by Box Set
I'm not sure how long I wander around until I see blinding white headlights. I shield my eyes with my forearm, squinting to see who it might be. I haven't passed another house. Maybe this is one of Maksim's friends?
My heart drops through me.
The car stops with a jagged screech, and I hear a door clicking open. I stop there, frozen to my core, struggling to focus my eyes.
Please, don't be Maksim or one of his friends. Please. Please. Please.
“Oh my God!” a woman says with shock. “Are you okay? Wha-what's happened?”
I blink up to see who she is, but my vision is so blurry. “Where am I?” I say, wobbly pattering onward. Unable to bear the weight of my own body, I fall into her like deadweight. She catches me around the waist and I scream out in agony, her fingers digging into the shot wound.
“Ohhh, I'm sorry! I'm sorry!” she cries, helping me sit down on the curb side. “Here. Just sit here.”
I grab my face, noticing the heat in my cheeks. My skin is really hot.
“What's happened to you?” that woman asks. “You're bleeding, and you don't look—”
“A phone,” I pant, wiping my hair back. “Do you have a phone?”
“Yes!” Fumbling through her pockets, she pulls out a phone and passes it to me. I grab it in both hands and try to dial Charlie's number. He's the only person I can think of who'll come get me. I'm not sure James is okay or even alive.
My fingers won't still against the digits. My hands are trembling like mad. With the screen glowing, offering me some light, I pause, studying the color of my skin. My hands are really red and blotchy with thin red streaks. Has Maksim poisoned me?
“Miss,” that woman says, touching my knee, “we should call an ambulance.”
“No!” I yell at her, then I slowly and shakily dial Charlie's number. The ringer hums on and on and then it dies off. “No,” I whimper, redialing him, panic setting in. “Come on, Charlie,” I beg.
It dies off again, and now I feel sick with panic. I swallow back a heave. I won't be sick. I won't be sick.
“Look, I don't know what's happened, but I really think we should get you to a hospital. I can take you.” That woman leans in to scan my face. “You look very poorly.”
“No, please, just wait,” I plead to her.
I try Charlie's phone one last time and he picks up, asking warily, “Who is this?”
“Charlie, it's Blaire.” I hug the phone to my ear with both hands.
He gasps my name with what sounds like relief. “I've been looking for you for over a week!” He turns his attention to another, saying, “It's Blaire.”
“Charlie, listen to me.” I gulp down a lung full of air, hunching over to put my head between my knees. “I don't know what Maksim's done to me, but I'm sick.”
Silence. It's the longest few seconds of my life. Then Charlie reels off so many orders I can’t keep up. “Track this number,” he says to someone. “Get the chopper up. Get the men in their cars. Get every fucking person we have on our side in cars with guns! Blaire, do you know where you are?”
I peer up at that woman with watering eyes. “Where are we?”
“Kent,” she says. “Sevenoaks.”
“Did you hear?” I say to Charlie.
“Who is that?” he asks, his tone taking a chilling edge.
“Some woman who just pulled over to help me.”
“Take her car and go to a police station,” he says in a bizarrely calm voice, then he yells at someone else, “Get a fucking move on!”
I flinch against his voice. It rings in my ears.
“Blaire, you hear me, baby?” Charlie says. “Take that woman's car, get to a police station, and call me from there. I'm coming.”
“No!” that woman screams, staring over me with wide, horrified eyes.
I don't know what happens, but I feel a heavy whack to the back of my head and I think I faint.
———
“Charlie warned you not to hurt her,” is the next thing I hear. “He warned us all with death threats, so what the hell are you playing at, Maksim-Markov?”
Maksim's here? That's enough to knock me out cold again.
For hours, I float in and out of perception, sweating my ass off, and my heart is pounding.
When I can open my eyes again, I find I'm in the same state. I'm loosely aware that I'm in Rumo's snooker room, slumped in a chair. It's the smell of mucky cigar smoke that gives my location away. No other place on this earth smells like this snooker room.
There's something cold on my head. A wash cloth?
“Where are you going to take her?” Rumo says. I only assume it's Rumo because I'm in his house.
“It's best that you don't know, my friend.”
Maksim. He is here.
My heart is already racing through my ribcage, so it cannot possibly go any faster without forcing me into cardiac arrest.
There's someone else in the room too, saying something in Spanish. Carl?
“Speak English,” Maksim snaps. “I can't fucking understand Spanish!”
“Why are her hands and feet covered in cuts?”
“I had nothing to tie her down with, so I scattered glass across the floor to prevent her from escaping.” Maksim laughs like he's proud. “Though, it seems shattered glass is no match for my little pet.”
They talk about me for a while. Carl wants to know why I'm in such a state. “What did she do to reap your wrath like this?”
I study the voices, trying to regain my strength so I can get out of here. I can't go back to Maksim. He'll make me suffer gradually and painfully, until I die. I know he wants me to die. I want to die, too, after all the pain, but not like this, and not before I see Charlie once more. I have to see him. And I have to know James is okay!
When the voices leave the room, I stumble off the chair, landing on gory hands. The room is whirling and the back of my head is throbbing like a bitch. I cup my face in one hand, straining to my feet. I sway, the soles of my feet tender and shredded to pieces. Using the snooker table for support, I make my way out of the room, blinking rapidly to steady my vision.
In the welcome hall, I hear voices by the front doors. Maksim and Rumo.
“I'll pull up your car,” Rumo says. “But that's it, Maksim-Markov. I'm not getting in any deeper. I'm not going to be a part of Blaire's death.”
I can quite honestly say that in all my life, I've never felt so hurt by someone's words. Maksim really does want me dead.
“I understand, my friend,” my master drawls. “I just want to thank you for bringing her back to me. I owe you.”
“I don't suppose I can talk you into giving or selling her to me?” I think Carl says.
Maksim laughs his head off, his voice echoing through the hall. “I want her death. Not money. I have enough of that now that I have Decena's cash. Pull up my car, Rumo. I need to go.”
Panic races through me. I've not got long. If Rumo is pulling up the car, that means Maksim intends to leave now.
Pushing open a set of doors, I struggle into a room I've never seen before. A living room. It's dark and the air reeks of old musk. I lean against a wall and fold over on my knees, gasping for breath.
“Where has my little pet gone?” Maksim says from the entrance hall.
I whip up my head too fast and rock off balance.
Shit.
I'm either going to have to fight my way to freedom or beg him to just kill me.
I'll beg him to take mercy on me. He has to see reason. In that dark soul of his, there has to be some kindness in there somewhere. Even I have kindness in me.
“She must be in there. The door was closed,” Rumo says, and all thoughts of begging go out the window.
Fuck knows how I manage it, but I dart across the living room, stubbing my toe on something. “Ouch,” I gasp under my breath.
Another door. I shove it open and stumble through, finding myself in the hall that leads to the ballroom where James and I fought. The fl
oors are so cold that they burn my wounded feet.
Running my hand along the wall for stability, I make my way to the ballroom, knowing French doors lead off there, into the garden. I can get out of the house through the ballroom.
“Blaire,” a voice whispers from behind me, and a red mist descends. All my pain fades into the background, and the only thing I can think about is escaping Maksim.
I spin around. It knocks off my equilibrium. But I'm well aware who I come face to face with. Carl.
“I won't go back to Maksim,” I say under my breath, and acting on instinct, I swipe for his throat with wicked pursuit. “You hear me?”
He gasps as I pinch his windpipe, digging in my nails so hard that I draw blood.
“I won't go back to Maksim,” I hiss in his face, squeezing my teeth shut for strength.
“Let me go!” he chokes, clutching my wrist with both hands. “I-I'm trying to help you.”
I'm numb to his plea. He's slowly fading, and I'm slowly ripping into his throat. I don't want to do this but I can't go back.
“I'm sorry,” I whimper, watching Carl drift away.
“Blaire!” someone yells from down the hall.
I freeze, staring at Carl's bloodshot eyes, my own blood roaring in my ears.
Heavy footsteps come toward me, followed by a fuss of voices.
Tears stream down my face, bitter tears. Maksim. He's going to take me.
A hand closes around mine and yanks me off Carl, who crashes to the floor in a pile of skin and bones. That black switch goes off in my mind. I can't stop it. I don't want to stop it. It's the only thing keeping me alive.
Screaming at the top of my lungs, I pound at God knows who—I'm not even sure if it's Maksim. I don't give a shit if it is. I won't go back to him.
“Calm down!” Maksim fights to restrain me but I'm going wild, clawing at anything and everything. “Calm down, Blaire! It's me, Charlie!”
37
“Charlie!” I sob out his name, craning my head back to look up at him. I squeeze my eyes shut a few times because I so desperately want to see him, but I can't make out a face.
“Yeah, baby, it's me,” he says, and I know it's true. I recognize his raspy voice now. “Where did Maksim shoot you?”
Bursting into tears, I fall into him, letting my vulnerability take over. “He-he's back there.” I swallow down my nerves, hiding in Charlie's body. “Please, don't send me back to him. I don’t want to go back to him!”
“I'll never send you back to him again. Dios, I’m sorry, Blaire.” Charlie wraps his arms around my shoulders, burying my face in his chest to embrace me with safety. “S'all right. Don't cry. Everything's gonna be all right.”
He smells like home, clean and soapy and musky. I hold him like I'll never let go. It's so bizarre that in just a few short months, he's come to mean more to me than anyone in this world.
“Baby, you need to sit down so I can check you over.” He tries to urge me backward. “I know Maksim shot you. I need to make sure the wound—”
“No!” I protest, clinging to him. I don't want to sit down. I don't want to be anywhere other than where I am right now.
“All right,” he says. “All right. Just stay calm.”
I distantly listen to a commotion behind, which I assume is Carl coming around. Then Charlie starts barking orders to God knows who. “Guard this entrance. Guard the front entrance. Have the Scour Detail ensure our exit is safe and get back to me. We need to leave as soon as possible.” A long, questionable pause, before he adds, “Whoever brings me Maksim gets a bonus.”
“I'm on it, Señor,” someone says.
“Where did he shoot you, Blaire?” Charlie asks again, kissing my damp forehead. “I need to make sure the wound is clean and bandaged up.”
“In-in the stomach. And my back...he burned my back.”
“No...” Charlie urges me back an inch so he can look down on me, but I step into him, gripping his shirt with desperate fingers, not wanting him to let me go. “Baby, s'all right. I'm not going anywhere. I just want to check you over and wrap up your wounds.”
I sob then, shaking from head to toe. “Please, just stay with me.”
“I am. I'm not going anywhere, I swear.” Holding me to him in one arm, he lifts my chin with his other hand, forcing our eyes to align. His enlarge and glaze over with guilt. “Dios mío, your face...”
He's seeing the bruises where Maksim slapped and punched me. He touches them, my black and blue cheek, and my eye.
“James didn't mention this.”
“James?” I heave his name. “Charlie, he-he was at my apartment.”
“S'all right. He's okay. I found him with a few bullet wounds to his shoulder—”
“Bullet wounds?” Anger comes over me, bubbling in my stomach with such rage I swear if Maksim was here I'd fucking shoot him!
“James is fine,” Charlie says, reassuring me. “He's had an operation and he's fine.”
Relief sweeps through me, but it only serves to make me feel ill. I squint through the lights in the hall, a warm rush of nausea coming over me. “I don't feel good.”
“Sit down then, please. It won't be long before we can leave.” He manages this time to sit me on something hard. The concrete cools the backs of my naked thighs.
I blow out a long, exhausting breath, and shut my eyes, holding the edges of whatever I'm sitting on. There’s the sound of material being ripped apart, then I feel pressure wrapping around my left knee. It makes me moan in pain.
“I'm sorry, but I need to stop this bleeding.” Once Charlie is done bandaging up my right knee, I hear that ripping sound again. He wraps more gauze around my palms, first my left, and then my right. It doesn't hurt so much having him fondle with my hands.
Next, he lifts up the shirt I'm wearing and bundles it around my chest. Cool air blows over my skin. It's so refreshing. I'm too warm.
“Aargh!” I scream through clenched teeth, as Charlie wraps something around my waist, over the burn on the low of my back and the bullet wound in my stomach. I grip his shoulders instinctively, panting through my nose.
“That's it. Just take easy breaths.” He lifts my left arm from his shoulder and turns my wrist from side to side like he's assessing me, finding the bite mark. Then he yells in a panic, “Andres!”
He lays something heavy over my naked legs. It’s his leather jacket. The material is cold but welcomed.
Charlie crouches in front of me, and I can feel that he's staring at my face. I sit forward, elbows on my legs, trying to control my breathing. Years and years of meditation and I can't control my breathing? I know something isn't right.
“Is that her?” a man asks in a Latin seasoned voice.
I glance up with blazing eyes, ready to attack.
“Relax.” Charlie grabs both my arms on my legs and holds me there. “That's Andres.”
“Your brother?” I say in a shallow tone, peering back at Charlie.
He nods at me, his face tight with anxiety. Then he looks up at his brother. “We need to go, hermano. Look at the streaks of red on her skin.”
“Dios mío!” his brother says. “She's the Irish girl from the missing person's report I got this morning.”
“What?”
“Yes,” Andres says to Charlie. “Her and her brother were kidnapped from their home in Ireland ten years ago. She looks exactly the same as the girl in the newspaper article.”
“The boy we’ve got at the house is her brother.”
Charlie knows James is my brother?
A blazing pain shoots through my lower back. I screw up my face, reaching around to touch the burn. Gaining height on his feet, Charlie leans over me and a hand lifts the shirt at my back. The anger that comes off his body in waves is stark.
“I'm gonna murder that motherfucker!” he shouts. “We haven't got time to wait for the Scour Detail. I think she's got blood poisoning.”
“No, no. Stop, Charlie!” Andres says in a fluster. “If we run i
nto trouble...just wait. Keep her calm.”
I feel Charlie's presence move away from me, and then I hear the low murmur of his voice, “He's branded his name on her back and bit her arm, shot her, and I’m pretty sure she's got blood poisoning. If we don't leave now, she won't make it anyway. She's dying.”
Another hand touches my back where the burn is under the bandage, causing me to whine in pain. “Please, don't touch my back,” I sob.
“Jesucristo,” Andres gasps. “James must've been telling the truth when he said Maksim shot her.”
Charlie's anger rises, as he says sarcastically in Spanish, “You think?”
A tall guy whose features I can't really make out squats before me. “Blaire, I'm Andres,” he says in a deep, soft voice. “I'm not going to hurt you, Cariño. I'm just going to look at your arms.”
“We don’t have time!” Charlie yells.
“Hermano, let me check her over,” Andres says, and I imagine he’s giving Charlie a serious look because nothing else is said.
I blink up at Charlie standing at my side, and he nods, so I let his brother examine me—for whatever good it will do. He gently grips my hands and turns them over. I let my head hang, coming down from my rush of adrenaline-panic, but as I do, the tension in my back and the wound in my stomach become unbearably painful. The fuzziness is back. The throbbing in my head makes my skull pound.
“You're right,” Andres says. “She does need immediate medical attention, but she’s got time.” He touches my inner elbow, which stings a little. “That puta pig has been giving her fluids, I think, so she’s hydrated. If you stay calm, Blaire, you’ll be okay,” he says in my face, warm puffs of air blowing over my cheeks. “All right, Cariño?”
I nod a couple of times in a hazy state.
“Did you know he was doing this to her?” Charlie asks someone. “Because if you did, I’ll have your fucking nuts!”
“No,” Carl chokes out. “I swear. None of us knew.” Between coughing, he tells Charlie that Maksim was warned a few years ago by Tatiana that he's not allowed to whip me anymore. “She's the reason Blaire has money, a car, and an apartment.”
“How'd you know this?” Charlie sounds dark with intrigue.