Taken

Planned

Three of my other kidnappers stand in the middle of the room.

I start to scream, but Nick's hand clamps down on my mouth from behind me.

I'm panicking. He must have brought me here only to reveal me to his friends. I wrench away from his hand and twist away, hard. He locks his fingers around my arm and pulls me back, one hand still on my mouth.

His hand stays on my arm until my breathing has slowed. I slump back against him. My short, manic burst of energy has been spent, leaving me achy and short of breath.

"Shae, you need to calm down and be quiet. Do you want Chris, or worse, Ron to find us in here?"

I slowly shake my head.

"Okay. Okay." He breathes deeply. "Shae, this is Will, Ben, and Rock. They want to help you."

"That ain't what I said, Nick," Rock, the tall, African-American one says. "I said I'm tired of doin' this. It ain't right. My mama didn't raise me to be no sadist."

Nick slowly releases my arm. He crosses to the short guy. Whispers in his ear.

"Yeah, I brought it."

He slowly shuffles over to me, fumbling in a backpack.

He lifts a granola bar out, and hands is to me without looking up. He continues to rifle through the bag. He lifts something out of the bag, gives me a tiny smile and looks me straight in the eye, holding a box up to my face.

"What is that?" My eyes strain to focus.

"This is a recording device. Hide it in your shirt. We need to know what Ron is doing at all times. In a week, Nick will bring you back here and we'll listen to it."

Rock's eyebrows go up. "Where did you--never mind."

The boy in front of me, Will, slowly turns to face him. "Did you just question me?"

"No, whatever, man. But if you could afford this junk, then why did we have to kidnap the chick in the first place?" He gestures to me.

"This," Will gestures, "cost me seven bucks at Best Buy."

He turns back to me and places the clunky recorder in my hand. I slip it into my shirt as he smirks, eyeing me.

Somehow that makes me mad enough to speak.

"You really think Ron is going to tell his prisoner his agenda?" I can't keep the sarcasm from my voice.

"We could really use anything. It would be a step up from the nothing we have now." He turns and winks at me before sliding seamlessly though the tiny door and out into the night.

Rock follows him. He looks almost comical, smacking ungracefully to the ground and wedging his broad shoulders through the space. I would be tempted to laugh, except that friends, not kidnappers and prisoners, laugh at each other.

The last boy (I think he was the one Nick pointed to when he said Ben) hesitates for a second before leaving. He looks at me and twists his hands together.

"You know, not all of us in the gang wanted to kidnap you, but Ron is our leader, and if you oppose the leader, you get kicked out. These guys are all the family I've ever had. I can't give that up."

He doesn't look back at me before exiting.

Nick looks at me strangely, then ushers me out the little door a couple of minutes after Ben leaves.

After feeling the relief of standing for so long, it's depressing to get back down on my hands and knees and inch our way back through the bushes to the warehouse where I have spent two weeks.

I enter the garage and head to the chair. I slump down in it, somehow feeling more weak than before.

Nick stands behind the chair and ties the thick rope several times around me. The strands pull tautly against my skin as he manipulates them into a knot.

He crosses to face me.

"Shae, you need to be careful." He removes the unopened granola bar from my hand. I didn't realize I was clutching my fingers so tightly around it.

He leaves the garage after laying a warm hand on my shoulder.

After I hear the door lock behind him, I try to rest.