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Betrayed (Trail of the Sandpiper) (Volume 1)

By Tina Pinson

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Chapter One


Japanese Encampment
July 1942

Slipping on leather gloves with the calm precision of a doctor readying for a long surgical procedure, Lieutenant Kobayashi stared at her. Disgust curled his lips, bile rose in his throat. Should he touch her? Did his gloves offer adequate protection?
His gaze swept the room. He wished one of the other four gathered there might step in and do what he hesitated to, but they stood idly by... watching, perhaps more afraid than he. He hazarded a glance at his commanding officer who sat in the corner looking superior as usual, and knew no help would come from that quarter, either. He turned back to her and gulped back his trepidation.
She looked worse than he recalled. Sitting in the pillbox -- a three-by-five hole in the ground -- had left her a wearied-wreck. And the ebb and flow of temperamental, torrential rains since the time of her capture, had effectively added to her debasement. The grate that secured her shelter offered little from the elements, leaving her to sit in three inches of water and refuse. She was muddy, sodden, and stank like she'd rooted with the pigs when they pulled her out.
But she was a woman, and the mud barely covered what he knew was there.
Her baggy clothes, a pair of Sanforized-shrunk work slacks and a chambray shirt similar to one he'd seen in those glitzy American magazines when he attended college in Boston, were drenched. Dry, they were already worn and sheer, but now they clung like a second skin, hiding little of her form.
Kobayashi studied her body. Were she not so skinny with that horrible skin rash that bloated her face and hands, she might even be pretty. For a white woman. But she was too English and had nowhere near the beauty of his wife. He thought of his wife's sleek black hair and the deep brown of her loving gaze then focused on the white woman again. In truth, he'd been with white women before. But this truth and the fact that he could speak the English language as deftly as the woman before him were things he could not say to his peers.
He was Japanese. She was English. She was the enemy.
Her muddied hair hung in a thick cord down her back. Loose wisps escaped their moorings and pressed against an equally dirty face. Fearful eyes peeked out occasionally against a backdrop of the earthen slough. Single strands of hair were beginning to dry and form flaxen curls that might catch a man's eye. Even her pale gray eyes had a feminine draw, but the red blotches of distorted skin rising beneath the mire caught the greatest measure of his focus. Did she have a skin disease? Leprosy? Worse? He didn't want to touch her.
But no one else was going to.
He held up his gloved hands, calculated the depth of protection over his fingers and another, more ominous, thought arose. Did the others see his fear? He may not want to touch her, but he didn't want to look like a coward in front of his peers. He didn't want to chance losing face. His superior cleared his throat in a clear sign of impatience. His decision was made for him; he needed to deal with the woman.
With a feral growl, borne from anger for his superior or her, he wasn't sure, he grabbed the rope of her hair and yanked her from the floor. He was pleased to hear her soft cry and glimpse satisfied smiles on the faces of his peers.
Their awe fed him, emboldened him to take firmer measures. He struck her face, her ugly face, and pulled her hair more firmly. A feat easily accomplished by wrapping the cord of hair around his wrist and tethering her. She was taller than him by a head, but moved by anger and arrogance, he whip-corded her about like a rag doll.

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