Jack Wilder - The Missionary

Stone let him drop and turned back to the first man, dragging him into the stairwell and kneeling on his throat. “Which room?” The thug struggled for breath, writhing and gasping. He shook his head, and Stone dug the tip of the knife against the man’s throat. “I won’t ask again. Talk.” He eased his weight off enough to allow speech.

“Six…nineteen.”

“How many are in there?”

“Don’t…don’t know. Tree men? Only da one girl.”

“Will they hurt her in the room?” He dug the knife-tip in farther, drawing blood.

“I don’t know!” Fear brought his words in a rush, nearly incomprehensible. “Depends on da buyer. Cervantes won’t touch, he hab his own girl. Don’t use da ones he sell. Buyer? Maybe do what he want. Not here, I tink. He take her somewhere else.”

Stone rose off his prisoner, intending to tie him up. As soon as his weight was off completely, however, the thug rolled away and drew a pistol. Before he could squeeze off a shot, Stone was on top of him, knife scraping between ribs and slicing through muscle. He watched as the man gasped for breath, but his punctured lung wouldn’t allow it.

Stone turned, forcing the weight of guilt away. He buried it, swallowed it. He didn’t have time for guilt, didn’t have the luxury of it. Wren needed him. He would spill as much blood as it took to save her from the fate awaiting her.

He dragged the dead man on the elevator into the stairwell with his friend and then wound his way through the corridor until he came to room six-nineteen. He heard voices on the other side of the door, male voices. The slap of fist on flesh and a soft female whimper of pain.

Rage blew through him, setting him on fire. He couldn’t just kick the door down and barge in with guns blazing. That would get Wren killed for sure. He had to be smarter about it.

Stone hefted the bloody knife, testing its weight, considering.

9

Wren sat on the edge of the bed, fighting to stay calm. Three men filled the room with her, one of them her captor—she’d learned from other men that his name was Cervantes; the other two men she’d never seen before. Both were older than her captor, maybe middle-aged. One wore a business suit, the other a pair of wrinkled chinos and a red-and-blue-striped polo shirt. They eyed Wren with obvious lust as they discussed terms. She couldn’t understand their words, but they held up fingers and argued, clearly bickering over price. That thought made her shiver with horror. They were discussing the price of her body, how much she was worth.

She steeled herself for the worst. Part of her wanted to charge at them, knowing they’d kill her. That part of her welcomed death over rape. Not just rape, but a lifetime of sexual slavery. But then, just before her body left the bed, her instinct for survival kicked in. If she stayed alive, maybe she could escape eventually. Maybe someone would rescue her.

As she battled with herself, she began to feel a gnawing, prickling need deep inside. Hunger for something. Need. Not for food, but for…the drug. The needle. She hated it, but her body was beginning to crave it.

The arguments grew worse, loud and angry, verging on violent.

Wren spotted a glass ashtray on the bedside table, and when the men weren’t looking, reached out and grabbed it, stuffed it between her thighs to hide it. The glass was cold on her skin.

One of the men let out a disgusted groan and turned away, clearly incensed, waving his hand in dismissal. He spat out something in Filipino, then stomped toward the door and jerked it open. He stopped, though, surprised by something on the other side. The bark of a pistol echoed, and red spray burst from the back of his head. He staggered, fell, blood gushing across the carpet in a flood.

Cervantes’ face contorted in shock, and then twisted into fury. He reached behind his back and pulled out a gun, darting to the side of the room closest to the window. The second buyer dropped to a crouch in the corner as the deafening explosions of gunfire filled the room, bullets digging into the floor where Cervantes had been. Cervantes fired his own pistol, and then cast a glance toward Wren. She was frozen, the crash of guns terrifying her into momentary paralysis.

A shape filled the doorway, a huge figure in khaki shorts and a gray Navy T-shirt, a pistol clutched in his hands.

Stone.

Relief flooded through Wren, but it was short lived. Cervantes leapt over the bed and wrapped his arm around Wren’s throat.

He jerked her off the bed, while Stone kicked aside the dying man in the doorway. He glanced at the second buyer, cracking off a single shot before returning his stare to Wren. She heard the slump of a body hitting the floor, and her gaze was drawn to the red painting the wall, trailing messily down to the carpeting.

She felt dizzy, whether from fear or from how tightly the arm was clenched around her throat, she wasn’t sure. She fought for breath and for calmness. She had the ashtray clutched in one fist, and Cervantes hadn’t seen it yet. Stone was watching her—watching them—tensed, crouched, one finger on the trigger, the other palm cupping the butt of the pistol. He looked perfectly at ease with the fact that he’d just killed two men.

Wren felt something cold against her temple.

“We goin’ now. You move, she die.” Cervantes’ voice was low and calm.

“Let her go, Cervantes. Let her go now, and you won’t die.” Stone’s eyes were hard, brown shards exuding mercilessness. “If you make me chase you, I’ll make sure you die slowly. If you hurt her, I’ll make sure you stay alive long enough to regret every single breath you’ve ever taken. If you hurt her, you’ll beg me to let you die.”

Cervantes laughed. “Big words, American. You sure you want her back?” He licked the skin of her neck slowly, then laughed again, an low, nasty sound. “You know how many times I fuck her? She beg me to stop, and then—and then she beg me to fuck her again. Jus’ like she beg me for da drugs. She not your innocent little girl no more. She mine . She a whore now.”

Stone’s face shifted, and even Wren was afraid of the rage and the promise of death she saw in his expression. She wanted to tell him it was lies, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t speak. She could barely breathe. And…she realized, in some kind of nebulous way, that maybe Stone should believe it. Maybe if he believed it, he’d make Cervantes pay.

She felt a shiver of something awful wriggle in her gut. It was something terribly like glee. The thought of Cervantes bleeding for what he’d done to her…it made a part of her happy to consider. And that scared her witless. What was happening to her? She shouldn’t wish pain on anyone, not even her worst enemy. She should pray for Cervantes. Turn the other cheek. Trust God to have a plan, even in the midst of this terror.

But…she just couldn’t. Not any of that.

She wanted Cervantes to hurt . She wanted him to hurt like she hurt. She wanted him to feel the kind of fear she felt.

She wanted him to pay for the need she felt in her veins, the horrible, itching, crawling, hot and then cold need she felt in her skin and in her blood and in her belly.

Need for the needle to pierce her vein and send the evil chemicals into her.

Need for the needle. Perhaps that was where the term came from. The word need was buried inside needle , after all.

“You gonna let us go, American. Count to thirty, slow . I see you, I hear you, she dead.” He nodded at the bathroom door. “Go in dere. Sit, wait, count, or I kill her.”

She watched in despair as Stone reluctantly moved into the bathroom and sat down. Wren felt herself dragged through the doorway, her heels scrabbling on the threadbare carpeting. She smelled Stone, faint cologne, sweat, and blood. She managed to meet his eyes briefly, saw the hate there, saw the anger and the sadness and the determination. She tried to comfort him with a single glance. She tried to pour all of her heart into that fleeting meeting of eyes.