4. Amorette
AMORETTE
“M on bébé, don’t cry.”
Maman … I hadn’t heard her voice in years. I wanted to tell her I wasn’t crying, that I hadn’t cried since she died, but my mouth wouldn’t obey me. Straining to hear her voice, I tried to press closer, yet pain coursed through my torso and down my back.
Her voice didn’t come again.
But the pain did bring the memories.
Memories I wished I’d never experienced. Being abducted. Thrown in cages. Touched and beaten. I thought that was last night, but my brain was filled to the brim with fuzz, obscuring every recollection.
I hurt so fucking bad.
There was so much dull pain that spiked when I moved that I couldn’t pinpoint all the places that were injured. Maybe the dull ache meant that some time had passed. One thing was certain, I wasn’t in the cages anymore.
The hunger pains cramping my stomach made me think more than a few hours had passed, at least. The scent of teakwood filtered through the fog of my brain as I cataloged everything I could to figure out just where the fuck I was.
Only the low hum of an air conditioner or something mechanical surrounded me. I at least laid across something soft, but that raised my suspicions. These were not kind men, and nothing was free. Any small mercy had a price too high to accept. The funny thing about that?
Even then, we didn’t get a choice.
I peeled one eye open, my good eye, and squinted into the harsh light overhead. My vision left something to be desired, but I couldn’t rub the sleep out. Even as groggy as I was, I knew from the hot throb around my eyes that it would hurt.
It was weird, this moment of peace in an unfamiliar room.
Given my circumstances, I should be terrified.
And I’d suffered through bouts of that particular emotion since I’d been abducted.
I couldn’t even comfort myself with delusions of eventual freedom.
Chances were, half of those girls would be dead within a couple of weeks.
I’d sat through the training. I’d previously organized several self-defense classes for underprivileged girls and women in the past. The statistics were heartbreaking, and no one would soon forget after going through the course.
No matter what the abductors promised, they wouldn’t save you. Or take you home.
Your only option was to fight.
Of course, that was information given about the initial taking. It was arguably a different game once you were locked in an unknown warehouse.
But those men…
Monsters…
Every time they touched one of the women, I saw red. I would rather die in defense of myself or others than let them defile me again.
Maybe I even hoped for death.
It had to have been better than the alternative.
For now, the room was quiet, I was alone, and it was a slight reprieve before I had to start thinking. Remembering.
In fact, this was probably done on purpose. Randall The Torturer seemed like he was into head games. Like he would get off on it. My heart rate picked up as I strained to hear any signs of someone approaching.
Nothing. I relaxed.
I hated this new paranoia plaguing me, even as I recognized it served a purpose. Survival instinct.
Just like before, there were no sounds outside the low hum. My left eye was still swollen shut, so as I blinked, only one eye cooperated. I lifted my head just enough to see where I was and froze.
The only thing that registered was that I was not alone in the room.
My pulse, steadily rising, suddenly jumped into my throat as I met a pair of sapphire eyes. He was new. Over the last few days, I had committed every evil face to memory.
On the off chance I escaped, I wanted to be able to describe as many of these bastards as possible.
I’d have remembered his. Even in quiet anger it was a thing of beauty. Good thing I wasn’t taken by beautiful faces.
Light blond hair was stylishly cut short on the sides with a longer top. The front was long enough that it barely brushed into his eyes. His hands were steepled in front of his face as he regarded me with something akin to irritation.
No, this man didn’t want me here.
Scrambling to a sitting position, I shoved my back against the headboard. Then immediately regretted all my life choices as my breath stuttered out of me and evaded my metaphorical grasp when I tried to inhale—bad idea. Moving quickly, hell, moving at all, was a bad idea.
Wait.
I glanced around at the blatant luxury. I was in a bed with an expensive cloth headboard and silky sheets. The walls were made of exposed brick and nothing else was in the room except for the beat-up leather chair my current jailer was sprawled across.
We were locked in this room together. Could I attack him? Did I have the strength? My trembling hands and difficulty breathing said no.
He was also too calm, and there were too few distractions to attempt anything. That would be incredibly stupid.
The man continued to stare at me as I returned the favor.
My traitorous heart started to slow when he didn’t make any moves to touch me.
He wasn’t dressed in all-black pants and shirts like the guards had been.
Instead, he was clad in a pair of old, ripped jeans, the kind which was actually worn, not trendy. A thin gray hoodie covered his torso.
What did it mean that he was dressed differently?
“You’ve been checked over by our doctor. He believes you have a mild concussion and a cracked rib. Bruising as well.” He didn’t elaborate outside of that.
Now that he mentioned it, my head pounded and my stomach roiled from the sudden movements. The edges of my vision darkened as if any minute I’d faceplant in the bed, but I fought it.
Passing out wasn’t an option here, if I could help it.
“What’s your name?” His voice was smooth and deep. The soothing quality of it was a lie. An absolute fucking lie.
I almost didn’t answer him.
Another vicious burst of agony shot through me as I adjusted my ass on the bed. This had to all be a sadistic nightmare. Because the reality that I was going to die, was too much to handle. And I still couldn’t stop trying to save the ones I could, even knowing it was pointless.
But, right now? With barely an inch of my body that wasn’t screaming in pain and so much of my pride beaten to a pulp, I was almost done. My body was pushed to the limit, and I couldn’t take another beating like I had the night before. Or this morning? I wasn’t sure how long it had been.
Deciding to choose my battles wisely, I answered him. “Amorette,” I croaked.
I would have lied if I wasn’t concerned that they’d taken my wallet along with me. But if he knew my real name and I didn’t give it to him, he could punish me.
“Amorette,” he tested out my name. It rolled off his tongue with too much ease, as if we were old friends instead of captor and prisoner. I didn’t ask his name. There was no reason to. The only one who I needed to know at this point was Randall.
As if it was an afterthought, he reached down next to him and picked up a bottle of water. It wasn’t the nasty plastic bottles they’d given us before. This one was a high-end metal bottle with a twist cap.
When he held it out, I didn’t immediately take it.
Something was off here.
Either I was still unconscious, having a really fucked up dream, or this was Randall’s idea as some sort of sick game. The adrenaline I’d counted on before was suspiciously missing while my brain felt I wasn’t in any immediate danger.
“Don’t worry, Killer. It’s not drugged, poisoned, or otherwise.”
A snide remark was on the tip of my tongue about the killer comment, but I knew better than to engage in any type of banter with him. It would only confuse my image of him and I couldn’t afford that.
The likelihood I’d get out of here alive was slim. I knew that. Yet I could hope for a quick death. While I was setting all my hope in one bucket, I’d still do everything I could to get out of here.
He shook the water bottle, and I hesitantly took it from him. My hand trembled as my fingers brushed against his. They were dry, warm. Funny that there wasn’t any visible blood on his hands.
“Thanks,” I conceded. Giving any kind of gratitude to these men tasted like sour milk on my tongue.
Silence settled back around us as we studied each other. None of the other girls made eye contact. Like if they didn’t see their attacker, the actual assault wasn’t real.
These men could hurt my pride, break my body, and take what I would never willingly give them, but they would stare into my eyes while they did it. I wanted them to see how much I hated them. How much I loathed the very devils they were.
I wasn’t foolish enough to believe they cared about me in any sense other than being a hole with a heartbeat. All the same, it made me feel like I was fighting back with every weapon I had at my disposal.
The man moved back to his relaxed position with his gaze locked to mine as he steepled his hands under his chin. The edge of his jaw grew sharper as he ground his teeth together. That, and only that, was the only visible sign he wasn’t unfazed by whatever his end game was.
“Who are you?” The honeyed tone of his question melted over me, and I startled.
This… this was the voice I’d heard one of the times I’d been knocked out. Maybe.
Disgust whipped through me, and I squashed the thread of hope that had started to twist around my heart. Without even realizing it, his docile manner had made me hope he was different from the others, that perhaps he was here to take me away from it all.
But his voice…
If he was here with them, then he was just as evil as the rest. Why would I ever let myself think any differently? Any man here, and maybe some of the women too, were bad people if they were in this compound willingly.
It didn’t take a genius to figure out we weren’t in the US anymore. Added to the fact they were too open about what they were doing, we weren’t anywhere close to authorities.