Page 12 of All the Little Raindrops

“Yes.”

Someone watched? God. This is insane.He sat up slightly, leaning on his forearm. “Do you think there are cameras down here too?” He whispered the words as though speaking quietly might help make himinvisible. “Do you think someone is watching ... and listening?” It was like he could suddenly feel their eyes. The unknown predators behind all ... this.

She leaned up, too, looking around. He hadn’t seen any small light, though. If it was here in this room, it was hidden well. Or perhaps the equipment was different. “I think we should assume there are,” she answered. “Otherwise, how did someone rent me? Based only on a description?” She shook her head. “No, I’d think they’d want to see what they were getting for the money.” She fell back on the floor, rolling onto her back and throwing her arm over her eyes.

For a minute he thought she was crying, and he began to put his hand through the bars to reach for her. But then she lowered her arm, turning her head toward him. “My father stopped taking me to church when my mother died,” she said.

Evan’s forehead met the cold bars, and he watched her as she spoke. “She’d been the more religious one.” She let out a small laugh that didn’t hold much humor, if any at all. “Ironic, I guess. I don’t know. She was committing adultery, after all.” He hid the grimace that threatened. “I think my father thought maybe it was all just BS. A building to go to on a Sunday morning. Words that went in one ear and out the other. I wonder if that’s what church became for him, because obviously that’s what it’d been for her.” She gave a fleeting smile and a small shrug. “Or maybe he just couldn’t bring himself to be around so many people. I really don’t know.”

Evan hung on her words, wondering where in the world she was taking this. “When I first woke in the dark, I thought about praying to die. But each time the words began to form, even in my mind, I stopped myself from saying them.”

“Why, Noelle?” Because he thought maybe there’d come a time when he said that very prayer. Wouldn’t it be better to fade into nothing than to live in untold suffering for who knew how long? How longcould a person endure being caged the way they were before their mind slowly rotted anyway?

“Because a prayer like that felt like an affront to God,” she said, her eyes moving around the room, maybe searching for the cameras they’d just been wondering about. “And if there’s any chance God exists, we need him now more than ever.”

He looked up at the top of his cage, gripping a handful of hair and giving it a gentle tug. It already felt longer than it’d been when he’d left the gym that night ... “God put us here,” he finally said.

She breathed out a laugh. “God didn’t put us here. Some person did.”

“God didn’t stop them. He didn’t intervene.”

“No, I guess not.” He turned his head and met her eyes and saw that tiny spark again. “But I can’t seem to give up on the hope that maybe he still will.”

He was amazed by her. She was in a cage after having just been raped, with unknown tortures in front of them, no possible way to get free, and there was still the flickering ember of hope in her eyes. And if she could manage it, so could he. “We can use all the help we can get.” He smiled. “But God helps those who help themselves.”

She smiled over at him, and for a moment he was able to linger in that tiny light of hope. It was abruptly interrupted when the door clanged open. Evan jerked, sitting up, and Noelle did as well, pushing her hair back from her face.

The same man in the black suit with red shoes entered the room. A spike of adrenaline speared through Evan’s system, his breath suddenly growing shallow. The man headed directly to Evan’s cage. “You’ve been rented,” he said, bringing the Taser from his pocket and holding it in one hand as he keyed a code into his lock with the other. Evan’s throat swelled, and for a moment, he had trouble catching his breath.

“For what?” he demanded.

The man laughed. The sound was squeaky and mean. “I don’t possess that information. All requests are unique. You’ll have to wait to findout.” He leaned his head on the top of the open door. “The choice, of course, is yours. You may opt out for the small price of her ear.”

Shock radiated through him, and he glanced over at Noelle, who was holding herself completely still. “Her ... ear?”

The man grinned, nodded. “She has two, after all.”

He looked over at Noelle again, who had brought one hand to her ear. She blinked, her hand dropping away. Their gazes lingered; her lips parted, though she did not speak. She did not ask him to spare her ear, just as he had not asked her to spare his fingers. She didn’t need to. “No,” he said, his eyes held to hers, “we stay whole. We leave here whole.” And then he crawled toward the man at the front of the cage, who stood back to let him exit.

Noelle crawled forward hurriedly, gripping the bars on the front of her crate as he stumbled by, his legs already weak from constant sitting. He couldn’t look at her right then. His body vibrated with fear.We stay wholerepeated in his mind, a mantra to give him courage.

But distantly it occurred to him that they’d already begun to be carved up. Noelle was no longer whole. She’d already had something taken from her. And he was all but certain that’s what awaited him too.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Collector watched Evan double over as the paunchy man’s fist connected with his midsection. No rape. This time anyway. The predators on the other side of the screens had so many reasons for renting the prey. The short man with a curved spine and toothpick legs swung again, hitting Evan in the jaw as Evan’s head whipped back, spittle spraying in the air.

Yes, the motivations could be varied, but some—like the one he was watching—were so predictable, so boringly trite.

Despite the older man’s success (and he had to be successful to affordthissport), inside he was still the ugly, gawky kid who’d once been pushed into lockers. And he’d never moved on. He likely wore a three-piece suit most days, commanded some boardroom in a luxury zip code, and dined in the finest restaurants. In that life, he didn’t need a mask to hide his face. The Collector would bet he had a penchant for young prostitutes and especially enjoyed hurting and humiliating them. Because now that he’d amassed power, he was bent on revenge.

Hungry for it.

And he’d take his fill wherever and whenever he could. He’d seek it out if he had to. Like now.

The Collector supposed this was especially satisfying given that the kid who was tied up and being beaten by him was handsome and strong, everything all those long-ago bullies had been. The ones he’dwanted to be. Maybe even the ones he’d wanted to fuck, though that might be going out on a limb.

The Collector zoomed in on Evan’s face, watching carefully. He could obviously take pain. He appeared completely zoned out. Interesting. It took some practice to achieve that. He’d bet the boy was used to being hit. Maybe not often, but enough that he knew how to take it without flinching. The Collector tucked that away. He’d use it at the right moment. He’d know when—and if—that was.

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