"It's very secure. I'm surprised they didn't come close enough to trip the alarms," Marcus finally said, admitting to the truth.
"They used their scopes I believe, but you'd have to ask them. We decided that since you didn't bother us, we wouldn't bother you," Claudia said, shrugging her shoulders.
The woman then stood and went to get more coffee for them. When she handed a warmed mug back to Marcus, he wrapped his fingers around it. His body had gone ice cold hearing all the information Claudia had about the van and the Noble Lord. He knew he had really messed up this time, following his own plans, instead of taking time to decide on something better with Alex. They could have both gotten into the Bronco and taken off. They may have found the survivors before the horde got to them, but it was unlikely with the fast ones he had been trying to kill. Deep down he knew that if the men overpowered Alex, Marcus being with her wouldn't have changed the outcome.
"What are you going to do?" Claudia asked. She had sat back down with her own cup of coffee and a photo.
"I'm going to go home. Get backup and get Alex back," he said.
"If you see my Sylvia, if she's alive, could you bring her back?" Claudia asked, as she slid the photo across to him.
Marcus took the small picture. The smiling face looked very much like Vera, but older. In this image she looked to be laughing at something, her head tossed back, and long black hair flowed behind her. Marcus hated to picture this woman alone, no one protecting her in this brothel. He knew the Duncans well, Alex the most, and he knew Alex wouldn't leave a woman behind to suffer at the hands of the Noble Lord if she could help it. He slid the photo into the front pocket of his button-up shirt. It sat directly over his heart and he realized the symbolism as he made his promise to Claudia.
"I promise, if we can, we will bring her home to you."
Claudia insisted on feeding him a late lunch. They sat around the large kitchen table, everyone eating quietly. Marcus kept his eyes on his plate, feeling the oppressive glares from the men at the table. They didn't appreciate the matriarch overruling them on the situation, but she didn't kick Marcus out immediately. To his right, AJ sat eating cheerily. He had a plastic dinosaur on the table and between bites he rattled off all the facts he knew of that type of animal. Marcus was enthralled, thinking about how much the boy was like Billie Duncan. Claudia's eyes shined when she looked at the boy and she ruffled his hair.
"He was a surprise this one. My Alonso and I were quite done having children. As you can see, there's quite the years in between," Claudia laughed lightly and it was impossible to not smile in response.
"There are children at our home as well. Once this is done, we should let them all meet. I know they would enjoy a new friend," Marcus replied. A scoff answered him from across the table.
"Mateo, I won't have your bad manners at my table," Claudia said, her tone seemingly to be soft and cutting at the same time.
"Mama, you are really trusting this man? Secretive and lives behind stone walls. What do you know of him?" Mateo said. Marcus knew the questions had been brewing in him since he had arrived.
"Mateo..." Claudia started and Marcus could see she was about to set in on her son. He cleared his throat to get her attention. She turned her gaze to him.
"If I may?" Marcus said, waiting for her agreement. He wanted to use every bit of manners he knew where Claudia was involved.
"Yes, we do live behind walls. But those have been there a long time. I guess you didn't know Mitch Duncan, the man who built that home. The Duncans have been a part of this area since their births. That is their home. There is nothing secret there. Only family working to keep each other safe," Marcus said.
"Your family?" Vera asked.
"They are now. Alex, the woman that I'm going after, saved my life. I need to take what you've told me back home to get her brother and sister. Together, I know we can rescue her."
"You don't know what you're dealing with. The Noble Lord isn't one to be messed with. We tried, and we almost lost both of my sisters," Mateo said.
"We may not know him, but you do. And you don't know the Duncans. Not much stops them from getting what they want."
Chapter Nine
"There's no use fighting. I tried. They caught me again. Just move on," Leona said quietly.
Alex wasn't sure why the woman wouldn't at least try. Did she really feel like throwing away her life and giving up was an option? In Alex's world, that would never be an option. Allowing men to take her and attempt to force her into whatever they had in mind, was not how Alex had been built. She would continue to fight until one side died. And she knew she would rather die than be a pet to the Noble Lord.
"I won't give up. And you shouldn't either. Once we're free, if you want to stay here you do that. But I'm getting out of here."
The handcuffs were going to be the biggest issue. Alex wasn't carrying anything to pick a lock or an extra key. Her father would have been furious. His obsession with distrust for the government had always gone over Alex's head. She didn't believe those that were entrusted to protect you needed to be feared. She knew differently now, having been faced with Callahan and his men. If she had followed Mitch Duncan's instructions, she would have a handcuff key hidden in her sock or bra. Being put into handcuffs wasn't her first worry when she’d left the compound the day before.
Alex shifted, so her hands were under her thighs. She could hear Leona gasp quietly as Alex breathed slowly and began to contort her body to get the handcuffs down the back of her legs and around her boots. Once she pulled her cuffed hands into her lap she breathed deeply, panting slightly at the exertion. Staying in shape had always been a goal of hers and she was now thankful for the many yoga classes she had taken to keep her body limber and stretched.
With her hands in the front, the first thing Alex did was pat down her pockets. She was pretty sure when the men searched her, they had taken everything, but she needed to be sure. She also realized she still had the survival bracelet on her wrist. She didn't know why they didn't take it, but she assumed they didn't know there was a bottle opener, whistle, flint, and compass hidden on the inside. She ran choices through her mind and right then she didn't believe the bracelet was going to help her get away from the van.
"What are you going to do?" Leona asked.
"Depends, are you going to help?"
"What would I have to do?"
"Create a distraction. Pretend to be sick, get up and go over there like you're going to throw up on them. When they’re worried about you, I will get to the door. First though," Alex said as she pulled off her hood.
She blinked in the sudden light of the van. It was dim inside with no windows except the windshield letting in light. The hood had been so black that Alex's eyes needed a moment to adjust. As she figured, the boxes of supplies were built up in a slight semicircle around the women. The men didn't care if the boxes fell onto the women, as long as they were out of their way. None of the men could see Alex directly, which she was thankful for. She didn't need any of them knowing that her hands were in front of her, at least not yet. She turned to look at Leona. The woman was once beautiful, Alex knew, but now her face was now swollen and covered in bruises. Her vibrant red hair, which looked too bright to be real, was hanging in tangles around her shoulders. Alex could only see some of her eyes in the dim light, but she could tell they were very blue.
The last thing Alex noticed was round burn marks on her arms. She looked closer and her mind flashed back to the bus and the infected tied up inside. Was that infected once a woman kept by these men? That thought played out in Alex's mind and she felt a sickness in her gut. She wondered if the woman was bitten before or after she was tied up. Her mind whirled with anger and disgust for the men sitting in the van. Her fingers twitched thinking of how she wished she had a weapon, something to hurt them all, the way they had clearly hurt these women.
"How long have you been held by the Noble Lord?" Alex asked.
"Too long. I'm not sure
anymore. I don't have a way to count the days."
Alex felt more anger, red and pounding in her mind. She couldn't fathom what the woman had been subjected to. But Alex was done with it.
"Ready, Leona?"
Leona looked around, her eyes darting to the men. Alex couldn't read her expression due to the swelling in her face, but she was sure Leona was nervous.
"It'll be all right. Go for the driver's area. Make him slow down. So, when the door is open, we can jump."
"We?"
"Do you want to stay here? I wasn't kidding when I said I was going to get us out of here. Us. You and I."
"Ok," the word was barely audible to Alex. But she finally knew she had Leona's buy in.
Strangely, Leona's hands were free. She gripped them in front her the entire time they sat. Alex assumed the men no longer worried about her, she was broken and fragile. Well, if Alex had her way, they had another thing coming. As planned, Leona got to her feet in a low crouch, so she could move through the van. The boxes blocked off the men in the back and she was able to go directly to the area where the driver and passenger seats were. When she was close enough, she began to feign gagging and Alex could hear her choking out the words “sick, hurl, stop.”
The driver, panicked he was about to get covered in vomit, swerved the van, slamming on the brakes, causing Leona to almost lose her balance. Instead of toppling over, she reached through the middle of the seats and grabbed the driver's arm. That got his attention further, and he cried out for the men in the back to help. As yelling and movement began, Alex got to her feet as well. Leona was backing away as the men threatened her and came closer, so Alex went the other way around the box wall. She found the door unsecured and couldn't believe her luck. That was until a face came back around the boxes.
"What do we have here?" Bo sneered at Alex.
"You missed my stop, I'll be getting off here," Alex said, as she yanked open the sliding door.
The driver had slowed measurably, believing Leona needed to be handled. The other woman had crawled to Alex's side. Bo began to move toward Alex and a split-second decision needed to be made. Alex knew she could get away, she could and would fight until her last breath. She knew these men wouldn't get what they wanted from her. But Leona wouldn't fight, she had no more strength to stop them. Alex couldn't leave her. And she couldn't let the men take her either.
"Jump, Leona. Roll when you hit the ground!" Alex cried before she threw herself at Bo.
Bo was ready for her attack and he tried to pivot as she impacted. The interior of the van was cramped with the people and supplies that were loaded up. Alex smashed her shoulder into Bo's stomach, and he grunted as the air left his body. She wanted to slam him down, but there was no space for leverage to do so. Instead, she drove him back as far as she could. She was quickly grabbed from behind and yanked off Bo, who was gasping to get air back in his lungs. Alex spit on him. She couldn't stop herself. The disgust she felt for the men was a disease that was eating her alive.
"We lost the other one," the man holding Alex said. The sliding door slammed shut and Alex looked around. Leona was gone.
"Damn it. I'm tired of dealing with that woman. This is the third time she's taken off. Let the dead have her," Lewis said from the passenger seat.
Alex noted that he didn't try to join the fray this time. She had to wonder if it was because he liked his balls where they were, and he knew that he couldn't take Alex on his own. Instead he left his lackeys to deal with her. She fought back, yanking her arms away from who held them and made to start toward Lewis. He gave her one dirty look then nodded to another man. Her arms were then yanked above her head just as the black hood was secured once again over her head. She was drug by the handcuffs into the back of the van. The sound of chains met her ears, and she was then left to hang by some sort of contraption. Her knees didn't meet the bottom of the van, so she was forced to crouch awkwardly on her feet as the van shifted under her.
As Alex hung there, with nothing else to do, her mind began to work. She was thankful Leona was out, but how long would the woman survive on her own in the wild with infected everywhere? Alex hoped the woman showed more fight with the dead than she did with the Noble Lord and his men. Alex wondered if she had ensured the woman's death by helping her escape. The Noble Lord and his men were clearly cruel, but was death a better fate than being a prisoner? Alex decided that Leona made that decision on her own by jumping. She took the chance of the dead instead of staying with the cruel leader.
Putting Leona from her mind, Alex began to categorize what she had learned that day. When she met the men, they had accused her of stealing from the Noble Lord. Alex couldn't figure out how they hadn't run into the men before. The Duncan compound was close to self-sustaining. They didn't need to go out often for scavenging runs. They did it more to keep tabs of what was happening in the town and what other survivors were doing. They had tended to avoid those that chose to avoid them. Alex wanted to trust other living people, but they had all experienced negative situations with other survivors. She realized now they had missed something brewing for some time.
The Noble Lord believed he had taken claim to the supplies of the area. Something Alex and her family would never stand for. The belief the Duncans and their friends had was everyone had the right to survive. To do that people needed to work together and share the supplies that were left. Alex had a grand dream that someday trade would be possible. That survivors would band together to keep the human race from going extinct. She knew that her home could be cultivated to provide more fresh produce and meat to those in need. However, she needed to trust the people they would do business with. This Noble Lord was not someone they would open their doors to.
Alex also noted on her list of observations that the Noble Lord's men seemed to be in some sort of withdrawal or under the effects of some sort of drug. From the conversation she had heard, they hoped to gain some sort of supplies from the Noble Lord by turning her over to him. They didn't take the supplies she and Marcus had collected and run with them. Instead, they loaded them up to return to the Noble Lord. Alex could guess that they believed it would gain them additional favor with the man that held some sort of power over them.
Power. That was the last thing. What was it that the Noble Lord had that had created this vacuum of power? Alex knew one answer was drugs. These men needed more than regular supplies to survive. But what was it about one man that kept other men from overthrowing him? Alex knew she wouldn't get that answer until she met the Noble Lord, something she knew she wouldn't be able to avoid. In her experience no one man held enough leverage to control the actions of so many. Not without an army, laws and a whole government to support him.
Her thighs had started to ache, pain reaching up to her hips as she tried to carefully keep herself balanced. She gave up trying to count turns or figure out the direction they might be going. She knew they had driven away from Kalispell. That was bad enough. She knew Marcus would know something was wrong when she didn't come for him. But how would he track her in the van moving away from their area? Alex found herself cursing Marcus again for going off on his own without a plan. Yet again. But even her inner cursing was halfhearted. Getting captured wasn't Marcus's fault. They couldn't have known what was to come.
Alex snapped to attention when she realized that the van was slowing. The men spoke quietly to each other and Alex could only pick up snippets of what they were saying. She knew they weren't at their destination yet when she heard the words "horde" and "camp" in their discussions. The sounds at the back of the van made Alex jump forward. She knew those noises, the banging and groans of the infected. They knew there was a meal inside the metal vehicle. The van began to move again, but much slower. Alex could feel the rattle as they pushed through the infected that must have been on all sides of the van.
After only a short time of fighting through the horde of infected, the van sped up again, and the men quieted. Alex readjusted her legs, trying to relea
se the tightness in her muscles. She couldn't seem to find a position that didn't ache. As she concentrated on her posture, she was roughly gripped from the side, her body pulled against the metal cuffs at her wrists. She couldn't stop the cry that came from her lips, partially in surprise and partially in pain.
"You think this is bad? Just wait. The Noble Lord will blame you for losing his pet," the harsh growl was near her ear. Alex immediately recognized Lewis.
"Had to wait for me to be tied up again to confront me, Lewis?" Alex taunted.
"I'm not afraid of you. You're nothing. You were easy to lure. Easy to capture. And you'll be easy to hand over to The Noble Lord."
"Untie me and we'll see how easy it is," Alex said, her voice low and threatening.
Instead of answering, Lewis roughly grabbed her breast, squeezing until tears prickled Alex's eyes. His hand began to wander lower. Alex, feeling panic and disgust, tried to judge where Lewis' face was and swung her head in his direction as hard as her bound body would allow. She knew she connected with his cheekbone as pain splintered from the impact. Though she couldn't see, she heard Lewis crash into the boxes that were directly in front of her.
"Touch me again and you'll suffer much worse," Alex yelled.
"You'll learn your damn place," Lewis said as he scrambled back toward Alex.
"I know my place. But you clearly haven't figured out yours. Do you enjoy being my punching bag, Lewis? You make it too easy," Alex said.
Alex could sense Lewis getting close to her and she knew his face was by her ear when his voice hissed out.
"The Noble Lord will enjoy breaking you," he said.
She couldn't see the blow as Lewis' fist collided with her abdomen. She didn't get a chance to avoid or tighten her muscles to help with the pain. The air rushed from her lungs in a loud gasp. Alex couldn't focus as her legs collapsed from under her as the pain radiated from her stomach. She scrambled to find her footing again as all of her weight fell onto her shoulders and wrists secured above her head. Her lungs felt like fire and she coughed and wheezed, fighting for air. All the while Lewis sat nearby, cackling his enjoyment at her pain.
Sundown Series (Book 4): Torment Page 11