Chapter 17
Ella:
Seeing her lunge, I casually stepped to the side avoiding the collision, not because I can fight or am a ninja or anything but because the lunge was pr
Chapter 18Ella:My eyes watch with precision as Declan's jaw drops, as his hand that is holding onto me falls slack, and as his chest becomes rapid movements of up and
Chapter 19Declan:Five years ago.
Chapter 20Ella:My phone is blowing up, message after message, ding after ding, notification after notification. It's been like this ever since we left school, even af
Chapter 21Declan:
Chapter 22Declan:Today the sky is a cloud-covered, gloom-stricken, dull desolate grey. A whole fucking mood, one that would dwindle and desiccate as the hours progres
Chapter 23Declan:The continuous vibration in my pocket halts only a brief moment before beginning again as it has for the last ten minutes. Finally having enough of i
Chapter 24Ella:
Chapter 25Declan:Water swooshes down my throat in icy cold gulps as I slam the perspiration covered glass down on my kitchen counter, the noise reverberating the room, a pale comparison to my mother's endless pounding on my
Chapter 34 Declan: Ella. My mom. Ella. My mom... JULIAN— Ella. I can't find the words to talk. Ellie's here. My mom's dead. Ellie's holding me up. My mom has a bullet in her head. People are yelling. There are so many people. Voices from all directions. It's making me dizzy. Ella's crying, I can feel her warm salty tears drip onto my dirt-drenched, blood-skidded skin. But I can't console her. I'm so tired. I'm so fucking tired. I can barely move, I feel so heavy. Like a barrel of boulders. Sleep, I want to sleep. My head is pounding, pulsating. And my eyes—my eyes are closing. They won't stop closing. I can't keep them open. I don't want to be here anymore. Something hurts. Everything hurts. And it won't go away, amplifying and expanding and evolving. Like a parasite or a disease.
My mouth drops open at the condition of the person, and my heart hurts for them. What kind of present is this? Until he lifts his head and my whole world goes spiraling. And I'm choking, tears spilling, as I go to get up and sprint to him only to be shoved back down by my shoulders. He's almost unrecognizable.My Declan.I try to get back up again, lashing out at the guy keeping me from my Declan. But the man twists my arms behind my back and steps down on my heels immobilizing me. Declan wrestles too, even in his condition he tries to fight the guys holding him but he's as skinny as I've ever seen him, his forest eyes sunken in, and his cheeks hollow. He's so weak he almost looks sick. "Ellie." He yells, his voice is a brittle rasp as if he's been deprived of water for days. And the very sound ofhisvoice makes my heart sing and crack and
Chapter 33Ella:And suddenly I felt nothing but the reverberation of my pulsing panicked heart roaring through me like thunder rupturing the sky. He smiled, bringing his index finger to his vile lips, tapping the window again with the tip of the gun, motioning for me to unlock and open the door quietly before settling the gun back on my face. My stomach squeezed, a ball of anxiety sitting heavily in its pit, growing, stretching, sprouting as quick as just a simple snap of your fingers.Behind me, Olivia's voice shakes. "Who i-is that?"I gulped, having no other choice but to lean forward and slowly unlock the door knowing my life was nothing to him and he could end it just like that. "That's Julian."
Ella: Two hours later I'm in the back seat of an undercover police car with Olivia and Declan's mom driving to an ordinary neighborhood just fifteen minutes away with strict directions to not leave the car. Declan's location has been confirmed by the spies sent out an hour earlier to watch the house that was a suspected location. They've taken pictures, showing four people who stand on watch outside the house, two in front and two in back. Which is enough evidence to know the house isn't an ordinary house. Normal people don't have bodyguards outside their doors. And normal people don't talk about who they are torturing in their basement. Torture.Declan was being tortured,hasbeen being tortured for just over a week. Hearing it crushed me, it nearly had me on the edge of a meltdown bu
Chapter 32 Ella: The front desk is nearly as tall as my chest, made only so the person behind the clear glass attached to the wooden wall dividing us can only see my face with the exception of a small square opening so they can hear people talk. It's more of an office with desks littered with papers and stacked filing cabinets behind it. The secretary on the other side of the glass is typing on the computer as I halt my steps, while another woman sits near the back wall behind her and licks the top of an envelope then presses down on the white paper to seal it. For some reason the envelope catches my eye giving me a sense of déjà vu. It makes me think back to when I came home one night after soccer practice and my mom was drinking. She had a torn op
Chapter 31Ella:Picking myself up off the floor, scrubbing away my tears, I gaze blankly at Olivia with only one thing on my mind. "I'm going to Declan's apartment," I state, my voice hollowed out. Every single emotion weaving around my brain is pushed back the moment I'm standing. Crying isn't going to help Declan or my mother. Self-loathing isn't going to get me any closer to finding them. They need me, not the weak pity party me, they need the put-together me. I'm done crying. I will not cry again, not until they're found. I vow it to myself and them.I'm done waiting, I'm done being helpless. Every second that passes could be another second of them being harmed. I will not waste any more time, too much time has passed already. Who knows what condition they're in? I'm g
**Trigger Warning** (abuse) If that makes you uncomfortable please skip this chapter.Chapter 30Declan:My eyes shoot open as my body becomes fucking frigid. Extremely gelid water being thrown onto my bare skin feeling like shards of ice piercing into my flesh. Like millions of needles poking and poking and poking. A choked gasp falls right past my lips as my body immediately begins to convulse in uncontrollable shivers causing my teeth to chatter. The water is so extremely cold it burns as if blue blazing fire is covering me from head to toe. Between gasped breaths, I recognize the two men showering me in Arctic water, my cousin Matthew and Julian's right-hand man Jason.Directly in
Chapter 29Ella:One week later.I'm a hole, a pit, a depthless cavity. A spiral of dark twisting deep inside of me. Hours feel like days. Days feel like weeks, and weeks feel like months. My mother is gone, Declan is gone, and pieces of me are gone. Stolen, taken, kidnapped. The same three words said multiple times a day, multiple times an hour. Shredding my ears and my heart and my mind into something dark, something critical, something desperate. And I don't think I've ever been so pathetically desperate in my life.Day by day, Declan's heartbreaking face lights up the tv screen on channel ten news right beside my mothers. His eyes of green forests and vast beautiful grasslands are not the
Chapter 28Declan:Slamming my apartment door shut, I chuck my keys on the table itching to break something, anything at this point.