The man blew out a breath, appearing bored. “Move back.”
“Please help,” Evan begged. “It’s not too late to let us out of here. It’s not too late to do the right thing.”
“Move back now, or I’m going to tase you,” the man said, pulling the Taser from his outside coat pocket.
Evan threw his body on the floor of the cage, his face turned and pressed against the front grate as he kicked the top with his feet, rattling the bars and sending waves of pain through his legs but causing no damage whatsoever to the enclosure he was in. The man’s mouth set, and even through his fear and the performance he was putting on, Evan saw the look of excitement in the man’s eyes. Finally, he was going to be allowed to inflict pain. Still, he gave Evan one last warning, and Evan put his hands flat on the floor as he braced for the jolt.
When it came, it felt like hot lightning flowing through his veins and rendering him incapable of movement. He gritted his teeth and rode through the agony, his eyes locked on the man’s tie pin, the small blurry reflection revealing the man’s finger as it stabbed at the keypad. 9906.
Evan let out a sound that was something between a sob of victory and a growl of pain and anger and horror at what he had to suffer before he could use what he’d just obtained. Because they didn’t yet have Noelle’s code, and he wouldn’t even attempt to leave without her. He’d made a promise, and one thing Evan had learned as he’d sat in the bowels of hell was that he could be stripped of everything and still keep his word. It was his. No one had been able to steal it, and he wouldn’t allow them to now.
The man with the red shoes grabbed Evan’s arm and yanked him back before Evan could even attempt to force his limbs to work. The man slammed the door of his cage and then stepped back, allowing Evan to slowly pull himself to his feet. “Enjoy that, meathead?” the man sneered.
Evan let out a feigned whimper as he followed the man toward the door, hanging his head but shooting Noelle the smallest of covert winks as he passed, a movement that, if seen, would be construed as nothing more than a blink. She was at the front of her cage, her hands gripping the bars, her eyes following him as he moved by. At his signal, her lips parted, eyes widening slightly. She knew.
She knew he’d been successful. One step down, about ten more to go.
But they’d moved one space forward.
Both he and Noelle were so much weaker, physically and emotionally, and he had no idea how long they could remain hopeful on so little. What he did know was that if breaking free was possible, they were very quickly running out of time.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The Collector swirled his drink, tipping it back and closing his eyes as the liquid burned down his throat. He rarely drank alcohol. He didn’t enjoy a dulling of his sharpness, and he didn’t require being anesthetized, either physically or mentally.
But some things required a special celebration, and so the Collector toasted Noelle with one shot of Old Fitzgerald Bourbon, a specialty liquor of which only a finite stock was still available to those bourbon enthusiasts who could afford the $6K price tag.
The Collector set the empty shot glass on the bar cart in his office and then opened the french doors to the patio. He took the bottle with him, smashing it against the outside stone wall of the house and watching as the amber liquid pooled on the flagstone floor.
There was much more where that came from.
The Collector’s lips tipped, and he brushed his hands, reentering the house and then sitting down at his desk. He’d been delivered back to his home that morning after a day of travel. Somewhere south, he thought, based on the few clues he was able to pick up, even in his drugged state. The organizers insisted on it, and though the Collector was loath to put his narcotized body under someone else’s control—someone else’s ownership—he’d made an exception.
He hoped the girl and the boy appreciated it, but he could see why they might not. Even if they knew what he had sacrificed.
He pulled the envelope forward that they had left with him, the souvenir he’d paid for. If others enjoyed mementos of their time spent with a contestant, he imagined they chose a piece of clothing or perhaps a lock of hair. Soiled underwear no doubt went for a pretty penny. But he’d chosen what he had for a reason, and she’d already impressed him greatly by committing the theft he’d hoped she would. He’d watched from a screen on the wall outside the room as she’d stared at the camera defiantly, breaking the pencil in two, and—he thought at least—slipping the piece of graphite under the wristband of her filthy sweatshirt.