The Clueless Hostage

The Clueless Hostage
Lucy’s POV

Detective Cole stopped pacing immediately and turned to face me. “So you mean to tell me you never left the house for close to three months?”

Detective Reyes’s brows furrowed as I shook my head vehemently.

“I didn’t even know this much time had passed. I was surprised when the driver said it was November,” I replied with a nervous laugh.

Another glance passed between them…it was as though they were having a silent conversation with their glances. 

Detective Reyes gave a small tilt of her head and detective Cole stepped toward the door, phone already pressed to his ear.

Reyes turned back to me. “How did you meet Officer Ethan again?”

I told her everything. About the scandal that had almost destroyed me…the married man, the accusations, the online hate that had drowned me and how I was sacked from work. I told her how Ethan had been the only one who didn’t look at me like I was dirty. How he had stepped in when everyone else stepped away.

“And what have you been doing indoors all this time?” she asked the moment I was done recounting what I strongly believed was the story of how I met the love of my life.

Heat crept up my neck as I struggled with how to say the words without sounding like a maniac. Sleep. Sex. Eat. Sex. 

The same perfect loop, night after night. Before I could force the words out, detective Cole returned.

He spoke quietly to Reyes, but the room was too quiet so I heard him. “Our guys at the suspect's residence have confirmed it. The CCTV in the apartment complex captured her leaving the complex only today after several weeks.”

Reyes’s hand suddenly closed over mine in a warm gesture. Her grip was firm, almost urgent.

“Did he hurt you, Lucy? Were you held against your will? Did he… rape you? Are you in danger? Miss Lucy, remember you can tell us everything. We promise to protect you,” she said protectively, like she was talking to her friend.

Another wave of panic rose inside me, the walls seeming to shrink inward. Rape? No…no…no. I wanted the sex. It made me forget. 

Hold on…why did they say suspect? What is he suspected of?

“Hey, hey…stay with me,” Reyes murmured, patting my hand gently. “You’re doing just good. Just answer our questions and we will be on our way.”

I dragged in a large breath and exhaled slowly, closing my eyes for a second until my head got clearer.

“No. I wasn’t held against my will… or I didn’t think I was.” My brows furrowed as the memory of the phone call in the cab returned. 

“What do you mean by that? And why did you decide to leave the house today?” She asked, jotting something down on a paper I didn’t notice she had been holding all this time.

I smiled sadly and looked down at my hands resting on the thin hospital blanket. Thin, honey-colored veins stood out against the pale skin…lines that hadn’t been there before Ethan. I hadn’t even noticed until the mirror this morning.

“I saw my reflection and couldn’t believe how I looked. I thought maybe I was sick. And the nightmares… they kept getting worse. So I decided to see a doctor.” I paused and met her eyes. “I called Ethan from the cab on the way here. He said he was at work and that I should go back, that he would take me himself. But I wasn’t having it because I really needed to see a doctor. And then he said… ‘Why are you always doing this?’”

Detective Reyes studied me the way someone studies a new puzzle they are determined to solve.
“Okay?”

“Yeah. Why would he sound like it wasn’t the first time? I was confused. I don’t remember ever leaving the house since he moved in with me. And he sounded really pissed that I left.” 

My fingers tightened around the rosary beads. I shouldn’t say more. What if it implicated him? What if they realized something was wrong with him and took him away from me? No. That couldn’t happen. 

Ethan is not a bad person…not really. Maybe it’s the demon or whatever inside him that made him appear weird. Maybe he kept me locked up probably because he loves me so much and can’t bear to lose me.

Detective Cole’s phone rang again. He answered, listened for nearly two full minutes, then turned back to his partner.

“The CCTV along the hallway captured her trying to leave like four separate times over the past weeks. But it never shows her actually leaving the building. Every time, it shows Ethan escorting her back into the apartment.”

Both detectives looked genuinely confused now. I looked confused as well. When did all that happen?
Huh. So that meant I had been trying to leave? And Ethan had kept bringing me right back. Why didn’t I remember any of it?

“Officer,” I asked, voice barely above a whisper, “what the hell is going on? Is he in some kind of trouble?”
Detective Reyes slowly stood up as she signaled to her partner.

“Why are you getting up?” I asked, voice still rough.
“You should answer me. Why are you looking for Ethan? Hasn’t he been working? When I called him from the cab he said he was at the precinct. And last night…when he came back there was blood on him. Didn’t he just take down some crime syndicate or whatever? What’s going on?”

Detective Reyes paused mid-rise. She and Detective Cole exchanged a long, unreadable glance. Then both of them looked at me at the exact same moment, expressions identical in their careful blankness. 

I shrank back against the pillows, the thin hospital gown suddenly feeling paper-thin.

Detective Cole pulled his phone from his pocket, stepped toward the door, and muttered something into it as he slipped out into the hallway. The door clicked shut behind him and the room felt even smaller with only detective Reyes left.

“What is going on?” I demanded, fingers tightening around the rosary beads until the cross dug into my palm.

Detective Reyes sat back down slowly, as if deciding how much truth the unstable patient in front of her could handle. Her voice stayed level, professional, but there was an edge beneath it now.

“There was no crime-busting operation last night, Lucy. Officer Ethan has been on official leave for two months. He requested it himself. Said he needed to take care of his sick grandmother.”

Sick grandma?
The words hit like a physical blow. So I’m the sick grandma? Hold on… why would he lie? 

All those mornings I watched him put on the dark blue uniform, adjust the badge, kiss my forehead and walk out the door like a man heading to work. Where did he actually go? 

The perfect notes on the table, the peeled oranges, the collected mail…none of it was adding up. 

My mind raced through every morning, every evening, every time he had returned looking exhausted or bloodied and I had simply believed the stories he fed me.

Reyes’s voice cut through the spiral inside my head.
“Ethan is a prime suspect in a series of murders involving women. It’s been going on for over a month now. Evidence linking him to the deaths was recovered from your apartment. And that’s not all we found.”

My head spun as soon as her words landed. He’s the killer? Ethan cannot hurt anybody. He’s so sweet and kind.

Suddenly, the conversation I had overheard outside the complex flooded back…women disappearing, bodies in odd places, the organs missing. Could it be connected?

Detective Reyes continued as if she hadn’t noticed how the blood had left my face.

“We found certain substances in your apartment in large quantities. Specifically, a potent combination of high-dose benzodiazepines mixed with dissociative compounds…enough to keep someone in a prolonged state of vulnerability, mental fog, and near-constant sedation. The kind that blurs days into weeks and makes memory unreliable.”

I choked on my own spit, coughing hard enough that the oxygen mask swung against my chest. “What the hell does that mean? So he’s a junkie?”

Detective Reyes exhaled slowly, the sound heavy with something that almost resembled pity.
“It means that he has been drugging you, Lucy.”

The color drained from my face so completely I felt the cold rush of it in my cheeks, my lips and on the tips of my fingers still locked around Grandma’s rosary.

What the hell?