Chapter 8
DAISY
The sack is still over my head and I’m sitting in a chair. I know that much. I’m tied to it. There’s whispering. I’m not sure how many hours it’s been but I sort of need to pee, so I hope this isn’t going to take too much longer.
Peeing myself without the excuse of the Stinger’s zap is not happening!
I try to glean what I can using the senses I do have. The air is cool and it smells a little damp. The chair I’m tied to is metal. There’s shuffling and movement, so I know there are a few people here with me. But I can’t get much else without my eyes.
After I was taken and tied up, I was left on the floor of the van to roll around a little during the short drive. I’ve got some lumps and bumps, but I wasn’t beaten, or anything, so that’s a plus.
The bag is ripped off without warning and I blink. A bright light is aimed at me, and I flinch under it, closing my eyes immediately. I think I’m in a room in a basement of some kind though. Every noise echoes a little.
No one speaks. I get the impression that they’re used to people who find themselves in this chair being a bit more hysterical from the outset.
I say nothing. I just sit.
‘Do you know where you are?’ a gruff male voice finally says a few moments later.
‘In a basement?’ I ask.
‘That’s right. A very deep basement, where no one can hear you screaming, so don’t bother trying, bitch.’
‘Okay.’
I crack an eye open, but can’t see anything beyond the bright light, so I close it again and sit back with a sigh. Compared with how I’ve been feeling at the Novelle house for days, this isn’t actually that bad, so long as I don’t think about what might happen to me next.
‘You don’t seem scared.’
‘The light is hurting my eyes,’ I say. ‘Maybe you could turn it off?’
‘You don’t call the shots here, sweetheart. I do.’
‘Okay. What’s your name, Mr. In-charge?’
‘You don’t need to know my name,’ he growls very close to my ear, making me jump.
He chuckles low. ‘Getting scared now?’
‘No. I have sensory issues. The light is hurting my eyes and this chair is really uncomfortable. Also, I’m cold.’
He doesn't say anything and I frown. I need to move this along. There’s not much time before Joe realizes I’ve given his babysitter the slip and I want my safety ensured before he starts tearing the city apart.
‘I’m Daisy,’ I say, trying for some normal conversation.
Maybe that’ll help me to appear less threatening and they’ll talk to me instead of interrogating me.
My overture is met with silence, though, and then I hear more whispering.
‘What?’ Mr. In-charge snarls.
‘My name is Daisy,’ I say a little more loudly.
‘We know who you are, Novelle!’
I frown. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I’ve been kidnapped by people who want ransom from my stepfather.
That would be very bad luck. Not the worst, but not great for my plan at all.
‘You know my stepfather hates me, right? I doubt he’d pay for me to be released or anything.’
‘What about the Bandervilles?’
I shiver involuntarily. Joe would pay to get me back. He loves torturing me too much to let me go and he wants this marriage. What would he do to me if I was given back to him after he’d had to pay for me to be returned?
‘Not sure,’ I say, my voice quieter.
‘Did you blow up the lab in Wrath? Set the fire in the Novelle Center?’
The question throws me. Why would a kidnapper ask that?
‘Answer!’
‘Um. No. I didn’t go to the Novelle Center that day and I was in the club when it blew. Why would I set off a bomb in a building I was in the basement of with no way out?’
He scoffs. ‘Everyone knows there are catacombs under the buildings in that part of town.’
‘That’s still quite a risk to take,’ I say, tilting my head to the side.
‘Maybe you did it wrong. Made it badly, got the timings off.’
I wrinkle my nose. ‘If I was going to make a bomb, Mr. In-charge, I’d research it to the nth degree. I would not do it wrong!’
He’s silent again for a few minutes. ‘Open your eyes.’
‘No, thank you.’
‘It’s not a request,’ he growls, his hand taking my chin in a tight grip.
‘Yes, I know.’ I try to shake him off, but it doesn’t work. ‘I made the request. The light. Remember?’
‘I— What?’
‘The light. It hurts my eyes. Could you turn it off, or angle it away a little?’
‘Look, bitch, the light is gonna be the least of your worries if you don’t—Yes, sir. I understand.’
The light moves from my face, and I open my eyes, blinking in the semi darkness. There are three figures, and a blinking red light in one corner. Someone’s watching this little dungeon scene.
‘Were you three in the van that took me?’
One of them moves closer. ‘I’m asking the questions! And I’m getting some straight answers, one way or another.’
I hear the sound of electricity and a stick the man was holding at his side sparks ominously. I feel my heart begin to thud properly for the first time.
‘What’s that?’ I ask faintly.
‘Cattle prod. Know what it does?’
Stings.
‘It shocks,’ I force myself to say evenly.
‘That’s right. Answer my questions or I’m going to shock you with it. Understand?’
I errantly wonder why everyone’s preferred method of torture seems to be electricity. Surely there are other styles to choose from. Water? Knives? Pulling teeth?
‘Yes,’ I say, my voice devoid of tone, my face expressionless.
‘Did you blow up Wrath?’
‘No.’
‘Did you start the fire at the Novelle Center?’
‘No.’
Mr. In-charge touches his ear. He’s listening to someone. Whoever’s on the other side of the camera, I suppose.
‘Did you hire someone to do it for you?’
‘No.’
‘You have access to both places, Miss Novelle. You’re one of the only people who does. Are you really going to tell me you had nothing to do with it?’
‘I didn’t,’ I say.
He leans forward. ‘I don’t believe you.’
He strikes out with the prod, the two prongs at the end clicking and sparking as he touches it to my bare arm. I tense, with a whimper, expecting the worst.
But the convulsions and the agony don’t come. It’s oddly anticlimactic.
I stare down at my arm and then look up at him. He tries again, pulling up my sweatshirt and striking at ribs this time.
It’s nothing like the Stinger that’s around my leg. The voltage is so weak compared to it that I begin to laugh.
‘What the fuck? Is this thing not working?’
He turns and sticks one of his cohorts who screams and jumps away with a ‘What the fuck man?’
‘I’m sorry,’ I wheeze between breaths, trying to get myself under control. Tears rolls down my cheeks.
I guess I am hysterical after all.
‘It’s just. I thought it would be so much worse, you know? I’ve had so much worse. Literally this morning. And that stick is really scary with all the clicking. But, like, it’s not much worse than a,’ I laugh harder as I babble, ‘a bee sting. I mean, is it broken?’
‘What the fuck is this? Who is this bitch?’ one of the other men in the room murmurs.
Mr. In-charge presses his ear again. ‘Yes, Monsieur. It’s definitely working. I’ll…try again.’
I tilt my head. Did I hear him right? Monsieur? Who else would be called monsieur if not a French man? This guy in front of me clearly isn’t French. Maybe I am in the right place after all.
‘Look, sweetheart, either you start telling us the truth or I’m going to turn this to the highest setting and—’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, looking up at him, ‘but it’s just not very scary anymore.’
His eyes narrow and he zaps me again, letting the current run through me for much longer than he did before.
When he finally steps back, I level him with an annoyed expression.
‘Could you stop that? It’s leaving little burn marks, you know? I’d rather not be covered in them. It’ll make it hard for me to sleep later when my skin is sore. Do you mind?’
He looks up at the blinking light.
‘Look, bitch, we captured you because you’re—’
‘You didn’t capture me,’ I interrupt. ‘I wanted to find you. At least, I did if the man behind the camera up there is Pierre Sauvage. Shade told me one of his guys was camped outside the club, and that he had shown an interest in me, so I thought that was a good way of getting to see him.’
I look up at the camera.
‘If you are Monsieur Sauvage, I have some terms, but I can make Envy for you,’ I say clearly.
Mr. In-charge snorts. ‘This is bullshit. How did you even—’
He touches his ear. ‘Yes. Right away, sir.’
He looks at me and shakes his head. ‘Get her up.’
The zip ties locking me to the chair are cut and I’m hauled to my feet. My left leg gives out immediately. It’s aching badly, I realize, and I hadn’t felt it with everything else going on.
Mr. In-charge catches me before I fall down.
‘Thanks,’ I murmur, giving him an open smile that seems to surprise him.
He shakes his head as if he needs to clear it and the three men walk me out of the room.
‘Are we in a hotel?’ I ask.
He looks at me sharply.
I sniff. ‘It smells of laundry out here. And I heard a big kitchen earlier.’
They take me into an elevator that doesn’t go anywhere until Mr. In-charge uses a special keycard like the ones in the lab on campus. We rise for a good few seconds before the doors open onto a wide corridor with a wooden floor lined with indoor plants.
It’s warmer up here, and I realize I’d been shivering down in the basement. I’m taken to a door and Mr. In-charge opens it with a smirk.
‘This is one of Mr. Sauvage’s private rooms.’
He pushes me in when I hesitate and enters after me. He closes the door behind him and stands there watching me.
I look around the room. There’s no one else here, but the room is a bedroom. An odd one. There’s a large four-poster bed with a cage under it.
There’s nothing else but a table with a chair facing the bed. Are those straps on the bedposts?
Weird.
I try to ignore my internal warning bells. I’m here now and there’s nowhere to go.