“He always gets his way,” Mari finished. “He’s right, Cami. He’ll torture you, I’ll give in, and my little rebellion will be for nothing.”
Cami glanced at her sharply. “It isn’t for nothing, Mari. We’re a team and we provide for one another. It’s what we were taught and how we work.”
Mari turned away to hide her sudden desire to smile. Cami was good, feeding Whitney’s ego. Of course he’d love to hear how the training he’d given them all was working. They were a team, and as a team, they looked out for one another. He would feel elated by that, as if he had brainwashed them into such loyalty they would endure anything for one another. He was so vain, had such a huge ego, it was the one weapon they could use against him. They were all careful to use it sparingly, but they pulled it out when they wanted to defuse a situation.
Whitney always used their deep affection for one another against them. He tried to point out that it was a weakness, that they should be a unit without the emotional attachment to one another. He told them that they would be stronger, and he was probably right in some ways. If they had adhered to his philosophy, he wouldn’t be able to use them against each other.
“Cami is ready to take your punishment, Mari,” Whitney said. There was no inflection in his voice, but when he looked at her, his eyes shone with a fanatical glee. He enjoyed these moments—the decisions they had to make. It was all very interesting to him to see how far they would go for one another.
Mari’s stomach rolled. She would have to find a way to endure the humiliation. It was all part of the dehumanizing process. Treat them like lab specimens, and not only the doctors and guards, but the women, would begin to view themselves as objects.
She swallowed the bile rising in her throat. She could face hand-to-hand combat, being shot, could run for miles, and be dropped in the middle of enemy territory, and not flinch—but this, this was her own personal hell. She backed up until her legs hit the table.
“It’s going to be all right,” Sean said softly as he caught her arm and drew it over to the strap. “You know I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
She didn’t look at him. “How many times have you been stripped na**d and examined in front of the world, Sean?” she asked.
“I know you two are whispering,” Whitney reprimanded. “That’s not permitted.”
“He was calling me an idiot,” Mari said. She laid back, trying not to look as hopeless as she felt. Where are you? Do you even care? And that’s what was so utterly stupid. He probably didn’t care. They’d had sex. Great sex, but still sex. It wasn’t love. He didn’t know her enough to love her. She didn’t even know what love was. Maybe there wasn’t such a thing. He was probably hundreds of miles away. She reached out anyway, because she had to find a way to get through this.
Of course you don’t care. Why would you? It isn’t like we’re the kind of people in the movies. It was sex. Only sex and nothing else. She squeezed her eyes tightly closed as they locked the leather straps over her wrists and ankles. Sean pulled off the gown and left her exposed to the bright lights, Prauder’s leer, and Whitney’s dead eyes.
Chapter 13
Mari would not cry. She would never give Peter Whitney the satisfaction. She heard Sean’s swift intake of breath and knew he was looking at the marks on the insides of her thighs and br**sts, virtually all over her body. Could it be any more humiliating? Cami was still in the room. They were all staring at her. She could hear the whir of the camera and the distinct click as the doctor took photographic evidence. It was like a vile p**n ographic film with her as the star.
“Are those teeth marks?” Sean burst out. “The bastard attacked her.”
“Sean, if you cannot simply observe in silence, call in another guard,” Whitney snapped. “Men display sexual passion in all sorts of ways. This is an interesting puzzle. Now stay quiet so I can process.”
Cami touched Mari’s hand in an effort to comfort her. A fresh flood of tears burned behind Mari’s eyelids, and she struggled to hold back, to keep her face composed when she needed to go to pieces.
“I think we can dispense with Camellia’s presence. Take her back to her room.” There was an edge to Whitney’s voice, as if his patience had worn thin.
The doctor began talking into his recorder, a slow and thorough description of every inch of her body. It was a dispassionate, clinical narrative that only served to make the situation seem worse.
She felt breath along her neck, a whisper of a touch against her throat. Screw them, Mari. Think about me. Think about us. I can take you far away from that room and those dirty old men. It’s probably the only way they can get off, having a woman tied down and exposed to them that way. You’re so beautiful they’re too afraid to touch you, which is a damn good thing right now. I’d have to kill them and that means blowing the big plan. Now, if I tied you down, I wouldn’t be sounding like a dead reptile, I’d be so f**king hot I’d probably disgrace myself. And I probably shouldn’t have used the word blow. Hell, woman, I can’t even think about you without getting the hard-on from hell.
Ken’s voice slid into her mind, a teasing whisper that made her want to laugh.
She struggled to keep the energy only on one single path, away from all the others, but even if they detected it, they would suspect she was communicating with the other women. Can you really take me away from this room while they’re doing this?
Ken rested his head on his arm. What could he give her to hang on to while Whitney and his pathetic doctor tortured her? There would be a reckoning, but it wasn’t going to be today. Their team had to be in place. Now that they’d uncovered the devil’s lair, they had to come up with a plan to get the women out alive. Whitney wouldn’t hesitate to kill them and destroy all evidence of his research. Ken had no doubt that the entire compound was wired to blow should they be discovered.
Ken? Her voice was unsteady. His anger was beating at her, pounding in her head the way it was pounding in his.
Sorry, baby, I just focused a little too much on your situation.
They couldn’t just go in there with guns blazing—but Peter Whitney, in spite of everything that Lily had said, needed to die. He couldn’t be allowed to continue with his vile experiments. He could only imagine how Mari felt. This place had been her home, that man her only steady guide, and yet she was treated the way Ekabela had treated him. Stripping him naked, dehumanizing him, stripping him of pride and decency and reducing him to less than an animal.