Sweet Dreams (WJA Series Book 1)

Chapter 27

THE COLD WATER JOLTED K awake. She looked around “Sam? Where are you, baby? Where is my daughter? Sam!” She yelled and cried as she fought to get the attention of someone—anyone.

K was strapped to a chair. She struggled against her bonds but they wouldn’t budge. Two guards looked at her and one spit out the side of his mouth.

“Shut up. You’re lucky we keep you alive after you killed Gustavo,” said a short man with a scruffy black-and-silver speckled beard, he glared at K from beneath thick eyebrows, his dark eyes filled with hate. “I liked Gustavo. I’m going to hate to have to tell his girlfriend he’s gone, too. You will die here. I will see to that.” He slapped K, knocking her back in her chair.

A rust taste filled her mouth. Her front tooth felt loose, but all she could think about was Sam. She shook her head as he pulled her upright again. “You come with us to see the boss. You behave, or your child will pay. You hear?” The man’s accent sounded childish to K. What she really wanted to do was mock him and use words on him to make him feel as vile as she saw him as. But she kept silent. For Sam.

They cut her duct-tape-bound wrists free and pulled her to her feet. Half dragging her to a cell directly across from the one she was in, they opened a door that led to a stairway. The basement was even more frightening than the rest of the building.

The lights overhead flickered, and the smell of sweat and blood filled the room. She would have never known the place had a basement. The doorway leading to it was in the back of one of the cells.

The stairs were carved from the earth itself, and in some places these had broken off. K stumbled and the two guards held her firm as to not drop her.

She could see the end of the staircase up ahead. It looked like it was all excavated by hand. Wooden beams stretched across the top and sides, making the room look like a mineshaft. The cave-like room was stacked to the beams with wooden boxes and crates full of explosives and guns—which K deduced by the printed lettering on the side of them. They led her to a rough-hewn door on the right and knocked.

She waited, and they waited. The guard to her left shifted his feet as if he was the one being marched to his death instead of her. Who was this guy they are so afraid of?

“Come in.” The male voice sounded English. The guards shoved her into the small room and shut the door.

Behind a desk made of stacked pallets sat a man with such an unassuming air that at first she thought they’d taken her to the wrong room. The laptop in front of him seemed out of place in the dirt-walled, dimly lit room, the glow of the screen illuminated his face. Was he responsible for all this?

“Where is Sam? Where is my daughter?” K’s legs were shaking.

“You have a problem, Mrs. Appleton. Your husband is a thorn in my side, and for that you must suffer.” He glared at K, his dark eyes glowing in the screen’s light. “Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Tripp Maddock. You may call me Geoff.”

* * *

KIRK HELD HIS BREATH as a heavyset man came down the hall toward him. He pulled out a cigarette and casually lit it. The cell door beside him opened and a short man with hairy eyebrows stepped through, shutting the door behind him.      

Kirk eyed the door, thinking it mustlead to an exit.

The two looked at him as he sat on a counter that held two computers. A large window looked out into the main lobby and the guard station. Kirk grunted and puffed a cloud of smoke.

“You not hot in that thing?” the tall guard asked. “I only wear it if I have to.”

The two didn’t wait for a response and moved on, as if his opinion didn’t matter in the least. Thank God the guard he’d killed was at the bottom of the food chain. He blended in better in that kind of uniform. Though the office door led into the lobby, every foyer exit was covered by a pair of guards. He had to find another way out.