My gut sinks when I see them. I don’t need to ask to know that they’re Kolya’s men.
I’m on the floor near the booths. My feet, still bare, are filthy and sore. My shirt’s still untucked from the exam, a tiny bit of sticky ultrasound gel remaining on my belly. My arms feel bruised from where the kidnappers gripped too hard.
“Thea?”
The voice is small and hoarse, but very familiar. My eyes widen and my heart clenches as I realize who it is.
I turn slowly to see Sylvie seated in one of the booths. She’s thinner—much thinner—and her hair is dull, pulled back into a messy knot. She’s wearing a black dress that doesn’t fit right, like it was given to her when she’d first arrived, and her body’s since shrunk. There are awful shadows under her eyes that look like they live there now.
Tears form in my eyes at the sight of her.
“Sylvie.” I scramble to my feet, unsteady, and hurry toward her. “Oh my God, Sylvie.”
She doesn’t stand. She doesn’t reach for me. She doesn’t move at all, in fact.
I stop and look at her.
Sylvie’s eyes are flat. Not exactly empty, there’s still something behind them, but it’s coiled and hard.
I begin to move toward her again, carefully. I don’t want to scare her off if I move too suddenly.
“Sylvie, it’s me. It’s Thea. Are you okay? What happened to you?”
No response; she just stares.
I clear my throat. “I tried to come back for you at the auction, I swear. But Gabriel wouldn’t let me?—”
“I know.”
Two words. Cold. Bitter.
“I watched you leave,” she says. “I stood on that stage all by myself and watched you leave with that prick.”
“I tried Sylvie.”
“Sasha bought me, if you don’t remember. Bought me for Kolya.” She says Kolya’s name with an ease that makes me sick to my stomach.
My hand moves to my chest. “Sylvie… whatever he did to you…”
Her eyes narrow and suddenly come to life in a way I didn’t expect. “Don’t you dare look at me like that. Don’t you pity me. Youleft. You went to your mansion, and your mafia boyfriend, and your new life, while I stayed here. I survived. And I did it on my own with no one coming to rescue me.”
The words hit me like a slap. Because she’s not wrong. Not entirely.
After my failed attempt at escape, I told myself that there was nothing I could do.Gabriel prevented me from leaving. Maybe I gave up too quickly. I didn’t even ask him for help in getting Sylvie back. I asked Amanda.And all the while, I was sleeping in silk sheets in a huge mansion while my friend was being broken in a nightclub basement by the man who killed my family.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, tears streaming down my face. “I’m so sorry.”
“I said, don’t pityme.”
She looks away. Her jaw is tight; her hands folded in her lap. She’s perfectly still, but in a way that suggests she’s trying her best to stay totally emotionless.
“Don’t be sorry,” she says. “You made a choice, now stand by it.”
What could I possibly say to her now to make things right? I didn’t try hard enough to get her back, and now Kolya has apparently warped her into his own personal plaything.
There’s nothing I can do to fix it.
Regardless, I try to think of something else to say. Anything. But before I can, a door opens at the back of the club. Sylvie’s eyes flick to the sound, and she sits up right away, her eyes flashing with readiness.
