The darkness swallows me whole, a black void where time becomes fluid and reality blurs at the edges as I drift in and out of consciousness.
I can feel Niko’s hands on me. I’ve missed him so much.
His touch is electric, sending shivers down my spine. I arch into him, craving more contact, more of his intoxicating scent.
“Miy kokhanyy cholovik…” I murmur as his fingers creep closer to where I want them to be.
“What the fuck, dude?” A foreign voice interferes with our lovemaking. “Leave her alone or you’ll be eating a bullet.”
Is someone else here? I struggle to pull myself out of the mire which is dulling my thoughts and responses, because something's not right. The hands exploring my body are rough, but not the right kind of rough. Not the familiar roughness I’m used to. And the smell is all wrong - cheap cologne instead of Niko's signature blend.
“She’s a live wire, this one. Look at her, she’s begging for it. You think the boss will let me keep her?”
There’s a slap and a grunt. “Why the fuck did you hit me?” the voice says again. “This one’s urging me on in her sleep. What did she say? She wants me, yeah?”
“She said, ‘my dearest husband’, I don’t think she meant you,” another voice deadpans.
Against my better judgement, my eyes snap open, reality crashing back with nauseating force. I'm not with Niko. I'm in the back of a van with my wrists bound, and there’s a man hovering above me, his face thankfully turned away. Panic claws at my throat, but I force it down. Focus, Lyah. Assess. Survive.
Clawing my way back to full awareness, my head throbbing with a dull ache from the aftereffects of the chloroform, I make a mental note of anything and everything that might help me.
The van's moving, but not at high speed. We're still in the city. A city, at least. I have no idea how long I’ve been out.
Two men are in the back with me, and another is driving. They're speaking in English, and understand Ukrainian, but their accents are off.
I slam my eyes closed again, feigning unconsciousness while I frantically cycle through my options. I haven’t been blindfolded. It’s always been drummed into me how bad that is. If I see them, I can identify them. It slashes my chances of survival.
Gradually I realize there must be two men in the front seats, since they’re conversing in low tones. Their language isn't one I recognize, but the cadence is unmistakably Eastern European.
A hand crawls up my leg again, and I fight hard not to flinch and give myself away.
“Don’t touch her again,” comes a command from the front of the van, and this time it’s the relief that’s almost my undoing. I know I can't keep up the charade any longer.
"She's waking up," one of the men in the back mutters, his voice low and gruff. “Put a sack over her head.”
The panic when they do that is real. "Help!” I call. “What are you doing? Where am I?" It all comes out as half legible croaks since my throat is so dry and scratchy. All I see is a sliver of skin on one of their wrists as my face is covered, and I try to make out the symbol I can see tattooed on it, like I was always taught, but the terror makes it hard. “Who are you people?"
The man closest to me, the one with wandering hands, laughs at me. "Don't worry, sweetheart. You'll find out soon enough."
I force myself to stay calm, channeling every ounce of training my mother drilled into me for situations like this. Assess. Adapt. Survive.
I guess some of those lessons I believed stemmed from paranoia were useful after all.
I curl into a ball and allow them to believe I’m appropriately cowed, while I wait for the opportunity to collect more information. Maybe find out where I am and if I can get away while I attempt to memorize what could possibly be an identifying mark.
It’s not long before I hear the change of terrain underneath the wheels of the vehicle. It sounds like we’re off-road now. I’m not sure that’s such a good thing.
The van lurches to a stop, and I hear the crunch of gravel under boots as the men exit. My heart races as the back doors swing open. Rough hands grab me, hauling me out. I stumble, disoriented by the darkness of the hood, but I push it away and attune my senses.
Birds. Fresh air. The smell of pine. The whisper of leaves in the breeze.
"Walk," a voice commands, shoving me forward.
I comply, counting my steps. Gravel under my feet and maybe leaves too. Fifteen paces, then we're inside a building. The air feels cooler, stale. A basement, maybe?
I’m pushed into a chair and bound to it. Then things go quiet as footsteps walk away, leaving me in silence, and alone.
Or so I think.
