Second Nature (When Seconds Count)

By D.L. Roan

Copyright
© 2013 D.L. Roan

Human trafficking is the largest and fastest growing form of international organized crime in the world. The slave trade exists in many forms and has no boundaries or borders. While Grant and Thalia’s story is purely fiction, there are countless men, women and children who have fallen victim to those who prey on their innocence and circumstances to feed the desires of the soulless and depraved. Many have died at the hands of their captors. Some have escaped and lived to fight against them. An unimaginable number still exist within the darkness of anonymity and even more will take their place when they are gone. There are many who are ignorant of its existence, some who stand and fight for the otherwise invisible and a few who will truly never forget the lost.

To the survivors and their inexorable strength, the memories of the many lost and stolen souls
, and to those who continue to fight a war that must be won to protect the innocent. My heart will never forget.

To my perfectly flawed hero husband, thank you for everything you are. I could not do this without you. To Sarah Ashley Stevenson, literally the strongest woman on the planet. You are my real-life Super Woman and I love you so hard! To my fellow Indie authors who have welcomed me into the fold with open arms;
Ilsa Madden-Mills, Leia Madison, Laura Hidalgo, Kaylee Ryan, and all of the gang in Writers United. It is impossible to list everyone so please know I adore you all. To Bookfabulous Designs for an amazing cover that really brought this book to life. To the Second Nature Street Team who has promoted me beyond reason and given me the opportunity to meet so many amazing people in the Indie world. Most importantly, to my fans, thank you for your dedication and for loving my characters as much as I do. This would be impossible without you. XoXo

Stolen Innocence

She heard a loud pop just before the car swerved
, and her grip tightened on the steering wheel. Her Driver’s Ed teacher’s words filtered through her thoughts with lightning speed as the first spike of panic laced her veins. Lifting her foot from the accelerator, she gently pressed the brake pedal and guided the car to a stop on the side of the country road.

Fine gravel shifted and crunched beneath her sneakers as she stepped around to the passenger side and got her first look at her first flat tire, on her first solo drive to school.

“Crap.” She walked down the road a bit to where the paper bag she’d hit lay torn to shreds, what was left of several green glass bottles shattered around it.

“Dad is going to kill me.”
Or worse, never let her drive again. How was she supposed to know it was filled with glass bottles? Okay, so she hadn’t exactly swerved to miss it, but it wasn’t her fault some people were jerks.

Sprinting
back to her car, she thought briefly about calling her boyfriend to come change the flat. That thought lasted just long enough to remember her dad’s stern warning about no boys in the car. Not that they would actually be
in
the car, but she didn’t need her dad giving her anymore grief about Michael. No, she might as well call the warden and get it over with. It wasn’t like she took out a tree or anything.

She located his number on her cell phone and pressed send, not bothering to leave a message when the call was automatically forwarded to his voicemail. After two more tries she was about to dial Michael’s number when a car she didn’t recognize pulled up behind hers and stopped.

She watched nervously in her rear view mirror as a tall, lanky man got out and approached her side of the vehicle. Unsure of what to do, she was a little relieved when his lips curved into a friendly smile and he tipped the bill of his baseball cap to greet her.

“Everything okay?”

The creep factor gone, she rolled down the window and nodded. “Yeah, just a flat tire. I’m trying to reach my dad, but he’s not answering.”

“The glass got you, huh.” He shrugged and pulled his cell phone from the back pocket of his faded blue jeans. “Let me make a quick call to my wife to let her know I’ll be a little late
, and then I’ll change it for you.”

“No, that’s okay. I…”

“It’s no problem, really. It will only take a few minutes.”

Her eyes followed his movements as he held his phone to his ear and walked around to look at the tire. She couldn’t just sit in the car and let him do all of the work. Keys still in the ignition, her purse and book bag
piled in a heap on the front seat, she opened the driver’s door and stepped out onto the shoulder. Shoving her cell phone into her front pocket, she rounded the back of the car just as the man ended his call.

“You really don’t have to do this. My dad will be…”

The rest of her words were smothered by the hand that clamped tight over her mouth as someone behind her snaked an arm around her waist and yanked her off the ground.
Oh God!
“Help!” she tried to scream, but nothing more than a muffled cry made its way beyond the suffocating pressure. Twisting and kicking, she watched helplessly as the nice man with the baseball cap grabbed her legs and wrapped a thin length of rope around her ankles. Fear turning to sheer terror, she flailed and thrashed and clawed at anything she could grasp. When she finally managed to sink her teeth into the hand clamped over her mouth, the man holding her captive tightened his grip on her jaw until she thought it would break and she was forced to let go as he shoved her to the ground.

She tried to crawl
away. Beyond words, her cries for help turned into incoherent screams as a heavy weight pressed her into the ground and her arms were pinned behind her back. The sound of tape being ripped from the roll barely registered before a long strip was slapped over her mouth, tangling in the wisps of long hair that had escaped her pony tail in the struggle. Her wrists bound tight behind her, she was wrenched from the ground and dumped into the trunk of their car. No words were spoken between the two men. No second glances or hesitations as they closed the trunk lid and the first wave of darkness swallowed her whole. It was only a shadow of the dark days to come. She would not be alone in her fate.

“Where’s the disk?” Fire exploded behind Thalia’s Brezlin’s right eye as the butt of a gun crashed into the side of her skull. Random flashes of light from the bare bulb swinging above her penetrated her rapidly swelling eyelid, making either the room or her head spin out of control. Any moment now she was going to puke or pass out. She truly didn’t care which came first, as long as the pain stopped. Neither option, she feared, would matter to this bastard.

“It’s not a disk.” Dammit
, it hurt too much to talk. She could feel the fresh flow of warm blood pouring from her temple; see it dripping into her lap onto what was left of her tattered cargo pants.
My favorite pair.
Only her sick sense of sarcasm kept her from giving into her fear. A fear she knew would cripple or kill her the moment she gave it even a shred of control. If this evil creep knew just how scared she really was, how scared she’d been for so long now that she could barely remember a time without fear, he would use it to eat her alive.

Keep him talking.
The pain from the metal handcuffs slicing into her wrists was nothing compared to the hell her face was going through, but she kept working. If she didn’t get her hands through soon, the swelling would make it impossible. She was so close.

She’d alr
eady mapped out her escape. The chair she was handcuffed to wasn’t bolted to the floor. That would be weapon number one. If it didn’t splinter apart after taking out her first target, she’d use it on another. Her second choice would be to go for the metal chain she’d spotted in the corner behind the only door to her dark, mammoth-sized cell. Dammit! If only she could get her hands on the nice piece of nickel this asshole kept beating her with…
At least he hasn’t shot me with it yet.

“Don’t toy with me
bitch!” The sound of ripping fabric echoed past the pounding in her ears. Her body jerked against the chair with each brutal tug, cold air swirling over the sheen of sweat that covered her bared breasts.
Oh God! Oh God! Oh God!
Thalia sucked in a sharp breath as twin spikes of pain pierced her nipples and rippled down her spine.
Please don’t do this!
She choked back her plea. She would not cry out and give him the satisfaction. Biting the inside of her cheek until she tasted the rusty tang of blood, she sucked in another deep breath, her nostrils flaring with her effort to control the pain. She forced herself not to look at his gun, now tucked neatly into the front waistband of his tailored suit pants. As long as both his hands were on her, the gun was fair game.

“Hamisi,” she hissed through her clenched teeth
, careful to mask her fear. “Were you really born on a Thursday? It is what the Hindi name means, yes?”

Hamisi kept one hand on her naked breast, tight
ening his vise-like grip. He threaded his other hand through her sweaty black hair and wrenched her head back, the sickening scents of peppermint and tobacco washing over her battered face. “What games are these you play? You know I will kill you if you do not tell me where it is!”

Thalia looked into Hamisi’s
inky black eyes, her gaze trailing over his near flawless complexion. He was an attractive man; tall and solid, his dark skin revealing his Indian heritage. Plump lips, with just a hint of dryness around the edges, pressed into a snarl. He wasn’t accustomed to the climate. She must have hit a nerve for Don Lalia to send his personal guard to deal with her. Killing his second in charge had been blind luck, but she’d taken it. She was quickly growing tired of running. She was tired, period. It would be nice to send another one of these bastards to hell before one of them finally killed her.

Returning her gaze to his
cold, dark eyes, she knew one thing for certain. He would kill her with or without the thumb drive. His grip tightened in her hair, a fierce growl rumbled from his chest. “You will give me what I want. Or I will rip it from you one strip of skin at a time.”

She didn’t flinch at his
biting tone or the spray of spittle that peppered her face. Her eyes slowly moved past his and focused on the rusty metal ceiling above them, ignoring the searing pain that ripped over her scalp. “I think it’s a fake name,” she said with a casual shrug of her shoulders, her right hand slipping silently through the cuff. “I’d have guessed you were born yesterday, and yesterday was Tuesday.”

He released her hair and she turned
her head just as his fist came down, glancing off her forehead. She felt nothing. Nothing but the blissfully cold nickel that soothed her palm as she wrapped her hand around the gun tucked into Hamisi’s belt.
Now let’s see how tough you are!

The chair explode
d into pieces over Hamisi’s head, the sound of splintering wood drowned out by the staccato of gunfire. Two rounds found their targets across the room, taking out Hamisi’s henchmen with practiced precision.

Before she could turn the gun on Hamisi, a suffocating silence filled the room. Arms of steel circled around her shoulders from behind, crushing her chest. “I do not die so easily,
kuttiya
,” Hamisi purred in her ear, sending sickening chills racing down her spine.

Thalia struggled
against his grip, holding tight to the gun as his slimy hand slithered up her shoulder. If he got his hands around her neck she was dead. “When are you guys going to learn?” she grunted through clenched teeth. “I’m nobody’s bitch.” Stars exploded behind her eyelids as the back of her head connected with his face, the crunch of breaking bones echoing off the steel walls of the expansive space.

She twisted from
his arms, her knee finding his groin with flawless execution. Hunched over from the pain, either choking on his balls or about to puke them up, Thalia took out his knee with a swift kick, flattening him to the cold hard floor. Sweat stung the cuts on her face as she fought for each breath, her shiny, new pistol now leveled at Hamisi’s bloodied face. “
I
don’t die that easily, you sick fucking kutta.” She pulled the trigger, the sound of a stale click sending shivers up her spine.

Hamisi’s laughter
clawed its way over her skin. “Who is the stupid dog now?”

Somewhere i
n the back of her mind she knew it was foolish, but she took a step closer to him, already imagining his brains slathered across the bottom of her boot. With blinding speed, Hamisi’s leg made contact and swept her off her feet, a searing hot pain slicing into her side.

Instinct had her moving before she could process the pain, her han
ds clutching at his wrist. The dull light from the one bare bulb reflected off the blade extending from his clenched fist. She was no match for his brute, male strength. A scream tore its way past her bloody lips as the blade sunk into the top of her thigh. Desperate not to give into the torturous pain, she pushed away from him, the knife’s blade slicing further into her flesh. Holding onto her last thread of control, her hands found his face as she blindly searched for the one thing she knew would end this.

An eerie
shriek pierced the air and drowned out the other sounds of their struggle. Sticky, wet fluid coated her fingers as they found their mark. Hamisi’s hands released her from his grip as he cupped his face and screamed in horror. The odd shaped eyeball, still tethered to the nerve, balanced precariously in his palm. Thalia used her arms to drag herself away from the grisly scene. Footsteps pounded from the floor above her.
Time to move, girl
. More blood seeped from her leg and her side, leaving a sodden trail along the floor as she dragged herself closer to the door. She had to get to her feet.

Bracing herself against
a metal pole near the center of the dimly lit cargo hold, she wrapped her fingers around the hilt of the knife.
This is going to hurt like a mother…

Sucking in one final breath, she ground her teeth together to hold back
another scream clawing its way up her throat.
Son of a bitch!
The instant the blade was free, dark crimson blood rushed from the wound and began to pool under her leg. She was going to bleed to death before she could get out of this shithole, wherever that was.

Working as fast
as her shaking hands allowed, she tore off a strip of what was left of her shirt and tied it around her thigh, biting back another scream. More heavy footfalls moved overhead and voices echoed through the steel hull from somewhere close.

Hamisi’s screa
ms had stopped. She guessed he’d passed out. God knows she probably would have. Nonetheless, she was thankful for the reprieve as she hobbled to the door and carefully peered around the frame. Clear in both directions, she stepped outside and was assaulted by the salty ocean air. From the familiar stench of dead fish and diesel fuel, she knew she was in a marina. What she didn’t know was where. Judging the distance to the water below, the boat was a freighter of some significant size. She’d been unconscious when they brought her here. How long ago that was, she wasn’t sure.

She studied the docks as she stumbled her way toward the back of the ship. The lights blurred and swayed as an icy blanket folded in around her. Her hands and feet felt like blocks of ice, dragging her to the slippery deck. She was losing too much blood. An agonized moan
slipped beyond her control as she slid down a short flight of stairs, grasping the railing with her blood slicked hands.

Moving with pure adrenaline, she forced herself along the stern.
It’s so dark
. If only a day had passed she should still be somewhere along the African coastline. Looking out toward the ocean, she could see the faint twinkling of a few shining lights from the nearby coastal islands.
I can swim that far.
It wasn’t a question of if she could do it. She had to make it happen. It was her last conscious thought before her body hit the cold, salty water below.