He estimates there are twenty units minimum.
Jules and Savannah are safe.
Alistair is a selfish pragmatist.Lachlan trusts him to conserve resources, and Ariadne’s bed seemed to be self-sufficient for life support.
Lachlan still has no fucking clue what was going on in the blue room, but he can take a wild guess it was something along the lines of a blood transfusion.These fucking monsters quite literally eat their young it seems.The bad feeling remains in his gut but there are others to contend with now.
‘Please,’ Madeline Delacroix begs of Fenwick.‘Pleaselet us have water.Anything you want.Money.We have so much—’
A soldier punches her in the mouth, and she sobs on the floor.
Lachlan stays quiet, knows better than to ask for anything.
A crunch point looms on the horizon for him in terms of water.They’ll either decide he’s useless or accept that he needs some to survive.He has a nasty, niggling suspicion about how they’lladministerthe water, though.
And maybe somewhere else, Lachlan could push four days without water away from the heat and sunlight, but the island is practically under a magnifying glass.His skin is already sunburnt.His body is scorched and there’s no shade to be had where they keep him.
Exposure is brutal.
‘Your money means nothing,’ Fenwick tells her.‘Bring them in.’
Lachlan stays outwardly neutral, but his insides tighten.
He has a feeling they’re about to up the ante.Wake comes in with Mikhail and Roman, flanked on either side.Roman keeps his gaze down, lip split, black eye.He’s visibly dehydrated like everyone else but otherwise not too bad.
Sorrenko is brought in next, limping badly, covered in tacky blood that won’t dry in this humidity.One of the remaining medics, wearing formerly white scrubs, now a patchwork quilt of red and brown, is brought in with Richard Vale, whose face is a red mess, jaw dislocated.
Fenwick’s boots crunch atop glass as he circles, surveying everyone.
‘So, who’s thirsty?’
‘Please,’ Vale begs in a dry rasp.‘Please.’
‘I think,’ Craig says, playing silenteenie meaniebut Lachlan knows exactly where it’ll land, ‘we’re gonna see how thirsty… the bodyguard is.’
Lachlan is dragged up while the others complain loudly.Lachlan briefly catches Sorrenko’s eye, can’t sign or speak, he just shakes his head minutely.
Two men drag Lachlan to the nearest strip of beach.It’s rough and unattractive, littered with beach weeds and debris from the storm.This isn’t the lovely slice of paradise with netted waters and combed sand.
The waves are tantalisingly blue.
Lachlan’s tongue is thick and dry, head pounding.
‘So,’ Fenwick says when they reach the waves.‘Feeling chatty today?’
They trained him for drown resistance in RB, but it’s only useful to a point because there’s nothing you can do to calm your body once it knows it’s drowning.Waterboarding is terrifying.
Two men keep guns trained on him while Fenwick kicks him onto his back in the sand, surveying from above.He’s holding a bucket and a towel.
It’s only water.
Blaire said water is God, or God is water.
‘Or are you gonna make work for it?’
Lachlan slows his breathing, wills his heart to calm.‘Guess.’
The towel is forced over Lachlan’s face.
