I mute the phone and take the chair I was sitting on and bash it against the desk until it is in pieces.
Sergei is talking in the background. "I've never found the US to be much of a marketplace. Most of the girls there are dried up before they exit their teen years, but this one is what, twenty, and still a virgin? I'm delighted! I have just the businessman in mind for her. He sadly has syphilis from one of the products that was infected by Harry, but he'll be so happy to get this one. I think he believes that if he f**ks enough virgins he'll be cured."
Sergei laughs, and I squeeze the broken wood so tightly in my hand that I begin to bleed in three places. It is enough to keep my voice level.
"I cannot imagine why you are calling me with this tale, Sergei. I took care of your accountant."
"You were supposed to bring him back, not kill him," Sergei thundered. He pounds his fist against the table so loud I hear it through the phone.
His show of anger has a calming effect on me. I open my laptop and pull up the GPS of Daisy's phone. The satellites take a moment, but she is pinpointed south of Moscow, at the location of the Petrovich country estate. It is a large, wooded compound complete with guards, fences, dogs, and trees. I copy those coordinates and send them to Daniel. If I am not alone, then this is his opportunity.
DAISY
When we land, my hands are zip-tied together behind my back. Yury places a pillowcase over my face, and I am led down stairs, across the tarmac, and into a car. I’m shivering with cold—and fear—but no one offers me a jacket. I’m tossed into the back seat of a car, the door shut behind me. All around me, there are people speaking in Russian, but no one seems even slightly concerned that they have a bound, hooded captive.
I wiggle around in the back seat of the car as it drives, but I am the only one back here. Regan is not with me. Fear strikes my heart, and I wonder where they have taken her. Why are we being sent to two different places?
Even though I am terrified, I am exhausted. I fall asleep in the car, so I don’t know how long we travel. I wake up when the car jerks to a halt. I listen for doors to open and close, so I can count how many people are here.
I only hear one. That means there is just one person with me. I can take out one person, can’t I? I flex my fingers behind my back and twist my wrists. The zip-ties are cutting into my skin. It hurts, but the hurt is minor compared to the fact that I am helpless this way.
The back door opens, and someone grabs me by my legs. "Get out," I hear a voice say, and I’m disappointed to realize that it’s Yury. I’ve been left alone with the person that scares me worse than Vasily. Vasily doesn’t like me, but to him, I am a chess piece to be moved about.
Yury hates me because I tasered him in the balls. I’m terrified of what he will do to retaliate.
I wriggle my way out of the back seat and get to my feet. I’m unsteady, weaving. I haven’t eaten since before heading to work, and I feel shaky and weak. My mouth is dry, and I have to pee, but I’m afraid to ask.
Rough hands grab my arm and drag me forward, leading me. I stagger as I walk, but Yury is moving at a brisk pace, and it’s difficult for my shorter legs to keep up. He’s not a very good guide, either. I stumble when my ankle hits something—maybe a curb? Then, a moment later, my face slams into something so hard I nearly black out.
Yury laughs, the sound cruel. "Stupid pizda. How can I be responsible for your well-being if you keep running into walls?"
Blood runs down my nose and into my mouth, and my entire face throbs and feels swollen. My teeth ache and I want to cry from the pain, but I bite my lip to keep from giving him the satisfaction. This is how he will hurt me. Vasily’s boss wants me as a bargaining tool, but Yury will just make me miserable because he can. When he jerks at my arm, trying to pull me forward again, I hunch my shoulders, preparing for another wall, but there is nothing.
And then I am inside somewhere.
I can tell we’re indoors; the air has changed, and our shoes make an echoing noise like we are in a big building. I still have the hood on, so I can’t see anything. Yury’s hand on my upper arm pinches terribly as he drags me forward, and then he slams me into metal that bangs against my shins. "Sit down."
I try to feel things out with my leg. It’s a metal chair, I think. I gingerly sit on it and wait, my hands aching from the tie, my face and arms feeling like one giant bruise. It’s too quiet. I want Regan back. Even knowing she is at my side would make things less miserable.
But I am alone with Yury.
The hood whips off my face a moment later, and I blink at my surroundings as my hair flies about my face in a cloud of static. We are in a warehouse of some kind. It’s empty, though, rows of nearby metal shelves have nothing but dust on them. A single lightbulb hangs from the ceiling, and everything is dark and ominous. There are folding metal chairs in front of a small card table, and this is where I am seated. Yury is hovering at my side.
He glares down at my face and cusses something in Russian. Then, he pinches the bridge of my nose. "Does this hurt?"
It hurts, but I won’t give him the satisfaction of telling him so. I jerk away from his grip.
He grunts. "Good. Is not broken. Sergei would have my hide if I permanently defaced his little moneybag." He gives me a cold smile. "You had me scared for a moment there."
I glare at him, my face throbbing where he pinched it. "Are you going to sell me back to Nick? Is that the plan?"
Yury stares at me. Then he laughs as if I have said something hilarious. "You seem to think your boyfriend will be alive long enough to buy you back. You are funny woman."
I try not to be bothered by this, but…I’m scared.
I know Nick is one of the bad guys, now. Vasily told me that he was an assassin. One of the Bratva. I’m guessing the definition Nick provided wasn’t a complete one.
Nick kills people for money. He’s as bad as the man that killed my mother and destroyed my father’s life.
And it makes me a terrible, awful person because I want him to come through that door in the next minute and rescue me. I want him to show up and hold me close and tell me everything will be okay. That he has me. That I’m safe.
And I hate myself for it.
"No more jokes for Yury? Shame." My captor studies me for a moment longer and then inclines his chin. "Maybe you are ready for other things to go in your mouth, then."
I remember his threat from the airplane. "If you put anything in my mouth, I’m going to bite it off." He can punch me or slap me, but he can't hurt me, not really. He’s too scared of his boss, this Sergei he mentioned.
His eyes narrow and he regards me for a long moment. "Go clean up in bathroom. You are disgusting with snot and blood running into your mouth."
I’ve won this round. "My hands are bound," I tell him, and I shrug my shoulders as if to demonstrate that I can’t move them. "I can’t stick my head under the faucet and clean off. And I have to pee. Can you untie me?"
"So you can fight me?"
Yes, I think, but I know that won’t get me what I want. "Are you afraid I’ll win?"
He snorts. I am triumphant when he comes to my side, but he delivers a ringing slap to my face that stuns me. He grabs my chin in the next moment, when my head is still spinning. "Listen very closely. I am going to untie your hands, but if you try to run away, I will break your arm in my bare hands. I will tell Sergei it was accident, da? You can still spread your legs that way."
I shiver. I know he is serious. "I hate you," I tell him quietly. "I hope Nick murders you." And I’m a bit alarmed at myself when I realize that I mean it. My gut is full of terror and fury, and I would love nothing more than for Nick to come through this door and destroy Yury right in front of me. I hate him so much. I hate him because I know he raped Regan. I hate him because I know he would casually break my arm as easily as he slapped me.
I hate him because it’s easier than hating myself for being responsible for all of this. All because I thought the man I was falling in love with was a computer hacker.
I am the worst kind of fool.
"You can hate me, pizda. But be smart and do not run away or it will be bad for you." And he pulls out a knife and slices through the restraints on my wrists.
I shake my arms and stand up. I want to rub my wrists, but I stare warily at Yury instead. Yury, who still has the knife out, regarding me. Waiting for me to spring, to do something stupid. He would love nothing more than if I tried to attack him, because then he would be justified in breaking my arm…or worse. So I simply say, "Where’s the bathroom?"
He points at a door in the back corner of the near-empty warehouse. "Clean your face. You are disgusting."
I go to it. The doorknob has been removed and only a hole remains, but I shut it for privacy anyhow. The toilet is disgusting, the seat broken and ringed with years of grime, but I quickly relieve myself and then wash my hands in the sink with the equally dirty cake of soap there.
There’s a mirror above the washstand. It’s cracked, broken, and filthy, like the rest of the bathroom, but I can see my face. The bridge of my nose is puffy and turning purple, and I look like I’ve been punched in both eyes. Blood cakes my upper lip, and my mouth is swollen. I carefully wash my face with splashes of cold water, but it doesn’t look much better once I get all the blood off. My wrists are masses of bruises from where the cuffs—and Yury—have held too tightly. I look terrible.
I am still better off than Regan, though. Tears flood my eyes as I think of her. It’s my fault she’s been taken, and I don’t even know where she is anymore. I’m so sorry, Regan.
My face cleaned, I’m in no hurry to go back out and see Yury again. I slide down the tile wall and crouch on the floor, hugging my arms close to my body. He can just come and get me. It’s quiet in here, and I feel a little safer with a door—even an unlocked one—between me and my captor.
My thoughts turn to Nick.
I don’t know what to think about Vasily’s words. He could be lying to me, but the tattoos on his hands and the way his eyes get cold when he’s angry look so, so familiar to me that I know he’s telling the truth. Vasily is an assassin, and so is my Nick.
I should have seen it earlier. The way he watches me. The way he has so much money. The frightening tattoos on his body.
The pain in his eyes, the loneliness.
I bite down on my knuckles to stifle the sob that threatens to choke from my throat. I am torn. Part of me wants to hate Nick for who—and what—he is. For lying to me. For letting me be so innocent and deluded even as he lies to my face. Has he been going out and killing people while I have known him? Does he murder someone and then come to me and kiss me? I am revolted by the thought. I must leave town on business, he told me, and I never thought to ask more. I’m so stupid.
Worst of all, I still have feelings for him. I think of the sadness in his eyes. The self-loathing. He thinks himself unworthy of me. And now that I know the truth, I understand why…but I can’t stop caring for him.