“Pretty, aren’t they?” he asked, switching to heavily accented English. “I’m so fond of my frescoes. Seventeenth century. The artist was anonymous but very gifted, in my opinion.”
Very fucked up in hers, Tam thought. She noticed two huge flat-screen TVs, set on tables to either side of her. Their blank fifty-inch screens were dark and empty. They were incongruous in the dim room, otherwise full of priceless baroque era art and furniture. Then the air moved on her shivering body, and a huge, gold-framed standing mirror right in front of her brought her attention to another unpleasant fact.
She was naked.
She was not surprised. She had learned young how vulnerable nakedness made a person feel, how easily controlled. It was a quick and dirty instant weapon for sadists and bullies, and she’d met too many of those in her lifetime. But she was tough as an old boot. Nakedness was not a problem. No, that fucking broken arm was the problem.
Novak clapped his clawlike hands together. “I was beginning to wonder if you would ever wake up. I’ve been so impatient to meet you, Tamara Steele. What a pleasure.”
He paused. Did he expect her to say that the pleasure was all hers? But even if she was disposed to play word games with him, she was shaking too hard to breathe enough to speak. All she could manage were shallow, squeaking drags for air.
Novak studied her thoughtfully, eyes hooded. “Let her down, András,” he said. “Onto her feet.”
András scowled and gave the rope an agonizing jerk. “But she—”
“She will faint,” the old man said harshly. “I want her conscious. I want this to last.”
András let up so abruptly she thudded down, legs buckling. She sagged to the side and was brought up short by her tortured wrists.
The two men watched impassively as she struggled to get her feet beneath her body again.
“Is that better, my dear?” The fake solicitude in Novak’s voice oozed over her like slime. Her mouth was so dry, she was choking.
She tried to swallow. Tried to cough. Regretted it. Coughing jarred everything, and everything hurt like pure, flaming hell.
“What do you want from me?” she whispered.
Novak’s smile curled thinly upward. “Something special. Something intimate. Something only you can give me.”
Her body clenched at the implications of those words. “Be more specific,” she croaked.
He leaned forward, close enough so that his fetid breath almost made her gag. “Pain,” he hissed.
Ah, yes. Great. Why was she not surprised. She almost rolled her eyes, but that sort of flip defiance could make her fate worse.
Or rather, Rachel’s. It was all about Rachel now.
“I never used to have such a passion for torture,” Novak confided. “It was just a means to an end. I am not like András, who is a true aficionado. An artist of pain. Then I discovered I had a disease the doctors were pleased to call terminal, and one day, while punishing a man who had wronged me, I noticed something odd. I felt restored by the experience. It literally gave me energy. I tried it a second time. The phenomenon repeated itself. It was therapeutic. Amazing, no?”
She was speechless. Not surprised, though, at the total self-absorption. The mark of a true psychopath.
“Really,” he said earnestly, as if she had argued with him. “I absorb the life force of the person I am punishing. Particularly if they have robbed or insulted me, as you have, my dear. It is so perfect, so appropriate. You were responsible for the death of my son. And now I have your daughter. Symmetrical, no?”
Her heart raced, her stomach rolled. Her ears rang, with some deafening inner noise. Rifle shots crackling from a distance. Screams from the tortured prisoners in the basement cells. Death all around her.
He looked hurt, at her failure to respond. “It’s true,” he protested. “Every time I indulge my test values show a marked improvement. My doctors want to know my secret, but they wouldn’t understand if I told them. I’m intrigued to see what effect playing my games on a three-year-old should have on my health. I suspect it will be a potent tonic.”
He stared into her eyes as he said it, avid for her reaction. She was too raw with pain and fear to hide it. His face creased with delight.
“Ah, yes,” he muttered between wheezing chuckles. “This will be good. This will give me months. A year, maybe. Delicious.”
She vibrated with pure fear. Her fuck-you-in-your-face bravado was torn away completely. He had her, and they both knew it. Even the tongue stud was pointless now. He would never get close enough to her for her to use it, not until after he had finished with Rachel. At which point, whether she lived or died would be no longer relevant.
Perhaps breaking the capsule and dying first would take the fun out of hurting Rachel for them, but then probably not. And she could not abandon her baby here while Rachel was still alive.
He might still come close enough to her before he started in on her baby. Close enough to gloat. She could hope for that.
“Where is she?” Tam forced the question out through shaking lips.
“Near, very near,” Novak assured her. “We’ve been waiting for her to wake up. The idiot who brought her overdid the sedative dosage for the airplane flight. Not used to dealing with small children, evidently. The child was practically comatose when she finally arrived, but my people tell me she’s come around nicely in the past couple of hours. In fact, she never stops screaming. I shall send András to fetch her in a few minutes, and we can begin.”
The pressure increased in Tam’s chest. An iron claw of fear gripped her lungs, her heart. Squeezing, crushing. She had always thought that she had seen the worst, felt the worst there was to feel.
How innocent of her. How naive. How lacking in imagination.
“We kept you under for the duration,” Novak went on. “Mostly because of your reputation for clever escapes and non-linear thinking. You should be flattered.”
He sounded like he was conferring a compliment. The fragment of her mind still capable of rational thought marveled at the kinky weirdness of it. Flattering a woman who was dangling from a hook by her wrists. What, was she supposed to simper? Thank him?
She had to lure him close enough to spit. It would be better to kiss him and get the stuff inside his mouth, but even spraying it onto his face might be enough to carry him off, sick as he was.
Tam dragged in air, gathering her energy. Her lips were trembling. She had to steady them. She had to work up some spit. He had to move closer. Just a little bit. Please.
“Thank God I don’t have to worry about fucking you, at least,” she taunted him. “Your breath is so foul, it smells like something crawled down your throat and died there. Please don’t breathe on me, for the love of God. Step back. It makes me gag.”
Novak’s eyes were wide, weirdly empty. “Ah, yes,” he whispered. “You are strong. You’ll last a long time. Strong ones are the best. Who knows? Maybe what I do to your daughter will actually revive me to the point of sexual arousal. We shall see, hmm?”
But he did not step closer, no matter how desperately she willed him to. He was too alert to fall for it, even though he considered her defenseless. His resistance to being manipulated was automatic.
And he had no sexual energy at all. She should have made her play on a different level. Shit. She’d gone with sex by sheer force of habit, it being what worked for most men, but not him. She’d fucked up, and her sweet baby would pay for her mistake.
He was speaking again.
Pay attention. Stay sharp. For as long as you can. Stay sharp for Rachel.
“…wait for Janos to bring you to me,”