Page 72 of Prisoner of War
Chapter Sixteen
When Zalaya stepped through the bedroom door two hours later, the sun was setting and the world outside the window was touched by amber. Minnie sat on the side of the bed, wolfing down food. She lowered the tortilla as he appeared, her heart leaping.
She badly wanted to question him about Blanco’s death. The eye of the camera behind him and the microphone under the bed kepther silent.
He looked irritated. “I told you to be naked and waiting.”
“Then you shouldn’t have sent food,” she said crisply. “Although that wouldn’t have gained you what you wanted either. Shoot me if you want. I’m too starving to care.” She bit into the tortilla, savoring the delicious spices.
“Oh, keep up your strength, by all means,” he returned. He made his way to the bathroom, leaningheavily on the cane. He paused by the head of the bed, opposite her. Then, as quick as a snake, his hand snatched up the chain where it lay on the bed. He hauled on it, dragging her across the bed toward him.
She held in the startled cry that pushed at her lips but was unable to resist the sheer power exerted on the chain. She slithered over the bedcover like a hooked fish.
He looped the chainaround the bedpost, forcing her arm up high. “If you think to move me with your pleas of hunger, you’ve misjudged me,” he told her. He put the cane aside and limped around the bed, bringing the extra length of chain with him, keeping it taut so her bound wrist could not slip free.
When he reached the other side of the bed, she scrunched up to the post where her arm was anchored, as far from himas possible. He gave an impatient sound and dug into his pocket. She thought he reached for his gun, but what he pulled out was a switchblade knife. He triggered the blade and climbed across the bed toward her.
All Minnie could see was the knife coming toward her. It looked huge. Her breath jammed in her throat as the knife came to rest against her cheek. Zalaya’s gaze was relentless.
“Liftup your other hand. Reach for the other post,” he said quietly.
The blade was cold against her cheek as she lifted her hand obediently. He looped chain around the wrist and the post, holding it there, before lifting the blade away.
She was bound and helpless again.
Zalaya folded the knife closed with a practiced motion and weighed it in his hand as he considered her. “On second thought,” hemurmured and flicked the knife open again. He brought it up toward her throat and she was helpless to prevent her shudder. She drew herself back, away from the blade.
He slipped the tip beneath the button on her dress and the button flew across the bed to patter against the closet.
She looked down at the tufts of thread that remained as the neckline of the dress sagged apart then up at him.“You asshole, you deliberately let me think you were going to cut my throat.” Her voice was thick with a lethal cocktail of anger, fear and relief.
In the waning light his dark gaze lifted to her face. “Learn the lesson well. Do not presume you know me.” He dropped the knife to the next button and it went flying like the first. “The fact is you will never know what I will do next.” The thirdbutton, the one that held the dress closed over her breasts, flipped away at the touch of the tip of the knife. “You will never understand me and should not bother to try.” The fourth button flopped onto the bed by her hip and now the dress gaped open. Only gravity held the fine fabric over her breasts and the next button would take care of that. He rested the knife against the button and looked upat her again. “Your only option is to obey me.”
He gripped the hem of the dress, stretching it taut so he could shear the threads beneath the button. The button dropped to the cover, the dress slid aside and revealed her breasts and most of her torso. She waited for him to look up again and spoke as evenly and as clearly as she could. “You and whose army?”
His gaze dropped, his focus turnedinward and his face grew still. She saw his chest lift and lower, as if he had given a subtle, hidden sigh. “Not mine,” he whispered. Then he straightened and folded the knife up with the same practiced flick of the wrist, almost like a man shaking himself back to reality.
Minnie stared at him, her heart hurting as it kicked up to yet a higher speed. It was the first time she had seen Zalaya’smask slip to reveal Duardo beneath. Had she seen doubt in his face? For one tiny moment, it had seemed like he was troubled. Given the challenges he must have faced every day in this role, what had happened to make him doubt in that way?
Serrano? The meeting she had witnessed had troubled her, too.
A heavy pummeling on the door made them both jump. Minnie gasped. Her heart could not stand muchmore of this. She was beginning to feel sick from the yo-yo of emotions and the surges of adrenaline.
Zalaya flipped the knife open again, staring at her. “Stay still,” he warned, resting the flat of the blade between her breasts. “Stay very still.”
She froze.
“Who dares to bother me?” he shouted in Spanish.
The pummeling stopped. “Forgive me, Colonel. I would not dream...” came the startof a timid reply, before it was drowned by a louder basso bellow.
“Just open the damn door, you imbecile!”
Minnie caught her breath. It sounded like Serrano. The door swept open and Serrano himself strode into the room.
She nearly jumped. Nearly. The cold blade against her chest kept her still.
Serrano stood barely five and a half feet tall, yet his girth was that of a much bigger man. Hewas staring at Zalaya. As his feet carried him into the center of the room, he registered what Zalaya was doing and blinked.
