PROLOGUE

Chains and Darkness

Madison had a dull awareness of pain. It subsided as she drifted back into unconsciousness. After an indeterminable time, her mindfulness returned and her ache became acute. Thoughtless and foggy, she opened her eyes. Everything was black. She closed her eyes and drifted off once more. Almost. The thumping pain prevented it. Her left eye, heavy and thick, throbbed with the slow beat of her pulse. Her lips were fat and stung as if cut by razor blades. She opened her right eye, her good eye. Everything was still black. She lay with her eye open as her brain cleared marginally. She flinched a breath through her stinging lips. The pain brought her into the moment and gave her thoughts. It's black? Where am I? My face?

Laying on her back, she raised her right hand and blindly fumbled it to her nose. She tapped her palm on her nose and searched for her fingers. They weren't there, just the black. My fingers should be there? In front of my eyes? How is it this black? Am I blind? My eye, my mouth, my face? Have I been beaten? What's happening?

Hearing metal scraping, she froze and listened... The sound vanished. 

Silence... 

It's quiet. No, it's not just quiet; there's nothing? How is it this silent? This black? Where am I?

She waved her hand in front of her open right eye. Her hand still wasn't there, just the black.

There's that scraping sound again?

Testing a thought, she moved her right arm. As she did, the scraping returned. Each time she moved her right arm, it was accompanied by scraping. She placed her hands underneath herself and fingered what she laid on. It was a mattress. As she felt the mattress, she became aware of something on her right wrist that was hard, heavy, and cold. Using her left hand, she explored its shape. It was metallic. A bracelet?... It's a bracelet? No… No. It's not a bracelet; it's a…

A handcuff!

"A handcuff!" she gasped out loud.

She bolted into a sitting position and desperately groped in the dark at the handcuff. Feeling her way to the second handcuff, she found it attached to something heavy. Her heart pounded. It’s a chain! That's the scraping sound! A chain?!  Every time she moved her right arm, the chain dragged on a hard cement-like floor.

"Oh my God! Oh My God!" she gasped as disorientation gave way to a chilling realization. She had been beaten and imprisoned and chained like an animal. And worse, chained in the dark. 

She stilled and listened, hoping to hear anything other than the sound of the chain. But there was nothing, only silence. Her mind raced. How could any place be this silent?! This dark?! 

She wondered if anyone would come, or if this was it, where she would die, chained in darkness. 

Still disoriented, she remembered being at work Saturday night, but nothing after that. Lost on where she was and how she got there, she tugged urgently on her shackles and screamed with everything she had.

"Help! Help! Someone, please help me!"