4
Endless time goes by, and I am nothing but a walking virus.
I puke, burn with diarrhea, and sneeze so hard my eyes nearly pop out of my skull. I pace the cell with hours of insomnia before passing out somewhere, often near the pile of dead flies. I’m like a wild animal eating and drinking my way through seven baskets of supplies, desperate to feel better, but I vomit it all back up again.
It gets worse when my period comes, a disgusting experience as I don’t have any sanitary pads. Blood stains the mattress I sleep on and blotchy red trails mar the cobbled floors. Since I can do nothing about it, it’s a practice of wash and wash, keep washing, until it passes.
But my period isn’t the only thing to pass.
After a long night on the can, emptying from both ends, I wake up feeling totally different, aware the second my mind switches to conscious mode. I peel my face off the tiled bathroom wall and gaze through puffy, raw eyes into the shadows. The quietness is serene; a low drone in the drum of my ears. The warm air on my skin is nice, no longer clammy, and that crazy, burning need of relief in my veins and chest is gone. I grab my chest where it’s a little tight, as is my neck when I stretch from left to right, making it crack. But nothing hurts beyond what I can tolerate.
I don’t understand this metamorphosis.
Taking things one step at a time, I reel out some toilet tissue and wipe myself clean, leaning over to use water from the sink, splashing between my legs. I pull up my shorts before flushing and wince in slight pain to stand. My spine twinges, but it’s zilch compared to the suffering I’ve been through over—what’s felt like—weeks of torment. It’s as if overnight, or however long I was out for, all my symptoms just disappeared. I don’t know if this is normal or if the last basket of food and water was spiked with something. If it was, I’m not sure I care. I would have given anything to feel normal.
Hunching over to ease my tender stomach, I lumber into the bedroom, working on an intuitive level. The creamy stench of soup is gone, replaced with...hmmm, an aromatic floral fragrance. Lavender. My eyes land on the incense stick burning near an air vent in the corner, white smoke snaking through the atmosphere.
This attentiveness is confusing. Am I not Robert’s captive?
I bend for the towels stacked near the main door, scoop up some toiletries, and I hobble back into the bathroom. I pull the string hanging near the cracked doorframe, and a tube light buzzes on. The bathroom is small and narrow, tiled from floor to ceiling in burnt orange terracotta, as is the cool tiled floor under my feet. There are no windows.
It’s insane to think I’ve been in and out of this room at least one hundred times, yet I’ve not mentally filtered what it looks like.
The shower in the corner doesn’t have any edges, just a hose hanging above a drain in the ground. I lean in to flick on the faucet, hooking the towels on the squeaky rail while dropping the toiletries in the tray. I turn for the sink to brush my teeth, wincing as the paste initially stings.
My numb state shatters when I see my reflection in the dusty mirror, when I look at the sunken blue eyes in an overly defined skull. My skull. Using the heel of my palm, I wipe a patch clean. My dark red hair is full of grease, hanging flat around my gray, freckly face. My lips are dry and cracked, too, covered in some sort of white foamy shit. It’s not the toothpaste. It’s a sign of dehydration.
Charlie wouldn’t recognize this girl staring back at me. I don’t. This is not the Blaire I know.
My chest aches with the mere thought of him tearing me up inside. Why is he taking so long to come for me? I strip from the filthy clothes, dump them on the floor by the toilet, and tiptoe into the shower, swearing I won’t cry. He will come for me. I know it. He said he loved me. People don’t say that unless they mean it, do they?
I hope they don’t.
The shower temperature hurdles between boiling hot and ice cold, like my fever a few days ago. I jump and groan in reaction, rushing to wash with the soap and my nails. I catch another glimpse of the silver bite mark on my forearm but glance away. I can’t let Maksim into my mind right now. I’m already hurting over the fact that Charlie might not be coming for me. Anything else will crush me.
When I’m clean, I pat myself dry using a towel, rubbing my long mane until it’s barely damp. I wrap the towel around my boney frame and slog back into my cell, falling face down on the bed with a heavy bounce. I’m determined not to think about anything, knowing the mind is a dangerous place when one is lonely. All I want to do is sleep until this parallel universe I awoke in vanishes—and if there’s anything like a God in the world, Charlie will be here. I just want him back. I don’t want to do this anymore. I’m tired of fighting to live. I want to live to fight.
———
The main door in my cell opens with a loud crash!
I leap out of bed on red alert, scrambling to cover myself in the towel. My skull is throbbing, harder when I focus my sight to see what the hell is happening.
Robert is standing in the main doorway, holding a pile of clothes in his podgy hands. He’s stooped at the neck, glaring at me for whatever reason, with his bulging, hairy stomach hanging over checkered blue shorts—pajama shorts. My eyes widen. That means he’s probably residing here, which also means James might be here, too.
I glance at the open door. Freedom. Then I glance back at Robert, so he doesn’t notice where my thoughts are heading. Kill him. Break free. Return to Charlie.
Robert wrinkles his nose, grimacing as he stares me up and down. “You look like shit.”
My eyebrows shoot up. I grip the towel at my chest with white knuckles. “Maybe because I’ve been sick, but you know that, don’t you?”
“You are okay now, aren’t you?” he snorts, ignoring my question. “You are over the withdrawals. They fade after twelve days like they do for everyone withdrawing from heroin, you dumb kurvë.”
I’ve been here for nearly two weeks? No wonder I feel like time has stood still.
Robert throws the clothes at me, and I instinctively lift a leg to shield my side, cringing into the wall.
“Get dressed, or I’ll do it for you.”
“Why?” I ask, scowling at him from over my shoulder. “What’s going on?”
“What the fuck is going on?!” he yells so hard my ears buzz, running up to me in a storm of screams. “There are videos floating around The Dark Web that your lover has implemented drug and human trafficking sanctions until you are returned! That’s what the fuck is going on!”
My stomach somersaults as I realize he’s still coming for me. But then I think about my brother. Robert is going to severely punish him for this if Charlie doesn’t get to us in time.
“Anyone caught disobeying the sanctions are being considered enemies of the Los Zetas!” Robert screams in my face, losing any essence of sanity. “Good business men are being slaughtered! All my associates are suffering! Deals I’ve set up are on the line!” He grabs his balding head, actually shaking with anger, while I’m gawking like a slack-jawed idiot.
I can’t believe Charlie would risk so much money to get me back.
“To ensure the underworld adheres to his temporary commands,” Robert hisses, “to ensure wars do not break out, Decena is offering up scandalous deals that go live when you’re returned—deals I’ve spent my fucking lifetime trying to solidify!” He spins around and punches the wall next to my head with such power I hear his knuckles crack. “Charlie-fucking-Decena...that fuck, fucking Decena! Do you know that he is the only one allowed to sell drugs on the streets? Do you know that he is raising the price of his stuff by the day until you’re returned? Every fucking day the price goes up!” His hands fist under his chin, like he’s pleading with me for an answer to this problem. “Do you know what all this means? Many of us are going to lose millions—millions! And not to mention the clientele...!” He turns his back on me and paces about my cell like a caged dog, wiping his forehead and flicking his bodily fluids on the floor. “And he’s not even done there. Ohhh no! Do you know what else he’s executing?”
There’s more?
I shake my head to answer his rhetorical question, too stunned to speak.
Robert literally growls, curling his lips against his teeth. “He is slaughtering anyone who has had recent dealings in human trafficking because a traitor tipped him off that you”—he walks up to me and pokes my cheek—“were sold at an auction. Until someone fesses up about selling you, everyone fucking dies!”
My mind flashes to the moment I’m certain I heard someone in the auction room say idiota, Spanish for idiot. Either a Mexican or Spanish associate of Charlie’s must’ve been there. They must’ve told him that they saw me. But, if they did tell him, then he’d know exactly who sold me and exactly who bought me, surely?
I’m so confused.
“The Turks and the Chinese”—Robert is going insane reeling off a list of people Charlie has already publicly executed, using his hands to emphasize numbers—“he’s murdering everyone because of you, you lavire!” he screams with dying passion, tensing from head to toe to get it out. “You cannot even comprehend how much money the human trafficking sanction alone is costing me! And I can’t even give you back...you know I bought you, and look at the fucking state of you...his demands are that you are returned unharmed. Fuck...!”
“This isn’t my fault,” I cut him off from speaking, telling him it’s not James’ fault, either. I’ve had enough of his rambling, and now I know for sure Charlie is coming... “We’ve done nothing wrong. You, bought us. You,” I point at him, surprised he’s even listening to me, “deserve all that is coming. I could have warned you of what Charlie would do if you double-cross him. Even Maksim was frightened of him, and Maksim was frightened of no one.”
Robert’s podgy cheeks tick while he hangs on to his composure by a thread, glaring at me.
“I know Charlie is bad fucking business when mad,” I say. “You should have known that, too, since you were acquaintances. Haven’t you heard the rumors that he takes pleasure in castrating men who wrong him, huh? Don’t you remember him coming to broker peace between you and Maksim? His arrogant bravery to stand against you should you reject the only offer he put on the table to pay for that girl, Arjana?”
He raises a hand as if to slap me, but I lift my chin in insolence. “Do it. But, expect it back in tenfold.”
“Awww,” he growls again, deeper this time, “you are one brave, stupid kurvë.”
I don’t for a second believe he thinks I’m stupid. He’s afraid of me. If he wasn’t, he’d have hit me. Maksim never hesitated.
His raging, brown eyes flitter back and forth between mine in an ominous moment of silence. Then he orders and warns at once, “Get dressed, or I’ll put you to sleep and do it myself, and I’ll likely enjoy it.”
“Why? Where am I going?”
If Charlie is hot on my trail, I don’t want to leave this place. James might be here, and I definitely don’t want to leave him.
“I’ve had enough of your resistance, you kurvë!” Robert grabs my shoulders, but I slap his hands away and shove him with my forearm. He bounces down on the mattress, making the frame squeak under his weight.
“I can get myself dressed,” I say, keeping my chin high and my attitude straight. I bend at the knees to pick up the clothes, moaning in discomfort. My back strains, as does my headache. It throbs in my eyes.
“You’ve got two minutes.” Robert shuffles about to stand, glaring at me. I try to walk past him for the bathroom, but he extends an arm. “There,” he says, “where I can see you.”
I glance at where he’s pointing, the space next to my bed. “No way. I’m not—”
“Last chance, Blaire...” Something wild flares in his eyes as he says my name, and a horrible feeling comes over me. If I don’t do as I’m told, I don’t think it will end well for me.
Listening to my gut instinct, I turn my back on him and huddle in the towel. I pull on a plain black underwear set, struggling to fasten the bra clasp before shrugging into tight black sports trousers, and a matching long-sleeved sweater. That’s when Robert snatches the towel from my hand. I scowl at him from over my shoulder. Iisus Khristos, if I ever get lucky enough to take him out...
“She’s ready,” he says, sneering at me.
I frown at first, but then my hackles come up as a group of men fill my cell one by one, lining the walls. They’re dressed in fitted black clothes with padded areas, and their faces are shielded behind black masks. I take note that they’re all likely trained, standing with their legs open for balance.
My vision tunnels in on one man—who’s holding a syringe full of liquid.
Robert grins at me, and nods right at the man who’s holding the syringe.
I step across the room into the bathroom doorway, gesturing out. “What is that? Wha-what’s in that syringe?”
“You can’t know where you are.” Robert shrugs. “I don’t trust you.”
“But, where are you taking me? Are you sending me back to Charlie? You-you said you were!”
Robert is amused at my anxiety, grinning from ear to ear. I can’t explain why, but I sense he isn’t sending me back to Charlie. It’s in the way he’s looking at me, damn right smug by whatever plan he’s concocted.
“Hey, if you dare touch me with that,” I warn the man coming at me with the syringe, “I’ll tear off your fucking arm.”
“Take her,” Robert commands, and I see red.
———
I wipe sweaty palms down my trousers, standing here stealing a second to gather my equilibrium, to gather my mind. I’m not in the best shape. I’m weak and thin from Maksim’s brutal torture, the heroin, and my head is pounding. But in the light of day, it shouldn’t matter. I was born to fight. If I’m going to die, I should die fighting.
Two combatants run at me, past the man holding the syringe, and adrenaline zaps at my senses.
I grab the right guy’s arm and hurl him across the cell with a deafening scream of strength, then I spin around to hammer my fist in the other’s throat. He chokes on impact, gargling for breath as he drops to his knees. Another man sprints out of line, but I kick him back on instinct, knocking myself off balance as I do. He somersaults across the room while I stumble into the wall.
Robert seizes my moment of weakness. He silently commands more to attack, and a swarm of men come at me, caging me in by the bathroom.
I’m quick on my feet to pledge my defense, dancing around in a clean circle to take them out one by one. I cross-whack my arms to block oncoming punches while kicking out at side assailants, bobbing and weaving whenever necessary. Bodies slam into walls, and others tumble back on their asses. The last man fists a handful of my hair from behind and yanks me back. I whip around to whack the inside of his elbow, buckling his arm, then I draw back and boot him in the stomach with such force he trips over his own feet, crashing into his men.
The bout of energy nearly wipes me out. I double over with hands on my knees, wheezing and heaving for breath. I ache from head to toe, the muscles in my legs burning and cramping, and my skull is absolutely throbbing.
“Stupid girl,” Robert seethes. “Stupid, stupid, girl. James will pay for this, you know?”
I’m aware James will pay for this—and I internally apologize to him—but I can’t just stand here and let Robert take me. He could send me anywhere, and then I’ll never find my brother or Charlie.
From under my eyebrows, I glare up at Robert, mockingly nodding at his men. They’re icing the floor in a messy pile of bodies, groaning and rubbing their wounds. “Is that all you’ve got, huh?”
“You’re going to regret it,” he spits through clenched teeth, and I catch a flicker of movement out the corner of my eye, more men in the corridor outside.
“Ohhh. Come. On,” I moan, watching them flood the room. I’m going to lose this battle. It’d be hard to beat this many on a good day.
It all happens in a blur of action, and I’m more outnumbered now than I was before. It’s hard to fight over all the bodies, too, without to mention the tiny space we’re crammed in. I take a few blows to the face, being shoved about all over the place until someone tackles me to the ground. It knocks the air out of me. We tumble across the cell, all arms and legs scrapping at each other. He’s successful at pinning me down, crushing my chest as he bestrides my body.
“Aargh!” I screech, swiping for his face. “Get! Off!”
“Blaire!” Robert shouts over me at the top of his lungs. “Stop! I mean it, this is your last chance! I’m warning you...!”
“I am Blaire-Markov!” I pull back my fist and clout my attacker in the face, busting his nose. “I will never stop!”
My attacker manages to get his hands around my throat, squeezing so hard his eyes turn red. I choke and gasp in his hold, heaving for air. I kick at the ground to turn us over so I’m straddling his lap, wrestling with all my might. His hands flay about to get me under control, pulling me down by my collar, but I rear-up and pound at his face with lefts and rights, turning him into a bloody, bruised mess.
I’m not ready for it when an arm wraps around my throat from behind. I clamp down on it with my nails, screaming to pry him off, but he’s too strong. We struggle, and his buddy under me shackles his hands around my wrists and stretches them outward, restraining me.
“Agh!” I tense my thighs to crush his ribcage, making him cough and choke. “Fuck you, pizda!”
A sharp prick on my shoulder sets my anger afire, and adrenaline re-zaps. I snap my neck back to head-butt the guy behind and smack my arm to get the needle out. I leap to my feet ready for another round, but a wave of dizziness comes over me. I spill into a wall. My hands slide down the bumpy surface. I open my jaw wide to control the vertigo, forcing my eyes open and shut, but it worsens. It courses too fast. I buckle at the knees, walloping my head on the guy under me. I look around blinking slowly, vision blurring, all the large figures shifting out of focus.
“No...” I say in a breath. “Wob...bert,” I slur his name, struggling to get up as the hazy rush takes hold of my soul. I press into the surface under me. My elbows give way, and I drop like a sack of bones. “Where...are...you...taking...me...? Wob...Wobert!”
Whack! Someone clocks the edge of my jaw, and I black out.