I would’ve thought that the worst part of being tied up in a pitch-black room was not being able to move, but that wasn’t it. At least not yet. When I needed to pee, I was sure I’d change my mind, but for right now, the fact that I couldn’t tell how much time had passed was driving me crazy.

I’d left Jalen’s place sometime in the late afternoon, early evening. I had no idea how long I’d been unconscious, and because there were no windows, I couldn’t tell what time of day it was. Was it still Thursday or was it Friday already?

It couldn’t be any later than Friday because I hadn’t wet myself, though the pressure in my lower belly indicated that might not be the case soon. I was hungry and thirsty, but I could ignore my stomach for a while. Dehydration would kill me before hunger.

Kill me.

Fuck.

I could die here.

No. I shook my head. No, I wouldn’t die here. Not like this. Not when I had…

A half sob caught in my throat as Jalen’s face flashed through my mind. Rich brown hair, brilliant turquoise eyes, the sort of face that could only be described as ruggedly handsome. Six-four, with broad shoulders and muscles that weren’t just for show.

After everything Jalen and I had been through, it couldn’t end like this. We’d just said, “I love you” and, sure, this thing with Elise was going to make things tense, but I wanted us to get through it. I wanted us to work through everything, to build a relationship.

Everything I hadn’t thought I’d want, a life that I’d never pictured myself having, I saw it all now. I saw it with Jalen. A life. A family.

But only if I got out of here.

I had to be smart though.

More time passed, but it could have been minutes or hours. I shifted myself around until I was sitting. At some point, I figured out how to tug down my pants and relieved myself in a corner. Not the high point of my day, but considering the rest of my situation, it wasn’t the lowest either.

That’s what I had to prepare myself for. The lowest. The worst. The things that, as a former student of the FBI, I knew could be coming. It all depended on who had me and why.

If they were looking for a ransom, they probably wouldn’t hurt me, especially if it was Jalen they were going to try to ransom me to. Except I doubted that was the case since not many people knew the two of us were together.

Which meant it might be a random kidnapping. That wouldn’t be good. Adult women weren’t generally kidnapped by grieving mothers to replace a child. I’d done enough psychological work to know that a quick death would probably be the best outcome I could hope for.

But there was one other possibility.

My father.

Any time in the last few years, I wouldn’t have been thinking about him at all, but ever since the second trial, he hadn’t been ignoring me like before. In fact, he’d been trying to talk to me. I’d kept getting collect calls from him, or at least I had before he’d escaped.

Had my father arranged this? Was this his way of trying to control me from where ever he’d escaped to?

The sad thing was, that possibility might be the best shot I’d have at making it out of here alive and unscathed. My father would want to take care of things himself. He wouldn’t want anyone else to kill me. Since he was most likely hiding somewhere closer to Indiana, that would be a problem. Which meant now that they had me, they had to figure out what to do with me while they waited. That meant I had time.

Suddenly, a burst of light from the other side of the room blinded me. I cursed, holding up my hands in front of my face while blinking until my eyes adjusted. I heard a click, and an overhead light came on. It was a single, dingy bulb, but offered enough light for me to finally see my surroundings… and wish that I hadn’t.

Cinderblock walls covered with peeling gray paint. A concrete floor, smooth but not finished. A cinderblock ceiling with the lone bulb that looked ready to blow.

This wasn’t a normal basement. Normal basements had wooden or tiled ceilings. Unless we were in a warehouse or something similar, a basement like this had to be purposefully made, and I could only think of one reason why someone would do that.

To hold someone like me.

I resisted the urge to check closer, to look for signs that other women had been held here. It wasn’t hard to do, really, since a large, muscular man was now standing directly in front of me, a glower on his square-jawed face. Buzz-cut brown hair and ice-cold eyes all gave me the impression of one of those Soviet villains from eighties’ movies. Like the big guy in Rocky.

This was bad. Really bad.

I’d assumed that my father would’ve hired some scrawny, wiry ex-con who needed chloroform to take me down. This guy was big enough that, no matter how tough I knew I could be, he could’ve taken me down without drugs. It would’ve been messy, dangerous, and time-consuming, though, because I sure as hell wouldn’t have gone quietly.

“What’s up?” I grinned up at him, not bothering to hide the anger I felt. Instead of playing the helpless, weak woman, I was going for disarming with bluntness. I’d never been any good at pretending to be a damsel in distress, anyway. I wasn’t even going to try.

His eyes slid away from me for a moment, and then he sneered.

Shame flooded me as I realized he knew I’d had to urinate in my little cell. I hadn’t done anything wrong, or anything that I’d really had any control over, but I was still ashamed. I pushed the embarrassment down, knowing that my cheeks were still burning. I squared my shoulders and lifted my chin.

“When you gotta go.” I shrugged. “Maybe you should’ve given me a bucket.”

His hand flashed out, the back of it cracking against my cheek and jaw in an explosion of pain. My head snapped to the side, and I hissed out a breath of air. Fortunately, it was far from the most painful thing I’d ever experienced, and it took only seconds for my thoughts to gather again.

“How is my father planning on getting here?” I gently touched the back of my hand to my cheek. “I know he’ll want to take care of me himself.”

The man’s expression didn’t change as he reached down and grabbed the front of my shirt. He yanked me upright and slammed me against the wall. It didn’t feel great, but I wasn’t going to let it show. In fact, I couldn’t resist taunting him a bit.

“How’s it feel to have an old man yanking your leash like some–”

All the air rushed out of me as he buried his fist in my stomach. I curled forward, coughing and retching as I tried to stay on my feet. I hadn’t expected a punch to the stomach. A backhand to the face, sure, but I figured that was to let me know it was a good idea to do as I was told.

“You are a problem.”

His English was impeccable. That combined with the military haircut and the way he carried himself made me suspect U.S. military, but probably first generation from an immigrant family. My gut – aching as it was – still said something Soviet. Not that it mattered right now.

“I know.” I sounded a bit breathless, but not too bad. “My dad thought I was such a problem that he tried to kill me. It didn’t take.”

The man frowned, his forehead creasing. “Why do you keep talking about your father? I have no interest in your family. Not yet, anyway. If you continue to be problematic for my employers, they may wish to meet your father.”

Shit.

Not random. Not ransom. Not my father.

What the fuck was going on then?

I didn’t let my confusion show on my face, forcing my tone to stay light. “That might be difficult for them since he’s on the run now.”

Not a flicker. Either he’d already known about my father, or he simply didn’t care. Most likely the latter.

The man grabbed my hair and yanked my head back, giving me no choice but to look up at him. “I won’t mark your face again.”

I didn’t have to wonder what he meant by that because his fist collided with my ribcage even as the last word came out. I gasped, choked, but I couldn’t catch my breath because his hand was around my throat now, squeezing. I pushed against his chest with my bound hands, but there was no strength in me. Black spots danced in my vision, and my knees gave out, but I didn’t fall.

He was silent as he hit me again, but I couldn’t hear the impact over the blood rushing in my ears. He must have been counting, or he knew how long he could choke and beat me until it was too much, because he suddenly stopped.

I dropped to the floor, but I barely felt my knees hit. I was sure it hurt, but everything else hurt too much for me to really notice. I supposed I’d see the bruises… if I survived this first. And judging by the way I was feeling at this moment, not surviving could be a viable option.

Except he wasn’t trying to kill me. He could have, I knew that. Even with as much pain and oxygen deprivation that my brain was trying to handle, I knew that things could have been much worse.

They could still get worse.

I had to get through the pain, figure out where I was, and how I could get out.

“Serge.”

A scrawny guy burst into the room and didn’t even look twice at me. He muttered something in another language, and the big guy – Serge, I supposed – snapped something back in that same language. Judging by the way the little guy scurried away, Serge was the top dog. Here, anyway. He’d mentioned bosses.

I sucked in another burning breath. Bosses. Who the hell in my circle of people would have bosses that would want me beaten up?

Serge leaned over me, and a part of me wanted to kick him, hurt him the way he’d hurt me, but I knew that if I did, I’d get another beating. That one might knock me out, and if I was unconscious, I couldn’t keep working on the problem of my escape.

“If you are not a problem, we will not need to have this discussion again.” He straightened and put his hands in his pockets. “Someone will bring you food once you are well enough to eat.”

The fact that he knew that I wouldn’t be able to keep anything down until the pain dissipated told me that I wasn’t the first person he’d beaten like this.

The question I wasn’t sure I wanted answered was, how many of those people had died here?