Broken

Broken- Chapter 1

This is my first official story I've published. A few things I want to say. This is the first chapter/prologue. If you're interested in reading more, leave a comment below and I'll add the next chapter. Critiques are encouraged but don't trash the story if you don't like it. Respectfully tell me what I can do to improve it. Thanks and enjoy:)

“Taxi!” Charlie shouted, sticking her hand into the busy street. It was a beautiful fall day in New York City and Charlie had just stopped to get coffee on her way home from ballet rehearsal.

Her hair was still up in a tight bun, a few strands clung to her neck from the sweat that had run down her face. She had quickly thrown on an over-sized wool pullover over her tights and flung on boots to complete her look.

She waved frantically at a passing taxi cab, but to no avail. Just when she thought she would have to walk back to her apartment, a cab pulled up to the curb and the driver waved her in.

“Where will I be taking you?” He asked of her, his eyes almost gleaming at her through the rearview mirror. She rattled off her address and sat back, pulling out her phone.

Three missed calls. Of course they were all from Max. She didn’t want to deal with him right now. Instead, she checked her email and replied to her mother’s message.

Her mother was always worried about Charlie living alone in the city while the rest of her family was still in Florence, Alabama. She was indeed a long way from home. But she loved it here. So she typed back a reply, letting her mother know she was doing fine and that she had not been robbed, raped, or killed since yesterday.

The cab was slowing to a halt as she slipped her phone into her workout bag. The door opened for her, which she remembered thinking was odd before she was grabbed from behind and yanked out of the car, across the span of the sidewalk, and in through a door. It happened so quickly that she only had time to inhale once. She started screaming and fighting once her senses came back, trying frantically to loosen the tight grips around her wrists and waist.

She was going to die. Charlie’s eyes flew everywhere, taking in the marble floors, the beautifully painted ceiling, and the statues all around. This wasn’t happening. There had to be a mistake, some miscommunication. Her mind couldn’t wrap around the fact that some rich person wanted her dead. She hadn’t done anything illegal, hadn’t offended a soul since she’d moved here two months ago.

Her protests echoed around the room as she was dragged across it, as the person holding her yanked her through an adjacent room and pushed her into a chair.

It was a man, she saw as she lifted her eyes up to meet his. He was of a different ethnicity, his face hardened and cold as he stared silently down at her.

Out of nowhere, she started crying. Pathetic, snot-filled sobs that wracked through her body and left her breathless. “Just do it already!” she yelled up at him after a few minutes of crying.

Charlie could tell she had confused him. “Do what?” he asked, his accent confirming her earlier thoughts.

“Kill me! Take a gun, put a bullet through my head, drown me in a bucket of water, break my neck! Whatever you have to do, just do it!”

He started laughing in the middle of her outburst. “Girl, you are going to wish you were dead when we get started with you.”

All her thoughts evaporated and she was left stunned as he walked out and bolted the door behind him.

“No,” she whispered, refusing to believe anything he had just said. But her heart was beating faster, her breathing was escalating, and she had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She was locked in a room with only a chair and carpeted flooring, no windows, and only the door she had come through.