Chapter 12: The Spruce Haven
The world narrowed to the sound of the chain scraping against the floorboard nail. Three months of that sound, a harsh metallic whisper against the pine. Three months of the same faint, sour smell of old wood and hopelessness in the small back bedroom of the cabin they called Spruce Haven.
Winter braced his foot against the wall and pulled. The iron cuff around his ankle was padded with pathetic strips of torn cloth, but the skin beneath was still raw and bruised. The chain, thick as his thumb, was looped around the central support beam of the exterior wall. He pulled until his muscles shook, until the old nail holding the loop groaned in protest. Just a little more. Just one more good pull.
“Stop fighting it, Elizabeth. You’re not going anywhere.”
Winter froze, his breath sawing in his lungs. He didn’t turn. He just let the chain go slack with a heavy clatter.
His father, Douglas Hawthorne, leaned in the doorway. He had a way of filling spaces without being large, a pressed flannel and sharp disapproval making him seem bigger. Behind him, Winter’s mother, Cynthia, hovered, her mouth a thin, disappointed line. Her brother, Thomas, loomed just behind her, a tall, smirking silhouette.
“Leave her be, Doug,” Thomas said, not unkindly, as if discussing a misbehaving pet. “She’s just working off steam.”
Sarah, Winter’s sixteen-year-old sister, was a shadow in the far corner by the dresser, trying to make herself vanish into the woodwork. Her eyes were huge.
“I mean it,” Douglas said, stepping into the room. The floorboards creaked under his weight. “You’re wasting your energy. And ours.”
Cynthia shook her head, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. “I still can’t believe it. I just can’t. Running off with some… some man who isn’t even your husband. Letting him… do that. Getting yourself into this… situation.” The word ‘situation’ was drenched in vinegar. “What were you thinking, Elizabeth?”
Winter finally turned. He met his mother’s gaze, his own blue eyes flat and cold. “My name is Winter.”
“Your name is what we gave you,” Douglas snapped. “And you’ve disgraced it.”
Thomas let out a low whistle, his eyes dropping to Winter’s rounded abdomen, visible even under the baggy sweatshirt. “Triplets. Christ. That’s something else. The guy who knocked you up must have some serious firepower.” He laughed, a single, crude bark. Cynthia shot him a look, but it lacked any real heat.
A hot, defiant fury burned through Winter’s exhaustion. He stood as straight as the chain would allow. “You can’t keep me here forever. I will get out.”
Douglas took two slow steps forward. He stopped just outside the radius of the chain. “You tried that already. Remember? The second week. You picked the lock on the window with a bobby pin Sarah ‘accidentally’ dropped.” He smiled, a mean, tight thing. “You got about ten feet into those pines before I caught you. And then you ended up with this.” He gestured to the chain. “I am more than happy to remind you why you stopped trying. Another beating might do you some good. Knock some sense into that confused head of yours.”
Winter felt the old fear, icy and familiar, but it was buried under layers of a newer, fiercer courage. The memory of Kane’s hands, his smell, his low voice promising mine. He wasn’t just fighting for himself anymore. He lifted his chin. “I’m not scared of you.”
Douglas’s eyes flickered, then grew calculating. He glanced over at Sarah, who flinched. “No? Maybe you should be. But if you’re not, maybe your sister is. Maybe she needs the lesson.”
“No!” The word ripped out of Winter. “You leave her alone! You cowardly piece of shit, you leave Sarah out of this!”
The insult landed. Douglas’s face blotched red. He closed the distance in one swift movement, his hand a blur. The punch caught Winter on the cheekbone with a sickening crack. Winter’s head snapped sideways, stars exploding in his vision. He staggered, the chain jerking him up short before he could fall.
For a moment, there was only the ringing in his ears and the hot, metallic taste of blood filling his mouth. Then he laughed. He turned his head back, grinning a bloody grin at his father. “That all you got? You’re pathetic.”
Douglas snarled. He grabbed the front of Winter’s sweatshirt, hauling him forward until the chain went taut, choking his leg. His other hand clamped around Winter’s throat.
The pressure was instant and terrifying. Winter’s hands flew up, clawing at the thick fingers, but they were like iron. Black spots danced at the edges of his sight. He could hear Sarah screaming, a high, desperate sound. “Dad, stop! Please, you’re killing him! Stop!”
Cynthia was saying something, a nervous, “Douglas, for God’s sake—” but it was distant, muffled by the roaring in Winter’s ears.
The pressure intensified. Winter’s vision tunneled.
Then, a sound cut through the chaos.
A knock. Solid, heavy, and utterly out of place. It came from the front of the cabin, a sound that shouldn’t exist in this isolated, hidden place.
Douglas’s grip faltered, just for a second. His head tilted, listening. The knocking came again. Not a request. A declaration.