A.N: This chapter contains a sexual assault scene; reader discretion is advised.

*

          I walked over to the broken mirror and caught a glimpse of my absolute mess of a face.

          My hair looked and felt like a rats nest... probably from Dylan running his fingers through it so much.

          I felt a blush creep up my cheeks as I thought about what had just happened between the two of us about five minutes earlier. He actually showed interest in me! Biting my nails anxiously -- a bad habit I could not seem to get rid of -- I jumped up and down and squealed in excitement. How weird, I never would have thought that I could ever merely even like my kidnapper, much less make out with him and think of us as possibly even becoming something... more?

          Either he was into me or into the thought of getting into my pants -- the latter being something I did not plan on happening anytime soon.

          My face was stained with mascara and eyeliner, my foundation had been completely rubbed off, and my eyes were bloodshot and slightly puffy from crying so much.

          My eyes trailed down to my neck and noticed a huge, dark red sore - a hickey.

          "Ugh, that little b-"

          I was cut off by the sound of a siren of some sort, so I walked over to the window and realized that it was probably the reason why Dylan had left the room so quickly.

          I slowly pulled myself up off the floor and, looking out of the window, my eyes darted back and forth to see what was going on outside of my closed-off room. As I looked through the transparent glass of the window, I saw a police car sitting in the driveway, the side of it saying the name of the county we were in - Brooksdale. Hm, maybe they're here to save me from these kidnappers? I thought, my eyes coming to slant daggers in deep thought and indecisiveness. I watched intently as the policeman walked back to the car and drove away.

          The door to my room barged open and Dylan gave me a no-need-to-worry look. Well, it was clearly filled with less worry for him than for me since I was the one taken here, and not the kidnapper getting away with the 12 billion laws they basically just broke. But you know, whatever. He filled me in on the situation, telling me that the policeman was here because he was wondering if they had seen a lost golden retriever that some family a few blocks down the road was looking for. I sighed sadly at the thought of the fact that I may never see my family again.

          Oh well, better make some friends here -- psychopaths or not -- so that I'll have at least someone to lean on when I'm sad, I thought to myself.

*

          After I had taken a slight nap, Dylan came into my room to check on me. I noticed he was wearing an expensive-looking black tux, and he smelled of eucalyptus. It was like he'd just bathed and was dressed up for some super special occasion. My guesses were correct as he held out a dress for me to wear to dinner. It was elegant, and not really my style. It came down right above my knees, and it had a cutout on the side that started at my ribs and went down to my waist.

          Once he left, I noticed there was also a lacy white bralette and a white thong inside of the dress. Although I usually didn't wear thongs, I thought, hey, I never thought I'd be kidnapped, either, but look how that turned out. So, I undressed in the rags I was wearing and changed into the pretty lacy undergarments and the elegant white dress. I noticed some white pumps sitting by the dresser, and assumed they were for me. When I put them on, they were exactly my size, 7 1/2, and they were actually pretty comfortable to walk in and wear altogether. When I was finished changing as if on cue, I heard a knock on my door. However, I didn't get to the door in time before the person, or rather, people, knocking, easily opened it without my permission.

          There were two women and two men, and they all quickly ushered me into the bathroom adjacent to the bedroom I slept in and went to work right away. Sheesh, before this makeover, I figured I was actually pretty decent at doing my own makeup. However, all that hard work I'd ever done at beating my face all went down the toilet along with my self-consciousness.

          In no time, I had a perfect winged eyeliner surrounding my hooded eyelids which were now covered with a dark gray-black smokey eye. My contour and highlight framed my face to perfection, and the fake tanner they covered my arms, legs, and stomach with made me look and feel like I just stepped out of a magazine. My long hair was curled messily, and I kind of felt like a model for a second. A second that went by all too quickly when I realized that these were other people. They had to know what was going on, right? Did they know that I was here against my own will? However, whenever I opened my mouth to speak or to ask them something, for some reason, the woman with long dark hair that matched the color of her eyes shoved some mints in my mouth. I wasn't exactly sure as to whether she didn't understand my language, if it was a custom of her company, or if she just didn't even want to get involved with my situation, but whichever it was, it worked. I gave up trying to even fake a cough as soon as I had more than five mints in my mouth at the same time.

          As soon as we had started, less than ten minutes later, we were finished. I literally looked like a Barbie doll, the only difference being that I had brown hair and the traditional Barbie had blonde hair. I stood high on the heels, and was probably about three inches taller than my original height, making me stand at about 5'8". I sat on the bed and tried to touch my face and hair as little as possible, not wanting to ruin the great work those makeup artists had done. Finally, there was a knock on my door, and Dylan was the first one in. He pulled out a white handkerchief and whispered, "I'm sorry," into my ear as he used the handkerchief to blindfold me. My ear instantly went hot as his words tickled and I hoped my cheeks were covered in the makeup enough to where my blush wasn't showing up.

*

          The handkerchief was taken off as soon as we were seated and Dylan took off my jacket for me and handed it to some server as he came by our table. I was sitting in between Dylan, to my left, and Slater, to my right. I was kind of uncomfortable, but I didn't complain. I had learned that keeping my mouth shut was usually the better, more efficient option around my kidnappers.

          The restaurant was dark and, even though I heard voices of what seemed to be some high-class civilization other than my kidnappers, I couldn't see them. I figured that maybe we were some special party guests and that we probably were seated in some room in the back for some privacy. It honestly made me shudder as I was kind of curious -- kind of not -- to find out what they did to make the kind of money to buy out an entire room for dinner and service this fancy. Is this really what rich people did with their money? Is this what it felt like to be an elite, to be in the minority of the upper-class?

          Soon, a waitress came to take our orders. I asked for a salad because I was not risking what was on or in anything since I was practically allergic to the world. In less than five minutes, our orders were being served. I'm not gonna lie, I liked being treated the way I was then. It was actually pretty nice. But I also had this weird feeling. The one I'd grown up with. The one of not fitting in with anyone, of pretending to be someone I wasn't, and a sense of loneliness.

          As I shoveled the delicious salad down my throat, I noticed how none of the men were really all that interested in me. It was odd, really. They made it seem as if this, sitting down and eating dinner with some girl they kidnapped, was just another daily thing in their lives. Did they have more girls in that hallway of endless doors back at their house? Was I the only one being trapped and taken against my will? Or were there others, just like me, suffering the pain of being taken away from home? Falling into a cycle of depression, of wondering if they would ever see their parents again? Or was I the first? The last? Would this be my final night? Would they rape me and kill me before I could scream out in pain and agony for a savior?

          As these thoughts floated about in my head, I realized that I needed to pee. I also had another thought right after the first; I had no clue where the bathroom was. Just as I was about to turn to Dylan and ask him these questions, Slater poured some wine into his glass and raised it for a toast. All the guys quickly finished chewing and swallowing their food and joined him as he made a quick speech.

          "Ahem," he quickly cleared his throat before starting, "I'd like to thank all of you for gathering with me tonight for this feast of many. Tonight, not only do we celebrate the joining together of our companies for five years, but we also have finally been able to receive our very highly welcomed guest, Miss Natalie!" All the men toasted and Dylan nudged my ribs, directing his eyes on my full wine glass in front of my dinner. I obliged and picked up the glass, my fingers resting gently against it as my shaking hand raised it up to clink it against everyone else's.

          However, as I brought it down to be even with my face, the bittersweet aroma hitting my nostrils immediately, I cringed, knowing that alcohol was the source of my father's temper when I was a child. All I could remember were the nights that he'd spend hours on end drinking as if he wanted to drown himself in the liquor, then arguing with my mother afterward about anything and everything. How the house was too small, how he was a hoarder, how he never would do anything around the house, how he was jealous of my mother's amazing job, how we never seemed to get out of debt. They seemed never-ending, those nights. I remembered how my younger sister would plug in her headphones and watch videos to drown out the noise and how my older sister drove over to her boyfriend's house to get away. How I never fit in with either of them to the point where I was the only one praying for a renewal of my parent's relationship. Asking God to make the enemy leave, to help us come together and pray instead of letting us be torn apart.

          Therefore, ever since, I've always had a rule, per-se, about alcohol. I vowed to myself and to God that I would never, ever, even try the stuff, because I knew how evil it was when it was abused. And I knew the consequences of not having a clear state of mind after drinking it. So that's what I always did. And still being me as the 17-year old I was, in that very moment, I had a choice. To go with the flow, to leave all my rules of myself behind, or to keep my vows in place and to not drink the alcohol. To not let the red wine even touch my lips.

          I was taken out of my awful memories and back to reality when I felt a hand holding onto my thigh. When I looked down, my eyes slowly gazed up the arm and I realized that it led to Slater. His fierce blue eyes were fiery as if was disrespecting him by not drinking along with the crew. He squeezed my thigh until I thought it was literally going to burst, and I realized that I had to do something. I had to cause a distraction to get myself out of this situation, and to hopefully find a bathroom afterward. Instantly, the perfect plan came to my mind.

          My hand was shaky as I made a choice. Me being me, I chose not to drink, and, instead, spilled the probably pricey red wine on my probably expensive white dress. 

          My eyes widened with fake shock as I pretended to be so mad at myself for ruining everything. "I-I'm so sorry, it's just I've never drunk alcohol before, so I was nervous, and-" Slater's fiery blue orbs bored into my gray eyes as he pulled me up by the elbow, not even caring about how abusive he acted in front of the restaurant staff and his friends, and pulled me out the back door. He took his jacket off of the coat rack and ushered me outside into the cold. He forgot to grab my jacket and cursed as he put his black coat over my shoulders when he noticed the goosebumps forming on my arms and legs.

          His fierce grip never left my arm, and he pushed me inside of the limousine, my head banging against the opposite door as he got in and slammed his door.

          Before I could even get myself straight, he pulled me up and my head was spinning. I touched the back of my head and felt blood oozing out, my finger covered in the dark red that smelled of metallic scent. If I didn't have a concussion then, I had to have been superhuman with all the head trauma I'd gone through these past few days.

          The drive back was quiet, too quiet. I could practically feel Slater's rage as he held onto my arm with frustration, his grip never ceasing to be gentle or easy as we rode back to the house.

*

          We were back at the house within no time and Slater smirked at me as he led me down what seemed to be an endless corridor of doors. I'm not sure if I was hallucinating from my bleeding head or if it was actually happening, but I swore I could hear screams of other victims, other women, scratching and banging against the doors to be free and rid of the prison we were all trapped inside of.

          Finally, we reached the end of the hallway, with a door made of dark oak, like the furniture in my room, rather than the plain white doors we had just passed by. Slater typed in a key code and unlocked the door with his ID card and pushed me inside the room as soon as the door was open.

          Slater slammed the door behind him and two guards in black suits and sunglasses stood in front of it, clearly not budging to let anyone out or in unless Slater said so.

          I was filled with anxiety and started twisting my purity ring on my ring finger as Slater started to speak coldly to me. 

          "Do you realize how much embarrassment you caused me tonight? I had everything planned perfectly for you, me, and the gang. But no, you had to go and ruin it all!" His voice increasingly got louder as his anger was on the rise because of the events that occurred not even ten minutes earlier. He suddenly was getting closer to me, step by step. I moved as far back as I could until I was against the wall and Slater's chest and chiseled stomach rested against me. His eyes pierced my soul and I looked down, scared of the intensity, nervous about what he was going to do to me. He seemed to notice I was still frantically twisting my ring and pulled my hand up to his face, staring at the tiny fake diamond on it with disgust.

          His grimace seemed to turn into an evil and sly smirk as his hand slinked around my waist and back and he unzipped my wine-stained dress.

          I had seen all the kidnapping shows and movies, including and the one's with rape, but then I realized that this was it. This actually was a reality for me. I was going to be raped and I couldn't do anything about it.

          I tried to keep the dress on with my one free hand, but that one eventually came under the control of Slater, too, as he forcefully grabbed it and let the dress fall to the floor.

          I felt out of control and embarrassed. This was not how sex was supposed to be. I was supposed to only do this with the guy who I married, who I loved and the guy who truly loved me. Not some dude I had met four days ago that took everything away from me without even caring. This couldn't have been my time. Hadn't they told us all no means no? Hadn't they said that the guys would respect us and our bodies if we didn't consent to anything?

          It made me wonder what kind of life Slater grew up in. What kind of sick reality did he live in that he thought he was entitled to take advantage of an innocent girl like myself? 

          I pushed the thought back down. I didn't want to know.

          I realized that right then was the perfect time to fight back, while I at least still had some dignity.

          I kicked my heel that was still on (one had fallen off in the car and I didn't care to try to put it back on) and it did not go where I needed it to go. It barely scratched Slater's shin and left a mark on his expensive suit. It turned out to be a bad idea when he looked down and noticed the damage I left. Like, seriously? It was a freakin' suit, dude, get over yourself. While he was paying attention to his suit, I kicked him in his manhood, my goal being the bathroom so that I could hopefully relieve myself and block off any entrance toward me.

          However, kicking him only seemed to do a little damage and he screamed out in anger as I tried to slide out of his grasp. To my avail, I did. I even made it to the bathroom and locked the door as quickly as possible.

          I searched the drawers underneath the bathroom sink, looking for some phone, or any communication device for that matter, to try to text my sister our code in case of an emergency. I found an old TracFone in the third drawer and booted it up as quickly as I could while Slater seemed to struggle opening the bathroom door. The banging got louder as I typed the SOS message to my sister's phone, "PNK C'S." As soon as I sent the message, however, the door broke down right behind me and not only did Slater come barging in, but the whole gang did, too.

          The phone was torn out of my hands, leaving red and itchy scratch marks from Slater's nails, and thrown into the toilet along with my hopes of being saved. I heard the bathtub being run and was thrown into it as soon as it was filled up enough.

          The water was filled with ice and freezing water. I was being tortured and I couldn't save myself from any of it. As I looked around the room, the men were all stripped down to their underwear and, clearly, were enjoying seeing me suffer.

          "If only she'd let me take her earlier, then she wouldn't have to suffer being taken by all of us at once," Slater stated proudly as he pulled me by the hair and shoved my head under the icy water.

          I'd never drowned before, but I had had an asthma attack before. This was worse. I tried to hold my breath as long as I could, but my asthma-induced lungs couldn't take it. I started sucking in the water, just needing, craving breath in my system to no avail. Finally, just as the world started getting a little dark, my head was pulled back up and I was out of the water in no time.

          However, I would have rather drowned that night rather than have done to me what came next.

          Slater threw -- yes, I was literally chucked into the air and thrown onto the red-covered bedsheets -- me onto the bed and pushed my back against the headboard. With one hand, he pinned my wrists above my head, and with the other, he forced himself up underneath of the lacy bralette, grabbing my boobs as hard as he possibly could.

          I screamed in horror and pain. I mean, who wouldn't in that situation, right? My own body had just been violated. Used as a sexual object purely because I was supposed to be submissive to these jerkwads. News flash, kidnapping someone basically makes a person have more respect for anthills than they do for you.

          My undergarments were taken off and Slater started to touch me. However, to my defense, I had had to pee since before dinner. It is not my fault that he didn't let me go earlier!

          I peed on his hand and his face turned into one of disgust and anger. "So that's how it's gonna be played, huh? HUH?" He spoke forcefully as he forced himself inside of me, taking away my most sacred and precious thing that I had been hoping to save for my husband. As soon as Slater was done with me, I was passed on to the next.

          All at once, all I felt was the whole gang of them touching me, grabbing me wherever they wanted. Doing things to me that I sure as heck did not want to be done. Saying things like, "You'll never walk again," "Deflowering you will be fun," and, "I hope this makes you realize that you're a whore. Why are you letting this happen to you?" To that one, I spat some bloody spit in his face. "Stupid slut, you'll get what's coming." They continued to assault and degrade me, treating me like I was worthless. And I let them. I didn't care what happened to me anymore, I just wanted it all to end. I stared at my purity ring and whispered, "I'm sorry," as the tears streamed down my face.

          I was raped that night. Several times, by several different guys, being knocked in and out of consciousness. The times I was conscious was the worst because I knew what was happening, internally, but externally, I wasn't able to stop it. Tears were made into rivers down my cheeks as I just watched my own body being compared to that of a prostitute. I actually kind of felt like I wasn't actually witnessing this, that it was some sort of nightmare or something. But as I kept coming back to consciousness, my terms of reality and dreams finally separated themselves and left me with what actually was happening to me.

          Once the numbness started to wear off and I realized what was happening to me, I let the waterworks flow. I started crying right on the spot, even more than I already was. I didn't want to hold in my feelings anymore if they treated me like this. I hoped they felt bad. I hoped it struck them in their Grinch-sized hearts because I wanted to let them know that I was a human too. I do cringe and cry in pain when someone abuses me; verbally, physically, and sexually. I was a freaking virgin before this, and I was actually planning on saving myself for marriage.

          I was not their little dog who they could just treat like a piece of crap; I was a human being that night, no matter the names they called me nor the things they did to me.

          They didn't stop, though. They just kept on doing what I assumed they did best; using and abusing a half-conscious teenage girl.

          Before I passed out for the final time that night, I realized something odd about the situation I was in -- and yes, it did get even odder than it originally was -- Dylan was not present. He wasn't giving orders nor was he even in the bedroom with the rest of the evil minions.

          He was completely absent from the entire situation.

          With that final thought in mind, I lost consciousness again thinking that maybe, just maybe, Dylan may actually be the nicest out of all of these frick-tards.