Obsession Read Free Page B

completely healed. Even knowing that hard truth, she held her breath, waiting for what came next.
    “I need your help, Jess.”
    Jess . The smooth, deep nuances of his voice whispered over her skin and just like that it was ten years ago all over again.
    Only this time, she would make certain they didn’t end up in bed together.
     
     
    Chapter Two
     
    Andrea Denton squeezed her eyes shut and tried to fight the effects of the drug. She didn’t know what the white pill she’d been forced to swallow was but she knew it was bad. The other girls were like zombies. Andrea would be too if she didn’t fight harder. She couldn’t let that happen.
    Stumbling and staggering like a drunk person, she paced back and forth in the darkness. The other two girls huddled in the corner, too afraid to move.
    Andrea’s stomach churned with the urge to puke again but she held it back. She’d eaten handful after handful of dirt, clawing it from the packed floor and shoving it into her mouth. She’d lost count of the number. Maybe it was stupid and she’d probably swallowed rat poop and no telling what else, but whenever any of her friends got this messed up they ate everything in sight and danced or walked or jumped around to try and wear off the effects of the alcohol or the drugs they’d partied with.
    Doing something was better than doing nothing.
    She kept walking. Once or twice she bumped into the metal bunk beds. The beds were shoved against the back wall. The springs stretched and creaked whenever they were forced to lie down. That and the oatmeal were her only ways to measure time. Bed at night made sense. Oatmeal in the morning. Her brain hurt when she tried to remember how long she’d been here. Three plastic bowls of soggy, unsweetened oatmeal.
    Looking for a way to escape, she had felt her way around the whole room. She’d almost had a heart attack when a rat ran over her hands. She shuddered. But she’d kept searching. There was a door but it was steel and there was no knob or lock on this side. A case of bottled water, she’d chugged as much as she could stand, sat in one corner, and a stinky pot with a lid for a toilet was in the other.
    After her first day she’d had to use it. A stench had hit her in the face when she lifted the lid and made her puke. She tried not to use it until she couldn’t hold it anymore. The walls were mostly dirt and brick. Except where the door was, it felt different. Wood or something. Smelled like a basement to her. Like the one in her great-uncle’s house. He’d always told Andrea it was haunted to make sure she didn’t sneak down there. Eventually she had and she’d discovered his nasty magazines and stash of weed. Creepy old bastard.
    When those bad people brought her here, the bag over her head had prevented her from seeing anything. Maybe this was a cave but she didn’t think so. A cave would have stone floors. Probably. This place smelled like a basement.
    As strong as the musty, damp odor in the air was it didn’t cover up the smell of human waste where some of the others had peed their pants or worse. Andrea figured the effects of the drug and the fear caused them not to be able to make it to the pot. That happened sometimes to people when they died too. She shuddered. Didn’t want to think about dying.
    Where was she? Why had these crazy people taken her and the others? For money? The trembling started again, first in her legs, then in her arms.
    Maybe they were planning something really bad. Like in the movies when they tortured their victims or cut them into pieces.
    She had to get out of here.
    Walk. Just walk. You’ll figure something out . Her mother would be upset. Maybe her dad, too. And Dan. Tears burned her eyes as Andrea hugged herself. He had warned her about stuff like this. And she’d listened. She was smart. Always watchful. She never drank too much like some of her friends.
    But she hadn’t expected the evil Dan had warned her about to come in the form