Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 86238 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86238 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
“Careful,” Maryanne mumbles before helping me to the door.
“I said single file.” After glaring at Watermelon Head, Maryanne soundlessly apologizes to me before stepping into formation behind me.
I yank up the pants I was dressed in when some of the women switched out my drenched-through clothes for new ones. I’m still bleeding, and the cramps are worse today than they’ve been all week.
“Just a little while longer,” I murmur to myself while lowering my hand to my flat stomach. “This is not the end of our story. We still have many chapters left. We just need to put one foot in front of the other.”
I hold up my hand to block the rays of sun beaming down on me. The salty air is fresh and welcoming but my stomach recoils instead of relishing it. This place smells nothing like home. It is too clean and pure, two things I’ve never been.
I slow the shuffle of the sex-trafficked women when something shimmering off the water captures my attention. It throws out a similar hue to a gem being held up in the sunlight. It is odd to be coming off the seemingly empty ocean, but I seem to be the only person who notices it.
All the women’s heads are down, and most of the men are barricading the SUV Kirill and Katie are being guided to. A sniper would have to take down two dozen men before they’d even get close to Kirill. There are just as many men on Watermelon Head since he’s gripping Katie’s arm.
“In. Watch your head.” A goon checks me off on a clipboard before placing his hand on my head and stuffing me into the back of an SUV crammed with women. After directing a woman I’ve not officially met into the seat next to me, he slides into the SUV, then signals for the driver to leave. “We’ve got consignments to deliver.”
Watermelon Head is an asshole, but he is not proven a liar when our SUV glides past a police car with its lights flashing. Our vehicle is overloaded with women of all ethnicities. Our faces are grubby, and many of them are crying, yet they let us pass without a single question being asked.
I’d spit at their feet through the cracked open window I’m squashed against if my mouth wasn’t bone dry. I think dehydration is one of the reasons I’m so weak. It isn’t that I haven’t wanted to drink. I just bring up anything I touch within minutes of it hitting my stomach. It is why Alek always had shaved ice at the ready. It was the only thing that kept me hydrated once I hit six weeks last time.
My crazy morning sickness is why I’m still clutching hope with both hands. I stopped feeling ill the instant I was wheeled into the maternity unit. I’ve vomited every day I have been held in captivity. I believe that may also be why I’ve been left alone. Not even monsters as vile as Kirill’s men want to be covered in vomit during sexual activities.
“What’s going on?” I ask no one in particular when our SUV suddenly stops in the middle of a dusty road, and the man with the clipboard tosses it to the floor before yanking out the girl seated next to me by her hair.
I watch in disbelief when he hits her with so much force she lands on the dusty ground with a thud before he removes his gun from the back of his pants and pops a bullet between her bloody brows.
With my wish to live kicking back into gear, I kick, scream, and punch when he leans back into the stationary vehicle with his target firmly set.
When he drags me out of the SUV with a rueful tug on my hair, several strands are ripped from my scalp. My knees are cut by the loose gravel laid over the dirt to give it more traction when I’m forced on my knees in front of him, but he stops me from running by yanking my head back so far the sun’s rays blind me more than the shimmers in the distance.
As I struggle to work out what the fuck is going on, he burns the skin under my chin with his recently fired gun.
Why keep us alive only to kill us within minutes of our arrival in the US?
It doesn’t make any sense.
For the first time, I am genuinely in fear for my life. I shake like a leaf, but confusion is my primary emotion when the SUVs tailing us recommence their trip.
“Katie,” I murmur to myself when I spot her in the first SUV.
My heart pains for her when I realize what they’re doing. They are using the captive women to keep her in line. The apologetic stare she issues me and the women silently sobbing in the SUV as hers slowly glides by exposes this, not to mention the wave she directs at me.