Read Legion of Despair: Book Three in The Borrowed World Series for Free Online

she both fully believed his statement and was satisfied with it.
    “You haven’t come across her?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
    Alice shook her head, which was not exactly easy lying with her head resting against a concrete floor. Her forehead rocked against the cool floor with the effort. “I wasn’t exactly looking for her, though. I decided to just get myself home. She could find her own way. Never really liked the bitch anyway.”
    She hoped this comment might somehow endear her to him and put them on the same side. It was a risk, though. If he felt bad about killing Rebecca, he may lash out at Alice for this slight against her.
    Boyd nodded. “I’m sure she’s well on her way home,” he said. “She’ll probably be there any day now, if she’s not already.”
    “I’m sure,” Alice agreed. She closed her eyes. Her body felt so heavy. She didn’t have the energy for these games. “What do you want from me, Boyd? I have a family I need to get home to. A husband. A son.”
    She’d always read that you should humanize yourself if taken hostage. Make it harder for the kidnapper to see you as an object. Take every opportunity to express that you were a person, not an object.
    “None of that matters anymore,” Boyd said. “Your son and husband are part of your old life. You’re going to have a new life. With me.”
    Alice cracked her eyes and stared at him. “I have a life. I have people that care about me. People that I care about.”
    Boyd smiled at her, then shook his head, a look of pity in his eyes. “Not right now, you don’t, Alice. Now you have nothing. But you do have an option. You can have the life I give you or you can have nothing at all.”
    “What do you mean by nothing ?” she croaked.
    “Nothing,” he repeated. “As in no life . As in I kill you in this basement and you never see another day on this miserable Earth.”
    She clamped her eyes shut and lay there. She would not give him any tears.
    “You think about it,” he said, rising from the floor.
    “Take these zip ties off,” she begged. “They’re cutting off my circulation.”
    He stomped loudly up the wooden steps. “Consider it an incentive to think very carefully.”
    “I’m hungry!” she cried.
    “More incentive!” he called back to her.
     
    *
     
    Alice lost consciousness after he left. She was too miserable to sleep, but the weakness from her deprivations pulled her into blackness. It was like the fevered sleep of the flu, where you lost all orientation to time and place.
    When she awoke, she opened her eyes and saw nothing. She moved her head, looked in all directions. More blackness. She listened and heard nothing. For a few moments she thought she had passed away and was dead once and for all, then gradually the throb of her raw wrists and ankles crept upon her and she knew that she was still alive.
    She felt the need to urinate, which was surprising to her since she had not had anything to drink all day. She started to just let go and pee on herself, then she decided this might be an opportunity to appeal to Boyd’s sympathy and see if she could gain any ground with him. Showing that she needed him would give him the feeling of control over her and he seemed to want that.
    She cleared her throat and called his name. “Boyd.”
    What came out was little more than a hoarse whisper. She worked her mouth, trying to distribute what little moisture remained there.
    “Boyd,” she called. It was slightly louder this time but she still suspected it could not be heard beyond the basement.
    “BOYD!” she yelled, louder this time, stronger.
    “WHAT?” he bellowed.
    She jerked in terror and nearly lost control of her bladder.
    “WHAT?” he repeated, screaming in her face.
    Where had he come from?
    A powerful flashlight came on just inches from her face. She contorted, tried to crush her eyes closed, the pain from the beam making her head explode. He must have been sitting there in front of her this whole