Chapter 28 Bruno
brUNO
Securing medical care for Saoirse is my first goal, and it’s surprisingly easy. Turns out when you buy a person, no one questions your intentions with them and most assume I want Saoirse treated so I can have my way with her.
The thought sickens me but it gets her medical care without question and that’s all I care about.
After her furious attack on me the first time I visited her, I expected the same with the doctor but the cameras showed a completely different story.
Saoirse was quiet and docile. She barely even reacted to the doctor’s presence as he cleaned her up, tended to her wounds and wrapped a few of the more serious ones in gauze.
She didn’t speak to him at all either. It was like she completely checked out.
And I don’t blame her.
How the fuck am I going to fix this? On one hand, I had to purchase the woman I love to save her from going overseas and protect her from a situation that she’s in because of me.
On the other, one wrong move and my father will do God knows what to my sister, and then likely turn on Saoirse. I have no one and nothing to help me.
But there has to be a way.
I will find a way.
That mantra plays through my head every time I visit Saoirse to bring her food and water, and clear away the untouched plates.
It repeats like a song in each meeting I attend with my father while doing everything I can to maintain his trust in me.
It’s a thought as common as breathing while pouring over every document and bank account I get access to for a hint toward who the mysterious third pillar of power is in this organization.
And through it all, keeping Saoirse safe is my priority.
Difficult when she’s imprisoned and I’m her jailer, but it’s all I can do to make sure no one hurts her ever again.
That mantra lasts until I’m alone in the shower with nothing but the pounding, scalding water for company.
It’s then that the despair comes. The panic and guilt that I was so blinded by my desire to get approval for my father that I couldn’t see what he was really like, and walked right into his fucking trap.
A few words and I was ten years old again, believing everything he told me like it was law and betraying the only person in the world who truly cared about me.
Saoirse.
How did I fuck this up so completely?
The world continues to turn while Saoirse remains my prisoner, and, after giving her a few days to calm herself down, I return to her cell in the basement of the lighthouse.
Domenico insists on keeping her there because it’s close to the shipments he leaves me in charge of.
I try not to think about the people buried in those shipments but I keep a record of every single shipping container, ship, and Captain.
I tell myself I’ll redeem myself by somehow saving everyone I have a hand in condemning but deep down I know how impossible that will be.
Knocking softly on the door, I balance a tray of food in one hand and let myself in.
The only thing Saoirse has ever accepted from me since arriving here is clothing to cover herself up, and a duvet and pillows for the bed.
She’s created a nest for herself, and I’d bring her more, but I’m terrified that anything I give her will be used to take her own life.
Her anger toward me seems topped only by her own heartbreaking desire to die. I caused this and I need to fix it.
“I brought soup today. The doctor says it will be easy on your stomach but you really need to start eating something or you’ll reach a stage where even water will be rejected.”
She doesn’t look at me. Doesn’t speak.
Earlier’s lunch remains untouched at my feet on another tray but the water cup is empty.
She’s drinking, just not eating. Maybe the soup will be easier on her then.
Crouching, I swap the trays around and I’m about to leave as usual when she shifts subtly under the covers and peeks out.
Her eyes darken the second she glimpses me though, and she immediately rolls over.
“Saoirse… please, talk to me.” It’s pathetic of me to ask and even worse for me to hope, but I need her to know I’m trying to help her. That I care. And that I’m so fucking sorry. Hell, once I get her out of her and back to her family I’ll happily let her kill me. I just want her to talk to me.
She remains silent with only a few strands of auburn hair poking out from the duvet.
Setting the tray down, I approach the mattress and drop down to my haunches. “It would be so much easier for me to tell you everything if you would just look at me.”
Nothing but silence.
“Saoirse, please. The longer this goes on, the harder it will be for me to fix this and I know, it should be hard but is there no—”
“Fuck! Off!” Saoirse bolts upward and spits directly in my face. “I’m not going to make anything easy for you, you fucking slimy piece of shit. I hope you break your neck walking out of here and I— what the fuck, get off me!”
I react more than I think and part of my soul cracks hearing how scared she sounds when I shove her back down onto the mattress and climb over the top of her. To the camera’s it’ll look like I’ve finally had enough and that’s what I need.
I need a show.
“Get off, get off!” She screams louder and louder with fat tears welling in her eyes until I firmly place my hand over her mouth and pin her down.
“Please,” I hiss, my voice barely above a whisper. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry but please listen to me. You have no idea how closely this room is being watched. I’m not going to hurt you and I’m not going to touch you. Beyond uh… this.”
Her muffled cursing fades but her large, tear-filled eyes stare up at me and I feel like a rotten hyena pinning a helpless bunny rabbit. And Saoirse has never been helpless.
“Just listen. Please. I know you have no reason to trust me, I know you hate me and I deserve it. I fucked up. I have no excuse. I believed my father because I was too eager to be accepted by him and I didn’t realize how terrible that was until it was too late.
Honestly, I thought I could bridge the gap and have us all working together.
But he used me and I fell for it and you’re suffering. I’m sorry, Saoirse.”
She blinks and her tears soak into my fingers.
“I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. I’ll say it until I’m blue in the face but I’m trying to fix things.
I’m trying. I know I bought you but everyone else there represented overseas investors.
If anyone else bought you, you would have been placed on a ship and I would have lost you forever.
You’d just be gone and I—” My voice cracks as my words tumble over one another in my desperation to explain while I have her in a position to listen.
She shifts underneath me and I move with her, doing what I can to make it look like I’m playing with her for the camera.
“I can feel how much you hate me but you need to use that, okay? We need to work together to get you out of here because I’m being watched like a hawk.
My father doesn’t trust me, so he’s forcing me to get my hands dirty while giving me barely any breathing room, and he has Mary, okay?
My sister. He sent her away somewhere and I have no fucking clue where and the second I step out of line?
She’ll be dead. I can’t—” I close my eyes and my head dips momentarily as an overwhelming surge of upset overtakes me.
“I can’t lose her and I can’t lose you so I’m trying everything I can think of to keep you both alive while having no control over any of it.
” Tears sting behind my eyes and I blink hurriedly to clear them.
When I look back at Saoirse, her expression has changed.
The anger isn’t the most prominent emotion in her eyes and her constant straining against my hand has faded.
“I’m not trying to make you feel sorry for me. This is my mess. But I’m trying to save you both so please, work with me. Please.”
I remove my hand and expect Saoirse to either resume screaming or saying something cruel, but she does neither. She glares at me, then rolls her head to the side and completely checks out.
Shit.
I’d been hoping to reach her in some way but clearly I’m on my own. Despite telling myself not to hold expectations over Saoirse, I thought she would have fire to get back to her family and jump at the chance. Doesn’t she miss her brothers? Her twin? Has she really been broken that much?
The following days follow much of the same routine.
I bring her food and water, and some days it’s touched and other days it isn’t.
Sometimes she’s deathly quiet and other times she’s burning bright like a white-hot flame, yelling obscenities and cursing me out while swearing to make sure my death is the last thing she ever does.
I’m hopeful on those days, desperate for something to finally get through to her but any time I think there’s progress, she reverts back to her silent self. Google tells me it’s a trauma response and I have to be patient and kind with her, but I’m running out of time.
The longer we wait, the more this organization can churn people overseas without consequence.
I spend one Thursday night attempting to get in touch with Rocky, but after swapping SIM cards around with a guard, my call didn’t even connect.
The guard I stole from is never seen again, confirming my suspicion that every single phone call is being traced. Even the door dash ones.
After five days, I try again with Saoirse and this time, there is fire in her when I pin her to the bed for a display for the cameras.
“Get off me,” she spits, thrashing about and hitting me as hard as she can. She’s weaker with the lack of food but she can still pack a solid punch.
“Saoirse, if you would just talk to me then I wouldn’t have to do this.”
“Talk to you?” Hatred burns in her eyes. “I don’t need to do anything to make your life easier.”
“It’s for both our sakes,” I snap as frustration swells.
“Do you honestly think I enjoy this? Do you think I enjoy knowing that one wrong move and my sister will end up dead because my father is a psychopath? Or that the woman I love will suffer a worse fate? You think you’re the only one imprisoned here? ”
“And whose fault is that?” she yells, tossing her head from side to side. Then her teeth sink hard into the soft flesh of my forearm, and she clings on like a dog unwilling to release a bone.
She bites deeper and deeper until I’m able to wrench myself free with a cry. Blood pours down her chin and Saoirse glares at me with wide, crazed eyes.
“My twin is dead because of you so I don’t give a shit about you sister, understand? I will do everything I can to make you suffer until it kills me, so buckle up you asshole. This is your hell!”
Wait— Cian is dead?
No… there’s no way. What the hell happened?