There’s plenty more where it came from as well.

He could feel a set of hands on his shoulders. They were tugging at his sweatshirt, pulling him back. He roared with anger, and tried to shake them away, but it was too late. Another set of hands was grabbing him around the chest. Both Hassad and Jabr had caught hold of him and were tugging him away. He lashed out a fist, aiming for Nasri’s face, but missed, hitting only air. Jabr had a lock on his chest, and with one swift movement, heaved Porter upwards, and threw him up against the wall. Porter could feel his back slamming into the stone, bruising the skin.

Hassad slammed a fist straight into the centre of his stomach. The blow landed hard, knocking the wind out of his lungs. Porter started coughing violently. As he looked sideways, he could see Nasri getting to his feet. He had taken a couple of bruises where Porter’s kneecap has smashed into his chin, but otherwise he wasn’t badly hurt. Leaning over, he picked the hose up from the floor, reeled it back into the air like a fishing road, then lashed it through the air. The tip of the hose slashed across Porter’s chest. Its impact was softened slightly by his sweatshirt, but it still stung viciously. Porter cried out as the pain ripped through him. In front of him, he could see a cruel smile cross Hassad’s face. ‘Next time, we kill you,’ he said.

Nasri had already turned round. The hose was high in the air. It flicked back, then lashed into Katie’s side. The sound of plastic ripping into skin filled the small room, then there was a brief moment of silence. Porter already knew what was happening from painful experience. It took a moment for the brain to figure out what the body had just experienced. The pain didn’t register instantly. But when it did, it was like having a hundred sharp blades cutting into your skin in the same moment.

‘No,’ screamed Katie. ‘No, no, no …’

Nasri had already drawn the hose back again. His muscles were tense and bulging. In that moment, Porter realised he had only made things worse. The man’s blood was up now. There was real anger in each blow. The hose was moving through the air with the venom of a snake. It curled through the air, then kicked into Katie’s skin, cutting through the cloth that was covering her, and drawing a line of blood that ran across her belly and up into her breast. ‘Please no, please no, please no,’ she whimpered.

Don’t lose it again, Porter commanded himself. It doesn’t matter how much they provoke you. It only makes things worse.

Hassad raised a hand. Nasri had already drawn the hose behind his back, but he paused. ‘You’ll read now?’ said Hassad.

‘I’ll …’

‘You’ll read, or you’ll keep tasting the whip,’ snarled Hassad.

There were tears streaming down Katie’s cheeks, but they were tears of pain, not regret. Specks of blood had splattered across her chest, and her face was so pale and beaten, it was as if she had already taken another step into the grave. They planned this, Porter realised. He felt another stab of fury drilling into his heart. They knew she’d refuse, and they’d decided to whip her, just so she would look even more pitiful for the camera. Every move, every step, was planned with a brutal, unfeeling callousness that disgusted him.