Hunted (2 page)

He waited until she looked at him, then he nodded back to the grave. “This is what happens to those who don’t listen, Dusk, to those who scorn what I provide them, to those who try to escape.”

She glanced to the side, down into the grave, the dark shadow open wide as if waiting to be fed again, and shuddered.

“You won’t ever try anything so foolish, will you?” he asked her softly.

For a moment, she didn’t move, didn’t speak. Then those eyes rose back to him and he saw the acceptance in them. Slowly she licked her lips, then shook her head. “N-no. No, I promise, I won’t ever do that. I won’t ever escape.”

He smiled. She was right. She wouldn’t escape him. No one ever escaped him.

Chapter 1

Cheb, Czech Republic; December 2

The music pulsed through the floor into the room she’d been assigned. The body over her moved, plunging in and out in a purchased dance of relief.

His relief, not hers.

The music screamed in a language she couldn’t understand. She closed her eyes and wished for the end. The end of the music, the end of the
job
, just . . . the end.

She no longer cared if she lived or if she died.

He grunted, once, twice, and then stilled.

Her mind focused on the music as she always did. It was the only way to survive. The foreign words and bass boomed through the floor, a male punching the air, the vibrations hitting her as surely as the man who climbed off of her to sit on the side of the bed. From the sound, the club below was all but raving tonight.

She didn’t move.

Why? Someone else would be in, in a few minutes anyway.

She no longer cared if they killed her or not. At least then the torture would be over, an end to this hell of a nightmare from which she knew she’d never awaken.

“Kurva,”
h
e
muttered.

She knew what the Czech insult meant, but didn’t care as she rolled to her side, heard the snap of the used condom, the slide of his clothing, the rip of his zipper. She could smell his expensive Armani cologne, his heavy cigars, over the stench of the room, of used sex and rancid bodies.

Sex sold. Always had, always would.

He muttered something else and pulled the threadbare blanket over her, its dirty material stiff and musty against her skin. She might not understand the words, but the tone was easily enough understood. He slapped her hard before walking away. She didn’t even try to evade. His expensive shoes thumped on the bare wooden floor as he walked to the door. Red haze slashed across the bed from the open doorway. She heard the girl in the room, crib, next to hers crying. Women were always crying here. For a while. Forever.

At least it was simply crying and not the tortured screams that the basement walls drank into their mortar. She would hear those screams even after she died.

Don’t think about that . . . Not that . . .

She didn’t look at him as he walked out the door. When it clicked shut, she sat up and looked around her room.

The dingy cracked window let in more cold air. She rose and stumbled to it. Bars obstructed her view of the old Czech city in winter. From here, she could see the street below, the city square in the distance with St. Nicholas spearing up, calling forth the weary. The church might as well have been another planet. A car zoomed by below and another. People going about their lives. Did they know what they were so close to? Did they know of the slaves? Did they care, or know many of the women here didn’t
want
to be here? Would kill to be free?

Biting December winds snaked through and around the small window. Wallpaper, yellowed and stained, probably with blood or semen or God only knew what, was peeled and ripped in places, hung down in others.

She didn’t care.

Caring would mean she’d have to face where she was. Another whimpering cry echoed through the thin walls. She tried to ignore it.

Another new girl. The vague curiosity of who the newbie was flittered across her mind, but it hardly mattered. American, British, French, Romanian, Croatian, Armenian, Italian, it didn’t matter. They liked girls here. Any age, any nationality, then again, any sex too. She’d seen the young men and boys down the street in another house.

The window was cool against her forehead.

This place gave them all a commonality. Humility. Shame. Though she knew the club owners did like the few Western women in their hold. It gave them a chance to demean and humiliate those who thought they were too good for places like this. Those who, in their normal suburban, SUV-driving, environmentally conscience, latté-drinking lives did not know hells like this still existed.

She had no idea how many Western women were here. She knew of two, maybe three of them for certain. There were women, and young men, from all over, mostly from war-savaged Eastern Europe. Others had simply been the lost, too forgotten for anyone to notice they were missing.

It didn’t matter.

Blood and nationality were stripped away. Status and wealth meant nothing here.

They were all the same.

They were all whores.

If she had anything left inside her, she might cry, but her tears had been beaten out of her, even drugged out of her, terrorized out of her long ago. Or it seemed long ago.

She’d had no idea of the month, though she now knew it was December because one of the johns told her Merry Christmas. When she’d looked at him blankly, he’d muttered it gutturally in English. He’d been pretending he was Saint Nicholas. She hoped his dick rotted off.

She’d last known it was the end of October because of the Czech Independence celebrations that had lasted all night with revelries in the streets. Then again, here, things tended to last all night anyway.

The light this time of year was a bit softer, the air colder. Though the last time she’d smelled clean air, seen an unbarred sky, was weeks and weeks and weeks ago. It could be Christmas today for all she knew.

The cracked dirty glass was cold against her forehead. She ran her forefinger over the crack.

November . . . December . . . Lots of
embers
here for her. There was no way out, no way out. There was a reason these places were historically called hells.

The afterlife held no fear for her.

She already burned. Burned with hatred at what was done to her. With pain they liked to arbitrarily inflict. With shame at what she couldn’t control.

At least they only used beatings and fear on her. Some were punished on drugs, addicted in the end and sooner or later died. What better way to control someone than to hold what they
needed
. It was all part of Mikhail’s punishment. He liked to use drugs as a punishment, just enough to get a girl hooked, and then take them away.

And right now, she wondered if it would be better in this hell if she went floating and jittering through on a fog of addiction.

Her hands shook as the hatred welled up in her. At herself. She was stronger than this, wasn’t she? Or was she? She no longer knew who she was.

Some part of her, some small part that she tried to ignore, knew, knew the drugs were simply a way for the bastards to control the girls more, a way to keep them in line and a way to make more money. Mikhail could easily keep the money for a screw, a job, and give enough dope to keep a girl doing anything for the next fix.

Need six cocks sucked?

Fine, so long as the fix came.

No, drugs were not for her. That would make it easier for her, and God knew Mikhail didn’t want it to be easy. Especially not for her. A hit of X would make her actually enjoy what was going on, and Mikhail wouldn’t allow that . . .

Fear trickled through her at the thought of what Mikhail was capable of, but it was quickly swallowed by a short burst of hatred, black and roiling, clawing up in her.

She hated herself to the point that the idea of breaking the window and slicing her wrists held a bright ray of hope.

Bright rays?

Hope?

There was neither for her. She was either too strong or too weak to kill herself. Like everything else in her life, she was in some fogged limbo.

A knock sounded before Dame came in.

“You should be cleaned and dressed.”

She should. “When’s my next appointment?”

Dame made a noise in her throat. “You don’t have one, yet. Mikhail called.”

She just looked at the woman. What made her want to please the lady? She didn’t know if she wanted to rage, and risk a beating or worse, or if she sought the woman’s help in order to ease things. Anything. Nothing. Things here were like freaking rabbit holes. Up and down were sideways. One unending nightmare.

Another song screeched and shook the floor beneath her bare soles.

“Jezek called?” The thought greased nausea through her. What did the bastard want now?

“You’re to wear this,” Dame muttered, tossing a silver dress across the bed, then a pair of strappy, scuffed, black fuck-me heels to complete the ensemble.

“Why?” she asked, noting her hand already trembled. Jezek. He’d left her alone for three days now. She’d thought that maybe, just maybe, he was tired of her.

Dame looked at her and pointed to the dress. “You’re to wear that. You do have an appointment, but it’s in Prague tonight. He’s a businessman and asked specifically to spend the night with
you
. Maybe he remembers you before, yes? When you were better, not here.” The woman’s English was stilted. “Though after Sparkle escaped from the other club, I’m surprised Jezek’s letting anyone out of his sight.” Dame shrugged.

Sparkle. She knew when Sparkle had escaped. He’d been furious and he’d come to her. With his needles and cocktails and stories of horror.

Sparkle.

She, herself, was known as Dusk.

A wry grin pulled her mouth. At least someone got away.

Dame raised her penciled brow and pulled a gold cigarette case from her silk trouser pocket. The one Mikhail had given her for her loyalty just weeks before. “You find something amusing?”

“Did they ever find her?”

Dame jerked her bleached chic bob toward the wall. “Sparkle? Not that I know, but then I don’t know everything. We don’t speak of her. Don’t even
think
of her.” Dame cursed beneath her breath, something about stupid. “You have a job to do tonight.” She motioned to Dusk. “Hurry. You make this one happy.” Dame sneered. “If you fail, you’ll go below for a week. You hear? Be happy the last client merely complained to me and not to Mikhail or you’d be below right now. Clients must smile. That is motto, yes? You make trouble, you end up like that other one. You remember, yes? You’ve had two strikes against you already. Three times and you know what happens.”

 . . . that other one . . .
whose screams she would forever hear. Gunshots in a quiet graveyard. She shuddered. The black monster of terror toyed with her mind and memories she begged to forget.

The other one. Ebony. Ebony, who had been Italian, said her father would kill these men if he ever found out what they had done to her. Dusk had been here long enough to know that most girls said something along that line, at least at first. So-and-so would pay
them
back. Then again, not most. Only the really brave, or the incredibly stupid. Either way, there had been a look in that girl’s eyes that sent a shiver down Dusk’s spine. Ebony had told the truth. Whoever her people were, Ebony was convinced they’d avenge her.

But the boys below had finished with Ebony before any word could be gotten to whomever she belonged.

Below
.

Just the word greased her stomach with nausea.
Below
. She shuddered, remembering the smell of blood and dirt, the darkness. The screams that went on and on and on.
Below
was worse than a bullet in the brain, worse than the gun at the base of her skull, worse than the K trips Mikhail often sent her nightmaring through.
Below.
She shivered.

Dame came forward. “Is not so bad, once you get used to it, and many of the girls think the desserts help, no?”

Desserts, drugs, same difference. Dusk really had no idea. They only gave her ketamine that made nightmares real. Those trips were punishment. There had been the occasional hits of X so that she’d enjoy fucking her pimp, his idea. Or the rare times he wanted her complacent for a client. However, no girl was allowed to become a junkie. Drugs were used as much for punishment as anything else here. Anything else would cut into his profit. Everything here could be a punishment, she’d learned.

Mikhail liked a bit of fight in his girls, but not too much or the girl went from his perfectly designed home to one of the brothels, and if she fought too much here, then she went below.

“You could have had it all,” Dame muttered, shaking her head. “He wanted you for himself, but you would not listen.” She
tsked
. “This is test. If you do this right, Mikhail may take you back.”

The words jerked Dusk’s eyes from the cracked window back to Dame, who reached over and grabbed up the dress.

“What?” Dusk asked.

Dame unzipped the material and threw it at her, then motioned to the little bowl of water. There were no private bathrooms here. It was like a page out of history. A washstand and a bowl and pitcher of water.

Dusk didn’t let herself think of what she used to have. The small things she’d always taken for granted, like privacy, a locked bathroom door, warm running water, or a warm safe home, or people who really cared . . .

 Perhaps conceding to Mikhail would not be so horrible. Either he fucked her in his mansion or he locked her here to have other men take her. At least with him she’d have warmth, and a freaking bath.

No
.

Some things were better left in the black parts of memories. What was pride anyway?

Survival. She could hold out. She could.

The dress shook in her hand.

Dame pulled out another leather case. Dusk knew what it contained, she’d seen it before. Her throat closed up, her muscles tightened. Sweat broke out on her forehead, cooled her bare back.