Broken Dreams (Delos Series Book 4)

by Lindsay McKenna

  “Don’t knock her out,” the General growled. “I want to see her reaction when you give her your famous pelvic exam.”

  The doctor shrugged. He picked up a vial containing the drug, pulling a certain amount into the syringe. “Very well. You’re a voyeur, so I’ll let you watch. But don’t try to tell me how much of a drug to give her. I know what I’m doing.”

  “This is one time I wish I were a physician,” the General said, chuckling darkly.

  Alexa heard his voice close to her. Dread grated on her raw nerves. Terrified, she saw him slowly walk around and stand beside her so she could see him, his hands on his hips. He smiled at her, eyes glittering with interest, as he slowly looked her up and down.

  “Get her drugged!” the General snapped. “She’s already been bought, and the owner doesn’t want any damage done to her.”

  “Stop bothering her and I will.”

  He looked down at Alexa. “Now, Number 2507, you must calm down. You’ll end up with bruises on every limb from trying to rip your arms and legs off this gurney as I continue my examination of you. I can’t have that. This shot will settle you down and make it easier for me to do my job.”

  Crying out, choking, Alexa felt the bite of the needle into her upper left arm. She wanted to escape. Run!

  “Stop frightening the merchandise, please,” the doctor scolded him mildly.

  The General shrugged. “I’d buy her myself, but she’d be the kind to find a knife and castrate me sooner or later.” He grinned, a chuckle rumbling up through his chest. “Let’s see how she likes the rest of your very thorough examination, doctor.” He laughed softly, as if it were an inside joke known only to him and the doctor. “It’s a good thing I brought her to heel with my belt earlier. She’d have been wild right now without the beating.”

  Whatever was in the needle, Alexa suddenly felt as if her body belonged to someone else. She tried to lift her fingers and curl them, but she could no longer even do that. Languor spread throughout her body, her muscles relaxing, and she was unable to move.

  “Well,” the doctor said primly, sitting down on a stool between her opened legs, “I’m not so sure it has helped at all. You’d better hope those bruises on her back are gone by the time you deliver her to the buyer.” She felt the doctor’s gloved hand on one of her thighs. Terror raced through her.

  Alexa heard them talking about her as if she weren’t there. Humiliation twisted through her and she kept sobbing, trying to move, but her body refused to obey. Her mind was clear, and she felt every invasion, every painful contraction of her body reacting violently to the cruel assault as he examined her.

  She gasped for breath, black dots dancing in front of her eyes. The doctor was talking as if what he was doing was routine. More tears streaked down her cheeks as she saw the General smile at her, revenge in his expression. Nausea rolled through her.

  “Just another minute and I’ll be done,” the doctor called to Alexa. He gave more information to his assistant.

  “What a nice bedside manner you have, doctor,” the General said wryly.

  The doctor glared at him. “My examination of her is going to seem mild in comparison to what this client is going to do to her when he receives her.”

  He pulled off the gloves and picked up a new pair, snapping them on.

  The General chuckled, nodding.

  The assistant released Alexa’s wrists from the leather cuffs and the doctor removed the straps from around her ankles and waist and released the tight, soft leather across her brow. Suddenly, Alexa was free, but she couldn’t move! She was a puppet with no muscles. She grunted in frustration, closing her eyes, not even able to clench her teeth.

  Her tears wouldn’t stop. Tears of outrage leaked from her eyes from being assaulted with no way to fight back to protect herself and her body. Alexa was so drugged she couldn’t put words together to curse these monsters. Instead, all she could do was moan and whimper with frustration and anguish.

  The doctor was satisfied with his exam. “It’s over now, you can relax. You’re better than most, I’ll give you that.” He looked over at the men. “Lay her on her belly. I’m finished.”

  Dull, roiling pain drifted up into Alexa’s abdomen, making her choke and sob. Her arms hung over the gurney as they laid her down on her belly, straightening out her legs. Whimpers of agony tore from her lips. She emitted a low, tortured sound as she shut her eyes tightly in a vain attempt to control her tears of rage and pain.

  He gave the exam information to a young man with a clipboard who rapidly wrote down his findings.

  Alexa’s tears of outrage wouldn’t stop spilling from her eyes. She had been sexually assaulted, with no way to fight back or protect herself. All she could do was moan and whimper as pain continued to throb throughout her lower body. She wished her mind wasn’t as razor-sharp as it was, because she never, ever wanted to remember this time in her life.

  “Send that information to the client,” the doctor ordered. “I’ll have test results on the slides for him by tomorrow morning. I will see if they come back clear and she has no sexual diseases. On a scale of one to ten, Number 2507 is a healthy female in every way. And she hasn’t had sexual relations in, I would say, a year.” He smiled a little. “So, on a scale of one to ten, she’s an eight out of ten, which most American females never attain.”

  The assistant nodded, quickly filling in the chart blanks, and hurriedly left the cave.

  He glanced over at the General. “I need to move to the next cave, where the next number is strapped down and drugged, so I can fully examine her. Let’s give Number 2507 a brief respite, shall we? She’s not going to have any peace ever again after you transport her over the border tomorrow. That drug will start wearing off in about thirty minutes. I’d advise ordering a soldier in here to keep an eye on her as she comes out of it.”

  “I will. I’ll meet you in the next examination room. I’m enjoying this immensely, doctor.”

  The doctor smiled thinly. “And why wouldn’t you?”

  Alexa closed her eyes, her breathing raspy as she fought the drug in her bloodstream. She was finally alone in the cave. Nausea rolled through her as her entire abdomen cramped with pain.

  As she lay there, the agony in her anal area began to slowly subside. But her back was hurting so much she couldn’t stop a moan from tearing from her lips. Who knew a thick leather belt felt so awful? The pain, an awful stinging burning sensation, continued to lap through her.

  Her mind went back to children she’d known who had been beaten by their father with a belt to punish them. At that time, Alexa couldn’t relate to what they’d gone through.

  She shivered. It was cold in the cave. The drug was beginning to slowly wear off Alexa closed her eyes. She could weakly flex her fingers, but that was all.

  Another soldier arrived, throwing a black wool burka next to her head. “Get dressed!” he said in thick, stilted English.

  Alexa felt the warmth of the wool near her shoulder where he’d thrown it. Gage flashed through her mind—his smile, the warmth in his eyes—and she tried to hold on to that. Alexa desperately needed a small corner of comfort right now, anything to feel safe.

  She wanted Gage to remain, but he vanished behind her closed eyes. Then she saw her mother and father. Would she ever see any of them again? She was being sold to a monster that killed his sex slaves somewhere in Pakistan. She would be raped, beaten, and forced into subhuman submission. Terror moved through her as she saw again the General’s wrathful expression as he came at her, wrapping the belt around his large fist.

  He’d enjoyed hurting her.

  A sob wrenched from Alexa, and she began to weep. She was alone.

  Abandoned.

  And there was no help coming. Tomorrow, the doctor had said, she would be leaving this cave—she was now a number, she had become nameless. She was considered someone’s property, no longer a human being worthy of respect or equality. She would never be found by her family.

&n
bsp; They’d never know what happened to her.

  Oh, God . . .

  CHAPTER 11

  Alexa was slowly able to get her body to move over the next half hour. She was finally able to sit up and pull the burka of rough, scratchy wool over her body. She heard the cries and screams of other women drifting down the tunnel. The doctor was doing his examination on another helpless victim. And it didn’t stop. Just as she managed to slide off the examination table, her bare feet hitting the dusty cave floor, another woman was brought into her cave between two soldiers, sobbing hysterically.

  Alexa managed to stagger out of the way as they forced the woman onto the table where she’d been lying. Now she got to see what they’d done to her. The woman tried to fight, but the two men were strong and quickly cuffed her wrists, strapping her heels into the metal stirrups. Alexa was numb, feeling nothing. She managed to hug the wall of the cave, wanting to do something . . . anything . . . to protect this woman, but was unable to do so as her piteous cries continued.

  No, help was not on its way. And Alexa hated herself, because she didn’t have the strength to lunge at the soldiers to grab a pistol and take action. Drool was still leaking out of the corners of her mouth from the effects of the drug, and she shakily wiped it away. They placed the waist strap around the woman and then the tight one across her brow. Her cries turned to rasps and whimpers as she struggled.

  The doctor returned with his assistant. He glanced at Alexa, now sagging against the wall.

  “Get her back to her cage!” he snapped at the soldiers.

  They grabbed Alexa’s arms. Her legs refused to work, and as much as she tried to walk, they ended up dragging her most of the way. She saw that half the cages were empty. The women who were left in them had heard the others’ cries and screams, their faces frozen, eyes wide with anxiety. Alexa felt sorry for them. They didn’t know what was coming.

  The soldiers pushed her back into her cell and she fell to her hands and knees, the thick, warm wool burka tangling around her lower legs. She had no more than sat down at the rear of her cage when another soldier came and threw her a pair of red slippers, telling her to put them on.

  *

  Terror ate away at Alexa. She had no idea what time it was, but she had come out of her drugged stupor. A soldier tossed her two more bottles of water. Later, another soldier came bearing a tray of food, sliding it into her cage.

  The slippers felt wonderful on her cold feet. The smell of the thick soup in a huge clay pot made her mouth water. Alexa hadn’t eaten anything since being captured; her stomach was now tight and growling, demanding food.

  She felt more of her strength returning and slowly eased to her hands and knees. The wooden tray held a crock of pottery that contained the soup. Huge chunks of bread sat nearby. Her hands shook as she crouched over the tray and jammed the bread into her mouth. Closing her eyes, Alexa groaned, chewing, gulping, and then tearing off another chunk from the loaf.

  Oh, no! More screams. More terrified shrieks. Cries for help. The tunnel echoed with them over and over again, and Alexa felt pulverized by the torture she knew these women were undergoing. It was one continuous unfolding nightmare with no end in site.

  Her mind was beginning to clear, and as she crouched, drinking the salty, hot soup filled with vegetables and thick chunks of lamb, she recalled the conversations going on around her. She had been sold for two million dollars to a rich man somewhere in Pakistan. Sold to a depraved monster. And the sex slaves he bought usually died within two months of coming under his control. She pushed hair away from her eyes, the stench of urine, fecal matter, and vomit now strong in the cave.

  Two soldiers dragged an unconscious woman, who had once been naked and was now clothed in the same black burka as she was, back to her cage. They were careful with her, not just dropping her on the dirt floor. Instead, they positioned her so she lay on her side. Alexa figured that the woman had been sold and the new owner didn’t want her bruised or battered, so some care was being taken with her.

  Then the soldiers strode to the next woman in line to be examined. Having heard the screams and cries of agony from the tunnel, the black-haired woman shrank against the wall at the rear of her cage. She cried and tried to fight off the groping hands of the soldiers as they hauled her out of the cell. She fought with everything she had. Alexa saw the stoic look on the soldiers’ faces as they dragged her forward. They didn’t care what happened to any of the women, and she wondered if they were paid to do this or if they just did it for the entertainment.

  Her ears hurt from hearing the women’s screams of outrage echoing within the cave. There was nothing she could do to help any of them, and this sense of helplessness was something Alexa had never encountered. As she ate hungrily, finishing off the soup and bread, she felt her old strength returning. She pushed back against the wall, her arms around herself, grateful for the warmth of the thick burka. Her feet were getting warm, too.

  The women down at the other end of the cave were silent. Terrified. Their turns would come, but Alexa was now in deep shock over what they’d done to her, assaulting her body, examining her as if she were a prized horse to be checked out before being bought. And that photo taken of her? The one with her lying helpless and naked on that examination table? Where was that being sent? Were they sending it to the buyer? Was it on the Internet? She closed her eyes.

  Somehow, she had to escape, but how? Alexa opened her eyes and watched the two guards at the tunnel entrance leading to the caves where the women were being brutalized. She wondered what happened to a woman who didn’t pass the physical inspection. What did they do to her?

  *

  Zakir Sharan sat at his massive teak table in his office, smiling as he looked at the screen of his desktop computer. A thin smile pulled at his lips as he sat back in the leather chair, rocking it a bit. The photo of the woman he’d just bought, a Donna Collins, stared back at him. She was naked and strapped to a table. But it was her face that stirred something in his memory.

  Could it be? Could it be? His thin black brows drew downward as he enlarged her face, and his heart pounded with possibility. Moving the mouse, he chose a file that said “culver” on it. When he opened it, there was a photo of Matt, Talia, and Alexa Culver. Hatred stirred powerfully through Zakir. Talia Culver had murdered his son Raastagar, and Matt Culver had killed his other son, Sidiq. And he’d sworn vengeance and retribution against the Culver family. He wouldn’t rest until he’d gotten his revenge on the three children of Robert and Dilara Culver for taking away his two beloved sons.

  Sweat broke out on his upper lip as a thrill moved through him. The color photo of Alexa Culver showed her in her desert flight suit, in the cockpit of her A-10. Her red hair was in a long braid between her shoulder blades. Her helmet was balanced on the cockpit frame. She had turned when the person with the camera had snapped her photo with a cell phone. Zakir had managed to get this one photo of her by paying a lot of money to have it hacked and stolen from the flight sergeant’s cell phone.

  Thanks to having the best hackers in the world on his payroll, he had managed to get a photo of each of the Culver children.

  His mouth curved triumphantly as he dragged the A-10 photo of Alexa Culver next to the photo of the woman on the gurney, naked and helpless. Yes! It was her! His heart swelled with a joy he’d rarely felt since his two sons were murdered. It had taken a year to get these photos. It was standard military policy not to allow officers, especially combatants, to have their photos available anywhere on the Internet. And now . . . Allah was on his side, clearly! Because one of the women scooped up in that raid at that Afghan village, by sheer luck, was none other than Alexa Culver!

  Sitting back, he stared at the pictures, his gaze snapping from one to the other. Yes, it was her! He was unable to believe his good fortune, and his smile broadened. Finally, he had one of the murdering Culvers in his custody. Of course, it would have done his vengeful heart good if it had been the sniper, Talia, or the Delta F
orce brother, Matt. They had been the ones to actually murder his two sons. But who cared? He could use Alexa Culver just as easily to start exacting his revenge on that whole family.

  Rubbing his hands together, Zakir grinned widely. He was going to make the Culver family pay for every bit of grief and loss he’d experienced. He sat there, rocking back and forth, his mind moving at the speed of light. Normally, General Bajar supplied him with young sex slaves every month or two. They did not know who they had now, and he chuckled. If he had let them know the woman’s real name, the Pakistani general would have increased the purchase price, and he’d be spending many more millions to retain the right to own her. This would remain his secret.

  His green eyes narrowed on the photos side by side on his desktop. Alexa Culver had lied about her name. He moved to another document, opening it, reading the doctor’s report on her physical examination. She had lied about her name and what she did for a living. After all, she was military and trained in evasion when captured. His fingers curved into fists on the arms of the chair. She was going to pay for the sins of her brother and sister. Her parents would be torn apart, just as he had been destroyed by the murder of his sons. They would all pay.

  Normally, Zakir had a set routine and schedule for a new sex slave to be brought to his villa in Punjab, which was set in a rural area, surrounded by fields of wheat, fruit orchards, and other agriculture. He was worth fifty billion dollars, the richest Pakistani in the country. He made his living in the Indus Valley, where his father had built an empire and left it to him when he was only twenty-three years old.

  Zakir had an endless thirst for power and control. He had ruthlessly taken the base fortune and multiplied it tenfold. He had steel and iron plants in Islamabad, textile mills in five major cities producing cloth. His shadowy activities, however, had increased his wealth exponentially, thanks to his sons. He was not only part of the poppy and opium cartel in Afghanistan but also prominent in the global sex slave black market. His money increased every year, thanks to the distribution of opium around the world. And sex slaves were becoming a fashionable necessity that every rich businessman, no matter from what country, was expected to have. He was good, fast friends with the world’s biggest sex trafficker, Valdrin Rasari, of the small European country of Malgar. Valdrin bought many of his Afghan children, selling them to South American customers. It was a lucrative market, and Zakir had made millions, thanks to his alignment with Valdrin’s global network.