Chapter 3 3

The first twenty-four hours in the cage dragged by like thick, suffocating mud.

Elinor sat curled in the corner of the room, her knees pulled tight to her chest. She hadn't moved. When Maria entered silently to place a silver tray of roasted salmon and asparagus on the table, Elinor didn't even blink.

An hour later, Maria returned and carried the untouched food away.

Elinor buried her face in her arms. A low, continuous sob tore from her throat. She couldn't stop crying. The tears were a physical reaction to the crushing weight of the billion-dollar debt and the memory of Boyd's hands on her skin.

Two floors down, in the massive corner office of the Walker Group, Boyd sat at his mahogany desk. A live video feed from the London branch played on his massive monitor. Six executives were presenting the quarterly projections.

Boyd wasn't listening.

He wore a wireless earpiece in his right ear. It was connected directly to the hidden microphones in the top-floor suite. Elinor's broken, breathless crying piped directly into his ear canal.

The sound grated against his nerves. He reached up and aggressively twisted his platinum cufflink. His jaw ticked.

"Mr. Walker?" the London VP asked nervously through the screen. "Do you agree with the margin adjustments?"

Boyd stared at the screen. His eyes were cold and dead. "Pause for ten minutes," he snapped. He hit a button on his keyboard, cutting the video feed instantly.

He pressed the intercom button on his desk. "Alex."

"Yes, sir," Alex Stone's voice came through immediately.

"Make her shut up," Boyd growled, ripping the earpiece out and throwing it onto the desk.

Ten miles away, in a cramped, mold-infested apartment in Queens, Deshaun Campbell stared at his cracked phone screen.

He had called Elinor thirty-two times. Every single call went straight to voicemail. He had dragged his bad leg all the way to the NYU campus, standing outside her lecture halls, but she never showed up.

Deshaun gripped the curved wooden handle of his cane. His knuckles turned stark white under his dark skin. He suffered from selective mutism; his vocal cords worked, but the trauma of his childhood kept the words locked behind his teeth.

He typed furiously on his prepaid phone. Elinor, are you okay? Please text back.

Nothing.

A cold sweat broke out on the back of his neck. He knew about Boyd Walker. He knew the kind of shadow that man cast over Elinor's life. If she was missing, Walker was the reason.

Deshaun grabbed his worn winter coat. He limped out of the apartment and took the subway to Manhattan. The two-hour ride felt like a lifetime.

He stood in the massive, marble-floored lobby of the Walker Group building. The security guards at the front desk blocked his path.

Deshaun didn't try to speak. He pulled a small whiteboard and a marker from his backpack. He wrote in large, jagged letters: I NEED TO SEE ELINOR RICHARDSON. He held it up to the guard's face.

"Kid, you can't be here," the guard said, reaching for Deshaun's arm.

Deshaun violently jerked away. He hit his cane against the marble floor, creating a sharp, echoing crack. He held the whiteboard higher. People in the lobby started to stare.

The head of security recognized him. He had seen the crippled boy waiting for Elinor outside the university gates before. He tapped his earpiece and made a call.

Up in the penthouse office, Alex Stone walked in. "Sir, the Campbell boy is in the lobby. He's demanding to see Miss Richardson."

Boyd looked up from his paperwork. A dark, dangerous shadow crossed his eyes. "Bring him up."

Five minutes later, the elevator doors opened. Deshaun was shoved into the private reception room outside Boyd's office.

Boyd stood by the floor-to-ceiling window, looking down at the city. He slowly turned around. The sheer physical presence of the billionaire made the air in the room feel thin. Deshaun's chest tightened, but he forced himself to stand tall, leaning heavily on his cane.

He raised the whiteboard. Where is Elinor? Is she safe?

Boyd let out a soft, mocking laugh. He walked toward Deshaun, looking at the boy's cheap clothes and the heavy wooden cane. "She is perfectly safe. She is simply paying the price for her disobedience."

Deshaun's eyes widened. He frantically wiped the board and wrote again. It's my fault! She came to my birthday party. Punish me, let her go!

Boyd stopped a few feet away. He tilted his head, studying Deshaun like a scientist observing an insect. "Oh? You want to take her punishment?"

Boyd reached into his pocket and pressed a button on a small remote.

Upstairs in the cage, the massive flat-screen television mounted on the wall suddenly clicked on. Elinor gasped and scrambled backward.

The screen displayed a high-definition, live security feed of the reception room. Elinor saw Boyd's back. And then she saw Deshaun.

"No!" Elinor screamed, launching herself at the screen. She slammed her hands against the glass. "Deshaun! Run! Get out of there!"

But the screen had no microphone. Her voice bounced off the walls of her cage.

Downstairs, Boyd looked at Deshaun. "Very well. I accept your request."

He didn't raise his voice. He simply looked at the two massive bodyguards standing by the door. "Break his other leg. Teach him what happens when he touches things that don't belong to him."

Deshaun didn't even have time to raise his cane. The bodyguards lunged. One grabbed Deshaun from behind, locking his arms. The other kicked the cane away.

Upstairs, Elinor watched in absolute horror. She pounded her bloody fists against the screen. "Boyd! Stop! I'll do anything! Please!"

The second bodyguard raised his heavy, steel-toed boot. He brought it down with sickening force directly onto Deshaun's good knee.

A loud, wet crack echoed through the reception room.

Deshaun's mouth opened in a silent scream. His eyes rolled back in his head as the agony ripped through his nervous system. He collapsed onto the marble floor, his body convulsing.

Boyd stepped over Deshaun's twitching body. He walked directly up to the security camera mounted in the corner of the room. He looked straight into the lens.

Upstairs, Boyd's face filled the screen. His eyes bored into Elinor's soul. He mouthed the words slowly, deliberately.

See? This is what happens when you cry.

Boyd didn't reach for his checkbook. He simply looked down at the agonizing boy. "His medical bills," Boyd said, his voice carrying perfectly to the microphone hidden in the room, "will be added directly to your adoptive father's debt, Elinor. Every time you rebel, the people around you will pay the price." He turned to his guards. "Now get this garbage out of my sight."

The screen in the cage went completely black.

Elinor's hands slid down the cold glass. The air left her lungs completely. Her vision tunneled. She collapsed onto the floor, her body shaking so violently her teeth rattled together. The silence in the room was absolute.