Page 19 of The Wrecked One

“Sex or murder, what’s your choice?” He set her back down but didn’t let go of her throat, and she brought her linked wrists up, trying to peel his hand away.

I’d experienced torture before, the worst kind, and nothing was comparable to this moment.

This was real pain. True, raw, visceral pain.

Mya let go of his hand, no longer resisting. She yielded by way of a nod, and he released her throat.

My fingers twitched. I was losing more blood. Becoming cold. A strange numbness taking hold of me.

“Nooooo. No. No.” I was now chanting like Anurak through a flood of hot tears on my face. “No, Mya.”

“On the desk. Jeans and panties to your ankles,” he ordered.

Struggling again, even though my energy was slipping from the blood loss, and my skin was ripping at my ankles and wrists, I refused to stop. I partially dislocated my shoulder in my attempt to get loose. The gunshot wound was healed, but now my arm screamed from a new kind of pain.

I clenched down on my back teeth, and using the momentum of my own body, shifted and slammed my shoulder backward to reset it the best I could. “Listen to me, Mya,” I began, ignoring the burn in my shoulder. “Don’t do this. I’ll take death any day over that man touching you. Please. I’m begging you.”

She ignored me, and with shaking hands, peeled down her jeans and panties.

Every movement shattered my last thread of control.

Lifting my back off the bed, my fingertips curled into fists, I tightened the muscles in my arms and legs, trying to get free. Blood was flowing from my wound. The haze of dizziness tried to take over, and I fought it as much as I struggled against the cuffs.

“You’re going to kill yourself,” he warned, seemingly unworried I’d escape. “Now, get on the desk, Mya.”

Still resisting, I watched in terror as she followed his orders. She slowly shifted the medical supplies to the side and sat, and in that moment, my body went numb.

A strange paralysis took over as he said, “Part your knees. I want him to see what I’m about to do to you.”

She closed her eyes but adamantly shook her head no.

“I’ll do anything,” I tried again, my pleas managing to cut through my numb state. “Please don’t hurt her.”

He used his knife to pop the two remaining buttons on her shirt free before cupping his gloved hand over her breast.

“Don’t,” I whispered, my body shaking almost violently from the mental and emotional pain, knowing what kind of hell she was going through before my eyes.

“I—I have to,” she stuttered, her cuffed hands drawn across her lap, trying to shield her nakedness from this savage.

“Mya, he doesn’t want me to die. He wants answers.” I was worried I’d pass out before I could stop this, so I begged, “You want to break me? Fine. But there has to be another way to do it.”

“Will you kill an innocent man with your own hands to save her?”

His question had Mya’s eyes flashing open, and my soul leaving my body.

“Yes.” No fucking hesitation. I wasn’t sure what kind of man that made me, to be so eagerly willing to kill, but at that point, I’d do anything to prevent this man from raping her.

Now Mya was the one to beg, “No. Don’t.”

I tried sitting up in vain. Hopeless. Helpless. And fucked.

“Hero types. Always so predictable.” The man grunted and let go of her breast, shifting to the side to observe me.

This fucker owned me. He’d known that from the start. This was all some sick game to get me right where he wanted me. He’d said he wouldn’t torture me to break me, but this was the textbook definition of it.

“This is your final decision? Kill an innocent man to save her.” He stole a look at Anurak, who was clueless of what was about to happen to him.

“Yes,” I rushed out.

---