Trained by Sansa Rayne

Chapter 28

“You did this to me, you little fucker.”

The alcohol on his breath could knock out a heavyweight boxer.

“I didn’t mean to!” I cry, unable to stop the tears. “I didn’t know what would happen!”

He pushes me to the floor; I land on my chin, biting my tongue. A metal flavor fills my mouth.

“Get up.”

He’s going to kick me if I don’t, but it hurts too much.

“Get up!”

Pain explodes in my side.

“Wake up!”

Ingram slaps me in the face.

“Open your eyes.”

I groan as the extent of my agony claws into my awareness. The last time I experienced this much physical pain, my name was still Simon. My broken fingers throb. Every muscle in my face screams. My sides ache just like they used to. I shouldn’t try to move — it won’t go well — but I try anyway. Nothing happens; my hands are cuffed to the arms of a chair.

Of course.

I’m fucked.

At first I don’t see much, only a pair of outlines. It’s just as well, considering how badly my head pounds. Ingram must have some idea of it, though, because the lights brighten all at once, like a solar flare burning right in my eyes. Wincing, I squeeze them shut and turn away. Then a surge of electricity sparks through my brain, burning my skull from within.

“Open your eyes,” says Ingram.

Fucking shit.

There are electrodes on my temples. That was an electroshock device.

Instinct commands me to panic. Logic reminds me there’s nothing I can do. Neither are helpful.

I force my eyes back open, turning to the stabbing light.

It’s the Enclave’s dungeon. Torture tools abound, though I don’t think Ingram plans to use any canes or floggers on me. No, he’ll opt for the brass knuckles, or the baseball bat. The knives and pokers. The blowtorch.

For now, he holds a tablet. Kate sits on a bench in the corner, watching from a distance. Is she comfortable being here, in this place where she’s suffered so many times? Is this what she imagined all those nights back in her cell? Is this going to live up to the hype?

“How do you want to proceed?” Ingram asks.

Should I even bother answering? He’s going to torture me one way or another. That’s what he wants to do. If I give him an excuse, he will. If I cooperate fully, maybe he’ll ease up, but not in the end. He’ll get his fill before letting me flatline. It’s my decision whether to suffer now or suffer later. One of them gives Ingram what he wants, though. I’d rather not let that happen.

Except, how much pain can I tolerate without breaking? All the logic in the world won’t help when all I can think about is wanting to die. I’ll talk, just to make it stop. I’ll say anything. At least some of it will be the truth. I could save myself some pain by cooperating.

“What do you mean?” I reply.

Ingram points to a camera pointed at me.

“You want to start chronologically? You could begin with the day you killed your father, Joseph Wilson. From there you could talk about faking your own death, followed by your time in the mob. Eventually you could move into the crimes you committed along the way to making Innovative AF the dominant tech company in the world.”

“Pass,” I grunt.

“If not chronologically, you could just list your crimes in order of severity. In particular, you could tell us about all of the people you killed, like Madeleine… Hank Lee… Sidney Traves. All of the times you coerced people into silence, every act of corporate malfeasance… Think of it like this: the more you confess to, the longer you’ll live.”

“No one’s going to believe a word of this. Anything I say will be disregarded. Why bother?”

“They’ll believe it, Anton. You’re going to spell it all out in great, great detail. We’ll find any loose ends that are still out there and get them to corroborate your stories.”

“And we have Jamison!” adds Kate. “As well as the courtesans. They’ll all talk.”

“Jamison won’t,” I say. “He’s not going to destroy his legacy by confessing. And the courtesans… Maybe they’ll be believed. Not by everyone. People will never be sure they can trust the alcoholic, disgraced ex-reporter — and they’ll never see the leader of Anarchy, Inc. as anything but a terrorist.”

Ingram taps his tablet, and a jolt races through my skull. I convulse, shaking uncontrollably in my seat. He may as well be using a live wire. My entire body feels burnt — there’s a smell in the air I don’t want to think about.

“You’re going to give a very, very convincing testimony,” Ingram says. “There’s no time limit here, Anton. You won’t run out the clock. No one will rescue you. Kate and I are going to kill you, but it’s not like we have a set day or time. It’s when the job is done. It’s when we’re convinced that your statement sounds like the truth. That’s largely in your hands. So, how would you like to start?”

I smirk, effecting a sigh.

“I need some time to think about it.”

“Kate, come here,” says Ingram.

She complies, walking up to his side.

“Would you like to push the button?”

“No. I’d like to do something else.”

“Whisper it in my ear,” Ingram says.

She does. He nods.

As I watch, she goes to pick out a small, red aerosol can, walks up to me and shoots pepper spray directly into my eyes. Cringing, I shake my head. Eyes searing, I squeeze them shut, trying to force the chemical out.

“How’s that feel?” Kate snarls.

“Shitty!”

“Let’s go,” Ingram says. “Anton needs time to think. We can give him a little. I’ll set the shocks to go off every ten minutes or so. He can give us a yell when he’s ready to talk.”

I can’t open my eyes, so I don’t see them leave, but I hear the door shut behind them.

Tears drip down my cheeks as I slowly recover from the pepper spray. I’m still trying to see again when the first shock hits me, a thousand hornets stinging me everywhere at once.

All I can do is breathe and wait.

Fuck you, Ingram. You think I can’t take this? You think I’ll crack on day one? Not a chance. I’d rather suffer.

Except, he probably doesn’t care either way, does he? Ingram will be happy to watch me get the shit shocked out of me. He wins no matter what I do. It’s illogical for me to hold out for the sake of saving face. What good does that do me? Pride has no practical value at this point, except to soothe my ego. Is that worth anything?

It might be all I have left.

When my eyes recover, I try to assess my odds at escape. My feet aren’t locked to anything, but the chair is bolted to the floor. There’s no way I can get out of it on my own. At some point, if they want to keep me alive, they’ll have to feed me and let me use the bathroom. I’m sure I’ll be under heavy guard the whole time.

I shouldn’t count on escaping. I should accept that, barring unforeseen circumstances, I’m going to die in this room.

—

Ingram and Kate return after the twelfth shock. I take it as a small victory that their patience runs out before mine. Still, if they put a bullet in my chest right now I’d probably die thanking them.

“What’s the… rush?” I laugh.

Ingram holds out his phone and says, “Send them in.”

After a minute, three courtesans enter the dungeon.

“What’s this?” I ask.

“Courtney, go ahead,” says Kate.

One of the courtesans, now fully clothed and not bound in any way, walks up to me and punches me in the face. The room spins from the explosion of agony. It wasn’t even that hard a hit; my head was already pounding, this just fanned the flames.

“That’s for shooting Ingram,” she says.

Her next swing, however, lands like a professional fighter’s.

“And that’s for Colette.”

Spitting, she turns and leaves.

I recognize the next woman: Samara, the ex-wife of Franco Silvestri.

Not good.

She pulls from her pocket a small syringe, removes a cover from the needle and injects a clear fluid into my arm.

“For Franco,” she says.

I feel it almost immediately: a searing inferno that spreads through my body in seconds. My scream sounds distant at first, as if it’s from behind a wall in another room. It’s only after an eternity has seemed to go by that I realize the inhuman howl is coming out of my mouth at full volume. When I open my eyes, Samara still watches, and a very real fear grips me from within: that she might have a second syringe, the way Courtney punched me twice. However, Samara turns to leave.

“Paulina, your turn,” says Kate.

I’m still reeling from the pain when the third woman approaches holding a dinner knife.

“I was supposed to do this to Merwin Locke. Now I can’t, so I’ll do it to you.”

She makes a series of small cuts on my arm in neat lines. Blood runs from them, and for a second I almost blissfully pass out. Then a fresh hell ignites as Paulina pours something awful on the cuts, something that turns them into vents of volcanic flame. Once she’s finished with my left arm, she repeats the process on my right.

When she’s done, Ingram says, “And this is just day one.”

I grunt a dark laugh.

Kate’s skin goes white and she covers her mouth.

“Excuse me,” she says, following the courtesans out of the dungeon.

Ingram waits for her to leave before turning back to me.

“I don’t blame her for going. You look like shit. She’s never done something like this before. I have. I can stomach it for as long as I have to. The question is, Anton, how much can you handle?”

“I… won’t…”

Even I can barely hear my own voice. Each word tears at my vocal cords.

“…Confess. Never.”

Ingram gets a bottle of water and holds it to my lips. I don’t drink.

“Don’t make this difficult,” he says.

I still refuse.

He grabs my nose and holds it shut, then jams the bottle’s head into my mouth. Water pours in, but I don’t swallow. Ingram doesn’t let go until I try to breathe, inhaling the water. I choke, bucking in my seat until Ingram backs away. Every cough is like a truck hitting me in the chest; I pass out from the pain.

Consciousness returns with a splash of water over my face.

“I warned you,” says Ingram. “We’ll set you up with a feeding tube if you don’t eat or drink. Trust me, you don’t want to die of thirst. It’s not a good feeling. I hid in a pile of dirt in Saudi Arabia for a week to kill Hamza and take your missiles — I drank as little as humanly possible. It sucked, and I was in good shape. You… you’re not, Anton. You’re in seriously bad fucking shape.”

I smile, as much as it hurts.

“Something funny?”

“None of this… is as bad… as what I did… to you and… Kate. I made her… a trained… animal. And you… watched.”

Ingram balls his fists.

“Eight months… you waited… and she… suffered. It must have… felt like… years.”

He nods.

“Yeah, it did. Kate and I considered keeping you alive for just as long, putting you through the worst torture imaginable. As far as I’m concerned, that option isn’t off the table.”

I shake my head.

“I’ll die… and be gone. You’ll live… with your… failure… forever.”

“You’re right, Anton. I will. Not a day will go by where I won’t think about what I cost her, and I’ll spend every day making it up to her. My life will be about picking up the pieces and putting them back together. But you… you’re going to die with your failure.”

I sneer at him.

“Even if she never has her whole life back,” he continues, “I will make her happy. Whatever she needs, I will provide. And you can be sure that she is going to make me very, very happy. I’m going to live a long life with her. Your skeleton will be at the bottom of the sea while Kate and I are living out our days. The world will know you were a monster and they’ll be glad you’re gone.”

Fuck. Fucking shit.

“At any point in the last twenty years you could have just looked me up, found me and shot me in the back when I wasn’t looking,” Ingram says. “You could have gotten your revenge and avoided all of this fighting. That wouldn’t have been enough?”

“No,” I growl.

He shakes his head.

“All of this because of a fucking broken bottle.”

With that, he turns to leave.

“See you tomorrow, Anton. Get ready for another very, very painful day.”

I’d rather not think about that, so I slump my head down and try to rest. Everything hurts too much, though; the throbs and spasms kick me out of my grogginess before I get in too deep. So, I’m still awake when Jamison enters my cell.

He walks right up to me and punches me in the face. Despite his age, he has plenty of strength; my head lolls back, dizziness takes me.

“Conquistador,” I say.

Jamison laughs.

“There’s no phone in here, Anton. There’s no network to send out a signal. Even if there was, your systems have been shut down and my chips were removed.”

Damn, I’m losing it. I knew that wouldn’t work; I still wanted it to work.

“Good… for you.”

He kicks my shin; it’s a fresh pain. Was Ingram saving that for later? Or did he not want the white-hot molten steel frying my brain so I couldn’t talk?

“I asked you a question earlier,” Jamison snarls, gathering the collar of my shirt in his fist. “Why the fuck did you kill her and not me?”

Really? He’s a smart person. He shouldn’t need an explanation.

“To punish… you.”

He kicks my other shin. I nearly vomit, the pain makes my chest heave so badly.

“Why? Because I helped Ingram? What was I supposed to do? He was the only one who could stop you from taking over. Why couldn’t you just kill me and be done with it? Why make me watch her… Why?”

This is good. He might kill me. It will all be over.

I may as well tell him the truth.

“You treated… Ingram… well. You gave… him… power. And you… were a… father… to him. He didn’t… deserve… another.”

“I should have known,” he says. “It’s always about Ingram. He’s been living rent-free in your head for two decades. You could have been on a yacht surrounded by supermodels like a normal billionaire. Instead, you’re here, suffering and about to die. Was it worth it?”

“It… would’ve… been.”

If I had shot Ingram in the head that night, killing him outright — this all could have been avoided. It wouldn’t have been the perfect revenge I wanted, but it would have been something. As they say, don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

“I guess so,” Jamison says, reaching for the locks on my wrist cuffs. “Don’t worry. You won’t have to live with the mistake much longer. Ingram’s going to be very mad at me, but I have to do this. For Colette.”

He unlocks my cuffs, then lifts me out of the chair.

What is he doing?

With the strength of a man half his age, Jamison throws me to the ground. He kicks me in the side, reigniting the damage Ingram did to my kidneys. Convulsing and coughing, I taste blood and bile.

Time stands still as I try to get my diaphragm under control. Jamison’s going to keep this up until I’m dead.

But I’m not stuck in the chair anymore.

And he’s still an old man.

I have a chance.

Cringing from the pain, I hold my breath until I regain my composure. Jamison stomps on my ankle, unleashing a cataclysm in my leg. He broke something, I’m sure of it.

But what’s a little more pain?

Today I’ve handled enough for a lifetime.

I catch Jamison’s next kick, grabbing his ankle before his foot lands. With one move, I pull his leg out from under him and drop him to the ground. His head cracks against the cold, cement floor. Adrenaline races through my veins, dulling the electric storm raging through my body.

Rising up on my knees, I punch Jamison in the face. Blood leaks out beneath his skull, but he still groans from the hit.

I should thank him for giving me this chance. I won’t though — I’ve learned my lesson. I keep punching until his eyes stare blankly at the ceiling. When I feel his neck, there’s no pulse.

Rest calls to me. Exhaustion’s seductive whisper tickles my ears.

No.

Not now.

I’m not finished.