Where the hell am I? I thought hell was supposed to be unbearably hot.
I could do with heat. My lungs were heavier with liquid, and every breath I wheezed with a struggle. The punishment of beatings and abuse turned my body into a wasted object, no longer useful for anything apart from the garbage.
“She’s awake. You may precede, Ignacio.”
My heart raced, chasing away the last of the smog I lived in. My brain kicked into gear and I looked around.
Shit.
I was in some sicko’s idea of a bedroom: a satanic bedroom. Black curtains hung lopsidedly over a boarded-up window, peeling wallpaper hung off the wall like dresses half shed, and a red lightbulb in the grotty chandelier turned the entire room into nothing but sick shadows.
My stomach twisted as I looked down. I was shackled to a scratchy bed, nak*d, wearing only gnawing rope on my wrists and ankles. The knots held my legs open, completely vulnerable.
Vomit rose in my throat but I swallowed it down. If I threw up I might choke and drown.
Good. Drown. Death would be a far better existence than what’s about to happen, Tess.
A whimper sounded beside me and I looked to my left. The blonde with the barbell and scratches down her chest lay in the same prone position. Our eyes met and her mouth wobbled as she fought back tears.
“Help,” she whispered.
I wanted to reach out and hug her. I wanted to protect her. Tell her all of this would be okay; that it was just a horrible dream.
I shook my head, biting my lip so I wouldn’t cry.
She squeezed her eyes, dispelling a waterfall of liquid. She sniffed, trying to bury her head into her shoulder.
“Which one do you want first, Ignacio?”
My eyes flew to Leather Jacket as he prowled at the end of the bed. White Man sat in a fancy faded chair by the peeling wall.
Leather Jacket smirked, his eyes slithering over every exposed inch. “I’ll go with chubby. Let the puta bitch see what’s gonna happen to her once I’m finished.”
Oh, God.
I thrashed my head, twisting my limbs, trying to get free.
I cried out as the woman who’d tattooed me waved from beside the bed. She gave me a horrid grin. “Time to go to a happy place.” She sat on my shoulder and inserted a needle into my overused vein. As she pressed the plunger, White Man murmured, “This is a different concoction to what you’re used to, little girl. It’s going to…well, it’s going to play with your mind. After all, that’s the part we need to break.”
The icy heat already threaded through my veins, heading to my heart to be shot around my body.
White Man stood and came forward. Patting my nak*d foot, a shred of pity appeared in his gaze. “After today, you’ll be sold. I’ve kept my side of the bargain. I will miss you, though. I’ve grown rather fond of your strength. It’s been a privilege to ruin you.”
He moved forward to cup my cheek. “Don’t worry. I’ve told your new owner that you like it rough. You’ll be well taken care of.”
I gasped as the worst feeling in my life started.
Beetles.
Spiders.
Insects with teeth and tiny claws shredded my intestines with rapid gnawing. My entire body itched and burned and I screamed. Then I coughed because my lungs couldn’t hold enough oxygen. I cried and coughed until I wheezed for breath and still the insects grew worse.
What’s happening?!
“Make it stop!”
Leather Jacket and White Man looked on as the sensation crept up my arms, into my fingers, my toes, my stomach, my chest. My heart became infested with cockroaches. My tongue chewed on by locusts.
And then it hit my brain.
I screamed as if my soul could fly free and evict itself from this prison of a body. This prison fast filling with murdering beetles and bugs. White Man morphed into a giant rodent, his perfect teeth elongated into yellow fangs. Leather Jacket evolved into a jackal, slobbering and laughing, growling and raging.
The girl next to me stayed pure and virginal, glowing white and silver with all the goodness in the world while the room began to dissolve, walls melted, paint dripped from the ceiling, scalding me as it landed on my nak*d body.
Leather Jacket with his jackal head started undressing. He removed his black jacket and slung it to the rapidly eroding floor. Flames licked the awful carpet, singeing a fiery path toward us.
I couldn’t breathe. I can’t breathe. This can’t be real. It can’t be real.
Once Leather Jackal removed his shirt and trousers, he eased off his disgusting underwear and stood with his small bent c*ck jutting out from a thicket of black hair. His groin crawled with spiders, a mass seething between his legs.
I closed my eyes but the visions found me there, too. If possible they were worse.
Q featured and he morphed from nak*d perfection with his sparrow tattoo, into a raging black-winged angel. His back sprouted three-metre-wide wings, glistening ebony with oil-slicked raven feathers. His pale jade eyes glowed with ferocity.
He shook his head in weighted disappointment and turned his back on me. His wings encompassed him into a black cocoon until he exploded into a million birds and took wing.
He left me.
Left me with Jackal and Rodent.
Something grabbed my ankle and my eyes flew open. White Man Rodent trailed his fingertips up my shin, my thigh, right to my hipbone, cutting me like a dagger even though he had no weapon. Phantom blood wept from where he touched, crying with red.
“This is for your own good.” He raised his fist and punched me in the jaw.
My head snapped sideways and I latched onto Blonde’s eyes. She panted, looking manic and wild. Undrugged, her eyes were clear and panicked. She looked like an angel, and I went from wanting to protect her to wanting her to protect me.
Please save me.
Another punch, but this time to my stomach. Lying down made the hit resonate through my tummy to my kidneys and liver.
Leather Jackal climbed onto the bed and came forward on all fours, gawking at Blonde Angel and me. His knee went between my open legs, and I cried out as he slurped his horrible feral tongue into my belly button and down. He nipped at my clit, dripping with burning saliva.
I screamed and screamed as his saliva ignited into flames, burning me to a cinder. It hurt. Fuck, it hurt. Make it stop!
White Rodent ordered, “Pay attention to the other one. Let the drugs fade a little. She won’t cope otherwise.”
Jackal nodded, breathing deep and gruff. One long paw grabbed me between the legs, probing me, raking me. He groaned as he forced a shredding nail inside. “You won’t be dry for long, puta. You wait for those drugs to switch. Soon you’ll be begging me.” He removed his touch and clambered on top of poor Blonde Angel. She keened as he settled between her legs. His hairy, untoned ass thrust hard as he rested his elbows on either side of her face.
“Lesh her go—go—you bastard!” Was that me? That slurring, broken, wild-sounding thing?
White Rodent punched me again, this time in the ribcage. I cried out as my old cracked rib wailed in agony. Did he rebreak it? It felt like it—every breath punctured my lungs, letting the build-up of liquid trickle out, filling my body with slime.
“Every time you tell Ignacio to stop, I’ll hit you. Do you hear me? You have to learn that speaking without permission equals pain. You have to learn that obeying is the only thing left for you. Do you understand, little girl?”
I raised my heavy eyes to look at the massive rodent standing over me in his blue polo and jeans.
Why is a rat dressed? It’s speaking to me.
“It’s here to rape you, Tessie. Do things to you that I would never do. You left me,” Brax murmured in my mind.
I knew it wasn’t real, but no matter how hard I tried to snap out of it, I couldn’t. The horror wouldn’t let me free.
Leather Jackal kissed Blonde Angel, rubbing his horrible snout all over her face. She cried and wriggled.
“St—stop it!” I yelled.
Instantly, a sharp ringing slap blazed my cheek. “What did I just say, precious?” White Rodent shook his head, admonishing me. “You need to learn.”
He said something about pain. Disobeying? Don’t disobey?
“Disobey. Fight. I’m coming for you, Tess!” Q raged in my head.
But if I fight, I get hurt. Why would I keep inviting such pain? That’s stupid.
“It’s who you are. You’re too strong to let them do this to you.”
Q fizzled away, replaced with White Rodent again. He asked, “Are you still with me, little girl?” He peered into my eyes, but I couldn’t bring him into focus. He stayed blurry and furry and vague.
Jackal spat on his paw and rubbed his claws between Blonde Angel’s legs. Her whimpers turned into ragged gasps and pleas. “Stop. Please. I’ll do anything you want. Please. Don’t do this!”
“L—listen to her! S—stop!”
A punch to the breast.
Fuck, that hurt the most. The sensitive tissues yelped and burned.
“Learn, girl. Retaliation equals pain. Next time, I won’t be so kind.”
Next time? Next time what?
Coherency left me and I swam deeper into fog.
I’m cold. So cold. Insects have taken over my body. I feel them creeping through my blood. They’re chewing on my brain.
Blonde Angel suddenly bellowed and screeched. I watched in horrified terror as Leather Jackal plunged his putrid c*ck inside her. He groaned deep and licked his lips, looking deep into my eyes. “You’re next, f**king bitch. See how I’m f**king her. That’s gonna be you.” He thrust again and again. “Oh, yeah. You’re gonna take me. I’m gonna pay you back for fighting.”
The fear swelled over me, bringing with it more spiders and locusts.
Blonde Angel fell deathly silent. Her body rocked with Jackel’s pummels and her eyes never stopped leaking, but her face went slack as shock stole her mind. I literally heard the snap as her mind broke.
No!
I went crazy.
I bucked and cried, uncaring that my body couldn’t withstand movement with its injuries. Nothing else mattered but getting free. I wanted to kill Leather Jackal. I wanted to rescue poor Blonde Angel.
Get off her! It wasn’t fair. The poor girl. The poor innocent girl. Ferocity blew the drugs clear for one precious moment and I screamed, “Get the f**k off her! Get off her, you bastard.”
Pain.
Intense, radiating pain.
I retched, activating aches in my chest. The agony swirled in my head, threatening to knock me out.
White Rodent stood above me with a pair of pliers. His eyes were grim, jaw set. “See what you made me do. Learn!”
I looked down, already back in the pit of hallucinations.
My middle finger was snapped in two. Bone protruded from skin and blood ran freely. Worms appeared from the wound, wiggling in the air.
The throb grew worse and worse. I wanted to tear my hand off just to be free of it.
“Nooooooooo!”
“Yes. Fuck yes.” Leather Jackal panted, rutting harder into his victim. She squeezed her eyes and endured.
I cried. It was sick, so sick. I opened my mouth to tell Leather Jackal to stop. To leave her be, but a lasso of panic noosed me.
Retaliation means pain.
My tongue lodged in my mouth and my eyes flew to White Rodent. He waved the pliers in my face. “Are you learning yet?”