by I. T. Lucas
“Oh, my God,” one of the girls whimpered.
“What do you mean purchased us?” the brave one asked even though he saw understanding dawn in her eyes.
“We’ve been monitoring his activity for a while now. He tempts pretty girls like you to come on board and party, then sells them to sex-slavers.”
She glanced at the shocked expressions of her friends and shook her head. “I can’t believe we were that stupid. What were we thinking? We were on vacation in Cabos, a little getaway to celebrate the end of finals week, and this really handsome guy invited us to his yacht, and we thought nothing of it…”
Naturally, they had been under Alex’s thrall.
The fact that these were college girls, not sixteen- or seventeen-year-olds, was a huge relief. Anandur thanked the merciful fates.
“He drugged you. That’s why you didn’t question anything and followed him without thinking, and he kept drugging you while you were on board.” Onegus gave them a plausible explanation. “Look around you. Do you have a purse with you? Luggage? Would you have followed these men you thought were your boyfriends without a purse, a phone, a passport, or some other form of identification?”
The girls exchanged glances, then shook their heads, the horrifying realization dawning on their young faces and leaching the color out of them.
The one who had done all the talking was the first one to bounce back. “So you’re from the government? Like the FBI?”
Onegus shook his head. “We are a secret private organization dedicated to stopping this horrendous trade.” Minute by minute, Onegus’s calm tone was melting away the girls’ anxiety.
Anandur watched the stress leave their faces. The leader who’d asked the questions even got up and sat on the bed, and then the other three joined her.
Onegus was doing a wonderful job, his gentle thrall unraveling Alex’s and adding a hefty dose of reassurance.
“Here.” He handed the leader a few sheets of paper and a pen. “Write your names and home addresses, and these guys out there will take you home.”
She took the papers and handed them out. “Are you going to accompany us?” she asked hopefully.
“I wish I could, but we still need to apprehend the yacht owner and bring him to justice.”
The girl smiled for the first time. “Good luck. And if you need me to testify against him, I’ll be happy to.”
“Thank you, we might call on you, but we probably won't need to. We already have enough evidence to put him away for eternity.”
And wasn’t that the truth—eternity having a whole different meaning in Alex’s case.
Chapter 40: Losham
Nothing helped Losham’s melancholy. Not the pretty girls, not their soft hands on his body, not even their gasps and their moans and their whimpers.
The only time he felt like doing anything at all was when he was plotting revenge. And the more he plotted, the more ambitious in scope his plotting became. His father, the exalted Navuh, would be very happy with him. For once, Losham’s need for revenge aligned with Navuh’s ultimate goal of world domination.
Losham had used to scoff at his father’s grandiose ambitions, not to his face, naturally. Navuh wouldn’t have executed him, he was too valuable, but a beating and prolonged torture were a given.
He often wondered if Sharim had inherited his deviant tastes from his grandfather. Navuh’s private harem was inaccessible even to his sons, ensuring no one knew what went on in there. For all Losham knew, his father could’ve been even worse than Sharim.
Navuh’s offspring hadn't been raised by their mothers. The five sons he’d fathered had been taken care of by nursemaids and tutors. The daughters had been given into the care and tutelage of the other Dormants.
To father Dormant sons who could later transition into immortality, Navuh’s private harem must’ve been comprised of immortal females, and not ordinary Dormants who had been turned by Navuh either, but the daughters of gods. Navuh’s five sons possessed abilities almost as powerful as their father, which meant that they were of much purer blood than the rest of the men whose genetics had been diluted by generations of breeding with humans.
Losham would’ve loved to have known his mother. If she was still alive, that is, and hadn’t been executed for displeasing his father in some fashion. Losham must’ve inherited his brilliant mind from her. Navuh was smart, but not nearly as smart as Losham.
Sitting in the antechamber to his father’s reception hall, Losham glanced at the huge portrait of Navuh. His father cut an imposing figure, and it was on Losham’s advice that he had it hung there and not in his private residence as had been his original intention.
Anyone cooling his heels in the waiting area was forced to look at the intimidating male who seemed to be staring at them from the canvas. Combined with the long wait, by the time they were admitted, they were properly subdued.
Obviously the portrait had no effect on Losham, and he didn’t mind sitting and waiting for hours until his father deigned to see him.
That form of humiliation didn’t work on him either.
Navuh could pretend all he wanted that he was too busy for an audience with Losham, his top adviser, but Losham knew exactly what the despot was doing behind the imposing double doors.
Absolutely nothing.
Losham, on the other hand, had everything he needed to keep working while appearing inactive and resigned. The gears in his brain kept turning at an uncommon speed, while his memory ensured that none of his conclusions was ever forgotten. Everything was stored and organized in the appropriate compartments.
A side door opened and Navuh’s secretary emerged, but he knew the guy hadn’t come to escort him in. Losham hadn’t been waiting long enough.
The secretary bowed his head. “His Excellency, Lord Navuh, is very busy today. He will see you as soon as he can.” The man bowed again and scurried back through the side entrance to the reception room; the one dedicated for servant use.
Up until Sharim’s untimely demise, Losham hadn’t been interested in taking over the world of humans. There was no need, no real gain to be had, just a lot of headache and additional work. It was better to be the puppeteer and manipulate the human leaders to do the work for him.
History was abundant with various despots who had striven to achieve that goal, but even though some of them had commanded armies of hundreds of thousands of soldiers, ultimately they had all been defeated.
Contrary to popular belief, what humans referred to as good usually triumphed over what they referred to as evil.
What those despots had lacked, though, was an adviser as brilliant as Losham. He wasn’t presumptuous, nor was his ego overinflated. He’d known most of those leaders and their closest lackeys personally. Some had been highly intelligent, but Losham was in a league of his own.
His biggest asset, though, something none of them had had the luxury of, was time.
He could plot and plan then plot and plan again, setting things in motion, then sit back and wait to see his machinations come to fruition.
And that was his second biggest asset—patience.
An asset the great Navuh lacked.
That was why his father would not approve of Losham’s plan unless he presented it with a slight variation: The estimated timeline.
Losham wanted Annani and her spawn gone, eradicated, and whatever they’d given the humans destroyed, annihilated.
It wasn’t logical. He’d run through the scenarios of possible outcomes, and none of them were good. In fact, destroying Annani and humanity’s technological and social achievements was detrimental to the Brotherhood’s future. The new technology and global communication made life much easier, even for Doomers.
Destroying it served no other purpose than the need for revenge.
The side door opened and Navuh’s secretary emerged, his robe flying behind him as he rushed over. “Our exalted leader will grant you an audience now, but Lord Navuh regrets to inform you that he can spa
re only ten minutes of his valuable time.”
It was the same nonsense every time; a posturing Navuh apparently couldn’t do without. Not even once had his father cut their meetings short. He was too smart not to listen to everything his best advisor had to say.
Instead of rolling his eyes, Losham assumed a respectful expression and bowed his head. “Our Lord’s wishes must be obeyed. I’ll keep it brief.”
Chapter 41: Anandur
“Ready?” Onegus asked, his voice coming out of the speaker inside Anandur’s headset. The helicopter pilot had switched to silent mode almost immediately after takeoff, but it was still pretty noisy in the cabin.
They hadn’t followed the boat until it became late enough for Alex to be asleep, and with international waters only twelve nautical miles or so from the coast, it meant that the Anna had passed that line hours ago.
The high altitude of the drone following it ensured that even immortal ears couldn’t detect it by sound. The helicopter’s silent mode, however, wasn’t silent enough. If awake, Alex would hear it, and the mission would be compromised. The moment he realized that he was under attack, the jerk would use the crew as a shield.
Anandur didn’t know the guy well, but anyone who could sell people into sexual slavery wouldn’t hesitate to snap a woman’s neck; which meant a long swim. The pilot was keeping the craft steady about three nautical miles away from the yacht.
Fortunately, the water was warm.
“Ready,” he replied.
Onegus went first, rappelling down and jumping the few remaining feet into the water. Anandur went next. Given the mild temperature they’d decided to forgo wetsuits, which would’ve restricted their movements. Now that he was in the water, Anandur regretted not putting at least a sleeveless top on. The straps holding his equipment secured to his back chafed like a son of a bitch.
Onegus was a powerful swimmer, but so was Anandur, and it took discipline not to turn this into a competition. It reminded him of the trek up the mountain not so long ago, when Kian and Andrew had butted heads about Kian rushing ahead of the humans who couldn’t keep up. Shockingly, Anandur had been the one to talk sense into those two. A lot had happened since. Funny how centuries could pass with nothing significant happening, not as far as the clan’s future, that is, and then suddenly everything was changing at an unbelievable pace.
An hour later they caught up to the boat.
With practically no wind, and waters as calm as could be, they were banking on the captain engaging the autopilot and going to sleep. The boat’s slow speed was a good indication that that was indeed the case.
The good news was that there were no lights in the common areas or the other rooms on this side of the yacht. Hopefully, both the crew and Alex were sleeping in their own beds and not having an orgy at his cabin.
Not a far-fetched scenario according to Amanda.
She’d been their main source of information about the crew and their habits, as well as the yacht and its layout. After searching the boat from top to bottom, looking for the drugs she’d suspected Alex of smuggling, Amanda was well familiar with where everything was and who slept where and with whom.
Anandur unstrapped the grappling hook launcher and glanced at Onegus who had done the same. The hooks were going to make noise; there was no way around it. They had seconds to get to Alex before he grabbed a crewmember.
Onegus nodded and pointed his launcher up toward the railing. “On three. One. Two. Three.” They shot at the same time, their hooks clunking noisily against the metal railing. Damn, unless the scumbag slept like a dead man, there was no way he hadn’t heard that.
Anandur gripped the rope and climbed faster than a monkey, arriving a second ahead of Onegus. This time, he wasn’t straining his muscles to the extreme in competition with his superior, and the prize wasn’t satisfaction over winning. He was competing against time, and the prize was getting the crew out alive.
Their bare feet made hardly any noise as they ran toward Alex’s cabin, arriving within seconds at his door. As planned Anandur burst in, while Onegus covered him with a throwing knife in each hand.
“Fuck, Alex isn’t in his bed,” Anandur gritted before running for the bathroom, his heart pounding in his chest not from exertion but fear. Alex must’ve grabbed whoever had been sleeping with him and dragged her in there.
But there was no one in the bathroom either.
Could he have slipped Turner’s watch and stayed in Acapulco?
Alex could’ve done so easily if he’d suspected their presence, thralling whomever he’d bumped into to forget he’d ever seen him. He’d pulled a similar trick with the private investigator in Marina Del Rey.
“Not in the closet,” Onegus said.
“Not in the bathroom either.”
Damn, the possibility of Alex giving them the slip was gaining credence. Nevertheless, the safety of the crew demanded they ascertained Alex wasn’t on board first.
“Fucking hell, I wish we could split up,” Anandur said as they left the owner’s suite. One could rush to Geneva’s cabin on the upper deck, while the other to the crew quarters on the lower deck. But assuming Alex had a gun, they needed to cover for one another. A bullet in the right place might give Alex enough time to either escape or deliver death with a blade. Working together, one of them could take the bullet while the other jumped Alex.
“Geneva first,” Onegus said and broke into a sprint. It made sense. Her cabin was the closest.
Again, Onegus covered while Anandur burst through… and was greeted by a barrel of a gun. But it wasn’t Alex who was pointing the thing at his heart. It was a blurry-eyed Captain Geneva. Sitting in bed and clasping the weapon with two steady hands, she meant business—provided her ancient Russian handgun would actually fire. The thing belonged in a museum.
“Put the gun down, Geneva. We can’t find Alex. Is he on board?”
For a second or two, her eyes traveled the length of his mostly bare body, still wet and dripping water on the carpet, then shifted and gave Onegus the same once-over. She shook her head. “Anandur, you shit-head, we thought you weren’t coming.”
“I’ll explain later. First, answer my question.”
She waved the gun, and both he and Onegus instinctively ducked. “Of course he is here, where would he be?”
“You sure he didn’t slip out and stayed in Acapulco?”
“Pfft, if he did, then he is still swimming. He was here before I went to bed.”
“Fuck, let’s go, Onegus.”
“Where are you going?” she called after them.
“We need to find him before he grabs one of the crew and uses her as a bargaining chip,” Anandur answered while grabbing the handrail on the glass staircase and using it to swing himself to the level below, then repeating the same move to descend another level. Onegus was right there with him as they ran to the first crew cabin and burst through the door.
Two startled women jumped out of bed, and a moment later the rest of the crew rushed out into the hallway, gawking at the two half-naked, wet men.
“Anandur!” Lana called and threw herself into his arms, kissing him on both cheeks. “You came.” Then she scowled. “Two days late!” and she delivered a slap that would’ve knocked out a human.
He caught her hand as she prepared to deliver another one. “You can beat me up later. First, we need to find the scumbag. He is either swimming toward shore or hiding here somewhere.”
Light footsteps running down the stairs had everyone whip their heads around, but it was just the barefoot Geneva, still clutching her gun.
“You found him?” she asked.
“He is not here.” Damn, they had a problem. If he was still on board, hiding somewhere, Alex could sneak up and grab one of the girls while Onegus and Anandur searched for him. And telling them to get into one room and lock the door wouldn’t help either, not unless it was reinforced.
Anandur cast a glance at Onegus, who was probably thinking the same thing. “We
need to call the chopper and have them airlifted.”
Brilliant idea, but someone had to take the yacht back to the harbor, and neither he nor Onegus had ever driven a boat like this. Give him an oar, and he could row with the best of them, but this modern day behemoth was too complicated to figure out on his own.
Geneva snorted. “I’m not leaving. I’m the captain.”
Anandur cocked a brow at Onegus. “What do you think?”
“That the chopper can take only five. I thought they could maybe squeeze together, but I think there would be a weight problem.”
The Russians weren’t small women. Tall and heavily muscled, they probably weighed the same as average-sized males—Marta possibly more.
“Okay, Geneva, you stay, but the three of us stick together, understood?”
Her lips forming a tight line, she nodded. “He is just one man,” she said, but he heard the uncertainty in her voice. The woman was too smart not to notice Alex’s peculiarities. She knew something was up with him, just not exactly what.
Onegus hailed the helicopter pilot and relayed the plan. The women would be taken to Acapulco and wait for Geneva to bring the boat back, hopefully with none of them hurt and Alex subdued.
The women got dressed and were ready to go faster than Anandur expected, and as the group emerged on the upper deck, the chopper was already hovering above with the rope dangling down and dragging over the wooden planks.
“Can you climb the rope, or do you need to be pulled?”
The women were athletic, but rope climbing required a lot of upper body strength. If they couldn’t, he would have to go first and pull them up one by one, then go down again, which would leave Onegus and those waiting below exposed.
Lana harrumphed. “Watch.” She jumped up and grabbed the rope high, letting it fall on the outside of her leg then stepping on it using the opposite foot to anchor it. Her weight distributed between her arms and her feet, she climbed at an admirable speed.
