“A hunting knife? Really? What do you guys need a…” I started to ask, but I figured I already knew the answer to that question. Dimitri was probably supposed to end up on the receiving end of that knife, or one like it.
I grabbed it. Wrapping my fingers around the rubber grip, I felt a strange surge of power rush through me. It was as if the knife was asking me to use it for its intended purpose. I pushed that idea out of my head and laughed at myself. There was no way a knife could be telling me that. No, the real reason I felt that power in my hand was much more disturbing. It was coming from a meaning and purpose I had attached to the knife as soon as I touched it.
Well, I certainly wasn’t going to use it to hurt anyone. I rushed back into the interrogation room in the basement and started cutting the ropes holding Dimitri down while he kept talking, apparently still trying to seal the deal with me.
“You know, I bet Gage is talking to the mayor right now. I bet they’re roughing him up and trying to find out when and where the deal is going down. See, I already know this information, but I’m using someone else’s knowledge to get them out of here so I can escape. And I’m helping you in the meantime.”
“You don’t have to keep trying to convince me,” I told him while I cut the ropes from his arms on the bottom of the chair’s arms.
“I’m just explaining to you what will happen if you decide to stay. When Gage gets back, he’s going to be the Gage I know. He’s going to be focused on handling Ivan and breaking up that deal. Suddenly, the sex you think meant something won’t mean anything. He’ll put you down here with me. And you’ll probably have to see shit worse than what you’ve already seen.” He talked as if he were imparting the meaning of life.
I stood up and held the knife under his chin. “I have the power right now, Dimitri. If you keep running your mouth, Gage will have to figure out what he’s doing with your corpse when he gets back.”
He swallowed hard. “Okay, got it.”
He held his free hands up while I freed his legs and then cut the ropes wrapped around the back of his chair.
He groaned as he stood up. He stretched his arms and legs. Then, he twisted and stretched his back. He towered over me, taller than Gage and almost twice as wide. He had to have been close to seven feet tall.
No wonder it took two men to bring you in, I thought.
“Give me that,” he said, reaching for the knife in my hand. “You don’t need to be waving that thing around and sticking it in people’s faces. Let me carry it so that we’ll have some kind of protection in case anyone wants to play hero.”
I handed it to him reluctantly. His large, meaty fingers wrapped around the grip, and he pulled the knife gently from my hand. He held it up and looked it over, turning the blade so that the light reflected on it passed over his face.
Suddenly, he had an arm around me, and the knife was against my throat. I tried to struggle, but the blade pressed against my skin and felt like it was trying to dig in.
“Now who has the power, Julia?” he asked. “You’re going to make great bait for Gage. Just don’t struggle and you might actually make it to see him when he comes to your rescue.”
He pulled me to the door, and we walked through it into the pit. Then, we walked up the stairs sideways so that the blade stayed on my throat the whole way. I couldn’t believe he’d tricked me! Gage had been right about him. He was going to kill me.
I realized as we walked outside that they had both been right about each other. Neither one of them was to be trusted. Neither one of them was the good guy in this situation.
“Listen, you said if I helped you get out, you’d let me go once we got away from the clubhouse,” I pleaded, forgetting to phrase my words in Russian.
“You forget, I don’t speak English, Julia,” Dimitri reminded me. “You can beg all you want, say anything at all, and I won’t understand you. But I don’t care, because you can still understand me.”
I repeated myself in Russian, and he laughed.
“I am helping you get out of there.” We walked along the side of the building, directly underneath the second and third story windows, hugging the wall.
“Where are you taking me?” I asked him.
“With me. That’s all you need to know for right now, Julia. You are my prisoner now, and if your little boyfriend wants you back, he’s going to have to come get you and free you from the same tortures he visited upon me. And believe me, it’s going to be a lot more fun for me than it will be for you. I promise.”