Winter's Fire (Club Aegis Book 5)

by Christie Adams

  He gestured towards the corridor, then pulled a young woman into the room and pushed her forward. She stumbled but quickly regained her footing and turned to see Hugo off with a few choice words before pivoting back in their direction.

  Although she was even more grubby and untidy than they were, Lucy recognised her immediately—Diana Carstairs, alive, well and verbally kicking. She took a step forward, intending to offer comfort to the other woman, but stopped dead at the look of recognition that lit up Diana’s face. She bypassed Lucy completely, and zeroed in on—

  “Logan? You came for me! I knew it wasn’t over between us! Oh, thank God!”

  Chapter 19

  Lucy watched the other woman run from the door, straight into Logan’s arms. Without hesitation, those arms closed around her, and pulled her to him.

  The sensation of falling through infinite space was nauseating. For several seconds, Lucy couldn’t think—her brain refused to work, to process what her eyes were telling her.

  The explosion of memories and questions stole her breath. Dizzy from trying to make sense of it all, she reached for the pillar for support, and as that initial devastation abated what took its place was a sense of betrayal so fierce a silent, primal howl blasted her ability to think into a million impenetrable fragments.

  Fragments that were whipped into a frenzy of white noise by the endless, breathless sobs of Diana Carstairs talking to Logan as if she, Lucy, didn’t exist.

  The truth, unpalatable though it was, slammed into her, robbing her of her ability to breathe, never mind think. Everything had been a lie. Every kiss, every caress now a brutal, crushing humiliation. How he must have laughed when she’d suggested making their relationship real. No different from any other man, he’d taken what was offered to him without the slightest qualm or pang of conscience.

  She’d been nothing more than a convenient way to pass the time until he could resume his relationship with Diana.

  “Lucy?”

  Resolved to remain cool and calm, and not betray her rage at an unjust universe, she levelled her gaze in Logan’s direction, armed with all the cool she could muster. “Yes?”

  “This is Diana. Lucy’s been my partner on the mission to find you.”

  His partner on the mission—that spelled it out perfectly, her role in his life. He was a better actor than she’d given him credit for. She’d been such a fool, falling for his lies like some starry-eyed virgin who shouldn’t be allowed out alone. Falling for him as if he were something special.

  Lucy dug deep into her emotional reserves. If he could act, so could she. She pinned on the brightest smile anyone in captivity was likely to be able to pull off and forced herself to close the distance between herself and Logan and Diana. “Lucy Winter, Miss Carstairs. I wish the circumstances were better.”

  Maybe she was being oversensitive, but Lucy could have sworn Diana’s ice-blue eyes took on an even more glacial chill, even as she pressed more closely to Logan, as if she were staking her claim on him.

  Why don’t you just go the whole hog and pee on him?

  For a fraction of a second, Lucy’s inner sarcastic bitch threatened to twist her lips into a humourless smile, but wrapping mental duct tape around her broken heart took priority. Plunging into a morass of self-pity wouldn’t help anyone—her, least of all.

  “Oh Logan, you have to get me out of here!”

  The hysterical wail dissolved into the kind of dramatic tears no man could resist. Watching Logan comfort Diana scraped Lucy’s already wounded heart raw, inflicted a pain so profound it almost engulfed her in its suffocating embrace.

  Hold on. Don’t break. And above all, show no emotion. You are stronger than this.

  ~~*~~

  They were left alone for the remainder of that day, but in what was to become a pattern for the days that followed, the guards came for Logan first thing in the morning after one of the longest, coldest nights Lucy had ever endured. Curled on her side, she’d counted each excruciating second, unable to rid her mind of the image of Logan and Diana together and the gentle way in which he’d coaxed as much information out of her as possible, to build a picture of where she’d been held and how she’d been brought to their location.

  At the crack of dawn, breakfast arrived, and in exchange for the food, the two guards—both built like tanks—dragged Logan out of the cell, while a third kept a gun trained on Lucy and Diana.

  In spite of the turbulence of her feelings, Lucy put herself between the semi-automatic assault rifle and the woman they’d tried and failed to rescue. All she could do was watch as Logan was taken away, and when the bolts grated home again, she was left alone with Diana.

  “He’s mine.”

  Lucy pivoted to face the source of two of the most venomous words she’d ever heard. It was as if a switch had been thrown—Diana was no longer the simpering victim but had transformed into a spitting cobra. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard.” Diana made not the slightest attempt to hide her sneer.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “I’ve seen the way you look at him. You want him.”

  With every fibre of her being, but there was no way Lucy was admitting it. Or at least, she had wanted him—as soon as his arms had gone around Diana, he’d become off-limits for her, so she’d walled up her feelings and turned her back on them. “Miss Carstairs, you’d better have something to eat—we don’t know when they’ll bring food again.”

  If she’d hoped to divert Diana’s attention elsewhere, she failed miserably.

  “You’re only here because that stupid resort doesn’t allow single people. If it did, I wouldn’t have brought that deadweight of a boyfriend with me.”

  While such a callous attitude shocked Lucy, on a different level, she wasn’t surprised by it—it was totally in keeping with the true colours Diana now revealed.

  For a moment Lucy wondered what Logan saw in her, but the answer was obvious—he was a man, and to her dying day, Lucy knew she’d never get to the bottom of how the male mind worked.

  “You do know they killed him?” In the face of such heartlessness, she felt no obligation to pull that particular punch.

  The revelation still didn’t elicit a more humane reaction in Diana. She gave a careless shrug, as if the news meant nothing to her. “Can’t say I’m surprised. His spine took a permanent vacation before we even got here. He was never going to measure up to Logan. Just like you’ll never measure up to what Logan needs.”

  Which Diana clearly believed she did. Lucy tightened her grip on her composure. She didn’t do meltdowns, yet right now, she was hovering at the edge of one, and she didn’t like it.

  “I hardly think—”

  “A woman like you could never be the sub a man like Logan needs.”

  The blunt statement slammed into Lucy with an almost physical force. She bit her tongue. She was not going to react to the taunting, no matter how much the two-faced witch baited her. “It’s probably a good idea to get something to eat.”

  Try as she might, Lucy found her own advice hard to stomach. She managed a few mouthfuls and made sure she was hydrated, and at the same time put both food and water on one side for Logan. She was also interested to note that Logan’s self-appointed perfect mate saw only to her own needs. The woman was the epitome of selfishness—and yes, vanity too, if the way she constantly combed her fingers through her hair and frowned when they snagged on a tangle was anything to go by.

  “We’d better get out of here soon, before my hair turns completely to straw. Do you have a plan?”

  Diana’s tone yet again made Lucy feel like the hired help—or would have, if she’d let it get to her. “We’re working on it, Miss Carstairs. We were both unconscious when we were brought here. I’m quite sure Logan will have a better idea of what we can do when they bring him back.”

  If they brought him back. If they didn’t blindfold him for the journey. If they hadn’t knocked him out again. Lucy shuddered
at the memory of that vicious-looking needle being jabbed into his neck, the last thing she saw as she succumbed to the chloroform they’d used on her.

  “I can tell you one thing—we aren’t on Nenufar anymore.”

  Lucy pricked up her ears. That was something Diana had omitted to mention when Logan had questioned her. “What makes you say that?”

  Diana rolled her eyes, as if Lucy had asked the most idiotic question in creation. “I overheard them when they were bringing me here yesterday. One of them said something about the boat coming back from Nenufar. They wouldn’t need a boat if we’re on the same island, would they?”

  That rather depended on whether they meant Nenufar the island or Nenufar the resort. Either way, Lucy filed the information for future reference—knowing there was a boat they could escape in might be useful.

  “Where they brought you from—was anyone else being held there?”

  Diana gave a condescending sigh. “Weren’t you eavesdropping? About a dozen or so other women. God, they never stopped crying.”

  Lucy wasn’t a violent woman, but Diana was testing her self-control to the limit. The harpy was certainly a talented actress—yesterday, with Logan, she’d played the delicate, abused victim to perfection, but today, she had “armour-plated bitch” down pat.

  ~~*~~

  Every time she was left alone with Diana, Lucy somehow managed to find the inner strength to deal with the other woman and her sniping remarks. Instead of rising to the bait, she reinforced her mental wall to shut out the hateful words, but she could do nothing in the face of worry and fear for Logan’s safety, and the raw, bleeding agony of his comprehensive rejection of her.

  The worry and fear were winning. Her imagination provided an unrelenting torment of speculation about what they were doing to Logan, but when they returned him to the cell, he refused to answer her questions. Not that he needed to answer them—just looking at him told her all she needed to know.

  Today, though, something was different. Lucy didn’t know what it was—there was no obvious reason for her to feel so uneasy, but as the time approached for Logan to be brought back, her usual fear swelled into a choking mass.

  The grate of the bolts being drawn back—a noise that now triggered an almost Pavlovian response of trepidation—jerked Lucy’s attention to the door. It opened, and Logan was pushed inside. He stumbled and sprawled across the dirty stone floor, landing with a tortured groan. Lucy scrambled over the space between them, managing to coax him over onto his back as Diana landed on the other side of him. She was already blubbing her eyes out, and her hands flapped uselessly around him, like wet laundry in a storm.

  “Logan! Logan!”

  Lucy spared the other woman a glare as Diana sobbed his name. Hysterics wouldn’t help, though Lucy felt ready to break down herself when she saw how badly Logan had been beaten. The extent of his injuries shocked her, and the way his arm hovered over his chest made her fear for his ribs. They were already badly bruised, but if they were broken…

  “What the hell have they done to you?”

  “I didn’t move fast enough this time.”

  The problem wasn’t his ribs—it was the ugly, six-inch cut along his side, ragged and gaping, and the source of the patch of blood that was almost lost among the other stains on what was now a tattered excuse for a shirt.

  There was no way that was going to heal without proper medical attention. The first aid kit had contained the bare minimum to begin with. It was now severely depleted, and totally inadequate for a challenge like this. Fired with anger, Lucy lunged to her feet and hammered on the door.

  “Hey! I know there’s someone out there! I need extra water, surgical gloves and a suture kit, and I need it now!” She hit the door again. “You hear me? I need a kit now, or he’ll bleed to death!”

  Lucy clenched her teeth at the extra-loud wail Diana gave. What she’d give for a ball gag to shut the woman up. She needed to think. They were trapped in a nightmare that even her worst fears couldn’t have cooked up, and she had no idea what to do.

  “Lucy?”

  More a groan than anything else, Logan’s utterance of her name had her rushing back to his side. Her stomach churned again. Before she could stop herself, she clasped his hand and stroked the hair back from his forehead. Grimy and battered and in love with another woman, he was still the most precious thing in her life.

  “What can I do?”

  “Help me sit up.”

  “No, you need to—”

  “I need to sit up. Help me. Please.”

  The big man wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Lucy wasn’t sure she could manage on her own, and she didn’t want him to risk aggravating his injuries. She looked to Diana for help, but she’d retreated to a corner when Lucy launched her attack on the door and was clearly in no hurry to leave it, in case she broke another nail.

  Somehow, Lucy managed to prop Logan up against the pillar as the door behind her opened. Two men appeared, both armed. One of them held a green and white case substantially larger than the kit they’d been given originally, along with a dozen shrink-wrapped bottles of water. Lucy started towards him and stopped dead when the other levelled his AK-47 directly at her. She didn’t take her gaze off them as they left the case and water on the floor and backed out of the cellar. So brave of them—not.

  Lucy inspected the contents of the case. Not brilliant, but at least it contained most of what she’d asked for. Unfortunately for Logan, there was no local anaesthetic, but there was pain medication. She popped two of the pills from the packaging and pressed them into Logan’s hand before ripping open the plastic around the water bottles. She unscrewed the top of one and passed it to Logan. “They’ll help with the pain. Can you manage to drink some of this?”

  Logan took the water from her, tossed the pills into his mouth, and put the bottle to his lips. Lucy waited while he drank a good half. “Okay, we need to get your shirt off. No, let me. I want you to move as little as possible.”

  As slowly and gently as she could, Lucy eased the filthy garment off him, and tried not to react to the mess she uncovered. The wailing from the corner increased in volume. Lucy clamped her lips together and pumped a generous dose of the alcohol rub into her palm, before donning a pair of surgical gloves.

  “I’ll do my best, but you need antibiotics. It’s going to take a miracle for this not to get infected.” She set to work, and tried to ignore Logan’s reflexive jerk away from her.

  “Have you done this before?”

  Should she tell him the truth? “In a manner of speaking.”

  “On a human being?”

  So he still had a sense of humour. Okay, she might have sewn up the odd joint of pork in the beginning, but everyone had to start somewhere, right? “Sam let me practise on Ben… eventually.”

  “Lucy—”

  “Save your breath. This is going to hurt.” Whatever else he’d been going to say, she didn’t need to hear it.

  Deep in concentration, Lucy stitched up the gash as neatly as she knew how. Sam had taught her well, but she was a poor substitute for professional help in a hospital, and she knew it.

  “We have to get out of here. You can’t take much more of this.”

  “I’ll take whatever I need to, to keep us all alive.”

  In spite of how he’d taken advantage of her, Lucy didn’t doubt his words. The ache inside her kicked off again. She’d never known loving someone could be so tough. If only…

  She shut down the thought immediately. That way lay madness. If not madness, then at the very least, more humiliation.

  With a determined effort, she finished the row of stitches, then dressed the wound, careful to keep the tape away from the sutures. When she was done, she snapped off the gloves and stuffed them into the bag where she’d deposited the used swabs.

  “Thank you.”

  Lucy shrugged. She wasn’t about to dissolve because of the way he was looking at her. The man was in agony, probably semi-del
irious with pain. “I’m just glad they gave us the kit.”

  “Is Diana all right?”

  “I’m here!”

  Diana launched herself at him, and the knife in Lucy’s chest twisted and forced itself deeper.

  Logan waited until he could no longer hear the guards’ receding footstep before speaking.

  “We have to get out of here. I heard them talking on the way back—they’ve brought the auction forward. They were also discussing getting the two of you cleaned up and adding you to the programme.”

  “What do you mean? Logan, what are you talking about?”

  The panic-stricken questions were accompanied by fingers digging into his forearm directly over the spot where a baton had connected during the latest “training” session. The physical pain wasn’t enough to make him react—no, it was the fact that his ex was clinging to him that angered him. Finding the patience to deal with her was becoming more and more difficult, but he’d do it to protect Lucy. He’d do anything to protect her. If Diana had any idea what Lucy meant to him…

  “Shh, calm down, Diana. It’s not going to happen, but we need to focus, and come up with a plan.”

  Lucy edged closer. “What can we do?”

  “You can’t let them sell me! You can’t!”

  Now he had no choice but to offer physical comfort. Diana was letting hysteria get the upper hand—if she carried on like that, she could end up getting them all killed. Lucy recognised it too. Logan watched her fingers flex and splay. His little spitfire was spoiling for a fight, but she also knew this was neither the time nor the place—if such a thing existed.

  “No one’s being sold, Diana,” she said, keeping her voice low and her tone forceful. “We’re going to get out of this, but freaking out isn’t going to help anyone, so shut the hell up!”

  Lucy’s gaze flew to him, but before he could offer her a grateful smile, she looked down, as if she were afraid of his reaction. That needed a conversation they couldn’t have here, or in front of Diana.