Once I got it steady in my arms, I walked down the table until I found the vacant spot where the new box was supposed to go. I set it down with a thud, breathing hard from the exertion.
The girl across from the box kept her eyes down. “Welcome to the club…”
“Yeah…thanks. I’m Raven.”
She kept her eyes down. “Get going, Raven. They don’t want us to talk.”
I glanced at the man who had just told me off and saw him staring at me again. I took the silent cue and turned away to grab the box left on the ground. I carried it back to the table, putting it in the pile with the other empty boxes.
A woman was there, dirty-blond hair pulled out of her face. She stood and studied her table, waiting for the next forty-pound box of cocaine to be depleted so it could be replaced. With her arms crossed and her gaze straight ahead, she spoke. “Some advice… The better you work, the more they leave you alone.”
I stood at the other side of the table and copied her movements, trying to make it seem like I was waiting for the opportunity to replace the next box.
“If you replace a box before it’s empty and pour the rest of the contents on top, they’ll like you more, because you aren’t disrupting the workflow of the girls.”
I didn’t care about the tip. “I’m Raven.” I needed to make friends, to learn as much about this place as possible, to figure out a way to get Melanie and me out of here…someday. “You?”
She kept her arms crossed over her chest, the vapor rising from her nostrils with every breath. “Bethany.”
I looked at the surrounding cabins, along with the large pine trees that stood tall around us. It was mostly an empty clearing, but nature was spaced throughout, the branches covered with blankets of snow like Christmas trees. The Alps were in the near distance, reflecting the sunlight off their potent whiteness. If I weren’t stuck in a labor camp in the cold, I might actually think it was beautiful. “There’s more of us than them. We can take them down.”
She shook her head slightly. “I know you’re new, and I get it. I used to be that way too. But it’s been done…with no success.”
I hadn’t had much hope to begin with, but I lost a little more at her words. “What happened?”
“They killed a lot of us.” She nodded slightly to the hanging woman at the edge of the clearing. “Like that.”
I couldn’t look. I’d already looked once, and I never wanted to look again.
“After you’ve seen your friends die like that…you don’t want to try again.”
I stared at the women as they all worked with their heads down, packaging the bags of cocaine with different amounts, doing the labor these men were too lazy to do themselves. When I’d moved to Paris, I was embarking on a new adventure, falling into the romantic haze of this beautiful country. But all of that disappeared as I was plunged into a living nightmare. “How long have you been here?” I kept my eyes ahead even though I wanted to look at her, to look into the face of an ally instead of the hooded cloak of an enemy.
“Five years.”
I couldn’t keep the breath in my lungs because it felt like someone had punched me in the stomach. “Fuck…”
She shook her head. “There’re others who have been here longer, so don’t feel too bad for me.”
I felt bad for everyone, whether they’d been here for a day, a year, or a decade. “There’s got to be something—”
“Shut your goddamn mouth.” The man’s voice projected across the clearing, making the women hesitate for just an instant before they worked faster. He stepped forward and walked down the line, heading right toward us.
Since they were all dressed the same, their identities were always a mystery, and that caused confusion, because it was unclear where they were looking at any given time. They could be turned the other way but still have their eyes trained on you—and you had no idea.
My heart started to pound harder as he came near. Tall like the man who’d escorted me here, he seemed equally strong, like he could crush my throat with the grip of his fingers. I went from a peaceful life to being afraid at a second’s notice, my brain unable to dissociate from reality because terror was constantly present.
He moved past me and headed to Bethany. A black hand reached out and grabbed her by the throat, choking her right away. “What’s so important that you needed to share?” He towered over her, squeezed her hard, pulling the life right out of her.
All she could do was choke and gasp.
I couldn’t watch. I couldn’t listen either. I couldn’t handle any of it. “It’s not her fault. I was the one talking.” In survival mode, it was stupid to stick out your neck, to take a hit meant for somebody else, but my humanity was too great—at least, right now, it was. Bethany gave me information when she didn’t have to, and now she was being punished for it.
His hood turned my way before his fingers released her throat.
She fell to her knees, coughing and gasping.
He slowly walked to me, his steps making the earth shake. He came closer to me, making me step back because there was nowhere for him to go unless he hit his chest against mine. He didn’t grab me by the throat. He towered over me, vapor appearing from his hood in long trails, like he was huffing and puffing like an angry bull.
I held his gaze, held my ground, but I was terrified…terrified in a way I’d never been before. The energy around this man was much different from the first man who had escorted me to and from the cabin.
He pulled his arm back then punched me so hard in the face that I collapsed backward, landing hard on the ground, my vision turning black for a moment like I’d just received a concussion. My back struck the cold earth, and I stared at the sky through the branches, bewildered but aware at the same time. Then his face appeared in my vision, and because of the angle, I could see the black beard at his chin, the only visible characteristic. “That’s just a warning.”
I sat at the table, my eyes down, the pain throbbing in my temple.
A tray of food was placed in front of me. It was an apple, a couple slices of bread, and a few strips of ham. It was meager compared to the dinner I’d had in my cabin last night, which was a full meal of greens, meat, and grains.
But I was in so much pain that it really didn’t matter anyway, because I had no appetite.
Bethany took a seat across from me, sitting at the very end of the line like I was. The tray presented to her was the same.
But the girls next to me had a full meal, meat lasagna with salad and bread.
Bethany kept her head down and ate quietly.
I ripped a few pieces of bread from the loaf and placed them in my mouth.
One of the men passed, keeping an eye on us, and then continued on his walk.
Bethany whispered to me. “You get less food and water if you disobey them.”
“I’m not very hungry right now, so…that worked out.” The thudding in my skull was so bad that I wasn’t sure how I’d get through this without painkillers.
“You need to keep your strength up as much as possible. You have to do your job well.” She spoke right before the food hit her mouth, carefully disguising her lips so her whispers would go unnoticed.