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)
The lump in my throat is too firm to dislodge, so I nod my head instead of speaking.
“Where from?” I don’t speak a word, but the quiver of my lips gives away the words I can’t speak. “Oh, Anastasia. I’m so sorry—”
She’s interrupted by the clanging of locks.
As per usual, the man entering doesn’t pay attention to anyone but Katie and me. He looks more amused than angry today. Even more so when he notices the stain on my underwear the high rise of my shirt can’t hide.
“Let’s go.” Watermelon Head plucks Katie off the ground like she doesn’t weigh a thing before marching her out of the orlop.
I’d usually put up more of a fight, but I don’t think I could get off the ground even if I wanted to. I am burning up, and my legs feel the weight of lead.
“Please tell me you’ll be here soon,” I whisper into the air like I did a handful of times in Sicily. I was homesick and missing Alek like crazy, but my esteem was too badly battered to work out that he would have never betrayed me so he had no reason to seek my forgiveness miles from home.
“You too.”
I drop my eyes from the paint-peeled ceiling when a man who usually shadows Watermelon Head’s every move stops in front of me. He drinks in my sweat-dotted forehead and white cheeks for half a second before he bobs down to toss me onto his shoulder.
As he walks me out of the orlop, I swish back and forth like a ragdoll. I’ve never felt more drained in my life. I honestly feel worse now than I did when I woke up in a pool of blood the day our daughter was born.
“Eat!” booms into my ears when I’m walked toward a room brimming with aromatic food.
As I’m lowered down the front of a goon’s body and joined by another with biceps bigger than my head, Katie is shoved onto a seat across from Kirill. I’m kept upright by them gripping my arms. One for each side of my flopped frame.
Kirill drinks in Katie for several long seconds like he can’t comprehend how she could be so disheveled before he says, “If you eat, I will feed the women in the orlop along with you. If you don’t…” he pauses like he has all the time in the world, “… I will kill one woman for every meal you refuse.”
“What?” Katie’s voice is as brittle as the one in my head screaming for me to run when Kirill shifts his focus to me.
“Starting with her.”
My legs fall back behind me when I am dragged into the dining room and dumped a foot from the table.
When Kirill asks, “What will it be, Katie?” I want to tell her to save herself, that I won’t need anyone’s help once Alek gets here, but I’m too drained to talk, and relatively sure my panties are soaked through with blood. The instant I was forced to stand, liquid gushed into my panties.
I internally high-five Katie when red hair curtains her face as she shakes her head. The moment I saw her, I understood Ghost’s fascination. She is gorgeous but a fighter.
She’ll need to be to survive this world.
“Okay,” Katie shouts when Kirill waves his hand through the air, granting permission for the man with his gun squashed at the back of my head to fire. “I’ll eat. I will do as you ask.”
To lessen Kirill’s suspicious glare, she plucks a bread roll out of the basket, tears it apart, then swallows a massive clump.
“More,” Kirill demands before she’s finished half the bread roll.
When she commences eating the pasta dish placed down in front of her, I’m ordered to be returned to the orlop.
I’m not exactly coherent over the next couple of days, but I’m kept alive by the women who should hate me.
One of Alek’s main jobs was the distribution of stock. The only stock the Bobrovs had were women. We had many fights about it, and right around the time I started to get through to him—by using his unborn daughter as an example—the world was pulled out from beneath my feet.
We never discussed anything after that day.
“Ana, wake up. They’re coming.” I’m nudged awake just as the locks to the orlop crack open.
We’ve been fed well the past two or three days but not once have the doors been opened since Katie left. Kirill got what he wanted—an obedient wife—so the rest of us were left alone to fend for ourselves.
“Single file.” Watermelon Head’s big voice booms over the quiet sobs of frightened women. “If you run, you will be fired at. If you survive the gunshot wound, you will be gifted to the men for them to do whatever they like with you. The workers will not help you. They are paid to turn a blind eye. So are the police.” He bobs down low so we meet eye to eye. “So don’t think about running. It would be such a waste of a pretty face.”