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CHAPTER 9
Tess clutched the bare mattress and gulped a lungful of stale air, her heart jackhammering against her ribs. A nightmare? No—men were shouting, outside. She widened her eyes, then squinted. Open, closed, open, closed, it made no difference. Black was black was black.
She sat up with a lurch and shuffled back against the damp stone wall to at least get a fix on which way was up. Not a sliver of gray slid between the floorboards above. Had to be night. She’d been asleep? For how long? She laid her palm over her face and blinked, the lashes tickling her skin. Definitely open. This wasn’t the kind of nightmare you got to wake from. As further proof, her big toes throbbed in unison where Hamid’s men had ripped out the nails.
A door squealed, and something solid was dragged across the floor overhead. From their nest in the corner of her cell, the mice scratched and squeaked—even they knew something was up. She shakily exhaled. Six days she’d been here, and each night had been heavy with silence until the distant song of a muezzin’s call to prayer. What was different about tonight?
A flashlight beam flickered through the cracks. More voices—instructions, perhaps. A series of clinks, a heavy scrape—they were opening the bunker hatch. Was she to be freed? She swallowed. Or executed?
Fresh air puffed over her face as the hatch lifted. She drew up her knees and hugged them. The flashlight beam tracked around the cell, pausing on a food tray the mice had finished up, and a scattering of empty plastic water bottles. The light flicked to her, scorching her eyes and drilling pain into her brain. She shut them tight and sealed her palms over top. Even then her vision pulsed bloodred.
If they were planning to make another video, or if Hamid was coming to ask again if she was ready for death, the next sound would be the rasp and bump of the rope ladder being lowered. But this early? This felt more like the hour of...
Enough overthinking. She breathed deeply through her mouth—she’d stopped inhaling through her nose days ago, so she couldn’t smell herself rotting.
People had survived years like this. She had to keep believing that the kidnap of a high-profile American TV journalist would prompt a large-scale search, even in East Africa. She had to keep visualizing a company of marines scouring the arid terrain. Or would they be out to get her, too?
Overthinking.
The rasp didn’t come. More scuffles and scrapes. She forced her eyes open. Shadows circled the dirt floor. Above the hatch, figures moved and a man grunted, as if with great effort. Something blocked the square hole, returning the cell to darkness. It wasn’t the hatch cover, so what was—?
The thing dropped. She shrank back as it thudded down a few feet away. A strobe of light flashed on a large curled shape before the hatch thunked shut. Metal scraped on metal—the bolts sliding home. She shivered. Voices and footsteps retreated, a door squealed shut, a key clicked in a lock, leaving the darkness absolute. She let her crown drop back on the cold stone. Not execution, not yet. Maybe they were storing something down here. But at this time of night?
As her shuddering breath subsided and the mice settled, she made out another sound. Air rasping, in and out, in and out. Holy crap. The thing was alive.
“Hello?” Her voice caught. She cleared her throat. “Hello?”
No answer.
She crawled off the mattress and felt her way along the packed dirt. Her right hand hit something warm, covered with smooth fabric. It flinched. Human, at least.
“It’s okay,” she said.
She splayed her fingers. Under the fabric the skin was firm but yielding. A stomach? A groan rose up—a man’s voice. Her left hand touched something hard. Bones—a row of them. He shuddered and arched away. His spine? Which meant her other hand was currently exploring a particularly solid butt. She released her grip.
He muttered something unintelligible.
