying, I'd thank him for it. But not for this. Not for this version of living. I wanted to spit at him, but my mouth was too dry. I resorted to looking back at him with cold eyes, expressionless.

His dark hair was cut close to his scalp. His stubble was as long as his hair. Brown eyes regarded me with amusement. I wanted nothing more in this world than to watch the light fade out of those eyes. For him to die slowly, painfully.

I didn't realise I'd curled my hands into fists until he looked down at them.

"You have some fight in you today, hmmm?" He raised an eyebrow.

No.

No. No. No.

He pulled a key out of his pocket and pushed it into the lock. He swung the door open and grabbed the end of the chain. He stood, dragging the chain with him.

I bit back a whimper of pain. The strap dug into my ankle as he pulled me across the floor of the cage on my ass.

The chain wrapped around one hand, he grabbed my wrist with the other and pulled me to my feet. He shoved me a handful of steps over to a basin on the side of the room.

"Wash yourself," he growled.

I grabbed hold of the side of the sink and held on to keep from falling. My legs could barely hold my weight. The chain was extended to the full extent of its length. I knew from past experience, it wasn't long enough for me to reach the door. Just the cage and the sink.

Before I could even pick up a washcloth, he grabbed the back of my hair, shoved my face under the tap and turned on the frigid water.

I struggled to breathe, but I managed to swallow a few gulps. It was fresher than what trickled down the walls. Not by much. It tasted like it passed through rusty pipes.

He pulled me back out of the water and laughed. "Refreshing enough for you? I should put in the plug, fill the sink and hold you under, but I won't. Not today." He sounded as though he was doing me a favour by letting me live.

He'd do me one if he carried out his threat and let me die. I wouldn't fight him.

He let my hair go and took a step back. "Hurry up."

I didn't want to obey him, but he gave me very few chances to get clean. I felt as though a layer of dirt coated every centimetre of my skin. If I could wash some of it away for now, it would stop being itchy and hard. For a while.

I grabbed the washcloth and wiped my face, before starting to wipe down my filthy body. I would have given almost anything for hot water and a proper shower or bath.

He snatched the washcloth from my hand and scrubbed it hard over my ass and pussy.

"That'll do." He turned off the water and tossed the cloth into the sink. From a hook on the wall, he pulled a towel and quickly ran it over me. The thin cloth was rough. Abrasive like a cheese grater on tender skin. It couldn't have been much cleaner than I was. Kurt had dried me with it several times already without taking it to wash it. It smelled sharp and musty.

Whatever the original colour was, was anyone's guess. It could have been blue, grey or maybe brown. Hell, it could have been bright pink for all I knew. Either way, it was old and worn. The kind people use on animals, rather than wasting the good, soft towels.

He stepped over to hang the towel back up on the hook. For those few seconds, he had no hand on me, or on the chain.

I stepped back towards the cage. If I was quick enough, I could scurry back inside.

He leaned over, grabbed a section of chain and pulled it, almost tripping me over.

I grabbed the outside of the cage to keep from falling on my face.

"Where do you think you're going, bitch?" He sounded amused. "You really are feisty today." He grabbed the back of my neck and pushed me forward until I was bent over the top of the cage. The cold metal dug into my chest and stomach, rough with wear and rust.

I pressed myself into it as though somehow I could slip between the bars and back into the cage. Hell was better than what he was about to do to me. What he'd done so many times before. I used to fight back, but I'd learnt the futility of that. The more I fought, the better he liked it.

I squeezed my eyes shut and hoped like hell he'd finish quickly.

The sound of a phone ringing echoed through the basement. It sounded so loud, I flinched. After spending hour upon hour in near silence, noises like that were a shock to my senses.

The ringtone wailed with the words to some rock song, the vocals sung by a woman, as far as I could tell.

"My love was a dark place,

Betrayed, denied, and broken.

I was shattered,

Over and gone.

Over and gone.

So gone."

"Fuck," Kurt growled.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket and pressed it to his ear. "What?" he snarled. He listened for a few moments before swearing again. "I'm on my way."

He shoved his phone back into his pocket and yanked me back upright. "Fun will have to wait until later." He pushed me back into the cage and slammed the door shut before pulling the key back out of the lock. "Try not to miss me too much." He smirked.

I'd miss him like I'd miss a bullet in my brain.

I scrambled back into the corner and curled up as small as I could. The cage was so filthy, I might as well have not washed myself at all. I couldn't avoid touching it, but I touched as little of it as I could.

I watched through slitted eyes as he hurried out the door and locked it behind him. It was a reprieve for now, but Kurt Lasalle was a man of his word. If he said he'd come back to finish what he started, then he would.

Tears were useless. Instead I let myself slip into my numb place, where I stopped thinking and feeling too much. I don't know how many times I'd been grateful to my training for allowing me to switch off like this. If it wasn't for that, I would have broken a long, long time ago.