Gripping my chest, I focused on inhaling air into my closed-with-panic lungs, but the room was so stifling. I was unclean. I needed to cleanse, to pray. I needed to repent, seek the Lord’s forgiveness, try and wrestle back my soul from the devil’s clutches.

Creeping to the closed door, I pressed my ear against the wood, trying to hear any sound. There was nothing. Carefully turning the doorknob, I opened the door just a fraction to check the hallway was clear. Voices drifted through vents from the lounge, but drawing my courage together, I entered the hallway, closing the door behind me, and tiptoed to the exit. I had to go to the river. I did not know what else to do.

Reaching the exit door, I pushed on the handle and instantly felt better as the night air kissed my hot skin.

Checking around me, I could see no one. Clattering and drilling noises came from the direction of the front gate, but I ran across the yard unseen and quickly reached the cover of the trees.

With every step I took, scripture poured from my lips, reciting my shame. Shame of my fornication, my adultery… my harlotry.

“Proverbs 5:3-20. ‘For the lips of an adulteress drip honey, And smoother than oil is her speech; But in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death, Her steps take hold of Sheol.’”

Branches hit my face, cutting at the skin. The hard, dry soil ripped at the soles of my feet, but I kept running to the river. The cleansing water would rid me of dirt and sin. The cleansing waters would take away the unclean.

Bursting into the clearing, I ran for the riverbank, tearing the ties of my headdress, and immediately let loose my hair. My vision was blurred by unshed tears and I blindly reached for the zipper on my dress.

I was so preoccupied with getting clean that I failed to hear the rustling of trees behind me. Failed to hear the thudding of six sets of boots crunching through the fallen twigs and leaves. Failed to hear six men step into the clearing, surrounding me, men with guns.

“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair, so I may climb the golden stair.”

My hands froze on the zipper as I heard a man speak.

Turning slowly around, I choked on a scream when I was confronted by six men wearing white vests and denim pants. The man at the front stepped forward, an older man with a paunch stomach and a rough red beard covering skin scarred by pockmarks.

“Need help with that zipper there, darlin’. I’d be just fine with helpin’ you out some.”

I stumbled back, heart in my throat. I searched the line of trees, looking for an escape, but the men had closed in on me, their large guns pointed down but their hands firmly gripped on the handles, ready to aim and fire.

“Hot damn! They told me you were one red-hot bitch, but they didn’t quite say I’d be hauling prime steak. You’re fuckin’ incredible, Rapunzel.” The man felt along his length and licked his lips. Vomit rose in my throat. “I may even have to sample a taste when we get y’all tied up nice and tight.”

“My… my fr-friends will be here soon,” I tried to threaten, but the man at the front simply smiled, and the rest of the men laughed in chorus.

“Now we both know that ain’t the truth, don’t we, darlin’?”

“They will, be assured.”

The men broke into laughter, and I clasped together my shaking hands.

“No fucker will be coming from the Hangmen, sugar. We created a nice little diversion to get the bastards in their lil’ church or whatever the fuck they call it. And they’ll be in there for a good damn while. We were gonna come in for you, girl, all quiet and stealth, but when we saw you running down here, well, you just went and made our night a whole lot easier, now didn’t ya?”

I breathed in through my nostrils just as he said, “So I’ll tell you what’s about to happen.”

My eyes widened as he approached. My nose stung as I took in his scent, a mix of body odor, tobacco, and alcohol. When he reached me, he lifted his hand and ran his fingers through my hair. My eyes snapped shut, and I became paralyzed by fear.

“Fuckin’ beautiful, darlin’. Pure Aryan too, blond hair and blue eyes, Hitler’s fuckin’ ideal bitch. A Klan brother’s living wet dream. Hell, if I weren’t been paid a bucket load of cash to deliver you unharmed to those freaks in bumfuck nowhere, I’d be taking you back to the ranch with me, showing you what it’s like to be fucked by the pure race.”

As he dropped my hair, panic fueled my legs and I bolted for the forest.

“Get her!” the man in charge shouted, and I heard the scramble of feet in my wake.

I pushed my legs harder, praying I could make it to the clubhouse to get help, to get Ky, but as I was about to breach the entrance to the woods, rough hands grabbed at my shoulders and pushed me down onto the ground. My back hit the hard dirt with a heavy thud, the impact robbing me of all the air in my lungs. My arms were scratched with the twigs and leaves, and my entire body ached. I struggled and fought to get free, as Ky had once told me to do, but the large man above me raised his arm and whipped the back of his hand across my face. My vision blurred and the world seemed to tilt on its side.

“Pin her down!” a faint voice ordered, and my arms and legs suddenly felt leaden. A leaf flowing downstream on the river caught my eye, skipping by rocks and boulders. For some strange reason, I could not pull my attention away. It looked so simple, so free, on its own journey into the unknown.

“You got it, Jep?” a low voice asked. The man above me grunted in response as the leaf kept floating southward.