Chapter 4

Daylight was fading. The lights above them were on, and did nothing to even trick the room into feeling warmer. Stella looked up at the two guys who had already been at the cabin when they arrived. They were sitting at the table watching the TV above them on a low volume. The man and the tall and muscular guy had disappeared elsewhere in the small cabin, and it seemed like they were taking shifts watching her and Grace. Stella didn't want to think about it, but if things went downhill then dealing with only two guys at a time would be much more in their favour than four.

One of the guys looked at his watch before getting up and crossing the room. "Bathroom?" They had been kind enough to let them have regular bathroom breaks while they'd been there.

"Yeah," Stella nodded, and when she stood, her body felt stiff and strained. She followed the guy through the hall and walked into the bathroom.

"Two minutes," he said.

Stella nodded once, switching the light on and closing the door.

—

Stella let the cold water flow over the abraded skin on her wrists, trying to ignore the stinging and focusing more on the numbness that was soon to come. She looked up and caught her reflection in the mirror, not expecting to see the red mark with surrounding light bruising on her cheek bone. It didn't look anywhere near as bad as it felt.

She looked across to the window and thought how quick and easy it would be to just climb out and run. Just like the other opportunity she'd had earlier that day when they were in the warehouse. If she had escaped, she would've found Josh and they would've gone after them, alerting the rest of their team of what was happening so they could take proper action.

She turned the tap off and tried not to think about it, it would only make things worse. She dried her hands on her shirt and instead of leaving the bathroom she looked around. While she was still in there and not being watched, she could look around for something to use as a weapon should she need it. She was sure they would've heard the running water so she wouldn't have much time.

The modest bathroom had an all-in-one shower and bath, a toilet, and hand basin, as well as a freestanding cabinet against the wall. The vent-style front showed there was nothing in there—it probably housed towels and linen when it was actually being used as a house instead of a kidnapper's den. On either side of the mirror there were wall mounted cabinets, and there were only a couple of half empty bottles of hair products inside them. She checked under the sink next. There were several bathroom amenities, and as she was trying to quietly move them around to get a better look inside, she knocked a canister to the floor. The crash when it hit the black and white tiles startled her, even when she knew it was coming. She held her breath, waiting for someone to come barging in. She quickly picked the canister up and put it back on the shelf when something metallic caught her eye. It was a pair of tweezers.

The door came flying open, and seconds before shooting up Stella swiftly reached in and grabbed them, tucking them in her hand behind her back.

"What are you doing?" the guy almost yelled, looking mad.

Inside, Stella was screaming, but she kept a straight face. "I was looking for tampons. It's that time of the month," Stella had to fight back the sly grin at her quick wit and easy lie, as well as the guy's expression—anger to embarrassment in surprising subtlety. "But you don't have any, so..." Stella didn't wait for him to reply, she just walked straight passed him and slipped the pair of tweezers into her pocket.

—

"What happened? I heard the yelling," Grace asked when Stella returned.

"Nothing. I was looking around and found this," a quick glance told her they weren't being looked at, and Stella pulled the improvised weapon out just enough for a peek. "Tweezers. The guy walked in and almost caught me. I told him I was looking for tampons."

"Nice," Grace nodded with a grin.

"Right? It's not like it's the best of weapons. But it's better than nothing."

After a few hours, one of the guys got up and opened a cupboard in the kitchenette. He pulled out a packet of crackers, putting the whole thing on a plastic plate and taking it over to them. "Dinner is served," he said. Stella couldn't help but scoff and shake her head at the pathetic effort. Nevertheless, her rumbling stomach was more than grateful.

While Stella and Grace ate the crackers, they quietly discussed escape strategies, should they need them. Stella wasn't the only one to notice their captors were taking shifts, Grace did, too, and they figured their best way of escaping would be to quietly take down the two on watch, then sneak out and take their chances, otherwise immobilize the other two before making a run for it. Soon enough they'd come across a road and cars, or even a house or town.

It was tempting to simply take action then, but judging by their previous encounters, the two original guys were strong and had experience, and there was a chance that if things didn't work in their favour, one of them could get seriously hurt. Part of Stella said it was worth it—she didn't really want to spend the remainder of the 24 hours on edge, not knowing what would happen next, or if it would be as simple as letting them go once they received the money. But they didn't seem to be in any immediate sense of danger so they decided to keep that plan in their back pocket. Besides being knocked about for the ransom video earlier, they were given food and water and bathroom breaks and were otherwise left alone.

Stella put her head back against the wall, closing her eyes. She could vaguely hear the news playing on the TV above them. She half expected to hear something about two missing police officers, but political jargon and sports were the only things that came on. She tried to picture herself being at her place, sitting on the couch in the comfort of her own home with said television on in the background. Except this couch wasn't soft and warm nor comfy, it was hard and cold.

Apart from the low noise from the TV, the cabin was quiet, and for the first time since being there, she noticed a clock ticking. She looked around and saw one on the wall above the kitchenette. Straining to see the hands in the near darkness with the lights turned out, it read 12:55. No wonder she was so tired, her day had started almost 18 hours ago. She wanted to stay alert in case anything happened, but her eyes were heavy. She tried to stay awake as long as possible, but eventually sleep took over.

—

Stella awoke with a start to something crashing. She looked around, startled. The morning light was seeping through the cracks in the curtains and was casting orange rays on the otherwise still room. She looked across to Grace, who seemed unaffected by the noise and was still sleeping soundly; she had sunken to the point of lying on the floor, using her arm as a pillow. Stella then heard someone curse lightly in a deep voice. It came from the other side of the room. She rolled onto her knees to see over the couch dividing the room, and saw the tall and muscular guy crouched on the floor over broken glass. The man wasn't in the room, and while she wondered where he was, she thought she could use this moment to attempt to talk to this guy alone, to make a connection. Stella thought he would be the safest of the four to be around as well, because it seemed like he was the one that was pushed around the most, and despite him actually being the one to have injured her and Grace previously, he'd been ordered to, or at least inflicted, by the leader.

Stella calmly walked over, and to her surprise he didn't make an effort to stop her or tell her to go back. "Do you need any help?" she asked, crouching down anyway. She started to collect the larger pieces of glass from what would've been a tumbler into a pile. He looked at her but didn't say anything. Now up closer, she saw there was blood on his hand and a couple of small chips of glass inside the wound. "You're bleeding," she noted.

He looked at his hand, and then in the direction of the hallway, "You shouldn't be over here."

Ignoring him, she said, "I have first aid training, I can take a look at it if you want."

"It's fine. I'll take care of it later."

Stella expectantly glanced towards the hallway, but then started to collect the smaller pieces of glass. She wasn't finished talking to him. "You don't have to do this. You could just let us go, look the other way. What happens if you don't get the ransom money, huh? Your buddy will probably kill us. Do you really want to be an accessory to murder?" Stella wished Grace had done the negotiating instead because her argument wasn't exactly compelling.

"Look, you just need to go sit back down now. You shouldn't even be talking to me."

Stella leaned in closer, "What are you afraid of? You're huge, you can defend yourself; you pack a mean punch," she pointed out, gesturing between her face and the direction of Grace.

He sheepishly looked away, and when he stood to put the glass in the bin, Stella stood, too. She wasn't about to give up trying to persuade him.

"What's going on here?"

Stella almost dropped the handful of glass from surprise. The man was standing in the threshold of the hallway.

"I-We were. Cleaning up. She dropped a glass when she was bringing it over." The tall and muscular guy tripped over his words, not expecting him to return when he did, as did Stella.

Stella looked at him and frowned at his lie, but ruled it down to him protecting his own arse. She expected the worst when the man started to stroll over towards them, and resisted the urge to take a step back.

"Get back over there," despite the order, he sounded suspicious.

Stella quickly disposed of the glass in the bin next to the counter and went back to their spot by the wall, where Grace, who had woken up, was watching curiously over the couch.

"And you, go get cleaned up."

At first, Stella didn't think anything of it, but as she sat down, she realised he'd told the tall and muscular guy to clean his wound, which would require tweezers to remove the small shards, and the tweezers were no longer in the bathroom, instead sitting snugly in her pocket. Her heart beat against her chest, and Grace asked if everything was okay.

"He's gonna know the tweezers are missing," she told Grace.

"What?" Panic was evident in Grace's voice.

"He's gonna find out we took them," she looked at Grace. "He cut himself, he'll need the tweezers to get the glass out. What do we do? You're the team leader here. Lead."

"Me—? You seem to have been handling this pretty well so far."

"Grace!" Stella exclaimed quietly, not wanting to veer off subject. "What, do we pose a bathroom emergency and get him out before he looks for it? Ugh," she sighed heavily, "Who am I kidding, he's probably looking in there right now."

"Look, maybe he doesn't even know they were there in the first place. He might not notice."

"Shit," Stella shook her head. Somehow, she felt that wasn't true. Everything had been well planned so far, and she didn't expect something as small as not knowing what was inside cabinets to get by them, especially the leader. "He's the weak link," she pointed out. "Maybe he won't say anything."

"That's if he knows they were meant to be there. Just relax, all we can do is wait and see what happens."

Stella tried to take her advice to just relax; after all, they were just tweezers, they wouldn't do much damage—they weren't even sharp.

Soon enough, the tall and muscular guy reappeared. He didn't say a word to the man nor confront the pair. Stella couldn't completely see his wound from where she was, but it seemed like he'd cleaned it up without issue. That settled her nerves somewhat.

Within ten minutes, he came across to the pair and offered another bathroom break. Grace followed him down the hall. When she returned some five minutes later, she looked apprehensive.

"What's wrong?" Stella asked.

Grace looked across to the tall and muscular guy, who was leaning against the wall by the table with his arms crossed. "Don't freak out on me—" that was never a good way to start, "—but he does know."

Stella listened as she explained what happened. Grace told her the tall and muscular guy got a moment with her in the bathroom and asked if she took them. Grace denied several times, but he was relentless. He caved after saying he had thought about it and realised he had other options—he didn't even want to kidnap them in the first place—and he offered them something in return: the tweezers for a safe passage. He'd told Grace that, although he was never disclosed on the specifics, the leader wasn't just going to let them go. Stella could only imagine what would happen if they didn't get the money. Grace said the only way he wouldn't tell the leader about the theft was if they returned them to their place in the bathroom.

Stella let out a sigh. Noticing Grace never said what kind of safe passage was offered, she asked.

"He said he'd tell us the way to the closest town."

Stella nodded. He knew they took the makeshift weapon. She knew they were in more danger than they thought. He would tell them the direction to the closest help in exchange for their only weapon, which there'd be a chance they'd need of they were to escape to reach said help. Stella felt the weight on her shoulders, yet she knew what she had to do. Grace had added her input as well, and Stella agreed. It would be in their best interest to put the tweezers back.

anon - thank you so much, that means a lot to me!

Billy1990ism - they're comin'! There's 7 chapters in total (and I'm considering a sequel, more details later!), so only a few more to go.