The rope bites into my wrists as I dangle from the third floor, feet kicking at empty air. Cold night wind slaps my face and dries the blood at my knuckles. I try to swing toward the brick wall, anything solid, but the drop yawns under me like a mouth.
He leans over the railing, smiling like he’s bored. “Scream,” he says softly, “and I’ll cut faster.”
“Please—don’t,” I rasp. My voice sounds thin, like it belongs to somebody else.
Snip.
One strand drops away. My body jolts; the knot burns against bone. The rope creaks in protest, and my stomach flips so hard I taste bile. Above me, he twirls the little pair of orange-handled scissors like a magician.
“Why are you doing this?” I choke out. “What do you want?”
He tilts his head. “Because you still haven’t remembered.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, forcing my brain to work through the panic. I’m in a half-renovated apartment building—Boardwalk Lofts, judging by the faded banner I saw before the hood went over my head. I’d been leaving my office late, walking to my car, thinking about tomorrow’s client pitch. Then—someone behind me, a chemical smell, the world folding inward.
“I don’t know you,” I say, opening my eyes. “You’ve got the wrong person.”
He laughs like that’s the funniest thing he’s heard all week. “Everyone says that.”
My hands are tied above my head, rope looped over a metal pipe on the balcony. Whoever did this knew the layout. Knew where cameras wouldn’t see. My wrists are numb, but pain still punches through every time I move.
Snip.
Another strand falls. My body drops an inch. My heart slams so violently I can’t tell if I’m breathing.
“Listen,” I plead, “my name is Emma Carter. I work at a marketing firm. I’m not—”
“Not who?” he interrupts, and his smile vanishes. “Not the girl who signed the paperwork? Not the one who said ‘it’s just business’ and walked away?”
A second voice rises behind him, closer than it should be. Female. Steady. “Do it, Ryan,” she says. “She’s lying.”
My throat tightens. I crane my neck, trying to see. “Who are you?”
Ryan doesn’t look back. He just raises the scissors again, eyes locked on mine, and the metal glints under the balcony light.
Snip.
The rope gives with a sound like a gunshot, and I drop hard—farther than an inch.
The world lurches. My shoulders scream. For a split second I’m sure I’m falling to my death—then the rope catches, snapping me to a stop like a cruel joke. I gasp so sharply my lungs burn.
Ryan’s knuckles are white around the remaining cord. “See?” he says, almost conversational. “Still plenty left.”
“Ryan,” the woman warns. “Stop talking to her.”
I blink through tears, trying to focus. She steps into view beside him—mid-thirties, hair in a tight ponytail, dark blazer like she came straight from an office. Not a mask. Not a random accomplice. Someone who wants to be seen.
“Emma,” she says, like she’s greeting me at a coffee shop. “You really don’t recognize me?”
My mind scrambles. Her face is familiar in the way billboards are familiar—seen, not known. Then it hits: a meeting room, fluorescent lights, a stack of folders. A woman across the table with tired eyes and a cheap pen, shaking as she signed.
“You’re… Dana,” I whisper. “Dana Mitchell. The small business owner.”
Ryan’s grin returns. “Now we’re getting somewhere.”
Two years ago, I’d been a junior account manager on a real estate rebrand. My boss handed me a list of “problem tenants” in a building slated for redevelopment. “We need them out,” he’d said, sliding the papers across the desk. “Offer buyouts. If they resist, escalate.”
Dana’s name had been on a different file—an adjacent strip mall. A daycare and a little print shop under a landlord who wanted a new luxury project. My job had been to craft messaging: “revitalization,” “community upgrade,” “new opportunity.” Words that made eviction sound like progress.
“I didn’t evict you,” I say, but even as the words leave me, I hear how hollow they sound. “I wasn’t the decision-maker.”
Dana’s eyes harden. “But you were the one who called me. You were the one who told me I had ‘options’ while my lease was being ripped apart.”
“I followed instructions,” I plead. “I didn’t know what would happen.”
Ryan leans closer over the railing. “Her daycare shut down,” he says, voice sharp now. “My sister’s kid was in it. My sister lost her job because she had to stay home. Then she got behind on rent. Then she—” He stops himself, jaw clenched. “You don’t get to say you didn’t know.”
The wind gusts, swinging me slightly. My hands slip, rope burning my skin. I force myself to think like a person who wants to live.
“Okay,” I say, fighting to keep my voice steady. “You want me to remember? I remember. I’m sorry. I didn’t understand what those projects did to people.”
Dana studies me, expression unreadable. “Sorry doesn’t reopen a daycare,” she says. “Sorry doesn’t undo funerals.”
My stomach drops at the word.
“Then tell me what you want,” I say. “Money? A confession? I’ll do it. Just—please—pull me up.”
Ryan lifts the scissors again, slower this time. “We already tried the system,” he says. “Tonight we try something else.”
Dana’s phone is in her hand now, screen glowing. She angles it toward me. Recording.
“Say it,” she orders. “Say what you did. Say it like you said it to us—like it was nothing.”
Ryan’s eyes flick to Dana, then back to me. The scissors hover at the rope.
“Talk,” he says, “or I cut.”
I swallow hard, tasting blood where I bit my tongue. The phone’s red dot glares like an accusation.
“My name is Emma Carter,” I say, voice shaking. “I worked on campaigns that helped push families and small businesses out of their spaces. I told people it was ‘just business.’ I made it sound normal. And it wasn’t.”
Dana’s face tightens, like she’s holding in something that could crack her in half. Ryan’s grip on the rope relaxes a fraction, but the scissors stay raised.
“Why my building?” I ask, trying to buy seconds with words. “Why hang me?”
Ryan’s eyes flash. “Because you get to go home after ruining people. You get to sleep. We didn’t.”
I look up at the metal pipe and the loop of rope over it. The knot is crude, rushed. That’s something. Rushed means mistakes.
“Dana,” I say, forcing myself to meet her eyes, “I can help you. I can testify. I can name the executives. There are emails. Contracts. If you wanted accountability, this isn’t—this isn’t going to get it.”
Dana’s laugh is bitter. “Accountability?” She steps closer to the railing. “I went to city council meetings. I filed complaints. I begged. Do you know what they told me? That I should’ve planned better.”
Ryan’s jaw works like he’s chewing on rage. “Keep talking,” he says, but there’s a tremor in it now—like my words are landing somewhere he didn’t expect.
I shift my weight carefully, testing the rope. My wrists scream, but I twist, trying to hook the rope against the balcony’s edge. If I can fray it on the corner—no, that’s stupid. Fray equals fall.
Then I notice something else: the pipe is bolted into the concrete, but one bolt head is stripped, half-out. Renovation shortcut. A weak anchor.
“Ryan,” I say quietly, “you’re not a murderer. You’re angry. I get that. But if I die, you don’t get your sister back. You don’t get justice. You get prison. Dana gets nothing.”
For a moment, his eyes flicker. Dana’s expression shifts too—not softer, but conflicted. The phone dips slightly.
“I can make this right,” I insist. “Not with money. With names. With proof. I’ll sign affidavits. I’ll hand over files. But you have to pull me up first.”
Dana’s voice drops. “How do I know you won’t disappear?”
“Because you’ll have my face on that video,” I say. “And I’ll give you more. I’ll give you everything.”
Ryan hesitates—just long enough.
My wrists jerk as I swing my body toward the wall, slamming my shoulder into the bricks. The impact rattles the pipe. The half-loose bolt squeals, shifting.
Ryan’s eyes widen. “Stop—”
The pipe pops with a sharp crack. The rope slides, scraping metal. I drop—again—this time in a wild, uncontrolled swing that smashes me against the building’s side.
Above, Dana screams, “Ryan, grab it!”
And then there’s a new sound—sirens, distant but rushing closer, like someone else heard more than they were supposed to.
If you were in my place, would you trust their “deal”… or would you risk everything on one desperate move? Tell me what you’d do.
