Page 6 of Burn

A boom of laughter ripped through the air. The man who’d been raping the woman next to me suddenly headed for us. But rapid-fire Spanish cut him off as an arm looped around my waist.

It dragged me back against a hard chest and I yanked the suit with us. He fell backwards. There was something satisfying about him hitting the ground. Unfortunately, it also jerked his tie out of my hands.

Dammit. I wanted to scream.

“Such a beautiful fighter,” the man holding me said, his English lacking any kind of accent. He stroked my hair like I was some kind of cat. I couldn’t see him, but I had a front row seat to the suit climbing to his feet. Rage vibrated off him and slapped against me like angry waves.

Blood spattered his already reddened face as he pulled his tie from his neck. I hope it hurt like hell. Violence wreathed the air around him as he stalked forward.

“Stop.” My captor pivoted to the left, putting me out of reach from the man reaching for me.

“She—” He spit the pronoun out like it was a dirty thing and blood struck me from where he waved his hand. “Filthyputabit me.”

“You shouldn’t have touched her.” The man holding me responded in an even tone. His absolute lack of accent threw me. I didn’t think he was American. The dialect was too flat. It sounded like he wasn’t a native English speaker, yet I couldn’t place what his first language could be. “I told you, this one is mine.”

He stroked my hair again. While I couldn’t place his origin, there was no mistaking the danger in his voice.

The prick in the suit glowered at me. You know what, fuck you buddy.

“He said he planned to fuck my mouth after you were done with me.”

“Did he?” A shiver of apprehension went through me at the silken menace underscoring those two words. He snapped out something in—a language I didn’t recognize but the suit did. Whatever it was had to have been bad because he paled.

The shackle on my ankle was removed and my captor continued to pet me as the man’s suit was stripped off and he was lashed to a post.

“Do you think ten is enough, pet?'“

“Ten?” Ten what?

“Hmm, you’re right. Make it twenty.” He snapped the fingers of his free hand and kept me right there with a front row seat to the whipping the suit took. Not once did he scream nor did he look away.

The pure malice in his eyes promised me a brutal retribution. Reading people had always been something of a hobby. With men, it was as much a business advantage as it was self-defense. They were bigger and they were stronger, if I could charm them, I stood a much better chance of surviving.

Bile coated the back of my throat as blood flecked his chest and spattered around from the heavy strikes of the whip against his back. Only when he sagged from the abuse and the twentieth lash landed did my captor turn me away.

His path gave me a full view of all the women. There were so many. They were all shackled and naked. Some huddled with their arms around their knees. Others still screamed and fought.

I wanted to help them but at the moment, I wasn’t even sure I could help myself. By the time we exited that hall and the door closed on the horrid sounds, I’d made my peace with the fact this was all really happening.

The man continued up a darkened hall. He moved like I weighed nothing at all. I still couldn’t get a look at him. Another man straightened at our approach, but my captor only said two words. I had no idea what the words were or what they meant but the man waiting merely nodded then opened a door to let us into…

My stomach dropped.

It was a private room. There were chairs, a sofa, and on the far wall a bed. There was also a door that opened into what looked like a bathroom. It wasn’t opulent, but it was a damn sight cleaner than the main warehouse. It also smelled better too.

Setting me on my feet, my captor wrapped my hair around his hand. “You will not try to assault me, pet, do you understand?”

The inflectionless English just made my skin shiver. I couldn’t even say why.

I swallowed hard. “I understand.”

Not agreeing was a challenge, because if there was a snowball’s chance in hell of getting out of here, I needed to take it. He turned me by my hair and I looked up to meet his gaze.

His eyes—well his left—was a pitiless kind of dark. The other was milky white. An angry scar bisected his eyebrow and across his right eye and down to his cheek. He’d lost his sight, but I had to wonder how he hadn’t lost his eye totally.

“You are as beautiful as all your pictures,” he said, stroking his fingers through my hair.

“Thank you?” I wasn’t really sure what to do with that compliment. “I don’t really feel beautiful at the moment.” There was a faint sourness in the air that wasnotcoming from him and sweat had soaked through my shirt.

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