Page 109 of Cooper

“I helped her move to find a better life,” I say, “but I didn’t seduce her. I never touched her.”

“Liar!” He smacks me again. “Did she give birth to your bastard?”

Jesus, he looks unglued.

But I’m in survival mode.

And I have to keep him talking until help arrives.

“I don’t understand why I’m here,” I say quietly. “You know the government isn’t going to tell someone as low on the totem pole as me where they sent her. She’s probably in witness protection.”

“She is mywife,” he hisses. “Do you not understand that she belongs to me?”

“No, actually, I don’t.”

He pauses, eyes wide and bloodshot as he stares at me. “Of course not. You have no morals, no ethics, no tradition. Our customs require women to be demure, obedient, and submissive.”

“So you want them to be robots,” I say. “With no thoughts or ideas of their own. They’re just there to produce your sons. Is that it?”

“This is our way.”

I shake my head. “What are you so afraid of? Why do women need to be your property? Why can’t they be partners, friends, lovers…? I don’t understand.”

“And I don’t have to explain myself to you!” He glares at me.

“I guess not. But I never touched Fatima, so that baby wasn’t mine. I have no idea what happened to her after I got her on that military transport out of Iraq.”

“Someone seduced her, and you were seen together many times, so it had to be you.”

“What, you think young Iraqi men don’t fall in love with women? Have sex with them? Rape them?” I stare at him. “You know how many women I met who said they’d been sexually assaulted by their own friends and family members? Men just like you.”

He uses his fist this time, catching me in the jaw, and my head snaps back.

“Shut your filthy mouth.”

I eye him curiously.

“Did you seriously chase me across the world because you think I slept with your wife?”

“I chased you across the world to find out where she is. Getting her back so I can punish her is just a bonus.”

“Dude, we can argue religion and tradition and women’s rights all day long because that’s a conversation we can have. As as the other stuff—I don’t know where she is, I don’t know how to find out, and I can’t tell you something I don’t know. No matter how many times you hit me.”

“I didn’t believe you in Iraq, and I don’t believe you now. And it’s going to be a very painful process for you to keep denying me what I want to know.”

I sigh.

Sandor better put his plan into action pretty quick. I can take a lot, but I don’t like the looks of some of the tools this guy’s laid out. And frankly, this isn’t a fight worth dying for. Fatima wasn’t the only young woman we helped liberate. There was a group of them who gave us information about what was going on in some of the smaller villages, sometimes very important information, in exchange for a new lease on life. I was happy to help make that happen and have zero regrets.

I was doing my job and something I felt was the right thing to do. Some of those girls were being sold to men three times their age, most were beaten and abused, and none of them had anything to look forward to. I’d make the same decisions if I had to do it all again, so I just want this to end. One way or another.

“You can die quickly or after a great deal of pain,” Yusef says, his eyes gleaming. “Why don’t you make it easy on yourself? Because I can still go back for your mother.”

I chuckle. “Yeah, good luck with that. She’s gone. My friends were coming to get her.”

“And your Limaji sweetheart? I know where her family is.”

That gives me pause, but I’ll be damned if I let him see it.

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