after
I don’t know how long I’m on the boat. I struggle and fight as they put me on it, kicking and biting and screaming, even though I know the nearest house is half a mile away and there’s no way I’ll be heard over the crashing waves. And then my shoulder stings, a pricking needle followed by a deep burn, and the world fades away.
When I come to, I’m being carried in Not-Daryl’s arms on another dock. The sun is bright and hot, and birds cry nearby. I’m so thirsty, so terribly thirsty, and I feel so weak, like my muscles are made of seaweed. I try to stir, try to fight, or at least speak, but there’s nothing for it. The darkness takes me again.
When I finally wake for good, I’m thankfully unbound and un-gagged, sitting by myself on a plane. It’s small and the interior is well worn and spare, populated only by Not-Daryl, three other men, and myself. No flight attendants on the Air Kidnapping flight but quite clean, I think tiredly. Two stars.
I roll my head against the back of the seat and look out the window. Mountains roll underneath us, mostly low and green, with the occasional spur of rock here and there. Off in the distance, I see the mountains grow taller, darker. I know these mountains from the war, from all the pictures and documentaries and shaky helmet-camera footage captured by soldiers.
Carpathia.
For just a moment, I let the fight leave me. I let the fear leave me. And I only think of my wedding. It was my last free day and I didn’t know it, and how fitting that my last free day would be the day I willingly surrendered my freedom to Ash.
Just the thought of his name brings heat to my eyelids and I shut them fast, afraid to cry around these men. Ash in his tuxedo, sliding his ring on my finger. Ash holding me in his arms as we danced to Etta James’s “At Last,” a song he and Embry danced to, he told me. Ash whispering to Embry as he caressed him, whispering to me as he and Embry both fucked me. Us, holding hands and promising…promising something. Love. An attempt. A surrender to the helpless feelings we all had for each other.
For just one selfish moment, I allow myself to be a damsel. I allow myself to be in pointless, nearly weepy distress. I ache for my life before, for yesterday—or two days ago, however long it’s been. I ache for my wedding dress and veil, for the church decked with flowers, for my groom and his best man. I ache for our wedding night, that wedding night I can feel even now with biting soreness. I ache for the feeling of being cradled between the two bodies I love best in this world, the feel of their sweat-slicked skin and hard muscles, and the biting teeth they used when they couldn’t find the right words to whisper to me.
I allow myself to indulge, just for a single moment, the thought that they will come for me. That the instant this plane lands, my king and my prince will be there, ready to sweep me away from this strange place and the people who would do me harm. I allow myself to hope for it like it’s the only thing I know how to hope for, that at this very moment, Embry and my husband are on their way to me. That they will find me at all costs and that everything will be okay.
I use my thumb to rub the slender band of metal on my ring finger, the one that sits below the dazzling engagement ring Ash gave me. For a brief instant, I’m grateful it hasn’t been stolen from me, that I’ve been allowed to keep at least one thing to myself, if I can’t keep my nakedness or my freedom or my dignity. But the gratitude fades the more I rub at the ring, as I remember what it represents.
I married Ash. I pledged my fidelity—however complicated that concept is between Ash and me—my honor, my respect, and my love. But that wasn’t all, because Ash isn’t just Ash, he’s the President of the United States. He’s the head of the most powerful military force in the world, the largest economy on the planet. Captain of a ship carrying three hundred and twenty million souls. Which means I married into that responsibility, I pledged my honor and respect to his office and his duties.
With Grandpa Leo as my guardian growing up, I’ve always been a patriotic girl. But now I really feel the full force of country first. I’m the First Lady. I’ve promised to do everything in my power to make our nation stronger, to help Ash in his quest to do so.
And the contradiction between country first and wanting to be rescued is obvious and insurmountable. Of course Ash can’t come after me. Logistically ridiculous and morally wrong. He can’t jeopardize the country or use resources available only to his office to find me. Same goes for Embry. Knights don’t rescue damsels anymore, not because they are any less gallant or devoted, but because there are systems in place for these things.
Diplomatic systems.
Military systems.
Intelligence systems.
The problem is that I don’t know how these systems can save me either. Diplomacy needs reciprocal energy, and I doubt Melwas is interested in reciprocating anything other than war. Ash wouldn’t want war, and I don’t either.
Which leaves intelligence. CIA. Special ops. The underground things the majority of Americans never see or know about. Things too opaque even to me to count on.
So the answer is clear. No more damseling. I need to save myself.
I sit up straighter and look around the cabin again, taking stock. My ears are popping, which means we are descending, but I take a gamble and stand up.
“I have to pee,” I announce to Not-Daryl.
“Sit down,” he says dismissively. “We land soon.”
“I have to pee right now,” I say, pitching my voice louder for effect. I mean, I do actually have to pee, so it’s not a lie—not that I’m above telling lies right now. “I’ll pee all over myself and this plane if I can’t go to the bathroom.”
Not-Daryl swears and gets to his feet, yanking me by the upper arm to the back of the plane. He shoves me into the tiny bathroom, but when I try to lock myself in, he shoves his foot in the way, easily blocking the flimsy folding door.
I already know the answer, but I ask anyway. “Can I have some privacy?”
He doesn’t answer, just keeps his foot in the doorway and gives me the same heavy-jawed glare. I sigh and make a big production of maneuvering my bathrobe to hide my lower half as I sit on the toilet. Glaring eyes sweep down the exposed lines of my legs, appraising. I sense that in any other situation, there would be much more bodily violation at stake, but something’s different here.
“Melwas wants me all to himself, does he?” I ask when Not-Daryl’s eyes come up from my bare legs to my face. “You’re not allowed to touch me.”
“I can touch you all I like,” Not-Daryl says. “President Kocur only says you are to arrive to him unmarked. Although…” a wicked smile appears on his face. Not sexy-wicked. Stomach-turning wicked. “…I notice you are quite marked up already by your own president.”
I can almost feel the weight of his assumptions about me, about my body, about what I allow or endure or enjoy.
I stare at him. I stare at him as coolly as I can, channeling all those times I watched Grandpa Leo wrestle down his political opponents by sheer force of will. I pour every ounce of my unusual upbringing as the princess of the Democratic Party, of my identity as Ash’s little princess, as his queen, into my stare. And even though I sit bare-assed on the toilet in a bathrobe, even though by every visible metric he controls all the power here, Not-Daryl’s smile fades and he looks away. He pulls his foot back and shuts the bathroom door with a loud clack.
I win.
For now. Because I can’t outmuscle these men. I can’t outrun them. And after I finish peeing and washing my hands and get back in my seat, I see out the window where they are taking me and I know that I can’t escape.
Fine.
I’ll find another way.
The plane dips away from the massive lodge and into a nearby valley, where it lands on a minuscule airstrip. From there, I’m tied up again and placed in a mud-splattered Range Rover, and we climb up into the jagged mountains. The lodge, hulking and black, comes into view now and again through the trees and around bends in the road. It looks like Dracula’s castle, perched malevolently over the stone teeth of the Carpathians, and I realize we probably aren’t far from the historical land of Transylvania.
I’d rather face a vampire.
But this is more than a castle; we pass perimeter after perimeter of extremely modern security. Fences and gates and patrols and cameras mounted everywhere. Drones fly overhead. This place is just as secure as Camp David. And my heart sinks even further, though I refuse to let my determination flag. I’ll pretend I’m Queen Guinevere in all those stories I teach, unreachable and dignified, and composedly serene even as she’s kidnapped over and over again.
The lodge itself is less utilitarian than it appeared in the distance—large windows line the walls that face out over the valley, and as I’m dragged inside, I see thick wood beams and a massive fireplace and lots of leather furniture. It’s definitely masculine, but the interior seems like a place made for enjoyment, not captivity. This impression is further reinforced by the room into which I’m deposited. It’s spacious, with a beautiful view overlooking the valley, a canopy bed like something out of Versailles and a bathroom almost bigger than the room itself, with a deep-set bathtub and walk-in shower. I’m unbound and instructed to shower. Not-Daryl indicates a closet at the far end of the room.
“New clothes are in there.”
“New clothes?”
Before I can stop him, he tugs off the bathrobe. I don’t bother to cover myself, partially because he’s already seen me naked and also because I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of thinking he’s upset me.
He smiles again, and away from the humiliating circumstances of the airplane, I’m finally able to make a connection I couldn’t before. I knew he’d been at the Carpathian diplomatic dinner, but that smile…he was also the man Abilene spent the rest of the weekend with.
Abilene. It was her text message that sent me down to the lobby in the first place. Had she been exploited by this man somehow? For her connection to me? Or was she complicit?
Had my best friend betrayed me?
I can’t think about that right now. I don’t think about it. I walk away from Not-Daryl and go into the bathroom and do as I’m told, not because I’m told to, but because a shower is a human comfort I crave very much right now. And as I shower, I pull together my thoughts and consider, reading this situation like I would read a medieval text, looking for clues and meanings and subtext. Like I’m at a fundraiser with Grandpa Leo and he’s asking me to spy for him, to find all the secrets hiding in the words and faces of the political literati.
First of all, by leaving me unsupervised and unbound, they are trusting that I won’t harm myself. I’m not sure whether this is an overconfident gamble on Melwas’s part or if he believes if I did hurt or kill myself, it would still serve his purposes. Suicide doesn’t serve my purposes, but the threat of it might be leverage.
Second of all, they’ve given me a windowed room where I can see the road and the drones and where I will be able to mark the days. This is a lot of information being handed to me—again, is this Melwas arrogantly assuming there’s no way I can escape? Or be seen by those who might try to rescue me? Or would my escape and rescue still serve his purposes?
Thirdly, as I wrap myself in a towel and go to investigate the closet, there’re only obvious reasons why Melwas would want me clean and dolled up for him. To make me pleasing to him, to make me comfortable, to give me the illusion that I’m some sort of guest perhaps…
So what are the reasons that are less obvious? Melwas doesn’t strike me as a subtle man, yet by using Abilene and preparing this extensively for my captivity, he is certainly a smart one. There are webs of contingencies and plans I’m certain that I can’t see, and until I can see them, it’s best to tread carefully.
I style myself as best as I can with the limited tools they’ve given me—a brush and hair dryer and some hairspray. Lipstick and mascara. They don’t leave me any bobby pins or nail trimmers or anything like that—nothing I could use as a weapon.
There’s any number of ridiculously lacy underthings in the closet, all exactly my size, and I have a moment where I almost can’t bear it. I slump against the wall of the closet and try to hold my quivering chin still.
I should be on my honeymoon. I should be with Ash. I should be with Embry. We should be savoring each other, taking long, delicious drinks from the cup we’d forbidden ourselves all this time. But that cup’s been dashed from my hands. All I have are these cold, angry mountains and a would-be rapist trying to dress me like a doll.
But I don’t succumb. I’m used to holding my emotions inside, projecting outward grace. It used to be for Abilene, and then for the cameras and journalists as Ash publicly claimed me as his own. And now I’ll do it for survival.
I dress in the most demure frock in the closet—a long dress of red silk with a plunging neckline—and try the door to the bedroom. Locked. So I sit and wait, wondering if there are cameras in the room, wondering if I can be seen even now. I think yes, I can, because Not-Daryl unlocks and opens the door not long after I sit.
“President Kocur is waiting,” he says.
And I get up and follow him to face my captor.
