“It’s okay, Danny. It’s alright. There, see? It’s gone.”
She massaged his calf and he relaxed again. He was pale, even paler than normal, and his lips were cracked. They had been bleeding, but even the blood had dried up now, forming a cakey mess around his mouth. Hers were cracked too and she ran her dry tongue over them. Of course she found no relief. The arid coating of her tongue snagged on the deep crack in her lip. She had never been so parched. The dryness of her mouth seemed to make the room feel even hotter. It was a sauna now.
As she mentally tried to overcome the misery she was feeling, a new sound encroached on the periphery of her consciousness. Tires crunching gravel and the slight metallic squeak of brakes. A car was pulling up to the house. Someone was there. She yanked her head up in alarm.
“Danny? Wake up. You’ve got to wake up, okay? Someone is here. It’s probably him.”
She shook him lightly, and he opened his eyes groggily. He was no longer fully cognizant and he struggled to focus. He stared in confusion at the blank wall.
“Danny? Can you hear me?”
He nodded his head and tried to sit up. Dizziness caused him to sway and he leaned into Sydney as he tried again. Her brain felt like mush and she couldn’t think very well but she decided to drag him behind the door so that when it opened, he would be protected even if only for a minute.
She wasn’t sure what her plan was yet, but she wanted Danny out of the way. She leaned him carefully against the wall and crept back to where she had been, directly in front of where the door would open. Dizziness caused the room to spin and she closed her eyes.
She heard footsteps falling outside of her door. Then another door opened and clicked closed. Muffled voices came from the room next to them and then terrified screaming and a thumping noise.
The screams went on and on and Sydney clapped her hands over her ears to block them out. Her heart pounded as she tried not to think of what was going on in there. She couldn’t help but realize that she had heard a similar sound before through the thin walls of a hotel room. The thumping had a rhythmic, regular pattern. It was a bed lurching against the wall.
The screaming finally wound down into sobbing and the door creaked open again and latched closed with finality. The footsteps resumed and stopped just outside of her own door.
She took a deep breath in an attempt to calm herself and waited nervously. The door handle jiggled lightly and then opened, bringing with it a mild gust of fresh air and tinged with the pungent, musky odor of sex. Light flooded the room and Sydney squinted her eyes against it. She couldn’t see a thing. Her eyes had grown accustomed to the darkness over the past few days. As she struggled to see, the man spoke. This was a different man than had abducted her and his familiar voice chilled her to the bone.
“Hmm. I see you’re still alive. Impressive. Did the boy die?”
Detective Daniels stood in the doorway, filling it.
Her eyes were getting used to the light and she could make out his shape and then his face. He had a cold smile on his handsome face as he stared at her with callous indifference. His voice was eerily empty of sentiment as he asked about Danny.
“Why have you done this?” she whispered.
Her throat was so raspy that it took effort to speak. She watched him with dry eyes, waiting for an answer. She had trusted this man. He was a police officer! Suddenly, what little hope she had left was spiraling down to puddle around her feet. She found it morbidly ironic that in this moment, the worst moment of her life, her eyes were too dry to cry.
“Why do you think?”
His voice was still icy, but now it was taunting, as well. He took one step inside the room, wrinkling his nose in distaste as he did so. His expensive clothing was in perfect order- his shirt tucked in, his tie straight. Even though he had just raped the girl in the next room. Every cell in her body screamed at her to run but there was nowhere to go. Panic rose in her chest and she fought hard to control it.
“You made me think it was my father…”
The dryness of her throat cut her off and she coughed. It felt as though her tongue was permanently stuck to the floor of her mouth, as though a puff of dust would come out when she exhaled. The thought made her cough again and the detective laughed.
“Of course I did. Why wouldn’t I?”
“What do you want from me?” her voice was panicked, as he appraised her with cold eyes. “Are you going to rape me, too?”
She couldn’t contain her disgust for him as she spoke and his face hardened again.
“No. I don’t want to rape you. What fun would that be? I know you won’t beg. Yet. Maybe later, kitten.”
Chills ran down Sydney’s spine and she froze in apprehension as he took a step. He grinned maliciously, amused at her poorly concealed terror. He then walked further into the room and dropped a water bottle into her lap, his eyes locked with hers at every movement.
He watched in amusement as she greedily tore the top off and began guzzling, streams of liquid running down her chin. Tepid water had never tasted so good. She kept her eyes trained on him as she drank but lowered the bottle when she remembered little Danny. She started to scoot over to him, but the detective stepped in front of her, halting her movement.
“No. That water is for you.”
“Please. He’s going to die. Soon.” Her eyes beseeched the detective’s hard face.
“Am I supposed to care?” His face was an emotionless mask as he spoke.
“Please. He’s just a little boy.”
“He’s unimportant. But I need you alive.”
“Detective. I’ll do anything you want me to do, but please- please let me help him. He hasn’t done anything to deserve to be here.”
Her face was pleading as she begged. Her eyes kept flickering to Danny as she realized that she hadn’t seen him move since she had placed him behind the door.
“And have you?”
Before Sydney could even respond, he continued.
“Why is this one little boy so important to you? He’s nothing.”
The detective walked over to Danny and gazed down at him for a moment, his lip curled in contempt. He nudged Danny’s leg with the toe of one polished Italian loafer before he turned his gaze back to Sydney. “He’s beyond help, anyway.”