"Absolutely Not."

Chapter 39: Bang!

 A change of scenery.

At least that was what Mara said, a god-awful joke when they forced me to a standing position and chained my arms above my head instead of behind me.

My ass wasn't numb, so that was a plus, but now my arms ached and prickled from the minimal blood flow. I couldn't have everything seeing that I served as their prisoner now, so I had to be grateful I could stretch out my legs for now.

However, the sleep deprivation was beginning to catch up to me, making me feel delirious. Life almost felt surreal as I stood there to wait for something to happen, the chains waking me up every time I nodded off to sleep, yanking me back to reality.

Everything blurred together, and I didn't know if I had been there for minutes or hours while barefoot and fatigued.

Once in a while, they'd check up on me, but for the most part their silence exacerbated my unbalanced state of mind.

How many days had now passed, distancing me from my birthday? Did my team notice my absence yet? Alejandro? Surely, they'd noticed.

What if they didn't? What if they didn't care?

I was but just another dog tag, right? Just another body to bury and move on from.

Did Simon find my location yet?

Did he care?

Wherever the hell I was, would be too far. It'd taken a couple of hours to get these headquarters, and there was no way we were anywhere near Las Almas.

Would he care about someone who he could barely call a girlfriend to travel hours away to rescue?

I scoffed at the idea as I shifted my weight to be on another foot, my hands flexing to induce more blood flow.

My mind wandered to how Mara snuck her way into that hotel room with him, and a part of me still wanted to kick her ass into a bloody pulp over it. Reeling over the sinful act she'd forced, I didn't even notice someone enter the holding cell, memories of everything of the last however long I'd been here.

Donovan slumped over to the side, his bleeding head dripping scarlet down the window of the helicopter, the rest of his brains scattered across the windshield.

His daughter and wife were probably waiting for him to go on leave so they could celebrate the little one's birthday, the three of them now two.

Funny how I could kind of relate to that, but simultaneously, it sickened me knowing that this would be the first birthday spent for a young girl without her father. Too young. Six was far too young.

And the fault was partly mine.

"What did you do?!" Mara snarled the second her fingers dug into my cold cheeks, ripping me away from my morbid reverie.

I hardly had the energy to recoil to give myself some goddamn space. "What do you mean what did I do?" My voice sounded exhausted even through my ears, low and exasperated. "How could I do anything when you have me chained up?"

With a frustrated snarl, she squeezed onto my jaw again before she tore herself away, leaving me to try and alleviate the tension now lingering around my skin and maw.

She repeated the question again, "What did you do, you stupid bitch?"

I had no idea how to answer that. What the hell did I do? Racking my brain, I tried figuring out what I could have possibly done in this godforsaken room, locked away and chained up — helpless.

"I could ask you the same thing really," I spat out, "but I honest have no idea what the fuck you're talking about."

Back and forth, she paced before me, and it served as a little bit of entertainment as she visibly stewed in her own irritation. I contemplated stirring the pot a little more, but my body already felt as though it'd reached max capacity. Any more, and I would break something internally.