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Yerik smiled a little. “Excellent. Well done, Oleg. Dismissed.”
Oleg nodded and left the door open.
Holding on to his rage, Yerik made his way down to the basement. There was a padded interrogation room wired with cameras and audio recording. Next door was the torture room. Next to it, a deprivation room that Yerik felt was an even better torture, because it took a person down mentally and emotionally, as well as physically. Two soldiers stood at the entrance to the interrogation room. They stepped aside and opened the door. Yerik strode in. Sky sat at the small, rectangular table, a pitcher of water and two paper cups on it. He saw wariness come to her eyes as he entered and quietly shut the door.
“You disappoint me,” Yerik said softly, coming around and sitting on the opposite side of the dilapidated table. He picked up the pitcher and poured himself some water. Sky’s face was scratched, but not badly. She was dirty. He saw debris and mud plastered across the front of her green tee. Saw the palpable beat of her heart beneath against her slender throat. Her hair was tangled, bits of leaves and soil in it. She must have fallen at least once. Sipping the water, his eyes never leaving hers, he knew the value of silence. Torture was all about timing. And he was a Master of It. Yerik saw her hands gripping her cup, saw her knuckles going white as she stared back at him. Yes, she was terrified. Sky wasn’t as stupid as he’d thought. She knew he was angry. The look in her eyes told him she was waiting for him to physically strike her.
He smiled shortly as he set the glass down. “What? Nothing to say, Sky?”
Sky stared at Yerik’s hooded eyes, felt his leashed rage toward her. “I want to go home,” she said in a firm voice. “I was going to marry Cal. You took me away from him. I don’t want to be here.”
“Ah, I see.” He sat back, relaxed, watching her. Yerik’s respect for her backbone of steel increased. “And here I thought you were happy with me here at La Paloma. You seemed resigned to stay. Why, you even seemed happy at times.”
“How would you feel if you’d been torn away from someone you loved?”
“Oh,” Yerik murmured, “it has happened twice in my life. First, my beautiful Darya dies giving birth to my son. And then,” his voice dropped, and he allowed some of his rage to be revealed to her, “Vlad falls in love with you and all you do is run away from him. He spent years trying to find you. And when he did, you got him murdered.”
Sky compressed her lips. She felt her heart beating like a wild bird trapped in her chest. “I NEVER loved Vlad! It was always one sided!”
“Hmmm, well my son loved you. He was obsessed with you.”
Sky felt panic and forced it down. She was in a padded room. She saw the cameras in all four corners of it. There was a reflective mirror behind Alexandrov, and she had no doubt there were soldiers watching her from behind it, even though she couldn’t see them. “Vlad got himself killed.” Her nostrils flared. “He kidnapped me in Peru! Against my will!”
“The last satellite phone call I received from my son was that you had malaria and two of his men, combat medics, were caring for you.” Yerik stared at her. “My son cared for you even then, Sky. He didn’t shoot you in the head. He gave you medical help.”
“Yeah,” Sky ground out, “when I came out of the malaria cycle, he was going to RAPE ME! So much for love!”
Scowling, Yerik growled, “Rape you? He LOVED you!”
Her nostrils flared, and Sky leaned forward, her voice hard, her eyes locked with Alexandrov’s surprised gaze. “Rape! Your son was going to rape me! That sure as hell isn’t love!” She slammed her fist down on the table. “Vlad tried to rape me when I was seventeen! He cornered me in my bedroom and threw me on the bed against my will.” Her breathing became uneven, her voice cracking. “You have this sick idea that Vlad was a good person. Well, he wasn’t! In Peru, he would deliberately rape a chief’s daughter in front of him and his village, then force them to work with him and carry cocaine. Your son was a sick, sadistic bastard!” Tears splattered down Sky’s taut face. “When I managed to push Vlad off me on that bed, he went and got a pistol. He was going to force me at gunpoint to lay on that bed and give him what he wanted. Only, my foster father, Jack Zimmerman, heard my screams and came running into my bedroom.” She sobbed and forced out, “Vlad shot him! He murdered him! And when my foster mother came because she heard Vlad’s gun go off, he killed her too!”
Yerik scowled. “If you would have surrendered, it would have turned out different. You should have submitted. Not fought.”
Sky angrily wiped tears from her taut face, breathing hard. “He murdered the two people I loved most in the world! And these people had taken care of him since age nine! Vlad enjoyed killing. He enjoyed torture! And he routinely raped the women down in Peru. Him and his gang of men. No woman was safe from them.”
Shrugging, Yerik growled, “That does not matter.”
Sky sat back, wrapping her arms around her breasts, feeling naked even though she was clothed. “Let me go, Yerik. Let me go home. I will NEVER stay here. I will keep trying to escape. I will NEVER be compliant, as you put it, with you ever again!” Sky watched in terror as his face grew savage, saw his lips lift in a snarl. She knew Alexandrov would torture her, even kill her, but she no longer cared. Sky had hoped for rescue. She had prayed Cal would find her. But a month had gone by, and she felt her hope crumble day after day. There was no rescue coming. Sky knew that Alexandrov had probably gone to ground, leaving no trail that Cal could possibly follow. She could feel Cal wanting to find her, but after a month, her hope had died. The Russian knew how to hide from the world. Instead, she had tried to escape on her own.
“Do you know,” Yerik said softly, giving her a bit of a smug smile, “that you’re pregnant? That man you were going to marry. It must be his brat you carry.”
Shocked, Sky sat up, her arms falling to her side. “What the hell are you talking about?” Instinctively, her hand pressed protectively against her abdomen. She saw Yerik smile fully, enjoying himself.
“When Dr. Zapata came here? I found out yesterday morning that you are pregnant.”
“No…,” and Sky sat back, her mind spinning. Her heart and mind fled back to that beautiful lovemaking when she’d felt it was so special. One-of-a-kind. Her hand tightened against her belly. Of late, her jeans wouldn’t fit around her waist anymore. She had thought she was just gaining weight. Reflecting, Sky realized lately her emotions had been like violent up and down drafts. She’d cried so easily the last four weeks, and that was completely unlike her. She thought it was because she’d been kidnapped and held prisoner here. Worse, she had begun to vomit every few days, unlike her unless… unless she was pregnant…
“Yes.” Yerik smiled more. “You did not know?”
Frowning, Sky muttered defiantly, “No.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter.”
She stared at him. “What do you mean?”
Shrugging lazily, Yerik picked up his glass and sipped from it. “In a few days, Dr. Zapata is coming here. She is going to abort your brat. You’ll have the surgery and be done with it.”
Sky gasped. She shoved away from the table, the chair falling to the floor as she jerked upright. “NO!” and she backed away, her hands over her belly. “You wouldn’t do that! It’s MY BABY! I refuse any surgery!”
