BoneMan's Daughters by Ted Dekker Read Free Book Online Page A

still hung on the wall. His BDU trousers were wet
     from his own urine.
    Nothing else had changed.
    Ryan sat in the chair for yet another long time before the latch finally clacked and the door swung open. Kahlid walked in
     bearing a bottle of Evian water and some yellow rice cakes. He shut the door behind him, studied Ryan with dark but gentle
     eyes, and then crossed to him.
    Without a word he opened the bottle, pressed it to Ryan’s lips, and fed him like a mother might feed her child. Ryan sucked
     down the liquid, surprised at his thirst.
    Kahlid withdrew the bottle and set it on the table next to the rice cakes. “There’s a bucket in the corner. I will remove
     your chains so that you can relieve yourself and stretch your bones. If you attempt to escape, I will put a bullet through
     your thigh. Do you understand?”
    Ryan blinked.
    Kahlid rounded his chair, unfastened the shackles, and helped him to his feet. His joints felt like fire and it took him half
     a minute to loosen the stiffness. Hobbling over to a lone bucket and roll of toilet paper in the back corner, he glanced around
     his prison, but there was nothing new to see. Just the lone chair, the table, the camera, and the photographs.
    He used the bucket and walked back to the chair. The locks on the chains were made by Master Lock.
    “Go ahead, stretch, get your blood flowing. I need you to be exhausted, but not in pain to the point of indifference.”
    Ryan’s mind began to spin again. Kahlid could hardly utter a word without complicating matters for him. Navy Intelligence
     could use a man like him.
    “That’s enough. Please”—his captor motioned to the chair —“sit.”
    Thirty seconds later Ryan was back in chains, staring at Kahlid. It occurred to him that the brief reprieve had worked against
     him. Chained again, he felt a surge of hopelessness that wouldn’t have been as acute without the reminder of freedom.
    All expected techniques, and effective.
    “According to your uniform, you are an officer,” Kahlid said. “Not that it matters. You have extraordinary control of your
     mind. You don’t express emotion very well. You might even be emotionally repressed. Worse, you might even be proud of yourself
     for not succumbing to my blatant attempts to affect your emotions. What you don’t know is that this will only work against
     you.”
    Again, expected.
    A slight, nearly sympathetic smile crossed Kahlid’s mouth. “You’re in intelligence, aren’t you? G-2? Again, just a guess.
     Tell me, how would you judge the effectiveness of my methods to break you thus far?”
    No harm in engaging the man on this level. “You’re good. Predictable at times and unorthodox at the same time. But I don’t
     think you understand me very well. We both know that I’m already dead. None of this matters to me. Yes, it would be nice to
     die quickly, but we both know that you won’t allow that. So I’m left with no option but to suffer whatever you have in mind
     for a matter of hours, days, or weeks and then die.”
    “So calculating. Arabs are far more passionate than Americans are, I think. Everything makes so much sense in your perfect
     world, doesn’t it? Now you’ve come over here to show us poor Arabs how to enter your perfect world.”
    Ryan didn’t think a rebuttal would help matters.
    The man’s shoulders sagged and he frowned. “Okay then, you leave me without a choice. We will play our game. But you must
     know one thing before I tell you what my intentions are. Many would say that I am insane. What I’m about to do will be heralded
     as inhuman by my own brothers. But you give me no choice.”
    “Like I said, I’m already dead,” Ryan said.
    “Yes.” Kahlid looked at the pictures. “And so are they. Killed by Satan himself, whom you don’t seem to care about, because
     you don’t believe in God.”
    Kahlid swiveled to him, and Ryan saw the change in his eyes immediately. Something in his mind had shifted.
    “Do you