She swept Cain’s trophies from the table with her forearm and they were distributed in a horrifying pattern on the floor.
‘Would you just look at the mess you’ve made,’ Cain said, as if he was scolding a child.
‘You are sick!’
‘You’ll be sicker,’ Cain said. ‘Pick them up.’
‘No.’
‘I said to pick them up.’
‘No. I won’t touch the filthy things!’
Cain placed both hands on his hips. ‘Hmmm. Then we have a problem.’
Jennifer didn’t see him move before he’d snapped his left hand around her wrist and dragged her forward. He was already drawing his Bowie knife before self-preservation kicked in and she tried to flinch away. She screamed, understanding what he intended, and tried to wrench Cain’s grip loose, but she might as well have been attempting to rip a tree up by its roots. Cain shook her savagely. ‘Sit still,’ he snapped.
Baron swayed in the wings as he watched with fascination. Cain glanced over at him. ‘Get over here, Baron, and hold her down while I replenish my stock.’
Baron took hold of Jennifer’s other arm. Jennifer hollered, tried to fight the men, but all she achieved was a laugh from Cain. He bore down on her arm, crushing it to the tabletop. Then he guided the Bowie to her fingers. Jennifer scrunched her hand in a tight fist, but it was no deterrent to Cain. He jabbed the tip of his knife between the knuckles of her index and ring fingers and instinctively her hand shot open. Cain transferred his grip, holding her hand flat as he positioned the cutting edge of his knife over the second joint of her little finger. ‘Are you afraid yet?’
Jennifer screeched. She bucked and squirmed in their grasp. Both men grinned.
‘I see some things do make you happy?’ Cain said and Baron winked back at him.
‘You like pain, huh, Baron?’ Cain switched his attention back to the woman. ‘What about you, Jennifer? Do you like pain?’
Cain grunted as he pressed down on the blade, and Jennifer’s eyes widened in disbelief as the tip of her finger shot away from her trailing a thin ribbon of blood. ‘Oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, my God! ’
‘As good as sex, eh?’ Cain said, retrieving the dismembered joint and stuffing it in the plastic bag. ‘Pity we didn’t have the cameras rolling, we’d have been an instant hit on You Tube!’ Jennifer doubled her efforts to escape, but Cain wouldn’t release her hand. He placed the knife over her second finger. ‘One down, nine to go.’
‘Let me go!’ Jennifer went wild, and even made it out of her chair, Cain struggling to control her until he swung the Bowie towards her face. The tip slid into the flesh just below her right eye, and the pain was enough to halt her in her tracks. She stood, her chest heaving, but it wasn’t for fear of being blinded.
‘Do anything you want to me,’ she said. Her voice was an octave below menacing. ‘But where’s the bait for your trap then?’
Cain loosened his grip, nodding at Baron to also let go. Jennifer slumped in the chair, cradling her injured hand. Blood trickled from the stump, pooling in the cup of her palm, but it went unnoticed by both men.
Her release wasn’t a show of pity. Cain had heard something even over the din in the galley.
The bland-faced man had heard it too.
‘Gunfire.’ Baron grinned, looking like a leering sideshow freak.
Cain addressed Jennifer. ‘Get up, and no goddamn nonsense this time.’
Jennifer’s face was an empty plane formed from shock.
‘You said that Joe Hunter would come,’ Cain said. ‘It seems you were right, after all. Let’s go up on deck and meet him, shall we?’
Chapter 41
We took it easy as we descended into the bowels of the ship. I took point, with Hartlaub moving slowly behind me, watching back the way we’d come. He had his gun in a two-handed grip, pointing it at every shadow. I chose to carry my gun propped against my hip, a preferred method for shooting in confined spaces. At each landing, we opted to continue down. If Jenny was being held, it would be far from prying eyes and ears. The first two decks were mainly given over to work space, and I believed that Cain — or whoever was in charge of the ship — would want his prisoner nearer the crew quarters where she could be kept an eye on.
‘Hunter. Over here.’
Hartlaub was peering through a porthole in a door. His whisper was very low, but his words held enough urgency to send a chill down my spine. I looked through the dirty glass at what lay within. Even in the dimness I could make out the forms of bodies stacked in the otherwise empty room.
Dear God, no!
I pulled open the door and stepped inside, fearing the worst. The coppery smell of congealing blood made the air viscous. Now that I was inside, I relaxed. The bodies were all male. There was no need to check to see if any of them had survived, because as well as bullet and knife wounds, they’d had fingers and toes removed and none of them still bled. A man with epaulettes at the shoulders of his once-white shirt had had his throat opened up, but his killer hadn’t stopped there. The shirt had been ripped open and I could see a deep cleft in his chest where a rib had been carved out. That was all the proof I needed that Tubal Cain was up to his old ways.
Hartlaub muttered under his breath, and I hushed him with an upraised hand. Gesturing him back out of the room, I hurried after him. Outside in the corridor I leaned close to his ear. ‘It’s Cain all right. But at least Jenny isn’t in there. We still have a chance.’
‘This Cain’s a real piece of work.’
‘He’s a monster.’
He nodded sharply, swung his head to peer along the corridor. We’d both heard a cacophony of high-pitched screams emanating from further back towards the rear of the ship. Hartlaub took a step in that direction, but I rushed past him, taking the lead.
We came to the cargo hold that we’d forgone when on the top deck and entered it warily. It was an open space that echoed to our footsteps, and groaned with the movement of the ship. I almost fancied that the ship was a living breathing thing. We traversed the hold, heading directly for a door at the far side. We hadn’t reached it when we heard more screams. But closer to us were the voices of men. They spoke foreign languages, Russian being the dominant one. Having been a soldier after the Cold War, I wasn’t schooled in Russian, but I’d learned enough in my time to judge that the men were almost as disturbed by the screaming as I was. That didn’t make them my friends, but I wondered how much these men were involved in Cain’s schemes and if they deserved to die. Fuck ’em, I decided, they were human-trafficking scum all the same.
Plus, they were between me and saving my loved ones.
I spurred across the hold to the door and eased it open.
Directly outside was another stairwell, one that must have exited via those sheds I’d earlier discarded as a way inside. Above me on the stairs were two men, hauling armfuls of computer equipment. As long as they continued upwards, they weren’t a barrier to us, but it looked like both men had paused there, waiting as they discussed the screaming which came from farther back in the ship. Every second they stood there, Jenny was suffering. I came out the door, drawing my Ka-bar, intending finishing them in silence.
I took the first step gently, but both men must have felt my presence and they turned my way. I could still get to them, take them down, and their deaths would be covered by Jenny’s screams.
The problem was, in my urgency, I’d missed the third man on the stairs below. He too was carrying something — a case of some kind — but in his other hand he held a gun.
‘ Derzhite yego!’ the man yelled. I didn’t need a translator to tell me he was commanding me to hold it, but his next words were lost in the rush of action. ‘ Kto ty? Chto vy zdes’ delaete? ’
Hartlaub was an undercover CIA agent; his grasp of Russian was better than mine. He said, ‘We’re here to kill all you pricks!’
Everything went to hell. The two above me dropped their loads, going for concealed weapons inside their jackets at the same time as the first swung his gun towards Hartlaub. Shit! I’d wanted to do them quietly.
