Page 119 of Reclaimed

His serene smile sickens me. “I knew you’d come around.”

I have to swallow three times to unstick the words lodged in my throat. “What do you want me to do?”

“I need you to change out of those whore’s clothes.”

“Okay.” My voice is hardly above a whisper. Without waiting for direction, I pick up the flowered dress and tug it over my head. He doesn’t object to the clothes underneath, and I’m not about to draw attention to the extra scraps of fabric. The dress smells like mothballs and cedar. I’d bet it hasn’t been worn for a very long time.

Wetting my dry lips, I hold my hands out. “You need to unlock one of these so I can get my arms in.”

He doesn’t hesitate to pull a key from his pocket. “You need to take off your clothes first.”

Air ceases to flow from my lungs. “What?”

Gripping the ugly dress, he tears it back over my head while tsking. “Take those off.”

“No,” I wheeze as fear grips my throat.

“You want me to do it for you?” he taunts. The look in his eyes turns lecherous.

I disconnect from my mind as I peel the shirt mechanically over my head and push my leggings over my hips. Standing in nothing but a bra and underwear, I tell myself it’s no different than being on stage. I scramble to retrieve the dress from his hands.

With satisfied eyes, he watches me settle the floral fabric back over my nearly nude body then cuffs my wrist again. “You look beautiful.”

I force my lips to stretch into a semblance of a smile. “N-Now what?”

“Now we burn them.”

I trudge back into the kitchen. The floorboards creak ominously beneath my weight. Henry follows with the gun loose in his hand pointed at my back. For the moment, he seems placated.

“Where do you want me to burn them?”

He nods across from us at an open fireplace. “Good old open fire.”

My neck prickles as he watches me collect the wood from a stack beside it. I kneel on the hearth and stack the logs in the firebox. The newspapers seem too damp to light, but with the flick of a match, the crumpled pieces prove me wrong. Within minutes, an orange blaze roars within the grate.

“You’re a natural.” The praise has the opposite effect.

I avert my gaze as I toss my things into the intense flames. The clothes didn’t hold a strong attachment, but getting rid of the final personal item in my possession feels like a knife between my ribs.

With one hand cradling my belly, I clutch the side of the fireplace to help me stand. I keep my attention on Henry the entire time.

“Check the fridge, Stella.”

Henry’s smile has me wanting to do the exact opposite. Finding out what he’s storing in there is the kind of game I’m not interested in playing.

My fingers tremble as I reach for the handle. The second the door opens, a rotten smell hits my nose. The fridge is empty except for a pack of steaks leaking all over the top shelf. The red juices drip steadily on the bottom drawers. It’s as if he bought them in preparation but overshot the use by date. I wonder howlong he’s been planning this. How long he’s known where to find me.

“These?” I ask hoarsely. Saliva fills my mouth as a wave of nausea peaks.

“It’s a celebratory dinner.” With the gun trained on me, Henry backs himself into one of the kitchen chairs. “You’re going to cook them.”

I almost puke as I retrieve the expired meat. The cuts are unlabeled, but I refuse to think of them as anything other than beef. My eyes water and my sinuses swell as I retch every few minutes. The kitchen doesn’t contain anything useful, not even basic spices, so I toss the rancid steak onto the singular pan I find in an empty cabinet and set it on the mounted grill in the fire.

The burning wood pops and crackles. I pray the old cabin holds and doesn’t burn down as the smell of smoke fills the air. The odds are stacked against me with this gun-holding psychopath. I’m not sure I can survive a raging fire too.

When the hunks are black, I pull them out. I don’t know what to do now. I stand in the middle of the room holding the pan in the bunched-up fabric of my dress.

“Don’t just stand there. Serve me my dinner!” The wooden table groans beneath his heavy fist.

---