Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 86177 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86177 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
But my throat screamed that a foot infection could wait. Or kill me, which didn’t sound half bad. I opened the bottle. Like I was in a desert storm, precious water rushed down my dry throat and filled my belly. As I drank the water down to the last drop, alarm bells went off in my mind. The water tasted medicinal. Something was off about it. Mmmm … no, not off. It was satisfying and sweet and good. Finished, I rubbed the back of my hand over my mouth. “Do I be-belong to Rocket again? Roc … What di-did you… you give? You gave? You drugged … me?” That small seed of modesty I clung to faded as my arms went limp. The world spun around me with Denis’s approach.
“Dah, Jordyn. You belong to Rocket, which means you no longer belong to Aleksandr. You’ll greet Rocket in, I’d say another”—through my faded vision, the skinny Russian checked his watch—“five hours or so. However, before I return you to the house to shower and wear Rocket’s favorite color, you are mine.”
Water sucked down into my lungs, and I slammed a foot against the cool porcelain, trying like hell to get up. I came back to reality, arms wrapping around me. As I choked on suds, Monique tugged me up into a seated position in the water. Aleksandr’s favorite outfit clung to her skin from getting wet. She sat back on her haunches on the opposite side of this blasted clawfoot tub. Aleksandr explained it came from the last Tsar to rule Russia. Who knows if he’d lied about that or the Rothschild Fabergé Egg at that home he took me to during our first summer together? He’d started off nicer than most. So, why did you ruin a good thing with your mouth, Jordy?
The short answer? They’d passed me around long enough. And enough. Was. Enough.
“Girl, your middle name must be trouble.” Monique’s baby doll face set into a smirk. “I don’t know how you handled living like a hobo out in the heat in the middle of summer. You put up a fight with Denis when he went to get you.”
I’d put up a what?
Head tilted, I glared at her. How could she be so stupid?
“We always liked you, Jordyn.”
“Child, please? We? I’ve been here since you were still sucking your thumb.” Okay, she wasn’t that young. But still.
Monique poured half the bottle of a luscious liquid soap onto a sponge. “Don’t call me child, old woman.”
“What are you, eighteen, twenty? Aleksandr is sixty-eight.”
“Nineteen.”
Almost a decade younger than my twenty-nine. I darn near moaned when she scrubbed my back with the sponge. “Well, do you consider Aleksandr old?”
“No.”
Now, I mirrored her eye roll, which I wasn’t fond of since the last time someone rolled their eyes at me, I promised to snatch them out. No, I wasn’t a hypocrite. I was hungry, and I forgot my loathe of fluttering lashes. “Tsk. I’m an old woman, but you don’t consider Aleksandr old. In our world, men have a longer life expectancy; thus, he’s younger, ratio-wise. Makes sense.”
“Don’t be so sarcastic, Jordyn.” She gestured for me to raise my arm. Monique scrubbed my pits, and it felt so good that I didn’t mind the teenage diva and her blabbing. “Your new owner, I’ve never heard of him. Rocket. I guess it ain’t as bad as the Bratva’s cleaner. Creepy m—”
I plunged myself under the water again, more curious about Aleksandr’s connection to Rocket than anything Monique had to say. This couldn’t be a return-to-sender type of thing. My last encounter with him? Heck, I was younger than Monique. Fifteen. He was twenty, maybe? A few years older than me, and I was convinced he was Rosemary’s Baby. After a year in his presence, I should’ve looked Aleksandr’s age. I did two hard years with Rocket. During a mission to re-up his weapons supply, my munitions knowledge caught the attention of an arms dealer Rocket worked with, commencing my international travels.
As I continued to hold myself under, the last bit of oxygen in my mouth bubbled out, tickling my nose.
“You’re not funny, Jordyn! Get up.”
Nah. I’d survived him once. Could I do it again? With that question, my lungs punched my chest.
Monique tried to pull me up from beneath the water. She tugged, pulled, and scratched at my arm. One scratch, though, as if she thought better of harming someone else’s property. “Help! Jordyn needs helpppp!” Monique’s cry echoed along the hot, sudsy water.
Nope. I just needed this to end. As my lungs fought for survival, my mind reiterated its request.
Could I survive Rocket again? My heart ached with the resounding answer. No. Ah, if I were a trading card, they’d have placed me in a keepsake glass box. Shined me. Treated me good. So not the case. I would tear my lungs to shreds in this watery grave rather than become the property of Edgar Flanagan, a.k.a. Rocket, again.