Chapter 15 Bonds Forged In Blood
BONDS FORGED IN BLOOD
INEZ
Ican't stop myself from toppling into sleep.
It's a restless slumber, fraught with nightmares—memories of bygone horrors.
I wake screaming, my skin crawling with the memory of cruel greedy grasping hands bruising my flesh as the cot creaked beneath me, hot rank breath on my face, male sweat dripping into my eyes.
I claw back to wakefulness, panting and sweating. Levering myself upright, I see the woman still huddled in the same corner, listless and vacant-eyed.
Her gaze drags to mine. "You have many bad dreams," she says to me.
"Yes." I jut my chin at the door. "Because of him."
"If you do not tell him, then what? He will cut off all my fingers, maybe, or who knows what else. I will die—I know this. My Alejandro has his grandmother and grandfather, so at least I know he will be loved."
"I'm sorry," I whisper again. "You should not be here. This has nothing to do with you."
"You did not bring me here."
"But you are here because of me."
She shrugs. "Perhaps. What is the point of saying it is your fault, or his fault, or anyone's? I will not get my finger back. I will never see my son again. But when I am no more use to him, what else will he do to get you to tell him what he wants to know?"
"Anything. Everything." I sigh. "I will kill him. If I can save you, I will."
She shrugs as if it doesn't matter and turns her gaze away to the window.
I don't know how much time passes, then. Daylight fades. Evening descends.
I've almost fallen asleep again out of sheer boredom when I hear someone approaching outside the door. My stomach tightens, sours.
Here we go.
The woman hears it as well and shrinks into the smallest ball possible. "No, no, no," she whimpers, "god save me, please no."
It's not time, yet. Instinct tells me I have to wait, bide my time.
The lock disengages, the knob turns, the door swings inward.
"I'm sorry," I whisper. "I'm so sorry."
Rafael enters, dragging a chair. The same two burly thugs enter after him, and they unceremoniously haul the woman to her feet, drag her to the chair, and shove her into it.
They stand on either side of her, each with a hand on her shoulder, holding her down.
Rafael tosses the bolt cutters onto the floor at her feet with a loud clatter that makes her jump with a startled half-scream.
Rafael laughs. "Haven't even started yet and she's already screaming.
This should prove quite…arousing." His eyes meet mine, glittering with wicked delight.
"Have you told your new friend who I am?
The things I enjoy?" He looks from me to her, expectantly.
When neither of us answers, he shrugs. "No matter.
I'll find out what I wish to know, one way or another, and I'll have fun in the process.
" He laughs, a dark, evil chuckle as he crouches in front of the woman in his white linen suit and pale blue silk shirt, wrinkle-free and pristine.
"You won't enjoy this very much, I'm afraid. But I certainly will."
Breathing hard through clenched teeth, the woman is growling and keening, eyes wild. "Please…please. Please don't. Please don't."
"Does begging change my mind, Sophia?" he says, his voice a serpentine, slithering whisper.
I stay silent.
He sighs. "Sophia, you are being petty. It's a simple, innocent question.
" When I remain silent, he slips that same black knife from his pocket, flips it open, and taps the woman's nose with the flat.
"It's not me you should plead with, you know.
It's her. The second she tells me what I need to know, I'll send you home.
Not in one piece, obviously, but alive. So, my dear, I really do encourage you to beg.
Beg for your life. Beg her to tell me where my son is. "
She considers it. I see it in her eyes, on her face. Her eyes go to mine, searching me. She spits in his face, then, perhaps hoping he'll merely kill her right then out of rage. Oh, my friend, how little you know the monster before you.
He rocks back on his heels, grinning as the gobbet of saliva trickles down his cheek.
"I see. Well. I suppose I have my answer, then, don't I?
" He whips a handkerchief out of his jacket's inside pocket, wipes his face with it, and then drops it over the woman's head so it covers her eyes.
Mostly. Just enough to obscure her vision.
So she can't anticipate what he does next.
He glances at the men. "Hold her, my friends. I don't want to tie her up if I don't have to. It's more fun this way."
She thrashes, dislodging the handkerchief, and one of the men grabs her by the hair, wrapping the long mass of it around his fist, and yanks her head backward, hard, and then forces it forward again. Replaces the handkerchief. Keeps a tight grip on her hair.
Rafael crouches in front of her again, knife in hand, and slices the blade up the front of her leggings, making sure to let the cutting edge slide along her skin, drawing a thin cut up her shin from ankle to knee, to thigh, to hip.
He does the same to the other side, and then slices away her underwear.
Her legs drip blood in root-like rivulets down her skin.
She thrashes again, fighting as hard as she can. She manages to get off a kick that catches Rafael under the chin, making his teeth clack together and knocking him on his ass.
He shoots to his feet, snarling. "I said hold her, you useless shitstains!" He spits blood. "Made me bite my tongue, you whore. Chain her legs to the chair. Now.”
One of the thugs pulls a set of handcuffs from his pocket and secures her leg to the chair, and then produces another pair from the same pocket and does it to the other leg.
"Now hold the stupid bitch or I'll turn you into shark bait," Rafael says.
The men tighten their grip on her, fingers digging into her flesh.
Rafael crouches in front of her again, glancing back at me over his shoulder.
"Sophia, please. I know you don't want to see this poor innocent woman suffer.
I'm sure there's some silly sisterhood of mothers or some nonsense like that making you think you share a bond.
But there is no bond. You will sit there and watch me slice her to pieces, Sophia. Her blood will be on your conscience."
I say nothing; it already is.
He sighs. "Very well. You always were far too stubborn for anyone’s good. I know I should just kill you and be done with it, but I too am stubborn, you see."
He wedges himself between her legs and carves the blade up her belly, slicing open her shirt, and then her bra, leaving her naked.
Her eyes go to mine, pleading—just for a moment. And then the blank stare takes over and she drops her gaze from mine.
What follows, over the next few hours, is a waking nightmare to rival those days in the cell. Worse, almost. I can endure pain. I can swallow agony and trauma. But watching Rafael slowly torture this woman by degrees? It's fucking awful.
I think of him—my son. Lorenzo—Little Ren.
I think of him watching Pugli blow his mother's brains out.
I think of his fear. He is safe—he's with Nick Harris and his men, hidden in a bunker on a private island in the Caribbean, guarded by some of the most fearsome operators on the planet—aside from my boys, I mean.
I think of him, and I know I cannot give him up. Not for this woman. Not for anything. Everything I’ve been through would be for nothing, if Rafael gets his hands on him now.
No.
I must endure.
I make myself watch.
Every cut. Every plucked fingernail. Every severed finger.
When hours have passed and I've not spoken a single word, Rafael finally loses his temper.
With a snarl of venomous rage, he drives the knife into the woman's thigh, low, near the knee, and begins twisting the blade until she screams.
"Tell me, Sophia," he hisses, his voice razor thin and dangerously quiet. "Tell me."
He twists the blade harder, and she screams again. "Tell me!"
"Never!" I snap, the first words I've spoken since he entered.
He yanks the knife free, and blood wells from the hole in her thigh, trails down her calf to form a growing puddle on the floor.
"Dammit," he snarls. "The clock is ticking, now."
I hear something—a low sound, distant, hard to make out over the throb of the engines and the woman's dull sobbing.
In between sobs, I hear it again, and I have to suppress a grin of glee.
It's a helicopter.
They're here.
They've come.
I have to distract Rafael, now. Give them time.
The woman is limp and weak from exhaustion, agony, and blood loss. She's beyond fighting. Rafael turns to me, pricking my throat with the tip of the blade. "Tell…me…where…he…is."
"Somewhere even you can't reach him," I whisper. "You will never have him. He will never know your name. You will never see his face."
With a wordless shout of anger, he whirls, and slams the knife back down into the same wound in her thigh, twisting again. "Son of a bitch!" he shouts. "TELL ME! Tell me where he is!"
"Fuck you!" I shout back at the top of my voice, to cover the muffled thumping. "Eat shit."
"Tell me," he snarls, twisting the knife again, harder now, drawing another weak scream.
I hear the crackle of automatics, and I have to fight to keep the currents of energy from showing on my face. "He's with the president of Brazil. They adopted him."
"Lies!" he snaps.
One of the men cocks his head, finally hearing the noise topside. "Uh, chief? You hear that?"
Rafael leaves the knife buried in her thigh and straightens, eying the ceiling, listening. "Oh, yes, now I do. The boys are shooting at birds, I suppose. Go see."
Rafael turns to watch his men exit, and that's when I make my move.
Long since having tightened the zipties to the point of pain, I slam my wrists down against my upward-driving knee.
The first blow, nothing happens. I try again, and a third time, and on the third attempt, the plastic snaps, freeing my hands.