Chapter 59 Chapter 59

Chapter 59 Chapter 59
Tito’s POV

It felt like floating and drowning at the same time.

Somewhere in the dark haze of sedation, a dream bubbled up, soft, warm, painfully nostalgic.

I saw my dad standing at the old gate of our childhood home, that silly crooked smile he’d always wear whenever he came back from work. He lifted me the way he used to, spinning me around until my ribs hurt from laughing, and he pressed a kiss to my forehead—

Then the sky behind him cracked open like broken glass, and he began to drift away from me.

“Daddy—”

My voice echoed strangely, warped, muffled.

“Daddy, wait—”

But he kept drifting backward, swallowed by darkness, and when I reached out, I felt nothing but cold air.

“Mom,” I whispered.

And the dream shattered.

I woke with a violent inhale, my entire body jolting before I remembered I couldn’t move. My wrists burned — tied behind me with something rough, maybe rope, maybe zip ties — and everything was still spinning slightly. The van’s engine hummed beneath me, vibrating against the metal floor.

I blinked, but everything stayed dark.

The mask.

My breathing hitched against the thick fabric, too warm, too tight, too suffocating. I pushed my tongue forward, found the edge where the cloth pressed against my lips, and — awkwardly, clumsily — tried to bite down and pull. It took several tries, my jaw aching, the cloth grinding against my teeth, but finally—finally—I ripped a small opening near my mouth.

Fresh air rushed in.

I sighed shakily, chest rising too fast, heart thumping so loudly it swallowed the sound of the tires on the road. My senses sharpened just enough for my paranoia to slip in.

Mom.
Oh God, Mom.

She must’ve been terrified when she didn’t find me at home. What if she called Kendrick? What if Kendrick came looking and realized I’d disappeared? What if someone thought I ran away again?

Why did I leave? Why did I listen? What the hell was I thinking?

And Jax—

A knot twisted deep in my stomach.

Did he know I’d been taken?
Was he behind it?
Was this all a setup?

Maybe he was in trouble. Maybe he’d called for help and someone else intercepted the message. Or maybe he had walked right into something himself—

But something inside me — low, quiet, instinctive — whispered: he knew.

I squeezed my eyes shut under the mask, trying to steady my breathing, but panic clawed its way up my throat anyway. It felt like my lungs were shrinking, fighting for space that wasn’t there.

Before I could spiral further, the van began to slow down.

My breath caught.

Gravel crackled under the tires.
The engine sputtered slightly.
Then silence.

A door slid open.

Boots thudded on the ground. Men murmured to each other in low, indistinguishable voices. A rush of cold morning air swept into the van, carrying dust and the faint smell of rust and gasoline.

I stiffened as hands grabbed my arms.

“No—don’t touch me! Let go!” I twisted, kicking backward, jerking my shoulders hard, but their grip tightened. Someone yanked me upright, nearly wrenching my shoulder out of place, and dragged me toward the open door.

“Hold her,” one of them muttered.

“I said let go!” I snarled, knees buckling as they hauled me out.

Light hit my eyes the second someone ripped off the bag.

Even through the blur of the sedation, the sunlight stabbed painfully. I winced, blinking rapidly. Morning. Actual morning.

And I instantly wished the hood hadn’t come off.

There were men everywhere — scattered around a large, rusted warehouse surrounded by nothing but dusty ground and the broken skeletons of old equipment. Every single one of them wore a mask. Black. Featureless. Dehumanized. Their clothes were casual but dark, their postures too disciplined for random criminals.

My blood went cold.

One man grabbed my chin roughly, tilting my face. I jerked away instinctively.

“Shut up,” he barked when I opened my mouth. “Walk.”

“I’m not going anywhere with—”

He shoved me hard, and I stumbled forward.

Another man caught me by the arm and yanked me toward the warehouse. The fear that had been quietly simmering inside me erupted into something sharper — not quite terror yet, but close. Too close.

“Let me go!” I kicked again, catching one of them in the shin. He hissed and slapped the side of my head.

“Tie her,” he muttered.

They dragged me through a metal doorway and into a dim, echoing hall that smelled like mold and old oil. A chair waited in the center — wooden, splintering, with ropes already looped around its legs.

My stomach lurched.

“Sit.”

“No.”

Two men grabbed my shoulders and forced me down, pinning me so hard I felt the wood bite into my skin. Rope scratched my ankles, my wrists — tight, unforgiving. I twisted, trying to break free, but they lifted the entire chair up with me in it and carried me deeper into the warehouse.

A door opened.

The room they brought me into was small, windowless, and dimly lit by a single flickering bulb. And in it were two other women.

One sat curled in a corner, hugging her knees, eyes closed as if too exhausted to remain awake. Her face was young, barely older than me.

The other woman stood when she saw me — thin, pale, with dark circles under her eyes that looked carved into her skin. Something about her expression — that worn, resigned look — silenced me more effectively than the men ever could.

The men set me down, tightened the ropes around my wrists again, and walked out without a word, locking the door behind them.

I swallowed hard, still trying to process it all.

The pale woman watched me quietly for a moment before sighing. “You’re wasting your strength,” she said softly. “Don’t do that to yourself.”

I blinked at her, confused and breathing too fast. “What—what do you mean don’t? They kidnapped me. They brought me— I don’t even know where I am!”

“Yes,” she said calmly. “And you’ll need your strength later. Trust me.”

There was something eerie in her voice — something that suggested she’d already lived through the worst of the worst, and this… this was nothing new.

My throat tightened. “How long… how long have you been here?”

Her lips trembled before she let out a hollow laugh. “I don’t know. Time stops mattering after a while.”

My breath hitched.

The other girl — the younger one — stirred slightly but didn’t wake. Her nails were bitten down to the skin, her hair disheveled, bruises peeking out from under her sleeves.

They looked like ghosts.

“What are they doing to you?” I whispered, barely hearing my own voice.

The woman looked down at her hands. “Whatever they want.”

My heart clenched so painfully it nearly knocked the breath out of me.

These people…
These masked men…
This place…

What were they planning?
Why me?
How long before Kendrick realized I was gone?
Was Jax truly behind this?

Guilt and terror twisted deep inside my chest, an ugly, suffocating knot.

I shouldn’t have left. I shouldn’t have trusted anyone. I shouldn’t have answered that call.

My breath trembled.

My life — everything — flashed across my mind in jagged pieces. My mom’s face, Kendrick’s exasperated smirk, Chloe’s chaotic voice, all the almost-moments I’d wasted, all the things I hadn’t said, hadn’t done—

The panic rose too fast to swallow.

It burst out of me in a raw, gut-deep scream that ripped through the empty room, echoing off the concrete walls, a sound so loud and full of pain that it made the younger girl wake with a startled gasp.

But I couldn’t stop.

I screamed again.

And again.

And again.

Until my throat burned and the echo trembled back at me like a warning.