“Your best chance … for ending today alive ... is to let Ms. Hamilton go.”
He sounded like he was out of breath. Was he having trouble breathing?
She had asked to see him, offering to treat their wounded men in exchange for being able to care for Derek. But they had ignored her as if they hadn’t even heard her, as if she were nothing and no one.
Another blow. A grunt.
“What did you tell The Lion? Speak—or I will geld you like a goat!”
“No!” Jenna jerked against the chain, her heart thudding sickeningly in her chest.
“I’ll still be … more of a man … than you ... you son of a whore.”
Another terrible cry—this one cut short.
“Leave him to bleed to death.” Qassim stormed out of the room, ignoring her and stomping outside, his two men behind him.
There was blood on his hands—Derek’s blood.
Had the bastard castrated Derek? Was Derek bleeding to death?
Feeling sick, her blood cold with panic, Jenna called to him, listening for any sound of life from the next room. “Derek?”
No answer.
“Derek!”
Still no answer.
Desperate to reach him, Jenna tried to pry the shackle open, then grabbed the wooden stake, rocking it back and forth with all her strength, trying to pull it out of the hard, dry earth. The stake came free without warning, and Jenna fell flat on her butt. It was a lot longer than she’d thought—and it was sharp on one end.
A weapon.
She picked it up together with the chain that was still shackled to her ankle and ran to the next room, the chain clinking softly.
“Derek!”
He sagged, shirtless and unconscious, from a tall wooden post, fresh blood streaming down his left arm, his pants down around his ankles, his body still intact.
Thank God!
Almost legless with relief, she ran to him. There was a terrible dark bruise in the center of his chest where the bullet had hit his body armor and fresh bruises on his ribs. His face was bruised, too, lacerations on his cheeks, his lip bleeding, the pressure bandage she’d put on his shoulder wound lying, bloody, in the dirt.
She dropped the stake, threw off her burqa. He was breathing, but his skin was cold and clammy, his pulse thready. “Derek, can you hear me?”
He raised his head. “Jenna? You shouldn’t … If he finds you … he’ll hurt you.”
She looked for the knots that held his bonds then went to work untying them. “I can’t sit there and do nothing while he tortures you.”
“Yes, you can. If it means survival … you can.”
The knots were tight, but she kept at it until the one around his ankles and then the one around his wrists came free.
“I’ve got you.” She eased him to the ground, grabbing the shirt they’d torn off him, and covering him with it for warmth. Then she tore the burqa, making strips and fashioning them into a bandage to stop his bleeding.
“You’re a good … field medic.”
But bullet wounds were far beyond Jenna’s experience. “I’m not a medic. I’m a midwife. Does anything here look like a vagina to you?”