Page 49 of One Minute Out

Over the previous winter Cage had traveled to Vilnius, Lithuania, spending time with his entourage in nightclubs. Jaco Verdoorn and his men ran his personal security detail. Cage and his associates chose six women over their week there, then returned home.

Recruiters took the women and placed them into the northern pipeline, and in a matter of weeks the girls were in California, standing before Cage.

But as was always the case, after a few months he grew tired of the new lot and wanted some fresh supply.

So six weeks earlier he’d gone to Bucharest, a return trip because his last time there had been fruitful. On this visit he picked out three women, including a stunning young brunette who chatted with him at length in a nightclub. The young brunette was half a head taller than him, and she possessed the highest cheekbones, the softest lips, and the most piercing eyes he’d ever seen.

He’d grow tired of her once she was his, but for now the anticipation of having her subjected to all manner of humiliation for his pleasure in his nest filled his brain with an impossibly rich mixture of “feel good” chemicals.

Cage lived for this shit.

He’d left Bucharest with instructions for his local recruiters to get that girl in the pipeline and over to him as soon as possible, by any means necessary.

And then he’d returned home to the world of a multimillionaire father, to baseball practice and dinners with friends in outdoor cafés on Rodeo Drive and evenings in the hot tub talking over family matters with his wife.

•••

Ken Cage pocketed his phone, then started back towards the door to the studio, but he stopped himself. Turning to his bodyguard, he said, “Fuck it, Sean. Juliet’s done her bit. Heather’s already pissed at me for leaving. Might as well call it a day.”

“Back to the house, sir?”

Cage shook his head and began walking towards the Mercedes. Hall stayed with him. “Where Heather can yell at me? Hell no. We’re going to the Ranch.”

“Right, sir.”

FIFTEEN

Maja stared out at the ocean and the late-afternoon sun hanging over it, and she wondered where the hell she was. Her view was partially obstructed by the ruined wall of the large, old, bombed-out warehouse, but enough of the coast was visible that she could tell she was somewhere beautiful.

But it did not make her happy. Her predicament had not changed, only her view.

The last two days and all of this morning she and the others from Mostar had sat in the blacked-out bus, parked in an underground garage. They’d been fed fast food, and a pair of buckets had been placed in the back for the women to use as a toilet, but no one was allowed to leave or to make a sound. It was a miserable two days, and Maja’s back ached and her bleary eyes burned from crying and lack of sleep.

Then the girls from Mostar had been brought inside the ruined building during the daylight this afternoon, which surprised her because this was the only time she’d seen the sun since the night she was taken.

Now she and the others, minus Diana, the poor girl who had been shot while trying to flee through the woods, were kept in a large open room with blown-out windows and trash all around. There was a view of a large body of water outside, but a fifteen-meter drop straight down onto broken masonry and concrete, sharp bent rebar and shattered glass meant no one here was going to jump out the window, run to the beach, and swim away. Bombs or tanks had attacked this building, but long ago, as Maja could see full-sized trees growing through the rubble below.

She hadn’t paid attention in history class in school, but of course she knew about the war in Bosnia and Croatia and Kosovo and all those other places in the Balkans. This had to be Croatia, she felt almost certain, and the water in front of her the Adriatic Sea.

When they’d climbed off the bus she’d been surprised to see that the Serbians were gone, and other men were watching over them now. Maja did not know what that meant. The one who ordered the women and girls about spoke English, and they were all darker-complected men. She couldn’t tell if they were Turkish or Albanian or perhaps even Greek, but they seemed more organized and professional than the group of gangsters who held them before.

She had no clue if this was good news or bad.

There was no door to this room, and no furniture, either, so the women and girls sat on the concrete floor. Any possible escape to the stairwell and then freedom was cut off by a group of five men who stood and sat near the open doorway.

She had not been raped in the past two days, and she had not been raped in Bucharest or in Belgrade or in the cellar of the farmhouse. As far as she could tell, she was very much in the minority here in that regard. She didn’t know what this meant, only thought it could be because she kept her head down and avoided any eye contact with anyone, even with the other hostages.

Just as she thought this, the leader of the new set of guards stepped closer to the group, and he spoke in English with an accent Maja, not a native speaker of English, could not identify.

“We heard about the killing the other night. That wasn’t us. That was the Serbs.” He said “Serbs” like it sickened him to do so. “We wish you no harm, but if you try to leave our care, we will be forced to recover you, and then to punish you and everyone else for your misbehavior. Do not try to leave, and you will be treated with respect.”

Respect? Did he really say “respect”? Maja wanted to laugh at this, but she kept her eyes averted and her mouth closed.

The man continued. “I suspect you all have been wondering why you are here and where you are going. I can only tell you this. You arrived early, due to the attack in Bosnia the other day. We were not ready to accept you, so we have put you here. Normally your quarters would be better, but we did the best with the time we had. Right now we are waiting on a boat, and it will arrive tomorrow night, and when it does arrive, you will all be taken to it and moved on to your next destination.”

No one spoke still, but he answered the question everyone had. “You want to know where you are going, yes? I do not know. My men and I are here to keep you safe, and to put each and every last one of you on the boat. That is all we know.”

He paused, as if waiting for questions, but no one dared. Finally he said, “I’ve heard all about this American who tried to rescue you, and then committed another attack on the process in Bosnia.”

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