Page 53 of Embracing the Consequences

When he didn’t move, she shimmied her body backward into the corner of the room and brought her knees up to her chest. She wrapped her arms around her legs and tried to warm herself.

The man in front of her didn’t move, but he also never stopped watching her with his unblinking black, almost dead eyes. It was unnerving.

Kara looked above him to the blinking red light of the security camera. She stared into the camera instead of the dead eyes of her captor.

Kara didn’t stare at the camera for long before there was a beep outside the door, a lock clicked loudly as it disengaged, and the door swung open.

Two armed guards, dressed in black from the neck down, stood in the doorway. Both had thick shoulders and were well built; both were of Hispanic descent. The miliary style clothing threw her off. She didn’t know of any gangs that had this kind of operation.

“Vamos,” the man on the right barked.

Kara slowly uncurled her body. She wondered if she should pretend to not understand Spanish. She also wondered where they were taking her and if she was about to die—the thought sent a spike of fear through her heart.

She was wobbly as she got to her feet. She steeled her spine and pushed back her shoulders. If she was going to her death, she wasn’t going to cower in fear.

Her legs were weak as she walked toward the guards.

One of them moved forward and roughly grabbed her wrist, yanking her forward. She stumbled and fell into him. She used her momentum to her advantage and brought her knee up and got him right in the balls.

He grunted and curled up.

Kara couldn’t even turn to the other guard before a hand wrapped around her neck and shoved her against the wall, hard. Her head snapped back against the concrete wall, her ears ringing as spots dotted her vision.

The man towered over her, his hand squeezing tighter. “Fuckingcunt,” he ground out.

Kara gasped for breath.

“I’m going to enjoy breaking you.” He growled in her face, squeezing her neck tighter.

Her vision dimmed. She tried to lift her hand and claw at his hand, but her movements were slow, jerky.

He abruptly let go, and she collapsed to the concrete floor in a heap. Her knees screamed in pain as they smacked the hard floor. Her chest was heaving as she drew in gasping breaths.

Both guards left, and the door locked back into place.

Kara was still on the floor when the man in the orange chair shifted and stood up. She froze, having forgotten about him. She looked up and found his dead eyes on her once again. Always staring.

“Hora de despertar, muñeca” (time to get up, Poppet). His voice was deep and lilting, almost singsongy. It was creepy.

Kara didn’t move. She didn’t know how much they knew about her, but she decided not to give away that she spoke Spanish fluently. She didn’t know if she was being foolish or if it would grant her a level of immunity, but it was all she had in the moment.

When she didn’t respond or move, Paunchy stepped toward her and lowered a hand. He left his hand outstretched in front of her face and waited.

She tensed, not expecting kindness from him at all, not from Mr. Dead Eyes. She must have already been losing her mind, she thought, as her brain created different names for a man whose true name she didn’t know.

Taking a risk, because she needed an ally if she wanted to get out of this prison alive, Kara placed her hand—and her trust—into that of the dead-eyed man before her.

His hand was rough and calloused, as she’d expected, but it was warm and gentle as he pulled her to her feet.

Her knees ached from her fall, but she stared at her captor unflinchingly.

He nudged her with her hand back toward the mattress. When she stepped forward, he dropped her hand and returned to his chair.

Kara frowned slightly as she moved toward the bed and slowly lowered herself back down. The cold, damp air was seeping into her joints, and she wished she had at least a blanket to cover up with. She was still in her work clothes, and the silky green blouse and pencil skirt did little to block the chill.

She curled back up at the top of the mattress, keeping her back pressed into the corner.

“She’s not answering herphone,” Kevin snapped from the front seat of the work van they had rented to do the snatch and grab of Vince Carmichael and Ken Laraway.

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