Part Four
Sixteen hours earlier . . .
Nadia gasped in breath, jerked, and found herself unable to move. Her heart was beating too quickly, and her mouth felt painfully dry. She tried to swallow and it was as if her throat was cracking. She couldn't see anything; everything around her was dark. Dust tickled her nose. Her neck was cramped, her shoulders sore from her arms being pulled back and bound, and from their ache she assumed she'd been there and unconscious for hours.
A whimper pushed past her resolve and there was movement somewhere close by, a rustle, like the shifting of a person moving to stand, and then a voice: "Nadia?"
Her head was still thick from whatever drug had been used to knock her out, but she knew she wasn't wrong about this: she knew that voice. She felt cold all the way through with shock. No. Because it didn't sound like he had come to rescue her. It sounded like he'd been there waiting for her to wake up.
A match was struck—the sound of it was unmistakable—and then Vaughn's face was visible, deeply shadowed, in the flickering light. He produced a candle from the thick darkness and lit it.
"The lights here don't work," he explained as he set it down on the floor several feet away—too far for her to reach with either legs or hands were she able to free either. "Are you all right?"
She tried to speak—Does it look like I'm alright?—but it came out a hoarse, mangled cry.
Vaughn looked alarmed. "I'll get some water. I didn't think—I don't have a lot of experience with this."
She wasn't sure whether or not that was encouraging. Following him warily with her eyes as best she could in the low light, she worked her wrists against one another. Tight. Too tight. Damnit.
"Here," he said, holding the cup carefully to her lips.
She accepted the water. She wanted to refuse it, but she didn't think she could speak without it. And this was Vaughn. Her sister's boyfriend. If she could talk to him, maybe . . . . Whatever he was trying to accomplish here, there had to be a better way.
"Good?" he asked, and she swallowed gingerly, and nodded.
He set the cup down and turned concerned eyes back on her.
"Why are you doing this?" she asked, and her voice was hoarse but at least he could understand her now.
"I'm sorry," he said, and his eyes clouded. "I don't want to."
"Then don't," she pleaded.
His face was anguished. "I wish it didn't have to be this way. But I have to find her."
"Her who? Does . . . ." Nadia swallowed again, trying to work the spit up in her mouth. "Does it have something to do with Sydney?"
Maybe Sydney was in trouble. Then at least Nadia would understand, would know what to try. What would Sydney say, Michael? Sydney wouldn't want you to do this. But he'd been with Sydney, hadn't he, when Nadia had been attacked?
Unless . . . unless Sydney was . . . . Nadia struggled to keep herself steady. She and Sydney weren't really . . . close, exactly, quite . . . but she knew her sister, and Sydney would never do this. She loved her. She was Nadia's family, the one person that . . . .
"Sydney?" Vaughn's head jerked up, and for a moment Nadia could see his eyes were wild. "No, why . . . . No. This is about Lauren."
This was surreal. Nadia was starting to have trouble following. "Your ex-wife?"
"I have to find her, Nadia."
"But what does that have to do with me?"
"She said she'd help. She said she could help me find Lauren."
"Michael," Nadia said urgently, "who?"
"I'm sorry," he said to her again, moving to her side and sliding up the sleeve of her shirt. She struggled, but he held her arm steady as he slid a syringe from his pocket with his other hand.
"Please, Michael, please," she begged, voice rising, but then the drug was flowing through her system, and his face got even darker, and she was gone.
