This is the End 2(668)
“Well, I’m off,” she grinned at us. She drained her soda in one swift chug and then handed the can off to Kane. “I’m on dinner duty. Besides I’m sure you want time to get to know your new…. plaything.”
Now her look of disgust was for me.
Ugh. I didn’t know whether to hate this girl or love her for trying to save me.
“Tyler,” Kane called out as she walked with graceful steps toward the door. “Check on Miller, make sure he’s alright.”
“Why don’t you?” she huffed over her shoulder.
“If I show him I care right now, he’ll think it’s Ok to behave this way. We both know, that under no circumstances can he be allowed to leave this place. He would die by himself; he would die in less than a day.”
“What if he wasn’t by himself?” she asked with casual humor- the kind that made it seem as though she were laughing at you.
“You’d die too, Ty,” he said with resigned sadness.
“And you care, Kane?” she laughed humorlessly.
“I care,” he agreed. “Just make sure he’s alright.”
“Whatevs,” she shrugged with that same indifference that seemed to gnaw at Kane’s patience. And then she was gone and the screen door was slamming behind her with a cracking thud.
“You have a very interesting family,” I pointed out as soon as we were alone again.
“You don’t have any family left?” Kane asked, returning his attention to me.
“Not anymore.” My tone was final and cutting. I would not talk about people I loved with him.
“Reagan, I know how to keep you safe,” he promised in a soft voice as if picking up on some great pain of my past. “This will be a good life for you.”
“Against my will,” I pointed out bitterly. “You’ll keep me safe against my will. And you’ll give me the life you think is good…. against my will. Honestly, I don’t even understand how I got here.”
Confusion crossed his features and he reminded me, “We found you in the woods this morning.”
Losing my mind just a little and all of my patience I snapped, “No, I know how I got here this morning. But I mean, to this place. To you keeping me under lock and key just like Tyler said, like a pet. Why do you think this is acceptable behavior?”
“I don’t,” he quickly reassured me. “I know it’s not alright to behave like this. But I also know it’s been eighteen months since a girl that has even remotely peeked my interest has stumbled upon our encampment and she died three days later because she was too dehydrated and starved to come back from that. Her body shut down and we watched her die in our medical facilities. Since then it’s been a steady stream of mostly men. Or women that won’t work for me.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m the last of a dying breed.” My arms were crossed over my chest defiantly and my eyes boring holes into his stupid head.
“No, but it means you are a rare and precious commodity. A woman is a status symbol in this community.”
“So you’re lazy?” I bit out. “Go find another woman! Go find someone who’s actually interested in you. You can’t just kidnap people.”
“I’m not lazy,” he growled. “I’m an opportunist. You should look at this from my perspective. If you were in the same position as me and the perfect man walked across your path I doubt you would be so quick to let them go.”
I thought about the Parker brothers and how that was true for them now. I would not let them go if I had the choice. But it was different too. There was a point when I could have walked away. And I would never force someone to be with me- especially in this way.
“I’m not perfect,” I said instead, afraid to incite his anger, or reveal more about the Parkers.
“Perfect for me,” he insisted.
“You’re delusional,” I hissed. And I meant it. He was, in fact, bonkers.
“I’m your future, Reagan,” he promised in a low, stony voice. “The sooner you come to terms with that, the sooner you will be able to move forward.”
He walked over to the front door and closed it. Pulling a padlock off a decorative table, he locked the door from the inside and pocketed the key attached to his large key ring.
The handcuff key burned against my breast as I realized that handcuffs were not going to be my only obstacle tonight. If I could escape those, I still had to break out of this house and then make it all the way back to the football field. If Hendrix, Nelson and Vaughan were able to get free, we still had to make it all the way back to the farmhouse and get Page and everyone else. There would be no way to warn them ahead of time, no way to tell them to be ready to go.