Tim tried his best not to cry.
He hugged his knees to his chest.
It was so hard not to shiver. It was really cold. The winds were howling and he could almost swear there were a bunch of voices inside, whispering tauntingly in his ear.
He glanced up.
There was a full moon out. He couldn't take comfort in the stars. There were dark, grey clouds overhead. Only the moon was visible.
The trees were bereft of leaves.
Their branches were covered in both shadow and moonlight.
Tim always possessed an overactive imagination. It wasn't hard to picture the ends of those branches reaching menacingly for him like demonic fingers. The edges were sharp and pointy.
He shivered once more and hugged his knees even tighter.
It was hard to tell how long he would remain in here.
He didn't have a watch and the only way he could judge time was the rising and setting of the sun.
The last time this happened, he'd passed out from hunger.
Tim was doing his best to show that he'd learned his lesson.
HE didn't like it when he cried. HE hated it when Tim displayed weakness of any kind.
Tim barely suppressed a whimper.
He didn't mean to cry. He'd tried to follow HIS instructions.
Unfortunately, their last session had been especially painful. Tim bit his lip in order to suppress his urge to cry out.
It wasn't enough.
A sob escaped his lips before he could suppress it.
As if adding insult to injury, a tear ran down his cheek.
HE was disgusted.
The last thing Tim remembered was feeling a sharp pain on the back of his head. The next thing he knew, he was waking up in an all too familiar hellhole.
Literally.
There was no use trying to escape.
The soil made it too impossible to climb. And he was still weak, trying to recover from being fed only two small meals a day.
And that was only if HE was feeling generous.
If HE was truly furious, sometimes, Tim wasn't fed at all.
Tim froze when he heard familiar bootsteps approaching the hole. HE wasn't trying to be stealthy at all.
Even a novice could hear the cracks of twigs and crunching of leaves.
Which meant HE was in one of THOSE moods.
Tim's shivering had nothing to do with the cold this time. He closed his eyes tightly and tried to disappear into himself. He could feel HIS eyes watching him, judging him and finding him wanting.
As usual.
"Timmy, Timmy, Timmy." HE sneered. "You've been a naughty boy. And do you know what happens to naughty little boys?"
Tim was too afraid to answer.
"They get punished."
Before Tim knew what was happening, he felt an all too familiar pair of hands grab him and toss him over a shoulder.
Oh no.
Not him.
HE had an assistant. Somehow, Tim hated the assistant even more. For one thing, he couldn't stand the assistant's laughter.
It reminded him of a gaggle of laughing hyenas.
The laughter always displayed the assistant's psychotic nature. No matter what HE said or did, it always sent him into a laughing fit. As if everything was one big lark.
And he always grinned like a demented loon. He would skip about like a kid in a candy store.
But that wasn't the worst part.
Tim couldn't explain it.
But there was something about the way the assistant watched him that made his skin crawl. Whenever he touched him, he would caress his pale skin longer than necessary.
Even though the man only touched his wrists and ankles to shackle him, something in the manner in which the assistant caressed his skin made him want to vomit.
He felt dirty and polluted.
And he didn't know why. Tim was too lost in thought to notice the assistant reaching for something attached to his belt.
Before Tim knew what was happening, everything went black again.
Tim's eyes shot open.
It was so hard to stay awake.
Even worse, his torment would bring everything rushing back. Everytime he passed out, he would relive bits and pieces of his previous kidnapping.
Memories he'd done his best to suppress.
Experiences that he wanted to pretend never happened to him.
It was the only way he could cope. "It never happened." John McGee coldly told him the one time he'd scrounged up enough courage to ask.
That might as well have been his father's credo.
Tim was too afraid of his father to disobey him.
With an effort, Tim suppressed his memories and sent them back to their previous hiding place.
This wasn't the time to focus on the past.
Gibbs would be so disappointed that he wasn't remembering his training as a federal agent.
Tim focused on his surroundings.
He was still in the same room.
His kidnapper never bothered changing his position, which meant he was still hanging like a human punching bag.
As if his body was determined to remind him, his pain came rushing back.
With a hiss, Tim did his best to ignore the pain.
He did his best to look around the room for a weapon. As usual, his kidnapper wasn't stupid enough to leave anything lying around.
And Tim was no Houdini.
His bonds were too tight and secure.
Tim was too lost in thought. Unlike his predecessor, his current kidnapper was employing stealth.
He was too preoccupied to notice the door sliding open.
He was quickly brought back to reality when he felt something sharp and painful hit his back. "Hello, Tiny Tim." A familiar, mocking voice rang out. "I'm back!"
Noelle's hand was shaking as she lit a cigarette.
It was like something out of a bad movie, she thought distractedly.
She'd sent her new husband, Michael, out for some bullshit reason she couldn't remember. She needed time to steady her nerves.
Damn that Sarah.
Her daughter was poking her nose into her affairs. Bringing up bad memories that were best left in the past.
It was as if Sarah's call had been the key necessary to open Pandora's Box.
Luckily, Michael was still going to a liquor store to get some wine around the time her so-called daughter called.
So he wasn't around when Noelle had a confrontation out of her worst nightmares. She barely had enough time to hang up the phone when she heard the telltale click of an all too familiar lighter.
She gulped.
She knew the sound of that lighter...
She took a deep breath to steady her nerves. Then she slowly turned around. Sure enough, he was sitting in a lounge chair by the nightstand.
The room's lighting made it impossible to see his face.
Only one lamp was lit.
The rest of his body was visible. She could see his hand falling and rising as he steadily inhaled the nicotine from his cigar.
He still favored Cuban cigars, she mused absently.
"Hello, Noelle." He purred. "We need to talk."
Penny's hand was shaking after she hung up her cell phone.
Dammit, she cursed to herself.
Sarah had overheard more than she should while she confronted John in his room back at the hospital.
And Noelle couldn't lie or act to save her life.
Her actions only served to arouse Sarah's curiosity.
Now she knew that Tim had been kidnapped before. She had to stop Sarah before she started poking this particular hornet's nest.
She would get stung in an extreme fashion otherwise.
While she wanted to help her grandson, there was more at stake than Sarah knew.
As much as she hated to do it, Penny had to help her so-called son cover up the entire mess once more.
Fortunately, Sarah asked Penny to meet her at some diner near Waverly College.
Hopefully, the drive there would give Penny enough time to concoct some bullshit story.
Sarah couldn't find out the truth. No one could.
Her entire family would be destroyed otherwise.
Penny slid behind the wheel and took off. She rushed as fast as possible to the diner. Normally, she would obey the speed limits and laws of traffic.
But she was frantic.
Desperate to make sure her family's secrets never saw the light of day.
As a result, she was driving too fast to avoid the other car coming from the opposite direction. The driver was drunk, judging from the way the car swerved back and forth.
Penny panicked, jerking the wheel and applying the brakes.
Before Penny knew it, she collided with the other car.
Inevitably, everything went black.
