For hours, I sat alone in that room, wondering where Ryan was and what they were doing to him. I could think of a number of things, nothing short of abuse, but I didn't want to imagine them. I knew none of it would be good and I didn't want to think about what might be happening to him when I couldn't even do anything to stop it. I had been released from my restraints shortly after Ryan was taken away, probably because they didn't see me as a threat when Ryan was away. I had banged on the door and shouted at the top of my lungs, but I received no response. Steven knew my history from the time when he was dating my mother, he knew I was more the lay-down-and-roll-over than the fight-back-with-everything-I-have type.

After what felt like an eternity alone with nothing but the ringing silence of my thoughts, the door opened and Ryan was carried into the room; he didn't walk in on his own two feet. His face was flushed and his eyes were red from whatever stress had made him cry. My whole body screamed with rage as I saw his collar was torn and he looked like he'd been rolling around on something dirty like the floor. He didn't look at me, he kept his glazed eyes on the floor. His hair was drenched in sweat and he was breathing hard through his nose.

I wanted to run to him, but one of the men shouted at me when I tried to stand, telling me to stay where I was. I did, but only because they were still holding Ryan and I didn't want him to get hurt. While I watched, the men dragged him over to one of the walls and dumped him down, not even caring that he seemed unable to hold himself up. I waited anxiously until the door closed before I rushed to Ryan's side. "Oh, my God. What did they do?" I asked.

I reached out to touch his arm to see if he was okay when he suddenly slapped my hand away with a blinded growl. "Don't touch me...!" he gasped, blinking his eyes open blearily. I drew my hand back in surprised and felt a lump form in my throat as he stared at me, venom on his tongue. His eyes were angry for a second, hatred boiling beneath the surface, before they seemed to clear. He fumbled with his words. "Jacob..." he said.

I knew he hadn't aimed those cold words at me, but it's still hurt; my hand hurt. I found myself moving away. "Sorry... I'll leave you alone," I said.

Ryan frowned and grabbed my hand, pulling my back towards him. "No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you. I thought-" He trailed off mid-sentence and looked away. "Never mind. I didn't mean to scare you."

Though I was unnerved by his first reaction to me, I allowed myself to be wrapped in his arms and I hugged him back. "It's okay. I know you didn't mean it..." I said.

I could feel his body trembling against mine and I felt so full of anger I had to hold Ryan tighter just to keep myself from screaming. I knew exactly what they'd done to him. They were disgusting and vile. I hoped they were repaid in full for everything they had done.

Ryan had his face in my shoulder and was rubbing my back like he was caring for me, but I could feel his tears soaking my sleeve and hears his breathy sobs as he fell apart in my arms. He was upset and I knew it. But I wasn't going to argue with him. This was how he coped and he could pretend if it helped him deal with the trauma. I let him cry it out in my shirt as ran my hands through his hair lovingly. After a while, he sniffled one last time and pulled away. He cleared his throat and looked down. "I t-tried to listen to see if I could get some information, but I didn't hear anything of h-... help," he said, a slight stutter in his voice.

He was putting on a tough act. It hurt that he wouldn't lean on me, but I decided not to push him. "Oh..." I said.

He nodded, trying to be in control of a situation he could never control. "I'll see what I can do next time," he said.

"There won't be a next time," I told him. He hesitated and I started over, calmer this time so as not to upset him. "I won't let them take you anywhere."

"Oh..." he said.

He nodded and I put my hand on his. "We'll figure this out and you won't have to go with them ever again," I promised.

He blinked back some tears that he didn't want me to see and nodded again. "Yeah..." he said.

Him and I both knew I was just giving false hope to calm us down, but we were too stressed at the moment to care. We needed it, we needed each other. It was better to think positive than than to stress yourself more with thoughts of reality.

I took a deep breath and wiped away a stray tear of my own. "So, did you hear anything at all. Even a small thing could mean something," I told him.

He shrugged slightly. "Not really. They said something about how being quiet wasn't really an issue or something like that, but that could mean anything." His face flushed again and he looked down. I knew why and I chose not to bring it up. He didn't need that right now.

"Do you think we could be at a club or something?" I asked.

He shook his head. "No, the room I was in looked more like a..." He hesitated in thought. "To be honest, it looked like a really old room from like a horror movie with different chains and sharp tools hanging everywhere. It was dark and dusty and just... fucking creepy," he said.

I thought in silence for a minute. We could be anywhere, a warehouse, a basement for some city building. I frowned in concentration. "Did you hear any noises? Like indications of anything?" I asked.

He sighed. "No... I didn't hear anything other than..." He sighed. "I didn't hear anything..."

I sighed too, getting frustrated with his antics. "Ryan, you don't have to say anything about it, but don't act like nothing happened. It's not like I don't know what happened already."

Ryan dropped his eyes. "Nothing happened, okay...?"

"No, not okay. Don't lie to me like I'm some ignorant kid. I know exactly what it's like to-" I stopped. I knew exactly what it was like to be locked in with a roomful of men, but I'd never told anyone before, not even Connor. Ryan had a right to his secrets, I should have known that better than anyone. "Never mind," I said.

Ryan frowned, looking at me again. "Jacob," he started.

I didn't let him finish. "Forget I said anything. I don't care if you keep it a secret. I won't bring it up again," I said quickly, ducking around the very same topic Ryan had just avoided. "Let's not talk about this anymore. We need to figure out how to get out of here."

It was apparent that Ryan didn't seem to want to just drop the subject as he had first urged me to do, but he nodded and cleared his throat gruffly. "I noticed a couple of machines that looked like grinders of something of the like. We could be in some sort of a processing facility," he said.

"Wouldn't there be people?" I asked.

He paused. "Probably..." he said.

I felt bad about dashing his hopes and mended my response, "Well, maybe it's a older facility. Or it's just not used anymore," I proposed.

"Maybe..." Ryan mumbled.

I could tell by his voice that he was disheartened. He was slouched and his eyes looked tired for our short conversation. I sighed and looked down too. Maybe we needed a break, I decided. That was when I noticed he was holding his hand behind his back. I frowned. "Ryan? What's wrong with your hand?" I asked.

He tensed. "Nothing," he lied.

I grabbed his sleave and tried to pull his hand towards me. "Let me see," I said, frustrated. He still resisted at first, but slowly brought his hand out for my inspection. I gasped when I saw it. "God, why didn't you say anything?!" I asked harshly as I saw the deep cut in his palm.

"Sorry," he said. He winced when I opened his hand more to see the injury.

"What happened?" I asked, looking over the cut. He tried to pull his hand away, but I wouldn't let him. "This is serious, stop it. How did this happen?"

"Just..." Ryan looked anywhere but my face. "There was a whip and I tried to block it..."

"A whip?" I took my shirt, as dirty as it now was, and tried to clean the wound out. Ryan hissed from pain. I wiped the blood and grime away the best I could and tore a piece of my shirt off, wrapping it around his hand tightly to stop the blood flow. "Why did you hide this? If you're hurt then you have to tell me."

He seemed ashamed. "I'm sorry," he said, and I knew he really was.

I sighed, tying the wrap off firmly. "Do you really think that little of me?" I asked

"No, it's not that at all. I just-..." He struggled for the right words. "You already had so much on your mind. I didn't want to add any stress."

"You are my stress," I said seriously, holding his uninjured hand in both of mine. "If I'm not stressing about you then it's not important. I hate that you don't trust me to handle myself."

"I do trust you, Jacob," Ryan said.

"Then don't hide things like this from me," I said. "Don't lie and tell me everything's okay when it's not."

Shame covered his face. "You're right... I'm sorry I didn't tell you. I won't do it again," he swore.

I normally would have told him he had better not, but I had had enough of listening to people tell me what I wanted to hear, so I just said, "Good. Now come here and let me pretend to be the brave one for once." I feared he would reject the offer, but a small smile appeared on his face and I felt relieved to see it. He crawl closer to me and I hugged him to my chest like a baby. "It's my turn to comfort you so just be quiet," I told him.

He nodded silently into my neck and hugged me back. I could feel him begin to shake again, so I combed his hair with my fingers again. I let him fall asleep in my lap, keeping him as warm as I could with just my embrace, and eventually I fell asleep too, Unfortunately, my sleep wasn't peaceful at all.

*******

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