Water.
Choking. Drowning. Darkness.
Nothing.
And now, I'm waking up in pain; my thigh screams, a hot throbbing pulse of pain in time with my heartbeat. I assess before opening my eyes or moving—I hear engines, splashing water chucking against a hull. A voice, somewhere overhead. I smell coffee and cooking food—bacon and eggs and rice. My leg is the only source of real pain. It's bad but tolerable, and I don't feel feverish yet, so hopefully there's no infection.
My hands are bound behind my back, cinched painfully tight by hard plastic ties—the tightness is a good thing, as it means I'llbe better able to snap them later. My ankles are also bound. Less helpful.
I listen, but the groan of the engines and the slap of water against the hull are the only sounds. I open one eye to a slit, peer around, close it again: I'm in the cabin of a boat, obviously, and as far as my first glance can convey, I'm alone. I wait a few moments, listening. Nothing. So I open both eyes and take a better look. The cabin has been stripped of everything except the bed frame and mattress—the frame is wooden and attached to the walls and floor, and the mattress is bare. There's a 5-gallon bucket on the floor in the corner, orange with a white snap-on lid, in which I'm meant to relieve myself.
I just love pissing in buckets.
I'm on my side, facing the room. There's a small round window showing that I'm just above the waterline, and there's no land in sight on this side of the boat.
I hear boots squeaking on the floor outside and then the lock thunks—apparently, the door to this room has been retrofitted to lock from the outside. I shut my eyes and force my breathing into a slow, deep rhythm, faking sleep.
I hear the door open. Smell food.
"Leave it on the floor, José,” I hear Rafael snap. "Keep your distance from her."
"But chief," the other says—they're conversing in Spanish, "she is bound hand and foot and asleep."
"Oh, she's awake."
"But how do you know?"
"With that one, you only assume wrongly once. You must treat her like the serpent which you all have named her after—the viper. Even bound hand and foot, I imagine she can find at least three ways to kill you."
Inside, I'm pretty proud of this. Good to know my husband is still afraid of me.
He should be—I shall kill him with my bare hands before this is over. A bullet from a distance would have sufficed, and would have been the swiftest end to this ridiculously drawn-out game of cat and mouse, but far less satisfying. Watching the life bleed out of him will be far more enjoyable.
I hear boots on the floor and then the rattle of plastic as José leaves the tray on the ground. I feel him hesitate, feel his stare. I snap my eyes open and meet his with the iciest, most vicious glare I can summon, the kind of glare that would flay him to the bone, were mere looks able to kill.
I wish.
He yelps and scrambles backward, topples to his ass, and then crab-walks backward out of the room. Rafael, arm bound in a sling against his ribs, lounges outside the room, watching amused as his lackey stumbles to his feet and runs, muttering under his breath about "the fucking witch."
"It's impossible to find good help these days, don't you think?" Rafael asks, his tone casual and conversational.
I roll to my back and sit up, and then swing around to perch on the edge of the bed, eying the food; my stomach rumbles at the smell of it, and I realize I have no idea when I ate last.
Rafael grins at the sound. "Hungry, eh?"
I ignore him. I know better.
He saunters in—well, limps. I only remember hitting him in the ribs, but it appears I injured him in more than one place, but I don't remember. I glance down and see that my leg has been bound in bandages.
"Here we are," he says, stopping a safe distance away, "together again. Our last session together was rather rudely interrupted by your friends. I doubt we'll have that problem this time."
I ignore him. Mainly because I have nothing to say, but also because it pisses him off like little else. He’s paranoid out of necessity, but deep down, he craves attention.
He snarls. "Look at me,whore."
I don't.
He is afraid of me. Even when I’m bound hand and foot and injured, he still won't approach me too closely. As if I’d waste an escape attempt on something so foolish and useless as merely causing him pain, as delicious as that would be.
