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And then the drugged haze receded just enough and I remembered. Cal! Cal was dead. And Rufus, too. I’d pushed myself up to hands and knees but now I slumped back to the floor and wept. The kindest, gentlest guy I’d ever met in my life and he was gone, executed. And Rufus…. Who could shoot Rufus?!
I’d gotten them both killed. If I’d just accepted my fate, that night in Ralavich’s bedroom, they’d still be alive.
I cried and cried until it turned into heaving, snotty wails. A few of the other women came and put their hands gently on my back but no one said it’ll be okay, because we all knew it wasn’t going to be.
I nearly gave up, right there. But then I thought of Cal and the way he’d looked at me when he’d given me that pep talk as we ran for our lives. He’d said I was brave. I sure didn’t feel it, but he’d said I was. He’d believed in me.
Giving up isn’t what he would have wanted.
And it wasn’t just about me: there were nine other women here and I couldn’t let them wind up in some Russian brothel. I had to do something.
I pushed myself up to standing, my legs shaking, and wiped the tears from my eyes. And then I started examining the walls, looking for a way out.
63
Cal
I JUMPED OVER A BUSH, crashed through some branches and—
An air horn blasted my ears.
I registered that the forest had stopped, but I was moving so fast that I was already halfway across the asphalt before I stumbled to a stop.
The air horn shredded my eardrums again. I looked that way and saw the eighteen-wheeler bearing down on me, the fender only twenty feet away. I dodged back out of the way and it blasted past, the slipstream stealing what remained of my breath. I checked around for Rufus, terrified, but then saw him safe at the edge of the trees. He was blinking at me, like, what are you doing?
The freeway. We’d reached the freeway. We were nearly there!
The mansion was on the other side so we had to wait for a gap in the traffic. I spent the time bent over, sucking in lungfuls of much-needed air. Now that I’d stopped, my muscles got in touch with my brain and started telling it about every mile they’d run. First, they burned like they were filled with lava. Then they started to tighten up and it was like the lava was cooling and setting into rock, shot through with jagged lightning bolts of pain.
A gap opened up in the traffic. We hurried across and ran on.
Just over the next rise, I saw a huge white mansion at the end of a long, winding driveway. We took cover in the scrubby undergrowth while I checked it out. There were high hedges and razor-wire-topped fences, guys on guard duty, and electric gates. This was the place.
I turned to Rufus. “You stay here. This is going to be dangerous.” I ruffled his fur, then started across the open ground. Halfway to the hedge, I realized he was beside me. “No! Rufus, no!” I hurried back to the undergrowth with him and pushed him down into a sit. “Stay! Dangerous!”
I set out again. Before I’d gone three steps, he’d caught up and was running alongside me. “Rufus—” I began, exasperated.
He tilted his head to the side and gave me a look that very clearly said you are not leaving me behind again!
I sighed. I’d missed having him with me when we were being hunted. And we’d been in this together since the start. Plus, it wasn’t like he was giving me a choice. “Okay, fine,” I said and ruffled his fur. “Let’s do this.”
The hedge was designed to look pretty, not keep people out, and we just rammed our way through it. The real barrier was the wire fence just beyond it, but with Rufus keeping watch, I cut a hole with the knife I’d taken from Alik’s belt and we belly-crawled through. Then we were up and running for the house.
A guard turned, saw us and brought his radio up to his mouth. I swung the assault rifle and clubbed him to the ground without stopping. Another one raised his gun. Rufus leaped and sank his teeth deep into the man’s gun arm. He screamed and I punched him in the face.
We raced up the steps and I staggered to a stop outside the huge double doors. This was it. I could feel the rage thundering through my veins. This was the nest those rich bastards had slithered out of. This was where they’d taken her, and all the others like her. Where they planned to—
I growled and reached for the door handle. But before my hand could close on it, the door opened on its own. A tall, thin, bald guy in an expensive suit stood there, as surprised to see me as I was him. He took in my plaid shirt, torn and leaf-covered from racing through the forest; my mud-stained jeans and dirty boots, the panting dog beside me. His lip curled in disgust and he opened his mouth to banish us. Behind him, I glimpsed marble tiles and a huge chandelier. This was his world, and we didn’t belong.
