They didn’t break his legs. That was the first mercy. Or maybe the first insult.

The second was that no one’d had the balls to show their face.

He came to like a man being born wrong—lungs screaming, mouth like sandpaper, and a mood foul enough to boil steel. The kind of waking that didn’t seem real until the concrete floor kissed hit his spine with all the warmth of a gravestone. His boots were missing, his belt too, but at least the dog tags were still hanging around his neck.

The pounding behind his eyes said drugs. Or a solid crack to the head. Could’ve been both.

“Brilliant,” he rasped, flexing his jaw as the dull throb in his skull settled into something steadier.

He tugged at the ropes binding his wrists, felt the bite of nylon against skin. Ankles chained too—bit overkill, that. Sloppy. Loose as a whore’s knickers.

They’d underestimated him.

Bad move.

“Pricks,” he muttered, dragging in a breath, cataloging the hurt. Nothing amiss. Nothing mutilated. Just… restraint. The way you treat a thing you’re not done with yet.

He shifted his weight, slow and careful. Shoulders tense. Back sore. Still breathing. That’ll do. Couldn’t hear a peep outside the room, which was its own answer. Likely soundproofed. Sturdy walls. They didn’t want him heard. They wanted him quiet. „Best of luck with that, ye gutless wankers.”

If they believed tying him down would shut him up, they didn’t know Soap.

The room was—bare. Not empty. Empty’s what the desperate call it to stay sane. No, this was intentional. A space curated. Windowless, one bulb swaying above him, a door without a handle. This wasn’t some halfwit’s garage. Someone had planned this. Whoever did this had resources. Time. Thought it’d be clever, probably. Thought they’d done the hard bit. Caught MacTavish. Trapped the Special Forces op. Look how smart we are.

He smiled to himself, wide and razor-thin. Aye. Smart.

Until he found his way out.

He’d been in worse spots. Had been captured before—war zones, border disputes, back-alley crossfires gone wrong. Tied up in Marrakesh. Shackled in Prague. Left for dead in a snowbank once with a bullet in his thigh and a half-broken radio. Even Price’d tried gagging him once or twice—never worked.

He always got out.

“Alright then,” he growled, voice low and venomous, “let’s see what game yer playin’.”

He was skilled at dealing with pain. Knew how to joke through it. Figured out how to grin in the face of someone who wanted to see him crawl.

Boredom, though? That was a bloody killer.

The hardest part was the waiting, the absence. It chewed at him more than fists ever could. The person that had brought him here hadn’t even bothered to make a show of it. No one barking questions. No threats, demands, or twisted monologue about why he was here. Not even a face to punch. Only the hum of electricity and the flick-flick-flick of that damn bulb above.

It was calm.

Way too quiet.

And Johnny hated silence.

If these dafties thought for a second that leaving him alone with nothing but his thoughts would wear him down? They’d clearly never met a Scot with too much time and a heap of fury.

When he got free—and he would—he’s gonna burn the whole bastarding place down to the ground.