The Orpheus Legacy

CHAPTER SEVEN

Alex Reeve’s head pounded like a carnival drum. When she opened her eyes, the pain of the light hitting them was so harsh she had to fight back the basic instinct to scream. She blinked several times and brought her hand up to her eyes to shield them. At least, she thought a few seconds later, the hood was no longer on her head and her hands were no longer tied.

Her eyesight gradually returned to her. Unfocussed and blurry at first but slowly coming back and building a picture of her world. She knew she had been drugged more than once and she no longer had any idea of what time it was or how long ago she had been arrested by Faulkner’s men.

She looked around. She was in what was clearly a prison cell and she was on her own. The room was small and sparse. Plain cinder block walls on all four sides, painted a dull olive green color that she recognized immediately. It was the one used by the US Marine Corp from basic equipment all the way up to the president’s personal helicopter, Marine One.

She looked down and saw she was on a metal wall-mounted bunk covered in rough blankets. Beside it was a stainless steel wall-mounted toilet.

Without a seat, she noticed with dismay.

The only source of light was a narrow window at the top of the cell, too high for her to see through. Then she looked behind her and saw her wheelchair at the head of her bed, but even if she climbed into it and pushed herself across the cell there would be no way for her to haul herself up and get a look out of the window.

So this was Tartarus.

Once again considering how alone she was, she felt her heart quicken in her chest. She was alive, but that didn’t mean to say her father or Brandon had made it. She guessed Faulkner had some kind of insane show trial planned for her father, but that still didn’t guarantee he was alive. What if a fight had broken out and things had gotten ugly?

Easy, Alex.

You have to stay calm — there ain’t no getting out of here by having a panic attack and passing out on the floor. You have to hold it together and think rationally.

She pushed herself up into a sitting position and then pulled the chair around to the side of the bed. With a great deal more effort than most realized, she heaved herself over into the chair, pulling her heavy legs into place when she was comfortably sitting down.

She blew out a breath and took a second before releasing the brakes and wheeling over to the door on the far wall. In its center was a letterbox which she presumed was for posting meals into the cell. When she raised her hand to touch it, she saw it was bolted shut from the other side.

Of course it was.

She pressed her right ear up against the cold, bare metal of the door and strained to hear anything that might give her a clue to any sign of life, but she heard nothing. From the far side of the cell and with her eyes properly adjusted to the light now, she was able to get a slightly better angle of the window but all she saw was a perfect rectangle of pure blue sky. It told her nothing. She could be anywhere on earth.

She felt like crying and for a moment wondered if she might lose control and all the horror of the last few days would come flooding out. But she surprised herself by holding it back and keeping a level head on her shoulders. She closed her eyes and heard her father’s voice in her head.

Don’t let the bastards get to you, kiddo.

“I won’t Dad,” she whispered in the unforgiving silence of her new home. “I promise.”

When Jack Brooke woke up, he found himself slumped face-down on the floor of a grimy prison cell. He had a split lip and a black eye, but only the vaguest memory of how they got there. He knew he had been drugged. How hard had they beaten him while he was under their influence? Had he said anything? Checking his arms, he saw several puncture marks and started to get an idea of just how much they had drugged him.

He rubbed the back of his head and cursed under his breath. Struggled to his feet and took a seat on the side of his wall-mounted bed. Blowing out a long, anxious sigh he stared around the small room and tried to take stock of his situation. As a man with many years military experience under his belt, he knew where he was straight away. He was sitting on military-issue sheets and this was a military prison.

Tartarus, just as Faulkner had threatened.

The only problem was up until right now he had no idea such a place even existed and certainly not the first clue as to where its location might be. Was it on an island in the middle of an ocean, or was it a compound somewhere hidden in a jungle or a desert? Some said it was on an artificial island, but that could be disinformation.

Judging from the bright light streaming in through the cell window high above his head, he knew one thing — it wasn’t an underground facility. That was something, at least, but he had so many other concerns he didn’t even know where to start.

Except he did.

Alex. She wasn’t in here with him, so they must have put her in another cell. He got up from the bed and paced the room, counting the steps and taking measurements. Assessing the height and tapping the walls to see what materials had been used to construct his prison. He tried to check the light bulb for any information that might give him a clue — a date, a name — but it was screwed in behind a chunky panel of safety Perspex.

He walked over to the window and leaped up until his hands grabbed the slim concrete sill. Heaving with all his might, he pulled himself up until he could just peer out of the window, but when he saw the view outside he almost wished he hadn’t bothered. All he could see was another plain cinder block wall stretching out of his line of sight in both directions.

“Great,” he muttered, and lowered himself back down to the floor.

He checked the door but it was locked, just as he had fully expected it to be. A man like Faulkner didn’t take over the United States in a coup d’état and then forget to lock a door on the cell of the man he’d just ousted.

Stepping back over to the bed he stretched himself out flat and crossed his arms behind his head. He’d been in worse scrapes in his life. Seen more shit than a monkey can fling, he thought. All that was really bothering him at this exact second was the wellbeing of his daughter and the Secret Service Agent who had loyally defended her right up to the last moment.

He sighed. The reinforced concrete ceiling offered the blandest view on earth so he closed his eyes and let his mind wander. None of this left him with much hope. Faulkner seizing power and then arresting him and his daughter. Flying them out to this Tartarus location that he had never heard of in all his time in the top echelons of the US Government.

If he knew one thing, it was that things were going to get a hell of a lot worse before they got any better. With that thought, he started to drift back to sleep.