“You’re all heart,” says Mace.
“I’d like to think so, and on that note, I’ll say goodnight.”
“Wait, I want to speak to her!” I say, making a grab for the phone, but Ash shows me the screen. Ilya’s hung up.
“No one speaks,” he says, gesturing to the door.
As we all file out, Ash strides ahead, hands in his pockets and his head down, deep in thought. Hunter and Mace fall in beside me. They each press a hand to my shoulder and the combined weight should pull me down, but it lifts me. We trek back through the woods in silence, and I cling to the image of Quinn with our baby, and me holding both of them. It’s too much to hope for, but it’s hope I didn’t have half an hour ago.
When we reach the SUV, Ash is waiting. Mace and Hunter climb in, and I’m about to follow when Ash hauls me back. He slams the car door shut, then slams me up against it.
“Next time I give you a fucking order, you obey!” he roars, jabbing a finger into my chest. “You could have wiped us all out with your stupid, reckless behavior!”
I square my shoulders. “This is my fucking fight!” I yell back at him. It’s as much of a shock to me as it is to Ash that I’m answering him back, but I keep talking while he’s still deciding how to react. “I don’t want or expect any of you to take unnecessary risks, but as far as I’m concerned, Quinn’s worth dying for. I’ll scorch the earth to find her, and you’d better not stand in my way. I’m not adamn kid anymore.”
“I know you’re not, Reid, because you’re about to become a fucking father!” He shakes his head. Doesn’t speak. “Fuck,” he says under his breath, and then I see it. The curve of his lips that wants to tug into a smile. “We’re with you, brother, all the way. We’ll get Quinn back, and I promise you now,we’llbe the ones treating her like a fucking princess.”
Chapter 29
Quinn
Acloth bag is placed over my head and I’m dragged out of my cell. My bare feet slap against concrete, and the ground starts to feel warmer as more light filters through the fabric covering my face. I’m being led out into the open, and the sun’s shining.
I’d lost track of time in my constantly lit cell. I can’t tell if the food they’re giving me is for breakfast, lunch or dinner because it’s the same grey slop every time. I can’t even be sure I’ve had three meals a day. My welfare is low down on their agenda. I’m still in my underwear and I haven’t had any water to wash with. I’ve barely had enough to drink.
The fresh air is a welcome relief, but it’s dry and scorched, and I don’t hear the birdsong I’d become familiar with in Poulton Springs. I’d already worked out that I wasn’t being held in Barrett’s stable block.
The weathered masonry and peeling paint of my cell had quickly robbed me of the last vestiges of hope that I was being kept somewhere where Reid could find me. Wherever I am, the climate is alien to me. It’s beenunbearably hot in my cell, and the dry heat is the confirmation I don’t want that I’m far away from Illinois, and Reid.
I can’t keep up with Mikhail’s long strides, and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to. A doctor had given me an all-too-thorough examination while two men held me down, and I presume the results of whatever tests he’d conducted are back. I’m theirs to do with as they please – just like they’re doing to all the other women I can hear crying out in various languages. I’d tried calling out to them, but they’re too afraid to answer. None of their cries sound like Blake, which I try to take as a good sign.
When I step on a stone and stumble, Mikhail curses in Russian, and grabs hold of my neck. “Walk like a fucking regular person,” he hisses.
“You mean someone who doesn’t have a bag over their head and their hands tied in front of them?”
He tightens his grip on my neck. “There are steps in front of you. Walk up them or I’ll throw you over my shoulder.”
I make slow progress, too slow for Mikhail and he hauls me off my feet. Only he doesn’t throw me over his shoulder, he carries me bridal style into another building. The care he’s displaying feels ominous, and when he starts carrying me up a set of stairs, I struggle against his hold. That’s where the bedrooms will be.
“If I drop you down a flight of stairs,” Mikhail says carefully, “you and I are both going to wish we were dead.”
I don’t understand why Mikhail would face punishment, but I don’t care. Despite my continued resistance, he reaches a door and kicks it open. My feet are set down on linoleum, or some similar floor covering that’s practical for efficient clean-ups. I wish I didn’t have such an active imaginationsometimes.
When Mikhail pulls off my face covering, I’m standing in a dimly lit bedroom with a queen size bed. There are closed shutters on the outside of the windows, and bars on the inside, but compared to my last holding cell, this is luxurious. Except it’s not built for my comfort. It’s for my captors’ pleasure. I can’t believe it’s come to this.
In desperation, I look over at the dressing table. There are brackets to hold a mirror, but the mirror is missing. I would have smashed it and used a shard to cut Mikhail’s throat, but I presume that’s why it was removed. I’m defenseless, and so damn stupid. How did I ever think this would work?
Mikhail must see the sense of futility in my face because he unsheathes a knife and turns it in his hand, soaking up my growing terror. “I have orders not to harm you, but if you cause any trouble, there are ways I can make you suffer that won’t be pleasant.”
He has orders not to harm me? Does that include not going through with his threat ofbreaking me in? I don’t know what to expect next, and I’m stunned when Mikhail grabs my bound wrists and slices his blade through the ties like butter.
“Why am I here?” I ask, rubbing my abraded wrists.
“Do I look like a fucking tour guide?” he snarls. He tips his head to the far side of the room. “There’s a bathroom. Get cleaned up. Ilya will see you when he’s ready.”
The leap I make isn’t a pleasant one. Is Ilya keeping me for himself? Fuck him if he thinks I’m getting washed.
Once I’m alone, I pull a gloriously clean sheet from the bed and wrap it around me. I perch on the edge of the mattress and rock myself as I await my fate.
