“What are you going to do to me?” I spoke so quietly that I wasn’t sure if he heard me or not.
He stood up. He watched me a moment before he casually came over to me. He knelt down and traced is finger over the side of my face. I flinched. “Nothing, Darling. I’m done hurting you for the time being. The boys, however, well, they’ll do what they can to get back at you.”
“Why’d you come back here?” I asked.
“I’m concerned for you, Andy. I did ask you to marry me, you know.”
I studied his expression. “Explain that.”
“If we were married, no one would be able to question why you’d show up on the ship black and blue, if we even went back to the ship. No one would have questioned why we never came back anyway. Then I could get back to getting your ransom money, and in the meantime, do whatever I wanted to you.”
“You’re despicable,” I spat out through my clenched jaw.
“I did have you convinced otherwise, didn’t I?”
I looked away. I felt foolish for falling for everything he’d done over the years. There was no way I could have guessed any of this, but I never imagined Mark would have been this kind of person.
“What about Jason?” I asked.
“What about him?”
“Is he in on any of this?”
He cupped my chin, which made me wince, and brought it back so I had to face him. “I said something about this to him once. It accidently came out. That’s why we started to fight. He knew something was going on, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. That’s why he told you I was a bad person but couldn’t explain. I am a very bad person, I don’t deny that, but I have your best interest in mind.”
“What best interest?”
He stood up and fixed his eyes on mine. “Whatever needs to be done for us to get our money, of course.”
I turned away again. There was nothing I could do. He suddenly whistled, and I brought my attention to the door where two big men came in. I stood up, not wanting to be pulled up by my shoulders again. They came over to me and tied my hands in front of me and then pulled me toward the door so I had to pass Mark. They held me in place as he leaned toward me. After he stared at me in the eye for a few seconds, enough to make me very uncomfortable, he leaned back and nodded to the men. They dragged me down the long hallway, the one that had been in my dreams. The only difference was that there were no screams coming from behind other doors. They took me to the room at the end of the hall where they pulled my arms above my head and attached my restraints to something hanging from the ceiling. I turned my head enough in time to see one of the men grab a whip off the wall. He caught me staring and grinned. He was missing several teeth.
“Yes, Doll. This is specifically for me. I myself was whipped when you ran away. And now it’s my turn to pay you back.” He flicked the whip to the side. The snap sound echoed down the hall. I turned my face back to the wall right before he let it fly again. This time it smacked my back. I bit back a scream but felt the tears sting my eyes. I wasn’t going to give him what he wanted. He let it fly again, and I cringed as it hit me and left a stinging line across my back. The third time, my back felt like it was on fire. I could feel my teeth break the skin on my lip, and I quickly tasted blood. The fourth time, the whip hit the top of my shoulder. I yelped, but still didn’t scream. I heard him grunt in frustration, and suddenly he was grabbing my throat and pulling my face toward his.
“Go ahead, Doll. Let the scream out.” He leaned in closer, enough where I could feel, and smell, his breath on my nose. I closed my eyes as he said, “Scream for me. You owe me.”
He stepped back behind me again and then let the whip fly. This time when it hit me, I couldn’t have held it back even if I had wanted to.
“That a girl,” he said as he dropped the whip and then a door closed.
I turned my head, but didn’t see anyone through the tears. The door opened again and Mark came in with a new man. Mark stood off to the side as the man picked the whip up off the floor. I kept my eyes on Mark as I was whipped this time. I was losing my strength, and the only thing keeping me on my feet was the rigging attached to my restraints. After several more slaps to the skin, Mark held up his hand and turned his attention to the man.
“Enough, Irvin. We need her to stay alive.”
The man, Irvin, grunted and threw the whip down on the ground. He stormed out of the room without another word. My back was numb as was a good portion of the rest of my body. I closed my eyes, and hoped Mark would cut me down. But when nothing happened, I opened them again. He hadn’t moved, but continued to stare at me.
“Goodnight, Andrea.” He bowed and then turned. He closed the door behind him.
~~~~~~~***~~~~~~~
“That son-of-a-”
“James, don’t.” I cut him off. I was tired of hearing what James thought of Mark. After being tortured for what I assumed was a few days, I was finally back in my cell. James had called to me that first day, but I had no strength to even lift my head. It took another visit from Mark, who discussed why I wasn’t eating any food to convince me I needed to crawl up on the ledge and talk to James.
“I feel so helpless, Love.”
I leaned my head against the bars. “You have no idea.”
“There’s no way you can fight back?”
“James, I told you before. I’ve been tied up. I lose consciousness. I have no fighting in me. I have no strength period.”
“But what are they doing to you?”
I lifted my hand as I counted off on my fingers. “I’ve been whipped, beaten by several different objects, punched, kicked, spat on, bitten-“
“Bitten?” James turned his head toward me.
“Yes. I have cuts and burns all over me. My back is a mess.”
“I wish I could see it so I would know what I could do to help.”
“You don’t want to see it.” I closed my eyes.
He hesitated a moment before he quietly asked, “Have they… have you been…. I mean they haven’t touched you, have they?”
I felt a tear slide down my cheek. I felt thankful when I answered, “No. My clothes have stayed on my body, at least what’s left of them.”
I could hear the relief in his voice when he said, “That’s good at least.”
“Can we not talk about this anymore? I don’t know when Mark will come back, and I’d rather not discuss what I’ve been going through the past few days. I would prefer to not remember any of it. Have they done anything to you?”
“No. I’ve just been in here, and they’ll throw that plate of mush in every once in awhile. But other than that, I’ve had no contact.”
I opened my eyes. I suddenly needed him to hold me. I reached my hand through the bar and took his. He looked down at it and then brought his gaze back up to me. He reached his free hand through the bars. He still couldn’t see me very well but he tried. I placed his hand on my cheek where he immediately stroked it with his thumb.
“I’m so sorry, Love. I wish I could do something for you.”
“Just be here when I climb up on the ledge. Even if I can’t make it, talk to me. If I don’t respond, then do something where I can hear your voice. You have no idea how soothing your voice is to me.”
“I can do that.” He moved his hand behind my neck, and pulled me a little closer to the bars. I covered my mouth as I yawned, which caused him smile. He slid his hand off my neck. “Lay down.”
“I don’t want to sleep. I don’t think I’ll be able to anyway.”
“You need sleep, Love. You need to get your strength back, including eating that mush.”
I stuck my tongue out in disgust. There was no way I was going to eat it. I didn’t know what they were doing to it. For all I knew, they could have been trying to poison me.
James leaned over and kissed the hand he was holding, and then gently slid it back through the bars. I climbed off the ledge and crawled under it. We had decided it was best to make sure Mark n
ever saw me up there. He didn’t seem to notice or care that James was next door, but we figured if he found us talking then he’d separate us, and neither of us could bear that.
I lay there unable to close my eyes. There was something about this place, probably my history with it, that kept me from sleeping. I was exhausted, but I couldn’t close my eyes for more than a few minutes when I was conscious of it. It was a good thing I didn’t because then the door opened. Mark came in. He lit the candle next to the door, but I didn’t move. I found that even if I had wanted to, I couldn’t.
When he looked at me, he tilted his head and gave me a confused look. “You know, we aren’t trying to kill you.”
I didn’t say anything. I only stared at him.
“We really aren’t, whether you believe me or not. We just want our money and, well for others, just having revenge is enough.”
I blinked. I had to force my eyelids to stay open when they protested.
He came closer and stood over me for a moment before he reached down and yanked me to my feet. I was barely able to stand but I managed. He held onto my shoulder, thankfully it wasn’t as rough as before, and looked over my body again. I looked up at the ceiling while he stared at me. I couldn’t watch the expression on his face while his eyes scanned by body. It made me sick to my stomach, and I didn’t want to know what he was thinking about though I had a pretty good idea.
“You know, I must say I never thought you’d look good in a dress. You just aren’t that type of girl.”
I closed my eyes for a moment before I looked at him with a tired expression.
“However, I must say that it looks astonishingly good on you.” He touched my face gently. I hated his touch. “I wonder though why someone like you is wearing it, or what’s left of it by now anyway.”
“Why are you here, Mark?” I sighed.
“I have a proposition for you. You see if you do this one little thing for me, then the pain can stop and they’ll just leave you alone in here until your father pays your ransom.”
“What’s this one little thing you want me to do?”
He placed his hand on the back of my neck like James had done only minutes earlier. He leaned toward me, and I stiffened my back, which was incredibly stupid of me. I cringed, as I felt a few of the cuts split open again. I tried to shift away but Mark wouldn’t let me. “What do you think I want, Andy?”
“I’m not going to marry you, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“That’s not what I want. What I want, well, it would normally come after the wedding.” He gave me a devilish grin.
I shoved him away and tried to ignore the massive amount of pain it caused me. “No.”
“Come on, Andy. It’s one little thing. And then the torture can stop.”
“Absolutely not.” I stepped back and leaned against the wall. The coolness felt good against the whip marks.
He laughed. “Whatever you say, Andy. If you reconsider, you know I’ll be around.”
I watched him as he walked toward the door. When he opened it, more men came in. Unable to move, they walked over to me. One yanked on my hair, which pulled my head back so that I was staring up at the ceiling. My arms were tied in front of me but I didn’t struggle. I felt a sharp pain against the back of my head and my eyelids closed. I gave in to my body’s desire to slip into oblivion. I only hoped that I wouldn’t feel what awaited me outside my cell.
Chapter XI
It seemed like more days passed before I was thrown back into my cell. I lay in the middle, unable to move yet again. It felt like my entire body was bruised.
“Andrea, Love?” James spoke quietly.
I didn’t answer. Instead, I closed my eyes. The cold stone felt cool on my face. The men had almost seemed rougher than before. The only thing different from the last time I’d been here was that they hadn’t used the knives yet. I was waiting for it, and I knew it would happen, but I just wasn’t sure when. But what they’d done so far had left no part of my body unscathed, or at least it felt that way. Mark probably did have a few rules in place so that I wouldn’t be completely worthless to him.
“Love?” James spoke quietly. “Andrea, Love, please talk to me?”
I moaned, unable to get anything else out. My head throbbed, my back stung, I could feel dried blood on my hands. My face was burning, and I didn’t have any feeling in my feet and halfway up one leg.
I heard my door open suddenly, and the candle was lit. I knew it was Mark because he was the only one that would light the candle before he came in. He sighed, and I heard the sound of his footsteps come toward me. I couldn’t even lift my head to look at him.
“Andy, I’ve told you before, we aren’t trying to kill you.” His hand went under my face to turn it toward him. “You need to eat.”
“Would you eat that stuff?” I managed to whisper.
He laughed, and it sounded like a normal laugh, not the vicious kind he had been using lately. “There’s nothing wrong with it. We aren’t poisoning you, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
I let my eyes focus on the tin pan by the door, and then dragged my gaze back to Mark.
“Look, my dear,” he knelt down, “I need you to keep your strength. You’ll only feel worse if you don’t eat it.”
I turned my head away from him. “Maybe I just want to die.”
I suddenly felt a sharp point on my neck. I cringed as I dug my fingers into the rock. Something didn’t feel right in them, and a painful sounding whine came out of my mouth. Mark probably assumed it was from whatever it was he had put into my neck, which he decided to drag, slowly and deeply, across the back of my neck. I dug my already excruciatingly pain-filled fingers into the rocks again. I clenched my eyes shut and felt tears form. He took the object out and again turned my head toward him. He was holding a knife next to my face, with my blood on it. I focused on before I looked at him.
“I can arrange your death for you after we get our ransom money. Your father has yet to respond to anything we’ve sent him, so you’ll have to endure us just a little longer.” He put the knife in a pouch at his hip and stood up. “Eat something, Andy. You’ll regret it later if you don’t.”
He left me in the dark once again. I forced myself up on my hands and knees and crawled, rather unsteadily, over to the ledge. I knew I was using up what little strength I had left instead of saving it, but I didn’t care. I carefully stood up, though I had to use the wall for support. I put my hands on the ledge and tried to jump up. I used my arms to lift me like before, but I couldn’t jump. It took me several minutes to figure out how to use the wall to my advantage, and I finally was able to collapse on the ledge. I reached out, but was just short of the bars. I cried out in frustration, and after a moment James appeared in the light. He reached his hands through, found my wrists, and gently pulled forward. Just to feel his hands on mine made me feel marginally better, even as I felt like my body was tearing apart. I bit my lip to keep from screaming out in pain. I knew if I did then he would stop, and I wouldn’t be as close as I needed to be to him at that moment. When I was as close as he could pull me before he fell off his side of the ledge, he let me go. I slowly drew my hands back to my chest and lay on my side for a moment to catch my breath. When I was finally able to turn my head toward him, I saw that he was holding a tin full of what looked like bread. I couldn’t sit up, so I just reached my hand through the bars. He handed me a piece of bread, which I slowly brought back and nibbled.
James had his eyes on where my hand had disappeared into the darkness on my side of the iron. “Let me see your hand again.”
I slipped my free hand through to him as I chewed on the bread. It was dry, and slightly stale, but it was better than the mush would have been.
James looked at it. He slowly turned it to look at it from all sides before he held it between his. “Your fingers are dislocated.”
“What?” I finished the bread and let my head rest against the cool stone.
“Y
our fingers. They’re black and blue. They’re bent slightly to the side. You haven’t noticed this?” He sounded shocked.
I slowly lifted my head and looked at my hand. In his light, I could see that my fingers looked weird. “Is that why they hurt so much?”
“Andrea, your fingers aren’t in the right places. Is your other hand like this?”
I slid my other hand toward him. When it went through the bars and into the light, I saw that they looked the same as the other hand.
“How did this happen?” James whispered. He sounded horrified. He took hold of my other hand and held both of mine between his.
“I haven’t been conscious the entire time, James.”
He looked up, as if looking into the darkness of my cell for Mark. He shook his head, and then brought his attention back down to my hands. “I need to push these back.”
“Don’t.” I tried to sit up but couldn’t.
“They’ll get worse, Love. I have to fix this.”
“No. Not now. Please not now.” I tried to pull my hands back unsuccessfully. “I don’t want to hurt anymore.”
“It needs to get done.” He changed his hand position so he was holding one around my fingers and the other around my wrist.
“James, if you fix it now, they’ll only do it again,” I said quickly, panic clear in my voice which made it louder than I had intended.
He stopped what he was doing and looked at me. “How do you know?”
“Don’t you think they’ll question if my fingers are suddenly in the right place? And then once they are, why shouldn’t they do whatever they did to get them like this again?”
He looked down at my hand again. He debated this before he finally let go. I brought my hands to my chest and turned on my side again. I was exhausted but I couldn’t find any rest.
Forgotten Truths (The Forgotten Truths Series) Page 16