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His years of self-discipline kicked in to overtake his grief as he processed each outcome with lightning speed. The minute those political leeches got their hands on the thumb drive Jauhar would be off limits. He would be untouchable, protected as an asset until the powers that be had crawled up his ass and combed through every possible source they could squeeze out of him. Only then, once he was of no further use, would someone like him be called in to eliminate the waste left behind after their plundering. That could take years. Countless other lives could be destroyed under the false flag of national security as different international agencies sat passively by and watched in hopes of gaining a fresher source to do theirbidding.
No.His head shook as he rapidly denied that outcome. He wouldn’t let that happen. He understood the game. He’d played his part flawlessly in the past, but this was personal. He couldn’t play by their rules on this one. He owed Thalia her freedom. She deserved a life free of the monsters that had ruled over her for so long. Free of the monster inside him. There was only one way to guarantee Thalia’s life would be her own once again: Jauhar had todie.
His stomach void of anything but the acidic pain of regret for what he was about to do, he shouldered his backpack and made his way out of the now darkened graveyard. He told himself it was what was best for Thalia, but in truth he was a selfish coward. He couldn’t face her. He wanted her memory to remain unspoiled for the many lonely years he would face withouther.
Following the twisting alleyways, he came to an abandoned rail station on the far side of the small tourist village. A lone phone booth stood adjacent to the closed ticket office. Grant marched purposefully across the platform and picked up the receiver, dialing the operator for a connection to the hotel suite. He would be long gone before anyone came looking for him. When they did come for him, as he knew they would, his trail would end here. No satellite traces, no signal triangulation. He would be off the grid for the next seventy two hours. Maybeforever.
* * *
Asmall whimperechoed in the darkness as the coarse concrete bit into the bare skin of her knees. She tried to breath past the pain, but kept gagging on the dirty cotton rag they had stuffed to the back of her throat. Her matted hair stuck to the spit and sweat that coated her face. Lose strands had tangled in the piece of cloth they’d used to gag her and tickled her nose as she fought to dislodge the material. Her wrists burned from the rough fibers of the rope binding them behind her back so tight that her shoulders screamed in agony each time she moved even afraction.
She could hear others crying, some openly sobbing in the darkness around her. Her own pain and shame faded a little as she wondered if they too were naked. If they had been stripped of their clothes in broad daylight and tossed from man to man, their hands roaming and inspecting places on their bodies no other had touched before. She didn’t wish it upon them, but believing she wasn’t alone helped calm the panic inside. She believed she would wake up, that it was all a nightmare, but as the hours turned into days of nothing but darkness and pain she knew, deep inside, she was going to diehere.
The room she was in had been sectioned off into make-shift stalls with sheets hung from wires strung from the weathered, pot-marked ceiling. It reminded her of an emergency room, but with no sterile equipment or busy nurses running from patient to patient. The floors were bare concrete, the walls painted a putrid green and peeling from years of neglect. Her stall had a stained and smelly mattress for her to lie on and nothing else. She was kept naked and bound in total darkness. Except when, every few hours, a man they called Stu would open the door to their room. Blinding light from the rows of overhead florescent bulbs would flood her senses, making her head throb and her eyes sting. She could not see anything beyond the tattered sheets surrounding her stall, but she could hear the screams of each girl as they were taken from the room, one by one. Darkness would once again cocoon them as the door was slammed closed, the click of the lock sealing her fate until it was her time togo.
Voices, loud and angry, shouting beyond the door shook her from her thoughts of the other girls. Fear, cold and violent, raced through her veins as the door opened again and more blinding light flooded the room. She could hear the scuffling of shoes as they approached her, a few wicked chuckles echoing around her like ghosts. Her lungs filled with acid as breath after breath she fought not to gag or scream. Maybe if she was quiet enough they would forget abouther.
“I told you. She wasn’t to be kept with the others.”A harsh accent she couldn’t place sounded beyond the curtain before it was yankedaway.
Instinctively her body flinched, turning away from the large man who stood looming over her, his arms above his head as his fingers hung from the wire above. Through her light-deprived eyes she could only make out a gauzy shadow as he released the wire and moved closer. When she tried to move away she fell from her kneeling position, and her cheekbone slapped against the cold, gritty concrete, sending more waves of pain through herskull.
“Now, now. Can’t have you scarring up that pretty face.”She tried to fight him off, but was helpless against the ropes that bound her as his hands wrapped around her aching arms and yanked her to her feet like a lifeless doll.“Having funyet?”
She squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head away from the foul smell of his breath. He’d been drinking. His smelly body was pressed against her naked skin, his fists clenched in her hair.“When someone asks you a question, you answer it like a good littlebitch.”
She shook her head, unsure of what the question even was. The only thing she could think about was getting away from him.Please, please, please.Her thoughts begged and screamed the words her mouthcouldn’t.
“That’s a good little princess.”His fists fell from her hair and she was released from his hold. His fingers framed her chin and turned her head, his thumb caressing the burning scratch on her cheek.“We’ve only just begun, little girl. Mind your manners and this will be a lot easier foryou.”
As he turned to usher her from the room a deafening, blood-chilling scream filled the hallway beyond the door. Her battered legs froze in place, unwilling and unable to take another step toward the door that so many others had disappeared through. The man pushed her forward and she stumbled back another step. No! Please! I can’t go with you! Please don’t make me!Please!
“Please! I’m begging you! Let mego!”
“Natalie!” Frantic, Daniel rushed into the bedroom. “Natty, honey. It’s just a dream. You’re safe,honey.”
Drenched in sweat, Thalia kicked out, her legs flailing against the sheets as she sat up in the bed and scrambled away from the man looming over her.Daniel Gregory.Her chest burned, each breath harder to take in as her memory of the last few hours pushed its way through thepanic.
“Breathe, Natty. It’s okay. I won’t hurt you.” Daniel stayed at the foot of the bed, his hands held out toher.
She didn’t know those hands. She shut her eyes and bit back a scream of frustration. If she didn’t get control now, she would lose her mind forever. Closing out the world around her, she forced herself to focus. Breath after breath, she allowed the space inside her mind to expand a little further until finally she was able to open hereyes.
“What happened in yourdream?”
The redhead’s voice filled the space in the room where Daniel had been. He was gone, but Thalia could hear someone shuffling about in the next room. “I never remember.” She shrugged and looked away. A shiver of residual fear fluttered beneath her skin. It wasn’t an entirely true statement anymore, but whoever this woman was, she didn’t need to know. “Where’sGrant?”
“You don’t have to talk about it, but it might help if youdid.”
“Trust me.” Thalia flung the covers away and slid from the bed, her ankle protesting the weight, but was surprisingly less swollen than it had been earlier. “If I remembered I’d tell you all about it, because you’resucha close friend, right?” She pulled her shirt up and over her head, enjoying the embarrassment and shock on the woman’s face as she limped into the adjoining bathroom. “That’s what best friends do, right? Tell each other their deepest, darkestsecrets.”
The sound of the spray hitting the shower floor drowned out whatever reply the woman may have had.Just what I need, someone else to hover.Thalia allowed the hot, steamy water to wash the sweat and grime from her body. Too bad it couldn’t wash the last year and a half from her mind as easily. God, she wanted more than anything for Grant to come in and join her, to make love to her aching body and take her away from all of the relentless questions that were demanding answers she didn’thave.
When she exited the shower, a fresh change of clothes lay on the opulent counter top, mocking her foul mood.Damn her.She closed her eyes and tried to massage away the nagging ache growing in her temples. She hated being a bitch. They seemed like nice people, but all she wanted to do was scream at them to leave her the hell alone and get back to finding a way to Jauhar. She didn’t know why Issa had lied to her, but it didn’t keep her from loving him. Jauhar still had to pay for hismurder.
She pulled on the fresh blue jeans and tank top before fingering the larger tangles from her hair and pulling it back with a rubber band she found around a clump of other toiletries sitting beside the sink. Her mouth watered when she spotted the fresh toothbrush and toothpaste packaged neatly beside the sink. It had been a while since she’d felt this clean. She wasn’t sure if her heart could take another look of pity from Grant, but at least now she felt strong enough to set him straight.Shit! Shit! Shit!Missing a step, her swollen ankle collided with the cabinet. “Ouch.” As long as she didn’t have to run anywhere she should be able to hold herown.
Twenty-One
What doyou mean he’s gone?Thalia could hear herself asking that question over and over in her mind as she sat crammed like a sardine into an aisle seat on a jumbo jet bound for the U.S. The flight attendants made their way down the aisle, pushing and shoving the bags into the overhead compartments as the last few passengers boarded and they prepared fortakeoff.
