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He stopped.
“Jesus.”
His eyes moved over the burns, bruises, blood, and sweat Isabeast had left behind.
The second guard glanced over. “What?”
“Look at him. This is more than Delgado ordered.”
No shit.
The first man disappeared to the sink and returned with a wet cloth and a towel.
“Hold still.”
“You lads really do know how to make a man feel special.”
He ignored me and wiped dried blood from the corner of my mouth, then worked carefully around the cut on my cheek before dragging the cloth down my neck and chest.
The water should have felt good.
Instead, having water rubbed over me when I couldn’t drink any of it felt like another form of torture.
The other guard crouched to check the ankle restraints while the operator opened the laptop and began testing the camera angle.
“Leave the cheek alone,” he said without looking up. “We don’t want it to start bleeding.”
“Then Delgado should’ve kept his fucking psychopath from playing torturer.”
That shut both of them up.
The operator looked through the camera, pointed toward me, and said something in Spanish.
Both guards grabbed the chair. They hauled me several feet toward the front of the dungeon and angled it toward the camera.
My ribs objected to every jolt.
The move left Isabella’s hidden panel behind me and off to the right, well outside the camera’s frame.
One less thing to worry about.
The operator made a few adjustments, checked the laptop, then stepped back.
The guard who’d cleaned me headed out. The other moved to the open dungeon door and took up position with his rifle across his chest.
Farther out in the corridor stood an older man I hadn’t seen before.
Gray touched his dark hair at the temples, and a radio hung from his belt. He said nothing, just watched the guards, the equipment, and the doorway before giving me one quick assessment.
He didn’t stare or posture. His attention simply moved on.
Interesting.
I filed him away for later.
The room settled into an uneasy quiet while the camera operator ran whatever final checks the equipment required.
Then the guard at the door straightened.
