"Hello darling." Fingers closed around her neck, the hands felt rough on her skin. A small whimper escaped her from deep in her chest.
"What do you want from me?" She found her voice shakily. The hands pulled at the tie around her head and the fabric went slack but she didn't open her eyes. She kept them closed tightly not wanting to look at her captor. He chuckled at her question.
"I don't want anything from you." A chair scrapped on the hard floor sounding as shrill as nails on a chalkboard. She flinched against the noise and heard a lighter engaging. Smoke once again filled her nose. He exhaled a cloud of fumes into her face and she turned her head away. Leila tried to hold her breath as to not breathe any in, but she coughed and came back grasping for air.
"Can you please not? I'm pregnant." She confessed. Eyes still closed she relied on her other instincts to tell her everything she needed to know. The man placed a hand on her thigh and she squirmed under his touch.
"Well, well, well." He ran his hand up to her stomach. "You're having his baby. I wonder if you truly knew who your boyfriend was if you would want to keep it." Jackson, She thought, so this is about his past. Leila concentrated on controlling her emotions. He wanted to see her cry; she didn't want to give him that satisfaction. Isn't that what they tell you in all those defense classes? She never attended any and was suddenly wishing that she'd let Caitlyn drag her to the one she went to a few months ago. Weeks leading up to the class it was all Caitlyn could talk about. "It's so important to be able to defend ourselves! The amount of events and parties we're going to be invited to once we're sisters!" Only Leila was more concerned about seeing Jackson than learning how to break ties and what to do when you're taken by force.
The man stood up and seized her by the face forcefully. "OPEN YOUR EYES!" He screamed an inch away from her. Leila let a cry but only tightened her eyelids around her vision. He let go of her and she heard the click of a gun cocking a bullet into the chamber. "Open your eyes." He said more softly but just as intensely. Leila blinked, adjusting to the darkness that surrounded them. The man was tall, just as tall as Jackson, with green burning eyes. He had a scar across his cheek, lowering the gun he bent over can came face to face with her. "Mine is the last face you will ever see and Mr. Harris will just have to accept that because there is nothing he can do. No one knows we have you. No one knows where you are. I will kill you here."
CHAPTER SIX
Caitlyn stared at her biology textbook. It had been hours since Leila walked away from her outside. She thought about calling her to talk it out, knowing that Leila was so mad at her made her feel sick to her stomach. It was worse knowing that she was right. Caitlyn had been such a bitch about Jackson and never let up. She saw that he was doing better, treating her like a queen, and she'd even heard the talk from the brothers of Phi Kappa Nu that Jackson wasn't flirting any girls now. He'd been true to his word. Yet Caitlyn couldn't let the past go. She knew it wasn't her grudge to hold but when she saw Leila so freely forgiving him it just made her more and more angry.
She looked up from her book and picked up her phone. When she called Leila it went straight to voicemail, "Leila I don't know if you'll listen to this before you come home but I'm sorry. You're right about everything and I totally suck. I promise, swear on my Phi Nu sisterhood pin, not to say one unwarranted bad thing about Jackson for the rest of my life. I can't hold my tongue if he really does fuck up but I promise not to behave like I did tonight." Caitlyn hung up the phone and sit it on the desk next to her. Instead of trying to read her textbook, she just gawked at her painfully silent cell. She tried not to worry about Leila, she knew that she would likely be there sulking in his room. She tried not to think about the things they could be saying. She groaned and got up from her desk.
She marched downstairs where some sisters sat around the kitchen table. It was Heather the president of their sorority and Jasmine the one that gave them their Greek Life Orientation. They stopped talking when Caitlyn walked into the room.
"What's up guys?" She said as she looked into the refrigerator pulling out a cherry coke. Heather sat up straight in her chair and stared at her hands. "Is something the matter?" Jasmine looked up at her with a half smile sort of grimace.
"Just tell her." Jasmine said looked back at Heather who exhaled loudly.
"We've been concerned lately." Heather turned in her chair to look Caitlyn squarely. "We know that you and Leila are very close so we wanted to ask you how she's really doing? She hasn't been very active the last two months and that's very worrisome. She comes to our meeting but nothing else. Most of the time she's locked up in your room."