by Jaden Wilkes
Columbia shuddered and willed herself to not think of her stepfather. It didn’t work and she could imagine had he been born in different circumstances, he would have been one of these men, these terrible cruel men who saw women and children as nothing but chattel.
“I met somebody in the midst of it all. Ioana. She helped me realize how much I needed to get away,” she said. “She and I started to plot our escape in Berlin. As you can see, it didn’t go so well and we ended up here, in the prison instead of in the bedrooms servicing Mace and his friends. If you ask me, this is much more enjoyable.”
“What happened when they took you away?” Columbia asked. She didn’t want to bring up a horrific experience, but she felt like she needed to know.
“Mace’s right hand, he used to be a friend of my father’s. A guy named Mike. He wanted to fuck me, so he fucked me. I don’t mean to sound blunt, I fought him of course, but there’s not much to be done when you’re chained to a bed and a man decides to have his way.”
“I think I was in that place, the chair?”
“Yes,” Iryna said, “that awful chair. But this was a different time, with Ioana. They filmed it, the fucking bastards. They laughed the entire time.”
“I am so sorry,” Columbia said. She waited and added, “I was almost raped by Mace. But the baby. Losing the baby, it stopped him.”
Iryna was quiet. They were both digesting what they had just learned about the other.
“He’ll come for you,” Iryna finally said. “If I know my Uncle Dimi, and the kind of man he’s become, I know he’ll come for you.”
“I hope he will,” Columbia said. “If he does we’ll take you too. We’ll rescue you.”
“And Ioana,” Iryna said, “I just hope he gets here before her baby does.”
“Her baby?” Columbia whispered, “She’s pregnant?”
“I’m sorry,” Iryna said, “I wasn’t thinking about…”
“It’s okay, I’m okay. I mean I’ll be okay.”
“He’ll come for you,” Iryna said and Columbia curled on her cot in the darkness and had to believe it. It was the only thing she had left.
*****
She woke, startled and unsure what had woken her. Something in the back of her memory, in the midst of a dream, had dragged her from sleep. A bang, a loud shockwave of sound followed by a small vibration. The metal lock on her door had rattled.
“Iryna?” she asked, “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know,” the girl answered, “I just heard a huge bang and everything moved.”
“What time is it?”
“I never know down here,” she replied.
Columbia sat up and saw the lights in the hallway flick on. Light spilled into her cell through the narrow window. She moved her leg into the square of light on her cot and was horrified to see how red and swollen her entire foot had become. She was most certainly infected. She pushed on the flesh and her finger dented the skin, leaving a mark long after she pulled it back.
This wasn’t good. She didn’t know how much longer she could survive like this.
She heard yelling in the hall, male voices screaming orders and making demands, arguing.
She heard Mace’s voice above the others, commanding them in English. “Protect the front, get everyone to the back. If they breech the midsection, kill all the women and set fire to the fucking place. I’ve got ten more just like it, and we can always buy more whores.”
Columbia whispered, “Iryna, what’s going on?”
“I think we’re under attack. We have to get out of here before they burn it down. We’ll burn up, we’ll die!”
“Stay calm,” Columbia said, “We’re getting out of here, I promise. It’s Dimi!”
She hobbled to the door and peeked out the narrow window. It had been left open. She saw Mace speaking to a guard just in front of her door; their voices were too low to hear much.
He turned and saw her staring at them and said, “Ah, just who I wanted to see.”
He motioned to the guard who unlocked the door and pushed it wide. He handed Mace the keys and ran through the open door at the end of the hall.
“Come with me,” Mace told her, “I need you.”
“Why do you need me?”
“Your beast has come for you. And he’ll get you back over my dead body. You’re coming with me.”
Her heart soared for one brief moment. This was all for her, Dimi had come. She would be free if she could survive the next few minutes with Mace.
“What about the others?” she asked and nodded towards Iryna’s room.
“They’re already dead,” Mace said, “leave them.”
He grabbed her hand and tried to pull her. She toppled over, the blood encrusted blanket falling from between her thighs and her filthy dress pulling up to her hips.
“Disgusting,” Mace said, “Cover yourself.” He took his suit jacket off and tossed it on top of her. She sat up, pulled it on and buttoned it up in the front. It hung loose on her, it would be comical in any other circumstance, but she was grateful for it right now.
He dragged her up to her feet and pulled her behind him, taking more care this time. Each step was an agony of pressure and pain. She once again imagined her foot stuffed with broken glass, tearing and cutting with each step.
She refused to cry out though; she refused to slow down. She was going to her Dimi, that’s all that mattered.
They made it through the door at the end of the hall, she saw stairs but they didn’t go up. He pushed a button on the wall and a door slid open, an elevator. Sweet relief, she hadn’t known how she would have made it up the stairs.
He pressed two when they entered and they sped up to what she assumed was the second floor of the building they were in.
The doors opened to chaos. It had been a well-appointed, luxurious mansion at some point, but now smoke billowed from the room directly across from them, the wooden panels were shattered in places along the hallway and the carved wooden door was decimated on the room where Mace dragged her.
“Where are we?” she asked, sneaking a peek out the window. They were overlooking a wide lawn, the sun was just going down and she could see a couple helicopters, their rotors still spinning as though they were at the ready to leave.
Dimitri had really called out the firepower to save her. Her chest swelled when she thought about him coming for her.
“We’re in my study,” Mace said, “and we’re going to wait for your beast. I will kill him, then kill you, and be on my way.”
“He’s going to gut you like a pig,” she said, “you realize that, right?”
“Shut up, or I’ll cut your tongue out.”
“You need me,” she replied, “or you would have done it already. You need me to assure him that I’m okay, to do what you say. If he comes in and sees my mouth full of blood and me gargling on it, he’ll kill you without thinking.”
He twitched and looked out the window. There was a great plume of black smoke coming up from somewhere near the front of the mansion. She could hear people yelling and gunfire going off at random intervals.
“You’re afraid of him,” she said in a very calm voice. She felt strangely calm, as though the threads of her life were being pulled together again. The sense of being frayed and stretched apart was gone. She was going to be okay. Dimi would make it okay.
But the baby, she didn’t know how she would ever tell him that she’d lost his baby. Would he love her if he found out?”
“I’m not afraid of him, he’s a pathetic shell of a man. He couldn’t even kill Sergei, somebody else had to do it for him.”
“You’re right,” she said, “he didn’t kill Sergei. I did.”
Mace’s head snapped up and he stared at her, daring her to continue.
“My beast held his arms while I slid a knife into his heart, just like this,” she said and pantomimed her motions at the end of Sergei’s life. “I killed all your men too. Every single one of them, they got what w
as coming for them.”
“You’re a fucking liar. You’re a filthy little cunt, a whore. How could you have managed any of that?” Mace demanded, but she could sense the fear and uncertainty creeping into his voice.
“I’m not a liar, but I am one hell of a fighter if I haven’t been tortured first. I can’t wait to see Dimitri’s face when he finds out what you did to me. If you survive, you will spend every single day of the rest of your life wondering when we will find you. You will never sleep through the night again, because we will come for you and we will kill you. But only after we repay your treatment, ten fold.”
Mace narrowed his eyes; he was getting past his fear and becoming angry. Columbia had hoped she could unsettle him though, had hoped to throw him off his game before Dimitri arrived.
Somebody came clattering up the hallway at top speed. Columbia held her breath, praying it was Dimitri. It didn’t sound like him, but she thought if she wished hard enough, she could make it so.
It was Mike.
“I got him,” he said, “I fucking shot the bastard.” He held up a pistol and waved it in front of Mace.
“Who?” Mace asked.
“The Russian beast, the burned one. Fuck, you know, Sokolov.”
Columbia’s heart dropped and she felt a lead weight fall back onto her psyche. Dimitri had been shot? He was dead?
“Are you sure you killed him?” Mace asked.
“I dropped him at close range with my Colt. He’s gotta be deader than a doornail. It was fucking perfect!”
Mace smiled and turned to Columbia.
He looked her up and down, at her swollen foot and filthy hair and said, “It seems we won’t be needing you after all.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
DIMITRI
He groaned and tried to move his hands. They wouldn’t budge. He panicked for a moment, and realized he was lying on them…they were underneath him.
He rolled himself to the side and freed them, pushed himself up and slowly stood. He used the bookshelf for support and quickly remembered what had happened.
He’d been shot, but his body armor had offered protection. It wasn’t obvious he was wearing it; he and Nico had purchased several pieces of lightweight armor from the same manufacturer earlier this year. Columbia had insisted.
He thanked her for it now, and shook himself to get his blood flowing. He didn’t know how long he’d been out, but not too long by the sounds of things. The fight was still in full force, with rapid gunfire and people yelling outside.
He went back through the kitchen to exit out the side door when he noticed something. The door to the basement was now open, gaping wide and calling him to find his little dove.
He checked his clip and reloaded his gun, dropped the old one on the floor with a clatter and went down the flight of stairs.
At the bottom was a small foyer with a room on either side. A quick survey informed him there was an operating room and a bedroom. A second glance told him otherwise, he recognized instruments of torture and knew the darkened stains splattered around the floor were blood. Cameras set up in the other room revealed its true function; they filmed the torture there.
He steeled himself for the worst, almost expecting to see Columbia’s body in the hallway as he continued down.
Metal doors lined this hall, most likely prison cells. He saw a couple faces pressed against the narrow window. None of them spoke, certain he was one of the guards.
He reached one that was open, stuck his head inside and was struck with an absolute certainty that Columbia had been here.
“Columbia,” he called, but knew she was gone. He kicked a bundled blanket and was alarmed that is was stiff with dried blood. He had to get to her.
“She’s upstairs,” a woman’s voice whispered from next door. She was speaking Russian. “The elevator…go save her, she’s been through so much,” she continued and coughed.
There was something haunting and familiar about the voice, but he was too focused on finding his love. He mentally put it on the back burner and decided he would talk to the woman when they were all free. To thank her for directing him to Columbia.
He thought her heard her speak his name as he ran to the end of the hall. He couldn’t go back, he noticed a paneled door, the buttons almost camouflaged against the wood grain.
He pressed one and within moments the door slid open. He got inside and pushed two. He’d already been on the main floor and it seemed to be deserted. He would start at the top and work his way down.
The door opened into a hallway that was nearly destroyed. Shattered wood, smoke wafting from one room, and completely silent. He heard a scuffle and angry words from below, so he moved to the right, looking for the stairs back down, convinced there was nobody left on this floor.
He reached the top step and heard a thump coming from a room back down the hallway behind him. He hesitated, considered descending, then decided to head back and take a look.
He came to a massive carved wooden door that had been split by gunfire or a grenade. He was pleased to see the damage; his men had earned their money.
He pushed the remains of the door open and walked into a large study, books lined the shelves in this room and several heavy leather chairs were scattered around the place. A large desk was placed in front of the window, giving the owner the upper hand as visitors would have to gaze into the sunlight to speak to him. Classic business power move, and classic Sergei.
Dimitri remembered the last time he had been here; Sergei had lectured him on the fine art of using drug mules to move shipments across international borders.
Dimitri had never gotten into that end of things though, he’d taken to murder so well that his rise as Sergei’s Enforcer had been a natural progression.
He noticed somebody edging away from him, from behind the curtains. He was heading to the door and obviously hoping Dimitri wouldn’t notice.
It was the man from Vienna, the one who’d stolen Columbia and shot him just downstairs. The man’s face drained of blood and his mouth opened and closed again, not a word came out.
“You didn’t really expect that to kill me,” Dimitri said, indicating the Colt 45. “That’s a movie prop, not a real gun.”
“I hit you. Dead on. How?”
“That’s irrelevant. I want to know where she is, where have you taken her?”
The man jumped at the sound of rapid gunfire from outside and said, “I can’t tell you that. She’s probably already dead.”
“Where is she?” Dimitri said and raised his gun. The man’s eye widened as he stared down the barrel of Dimitri’s M4. He glanced down at the Colt 45, the very one that he’d used to shoot Dimitri earlier, and the very one that he could barely hold onto with trembling hands.
“If you kill me, you’ll never know where she is,” the man said. The arrogance in his voice set something off in Dimitri, and he squeezed the trigger.
The man exploded in a blast of torn flesh and spraying blood. He fell back against the wall and slumped to his side, and slid down the window. He left a long, thick streak of red in his wake, and was dead by the time he hit the floor.
Dimitri felt nothing. He’d wanted to take his time with this man, but circumstances had dictated otherwise. Now that he was out of the way, he needed to find out who had Columbia now.
He rubbed his throbbing abdomen. The bullet wound stung, and the area he’d been shot was aching, it throbbed and was swollen and tender. He didn’t have time to look at it; he couldn’t do anything about his injuries right now, so why bother assessing the damage?
He turned to leave, stepped through the shattered door and something caught his eye. A crumpled suit jacket, tossed casually behind one of the leather club chairs, but as he’d walked past, he thought he saw it move.
He stepped back, walked towards the jacket and heard a moan. He almost prodded the heap with his toe when he realized it was covering a person, a woman. He noted the dank, limp hair and gaunt face, the swollen foot a
nd twisted figure. He would have to leave her here until his group could offer medical assistance.
He moved back to the door when something struck a chord within him. The set of the jaw, the curve of the shoulder, he wasn’t sure. He walked back, dropped to his knees and pulled the jacket back.
The emaciated figure on the floor, the one with the damaged foot and greasy hair, the one who smelled so rank and seemed hovering between this world and the next…
It was his little dove.
He set his gun to the side and leaned over her. Her breathing was shallow and rapid, her head felt hot to his touch and she was unresponsive.
“Columbia,” he whispered, touching her with all the care he would give a child. This fragile creature, seemingly held together by fevered skin stretched over sinew and bone, was his reason for living, his reason for not descending into the darkness that was ever present on the edge of his consciousness.
She was his sole reason for kindness and laughter and pleasure and love.
He felt an anguished howl building up inside of him, from somewhere deep and dangerous and unknown.
His touch was tender, but his soul was on fire, needing revenge on whoever had done this to her.
He picked her up and cradled her to him, brushed her lank hair away from her forehead, kissed her and carried her down the stairs. She weighed almost nothing, she had been too skinny before her capture, but now she felt dangerously thin.
He could hear the fighting settling down from outside. From the main floor he heard the scattered sounds of battle, but it seemed whoever ran Sergei’s operations had been outgunned.
He walked to a front sitting room and kicked the door open. He set her down on a leather sofa and covered her with a thick, plush blanket.
He felt helpless and needed help.
“Nico,” he yelled. “I have her.”
He heard running from somewhere on the other side of the house. Nico’s voice called, “Where are you? How is she?”
“On the East side,” Dimitri bellowed, as if his powerful voice could bring something back to his love. “And she needs help, she’s in a bad way.”