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It didn’t.
It wasn’t until I heard a crunching sound behind me that I felt the first stirrings of oh shit and turned, bringing my knee up automatically as I did. My training from Bran didn’t fail me this time, but I’d heard my assailant too late.
I barely saw him sidestep my maneuver before I felt a prick in my neck. Then everything went black.
I don’t know how long I was out. When I came to, it was slowly, and I had a killer headache. Wherever I was, it was pitch black and utterly silent. As I woke, I worked on tamping down the panic that was threatening to consume me, and took short, shallow breaths.
My wrists were bound together, but my ankles were free, and I wasn’t gagged. I could feel the cold floor beneath my butt and a draft in the room that made me shiver. I was cold, like down to my bones cold, so I figured I’d probably been on the floor for at least a few hours.
I wondered if Alani had gotten hold and told her parents what was going on, and if she’d called Cade told him where I was. I hoped so, and the thought of an alternate scenario was more than I could handle in that moment, so I pushed the worries away.
I needed to focus, plan, and prepare.
Focus on my situation, plan what to do when whoever tranqued me came back, and mentally prepare myself for all of the possible outcomes.
That’s what I was doing when I heard the scrap of steel against steel.
Light came through the opening, bit by bit, until the room was illuminated and I was blinking rapidly as my eyes tried to adjust. The rapid change from dark to light allowed the large man to seemingly be at the entrance one moment, and towering above me the next.
When my eyes finally adjusted, I took in the large, muscular man in front of me, and knew it was the same man who’d come up behind me earlier.
“What are you going to do?” I asked, my voice coming out in a rasp.
“Well, Delila Horton from Greenswood, private investigator and mother of two,” he began, making my already chilled body freeze over with his words. He’d obviously taken my wallet and gone through it. I hated the thought that he had my address and business card, even though we were thousands of miles away from home, but the fact that he’d laid his beady eyes on my babies filled my heart with rage.
“Fuck you,” I spat, livid despite my predicament.
His response was a chuckle, which only made me angrier.
“No thanks,” he replied, and I caught a hint of an accent, although I had no idea where it was from. “But don’t worry, a lot of our buyers like them feisty … and old.”
I would have been incensed over the old comment, if I wasn’t stuck on the word buyers.
“What do you mean…” I began, but was cut off when he grabbed me by my wrists and yanked me to my feet.
“Let’s go, we’ve got to hose you off before the party tonight. Our buyers aren’t picky, but the boss has a rule about no smelly merchandise.”
I tried to drag my feet in order to keep him from pulling me from the room, my mind reeling at the thought of being taken and sold like cattle. I knew my struggle was pointless when he picked me up, tossed me over his shoulder, and carried me out of the room.
It was hard, but I pushed my fear back and focused on my surroundings. Where we walked, the sounds filtered in between containers, along with the pungent smell of fish and the ocean. It was hard to see, because every time I tried to lift my head up to look around, the big oaf jostled me around on his shoulder, forcing me to fall back down. His ginormous ass my only view.
When he stopped, I heard him opening a door and lifted my head up a fraction to look around.
We were in between stacks of containers, but it looked like we were entering the inside of the ship. I wasn’t sure if a ship like this had cabins or rooms or what, although I assumed if there were workers living on this ship for months at a time, there must be some sort of living setup.
I feared I was about to find out more than I ever wanted to know.
I heard women screaming as we crossed the threshold, then the sounds of male voices shouting, and finally a loud noise followed by whimpers.
My stomach cramped as I wondered what I was about to not only see, but become a part of. I could only hope that help was on the way.
One moment I was over the oaf’s shoulder, and the next I was thrown down to the ground, landing unceremoniously on my butt.
“Hey!” I shouted, ready to surge to my feet.
The oaf must have read my intention, because he pointed a beefy finger at me and said, “Stay,” like I was a goddamn dog.
I glared at him, then turned my head to see another goon standing in front of girls, holding a large hose. Young, frightened girls. They were scattered around the room on the floor. Some sitting, some laying down, some curled in a ball. They were all naked and shivering, and would be more so when he opened the valve and started spraying them down.
