Free at last

Chapter 2

The festivities continued well in the evening as the guests danced and laughed under a canopy of stars.The newlyweds,basking in the glow of their love and warmth of their friends and family, knowing that this was a continuation of their beautiful journey together.

After the wedding, life finally felt steady. The small house we had rebuilt our lives in carried laughter again;soft, careful laughter, as if everyone feared it might break. Our mother watched her eldest daughter step into marriage with pride mixed with fear. She had survived too much to believe peace came without a price.

Grace had married a man who seemed gentle. He spoke kindly, worked hard, and promised safety. For a while, those promises held. She glowed with new purpose, learning how to love without flinching, how to trust without constantly looking over her shoulder.I watched her closely, believing marriage was proof that endings could be happy.

Our mother tried to rest. Years of running, hiding, and rebuilding had carved deep lines into her spirit. She focused on protecting her children the only way she knew—by staying alert, by never forgetting what danger looked like.

But peace, once again, was fragile.

It began quietly. My sister changed. She laughed less. She avoided home. When asked, she said marriage required sacrifice. Our mother recognized the words immediately,they were the same ones she once used to excuse bruises and silence.Before anyone could intervene, disaster arrived in another form.

The man our mother had once remarried—the one believed dead—had not been a simple abuser. His disappearance had buried truths no one had uncovered. Investigations reopened. Whispers turned into reports. Names surfaced. Routes, victims, transactions.He had been a human trafficker.And he had left enemies behind.Exposure brought danger back into our lives. People who wanted silence watched the family closely. Threats followed. Fear returned like a familiar disease.

One evening, violence struck without warning.It was just a normal day,a knock came through as we were preparing to have our dinner.My brother in law walked in with his men.He did not seem as a threat to my mother and I or so I thought.Before anyone could say anything one of his men shot my mother,and she died on the spot.The supposedly normal evening turned chaotic in a split second,tears and noisy cries filled the room in an instant.I hurled in a nearby corner, shacking, crying,messy as I was,I begged him to spear me.Memories from the stepfather's a***e surfaced and I felt something heavy hit me at the back of my head.I got all dizzy and thankfully what followed was an abyss of darkness.

The first thing I heard when I woke up was the faint sound of rain reminiscent to a mild shower.I slowly opened my eyes only to find myself bound to a chair,I was wondering why the lights where off until I realised there was a sack covering my face.

"Ahh!finally you are awake!"

A masculine voice exclaimed behind of me.Then suddenly I remembered the events that followed before my capture,how my goody-two-shoes brother in law turned out to be a different person ;a murderer for that matter.The man removed the sack from my face and lead me to a room where there were a lot of girls,my age and even older As I entered the room,all their eyes turned towards me.Their eyes a clear portrait of unmeasurable pain and I could see the amount of pity they held for me as I was pushed through the room.Their pitiful look was as though to portray a " welcome to hell sweetheart" message.Fear slowly crept onto me.I was oriented the very same night about the order of things in the hell house.They told me to escaping was out of question as those who tried to run away were caught and killed,brutally.I instantly knew that the jubilant life is a thing of the past,the real t*****e then began.

Early in the morning the following day,I was escorted to the supposedly leader.To my surprise it was my very own brother in law,he then told me a tale I never would have imagined.Turns out this all was once my stepfathers business,and once they kidn*pped his own sister and trafficked her.After my stepfather died he traced his remaining family, which is us in order to get his revenge.He told me how well he had orchestrated everything until he made his way into our lives,so as to destroy us when we least expected it.At this point I was truly convinced that the devil himself was talking notes when Jason was talking.After the talk I was returned to the room with the other girls.

Every single day began with torture.At some point I could no longer cry because I had finally accepted that death was the only way out of this torture.Men from all different places came every single day for s****l escapades.It was as though we were tools that they could use whenever they feel like it.Sometimes the cruel m*b would just keep us n***d in empty rooms, torturing us whilst filming at the same time.Apparently there was such a huge demand of such videos;amateur pornographic videos of men molesting young women and some physically abusing them.This world is sick,who derives pleasure from such activities?What had happend to men being our protectors?