HARDCORE: Storm MC(47)

I think the strap that bound me around the waist was an actual man’s leather belt. The buckle was located under the table, but conveniently for my purposes, it was just under the edge on my right side. When I discovered this, I almost laughed with relief. It took me several moments to get the strap out of the buckle—it was awkward, working it behind me and several inches below with the table edge in the way, but ultimately I managed it.



At this point I was able to sit up and shift myself into a better position in which I could maneuver the last major hurdle: untying my left wrist from ankle. It took the work of several moments, but finally I had free space, motion, arms, legs, body.



I was so flooded with adrenaline that it overpowered my awareness of the cold, of my shivers, aches, and pains—well, for the most part. I still ached and I needed to stretch; I felt pinpricks all over. But I could move again. I was no longer tied down and presented like a turkey on Thanksgiving.



I was still locked up behind a heavy hydraulic cage door in a cell in the basement from hell, but I had a fighting chance now.



And no way was I going to waste it.





Chapter Fourteen



Dom



Nothing happened on the way to the basement.



But as soon as the doors opened there, I had to take a deep breath. I’d never been to Versailles, but this hall of mirrors certainly earned the descriptive title just as much, though in a much shadier perspective. The carpeting was a deep red, like blood. The ceiling was black, and the doors were painted cream. It could have been used as part of the set in The Shining. There were mirrors everywhere along the walls where there weren’t doors, with dimly lighted sconces interspersed, so it was impossible to tell how long the hallway was, nor how many doors and lights there were. It looked like it went on and on forever. It was like being in the madhouse at a fucking freak show.



What made my entry here a gazillion times worse were the sounds of life: an eerily keening voice, high-pitched. I didn’t think it was Sienna—I had never heard anything like it from her before. It was counterpointed with a man’s loud grunts, definitely of the powerful thrusting kind.



I was listening to a rape; there’s no way it could have been anything else.



The problem was that the sounds almost seemed to echo in the hallway, and there was a third voice—god, was that Sienna?—moaning as well, which seemed to be separate but somehow also in conjunction with the feminine sounds of Fielding’s current victim. It confused my comprehension somewhat, and my instinct to go to her first warred with my need to help the woman in obvious and immediate need.



My blood was pounding in my veins in rage and frustration, and adrenaline, too.



So I headed toward the first sounds I had identified, starting at an almost-run down that endless-seeming hallway from hell. It was disconcerting, the optical illusion with all the mirrors and sconces and doors, and with not knowing how far I needed to go.



I found that keeping my focus on the mirror facing me at the far end of the hallway was the best way to manage understanding the space visually. Then I relied on my ears alone to pinpoint the sounds. I slowed as they got closer, and it took me too many moments to finally zone in on one door in the middle of the hallway. Or, it appeared to be in the middle. Fuck, everything was in the middle.



Didn’t matter. I found the door, I was pretty sure.



I sent up a silent prayer that I was making the right choice, to help this woman before Sienna. Then I braced myself to power into the room.



I raised my gun to my shoulder, put my back to the wall by the door, and took a deep breath, ready to rain hell on Fielding, and hoping with all of my heart that the woman inside was not Sienna.



It flashed in my mind that it might have been Zoe. God, I hoped not. I wanted to find her, but not like this.



When I threw open the door, in a semicrouch with my gun in front of me with both hands, I found myself standing directly in front of another door made of bars of steel, and what I perceived to be a cage—the woman was strapped to a table inside the cage, so Fielding, too, was inside it. I stepped in far enough to give me a clear shot at him. I wasn’t worried that he’d have a gun ready to counter my own; he had obviously been otherwise occupied before my entrance.



I immediately targeted Fielding’s left side, which was facing me as he faced his victim, who was naked and trussed up on the table like a fucking turkey.



He was shirtless, and his pants were falling partway down his legs. And he was, indeed, raping her viciously.



“Get the fuck off of her, you motherfucker, now!” I heard myself roar.



Fielding’s head snapped in my direction at the intrusion to his sick scene, his eyes wide open in surprise and displeasure, and his body kind of slowly stopped pumping. He clearly had not anticipated a third-party entrance. My nostrils flared in satisfaction; I was at a distinct advantage here.