Page 86 of Sinful Beauty

The door creaks open.

A tall man in a black wool sweater, brown cargo pants and brown boots pauses in the doorway.

He takes stock of me on the bed. It’s the strap around his shoulder and the intimidating gun hanging on his back that I can’t look away from. He uses an arm to hold the door open, giving me a view of a holstered handgun on his waist. He keeps his eyes trained on me as he announces to someone, “You can come on in.”

An elderly man with a shock of white hair pushes a cart into the room. Kind eyes, featherlight blue, look upon me. His hand trembles slightly as he holds up a plug and says to the man holding the door, “Can you plug this in somewhere? It’s an extension cord, so should reach.”

The two men stare at each other. The man with the gun crosses his arms below his chest.

“Very well then,” the white-haired man says. He releases a defeated sigh as he holds the plug up, shuffling along the walls. His eyebrows rise and he shuffles toward the bedside table.

“Why am I here?”

The white-haired man pauses, the plug suspended in the air, and asks, “What have you been told?”

“Nothing. I want to leave. You’re the first person I’ve seen. I have no memory of how I got here. I think I was drugged.”

The man at the door is impassive, and it occurs to me he probably doesn’t understand English.

“Where am I?”

The older man purses his lips and moves to the wall. His knees creak as he bends to the floor. The table shakes. The pitcher wobbles but remains upright as the table slides along the floor.

When the white-haired man stands, no longer holding the plug, he wipes his hands across the front of his trousers, then lifts a white lab coat off the cart and slips it on over his dress shirt.

“Can I leave? Who are you? Why am I here?”

“I’m doctor…” His voice trails and he wipes his palms again, this time on the white coat. “I know little more than you do, sweetheart. But, based on what I know, I don’t believe you can leave. On the bright side, I don’t believe they’ll hurt you.”

He glances back at the man at the door.

“Who are they? Who has me here?”

“I’m not at liberty to say.”

“Please.”

I reach for him, but he steps back, shaking his head. The man at the door lifts his handgun and aims it in my direction. He shakes his head back and forth, telling me no.

“I don’t believe you’ll be here long.” The doctor’s tone is calm and unafflicted as he fiddles with objects on his cart. His calm exacerbates the rise of panic.

“Now, it’s my understanding you’ve come in the way of a child.” He lifts his head, peering at me over the contraption that rests on the top of the cart.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re pregnant, are you not?” He lifts a plastic piece and squeezes clear gel from a tube onto it. “What I’m going to do today won’t hurt a bit. We’re going to confirm you do indeed have a wee one in you.”

“Tristan did this. Tristan hired you?”

What the hell? If he has the nerve to show up here, I’ll kill him first. What a neanderthal.

“Here now, what I’m going to need for you to do is remove your clothes from the waist down. This bed isn’t ideal, but you’ll lie across it and spread your legs.”

“Absolutely not.”

The older man glances back at the man at the door. I don’t see what he communicates, or how for that matter, but the door slowly swings shut as the armed man leaves it, approaching me. He holsters his gun and pulls out a knife.

“You’re going to want to do what I say.” Those light blue eyes no longer look quite so kind. The light blue evokes a chill and his lips have flatlined.

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