Kacey Doka felt the warm gush of liquid surge down her thighs as her water broke. She knew what it meant, knew she must alert the guards. After eight months of captivity, she would be the first to see what happened next.
She didn’t know what frightened her more, the prospect of giving birth or what they would do to her when she was finished.
“Don’t tell them,” said her friend Marta, her eyes wide with terror. Marta Garcia was also nineteen and had been taken before Kacey. She was bigger around the middle, so all the girls trapped with Kacey in this dusty basement thought that Marta would go first.
“They are going to notice a baby,” said Brenda Espinoza, who was two years younger, was well into her second trimester and no longer able to deny the child that moved within her.
Brenda was the third to arrive. In May, according to their floor calendar, three months after Kacey.
“And that you’re no longer pregnant,” Brenda added. “How do you expect to hide that?”
She didn’t. Kacey knew that she had no alternative but to alert the guards. She glanced to Maggie Kesselman, the newest arrival here, just over a week ago. Kacey felt so sorry for her. Maggie was the youngest at only fourteen and still grappling through tears and disbelief at what had happened to her.
“Call them,” said Kacey.
Marta walked laboriously up the wooden steps from the basement to the metal door that opened exactly twice a day. Marta glanced back with wide, troubled eyes and Kacey nodded. Marta knocked and then retreated down the stairs. All the windows were covered from the outside and barred from within, so the only light was the single overhead bulb that never went out and that now cast Marta’s shadow before her as she descended. Marta hurried along with a heavy, rocking tread, gripping the banister for support, anxious to be back on the cold concrete floor before that door swung open because they didn’t like them hanging by the door when it opened.
Kacey did not know where they were being kept. But she did know that screaming for help brought only the guards. Vicious, heartless guards who spoke in a thick foreign accent.
“They’ll find us soon,” said Kacey to the other three. “They’ll come and rescue us.”
She kept saying it, believing it until the others believed it, too. Their families, their tribe, the authorities were all searching. They’d come for them.
“If I don’t come back, I’ll send help. I promise.”
Marta hugged her. Maggie started to cry again. Brenda stared at the floor with an unfocused gaze, her hands laced, locked and pressed to her mouth.
Kacey knew the guards did not like being disturbed between feedings. Whatever they were doing, interruptions resulted in blows.
The door banged open and two men descended the stairs with clubs. The girls screamed and fled to the corners of the large empty basement area. Only Kacey remained at the bottom of the stairs.
Their captors had provided them each with a blanket and mattress. They also had a sink and toilet behind a partition. The toilet smelled of bleach and soap, both provided, but the basement held the musty scent of wool, dirt and decay. An appearance of a new mattress always signaled the imminent arrival of a new girl. Yesterday, the fifth mattress had appeared. To date, four had entered through that metal door and none had left. Kacey was about to leave their prison.
Would they bring her to a hospital to deliver her baby? No, of course they couldn’t do that because she could speak to any of the medical staff and alert them that she was a prisoner.
“What is dis? Why you are knocking?” The one they called Oleg spoke to the group. His English was best but still difficult for them to understand.
The girls looked from one to the other, none willing to speak to Oleg because although his English was the best, his temper was the worst. Kacey’s insides seemed to have a will of their own and began squeezing so hard that she cried out.
“Her water broke,” said Marta, pointing to the wet spot on the concrete floor.
Oleg turned his pale blue eyes on Kacey. Then he glanced to the large pool of water darkening the concrete. He motioned his head toward Kacey, and the second man, Anton, stepped forward and captured Kacey by the arm, hurrying her toward the stairs.
She glanced over her shoulder to see the girls coming together in the center of the room, huddling tight as they stared after her. Oleg grasped her opposite arm and she was thrust up the stairs before them and through the prison door.
On the floor above the basement, she saw an office with tight dark carpeting and three desks with computers and phones under harsh fluorescent lighting. A television had been mounted on the wall, and a mini fridge sat beneath it with a half-full coffeepot resting on the top. The shape of the room and the two doorways made Kacey think she was in a large house. The normalcy of the layout clashed with the terror below her feet where the others huddled in near darkness.
The windows furnished views of a busy road where cars buzzed past trying to make the light. Beyond that squatted a strip mall, housing a Chinese restaurant, nail salon and pet grooming. The sunlight seemed especially bright and she used her hand as a visor.
“Call the boss,” said Oleg.
Anton released her to move to the phone. The third guard, whom she had never seen, watched her intently as her eyes moved from Anton to the door and then to his face to see the wicked smile challenging her to go for it.
Kacey wrapped her arms around her squeezing stomach and clenched her teeth. Anton lowered the phone.
“The boss said he’ll call the doc.”
Oleg thrust her into one of the office chairs. Kacey’s eyes went from the computer to the phone as she calculated her chances of using either. The big unfamiliar guard stalked forward and sat on the edge of the desk. Then he folded his arms across his wide chest. He looked so smug and superior that instead of feeling defeat, Kacey felt rage.
“Not there,” said Anton. “She’ll bleed all over everything. Take her to the exam room.”
She was lifted by the upper arms with such force she momentarily left the floor. Kacey soon found herself in a small windowless room dominated by a short black examination table with two metal gizmos that reminded her of small riding stirrups. Her flesh began to crawl.
The pain ripped across her back and she doubled over.
“It hurt?” asked Oleg.
She nodded, blowing out a breath as sweat beaded on her forehead.
“Good. That mean baby is coming.”
The door closed but not before she heard Anton ask Oleg, “What about her?”
Oleg’s answer was not in English, but Anton’s reply was.
“Dump her or sell her?” asked Anton.
She could not understand the reply but did not need to. She had her answer. After the baby was born, she would be sold or killed.
Kacey