Chapter 1
The water was running as she took her night shower, trying to relax and let go of the somehow unsatisfying day. As if the running water on her skin could take the tension away with it while vanishing in the drain.
Multiple thoughts were occurring meanwhile about what she has to do tomorrow.
That’s the last thing she remembers.
Probably the running water muffled the sound of the intruder. Probably she was too lost in her thoughts to notice that someone has entered the bathroom. The music playing on her cellphone to accompany her shower also helped him to come in unnoticed—her voice whispering the song’s lyrics, as well.
But all that doesn’t matter now.
A screeching sound in her ears starts to get louder as she regains her senses.
She moves her head up slowly and cracks her neck back left and right before opening her eyes. Kinda like to mentally prepare for what is she going to face. She tried to touch the back of her head because it hurt, probably where she was hit unconscious. Something cold and heavy limited the movement of her hand down.
Handcuffs, she thought.
Ok, here we go.
She opened her eyes, realizing that she could have gotten all the time in the world and still couldn’t be prepared for what was in front of her.
Seven. She counted them from left to right.
Too much information now.
She was handcuffed on a loop at the middle of the table, like the ones they have in the police departments. There were no windows, which made her assume they were in a basement, only a big mirror behind the seven guys. And third...
She looked at them one by one without any emotion on her face. They could tell by her expression that she wasn’t scared. The tall guy standing directly in front of her took a step forward, as he realized that he could talk to her now as she was fully conscious, but before he even opened his mouth...
“Where the fuck am I?”
She shouted at him, totally serious and bold, which made them almost all widen their eyes from surprise, except the one who tried to speak, who raised his eyebrows unamused.
She felt from the way he was standing in the middle with crossed arms that he was their leader of whatever they were.
“I SAID WHERE THE FUCK AM I,” She shouted again, banging her handcuffed fists on the table. This time, it wasn’t a question.
“Ok, calm down.” He scoffed as he moved forward and stopped at the table, directly in front of her.
“I think you know that in this kind of situation, we ask the questions.” He continued, narrowing his cold stare over hers.
“Where the hell have you brought me? What country is this? ” she raised her voice even more.
The man standing in front of her tilted his head on the side, observing her, a smirk of curiosity slowly formed on his lips.
“How...”
“...Can I tell? Well, you idiots at least can turn on the air conditioning. It’s hot as hell in this basement, and you are all wearing light clothes and t-shirts. At least you had the courtesy to dress me and not kidnap me wet and naked, but my clothes which you used to dress me are isothermal cause I lived in Sweden. So I ask again. Where. The. Fuck. Am. I. ”
A moment of silence followed, with the expressions of disbelief and amusement painted on their faces as a response.
“Oh my god, do you even speak English?” She screeched and leaned back in her chair, exhaling impatiently,
The truth is, they didn’t expect her to be this way.
She caught them off guard.
“Do you know what they want from you? ”
The one who was standing in front of her asked. A tall, muscular guy with dark brown hair, long enough to fall on one side to the middle of his cheekbones, contrasting the other, shaved short side. Somewhere in his mid-twenties, he was strong and fearless-looking. The black graphic tattoos on his arms gave him a darker appearance, brown eyes cold and calculating.
“Who?” She replied exasperating, narrowing her eyes over him, almost trying to read his intentions.
“What do you know?” he asked; the tone of his deep voice was calm and contained, contradicting his dark appearance, a tell that he had done this kind of questioning many times.
“Dude, I don’t have the slightest idea of what you are talking about. Can you ask a question with content in it?” She asked while tapping her fingers on the white table to show that her patience was slowly exiting the conversation and also that she was not afraid of them.
“Are you aware that some people were after you?” He said, looking skeptical about it because he didn’t intend to reveal more information before she gives them some, but this wasn’t going anywhere.
She might have actually been clueless. Even though she seemed like a very aware person, could she possibly haven’t noticed that the last days she was being followed?
“You mean, except you?” She said with a clear tone of sarcasm without a muscle moving in her astonishing pale face.
“Yes. Except us.”
The other six listened to the conversation with caution and have all moved a bit closer even though they could hear everything loud and clear in this quiet, empty room. Almost like they were waiting too, to find out what was happening.
She had the time to caught glimpses at all of them while talking. They looked all unique and different from each other. Their ages also seem to differ from somewhere around 22 to 28.
“Well, shame on me, but no. I haven’t noticed. It was a busy week.” She looked at them again from left to right and back, her eyes scanning them then stopping at the last one on the right.
His hair was colored red, and his big eyes full of emotions. He looked back at her, not moving his eyes either, as she spoke.
“Can I have a cigarette?” She asked him with the same emotionless face but hiding a playful tone in the corners of her mouth.
The guy's eyes narrowed in shock, he almost flinched as the rest of his group looked at him, weirded out. Almost judging.
“You seem to be the only smoker here, so will you give me one?”
Everyone else was staring at him now, and he sighed, then murmured something internally in the realm of how the fuck, as he proceeded to take a packet of cigarettes from his back pocket, knowing that he couldn’t avoid the situation now.
She had uncovered him.
“Sorry,” she said, amused as he put one cigarette in her mouth and lighted it for her while he pursed his full lips, avoiding to meet the judging stares of his teammates.
They didn’t know that he was smoking until now. And this stupid girl revealed him. The weird thing is that he managed to hide it for months from them, but she could tell after just seeing him for five minutes. How?
Well, I will get you back for that, he thought, observing her as she was exhaling the smoke upward, closing her eyes from the nicotine satisfaction, after giving him one last meaningful stare.
She opened her cold dark russet eyes, avoiding the guy who gave her the cigarette in front of her and turned her stare to lock it once again with RM’s.
“Now... what do you want to know?”
A/N
Thank you for taking the time to read the first chapter!
Irrelevant information of the day: I always imagined this story as a movie in my mind.
