Page 54 of Kadra: The Unfeeling

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“You’re not going to tell me where we’re going?” I asked him for the third time since we got in the car.

I feel his stare on me as he laughs and then says, “It’s a surprise.”

“I don’t like surprises,” I mumble while looking at the tall buildings passing in a flash as Vitali takes a left turn and drives us down a street lined with a mixture of abandoned warehouses. Some are in various states of decay.

“You’ll like mine.” He says confidently.

“I highly doubt it,” I reply, turning my gaze from the view out the window to him. Vitali tried to hide it, but it was hard to miss that little flicker of a smile on his face. He looks way too giddy that I find it highly suspicious. Something tells me that whoever is waiting for us wouldn’t be as excited to see us as Vitali is to see them.

Failing at getting him to tell me where he is taking me, I try a different approach. “Did you find another lead?” Running through a quick mental list in my head, I cross out names as I go. We’re still a long way from getting our hands-on Beauregard Sr. and his scum of a son but I distinctly remember the youngest Beauregard heir making the news after he was found dead in an abandoned warehouse that looks almost identical to the ones we’re passing by.

“I did.” He answers, glancing over at me before turning into a gated entry. A four-digit code and a press of his thumb later, the gate swings open and he drives us through and around to the back of the building to an empty parking lot.

I usually don’t like surprises but this time it feels different.

Stepping out of the car after Vitali, I try to conceal the curiosity I feel as I follow him into the building. I almost smile when he starts to whistle a catchy tune.

Oh, yes. Definitely murder.

Vitali is rarely this happy unless he is inflicting pain on someone who deserves it or figuring out new and creative ways to get under my skin. It also becomes painfully clear as we venture down the dimly lit hallway that the Russian owns this warehouse—I can see it in the technology built into everything around us. “You know, if this is some—” In the span of a heartbeat, I forget what I was about to say because I come face to face with a woman I’ve never met before. A very bruised and bloody woman.

She’s hung from a hook in the ceiling with a blindfold over her eyes and a dirty cloth stuffed inside her mouth. The woman, a pretty-blonde, is unconscious, which explains why she isn’t screaming in fear even with the gag in her mouth. Not that anyone would hear her down here. Looking around the abandoned room, there’s no doubt in my mind that the Russian had the room sound proofed. Turning to Vitali, I ask, “What is this? She’s a woman.” The moment those words leave my mouth I want to punch myself for saying them.

“What does her gender have to do with it? Women can be just as evil as men.” Vitali’s expression changes from giddy to nothing in a span of seconds. “This pretty blonde with the innocent looks is in charge of befriending homeless and scared kids until they trust her to then hand them over to the pimps which in turn get them ready for the auctions where they would sell them off to fucking perverts.” He spats. “Azariel recognized her…”

Azariel recognized her.

Anger surges as I look at the unconscious woman. There’s evil and there’s inhumane and by what Vitali tells me this bitch is just as evil if not more than the ones who sell the kids. Because she pretends to be their friends when she knows those kids are starving for anything. Food. Love. Compassion. They want to feel cared for and protected and for a moment this filth makes them feel as if they have someone who cares. She gives them hope and promises of a life without struggles and pain and then takes it all away in the most heartless of ways. “How did you find her?” I ask, stepping back. It feels silly asking him how, when I’m sure he spends countless hours browsing the internet for these freaks. I also know the Russians don’t mess with perverts. They’ve been after these traffickers for years now. “When did you find her?”

“Give me enough information, and I can find anyone.” He doesn’t say it in a cocky manner but as a fact. I don’t doubt that.

Vitali grabs a chair from across the room and hauls it over, patting the seat for me to sit as he moves closer to the woman’s limp form. I sit without question, my eyes glued to him as he drops a red bag onto the floor and unzips it, pulling out a wrap bundle from inside. Inside there are countless knives of all types. “To answer your other question, love, I found her about a week ago before it all went down.”

I shake my head, baffled. “You mean to tell me you’ve left her all these weeks without food or water?”

“She was on a time out,” he answered with a shrug, pulling out a cigarette from his back pocket and placing it on his lips as he did so. “But none of that’s important, is it? What’s important is that she’s here and now she gets to experience what those kids did.” Vitali stretches his arms above his head, going up onto the balls of his feet and lingers there for long moments before righting himself again. He’s stretching. He’s clearly excited about the pain he is about to inflict.

I should feel bad for what the woman is about to endure but I don’t. I don’t feel anything at all. Well… that’s not exactly true. I do feel something now. A million things actually but towards the excited man with chaos in his blood and retaliation on his mind. I look at him and my heart rate spikes.

There this woman is, a woman that deserves more than just death, yet I can’t take my eyes off the man who looks like an excited child on Christmas morning. My man in black. He’d once told me to raise hell and I always wondered just how much chaos this man has inflicted on the world. I heard of it, of course I have. Who hasn’t? But it’s something entirely different to witness it. But now as I watch him move closer to his captive, I no longer wonder about his levels of depravity. I’m not disgusted by what he is about to do. I’m kind of looking forward to it.

Then he begins and I sink into the chair, getting comfortable, crossing one leg over the other.

First, Vitali pulls the blindfold off the woman’s face and then slaps the woman hard enough to wake her with two raps to her face. “Rise and shine. We’ve got a lot to discuss, you and I.” The woman wakes up violently, her head swinging around as she tries to get her bearings. Her eyes are wide and frantic, not staying on any one thing for longer than a couple of seconds. Her eyes seem to widen even further as she settles on Vitali’s bored face. It’s funny how once she sees him she looks as if all the air in the room has disappeared. I guess I would feel the same if I woke up to find the devil wearing a smile waiting for me to atone for my sins. “Thought it’d be nice if you had a little chat with my future wife,” Vitali says as he turns the woman until she is facing me.

I ignore the way the word wife makes my heart skip a beat. Many beats.

While he is busy yanking the cloth from the woman’s mouth, I marvel at the way Vitali looks right now. I had seen his work before, in a file I have on him, but nothing quite like this. At first, I thought he was eager to inflict pain to the woman because he craves it. Because he needs to inflict pain on others but it’s so much more than that. When his dark gaze catches mine in the next second, I realize that he doesn’t care about the woman currently strung up. Not really.

This is about me.

This is about the little boy back at the mansion.

Finally getting the cloth free, Vitali tosses it away and turns his attention back to the woman. “Tell her.” He demands while pointing my way.

“I told you before. I don’t know what you’re talking about. Please! I’m just a schoolteacher.” Vitali shakes his head, walking around until he is standing in front of the woman forcing her to meet his eye. “Tell her who hired you.” Vitali slaps the woman again, this time splitting her lip.

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