Now as I lie here, I close my eyes and imagine him like he was, as I slide my hand down over my stomach between my legs. I touch myself gingerly over top of my panties. Not inside. And I imagine his fingers there. Imagine how I felt to him.
Just then a noise from inside the apartment startles me.
I turn to the closed bedroom door. Hear someone laugh. A cold shiver passes through me at that sound. Because I know it.
My legs finally get the message from my brain to move, and I push the blankets off. Sitting up I swing my legs over the bed. There’s carpet on the floor here. A small, scratchy circle with an ornate Persian design. Better than the concrete.
Another noise comes from one of the other rooms. Glass breaking.
I get up, go to the closed door, put my ear to it. It’s thick but I can make out some sound. Men. More than one. But it doesn’t sound like it did with Dante’s soldiers.
I gasp when someone curses loudly and something shatters. Not a glass this time. This is too loud for that. I turn the lock on the door and jump at the next crash. Inside this room is a large bed, a proper nightstand, and a dresser. At the far end is a large window but this one has the small squares of glass. It’s not an exit. This room is only half the size of Dante’s and there’s no attached bathroom. Nowhere to hide.
On the nightstand is a small lamp, a cheap, plastic thing. It won’t do me any good if whoever is tearing up the place out there comes in here. And they will. It’s just a matter of time.
I open the first of two drawers. Inside is a book, worn like it’s been well read. That won’t help me either, so I close it and open the next one. Here I find balled up socks, and when I rummage through, I close my hand over the cool, bumpy surface of a Swiss army knife.
I sit on the edge of the bed and look at my prize.
Helga used to have one similar to it. I took it from her when she died but Petrov took it from me before we even got into his SUV that same night.
This one, though, is better. It’s a pocketknife. The bright orange handle is solid. It fits perfectly in my palm. And the blade is sharp. Deadly.
I close it as I hear footsteps come nearer my room.
“Maaaaraaaaa,” someone calls out, drawing out my name. “Come out, come out wherever you are,” he sings.
My heart races. The blood inside my veins turns to ice.
No. No way.
It can’t be him.
I know that voice though. Know his taunts. I know the man it belongs to. I haven’t seen him in five years. I’ll never forget him because he terrifies me.
I get to my feet, walk around the bed and back away from the door as the handle jiggles.
“Empty,” another man says I guess of another room.
Someone pounds their fists against the door, and I jump with the violence of it. That pounding of fists will always make me jump. I feel my shoulders hunch, my body curling around itself.
I’m scared.
God. Will I ever not be scared?
And then it happens. The crash against the door, the wood creaking. It comes again, a kick making the door rattle, splintering the wood. The third kick sends his boot right through. I hear him curse then yank his leg out.
I don’t scream when he bends to put his face in the hole. I don’t scream when I see his eyes. His leering grin.
“There you are, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart. It makes me sick when he says it. Makes me want to vomit.
He reaches his arm through, feels for the lock. It seems like a silly thing, that little lock. He could more easily kick the door in altogether. But he turns that lock and pushes the door open. I grip the knife hard, keeping it hidden in the palm of my hand.
He’s tall. Not as tall as Dante but taller than me. And I know how solidly he’s built. There’s no getting around him.
He stops when he’s a few feet from me, his fatigues dirty, a splatter of bright red on his chest. Some of it on his face.
“Well, aren’t you all grown up,” he says after looking me over.
Sweat slides down the back of my neck. I press myself against the cold, rough brick wall. He takes a step toward me, grinning all the while. I remember his breath. How stale it always smelled. Remember his yellowing teeth.
He cocks his head to the side. “Aren’t you going to say hello?”
I swallow hard, see the two men move into the room behind him. Felix’s men. I know because Miguel, the one in front of me, is one of Felix’s most trusted soldiers.