She gasped as he took a large step toward her, and a second man came through the exit door came to join him.
“Bună ziua, printesa.” His deep, gravelly voice made the hairs on her arms stand at attention. His dark and menacing eyes leered down at her as he licked his lips greedily.
She was in trouble; she knew it without a doubt. Not only was she now trapped, she also had a sickening feeling that she had just been drugged. The two men closed in on her like vultures, predators eyeing their prey with a hungry gleam in their eyes.
She opened her mouth to scream, but was silenced when one of the men lurched forward and shoved her against the wall while covering her mouth and nose with a rag. Oh, God, no... Chloroform. These men were here to take her.
She struggled violently, twisting and turning her body to dislodge herself, and tried frantically to lift a knee to strike him in the groin. A tiny voice of reason in her brain screamed at her Do. Not. Stop. Her panicked breathing only forced more of the acrid fumes into her lungs, and within seconds, she was slipping under. Her struggling weakened, her breathing slowed, and with a weak whimper, she succumbed to her captors.
CHAPTER FOUR
Her head smacked on a hard surface, dragging her out of her deep, foggy sleep. It was dark and loud, and she bounced against the floor. She had to be in the trunk of a car. Gagged, her hands were bound behind her back, her ankles were tied, and her body was folded into the fetal position.
Another bump, and her head flopped against the rough, carpeted floor of the trunk. Sweet Jesus, her head hurt. Her cheek felt raw from rubbing against the floor, and tears stained her temple and dampened her hair with salty stickiness.
She tried to grasp at the wisps of memory that she had, determined to make sense of what was happening. Had she just come from the restaurant? Where was her father? Was he okay? Oh, please God. Don't let him be captured too. She remembered sitting at the table with her father, talking about school. Then... what? Oh, she felt sick and had to go to the restroom. Someone had slipped something in her wine, something to lure her away from the table.
Why her? Was she just at the wrong place at the wrong time? Had they sought her out? She had barely been in Romania for twenty-four hours, who else could have possibly known she was there?
She struggled to make out anything in her surroundings. She was sure she was in the trunk of a car, but it was so dark and she was still so disoriented that she had no idea which direction she was facing. She didn't know which direction she should kick in, if the trick of kicking out the taillights even worked. So she started blindly kicking anything she could find. She managed to bring her bound feet in front of her, and thrust them wildly against any surface she could connect with. If anything, she would get someone's attention.
Then, the car came to an abrupt stop, and she nearly rolled over with the force of it. The car sat still for a moment, and she heard what she thought was a garage door opening. Then, the car moved forward slowly, and she could tell they were driving into a building due to the change in pitch of the sounds outside.
Men talked back and forth in Romanian, some laughing. There were several. Every muscle in her body bunched tight, and she fought a sob as she heard them come closer to the trunk. Horrifying images flooded her foggy mind—rape, torture, abuse, and a horrific death. She started to shake violently, and was blinded when the trunk door flew open and bright fluorescent lights flooded overhead.
A dark shadow loomed over her like the Grim Reaper; she shut her eyes tight to block the shards of pain shooting through her head. Maybe if she closed her eyes, it would all go away. Or maybe this was some awful nightmare, or a sick prank.
Rough hands grabbed her arms and jerked her upright. An arm slid under her knees and lifted her from the trunk. She dared to open her eyes, and she stared up into the same terrifying face of one of the men who had taken her.
Panic decided to join the party. Her breath froze in her chest, and her body stiffened for a split second before she exploded into a flailing ball of bound arms and legs. A muffled cry tore from her throat as she tried to leap from her captor's arms.
“Rahat!” He growled what she guessed was a curse as he tightened his arms around her. The second man from the restaurant stepped up to help hold her still, while the first man flopped her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
“No! No!” She tried to scream, but the gag muffled the words. “Please!” She tried to kick her legs, but her ankles were still bound.
A large hand slapped her hard on her butt, the sudden sting putting an abrupt end to her struggling. She lifted her head and looked around; they were in a garage with three cars. Five men surrounded her, watching her with a curious but lascivious leer. They all laughed and jeered back and forth, no doubt laughing at her.
She bounced and flopped against the man's shoulder as he walked through the garage and down a flight of stairs. A fresh wave of terror flooded her at the thought of being trapped in a basement. God only knew what—or who—was down there.
Fresh tears flowed down Brooke's face as she watched them go deeper and deeper down the stairs. Where were they taking her? What horrors did they have planned for her once they reached the bottom?
A door ahead of them opened, and they walked into a room. The man flipped her forward until she was sitting in a chair. She sat in front of a table, where yet another man sat. He was middle-aged with graying light brown hair, clean-shaven, and dressed in a gray suit. He certainly didn't look like your typical kidnapper.
The man removed, but her hands and ankles stayed bound. The two men from the restaurant stood behind her on either side of the chair while the other man studied her, his hands steepled in front of his face.
Brooke stared back, communicating her sheer hatred for him with her eyes alone. He didn't deserve to hear her speak.
“I heard you gave my men quite the workout.” His voice, lightly accented English, was polished and clear.
“I hope I hurt one of them.” She tucked her eyebrows at him, jutting her chin out in defiance.
He scoffed. “First things first—that attitude will not be tolerated. I'll let that remark slide since you're new.”
Attitude? He hadn't seen attitude.
“Now, you listen, and listen closely because I only explain this once to all newcomers.” He dropped his clasped hands against the surface of the table, and leaned forward. “I don't care who you are, what your name is, or where you come from. All I care about, and all you need to know is that I now own you. All of you. You are no longer a person, you are a commodity that will be sold, traded, or used as I see fit. If I want to sell you to the highest bidder, I will. If I want to keep you for myself to fuck however I want, I will. This is not up for negotiation, and there will be dire consequences if you do not comply. Your defiance will only result in pain for you. Are we clear?”
Dread slithered down her spine, its icy fingers tightening her scalp, and wracking her body with a hard shiver. Her worst possible fear—confirmed. All the horror stories she had seen on television, read online, and talked about among her friends had just become her worst nightmare. She knew that nearly all, aside from a very few lucky ones, disappeared forever once they were pulled into this dark and sinister world of the flesh trade.
The fancy guy continued to rattle on, but Brooke couldn't hear him over the deafening roar in her ears. She wasn't sure if she wanted to cry, puke, or pass out. Maybe all three. Her entire life as she knew it was over. Done. She'd never go home, never see her parents or her friends again, never finish medical school.
She was pulled from the darkest corner of her mind when the man behind the desk snapped his fingers at the two men behind her. One untied her ankles, but left her hands bound. Then they each grabbed an arm, and stood her up. They started to walk her toward the door when something inside her snapped. He didn't care what her name was? Too fucking bad. She was a person—a living, breathing, human being that had just been stolen from everything she held dear.
And she would make sure he knew that.
“Brooke! My name is Brooke!” She struggled to free her arms and turn back toward the fancy guy. “My name is Brooke Kennedy! I live in Baltimore, Maryland, and I'm in medical school! I'm a person; do you hear me? I'm a human being! I’m the daughter of the United States Ambassador to Romania! You’ve kidnapped the wrong person, they’ll come after you!”
A hard hand flew across her cheek, her head snapping to the side as the entire right side of her face tingled painfully, and her eyes stung with new tears.
The fancy guy flew upright from his chair and stalked toward her. He grabbed the back of what was left of her bun, and jerked her head back to meet his eyes. “Not anymore. All you are now is a pussy and a set of tits. You don't exist anymore. You'd better get that through your pretty little head if you want to have a chance at surviving.”
He let go of her head with a quick twist of her hand. “Get her out of here. Get her showered and examined.”
Examined? What the hell did he mean by that?
Dragged down a narrow hallway, doors lining both sides of the hall, she was taken to a room with floor-to-wall tile that was cracked, stained, and damp. Her hands were freed, and one of the men leaned toward her.
“You take a swing at me and I'll fucking kill you,” one of the men growled near her face.
She quickly understood why they had freed her hands. One of the men reached down and yanked her sweater over her head. Brooke let out a sharp gasp as she rushed to cover her chest with her arms. He jerked her arms away, and pulled off her bra.
Brooke stood there stunned as they yanked first her boots and then her socks off. Then finally, they ripped her jeans and panties off. She stood there completely naked in front of two men that she hated with every cell of her body. The elastic holding her bun in place was ripped out, her scalp stinging with the few hairs being yanked from her head.
He leaned into the tiny shower stall and turned the water on before grabbing her once again by her hair and shoving her into the stall. “Wash yourself.”
She yelped at the sudden chill of the cold water, hunching her shoulders as much as possible to shield herself.
“Wash!” The man in the sport coat roared. Brooke started to comply with slow, shaky hands, grabbing the dry, crusty bar of soap from the shelf and lathering herself up. Once she rinsed the dismal suds down the drain, they yanked her out of the stall, and haphazardly dried her with a towel. Then, he shoved an oversized t-shirt over her head before grasping her upper arm tight and dragging her from the room.
A few more doors down, he pulled her into another room. Brooke let out a gasp as she dug her bare heels into the concrete floor. She tried to twist away and run when she saw the exam table and stirrups in the center of the room.
Oh, God. That's what he meant by ‘examining’ her. She hated going to the gynecologist enough as it was; she was sure they wouldn't be as gentle with her as a trained and courteous doctor would.
“Settle your ass down!” He ground out through his teeth as he scooped her squirming body up, and plopped her down on the table. “If you make me tie you down, you'll stay there all night.”
Another man then appeared from the hallway. He snapped on a pair of latex gloves as he quipped something, presumably in Romanian, at the other man. They both laughed.
The gloved man stood at the end of the exam table and jerked her ankles into the stirrups; grabbed her by her hips and pulled her bottom to the end of the table. Brooke fought with everything in her not to kick his head and run.
She had never felt so exposed or humiliated in her life as he took his sweet time examining her. He seemed to be enjoying himself, and that made it a million times worse. Then, with no warning, a gloved finger speared her vagina, and she let out a broken cry as she fought to keep herself on the table. It hurt like hell, worse than the metal speculum used at the doctor's office.
He felt around for a few seconds, no doubt getting a free feel. Then, a grin spread across his greasy face as he looked up at the other man. They talked back and forth in Romanian for a moment, and laughed.
Brooke covered her face with both hands as she began to cry. They knew. And they were laughing at her. Now she had never been more humiliated.
She was still a virgin. Moreover, these sick bastards were laughing it up as if it was some kind of joke.
“All done, you can sit up.” The doctor pulled off his gloves.
She slowly sat up, shaking, with fresh tears flowing down her face. Right then and there, something inside her died. For the first time since she had been taken, she no longer wanted to fight. Maybe her subconscious was trying to protect her by shutting her down to conserve her energy. She prayed for the latter.
Her vagina throbbed at even the small invasion of a single finger, and she wanted nothing more at that moment than to curl into a ball and pass out.
She received at least part of her wish. Her escorts took her from the exam room to another smaller room. A cell. Her room, with a single, thin piece of foam that served as a bed, and a tiny prison toilet in one corner. She wanted to scoff at the mild gratitude at least having a flushable toilet.
Left alone to finally process what was happening, Brooke curled up on her little foam bed and attempted to let herself rest. Her head still throbbed, she still had a slight twinge between her legs, and her muscles ached from trembling. Now, all she could do was wait.
Some man she hadn't seen before came to her room a few hours later, waking her from a light doze, to bring her a bowl of soup and a bottle of water. She wanted to throw the soup in his face, but she couldn't ignore the pang of hunger, and the self-preserving need to behave herself... for now.
CHAPTER FIVE
UNKNOWN NUMBER: Hey Tiffany. This is Mike from the club, how r u ;)
Dorin's burner phone buzzed with the innocuous text. Only, it wasn't a random guy who thought he was texting some hot girl.
He typed his automatic reply. Wrong number. Sorry bro :(
It was a code. It looked like his handler, Tanner, had some new Intel for him. It had been their code for Dorin to check his ‘other’ phone for a few years now. It started when they were sitting in a sports bar having beers and watching a game when Dorin got the random text message followed by a fucking dick pic. Apparently, Tiffany had given Mike a fake number. Tanner laughed hysterically over it for twenty minutes straight, begging Dorin to roll with it and mess with the poor guy.
Tanner had been Dorin's handler for five years; he was also his best friend. He and the goofy bastard immediately hit it off when they were first paired together. He’d become practically the only family Dorin had.
Luckily, he was already in his hotel room, and he dug his other cell phone from its hiding place. Tanner normally contacted him on his burner phone, unless there was special Intel or an update that required reading. He turned on the encrypted smart phone, and waited for the attachment to load.
Shit, it was a State Department alert. A missing persons report. The American Ambassador to Romania, Richard Kennedy had reported his daughter missing from a restaurant right here in Bucharest last night. He opened the attachment; it was a dossier on the missing girl:
Brooke Danielle Kennedy
Age: 24
Height: 5'7”
Weight: Approx. 120 lbs.
Hair Color: Brown
Eye Color: Brown
No known tattoos or scars
Last seen wearing a green sweater, jeans, and brown boots
May need medical attention
Dorin zoomed in on her photo, a generic photo that would have come from her passport. She was a pretty girl: flawless light olive skin, cocoa-colored hair, big brown eyes.
...the kind of pretty that would be in high demand in the trade.
He shuddered; there was a very high chance that she had been snatched for selling. He thought about the upcoming auction, and sent up a conflicting silent prayer. If she were to be auctioned off tonight, he would have a chance
to rescue her. But it also meant she had endured God-knows-what leading up to it.
It was seven o'clock, only two hours until the auction. A hot shower helped dispel some of the anxiety that always came with setting foot on Romanian soil. Jesus, at this rate, he would need medication and therapy by the time he reached his thirty-third birthday. Ops in Romania always spelled bad news for him mentally. He rarely thought of his childhood here, until he was physically here. Hopefully he could close this op and be back stateside before he had a nervous breakdown. He loved being back home, back in his apartment in Washington, D.C.
It was the price he had to pay doing the job the good ol' U. S. of A. thought suited him best. He was the perfect operative—no family and no loyalties or ties but to the country that saved his life. Above all, he was a patriot and loved his adoptive home.
Suits felt like a fucking joke to him; he'd much rather be in jeans and a t-shirt. However, Alexandru Cuza was a classy guy, one who wore suits that Dorin Milosovici could never afford on his salary. Classy, suave, and shady as hell, he pulled it off well.
He arrived at the club at eight-thirty, plenty of time before the auction started. Times like these tested the limits of his self-control; he desperately wanted to mow down every single one of those bastards inside, and burn the place down.
But he needed as much Intel on Anton Vasile as possible; he was the most wanted trafficker in Europe, and the only way to get that information was to keep him alive...
...for now.
Yet again, he was patted down, and had to fork over his gun. He hated being unarmed. Being without a gun was worse than being without his pants. He felt like he was missing a limb.
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