Chapter Five

Chapter Five

By the following morning, the news had spread like wildfire. Lily had been found dangling off a coat hook with a neck tied firmly around her neck. How long she'd been hanging there, no one knew but the time they had checked for a pulse, Lily was long gone.

“I don't like this,” Elena said, growing uncomfortable.

Now, Jane and Elena were in the middle of nowhere. All around them stood tall trees towering above them and beneath them was a clearing. Dirt, bushes and a large wooden crate surrounded by flies.

“What the hell is in that?” 

Jane barely glanced at it. "What'd you think?”

It only took a minute for Elena to grasp what was going on. She shook her head and stumbled back. 

"I'm not doing it.”

Jane arched a brow. "Who said you had a choice?” She asked. "Come on, Elena. Let's get to w—”

"I said I'm not doing it!” She snapped. 

"We don't have a choice.”

"Yes, we do!” Elena replied. "Look around you, no one else is here. We can leave. We can get in the car and drive away. They won't find us.”

Jane laughed. “Do you really think running will save you?” She asked. "Be honest.”

"We can drive into town and report to the nearest police station,” Elena responded, her hopes rising. “It's do-able." 

“Clearly, you know nothing about the Mafia. Who do you think controls the police?” She asked. "The government?" 

Elena remained silent.

" Don't you think someone's already looking for you? Surely, there's got to be someone out there that cares enough to want to know where you are." 

Elena thought about Elijah. Her job. Her boss. 

"They can't find you because there's way to. The Mafia controls a whole lot more than you think,” she replied and trudged towards a patch of soft dirt.

“Come on." 

“No." 

Jane sighed. “You really are a handful, Elena. Don't be difficult." 

“I'm the one who's difficult?!” Elena snapped, narrowing her eyes into thin slits. "You're the one who has freedom at the tip of your fingers but refuses to take it because you're a wimp."

Silence rested between them and something flashed in Jane's eyes. She exhaled wearily.

“I've been here longer than you, Elena. You know nothing about me and what it took me to stay alive this long," she said, her tone sharp and cold. “If you want to survive here, you do as you're told."

Elena’s face twisted in disbelief. "You want me to obey them?”

"I'm telling you to stay alive.”

"They killed my father,” Elena retorted, fighting back tears.

Jane swallowed.

“They killed Timothy's mother and Lily's sister, a child, for God's sake!”

Jane yanked her forward. “Keep your voice down," she warned. “They're watching us.”

Elena looked around. "Who?" 

“Snipers," she responded. “We’re not the only ones out here."  

“So, what do we do?" Elena asked, shakily.

“We dig." 

__

An hour later and they'd managed to dig a hole deep enough to swallow the crate. Elena retired to the truck to catch her breathe and Jane joined her. 

" How long have you been here?"

Jane stared ahead, her eyes distant. "Longer than I choose to believe,” she replied. "Five years.”

"Don't you ever want to leave this place?”

"It's not that easy.”

"You said it was better to learn the ropes of things before leaving. Haven't you done that by now?" 

Jane lowered her gaze. "I did try to leave."

"What happened?"

"They got my brother."

Elena said nothing.

"He was twelve when our mother died. Our father had already disappeared years before that."

Her voice was calm, but Elena could hear the pain beneath it.

"So it was just us." Jane continued. "I worked wherever I could. Strip clubs, brothels, restaurants, cleaning jobs. Everything.”

She smiled faintly. "I thought I could handle it. Then a man approached me while I was working the poles one night. He said I was too good for a place like this and he offered me a job."

Jane's smile disappeared.

"Good money. A place to stay. Food. He said I wouldn't have to worry about my brother anymore."

Elena already knew where the story was going.

"I was desperate, Elena." Jane looked at her. "And desperate people don't always ask the right questions.”

"By the time I realized the mess I'd put myself in, it was too late.”

“Why didn't you leave?" 

Jane's eyes filled with something that looked almost like shame. "I did."

Elena froze.

"I ran. I got three days away from them but on the fourth day, they found me and my brother." Jane’s voice shook. “They didn't hurt me. They hurt him.” 

"They didn't know I had a brother. Escaping and going back to find my brother put him in harms way," she said.

"They made sure I understood that I wasn't going anywhere again and that's when I learned something. These people, they don't always need chains to keep you trapped.”

The words settled heavily between them.

“Sometimes, all they need is someone you love. A husband, a boyfriend, a family or a friend." 

Elena looked away and for the first time, she didn't know what to say. 

Jane got out of the car, her sandwich untouched.

“Come on, let's finish up the rest."

Elena didn't move. 

Jane looked back at her.

“Come on, Elena. If you want to escape, you need to stop thinking like a dead man.”

Elena narrowed her eyes. " What does that mean?”

"It means you stop believing you're at the end of the tunnel," she responded. “You keep moving. You watch, you listen and you remember everything.”

"The guards. Their routines. Their names. Which doors are locked. Which ones aren't."

Elena stared at her

"Do what they say when you have to."

Jane handed Elena a shovel. “But never forget why you're doing all of it.”

Elena looked down at the shovel in her hand. The weight of it felt unbearable. Not because it was heavy but because she knew what she was about to do.

She stared at the crate.

Timothy.

Lily.

Adele.

Her father.

They were all awaiting a burial, befitting or not, and if she died in the hands of these men, she would never get revenge. If she broke now, the Romano family would win.

Together, they pushed the crate into the dirt. The lid popped open and a putrid smell hit filled the air.

Jane grabbed a can of fuel and began to pour it on the crate and the bodies. Once the can was empty, she back away and fished a matchbox out of her pocket. 

She struck a stick and tossed it into the pit. Bright, hot flames erupted, licking the air. 

She backed away.

Several feet behind her, Elena stared at the flames. Today, something in her had died. She wasn't surrending. She was learning.

Every name.

Every face.

Every death.

And when the time finally came for her to escape, Elena wouldn't just run.

She would make sure the Romano family burned behind her like the bodies burning in the flame