"A whole week?" Allie tried not to sound whiney, but this was getting to be too much.
"I'm sorry, honey." It didn't make things any easier that the regret in David MacPhail's voice was genuine "You know how these assignments can drag on."
Do I ever, she thought, as she toyed with strands of her long, dark hair. Guess I should know better than to expect an undercover police officer to keep regular hours.
"David, you promised…"
"I know, I know. And I'm keeping that promise."
Allie looked down at the ring on her finger. "You said…"
"Nothing's changed. It's a little more intense right now than I'd expected, but I'm still only a month from reassignment, and when that happens, it'll be regular business hours. I promise"
"And our plans…?"
"Wedding as scheduled, never fear. And we're still buying the house. Nothing's changed. Any prospects?"
"Actually, I'm supposed to be seeing one today!" The excitement of house-hunting drove the gloom from her voice.
"Good, good. Look, leave a message at the station when you've seen it. I'll call you in the morning, at the end of my shift."
"O.K. Love you!"
"You, too."
Allie hung up the phone, and smiled wryly at the statuesque redhead sitting across the table from her. "You heard."
"Yes," Dana smiled at her. "Don't worry. David would do anything for you; you know that. You'll see. This time next month, you'll both be relaxing in front of a big fire in your new house."
"I suppose you're right. It's just hard to wait."
"I know." The doorbell rang, and Dana added, "But at least it sounds like you don't have to wait any more today."
"Oh, this must be the realtor! Sure you can't take some time and come with us?"
"Sorry," Dana shook her head. "We're short-staffed at the store, so I'll probably be there until closing today. Stop by, though, and tell me all about it!"
"Oh, I will!" Allie assured her. As Dana grabbed her purse, Allie opened the door. Standing on the step was a striking-looking woman: tall, impeccably dressed from her gray, tailored business suit down to a pair of white gloves, with jet-black hair piled high on her head, and eyes of a watery blue.
"Hi, you're the realtor?"
"Eleanor Cromwell." The British accent lent the voice an air of dry authority. "You must be Allie."
"Yes, that's me, and this is my friend, Dana." The beautiful redhead smiled and held out her hand; the Englishwoman seemed to be regarding Dana with unusual interest. Ah, Dana, Allie sighed to herself. Even the women can't take their eyes off you. "Will you be accompanying us today?"
"No," Dana answered. "Off to work, I'm afraid."
"Pity." The realtor continued to regard Dana with keen interest, then returned her attention to Allie. "Well, Allie, shall we be off, then?"
"Oh, definitely! Dana, I'll see you at the store!" The friends exchanged waves, and Allie turned back to Eleanor Cromwell.
"I'm so excited! Shall I get my car?"
"No need, dear. I'll drive." The realtor nodded to a nondescript sedan parked at the curb. Allie shrugged, picked up her own purse, and locked the door as she left the house. The street was quiet this morning, with none of the neighbors visible. As Allie slid into the passenger seat of the car, something seemed out of place to her, but she couldn't quite decide what that was. It was only much later that it occurred to her that it was strange for a local realtor to be driving a rental car.
For the first few minutes, Allie carried on an excited conversation with the realtor, but the woman seemed to be distressingly short on specifics about the house. After a while, seeing that she would learn no more until they reached their destination, Allie gazed out the window, lost in memories.
Settling down, finally. With David. Who'd ever have dreamed?
A year ago? No, it had to have been a lifetime… at least a lifetime since that day David had pulled her from the burning car, the day she had almost…
She had never told anyone about it; some days, she could hardly believe it herself. Through a miserably unhappy circumstance, she had been kidnapped and held in the mansion of the Scottish expatriate Lord Falkenberg, where women were kept and trained as sex slaves. Dana had been an inmate of the house, too, and her friendship had given Allie much of the strength she needed to go on. They had been rescued, and Falkenberg's monstrous enterprise ended; but only after Alle had been brutalized, had her nipples pierced under the eye of Slavemistress Sarah Lovett, nearly raped by the vile Beale… and nearly stolen away by the beautiful Armando, who was ready to defy Falkenberg and all his power for love of Allie. Storybook stuff-- and, of course, just about as substantial. Rather than face jail, the lovely Latin bastard had left her to die in a burning car-- all right, so he probably hadn't known the car would catch fire when he ran; still, he left her bound, gagged, and helpless, because he valued his freedom more than he did her. And it was David that saved her. Initially shy and awkward, the young undercover policeman had grown into a satisfying lover and companion. If he was not quite in Armando's class as a lover…. well, David was here, and planning to stay. That counted for a lot.
"Here we are." Allie's reverie ended as the car pulled to a halt in front of a large, blue house, on a small, quiet cul-de-sac. There was no realtor's sign in front; as she got out, Allie wondered if Eleanor had some kind of "inside tip", or if she was just speculating. That would be disappointing, if she doesn't even have the listing to show me! Anyway, from the outside, the place looked a bit run-down; surely, she and David can do better than this! Won't hurt to look, though…
Allie preceded the woman to the front door of the house. It was locked, and she called over her shoulder, "Got the key?"
"We won't need it."
"What do you-" Allie was turning back to the realtor, puzzled, but her question was cut short by the sight of the pistol in the woman's hand. Thanks to David, Allie knew a bit about guns, and knew that she faced a powerful weapon, in the sure hand of someone who knew how to use it.
"What the hell--?!?"
"Shut up and do as I say." The woman's voice was crisp and to-the-point.
Allie knew that David always counseled people to respect a gun, and defer to its owner, rather than risk being killed. Not, of course, that Allie always did just what David told her…
"The hell I will, lady. Put that away before you get yourself in trouble." Allie cursed herself for riding in the woman's car--if she'd had her own, she could have made a dash for it.
"Trouble." The woman's face lit slightly in a thin smile. "There has already been more than enough trouble. That's why I'm here." Her gun hand didn't flinch.
"What are you talking about?"
"You'll find out soon enough." Without taking her eye off Allie, or allowing the gun to waver an inch, the woman dipped into her shoulder bag, and pulled out a pair of handcuffs--not steel, like David's, but made of leather. That brought back a flood of unpleasant memories.
"Turn around and put your hands behind you."
Allie snorted. "Oh, now you're really scaring me. Lady, believe me, after the things I've seen in my life, it will take more than--"
"I don't give a good goddam about your life or what you've seen." The voice was ice. "You either do as I say, right now, or I shoot you in the knee and then cuff you."
Allie swallowed heavily. This couldn't be happening. No one could be kidnapped twice in one year! Was this someone's idea of a prank? David? No, he'd never--
"Now!" The pale blue eyes bored into Allie's dark brown ones, with a fierce intensity.
Slowly, Allie turned her back. There was no time to think or ask questions. She held her hands behind her back. Allie desperately looked for a reflective surface, a window, anything, to see if the woman would have to put the gun down, but there was nothing, and in just a few seconds, Allie felt the horribly familiar sensation of cuffs being placed on her wrists, and fastened tightly. The leather was soft, and worn with use. The woman's hands had an expert touch, as she fitted Allie's thumbs into another tiny set of cuffs, ensuring that it would not be possible for Allie to get at the buckles. Ridiculous though it was, she tugged experimentally to see if there would be any chance of freeing herself.
"Don't bother," came the sneering tone behind from behind her. "Now, walk around the back of the house."
"You won't get away with this-kidnapping me in broad daylight."
"Broad and lonely daylight--there's no one in the street anywhere. Be smart: shut up and walk."
Now, for all her bravado, Allie found herself trembling. True, she'd already survived an ordeal such as few women had ever had to face, but that didn't mean she'd be so lucky this time. Show fear, though, and you're half-beaten already, she told herself. With that, she straightened her shoulders as best she could, and began to walk.
The woman guided her around the side of the house, and Allie miserably realized that the wooden fence bordering the yard made it unlikely that anyone would see them. Yell for help? Unless there was an armed policeman in the area, chances were that anyone who came to help her would wind up dead. Maybe if I shout "Fire!";
"Keep your mouth shut." Allie realized that she must have visibly drawn breath for a shout. "You make one peep and you can walk the rest of the way backwards, with the gun barrel in your mouth."
If she could have seen someone, anyone, Allie might have risked it, anyway, but it made no sense to take the chance if there was no hope of rescue. She would just have to keep her eye out for an opportunity.
As they rounded the back of the house, Allie could see that there was a narrow passageway between houses to the next street. At the woman's prodding, they bypassed the house's back yard, and headed to the passageway. A large, black van was parked on the street, and as they emerged from the passageway, Allie made one last, desperate look around for some kind of help--obviously, this van was her destination, and she had only seconds before she disappeared into its darkened interior.
"Got her." The woman had raised her voice, slightly, to someone inside the van. Before Allie could even decide on a last, desperate chance, the side door of the van opened. There was at least one person in the darkened interior, but Allie couldn't see well enough to decide if it was a man or a woman.
"Inside." Now that there was no room for Allie to bolt, the woman dug the gun into the bound girl's back. Left with no options, Allie began to mount the steps. In the next moment, she was inside the van, the door had been shut behind her, and she was, once more, a prisoner.
As the door closed, the woman pushed Allie from behind, causing her to lose her balance and fall forward to her knees; before she could even think of trying to scramble to her feet, the woman planted a foot in the small of her back and pushed Allie down to the carpeted floor of the van. Allie turned her face to avoid colliding with the floor; what she saw was almost as disquieting as anything that had happened so far today: the van had evidently been customized with some sort of leather straps mounted in the walls, that were doubtless for the restraint of prisoners. Fearfully, Allie rolled to her side to try and see into the darkness. The woman had taken a seat on a small bench seat near her; another figure was just turning the passenger's captain-style chair around to face her. It was still too dim to see properly, when the figure spoke.
"Hello, luv. Happy to see me?"
Oh, Jesus. BEALE! This couldn't be happening!
When she had been captive in the mansion, the slimy Englishman, one of Falkenberg's toadies, had tried to rape her. At the last moment, Armando had interrupted him, and Beale had been thrown out of the house by the imperious Sarah Lovett (who didn't mind watching her guests rape helpless women, but drew the line at the hired help doing so).
"But--how? Why--"
"All in good time, you little whore. Plenty of time to answer all your questions."
"Fuck you, you sick bastard!" For all that she tried to remain calm, the insult was almost worse than being kidnapped! "Let me go!"
"Oh, I don't think so, cunt. Not after all that you and I… almost shared… once."
"You prick!" Allie gritted. "Fine, then, rape me and be done with it!"
To her astonishment, the man just laughed; an unpleasant high-pitched giggle. "Oh, ho-- mink-lined is it?"
The response was so unexpected that Allie could only gape at him.
"You're such a fine bit of crumpet that I'd come back here just to get a taste of what I missed?!!" He nearly dissolved in a fit of giggles. "Oh, that is marvelous." Beale bounded out of his chair, and dropped to one knee, kneeling above his captive. "You sodding little tramp, I have far more important business to attend to. Never fear, though--" he gripped Allie's chin painfully, and dug his nails into her skin, "I'll run you up the flagpole once or twice before we're done." She flinched in pain and disgust, but the man's wiry grip was unyielding. "Not now, though," he continued, as he released her face. "Now, I need your help with… a little 'project' of mine."
"Help? Why the hell should I help you with anything?"
Beale shook his head, as if in wonder. "Can you really be that stupid? Do you honestly imagine that I would hesitate to kill you if you don't do as I say?"
The threat hung in the air; after a moment, Allie asked, "Why me?"
"Why you?!?" the man was genuinely incredulous at the question. "Why you? Amazing. You must be stupid. Don't you know what you cost me?"
"Your job?" Allie gulped.
"JOB?!?" Beale practically shrieked. "Is that all you think it was?" He bent his face to hers, and hissed, "maybe it doesn't mean anything to someone who grew up in this benighted country with its fucking 'classless society', but can you imagine what it was like for me, growing up poor in London's East End? Every day of my adult life, I saw beautiful women attended by men who weren't worth half of me, but because they came from the right families, and they had money, those stupid tarts wouldn't even look at me!" Spittle flew into Allie's face, and Beale tried to catch his breath. "And, then, one day, a friend recommended me to Falkenberg, and I came with him to this country." His voice lowered, and he gave out something resembling a sigh. "Can you think what that life at that mansion was like for me? Women so beautiful it would hurt to look at them--they were on their knees before me, calling me 'Master'!" His breath heaving, he stared hard at the woman who trembled on the floor. "And then, you showed up. You couldn't just go along with a bit of fun, could you? You had to make a scene, and then that red-haired cunt ran off to find Miss High-and-Mighty Lovett and that poncey Latin bastard, and I'm out on my ass, thanks to you!"
His hand lashed out; Allie pulled back as far as her bound hands would permit, but still caught the backhanded blow across her cheek. Tears stinging her eyes, she snapped back, "If you hadn't been kicked out, you'd have gone to jail with the rest! You ought to thank me, you moron!"
"Oh, don't worry," his hand smashed her other cheek. "You'll be thanked good and proper! Won't she, Ruth?"
The "realtor" snickered. "Oh, do forgive me," Beale addressed her, "I've not introduced you two." He grinned down at Allie. "Stupid Cunt, this is my sister Ruth." The woman gave Allie an ironic nod. " Ruth will be assisting us in our efforts."
Ruth Beale peeled off her gloves, and slapped them across Allie's face; the pain was trivial, the symbolism clear: to these two, she was property, now, to do with as they would. "Let's get her fixed up. We need to get going." Her eyes were pitiless as she regarded the captive girl. At the suggestion, the Englishman drew from behind his seat a large leather case. He opened it, turned it so Allie could see, and a year's worth of nightmares stared Allie in the face: gags, harnesses, cuffs, whips… all the horrible paraphernalia of her captivity with Falkenberg. And this time, there was no Lovett to discipline Beale, no Armando to save her. She was all alone…
"This, I think!" Beale held up a terrifying black object: it was a leather hood, with some kind of huge rubber plug dangling from the inside.
"No, please!" It was sheer reflex-there was no rational hope for any sort of mercy from these two.
Beale laughed, clearly delighted by her response. "Oh, come now-this is all the fashion for interfering little sluts!" He opened the hood wide, the black rubber phallus aimed squarely at Allie's mouth.
"NO!" Hopeless. Handcuffed, nowhere to run, and it was two against one, but Allie couldn't help trying to fight them "HELP!! HELP!! HEL---gguuaggghh!!!" She felt the woman's slender fingers grip a fistful of her hair and pull her head backwards as the grinning Beale thrust the rubber prod into her open mouth.
"Uggghh-kakk!!" Allie's struggles subsided as she tried desperately to keep from choking, and Ruth took the opportunity to release Allie's head to her brother's care, while she began to bind the helpless girl's legs. As Beale brutally jammed the black hood down over Allie's face, she could feel harsh cord being tied around her ankles, the woman taking pains to scrape the coarse fibers across her captive's skin as she worked.
Allie's body was now stretched painfully: Beale was fastening the hood around her upraised head, while his sister began to pull the girl's ankles up to her back. As the zippers sealed Allie's head into its black prison, Ruth used the cord to knot Allie's bound ankles to the leather cuffs that imprisoned her hands.
The mask covered Allie's eyes. Beale had snapped shut a pad of some kind over the plug, forcing it even deeper into her mouth. Her nose was free, but with her terrified struggling, the amount of air she could take in that way felt desperately inadequate.
Relax!, Allie told herself. Panic, and you're dead. You've been hogtied before; try and breathe as normally as you can, and--
Her self-help session was brutally interrupted as her head felt as though it were being torn from her shoulders. Her body spasmed; even with no eyes to see, she could tell that one of her captors had tied more of the rope to something in the top of her hood, and fastened it where her bound ankles and wrists met, pulling it taut. She doubted she had ever strained more muscles at the same time in her life: her chest and neck screamed as her body pretzeled itself, her head forced up and back, her shoulders near to dislocation. She was screaming, now, not for help, but in agony; inside her head the sound was a loud wail, but she knew well that only the barest of muffled moans could be escaping the stifling hood.
Allie lay on the floor, helpless, blind and mute. But not deaf…
"So, Jeremy, you never did this one, then?" The woman's voice sounded muffled to Allie's hooded ears, but there was no mistaking the nasty dig in the ribs the woman gave her with the toe of a shoe.
"I had hundreds, all better-looking than that slag!" Even in her misery, Allie almost felt like laughing at the man's pathetic boast. "Still, I imagine I could be persuaded to do her a favor!" He broke off into a fit of giggles again, as he started the engine, and the van moved into gear. Over the noise of the car, it was getting harder for Allie to hear, inside the hood, though snatches of her kidnappers' conversations penetrated.
"The car's clean, then?" Beale asked.
"Completely," came Eleanor's response. "Paid on a stolen credit card, and I left no prints. It's covered with hers, of course," another kick to Allie's ribs, "but that's all right-there's nothing to link her to us."
Certainly, Allie had known hopelessness before, trapped in Falkenberg's mansion, her whereabouts unknown to any of her friends. Once in there, though, the miserable future her captors had in mind for her was clear, and had involved keeping her alive and healthy. This was quite different. For all she knew, Beale would let her suffocate in this hood. Even if he did need her to "help" him in some way, there was nothing to prevent him killing her after he was done.
It was hot in the hood. Stifling. It drained Allie. She tried desperately to cling to hope, to fill her mind with pictures of Dana and David finding clues to the bogus realtor, tracking down the rental car, tracing Beale's van… but it was no use. She had read of prisoners who were able to allow their minds to somehow "escape" their imprisonment. Try as she would, though, her body only brought her back to the reality of physical pain, and the fear of death.
Her bowed body wasn't anchored to anything, and she rocked and slid painfully with every bump and turn. The fact that she was still clothed meant that it was less painful than it might have been… and why, she wondered, had Beale neglected that little detail? What the hell kind of help did he need? What did it matter-- at this point, she'd have done anything to be released from her tendon-straining confinement.
Finally, after what might have been ten minutes or two hours for all she could tell, the miserable rocking ceased as Allie felt the van slow to a halt.
Her captors spoke to each other in tones too low for her to hear; then, almost incredibly, she felt one of them grasp a zipper and begin to release her head from its leather prison.
In moments, her eyes were free, and while she tried to adjust to the light, Beale yanked the disgusting rubber phallus from her mouth; it slid free, saliva-coated, and Allie thought she had never seen anything quite so vile. As the hood was pulled from her face, the rope slackened, and the relief in her muscles was instant; the hogtie was unforgiving, but nothing could have been as merciless as having her head tied that way.
"Please… a drink…" Allie kept her voice low, not wishing to be re-gagged. She looked up from her painful hogtie to see if her captors would show mercy, or simply prolong her torment. To her surprise, Beale had, indeed, produced a small bottle of water, and, in a very businesslike way, was setting about cutting the bonds holding her wrists and ankles together. She bit her lip to stifle a groan as her body relaxed on the floor of the van. Still bound hand and foot, she had to sip from the bottle as Beale held it to her lips, like a child.
"Look at her," he sneered to his sister. "Looks like a bleedin' sheep drinking that way." Allie did her best to shut out the cruel laughter that greeted the remark, and concentrate on the blessed relief of the water. All too soon, though, the bottle was drained. Beale tossed it aside, and used his foot to roll Allie onto her back; her arms were so numb from the hogtie that she didn't even bother trying to keep from lying on them.
"Now, you fucking whore," Beale addressed her cheerfully, "it's time for you to earn your life. You have a very special task to perform here. You do as you're told, and you live to see another day. Cross me even slightly, and I'll kill you."
Beale spent another moment or two issuing threats, but Allie didn't even hear them. Lying on her back, now, she was able to see through the heavily smoked windows, and the surroundings were very familiar. She could see a Starbuck's, the Dry Cleaner's, that weird hole-in-the-wall computer store… and, suddenly, her heart sank, her eyes beginning to tear.
She knew where she was.
The van was parked outside Dana's boutique.
To be continued...