Wild Poppy Read online

  Wild Poppy

  A Black Sentinels Spin Off

  Victoria Johns

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Other books by Victoria Johns

  All rights reserved.

  The rights of Victoria Johns as the author of the work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000. All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means without prior written permission of the author or publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review, by an approved book reviewer. No circulation in any form or binding or cover that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchase.

  This book may not be resold or given away to other people for resale. Please purchase this book from a recognized retailer. Thank you for supporting the hard work of this author

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places or events are entirely coincidental. Many are products of the author’s imagination.

  Cover design - Eleanor Lloyd Jones – Shower of Schmidt Designs

  Formatting Services – Tammy Clarke – The Graphics Shed

  Editing Services – Nikki Groom – The Indie Hub

  Proof Reading – Heather Ross

  Chapter One

  Codename : Agent Poppy

  The hand that covered my mouth to stop me from screaming out loosened for a fraction of a second and slipped down over my chin until it was firmly clenched around my neck. In college days gone by, I’d enjoyed a bit of dominating sex, just on the edge of rough, but not now.

  Not now I knew the true meaning of it.

  The hand clenched, tightening like I knew it would, and instead of lust flowing through my body, it was pure fear. Replacing the blood pumping in my veins, paralyzing me until I was compliant. A harsh lesson I’d had to learn quickly.

  Compliant and docile, just like they wanted. That was how I stayed alive.

  “American whore!” The fingers pinched tighter until I was forced to gasp for what little oxygen they would let me have. It was exactly what the animals wanted. The minute I opened my mouth, I saw the pleasure in the depth of his eyes. The dark, cruel nature of his soul pooled and taunted me as my tormentor smiled and spat at me ferociously. His disgusting spit hit the back of my throat, coated my face and blotted my eyes which were bugged out wide and silently pleading for death to come and take one of us.

  Him, preferably.

  He deserved to die a thousand painful deaths, whereas I was just serving my country. A country that appeared to have forgotten about me and was clearly happy to let me rot in this hell hole.

  “Please!” The word squeaked out on a breath, one of many I’d wasted pleading with these fucking monsters.

  He slapped my naked breasts sharply with his free hand. The cloth tunic I was allowed to wear around the house had been torn from my body shortly after the guests arrived. My ‘husband,’ my fucking master, said that a naked American whore was the right and proper way to greet important guests. “Do what you’re good at. Spread those legs. Share that used pussy.” His accent was heavy, but his English was good. Like most of the modern monsters in the world, we’d educated them, trained them and in most cases, fucking armed them, and now some of us were paying the heavy price for it. Some of us were paying what felt like the very heaviest of prices.

  The first few times I’d tried to fight and resist, clenching my thighs until my body screamed in pain, but the fight was what they wanted, any opportunity to dominate something American. I soon learned that the easiest way to get it over with quickly was to retreat inside my head, think of home, a time before I gave my life, my freedom and my fucking sanity to the agency.

  My body braced for the onslaught after hearing the belt buckle of my tormentor clang against the table he had me pinned to. I winced in pain as he forced his dick inside me. There was no making sure I was ready. This wasn’t love making; this wasn’t even fucking. It was brutalizing. Before my eyes glazed over, I looked up at the sorry excuse for a man grinding into me. He would be done soon enough, and thankfully I’d seen sense to let the agency fit a new device inside me—one not available on any market—that would stop these animals impregnating me. While it served a purpose now and meant I wouldn’t leave a child behind when I eventually figured out how to leave, it would also be my undoing. If I didn’t bear a child soon, I would be resigned to this life permanently. Either sold on or kept here and used like this until my body fell apart. Praying for them to kill me would seem like a mercy.

  He finished on a grunt, licking my face with his putrid tongue before turning to laugh to the cheering crowd. I lay there quivering on the table, knowing that I couldn’t get up and leave until I was given permission. I waited with bated breath for the command to come, willing myself to hang on but instead heard a bark of, “Next!” sending my heart plummeting to the floor.

  The next guy stepped up and turned me over, my cheek slamming against the wooden surface as pain radiated through my face. “No!” I tried to shout it, but with the wind already knocked out of me, it was more of wheezy whisper.

  Guy number two pushed his palm flat against my sore cheek, holding my head firm against the wood, forcing me to look at the one guy seated in the corner, bathed in darkness and candlelight, smoking a hooka and not in the slightest bit interested in me. His interest lay in the open crate of weapons in front him, the grenades he’d just inspected that my ‘fellow American’ had laid out in front of him for sale.

  He was my countryman, the one who’d ultimately been given the intel I’d constantly fed back, wasn’t even bothered that one of his assets was being raped in front of him.

  This was not what I’d signed up for. I was sold a line of protecting and serving, not collaborating.

  The big brute behind me dragged me to the edge of the table, my toes barely able to get any purchase as I felt the head of his dick nudge my other hole. I knew I wouldn’t be able to sit down properly for the next few days, which would earn me more lashes, but at least he was going to get a surprise. I hadn’t been to the bathroom in days, when this one pulled himself free from me, he was going to need a bath, and his poor unfortunate house slave would be washing the smell of shit from his clothes for days. With a bit of luck, the rest would find it funny and go easy on me for punishment. I squealed out at being split in two. “Quieten the bitch,” came a voice, and instead of finding a hand covering my mouth, I felt the head of another man’s dick force its way past my lips and surge forward until it nearly choked me. The temptation to bite down and make him regret it passed quickly. The one and only time I’d done that, they had my mouth fucked repeatedly as punishment until I vomited so much it came out of my nose and I nearly choked on it. I’d take a bit of brutal oral sex over that; it didn’t last as long.

  The music seemed louder now that I was concentrating on it. The girls wearing floaty, sheer outfits moved and glided around the room in time with the beat.

  Not long now.
>
  Neither of these men would keep up this pace for long, and I’d have filled my entertainment quota for the night. With a bit of luck, after this business transaction was done, the important guests would leave, and I’d be left with the locals. Having to service those men, and my ‘husband’ was nothing compared to a special party performance.

  The grunts from both men came to a crescendo, and as I had promised myself, I released my bowels over him just as I felt him pull himself out of me. He muttered some abuse in Arabic, and then rushed to tend to himself. As an added bonus, the guy at my mouth fell out of me laughing, spraying his junk on my face rather than forcing me to swallow it. A ghost of a smile threatened to form on my lips, but I held it back. I would celebrate that small victory internally later, when I was alone.

  Again, I waited on the table, my body battered and bruised from its assault, hoping they’d hurry up and release me from my duties for the night as I saw the man buying the weapons from my comrade get up to leave. As he shook a lot of hands, I noticed he wasn’t dressed like the others. His robes were longer, pressed sharper and cleaner. I tracked him all the way to the door, not wanting to feel angry that he’d ignored me and the performance I’d been forced to give him, only to be proved wrong. At the last minute, when he’d ducked his head to pass under the door frame, he looked back and nodded his gratitude in my direction. This asshole was important as well as scary, and it wasn’t just because he was treated like royalty, or the fact that he’d done a deal with an agent from my homeland for arms. It was that I felt thankful that he’d acknowledged my show, and that meant I was well and truly broken. I was seeking the approval of my captors, which meant I was now just as dangerous to my country as I was to these people.

  America would call me a double agent.

  Officially, I was as good as dead already.

  The next morning, I was dragged out of bed by Inaya. She was supposed to be my house help, but I knew she was fucking my so-called ‘husband.’ With a bit of luck, he’d knock her up soon. It galled me that I wished for that. The poor girl was a month shy of fifteen-years-old. It was at times like these when I realized I was thinking like an American. I was used to having sex with grown, respectful men, those who became boyfriends I liked after we’d dated, a normal course for a relationship. But here, a hairy-assed terrorist old enough to be your dad or grandad, which was definitely not right, was the norm for Inaya; she didn’t know any different.

  “Market. Come. Must get ready.” She stroked my back gently. There had only been the one time when she’d shaken me violently to wake me up and I’d nearly taken her head off. That was another thing about Inaya: she was a quick learner. I groaned as I rolled off the bed, the sheet beneath me stained with blood from my anus, and I could feel the nightdress was stuck to me with more of it, all crusted and dry.

  “I run tub,” she said kindly, her grasp of English getting better, thanks to me, she also had the decency to look away, embarrassed.

  Nodding, I eased out of bed and felt no shame in stripping off in front of her. This might have been normal life for her, but I wanted her to see just how the men she looked up to treated me. In the beginning I pitied her and the other females who lived in the compound, but that did nothing to keep my mind in the game. While I was here, I had a job to do, and feeling sorry for those that let themselves become the lesser of the human race wasn’t it.

  I sat in the metal bath with my knees close to my chest and my arms wrapped around them as she poured jugs of water into it and over my back. There were other rooms in this large house that had running water, but I wasn’t allowed to use them. It was my punishment for being an American whore. I had to get used to the simpler things in life, not rely on the same comforts I had at home.

  I thought back to the first day I’d laid eyes on Mohammed. He was just a guy, but he was the front man for their campaign, and he was handsome as fuck. We’d had coffees on the college campus, a few dates out, but it was his shyness that suckered you in. He wasn’t like the other guys on campus, and then he disappeared. That was all part of the plan we’d concocted and baited. He thought he was drawing me in, suckering me with feelings, but he was really the worm on the hook. We’d had a long-distance relationship. I wasn’t supposed to be here doing any of this, but I’d made myself a valuable asset to my country.

  I wished to all fuck that I’d walked in the other direction when they approached me.

  “Ointment?”

  I nodded at Inaya as she pulled me from the depressed musings I often ran through in my head. I felt her hands on me, gently rubbing over the bruises that lined my spine. The pot appeared in front of me and I poked a finger in it. Whatever this stuff was, it worked on everything, and seemed to burn less when you applied it in water. Leaning to the side, I winced as I rubbed the dollop of it around my split ass hole.

  “Market busy today. Festival.”

  “Great,” I muttered, with about as much enthusiasm for it as a fart in a space suit. I’d worked my ass off last night, literally, and now I’d be rushed off my feet today. The only good thing about the market was the monthly contact I got from my handler. He came in and gave me some information, or a mission and some hope that what I was doing out here was useful in the war effort on terror. After the first year, I’d stopped hoping that they were coming with details of my extraction. The highs and lows of that disappointment were the real killer in this fucking place.

  Two hours later, I was balanced on the crate I used as a seat behind the spice market stall. My ass was on fire, some of it from the ointment, some of it the sheer harshness of the wood against my torn butt skin, and I waited.

  The sign for saffron was out as required. That was how my handlers knew it was safe to approach me. If I didn’t advertise it then they knew they needed to steer clear. The code word was ‘saffron tulip’. If they enquired about saffron coming from a tulip, I knew they were a friendly; anyone who knew their spices knew that saffron came from crocus not tulips.

  I saw the regulars come and go. Some would buy from me because I was a novelty, a turncoat against my own people, and in these parts, you didn’t betray your home land. Others would either spit on the floor as they walked past me or curse in Arabic and tell me they’d rather buy from the devil himself than me. This was another part of my punishment—public shame. Mental mind games.

  I’d just finished guzzling a bottle of water as I saw him approach, the man from last night who had done the deal with Iqbal. My heart soared knowing that the deal he’d done with the evil war lord was all part of some master plan. Whatever it was felt final last night, something that we’d all been working towards between us, me feeding them information, my handlers responding, finally cultimating in an entrapment exercise where we could take some decisive action.

  “Could I sell you some spices?” I asked as he stopped in front of me. He did nothing to hide that he was a foreigner in these parts. White pants, linen shirt partially buttoned up and sleeves rolled up to his elbows that flapped as he attempted to swat at the circling flies. With his black ray-bans on he looked confident, he was just missing espadrilles and pina colada.

  “Uh...” He paused, as if trying to remember his line, and it was on the tip of my tongue to remind him by suggesting he might like some saffron, when he smiled and replied. “No thanks, darlin’, not got a need for spices right now.”

  Something inside me understood then that his smile wasn’t a smile, it was a sneer and his confidence wasn’t just that either. It was pure fucking arrogance, American arrogance. Only someone with something to sell would do that in these parts, would forget the risk and strut their shit around here like they owned the place. I paused and waited as he continued to stand there. Was this a test? If it was, I’d pass it just like every other one they’d given me.

  He chuckled, and it rocked me to my core. The Miami vice wannabee leaned closer. “Remember, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” This fucking asshole knew exactly what he was doing. He was tauntin
g me. The horrific thought occurred to me that he might have given me up, but then I knew they’d never do that. Above all else, the intelligence I could give them would always be worth more to them.

  As he casually placed his hands in his pockets and turned away, it was on the tip of my tongue to beg him to take me with him, but that would never happen and if anything, one of us had to get out of here, otherwise all my suffering had been for nothing. Like always, I was a sucker for the cause.

  With my heart in tatters, I was losing the fight mentally. Another market had come and gone; another chance to be extracted had passed me by. I didn’t know how much longer I could go on doing this. How many more deals could my countrymen do with Iqbal’s army of Jihadis? If they fucked up these deals, I was dead for sure. Every time they looked at me, or I spoke, it would serve a reminder of the country that had fucked them over.

  No.

  I would not get caught up in that. If they didn’t extract me soon, I would have to make my own way out, and if I got killed trying then so be it.

  I’d done my bit for good against evil and if God had seen fit to reward me for that, he would get me out.

  If not, then what would be would be.

  Chapter Two

  Codename : Agent Poppy

  “See you’ve got saffron on special.”