Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 76572 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76572 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
I shuffle off the bed and drag my duffel closer to my legs so I can grab some clean clothes. Once I pull the shirt over my head, I gather my hair up in a messy bun. Then I slip into a worn pair of jeans and head into my small ensuite to brush my teeth and wash my face.
My father probably wants me in my prostitute costume so I can entice his prisoner, but if I’m dying today, I’m doing it looking like myself. None of the makeup and fake clothes. Clothes I’d rather burn than wear again.
After I’m done in the bathroom, I hunt down my phone and text the supervisor at the casino to let them know I won’t be back at work tonight. I get a winky face emoji in return. Well, she must know who I walked out with last night. And if that’s the case, maybe one of his friends will be able to find him before my father can really get his mad scientist on.
I toss the phone onto my bed and slide my feet into a pair of canvas slip-ons. This is as good as it’s going to get today, and if anyone has a problem with it, they will have to drag me back to my room themselves. It’s funny how much less scared I am of all of my father’s men when I’ve faced Ivan’s anger and survived. Once, at least.
My room is on the basement level so my father can keep his eyes on me. Which makes it easy to walk down the long compound hallway to get to the dungeon cells. A guard stands outside, Pavil something, I think. I don’t know his face as he’s not one of the men who have taken advantage of my father’s generous offerings of my body to his guards.
I grit my teeth as I approach him, and he casts his eyes down and then back up at the wall.
With a sigh, I wave at the door. “I’m supposed to have a conversation with our prisoner in there.”
He straightens his spine, his black shirt tightening across his chest at the movement. Right now, he thinks he’s being respectful of me. Pretty soon, he’ll follow in the other guards’ footsteps and treat me like garbage along with everyone else.
“Are we going to stand here in the hallway all day, or are you going to unlock the door for me?”
One of the other guards. Eric. Tall, beautiful, disturbingly evil Eric strides down the hall with a tray of food in his hands. He stops beside Pavil and thrusts the tray at my chest hard enough to send me back a few steps. “We already got him cleaned up and changed for you, princess. Go give him some attention, and we’ll keep an eye on things from the video screens.”
I swallow against another wave of bile, my throat burning, and clutch the tray, so he will take a step back and release it. When I don’t respond to him, he grabs my chin hard and tilts my face up.
His sneer is enough to make me look away so I don’t have to see it. “You didn’t even bother to put on some makeup? He’s not going to want you looking like this. You’re like a fucking kindergarten teacher or some shit.”
I know better than to respond. It will only make him more violent and more brutal. After a few tense seconds, he releases my face with a little shove and steps back to look at Pavil. “What the fuck are you looking at?”
Pavil narrows his eyes but doesn’t comment on Eric’s behavior or his question.
Once Eric turns and heads back down the hallway toward the control room, I face Pavil. “Can you open the door now?”
He reaches into his pocket, fumbling with something, then slips a glass vial I recognize all too well into the coin pocket of my jeans. “Just in case you need some help in there. The doc was just in there, though, so he might already have what he needs.”
I stare him down this time. My patience has blown its limits and kept on going. Now all I have left is numbness. It’s comforting, actually. Better than the abject despair I usually feel as I cry myself to sleep at night.
Pavil opens the heavy steel door, and I step into the semi-dark room to face my death for the last time.
8
IVAN
The steel door doesn’t scrape against the concrete this time. It does squeak ever so slightly on the hinges as it opens and then closes. I don’t need to look up to know who entered. She’s silent as if she’s spent her entire life walking carefully, trying not to draw attention to herself.
I keep my eyes downcast so she can’t tell if I’m asleep or not. Her feet move closer, on the edge of my vision. The spiteful part of me is tempted to kick out, bring her to her knees, and make her pay for what she’s done to me. But I don’t. Something about her calms me. Until I figure it out, I refuse to hurt her, well, at least no more than she wants to be hurt by me.