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The fat slob goes to a drawer and pulls out a bunch of ties.
I kick a workbench closer. “Sit.”
“I’ll do what you want if you promise not to hurt my kids.”
“Sit,” I say again, harsher.
He flops down onto the bench, his fringe falling over his face.
“Hands behind your back.”
When he complies, I tie his wrists and bind his ankles to the feet of the bench. He’s ex-military. If he gets the chance, he’ll come at me. Not that I can’t take him down, but I have no intention of getting into a fight that will wake his kids. He doesn’t need to know that, though.
He stares up at me from under his hair as I round the bench and stop in front of him. His stomach strains in the wife-beater he’s wearing and his thighs stretch his boxer shorts. He hasn’t been taking care of himself. It seems the cushy job in government made him lax.
“That woman,” I say. “What’s her name?”
His face scrunches. “What?”
“What is her fucking name?”
“It’s been a long time. I hardly remember her face.”
“Don’t fucking bullshit me.” A man doesn’t forget something like that. A name maybe, but not what she looked like lying naked and twisted in a puddle of blood and vomit. Not even a hardened soldier forgets that. “Answer me.”
“158–14–something.”
“I asked for her name.”
“I never looked at their names. It’s better to think of them as numbers.”
I grit my teeth. “Mina. Mina Belan.”
“Fine. So what?”
“You took her statement.”
“I was the superior in charge.”
“What happened?”
“You know what happened.”
“I want to hear it from you.”
“What is this?”
“What do you think it is?”
“Revenge?” When I don’t answer, he asks, “Why wait all these years? Why now?”
“I asked you a question.”
“She said the men attacked her in the shower. They beat her and were going to rape her, but a teammate walked in on the scene.”
“A teammate?”
“Gergo Nagy.”
“Ah, so you remember his name.”
He gives me a cutting look. “I’d been on missions with Gergo. Ms. Belan hadn’t been deployed with any of the teams I supervised in the field.”
“Keep talking.”
“The men backed off when Gergo pulled a gun. He called the medics.”
I walk around him, digesting his factual manner. Apathetic. Like a soldier trained to inflict torture. “What happened to this Gergo guy?”
“He resigned not long after she did. He claimed the attack was too much. They were good friends, Gergo and Belan.”
So, Gergo is the only person who helped her, who stood up for her. “Where is he now? What does he do?”
“I have no idea. I didn’t keep in touch with the men who served with me.”
“What injuries did she sustain?”
The tensing of his shoulders is the first sign of emotion he shows. Even more significant is his silence. The incident left a mark on him, after all.
“What were her injuries?” I repeat, taking a wide stance in front of him.
He sighs. “Four broken ribs, broken arm, concussion, and internal hemorrhage.”
“They punched her in the face.” I go deathly cold as I recall the image of her eyes swelled shut, purple and bloody. “Repeatedly.”
“Yes.” The admission is regretful.
“Until her skull fractured.”
“Yes.”
My rage mounts. It’s a cold fury, the most dangerous kind. “They kicked her while she was down.”
“Yes.”
“Until her right kidney split like a bean.”
“Yes.”
“Then they kicked her in the stomach.”
He turns his face away.
“Look at me,” I grit out. When he obliges, I repeat, “They kicked her in the stomach.”
“Yes.”
“Until they damaged an ovary.”
“Yes. I get it. You can stop this game.”
“It may be very hard for her to conceive.”
He hangs his head. “Yes.”
“Yet you have three beautiful children.”
He jerks his gaze back to mine. For the first time, his voice takes on a note of panic. “They’re innocent.”
“So was Mina.” I tilt my head, considering him, considering his part in what should’ve been justice. “Yet you said otherwise. You claimed she fell down the stairs and then tried to pin her injuries on her teammates.”
“I said what was reasonable.”
“Is that so?”
“What do you expect when you throw a young, beautiful woman into a room full of men—healthy, virile soldiers—who don’t see women for most of the year?”
I think of that photo, that Evidence A, and the long, blond tresses caked with blood. I see Mina in my mind’s eye, irreparably broken, the picture ingrained in my brain. I’m unraveling, the edges of my soul tearing, and all I can think about is that bloodstained hair. Why did she cut off such beautiful hair?
“I’d always been against including her in the elite corps,” Tóth continues. “I knew it was going to lead to something like that.”
Ah. Some truth, at last. “Is that why you let those would-be rapists off the hook with a reprimand?” A fucking reprimand, when Mina fought for her life in a hospital bed for months. The coldness escalates, slowly creeping over every part of my body, hardening my heart.
