The smell of mold was distinct in the air. Most likely coming off the sheets in the rough iron bed in the corner of the room, or perhaps the moth eaten curtains closed snuggly over the one window. Her chin was pressed into her chest, unable to lift it as her mind drifted between semi-consciousness and horrid awake hours. She could not sleep. She could never sleep. The floor was coated in a thick layer of dust, that his boots had left prints in. The steps paced back and forth. Back and forth. Always just back and forth. The chair she was tied to was made of wood, and her body had long since given up trying to find a comfortable way to sit on the unforgiving surface. Her arms were behind her, pulling her shoulder muscle beyond pain. By now it was normal. By now she was lucky to feel her own heart beating in her chest.

The floor creaked.

Jude lifted her head as the door to the room she was hidden in opened. She saw a glimpse of the only other room in the shack Hunter had brought her to. The table was littered with abandoned food and the gun. Jude's stomach growled, she hadn't eaten in three days.

The car ride was incomprehensible to keep straight in her mind. The road had traced on in a highway, then leaving that for steadily curvier back roads, until she finally felt the change as the tires wheeled onto a dirt and gravel path. They were, she knew, nowhere. But Hunter was staring at her from the doorway, as he often did. As if he were mulling over what to do with her next. She had not given him the pleasure of words, or begging, or even any sign that she was anything. She was an object, he had proved that at the house.

His eyes were all over her skin, and that alone made her want to hide behind something. To simply get his filthy eyes off of her. To get her out of his mind. She did not what to know the things he planed, the things he schemed, the things he desired.

Then he did something she was not expecting, he walked around the chair and stood behind her. The eyes were on her still, worse than before, yet now her heart was racing at twice the speed. She wanted to scream, to struggle, to run away. But the fact remained that they were nowhere and thus there was no where to run.

"What?" asked Jude, her lips barely moving as the words came up through her parched lips. They hit her tongue like sandpaper.

There was a distinct pause, and then his coy voice answered, "So you do speak."

Jude pressed her lips closed, and focused on the open door. She could see out into the room still, and through the far window there was sunlight. A thing she only seemed to remember now. The trees that must have been outside cast long shadows across the yard…if there was one. The car, with the trunk, parked just passed the door. Hunters footsteps emanated through the room again, and he pressed the door closed. Jude closed her eyes, capturing that last glimpse of sun, preserving it as yet another memory to replace what she was sure would follow. There was nothing to remember, she tried to will herself into believing, if the event is not acknowledged.

He spoke. "I was starting to think I'd never hear your voice again" Hunter crooned. Jude kept her eyes closed and blocked him out. But the words still hit her. "And perhaps I have spoken too soon," Hunter sighed. Then his hands were on her face and forced her to look up. "LOOK AT ME!" Hunter roared. Jude hesitated, resisting the crushing pain of his fingers on her chin, before her eyes opened and glared up at him once more. "Better" Hunter spat, obviously not fulfilled, before he dropped his hand and looked around the room. "I think I've done well" Hunter started in a lighter tone.

No you haven't Jude thought.

"I mean four days, I'd say that's shocking to you isn't it?" There was a sneer on his face as he looked back at Jude.

Three Jude thought, and then let her heart sink a little Four.

"Wouldn't you say?" Hunter led on again, "No Tom here yet to whisk you away. Maybe…" Hunter crooned again, "…he simply doesn't care."

"Shut up!" screamed Jude, the words bursting out of her lips, before she could stop them.

"That's right!" Hunter said, suddenly enthralled, rushing towards her and leaning over her. His breath hot on her face "That's right get angry, tell me where he is. Tell when he's going to find out where you are. Tell me Jude, tell me! How is Little Tommy Q going to save the FUCKING day one more time?"

Jude shook under his gaze; the anger pulsating harder and harder in her veins. She did not speak. She did not blink. She did nothing. Then without thinking, she spit right in his face.

His hand slapping her face sounded like a bolt of lightning hitting a tree branch in the middle of the woods in a storm. "Good" Hunter said, taking a few steps back, watching Jude staring sideways at the floor, her check an angry red, with not hands to comfort it. "Good" he repeated, and then walked out, and slammed the door behind him.

The silence engulfed Jude once again.

They were nowhere. She was no one. There was nothing.