I nodded. The more, the merrier, I had a lot of tension I needed to let out.
“So, are you both planning on staying here or are we going to kill some Triev goons?” Dom asked, posted by the door. “Our boys are already gathered and ready.”
“She said there might be a lot of them,” Frankie added sensibly.
Dom laughed. “I doubt it’ll be something we can’t handle, especially not after Maxim’s award-winning documentary.”
Chapter 26 - Katya
It smelled rank in this place. Like vomit, stale piss, blood, and a corpse. I was chained to the wall with a leather collar linked with steel chains and sat on the ground with my arms around my knees.
It was difficult to breathe, and the foul smell made my stomach turn. But I wouldn't be throwing up anything, not since I'd already thrown everything in my up in a puddle five feet from me, close to the severed hand and ear I'd stumbled upon.
I watched them both lay there, closer to the bars of this cell, rotting away, and shuddered.
Somebody had died here, and maybe I would too.
I even with the gun firing at me in Paulina's apartment, I hadn't believed I'd die. Get shot and be injured, maybe, but death hadn't been on my mind.
Now it was.
Maxim would rip into me like the madman he was. Before Alex or anybody else would find this place, I'd have been long gone.
I didn't want to die. If there were a clear choice, I'd choose to do whatever it took to remain alive.
Unless the condition for staying alive were anything even mildly related to forgiving Maxim, in which case, I'd drink the poison.
It was cold down here, and I was still in the simple brown dress I'd worn to Paulina's. Funny to think that I'd almost debated between this and a spaghetti strap mini dress.
The dress had a sleeve that went halfway down my arm. I still shivered, but I was grateful for it.
Cold, hungry, and with injuries from Maxim's movie and the beating I'd gotten for putting up a fight when they'd dragged me here, I still managed to rein in my emotions.
He could batter me like a rag if he wanted, I had no plans of giving him anything. No deals, no tears, not even a fucking scream.
High and dry until my last breath, and I'd die knowing that Alex would make him pay.
I'd told him to burn it all to the ground, but I knew that once he got a hold of Maxim, he'd make the bastard beg for death.
The couching fits came again, forcing me to lurch forward on my knees and hands, coughing and spitting out blood.
I kept coughing, even as I caught the sounds of somebody coming towards the cell. Keys jangled and hinges squeaked as the cell gate was opened and shut.
When the fit resided, I still stayed in that position, just breathing. Every cough had tugged on my intestines, and they needed time to slide back down.
“If you attack me again,” the creaky voice of the German/Dutch elderly woman, “it will be the last time I will tend your wounds. A scarred girl is not one he'll keep alive. You can ask the last girl to be locked in here.”
I pushed myself back into a seating position, wincing because the pain all over my body was blinding plus, I was starting to develop a raging headache.
“Yeah, we had that conversation right before you came in. She knows how to tell a great joke.”
The woman glared down at me, the same as the first time we’d met, and then went down on her knees to set the first aid box down.
“I'd thought you were a smart girl, but you resisting Mr. Triev has shown otherwise,” she said, grabbing my arm forcefully. All the care she'd given it the first time was gone in the scuffle when they'd chained me to this damned place, and now she couldn't care less.
Still, it was the best form of treatment I could get, so I allowed her to handle me roughly.
“If you just do what he says,” she continued with that froggy monotonal voice, “it would be better for you. He is capable of violence far above your nightmares.”