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He looked away.
The full import of his words penetrated my slow mind. “Where are you taking me?”
He gave me a sidelong smile. “I’m the nice man who’s gonna reunite you with your sister. Isn’t that what you want?”
My heart leapt, and I tried to get to my feet. Of course, I was encumbered by my handcuffs. “You’re taking me to Celia?” My voice was barely louder than a breath. He heard the hope that flooded it and grew too happy at the chance to crush it. But this was finallysomething.
“Don’t look too happy about it,” he huffed in amusement. “You might not like the state she’s in.”
The urge to kill him was unbearable, and I pulled at my cuffs to no avail. He cackled some more. “Oh yeah, careful what you wish for there, babe. You just might get it.”
“I’m going to kill you,” I promised.
Just then, a second boat drew up beside us and three men came aboard ours. They began speaking in Russian, occasionally glancing at me and I knew whatever was going on here, it was nothing good. The bobbing up and down, did not seem to have any impact on the men’s balance as they stood in the boat. That told me they were accustomed to this. They’d been doing it a while and, soon, I’d be at their mercy.
I have a very sturdy stomach, but I had to swallow down bile as nausea assaulted me.
I watched them closely, noting the long scar on one guy’s cheek that went from the edge of his left eye right down to his jaw. It looked like it’d been made by a knife. He was doing most of the talking, addressing Kirill in rapid fire Russian. Kirill seemed to be agreeing with everything they said.
The wind whistling in my ear prevented me from hearing a damn thing. Not that there was anything I could do about it. My difficult childhood did not make for much practice swimming and the precariousness of my being on a flimsy boat surrounded by miles of water was its own kind of despair.
A few seagulls called to each other over my head. The salty sea air assailing my nostrils together with the splash of passing humpback whales combined to make everything seem deceptively peaceful around us. Only my tightly bound hands and the presence of grim looking men before me gave any indication that it was anything but.
Scar face reached into his pocket and extracted a thick envelope which he passed to Kirill. He pocketed it and nodded towards me. The other guy came up to me and unlocked my cuffs before rough hands pulled me to my feet. Kirill grinned at me and twiddled his fingers with a wave as the guy manhandled me to the new boat.
It looked like I’d been sold.
I should have paid more attention to those special features on CNN about human trafficking.
Because I wasn’t sure how I was going to get out of this one.
CHAPTERTHIRTY-TWO
ALEXEI
Igor was stupid enough to report for duty. Sucked to be him. I asked him to report to my office, escorted by security in case he decided to run. As he stood before me, I could see from the smug look in his eye that he had no clue we were on to him and Kirill.
“Igor, how nice of you to join us.”
Katya stood behind me, her arms crossed.
“Uh, sure, boss.” He shifted from foot to foot.
“Sit.”
He looked from me to the chair to the door. It seemed he was starting to get that things weren’t exactly copacetic. Slowly, with a sigh of resignation, he sat down.
“Good boy.” I leaned forward, looking him in the eye. “Now, tell me where Kirill’s taken Nora.”
His eyes flickered and then he frowned. “Nora? Who’s that?” he said unconvincingly.
I drew back my fist and hit him in the face. “Did that jog your memory?” I asked. “Where’s Nora?”
“I-I-I don’t know who that is, sir!”
I flicked open my Swiss army knife and held it to the still healing gash on his face. Katya had told me all about how he got it. I gave him a smile. “Would you like to change your answer or shall I open this up some more?”
“Sir, please. I don’t know anything. I don’t know.”
