✮the beginning of us; past
It is at hour 53 that Maxine stops counting.
By this time, the ropes tied around her body have already created painful welts on her skin and she’s beyond exhausted trying to loosen them up. Thankfully, they haven’t gagged her throughout the entire ordeal but that really doesn’t make up for any of the horrible things they’ve done so far.
She openly glares at them from across the room; she may not see their faces-- these cowards who hide in the shadows-- but she knows full well that they are there. The smell of cigarettes filling the room already gives them away.
“Every single one of you are going to regret you ever did this to me!” She calls out, voice brave despite the impending violence such action entails. It won’t be long now before her father and mother and the rest of her aunts and uncles send someone to save her; she trusts them and knows full well that they won’t let anymore harm come to her. “My father will have your heads!”
The men haughtily at her remark and one of the masked men approaches her, painfully grasping her cheeks in his dirtied hands. “Well, aren’t you a fiesty one, princess Maxine?” He leers and Maxine braces herself for the worst.
“I like my women fierce.”