Beginning #2
I knew my actions wouldn’t go unnoticed for long.
Destroying another hunting ship under Whitton’s thumb and payroll was bound to get attention.
People didn’t have anything better to do than spread words.
Even the good people at Port Devlin weren’t above a bit of gossip and Whitton certainly wasn’t above getting revenge for my killing one of his best hunters.
He and Collin had something in common. They both enjoyed live merchandise.
Of course, when Collin went after my live merchandise, he had surrendered himself to my judgment.
I shrugged. “He took something of mine.”
“It wouldn’t be this feisty morsel, would it?” he asked, stepping toward Dahlia and running a finger through her dark hair. “Though she looks like she’s been in more fights than even you.”
I could see her lip twitch. She was itching to bite off his finger, but no one had caught on to what she was yet.
She remembered the dream as well as I did.
She was there and she’d mentioned it to me more than once in the months following.
It was our intimate curse to share dreams since she’d eaten two of my fingers when we were both children.
Because she never finished the job and I still drew breath, we were bonded in a way that no one could ever truly grasp. Not even us.
But sweet Dahlia resisted her urge to take Whitton’s fingers with her teeth.
She was fully aware the men were armed with bronze weapons and we were in no position to win that fight.
Oh, but I loved seeing her try to rein in her violence.
The hate and hunger in her eyes had become something of an addiction for me.
“No,” I answered. “This here is just another poor soul who somehow found her way onto my ship. The prick, Collin, took my boy David.”
“Ahh, that scrawny redheaded boy. I remember. Well, you cost me a lot of money by destroying that ship and her crew.”
“Can’t say I’m sorry, mate.”
“I can’t say you’re sorry either,” he sighed. “Take them both to jail. I’d like to have a conversation.”
I looked at Dahlia and shrugged. “This ought to be good, love.”
Dahlia and I found ourselves in one of Gilly Pine’s dank jail cells.
It smelled like piss and mud, but I’d been in worse places.
Whitton sat down in a chair too fancy for the place, probably from the governor’s house.
He would sit in nothing else. Night fell on the town and the only things lighting the room were a few torches fastened to the stone walls.
The sadistic pig had his goons beat the ever-living shit out of me.
Dahlia had been closed into the adjacent cell and watched the whole thing with a great view from across the hall.
She stood in the middle of the cell, wrists cuffed in front of her, and watched every second of the beating without a peep.
Oh, the things I knew she was conjuring in her mind. Every chance I got, I smiled with bloodied teeth at the idea. Every time a fist slammed into my face, her nostrils flared or her eyes twitched. She was in there, my furious siren. Waiting.
One eyebrow was split and blood was gushing into my vision. My lip was split, too. My nose might have been cracked and my ribs weren’t faring any better.
“I’ll have my men seizing your ship in the morning,” Whitton said casually.
“And I’ll likely hang you at sunrise. But tell me this.
What were you doing so far north? I’ve never heard of a hunt going that far out.
What is it you found, I wonder. Something you didn’t want to share with me, no doubt, which leads me to believe it was quite valuable. So? What were you doing?”
He’d asked the same question a hundred times and I answered the same every time.
“Fucking your mother,” I spit, barely missing his polished shoes.
My wrists were chained to the wall so every time I was punched or kicked in the stomach, my body didn’t go very far. I was confined to my place, bloodied and bruised.
After a while, I could see the moon in the cell window and knew we’d been at it for some time.
I groaned with exasperation, full well knowing that my crew would be ready for Whitton’s men in the morning.
I didn’t have to worry about them. Dahlia, on the other hand.
I wasn’t fond of the idea of her getting wrapped up with Whitton if I was killed before she escaped.
“Right, then,” Whitton grumbled, the wooden chair whining under his weight as he adjusted himself. “You keep glancing at the random ‘poor soul’ you found. I’m inclined to think she’s not some rat you picked up like the rest of your crew.”
He waved a hand at his men and two of them strode to the next cell, unlocking the gate. She didn’t fight them as they grabbed hold of her arms and dragged her into the cell with me. I trusted that she could take a harsher beating than me, but it didn’t mean I wanted to see it.
“In the business of torturing women, now, are you?” I said. “Can’t say I’m surprised, a cunt like you.”
Whitton, wincing at my commentary, nodded toward his men and as if they knew exactly what his wordless commands meant, two of them left the cell while the others tightened their grip on Dahlia.
Her stare only grew more venomous as the two officers returned carrying a rickety wooden table.
They set it in the middle of the room and immediately forced Dahlia on her back on top of it.
It was then that she finally started to struggle.
She kicked and writhed as the four officers pinned her in place.
Their hands all over her struggling body made me want to bite out their jugulars myself.
I tugged on my chains and Whitton glanced at me with a pleased smile as if he was winning.
He wasn’t winning.
I bit down on my teeth, my jaw pulsing as I watched them slide Dahlia up the table until her head was hanging slightly off the edge. She was growling in protest, her boots scraping on the wood. I watched them cover her face with a stained cloth and immediately realized what they were doing.
I’d been waterboarded before. It wasn’t the most fun memory I had.
Whitton stood to get closer to the spectacle when one of his men lifted a bucket of water over her face and began to pour. I could hear her garbling and choking and wheezing for air as they saturated her face completely.
“Whitton, you fucking coward,” I snarled, tugging on the chains until I felt the cuffs biting into my wrists.
It was all too familiar. Me, helpless. Dahlia struggling with a mob of enemies around her. Whitton watching cockily as he reveled in his sadistic victory.
His laughter filled the cell along with Dahlia’s struggles. When they stopped pouring water on her face and removed the cloth, she choked up mouthfuls of it, sucking in air with labored breaths.
“What were you doing in the north, Woelfson?” he asked for the hundredth time. “You can be honest with me.”
“Killing Collin Jones,” I hissed. “After fucking your mother, of course.”
He shook his head and stepped toward Dahlia, placing his hand on her stomach.
She jolted angrily at his touch like he was made of hot iron.
I watched him slide his swollen fingers under her wet blouse to her ribs before he glanced my way with a raised brow.
I couldn’t help the rage from twisting my tense face even though he took pleasure in my discomfort.
My fists clenched and I growled low, feeling more like an animal than a man as he infected her with his slimy hands.
“There’s a reason you’re not telling me the truth,” he said. “I want you to know, we could be partners again if you talk to me. But if you continue to refuse, you will be swinging over the square tomorrow. And this lady of yours? I will keep her until she begs to follow you.”
I thrashed against my chains, baring my teeth. “You’re going to die tonight.”
He laughed, his round stomach bouncing.
“She’s important to you. Vidar Woelfson has found himself a whore. A well-used one by the looks of her.”
He waved at his men and once more they covered Dahlia’s face with the wet rag and began pouring the water over her.
She kicked and choked, but they continued.
They continued until she stopped struggling.
Until the bucket was empty. Finally, the officer tossed the pail to the floor and the men stared at her, pulling the cover from her face.
She was unmoving. Her limbs had gone flaccid and rather than cough up the water, she just laid there, mouth agape.
They pulled her body fully onto the table so her head was no longer inclined off of it, but there was nothing.
Her wet hair hung over one edge and her legs over the other.
When the whole room assumed she’d passed, she coughed up a fountain of water and wheezed.
“Well,” Whitton sighed. “She’s a resilient one.”
He leaned over her with a rotted smile and, opening her eyes, she spit a mouthful of water onto his face.
He pulled a small handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his cheeks before one of the men hoisted Dahlia up and swung, hitting her cheek with the back of his hand.
Before she rolled onto the floor from the force, the men caught her, bringing her down to her knees in front of me.
Our eyes met and I could see the malice in hers, starving for retaliation.
One of the men tangled his fingers in her hair, tugging her chin up and exposing her throat to the thin little blade he had pulled from his belt.
He pressed it right over the scar she already had stretched across her neck.
“I know this is a shock,” Whitton continued. “You’re not used to losing but try to stay focused. What were you doing up north? What secret dealings are you keeping from me?”