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That was all I got before he struck.

The needle punched into my neck, sliding into my flesh and coating my veins with its unknown poison. It affected me so rapidly that I had no way to fight against it. My head spun and I slumped forward, losing the ability to keep myself up as my legs felt like they’d been cut off from me entirely.

“N-no.”

“Still talking?” Wayne muttered, almost amused.

“Yeah,” I forced out like a stubborn bastard, even as my tongue started to thicken. “Gonna…be hard…to shut me up.”

A breathless laugh left him as my head dipped before my body followed, folding forward, no matter how hard I fought it. Wayne reached up and unlocked my wrists, my arms instantly dropping, landing unceremoniously beside me, dead weight against the mattress where the springs were exposed. Wayne shifted off my lap, then grabbed me again. His shoulder drove into my stomach as he hauled me up. I watched as my arms dangled, limp and lifeless, brushing against his back, fingers grazing the rough fabric of his Levi’s jeans.

“P-put me down,” I rasped, even as the words barely made it out. “You can’t…”

Wayne just laughed under his breath and adjusted his grip.

“Yeah,” he said. “I can.” He grunted as he bent and dumped me onto something cold and metal. The impact rattled through my spine—a dull jolt I barely felt through the drug still flooding my system. My head lolled to the side, vision swimming as I tried to force my body to cooperate.

“Stay put,” Wayne demanded, like I had a fucking choice.

I felt his hands on me, dragging my arms out, chaining my wrists to a metal pole welded on each side of the frame. He repeated the same with my feet until I was spread out. Fuck that. I forced my head to lift, even as it felt like it weighed a hundred kilos. My vision blurred in and out, but I tracked him as he moved away, disappearing out of sight before sounds of rummaging filled the silence.

“Stay…awake,” I muttered to myself, the words barely forming before a low sound slipped out of me when something cold touched my leg. It dragged slowly upward, and a tearing sound followed, fabric giving way as the blade split through my pants. The sensation was distant, but wrong. Pressure weighed as a coldness bit, with the faint pull of hair as it moved higher and higher. I held my breath as it bumped against my knee, then kept going.

I forced my eyes open and spotted a cobweb draped in the corner of the ceiling as he sliced the other side of my pants open. He didn’t need to cut them off. He could’ve just pulled them off. Which meant he wanted me to feel it.

My muscles tensed instinctively, flinching under the slow drag of the blade as it traced up to my hip. My skin prickled, every nerve screaming, despite the drug dulling everything else.

Wayne stepped back into view, tossing the scissors onto a wooden desk with a dull clatter before he yanked the ruined fabric out from under me. “Stop,” I managed, the word slurred.

He moved away again, and my head rolled to the side, breaths coming shallow as I forced myself to focus on anything but the position I was in. I looked around the dimmed basement, noting the thick, wooden beams high in the ceiling and the red bricks lining the walls. There was a washing machine with a shelf underneath. I fought to hold my focus, but as my lids fluttered shut, I caught Christopher staring directly at me.

“Don’t. Fight. Him,” he mouthed slowly so I could understand. An electric sound buzzed from behind me, and my stomach dropped.

Here we go.

“Now,” Wayne said, stepping back into view. “This one's my favourite.” He grinned, brandishing a long black pole, with blue arcs of electricity snapping and crawling at the tip.

Here we fucking go.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

JACKSON

Seven Years Ago

March 24th, 1985

“If you could live anywhere in the world,” Evie questioned quietly, her voice muffled under the woollen blankets, “where would you go?”

Was “in your arms” an appropriate answer?

I didn’t say it.

I thought it, though. Like I always did with her.

Evie had been sent home early from school after the guidance counsellor found her crying behind the bleachers again. She’d called me from the principal's landline and said no less than three words:

“I need you.”