Chapter 4 Chiara
Chiara
Several hours previously…
The wind howls outside. It sounds like someone is screaming, or maybe that’s exactly what I can hear. It’s hard to tell down here in the pitch dark.
I was barely conscious when someone shoved me into the back of a van, but by the time we arrived at Castle Dracula, I was very much awake.
No joke, this place really does resemble Castle Dracula, with its gray stone turrets and Gothic aesthetic. Nobody bothered to give me a guided tour, but I’m confident it’s not a five-star hotel.
The English fucker who shot Carlo is nowhere in sight. Perhaps this is his home. It certainly matches his ice-cold personality.
I sit on a rough blanket, shivering in the cold, damp air. It smells musty. There’s a small window, but it’s so high up I can’t see a damn thing, and all I know is that night has fallen. The sound of water dripping squirrels into my brain. A slow torture.
At least there are no rats.
I fucking hate rats.
Thank fuck I’m wearing jeans. Hypothermia would have been in my future if I’d chosen a dress or skirt to wear this morning. Or yesterday. My head still hurts from whatever sedative they shot me up with.
It reminds me of when I woke up all those weeks ago inside Angelo’s mansion. How sad that I remember that moment with fondness instead of anger. At least there I had a comfortable bed and a bathroom. Oh, and it was warm.
There’s no bathroom here. Just a bucket in the corner, which I’m ignoring.
What I can’t ignore is the all-pervasive fear that’s dug its claws into me. I’m trying very hard not to panic, but it’s pretty fucking obvious I’m not in Kansas anymore.
Where even am I? England?
The locked door in front of me opens, and a shadowy figure throws a plastic bottle at me. Because I’m so numb with fear and cold, I don’t react fast enough, and it hits me on the cheek. Pain explodes across my face, but the figure doesn’t say a word.
As I scramble to grab the bottle, the door closes, plunging me into darkness once again. I’m so thirsty that I break the bottle seal and gulp the contents down in seconds. It’s tepid and tastes of minerals, but it’s not unpleasant.
When nobody else comes, I wrap the blanket around me and try to rest while praying someone comes to save me. It’s a forlorn hope.
For all I know, Angelo has grown tired of me and he’s the reason I’m stuck in this room below Castle Dracula. It’s not like we’ve enjoyed a happy marriage so far, and divorce is expensive these days.
Maybe he decided it was cheaper to stage a kidnapping and get rid of me that way. Less messy and no chance of an inconvenient body floating in on the evening tide.
But the more I think about it, the more that story makes no sense. Carlo hinted that someone unknown had paid him off.
All this must link to the strange deposits in the accounts. I know Kane had hired a tech expert to trace the transactions, so does Angelo think an enemy is trying to frame him for fraud or money laundering?
Perhaps this shadowy individual is behind my kidnapping?
The best-case scenario here is that I’m being ransomed in return for a cash payment. Angelo is rich, so it’s possible a deranged idiot could have kidnapped me in the hope he’d get paid to send me back.
At least if this is a kidnapping plot, I’m unlikely to be hurt.
Unless the kidnapper wants to send physical evidence, such as a finger.
My stomach heaves at the idea of someone chopping my fingers off. Only the knowledge I’d have to use the bucket stops me from vomiting.
Be brave, Chiara.
Coco and Felix need me.
Will Angelo look after them?
He’d better, or I’ll torment him from the afterlife if anything bad happens to me.
My thoughts drift as the hours tick by and the room grows colder.
Does Luka know I’m missing?
Does he care?
Tears drip down my cheeks in icy rivulets, but I wipe them away with the sleeve of my shirt. There’s no point in crying. It won’t get me out of here.
Fear turns to anger.
This is all Angelo’s fault!
If he’d left me alone in my shitty job down in Texas, I’d be fine. Broke and overworked, sure, but safe. And safe, broke, and overworked is a fucking lot better than kidnapped by a deranged nutcase and locked in a cold, damp room awaiting some godawful fate.
I resolve to tell Angelo exactly what I think of him when he rescues me.
And he better fucking rescue me or I’ll find a way out, hunt him down, and kill the bastard myself.
It’s pitch dark when a man next unlocks my door, slamming it against the stone wall. Despite the cold, I’m dozing, and the sudden jarring noise makes me scream. He laughs.
“You won’t last long, bunny,” he sneers. At least I think that’s what he says. The thick accent means the words are difficult to interpret.
“I’m hungry.” After being given only one small bottle of water, I’m starving as well as dehydrated.
“I’ll notify management,” the man snaps with an eye roll. “Now move.” When I refuse, he reaches down and grabs my wrist. My self-preservation instinct kicks in and I lash out, my one remaining sneaker catching his arm. He grunts but otherwise doesn’t react.
“Let me go!” I struggle hard, but it’s useless. The man is massive. A wall of thick muscle beneath his jacket.
He drags me up a flight of stairs and down a corridor. The air is drier up here, and a fraction warmer, but after several hours in that cell, the cold has sunk so deep into my bones I’m not sure I’ll ever feel warm again.
I’m thrown into a large, airy room. Ancient floral wallpaper hangs in damp strips, echoes of a time when this would have been a ballroom, or perhaps a dining room.
When I make the mistake of looking up, I see black mold creeping across the ceiling.
A dusty chandelier hangs from the center of a decorative ceiling rose, while a few rickety velvet chairs sit around a vast stone fireplace.
Sadly, nobody has bothered to light a fire, and I’m not the only guest shivering.
There are several women in the room, some dressed in little more than undergarments. The ones wearing the least are blue with cold. Barely conscious. One girl crouches against a wall and stares at the floor with a blank expression.
Who the fuck are they and why are we all here?
While I stare in horror, someone shoves two more women through the door before locking it behind us. A tall brunette wearing a thin, sheer dress rubs her arms. There are tear tracks down her grubby cheeks, but she seems more alert than the rest of the women.
I walk over to her as she stares out through the only window not covered by a metal grille.
“Why are we here?” I keep my voice low, unsure of who’s listening.
“I know why I’m here,” she replies in a flat voice. “Not sure about you, girl.” From the way she cocks an eyebrow, she thinks I don’t belong here. I’m desperate for information, so I try again.
“Okay, so why are you here?”
Her shoulders sag. “My father sold me to pay a debt. The old bastard couldn’t stop sniffing the product. He had to give Monroe something or lose his life.”
“Monroe?” I frown. That name means nothing.
The woman huffs out a sigh. “Monroe. The man in charge of distribution up here.”
“Distribution?”
“Jesus fuck, are you thick, girl? Drugs!”
The words are loud enough to attract the attention of a petite girl nearby.
“Monroe is a cunt,” the younger woman hisses. “He had me on the game when I was fourteen. Now he reckons I’m too old.” Is she joking? She looks so young.
“Yeah, he’s a monster,” the brunette agrees. “But he’s Barrington’s right-hand man, so we’re fucked because he’s protected.”
Barrington. That name also means nothing. I scrub my eyes and pray for divine intervention. Nothing makes sense. I have no clue who any of these people are or why I’m here.
Since I’m getting nowhere with this line of questioning, I change tack.
“What’s going to happen next?” The women glance at each other as if debating how much to tell me.
“This is The Hunt.”
Well that doesn’t sound at all ominous.
“What are we hunting?” I’m not a fan of blood sports.
“We’re not hunting anything, girl. They’re hunting us.”