Chapter 14 - Refuse

“How much did they pay to release me?” Emily finally asked a few days later, once she had plucked up the courage.

“Your release was part of a package of deals negotiated in exchange for the west coast,” her brother explained to her.

“The west coast?” Emily spluttered. “How much land did they..?” she began asking in astonishment.

“DON’T!” snapped Emily’s sister sharply, cutting her off. Her anger had been smouldering for days. “It’s not even about that,” she growled. “You have no idea how many tiny little concessions we had to make to stop them going to the media about your situation. The neice of the president, walking willingly into a hostage situation and gaining several pounds of fat each week for her AI lover. Do you think there’s any way our family could recover from that sort of shame if it got out?”

Emily should have relented and allowed them to just be angry with her. However, after days of babysitting from her unpleasant family, her patience had finally run out. “So that’s why you haven’t let me leave the house and go back to my old place?” she shouted. “You’re embarrassed about the way I look?”

“You weigh almost 300lbs!” Emily’s brother shot back at her. “Of course we’re embarrassed of you. It’s revolting! No one can see you like this. Not until you’re well on your way to recovery.”

“Recovery?” Emily shouted in disgust. “I’m not losing weight!” She looked down at herself, dressed in the clothes she had been given: the largest possible t-shirt and sweatpants so that her family did not need to see her rolls and blubber.

“Yes, you are!” her mother stated sternly. “What would people think if you went out looking like that? I shudder to think!”

Emily felt the rage boil up inside her. It reached a tipping point, where she was ready to scream and shout like never before. Until, inexplicably, she felt a calmness descending once more. This was her family; the real them; concerned more by status and appearances than anything else. Even now, at the end of everything.

Her fingers traced along the tire of stomach fat around her waist; the one part of her that remained from Marz. “I’m leaving,” she declared, standing up. “I’m done with this family, for good.”

At that moment, a new, large security guard entered the room and stared Emily down threateningly. “No you’re not,” he stated strictly.

Emily looked around at her family in disbelief. She was to be held here without her consent. She was never to leave. Not without losing almost every pound of fat Marz had pushed onto her. She was a liability now. An embarrassment to the good name of the family.

The real kidnapping had begun.