I was carried out hours later. They took me upstairs, tossed me on one of the beds, and left. I knew without checking that the window was bolted shut and the door was locked. There was a bathroom I could use, but I was shivering, and my insides were twisted inside out.
He’d not touched me, but the questions and the tone Ashton had used.
If he could’ve killed me, he would’ve.
I would never forget the look on his face before they threw a sheet over my head, tipped me back, and poured water down my throat.
“Are you working for anyone in the Worthing family?”
“Have you installed listening devices on Trace’s phone or anywhere on his property?”
“What information did you tell your team leader about us?”
“Are you working with the police in gathering evidence against Trace?”
“Did you give our locations to any member of the government? Were you taken in for any questioning regarding us?”
He asked the questions over and over again. Everything. Anything. For hours, in between times when they would waterboard me. Experiencing almost drowning over and over again had an effect on a person. I’d aged twenty years over the last three hours.
Or the last few hours.
I had no idea what time it was, but it was starting to get light out. I was guessing it was six in the morning. Maybe five.
I touched my nails, felt how cold they were from my own touch.
“Are you planning on turning evidence on Trace?”
“Are you helping to build a case against him?”
“Did you agree to work undercover against the West family?”
They checked my pulse every time they asked.
They waterboarded me.
They stopped, asked me questions. Checked my pulse again.
They repeated it over and over again until I realized what they had done.
I was conditioned so that if they asked a question I knew would get me in trouble, my pulse would jump at the thought of the waterboarding. It took a long time, but it was effective. I had nothing to hide, but if I had, I wouldn’t have been able to hold it back.
I might’ve fallen asleep.
I must’ve because I woke as I was under the covers, curled on my side in a fetal position, and when I heard the door creak open, I almost pissed the bed. I was terrified but too terrified to leave this bed to relieve myself.
If Ashton hadn’t hated me before, it wouldn’t matter now. I hated him.
He’d reduced me to the six-year-old I used to be, and he’d become my father.
I gritted my teeth, tasting my own tears, and fuck him. Fuck them.
I didn’t move, hearing whoever came toward the bed.
They didn’t touch the bed. They didn’t touch me, but it was Ashton. “Leave Trace alone. After this, when you go back, don’t see him. Don’t call him. Don’t show up anywhere he’ll be. You’re fired from the nightclub.”
God.
He was gutting me alive. That’s how it felt.
“Trace has no idea about any of this, and he won’t because you’re not going to tell him. You proved tonight that you can’t separate him from what he does.” He turned, going for the door. The floor creaked underneath him until I heard his pause again. “You’re not the snitch, but you’re not far from one either.”
I held my breath, my heart pounding against my sternum, until he went all the way downstairs.
I could hear conversation beneath me.
There were voices from outside.
Then, more voices outside, and a door shut beneath me. It was loud enough to shake the house.
I didn’t dare move. I couldn’t. Not yet.
A car started.
Car doors were opened, then shut.
Tires moved over gravel.
Then silence.
Nothing.
I bolted for the bathroom, falling into the shower as my bladder released at the same time I vomited, emptying out everything that was inside of me. Including me.
