Chapter Sixteen
Yulia
“Come on, let’s go.” Rough hands lift me off the seat, startling me out of uneasy sleep. “We’re here.”
Here? My heartbeat jumps as I realize we’ve already landed. I must’ve fallen asleep at some point during the flight, my exhaustion outweighing my anxiety.
It’s another man carrying me now—Diego, the leader called him. His grip on me is not especially gentle as he holds me in front of his chest. However, I’m glad they’re not making me walk. After spending the whole flight with my ankles and wrists cuffed together, I’m not sure my cramping muscles would be up for the task. Not to mention that I’m so hungry I feel sick and dizzy. They took off my gag and gave me some water mid-way through the flight, but they didn’t bother feeding me.
As soon as Diego exits the plane, a wave of warm humidity washes over me, making me feel like I just entered a Russian bathhouse—or maybe a rainforest. The latter is probably a better comparison, given the thick, vine-draped trees surrounding the air strip.
Despite the terror circling through my veins, I’m dazzled by the greenery around me. I love nature—I always have, ever since I was a small child—and this place appeals to me on every level. The air is rich with the scent of tropical vegetation, insects are chirping in the grass, and the sun is bright despite a few clouds in the sky. For a couple of blissful moments, I feel like I’m in paradise.
Then I hear a car approaching and reality crashes in.
The owner of this paradise is going to torture and kill me.
My empty stomach clenches. I don’t want to give in to the fear, but I can’t help the dread that spreads through me as the car—a black SUV—stops in front of the plane.
The driver’s door opens, and a tall, broad-shouldered man steps out, the sun glinting off his short, light-colored hair.
I stop breathing, my eyes glued to his hard features.
Lucas Kent.
He’s alive.
His pale eyes lock on mine, and the world around me recedes, blurring out of focus. I forget all about my hunger and discomfort, about the cuffs restraining me and my fear of the future.
All I’m cognizant of is the stark, irrational joy that Lucas is alive.
He starts walking toward me, and I force myself to breathe again. He’s even bigger than I remembered, his shoulders wide and thick with muscle. Dressed in a sleeveless camo shirt and ripped jeans, with an assault rifle slung across his torso, he looks exactly like what he is: a ruthless mercenary working for a crime lord.
“I’ll handle it from here, Diego,” he says, approaching me, and I begin to shake as he reaches for me, his gaze sliding away from mine. Diego hands me over without a word, and my shaking intensifies as I feel Lucas’s hands on me again, his touch burning me even through the rough material of my prison jumpsuit.
Stepping back, he turns and begins carrying me to the car, holding me flush against his chest. He evidences no disgust at my unwashed state, and a shudder ripples through me as I feel the heat of his body seeping into me, melting some of the residual chill inside. I should be terrified, but instead I feel that awareness again—that irrational attraction I’ve only experienced with him. At the same time, a pressure gathers behind my temples, and my eyes prickle, as though I’m about to cry.
Alive. He’s alive.
It doesn’t seem real. None of this seems real. My reality is a gray, smelly cell in a Russian prison. It’s Igor’s greasy hands and Buschekov’s mirrored interrogation room. It’s hunger, thirst, and longing—longing for the life I lost when my parents’ car slid on black ice, for the brother I only saw in pictures, and for the man I’d known just one day.
For the man I thought I’d killed—the one holding me right now.
Could all of this be a dream? A fantasy concocted in my exhausted, sleep-deprived mind? Could I even now be passed out at the interrogation table, with that screeching alarm about to jerk me back to consciousness?
Lucas’s face blurs in front of my eyes, and I realize I am crying, fat, ugly tears welling up and spilling down my cheeks. Embarrassed, I automatically try to wipe them away, but my hands, still cuffed to my ankles, can’t reach that far. The motion ends up being jerky and awkward, and I see Lucas’s face turn to stone as he glances down at me.
“You fucking bitch,” he says so softly that I can barely hear him. “You think you can manipulate me with your tears?” His grip on me tightens, turning hard and punishing as he stops in front of the SUV and glares down at me, as if waiting for a response. When I don’t give him one, his features harden further. “You’re going to pay for what you did,” he promises, his voice filled with quiet fury. “You’re going to pay for everything.”
And with that, he jerks open the car door and throws me onto the back seat. As my back hits the cushioned leather, I know that I was wrong.
This is not a dream.
It’s a nightmare.
* * *
The ride takes only a few minutes. Lucas drives silently, not saying anything else to me, and I use the time to compose myself. Strangely, thinking of his threat helps me control my tears, my stunned joy turning into cold fear as I process the fact that Lucas Kent is alive—and that he will indeed be the one to make me pay.
Does that mean the plane crash happened after all? If so, how did he and Esguerra survive? I want to ask Lucas that, but I can’t bring myself to break the silence, not when I feel his rage pulsing in the air like a malevolent force waiting to be unleashed. He took off his weapon, setting it on the front seat next to him, but that doesn’t lessen the threat emanating from him.
He can kill me with his bare hands if he’s so inclined.
As the car leaves the heavily wooded area, I see a big white house in the distance. It’s surrounded by manicured green lawns that form a contrast to the untamed jungle behind us. Farther back, I see guard towers spaced a few dozen meters apart. The sight doesn’t surprise me; Esguerra’s file said that his Colombian estate is heavily fortified despite its remote location on the edge of the Amazon rainforest.
We don’t go to the big house; instead, we turn and drive along the jungle to a cluster of smaller houses and boxy, one-story buildings. It must be where the guards and others on the Esguerra compound live, I realize as I see armed men—and an occasional woman—going in and out of the dwellings.
The car stops in front of one of the individual houses, the one with a front porch, and Lucas exits, leaving the gun in the car. He slams the door behind him, and I flinch, trying not to give in to the anxiety choking me from within. The fear is thick and bitter in my throat. It’s worse somehow that it’s Lucas who’ll do those terrible things to me, that he’ll be the one to rip out my fingernails or cut me open piece by piece.
It’s worse because there were times in that Moscow prison when I used to imagine I was with him, when I fantasized that he was holding me and I was safe in his strong embrace.
Lucas walks around the car and opens the back door. Reaching in, he grabs me and drags me out, still not saying a word as he lifts me against his chest and slams the door closed with his foot. His hold on me is again harsh and punishing, and I know it’s only the start.
My fantasies are about to shatter under the weight of reality.
He carries me up the porch stairs, walking as easily as if I weigh nothing. His strength is tremendous, only there’s no safety in it. Not for me, at least. Maybe for some woman in the future, someone he’ll care about and want to protect.
Someone he won’t hate as much as he hates me.
As he pushes open the front door and turns sideways to carry me through the doorway, I catch a glimpse of curious faces staring up at us from the street. There are several men and a middle-aged woman, and for one absurd moment, I’m tempted to beg them for help, to plead with them to save me. The urge fades as quickly as it comes. These people aren’t some innocent passersby. They’re employees of a sadistic arms dealer, and they’re fully complicit in whatever fate is about to befall me.
So I stay silent as Lucas carries me into the house and once again shuts the door behind him with his foot. He’s not looking at me, so I use the opportunity to study him, noting the granite set of his jaw. He’s still furious, the rage radiating off him like heat off a flame. It makes me wonder why he’s so mad. Surely this sort of thing—making Esguerra’s enemies pay—is routine for him. I would’ve expected cold detachment, not this volcanic anger.
Come to think of it, I would’ve expected him to take me to some warehouse or a storage shed, some place they wouldn’t mind dirtying with blood and bodily fluids. Instead, I find myself inside a residential home, albeit one with only basic furnishings. One black leather sofa, a flatscreen TV, gray carpet, and white walls—the room he carries me through is not luxurious, but it’s certainly no torture chamber. Could this be Lucas’s house? And if so, why am I here?
I don’t have time to dwell on it for long because he brings me into a large, white-tiled bathroom. There is a massive tub, a glass-walled shower stall, and a sink next to a toilet.
Definitely not a torture chamber.
“Why did you bring me here?” My voice is hoarse, scratchy from disuse. I haven’t spoken since Esguerra’s men stopped me from screaming back in Moscow. “It’s your house, isn’t it?”
Lucas’s jaw muscle flexes, but he doesn’t respond. Instead, he carries me into the shower stall, sets me down on the tiled floor, and pulls out a key. Grabbing my handcuffs, he unlocks them and detaches them from the ankle cuffs, which he unlocks next. Then he yanks me to my feet.
“You need a fucking shower,” he says harshly. “Take those clothes off. Now.”
My knees buckle, my leg muscles unable to bear the sudden strain of standing, even as my aching back weeps in gratitude at finally being straight again. My head spins from chronic hunger and exhaustion, and it’s only Lucas’s grip on my arm that prevents me from sinking back down to the floor.
A shower? He wants me to take a shower? Before I can process that odd demand, he lets out an impatient noise and grabs the zipper of my jumpsuit, pulling it down roughly.
“Wait, I can—” I try to reach for the zipper with one trembling hand, but it’s too late. Lucas spins me around, flattening my face against the shower wall, and yanks the jumpsuit down to my knees, leaving me wearing nothing more than a pair of loose, high-waisted panties and a stretched-out sports bra—the only underwear allowed at the prison. Within a second, he rips those off me as well and spins me around to face him.
“Don’t make me tell you twice.” His fingers catch my jaw in a hard grip as he holds my upper arm with his other hand. “You’ll do what I say, understand?” His eyes glint with icy rage and something more.
Lust.
He still wants me.
My heart pounds in a furious rhythm as the fact that I’m naked in front of him again sinks in. I should’ve expected this, but for some reason, I didn’t. In my mind, what happened between us before was entirely separate from the punishment he’s about to dole out, but I should’ve known better.
For men like Lucas Kent, violence and sex go hand in hand.
“Do you understand?” he repeats, his fingers digging painfully into my jaw, and I blink affirmatively, the only movement I’m capable of. Apparently, that’s enough, because he releases me and steps back.
“Wash yourself,” he orders, stepping out of the stall and closing the glass door behind him. “You have five minutes.”
And crossing his arms in front of his massive chest, he leans back against the wall and stares at me, waiting.