18. Remy
Chapter eighteen
Remy
We take the third-floor landing—or at least, I assume it is the third-floor landing, though when I glance over the balconette as we pass, it looks like we’re much higher than that. To my surprise, there aren’t many doors… just a few on each side, with tarnished gold letters instead of numbers pinned to the dark wood doors. We stop outside of room C for just a moment as the guard ahead of me pulls a key from the ring at his waist.
When he gets the door open, I realize why there aren’t many rooms. If they’re all the same size as this, no wonder there aren’t more. It’s a massive space, with light filtering through a stained-glass window that casts a red glow over the four poster bed in the center of the room. And on the center of the bed is a woman whose long legs drape over the side of the satin sheets. Luxurious, but not very practical.
The woman, 2278, is newer. I know as much because the ‘special’ is, according to John, usually a recent inmate they intend to break. But she doesn’t look broken as she looks at me with hatred in her dark eyes. She looks pissed.
I don’t pay her any more attention as the guard sets the briefcase up on the table and spins the combination. He steps back as I step in, watching me appraise the blade. “This is what you selected, sir?”
I purse my lips, squint my eyes, and lift the knife, testing the edge against my finger. “It seems rather dull.”
The guard furrows his brow and steps toward me to test my claim himself. It gives me the opening I need to lunge at him, wrapping one arm around his mouth and nose and the other pinning him to my front.
I don’t waste a second, ignoring the woman’s scream. I’m sure that no one will think twice about a woman’s scream in a place like this, but I can’t have the guard calling out for help. I press my hand tighter over his mouth as he tries to gnash at me with his teeth, and I let the blade fall to the ground as I grab his chin with one hand, jerking his neck with every bit of energy I have.
I’ve never snapped anyone’s neck before, but it’s surprisingly easier than I thought it would be. My hatred for these people seems to give me animal strength, and I don’t even think about it until it’s done.
The guard falls slack against me before I drop him to the ground, his death instant. He got off easy compared to the torture his prisoners go through, but this mission isn’t about trying to make them pay. This is about doing the greatest good.
I let his body fall to the floor without ceremony and glance up to see that the woman is now holding the blade between us. And it’s all that’s between us, because she is entirely naked, showcasing the bruises and welts across her skin in varying stages of decay—older and yellowing ones beneath purple and blue, intersecting red welts and older scars. I decide to focus on her eyes, which are glaring at me with abject hatred. They don’t even betray a hint of fear.
“It’s okay,” I tell her honestly. “I’m here to help.” I raise my hands to show her that I’m harmless, and then slowly reach for my jacket. I don’t even know if she speaks English, a thought that didn’t occur to me until she stares blankly at me. Hopefully, she at least understands the word help .
She more than understands it, judging by her cynical laugh. “Help? Man doesn’t help.” She speaks with an accent that suggests English is her second language, but she seems to know it well. “Man hurts. Man takes. Let me go.” Her eyes flicker to the door behind me as she assesses whether she has a chance of slipping past me .
“I will.” I tell her, taking the key from the lock and shutting the door before locking it again. Her eyes narrow, her anger grows, and she steps back away from the bed and away from me.
“I am not afraid. I will kill you.”
“Don’t kill me.” I say slowly, slipping the ring of keys between my fingers as I go back to removing my jacket. When I hold it out for her, she stares at me with disdain, refusing to step closer. I can’t exactly blame her for that, so I toss it gently to her, letting it fall at her feet so that she doesn’t have to come closer to pick it up. I tug the buttons free of my shirt with my other hand, slipping quickly out of it. Her eyes watch me with utmost hatred as I slip out of my slacks, and I notice her breathing increase as her chest rises and falls faster.
She does a damn good job of acting unafraid, and I’m certain that someone—or multiple someone’s—have made it a point to let her know they get off on her terror.
Interest begins to take over as she watches me stop at my boxers, not going any further or any closer to her as I bend down to begin stealing the guard’s clothes. Undressing another man is not the highlight of my life, but I make quick work of it, pulling his shoes off before taking his pants and shirt. He’s a little larger than I am, so I take his belt too, notching it on the last hole, and stand to look at her as I fit the cap on my head.
“Doesn’t suit you,” she says coldly.
“That’s not very nice.” I muse. “My jacket would probably suit you, if you wanna suck up your pride.” When she doesn’t move, I shrug and stoop to take the only weapon the guard had on him—a taser—and stuff it into my pocket. “If you want to make a prison break naked, be my guest.”
She laughs, and that makes me laugh, too. Both of us stop when I point at the knife in her hand. “I’m gonna need that back now.”
“I’m not stupid.” She laughs. “Man tries to trick you. No.”
“I have no interest in tricking you,” I tell her. “I just need to make sure he’s dead.”
Her eyes flicker to the man in his boxers on the ground. “Check for pulse.”
“No, I want to be very certain. I need to see his blood.”
“I can do that.” She smirks, thinking she’s got me in check. But I have no interest in playing with her life. I gesture to the body and take a step back, giving her space to do her thing. A glance at my watch shows that fifteen minutes have passed since I last checked, and we are running out of time. I guess it really does fly when you’re having fun.
She doesn’t take her eyes off me as she gets closer, dropping to her knees still nude, making me look away until she presses them together. “One clean slice across the throat should do it.” I tell her.
But she reaches for his boxers, her long fingers slipping under the material and yanking them down his thighs. His small dick is flaccid even when she picks it up in her hand. I narrow my eyes on her.
“I’m in a bit of a hurry…” I tell her as delicately as possible. I hate to deny a woman the chance to return the torture she’s endured, but mutilation isn’t on my agenda. She tuts her tongue, looking annoyed with me, but seems to take the hint. Her hand falls away from him and she moves her arm back, gathering momentum.
There’s a squelch as she drives it straight into his dick, and I cringe, my whole body clenching at the pseudo pain.
“Lots of blood,” she says, glancing up at me from under thick lashes. “Happy?”
I’m certain that no one could have survived that without reacting, and the lack of spurting blood assures me his heart has already stopped pumping.
“Mm.” I nod. “Something like that.” I glance at my watch. “Time to go. You coming? Or would you rather stay here?”
She narrows her eyes at me before stepping back to grab my button-up off the floor. It’s a better choice, and she fastens the middle buttons quickly before slipping the jacket over top of it. I watch her free her wild hair from the collar, and then she bends down to wrap her hand around the blade still sticking out of the guard’s cock. I think she caught a testicle under that blade, too.
I manage not to wince this time when she pulls it out, unlocking the door and ushering her ahead of me. Her eyes make her distrust obvious, and I can’t exactly blame her, but I’m not letting her walk with a blade at my back. She’s not willing to walk in front of me because she just saw that I don’t need a weapon to take down a man the same size as me. And, probably, because the weapon she is most afraid of is my favorite appendage.
I nod, recognizing my mistake, and settle for walking ahead of her while keeping her close. “We have to meet someone on the second floor,” I tell her. “Do you know where the masters are?”
“Top floor.” She shudders, wrapping my jacket tighter around her. “That’s where they initiate us.”
I don’t care to know what the initiation process entails, but this is useful knowledge. Hopefully, they stay out of the way, and we can break away in silence before they ever have a chance to realize I stole their prisoners right out from under them. Rich has got a grenade back on the plane that he’s dying to pull the pin out of, and that’ll taker care of the masters.
I press my finger to my lips, warning her to stay quiet as we move to the staircase. I keep my head on a swivel, my eyes sweeping back and forth over every surface as we descend. I wish I had a gun, but without any ammunition, it would have been useless. Hopefully I can take one from one of the guards in the communications room.
The woman next to me freezes on the steps when she spots Kent, standing in the same uniform as me, outside the door to the communication room. Natalia is nowhere to be seen, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about that.
“It’s okay,” I tell her in a quiet voice. “He’s a friend. He’s safe.”
I can tell she doubts at this point whether any man is safe, but she tightens her grip on the knife and continues moving. Kent’s eyes snap up to mine almost as soon as we spot him, but he doesn’t let any emotion pass as we approach. I glance at my watch. Two minutes.
“You need to stay out of sight,” I tell the woman next to me. “Over there.” I gesture behind a gaudy vase filled with fake flowers set up on a marble pedestal, and she glowers at me but goes. “Don’t move until I tell you it is safe.”
Kent shakes his head a little as he watches her go. She certainly isn’t the traumatized and terrorized prisoner we expected, and I’m grateful for that. I never did well comforting any of the women in my life before, and I don’t have the time or energy to give them any effort right now. “Where’s Natalia?”
“Hopefully, still bleeding all over her pretty floral sheets,” he grunts. “The only thing worse than a man who treats women like animals is a woman who enables them.” He slips open his jacket pocket and passes me a pistol. “And look what I got out of it.”
“She was packing this?” I ask dubiously. That black skirt looked a bit too short to be hiding a gun, even a small one like this.
“No,” Kent laughs harshly. “She pulled it on me the minute I got her out of those clothes… not that I was going to try and pass myself off in them, but it was fun watching her give me her dignity, knowing how many she’s helped strip it from.”
“Dead?”
“As a doornail.” He nods, not looking the least bit remorseful. And I don’t really feel bad, either.
I want to ask how he got the guard’s uniform, though, and if he has any idea where John went, but the door opens, and we fall silent, dropping our heads.
Time to dance.