Portia
It’s so quiet, it’s almost eerie. I look up at the ceiling, watching steam rise from my bath. I hear a drop of water fall into the tub. That’s it. That’s the only sound. And it feels somehow wrong.
The bedroom door opens. I turn my head, but from this angle I can’t see who it is. It’s quiet again. Like whoever opened the door just walked away.
“Callahan?” I ask quietly, sitting up, drawing my knees toward my chest.
He doesn’t answer. No one does, but if I listen closely, I hear footsteps in the living room, then whispers. Men’s whispers. Soldiers?
No.
Not soldiers.
Ice coats my spine when I hear his voice. He shouldn’t be here. Callahan wouldn’t allow him to be here.
Would he? He wouldn’t do that to me, would he?
I look around for a robe, a towel. Something to cover myself, but his footsteps become more pronounced.
He’s not trying to be quiet. The opposite.
He’s in the bedroom so I remain in the tub, my arms hugging my knees to my chest.
And then he’s leaning against the doorway. He cocks his head to the side. When I try to swallow, my throat closes up.
I don’t want to show fear. But I am afraid.
If I’m honest, I’ve always been afraid of him. I just lied to myself when I said I wasn’t, because sometimes you need to lie to yourself to survive.
“Portia,” he says, walking into the bathroom, eyes roaming my body. He sits on the edge of the tub and extends the arm that’s not in the sling into the water, fingers skimming it, not touching me but creating a ripple.
“Where’s your groom?”
Relief. Callahan didn’t send him.
But that relief is short-lived.
“He’ll be right back,” I say.
“Hm. I don’t think he will.” His gaze moves to my breasts, which are fairly well hidden by my legs.
He tilts his head, touching my knee. I resist, water splashing as he pries a knee open to have a good look.
“I thought you only liked little girls, Uncle.”
He drags his gaze over my body and up to meet mine. “Oh, I’m not looking for myself.”
It takes all I have not to physically shake at his words. I hold his gaze, even though all I can see is him over me, on top of me. All I feel is sweat dripping on me as he grunts. All I feel is him inside me.
Hurting me.
God. I’m going to be sick.
“But you’ll still bring in some money. Cartel Princess on the auction block. Do you know how many enemies your brothers made? Just imagine the ways they can punish you for their wrongs.”
“Where’s Callahan? What did you do to him?”
He stands up, shakes off his hand and gestures to the two soldiers who come into view. I don’t recognize them.
“Get up.”
“Fuck you.”
“Lift her out.”
They’re on either side of me before I can make a move. Two sets of hands hauling me to my feet, water dripping off me, splashing onto the bathroom floor as I fight. It’s no use, I know.
“Where’s Callahan?” I yell to my uncle as he stands perusing me.
“Take her.”
One of the soldiers reaches for a towel.
“Like she is,” my uncle instructs, and the soldier only hesitates momentarily before he drops the towel.
I fight as they lift me off my feet, kicking when they throw me face down onto the bed and drag my arms behind my back. Binding my wrists first, then my ankles. I manage to kick one in the nose before they can secure my legs.
Once I’m bound, they stand me up. The one I kicked wasn’t the one who had reached for the towel. He raises an arm to slap me, but my uncle grabs it.
“Not her face,” he says. “Don’t mess up her face.”
But when the soldier makes a fist to punch me in my belly, he doesn’t interfere. He just looks on as I double over, the wind knocked out of me so I can’t even scream.
Once is enough, but he does it a second time, before I’m lifted, doubled over, and carried out through the house. I see Alec on the floor at the opposite end of the room. He’s cradling his arm but he’s alive. The rest of Cristiano’s soldiers are lying on the ground dead or dying, I wonder how I didn’t hear the bullets, but I know a moment later when we get outside.
Another soldier is dragged to his knees and executed with a bullet to the back of the head. The gun is fitted with a silencer.
I’d scream but this isn’t the first time I’ve seen this. Not even the second or third. And it all happens so fast. The icy rain on my naked skin, my feet scraping against stone, shin slammed into the back of the car as I kick my legs, bound to make a mermaid’s tail. I’m lifted and dumped into the trunk of a waiting car.