They Sent Me to a Killer Town—Everyone Knew Me

I've always been a bad kid. When I was eight, the boy sitting next to me threatened to tell the teacher I'd copied his homework. I shoved him down the stairs from the second floor. He broke three ribs. When I was twelve, the school dorm supervisor confiscated the snacks I'd hidden in my locker. That night, I cut the brake cable on her electric bike. The next morning, she lost control going downhill, crashed into a ditch, and needed seventeen stitches. Then, when I turned eighteen, my biological parents finally found me and brought me back to their wealthy family. Everyone in the city knew Richard and Margaret Whitmore as famous philanthropists. People said a couple like them could surely straighten out a bad kid like me. Instead, on my very first night in their house, they pinned me down in a surgical chair in the basement and started drawing bag after bag of my blood. They said it was for the daughter they'd raised for eighteen years. Claire. I didn't say a word. When the nurses changed shifts, I got my hands on one of the blood bags prepared for her, poured hot pepper liquid into it, sealed it back up, and returned it to the medical cooler exactly where I'd found it. The next day, Claire received the transfusion. She went straight to the ICU. That was the last straw for my parents. That same night, they tied me up and drove me deep into the mountains. Richard shoved me out of the SUV. "This is Black Hollow! Everyone here is a killer or some kind of criminal!" "An ungrateful little bitch like you won't last three days in there. They won't even leave enough of you to bury!" Margaret rolled her eyes from the passenger seat. "When you finally learn your lesson, admit you're wrong, and beg us to take you home so you can keep giving Claire blood, then this ends." Richard kicked me away from the car. I landed on the gravel and looked at the familiar dirt road ahead of me. Smoke drifted from chimneys in the distance. I almost laughed. Did they really never stop to wonder... where I'd learned to be this bad?

The second I hit the ground, I took off running toward town. The next second, Richard's boot slammed into my lower back. I flew forward and hit the ground hard, my chin smashing against the rocks. "Running?" He grabbed me by the back of my shirt and hauled me up. "Where the fuck do you think you're going?" Before I could even turn over, he yanked me upright and punched me across the left side of my face. My cheek swelled so fast I could barely open my eye. "God, you're a nasty little bitch. You think running into town is going to save you? It'll only get you killed faster!" He pulled a nylon rope from the SUV and tied both my hands behind my back. Then he took a dirty rag from his pocket and stuffed it into my mouth. Margaret stepped out of the passenger side. She looked at my swollen face and wrinkled her nose in disgust. "God, she's ugly." She glanced at Richard. "Are we sure this girl really has my blood in her?" A figure slowly appeared in the distance. An old man was walking toward us with a black metal cane. I recognized him immediately. Elias Carter. The man who had always spoiled me the most when I was little. Richard grabbed my hair and forced my face up toward him. "See that bad leg?" He lowered his voice like he was telling me a ghost story. "Years ago, three businessmen came out here planning to build a factory." "That old man didn't say a word. He went to their construction site in the middle of the night and took on all three of them by himself." "Beat every one of them so badly they never fully recovered." "He shattered his own lower leg in the fight. That's why he walks like that now." "Someone called the cops afterward." "The officers didn't even make it past the entrance to town." He laughed. "Know why?" "Because everyone in Black Hollow swore those three businessmen had fallen and hurt themselves." He leaned closer to me. "A place where even the law can't do shit." "What makes you think a little girl like you can survive here for more than a few days?" I lie on the ground and listen to Elias's footsteps getting closer. Richard doesn't know anything. Elias could have handled those three men without breaking a sweat. They never even would've gotten close enough to touch him. He broke that leg ten years ago. I had a high fever, and he carried me over the mountain to get me to a clinic. He slipped on the trail and shattered his leg. And those businessmen? They were trying to build a chemical plant. The waste pipe was going to empty straight into the river behind town. The same river all the kids in Black Hollow swam in. If Elias hadn't stopped them, every kid in town would've been drinking poisoned water. But I can't say any of that. The dirty rag in my mouth pins my tongue down. Margaret walks toward Elias with a polite smile. "Sir, our youngest has been nothing but trouble since she was little." "She steals, hits people, lies about everything. We just can't control her anymore." "As long as you don't kill her, you can teach her a lesson however you want." She pulls a thick stack of cash from her purse and holds it out. Elias doesn't take it. He stands three steps away, leaning on his cane. His cloudy eyes move over me once. It's too dark. My face is swollen beyond recognition, covered in dirt and blood. He doesn't recognize me. He just says coldly, "That's it?" Margaret freezes. Elias looks at me again. "Girl doesn't look useful for much." "Might be easier to knock her out and dump her in the river behind the mountain." Margaret's face changes instantly. She steps in front of him. "No!" "She can't die!" "She has a rare blood type. Our older daughter isn't healthy and needs transfusions all the time." "She's basically a walking blood bank." "If she dies, where the hell are we supposed to find another one?" Elias raises an eyebrow and looks at me again. "A walking blood bank?" "Then she's going to cost you more." Margaret grits her teeth and pulls another stack of cash from her purse. That's it. That's the opening I need. Her hand leaves my shoulder. I use the last bit of strength I have and throw myself forward. I slam my head into the stack of cash in her hand. Not because I care about the money. I just need Elias to see my face. Bills explode into the air. Elias's eyes land on me. Richard reacts faster. His boot slams into my chest. I fly backward and hit the ground. The back of my head cracks against a rock. My vision flashes white. "Can you fucking stop for one second?" Richard rushes over and straddles me. He grabs my index finger. Then bends it backward. Crack. The joint slips out of place. My whole body jerks. The groan in my throat gets trapped behind the rag. He doesn't stop. Middle finger. Ring finger. Pinky. One after another. Then the other hand. By the time all ten fingers are dislocated, he throws my hands aside and stands up. He wipes the sweat from his palms. "These hands are always causing trouble." "Break them first, and maybe you'll finally behave." I curl up on the ground. My whole body won't stop shaking. The veins in my forehead stand out from the pain. But I don't beg. I turn my head. With the one eye I can still open, I stare straight at Elias. He's standing two steps away. Then he speaks. "Fine." "I'll take her."

Elias picks me up and carries me toward town. Margaret hurries after him in her heels. "Wait! Don't put her inside your house." Elias stops. Margaret covers her nose and points at a half-collapsed shed beside the road. The inside is pitch black. It's where people in town keep loose pigs. "Just put her in there. No need to dirty your house." "We'll need to draw more blood from her later anyway. Keeping her in the pigpen will make things easier." Elias looks at her. He doesn't say anything. He carries me into the shed. The ground is covered in wet mud and pig shit. Two black pigs grunt in the corner. Elias sets me down on a stone slab near the entrance. Then he turns and leaves. Margaret looks satisfied. "That's better." "That's where she belongs." The door is bolted shut from the outside. Richard stands outside the pigpen and makes a call. "Claire, sweetheart. Daddy found you more blood. We'll send it back tomorrow." Claire's spoiled voice comes through the phone. "What about that psycho?" "Dad, did you get revenge for me?" "Did you make her cry?" Richard laughs. "Yeah, yeah. She cried." "She was on her knees begging." He hangs up with a smile and nudges Margaret with his elbow. Then he tips his chin toward the entrance to town. "See that old woman?" A hunched old woman is sitting on an overturned paint bucket by the road, patching a cracked work boot by hand. Miss Ruth. Margaret lowers her voice and whispers something to Richard. Then she crouches beside the fence and leans close to my face. "See that old woman?" "She sells children." "Any kid around here who ends up in her hands gets sold off." "Boys get sent to illegal mines." "Girls get sold to old men living out in the mountains." She pats my cheek and smiles gently. "Someone your age, and looking like this?" "You'd probably only be worth a few thousand dollars to some fifty- or sixty-year-old man looking for a wife." "So you'd better behave." "At least we still treat you like a person." "If you fall into her hands, you'll be worth less than one of those pigs." I keep my eyes down. I don't look at her. Miss Ruth really has taken in a lot of children. Just not to sell them. They were all abandoned by their biological parents. Some were left by the side of the road. Some outside hospitals. Some beside dumpsters. Miss Ruth found them one by one. She cleaned them up. Fed them. Kept them for a few days. Then she worked with local families and social services to find homes for them. I was one of those kids. They told me she found me in the middle of winter. I was wrapped in an old coat and left in a snowbank near the entrance to town. Miss Ruth tucked me inside her own coat and held me against her chest all night. I didn't cry until the next morning. After that, the whole town raised me. Richard checks his watch. "Come on." "Let's go talk to Carter about tomorrow." Margaret stands and brushes the dirt off her skirt. "We're really leaving her here alone?" Richard glances at me. "Her hands are useless. Her mouth is stuffed." "Even if she manages to crawl out, what can she do?" He pauses. "And if she runs around this town and meets anyone else..." "She'll probably end up even worse." Their footsteps slowly fade away. The pigpen goes quiet again. I press my back against the wall. I try to rub the rope around my wrists against the sharp edge of a stone. I barely get started before I hear slippers dragging across the ground outside. Miss Ruth has wandered over without me noticing. She leans against the fence and peers inside. "Well, what the hell is a person doing in the pigpen?" She squints at me. "Why's this girl got a rag stuffed in her mouth?" She reaches in to pull it out. The second her rough fingers touch the corner of my mouth, I almost start crying. Miss Ruth. It's me. It's Tessa. Her fingers have just caught the edge of the rag when a sharp voice explodes behind her. "Stop!"

Margaret rushes over and yanks Miss Ruth's arm away. Then she shoves the rag even deeper into my mouth. "She's acting up again!" She turns to Miss Ruth with a smile. "Miss Ruth, this girl has a nasty mouth." "Last time, she bit one of the nurses so hard she nearly took off a finger." "Please don't touch her. I don't want her hurting you." Miss Ruth pulls her hand back and looks Margaret up and down. "You city people always discipline your kids like this?" "You lock them in a pigpen?" Margaret's smile freezes for a second. Richard pulls a wad of cash from his pocket and presses it into Miss Ruth's hand. "Here. Take this." He pauses. "Help us hold her down." "We need to draw some blood." "If she starts fighting, pin her down as hard as you have to." Miss Ruth looks at the money. Then she looks at me. "All right." She stuffs the cash into her pocket, crouches down, and presses both hands against my shoulders. Margaret opens the medical cooler and takes out syringes, a tourniquet, and seven empty blood collection tubes. The nurse is called over from the SUV. She climbs into the pigpen, ties the tourniquet around my arm, and taps the inside of my elbow. The needle goes in. One tube. Two. Three. Richard leans against the fence, scrolling through his phone with the volume turned up. A video starts playing. It's a recording of a speech he gave at a charity gala. "...As business leaders, we have a responsibility to care for the most vulnerable people in our communities..." Thunderous applause comes through the phone. Four tubes. Five. Six. My lips are completely drained of color. The nurse checks my pulse and hesitates. "Mrs. Whitmore, if we keep going, she could go into shock." Margaret doesn't even look up. "She won't die." "When you're done, cover the needle marks." "I don't want blood everywhere. It's disgusting." The seventh tube starts filling. My vision goes black around the edges. My whole body goes limp. Miss Ruth's hands tighten on my shoulders. I can feel them shaking. When it's over, Margaret lines up the blood tubes inside the medical cooler one by one. Then she zips it shut. Richard crouches down and pats my face. "We'll do this again tomorrow." "If you behave, after that it'll only be once a month." "No more than this." "But if you don't behave..." He doesn't finish. He doesn't need to. They pack up their things and leave. Miss Ruth is the last one to stand. She stays beside the fence for a moment, looking down at me. Then she sighs. "Girl, I'm sorry." "I've got more than a dozen kids in this town depending on me." "I really do need the money." She reaches into her pocket and pulls out half a roasted sweet potato. She slips it through the fence. "If you can eat, have a few bites." "Don't let yourself starve." Then she turns and walks away. The pigpen goes completely quiet. I lie on the stone slab and stare at the half sweet potato by the fence. It's still warm. Every winter when I was little, Miss Ruth roasted a whole batch of sweet potatoes. Every kid in town got one. I always got an extra half. She said I was the youngest. I needed to eat more if I wanted to grow. I don't know how long I wait. Eventually, I'm sure there's no one around. I roll onto my side and press my back against the corner of the wall. There's a sharp edge of exposed stone sticking out. I start rubbing the rope around my wrists against it. Back and forth. Again and again. The stone tears through my skin. Blood runs down my wrists. I bite down on the rag and don't make a sound. I don't know how long it takes. Finally, the rope snaps. I shake it off. Then I turn sideways and squeeze through a gap at the bottom of the pigpen. There's no moon outside. Black Hollow is so dark I can barely see anything. But I know the way. Past the crooked tree up ahead. Elias's house is right there. I drag one leg behind me and move forward one step at a time. Twenty steps. Ten. I'm one step away from making it into town when a cold voice comes from behind me. "I knew you were only pretending to behave." "Now I'm going to show you what happens when you don't listen."

Richard grabs the back of my shirt, drags me back to the pigpen, and throws me onto the ground. "You fucking ran again!" Margaret rushes over and stomps on my back, grinding my face into the mud. Elias stands two steps away with his cane, watching coldly. Margaret is breathing hard. She turns to him and forces a smile. "Mr. Carter, please." "Help us teach her a real lesson." Before Elias can answer, Margaret's phone rings. It's a video call from Claire. Margaret picks up. Claire's face appears on the screen. She's leaning against the headboard in a silk robe. A plate of cut fruit sits beside her. "Mom, is that psycho acting up again?" "You bet." "She just tried to run. Your dad caught her." Claire tilts her head and pouts. "Come on, Mom." "Beating her isn't going to work." "Someone like her isn't scared of getting hit." "And what if she gets away and calls the cops?" "You can't watch her every second." Margaret pauses. "Then what do you think we should do?" Claire smiles. Her voice turns sickeningly sweet. "Mom, think about it." "Why do women who get trafficked into remote places eventually stop trying to run?" "It's because they have kids." "If my sister gets pregnant by someone in that town, where is she going to go?" "Then she can stay there like a good little blood bank." "You can take as much blood as you want whenever you want." All the blood in my body rushes straight to my head. Margaret's eyes light up. "Richard!" "Claire has a point!" Richard leans over and listens for a few seconds. Then he slaps his thigh. "Right!" "Didn't Carter say there's a guy on the east side of town who just got out?" "Did ten years." "Two dead bodies on his record." "A man like that hasn't touched a woman in ten years." "If we throw her in there tonight..." He looks at me. Then he smiles. "Kill two birds with one stone." I bite down hard on the rag in my mouth. I know exactly who they're talking about. Caleb Reed. When I was eight, two drunk men from the next town put a knife to my throat and demanded money. Caleb charged at them. He took the first one down with a knife. The other man slashed him across the face. From the corner of his mouth all the way to his ear. Caleb didn't even wipe the blood off. He turned and struck again. Two dead men. He spent ten years in prison. The day they took him away, everyone in Black Hollow stood at the entrance to town to see him off. I ran after the prison transport for two miles. Elias didn't catch up and carry me back until we reached the fork in the road. After that, every year on my birthday, I got a letter. It always had the same line. *Tessa, kid, I miss you.* Three days ago, Caleb finished his sentence and came home. Richard grabs the back of my shirt and drags me toward the east side of town. He stops in front of Caleb's metal shack and pounds on the door. "Open up!" "Brought you something good!" The door opens from the inside. A man's silhouette fills the doorway. Richard slaps a stack of cash against the doorframe. "Brother, this girl's my daughter." "She doesn't know how to behave." "She's yours." "Do whatever you want. Just don't kill her." The man says nothing. He takes the money. Margaret steps closer to the doorway. She crouches in front of me, grabs my chin, and smiles. "This is what happens when you don't listen." "Let's see who saves you now." The door closes behind us. Darkness swallows everything. I hear his footsteps coming toward me. They stop right in front of me. Then one hand closes around my throat. He lifts me off the floor and slams me against the metal wall. My back crashes into the cold sheet metal. My feet leave the ground. I can't breathe. With his other hand, he rips the rag out of my mouth. I try to scream. Only a hoarse sound comes out. He leans closer. Close enough that I can feel his breath against my face. Then he stops. The hand around my throat suddenly lets go. His voice shakes. "...Tessa?"