Twenty Minutes

Elise craves the rope, the cuffs, the choke. Jack knows it. He snaps the cuffs behind her back, spreads her legs wide with the bar, then pulls the rope around her neck until she stands on her toes, throat stretched, breath already thin. He sets the timer, steps back, and leaves her there—twenty minutes alone with her own pulse pounding in her ears. Every swallow pulls the rope tighter. Every twitch of her hips threatens to tip her off balance. She has to stay upright. She has to breathe. She has to survive. Nothing else exists. Just the metal at her wrists, the bar forcing her open, and the slow, brutal squeeze around her neck. Time drips. Her legs shake. Her vision edges dark, then clears, then dark again. She fights the panic, fights the heat, fights to stay alive for every last second.