His eyes narrow, blond, bushy brows drawing together as he dangles a syringe from his fingers. “You want this, sweet Red? Medicine to make everything fun again?”
“Yes. Please.” I’m so scared, my whole body is shaking, and if I can’t get out of this room in the next few minutes, I’ll pass out, and he’ll do…God knows what to me.
The syringe lands on the bed. “Not yet.” Kolya lunges for me, and I’m too slow, too weak to get away. His fingers tighten on my arm, hard enough to leave yet another bruise, and he spins me around and bends me over the bed. I yelp and thrash, but he pins my arms at the small of my back. “I am not going to kill you, sweet Red. I am going to keep you. And I want you to understand what that means.”
“No!” I scream. “Don’t!” He’s hard already, grinding against me through his pants. “Get off of me!”
Kolya laughs, pulls a thin rope from the nightstand, and has it looped around my wrists in a few seconds. Helpless, terrified, I kick him, and I must find his dick, because he goes down with a groan. I have to get free. I aim another kick in the same general area, and this time, I hit his balls.
Working my wrists, I rub them raw in seconds, but he never knotted the rope, and it starts to loosen. My right hand pops free, and I lunge for my hidden weapon. Swinging wildly, I connect with the side of his head.
“Cyka!Kolya growls as blood wells at his temple. My pitiful strike did nothing but daze him and piss him off, and I try again, grunting as I bring the metal down on the top of his skull. But the impact sends the thin float arm clattering to the floor, and I scramble back, almost falling on my ass. The needle glints in the lights. Can I dose him before he overpowers me?
I pause for a single second, the lure of not caring when he rapes me stronger than I expect, but then I hear Ryker’s voice in my head.“I care, Wren. I care.”
If he’s alive, I have to get out of here and get back to him. Because…I care too. More than I knew. Snatching the needle from the bed, I lunge at Kolya. He tries to knock my arm away, but my knee lands on his already abused dick, and his reflexes kick in, his hands trying to protect his family jewels. My heartbeat roars in my ears, and my fingers tremble, but I make a fist and punch him in the eye. Pain sings up my arm. I grab a metal lamp from the nightstand and swing it towards his forehead. But it’s too heavy, and it glances off his temple. Still…it’s enough to make him slump to the floor.
Forcing a deep breath, I angle his head and aim for the pulsing vein on the side of his neck.Please. Please work.As soon as the needle pierces his skin, I depress the plunger.
Koyla lunges for me, and I go down hard as he jerks my ankle. But his grip loosens a few seconds later, and he groans, then curls into a ball. His limbs move slowly, like he doesn’t quite know how arms and legs work, and as I watch, his entire body goes slack.
“Hey, asshole.” I should run. He doesn’t answer, and I wave my hand in front of his face. His eyes barely track my movements. I stumble towards the bedroom door, then realize I’m naked. A wave of nausea has me retching, but there’s nothing left in my stomach to throw up. Still, my eyes water, and I can’t move until the sensation passes.Get your marbles together, Wren. Find your stuff and get the hell out of here.
There. In the corner by the bathroom. My bag. I destroyed my tablet, but dammit…I don’t want him to have anything of mine. My shredded clothes are gone, and I try to remove his shirt—needingsomethingto cover my body, but I can’t manage the tiny mother-of-pearl buttons, so I give up. The ankle chain digs deeper into my skin as I creep towards the door. Listening carefully, I hear laughter, but it’s far away, like maybe downstairs, and when I peer out into the hall, I’m alone.
With one last glance back at Kolya, who’s staring at the ceiling with a blissed out look on his face, I creep towards the stairs. But voices head my way, and I stifle my gasp as I dart into another room and try to quietly shut the door.
Kolya’s office. The chair he tied me to still sits in the middle of the room, righted now. On the desk, his computer is on…and Cracker Jacks…unlocked. I crouch down, ready to dive under the desk if the door opens. But when nothing happens after a few minutes, I stare at his computer screen.
Elena copied a lot of his financial records. But not everything. The men outside the door are joking and laughing, and I’m trapped. Digging into my bag, I pull out a USB stick and slide it into his computer. My breath catches in my chest as the progress bar fills the screen. All of those idiotic espionage shows where a rogue hacker transfers the contents of someone’s hard drive in five minutes, whispering, “come on, come on, come on,” at the screen? Total horse-pucky. But my little drive installs a trojan so I can access his computer from the safe house. If I ever get back there.
Fifty percent, sixty, seventy… I glance at the door, praying the men don’t come in here. Or go check on Kolya. At one hundred percent, I yank the stick out of the drive and tuck it into my bag. I need the encryption key on it to open the portal.
I stand up too quickly, and the room spins around me. A moan escapes my lips before I can control myself, and the voices stop. Looking around wildly, I stumble over to French doors that lead out onto a balcony. I can’t fight. I have to get out of here now.
My first try, my hand is so sweaty and shaking it slips off the handle. Rubbing my palm on my bare thigh, I try again, and an icy wind chills me to the bone. The door snicks shut, and I creep towards the far end of the balcony.
The freezing concrete makes the soles of my feet tingle. I suck in a breath, my lungs rattling. Crashing to my hands and knees, I sway, falling against the metal railing.
In the dim light seeping through the drapes, I catch sight of the multiple, red, swollen puncture marks from Kolya’s injections.
Move, Wren.
My fingers curl around the top of the railing, and I pull myself up, staring down at the frosty ground four stories below. I can’t…I’m trapped. My chest tightens, and I wheeze, looking around wildly for any possible escape.
An awning one floor down. But it’s so far away. I’ll have to jump from this balcony to the next. And the next. Then let myself fall. I can’t do this. I’ll die.
Except…I’ll die here if I don’t try.
Throwing my leg over the freezing metal, I wheeze.Fight through it. You can panic when you’re free.
I catch my foot on the railing when I try to jump to the next balcony, and flop over the other railing, the impact driving the air from my lungs.
My head hits the concrete as I crash to the concrete. “Get up, Wren. Keep moving.”
Dizzy, shivering, and desperate, I scramble over the next railing and leap, barely managing to stay on my feet. Oh Cracker Jacks. This balcony is at the end of the upstairs hallway. And the drapes are open. Shadows move in my periphery, and as I reach the corner closest to the awning, muffled shouts send terror coursing through me. Blondie and the Groper burst through the doors, guns drawn.
I don’t think—can’t, anyway—and let myself tumble down onto the awning. I roll, unable to stop myself, until I fall off the edge with a scream.
