Maybe he needed a drink or something.
I head back out of the room and down the stairs, going very quietly so I don’t startle him. As I go down the stairs, I don’t hear a thing to tell me he’s down here. But it’s a big place so he could be anywhere.
Going into the kitchen, I go to the laundry room to look through the trash where I threw the package the cuffs came in. Angel is my top priority. I can come look for wonder boy once I’ve set her free.
As I open the door to the laundry room, I find Cuddles sleeping in a corner of the large room. She doesn’t open her eyes as I come inside and turn the light on.
“Cuddles?”
I can see her little body rising and falling with each breath so I know she’s breathing. But damn that’s some hard sleeping she’s doing.
I know she played pretty hard with Gage but that’s too deep for her to be sleeping. I nudge her with my foot and brace myself for her to tear into me with the intrusion.
Nothing.
She doesn’t even halfway open her eyes.
A chill runs through me. But I shake it off and start digging through the trash for the package. It’s taking too long and I pick up the can and turn it over, making the paper and other paper goods we put in this can for recycling spill out onto the floor.
I look back at the dog and she’s still out like a light. When I look back, I see the package the cuffs came in and pick it up. There the little set of keys are. I must’ve forgotten to take them out.
With a quick tug on the tape that holds them inside the package, I get them out and leave the laundry room and head to the stairs to let Angel out of the cuffs.
I’ll come back down after I get her settled.
“Hey,” I hear from the dark of the dining room off the kitchen.
I turn as I recognize the woman’s voice.
“How the hell did you get in here?”
ANGEL
My tears have dried up as Benny seems to be taking a very long time to get back. I’m cuffed and blindfolded, lying on the bed. Being naked as well, I feel extremely vulnerable.
Wiggling around on the bed, I try to get the blindfold to slip off and manage to get it some of the way off. One eye is nearly free, I think.
The door squeaks a little as it opens. “Thank God, Benny. Did you find the key?”
I hear nothing. Then hear not one set of footsteps but two. Then two sets of hands are on both of my arms and I’m lifted off the bed.
“Hey!” I scream.
These hands are small. Not Benny’s or any other man’s.
I’m drug backward. The carpeting turns to tile. I’m in the bathroom and I hear the water turn on in the tub.
“What the fuck!”
I scream as I feel something slam against the side of my head.
I’m dropped and fall to the floor.
It stings on the side of my head. I’m very disoriented and try hard to listen. Neither of the people speak as I hear water filling the tub.
Steam is beginning to fill the bathroom as I can feel it on my skin and the heat from it lets me know that it is straight hot water they’re filling the tub with.
“Please, whatever you want just take it and leave us alone,” I say, trying hard not to let my voice tremble.
The urge to scream for someone to help me is a thing I have to keep under control or they may well knock my ass out and then I stand no chance.
It’s painfully obvious they plan on putting me in the deep bathtub in the scalding hot water. My mind is racing with what I need to do.
With the blindfold on, I can really hone in on where the two women are in the bathroom. Footsteps echo off the marble floor and the tiled walls.
One is across the bathroom and the other is by the vanity. My heart is pounding hard with fear and I take in some slow breaths to calm it so I can hear better.
My feet are free and even though my hands are cuffed, they’re in front of me. I can kick and make some uppercuts with my bound hands.
I’m not dead yet. I know they want me that way, but I still have a hell of a lot of fight in me.
“Who are you? I deserve to get to see the faces of the women who kill me, don’t I?” I ask with an even tone to let them know I’m not afraid of them.
Footsteps click and clack quickly toward me then they stop right in front of me. I feel a hand move over my cheek and the blindfold is nearly taken off but then another set of footsteps moves quickly toward me and I hear a loud smack as the one who’s about to remove the blindfold is whacked by the other.
Okay, I bet they aren’t getting along so well now.
“No reason for any violence,” I say.
I’m picked up by my hair and made to stand up. My toes hit the edge of the bathtub and I can feel the heat from the water below me.
I know I have this one chance, and that’s it, to save myself.
No one else can do this for me. I ready myself to fight for my life. Both let my arms go and I hear them take a few steps back. I think they’re about to run at me and push me into the water.
God, please help me…
The Compromise of the Billionaire and His Angel H.N.S Part 4
By Michelle Love
BLAZE
The smell of wet dog brings me around and I find myself lying face down on the hardwood floor in the dining room as Cuddles licks my face. I blink a few times to try to focus as everything is dark and blurry.
I guess I need to get up and figure out what’s happened to me.
Everything’s a big blur. I went downstairs to get something. I can’t really remember what it was.
Hey!
I’m tied up. My arms are behind my back and my wrists are tied with something. And so are my ankles.
Shit!
Cuddles takes a few steps back and I can see she’s kind of wobbly.
Oh yeah! Now I remember.
I saw Cuddles asleep in the laundry room. I was going through the trash to find the key for the cuffs I put on Angel.
My eyes focus and I see that Cuddles’ face is all wet. I have no idea why she would be wet. But I have no idea why I’m lying here on the floor with my feet and hands bound either.
Then a face flashes in my mind and I do recall seeing a woman in the house. A tall, kind of heavy-set blonde.
The blonde from the bar that night! The one Angel decked and knocked out!
What’s she doing here? Is she the one who did this to me?
She had to have help!
Looking back and forth and listening very hard, I hear nothing and see nothing. So, I start to roll over and make my way to anywhere but here.
If they left me here, they’ll come back here to do whatever else they have planned for me. So here is not a place I want to be.
Cuddles follows me as I roll over and over and I find myself in the great room. Cuddles walks in front of me, her gait is way off. She must’ve been drugged by the big chick.
I guess I was too. I don’t feel where I was hit to get knocked out. And now that I’m becoming more and more aware of things, I can smell something odd.
I suppose they used some type of thing to knock me out. Maybe chloroform or something like that. Cuddles begins to whine and I try to see what she’s whining about.
A dark figure is lying on the floor in front of the fireplace. I roll over to it and find it is not moving and I think it might be a man. And he seems to be tied up too.
One more roll has me close enough to see. Cuddles licks the man’s face and I can see that it is Gage.
Great! The only two viable males in this house who could possibly protect the rest and we're both tied up and one of us is still out!
How much worse can things get?
I bite my tongue as the thought crosses my mind. I shouldn’t have even thought that.
Angel’s still handcuffed, up in our bedroom, naked as the day she was born and completely vulnerable. I have to get up and get to her. But how?
I roll over and hit Gage with as
much force as I can and hiss, “Gage! Wake up!”
Nothing.
Cuddles is licking his face like crazy and it’s not doing a thing to wake him up. So I lean over and bite his shoulder. I give him a good bite and he stirs a bit.
“Ow!”
“Gage, wake up!” I whisper as loud a whisper as I can.
I don’t need us getting found.
“What the hell?” he mumbles. “Why am I tied up?”
His eyes flutter open and his pupils are dilated.
“Gage, someone’s in the house. I need your help to get untied. Angel’s alone in our bedroom and I have every reason to believe it’s her they’re here to hurt.”
He shakes his head to clear it. “Fuck!” He coughs a little.
“Shh,” I hiss at him. “We have to be quiet.”
With a nod, he says, “Yeah. It’s Melissa and some blonde woman here. I remember now. I came down to grab a bottle of water and found them with Cuddles. Melissa was holding her and that other chick was holding a rag over her little face.”
“Then they got you, huh?”
He nods. “Only, I ran out of the kitchen and they caught up to me in the great room.” He looks around. “Yep. Right about here is when the big one tackled me and then something was placed over my nose and mouth and here I am.”
“How good are your teeth, Gage?”
He looks confused. “They’re okay. Why?”
“I’m going to move around and you try to get my wrists free using them.” I start to move around the best I can and manage to get my bound wrists near his face.
I feel him trying to loosen the bond. Then he stops and whispers, “It’s a bungee cord, Blaze. Try to pull against it. I’ll never be able to bite through that rubber.”
“If I could get on my feet, I could hop over to a door and use the handle to stretch the cord then I might be able to get out of it. I’m going to need your help,” I tell him as I roll around to try to use his body to help get my ass off the floor.
Together, we manage to get me off the floor and I start hopping to the closest door knob. My robe is all messed up and parts of me are hanging out that I’d rather not have doing that. Hooking my wrists over the door knob, I pull and the cord stretches but it hurts like hell.
I have to keep thinking about what the hell they’re doing to my Angel to keep pulling them against my skin and finally I can get one hand free.
That’s all I need. I pull the cord off my wrists then my ankles and rush to set Gage free.
“We need something to level the playing field against these bitches, Gage. Maybe a couple of long knives. And something to hit them with,” I say as we hurry to the kitchen and I adjust my robe to properly cover myself again.
I grab a couple of knives out of the wooden block on the counter and Gage goes into the laundry room and brings back a broom and a mop. “These will work to knock the shit out of them with.” He looks down at Cuddles who still looks kind of loopy. “We should put her up. She might get hurt.”
“Stash her in the laundry room,” I tell him.
After he puts her up, we take off to go upstairs to see if the women have found Angel yet. I have no idea how long I was out so I’m worried about what we’ll find. Or won’t find.
I notice all the bedroom doors are closed as we pass them. All except Gage’s.
“Gage, is your cell phone in there so we can get the police coming this way?”
He nods and we go into the room. He grabs his cell off the dresser and calls 911. With a quick description of what’s happening and the address, I end the call and we leave the room to get to Angel.
I’m praying we make it to her before it’s too late. I have this terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach.
We stop in front of our bedroom door and I try the handle.
“Fuck! It’s locked,” I whisper and lean my ear against the door to try to hear anything.
My eyes go wide at what I hear and Gage leans in to listen too.
“God damn! What the fuck is happening in there, Blaze?”
“We have to get inside!”
ANGEL
I can hear the two sets of feet making noise against the tiled floor of the bathroom as they take steps away from me. I have a feeling they’re about to push me into this scalding hot water they’ve filled our deep bathtub with.
Obviously, I can’t let that happen so I’m gearing myself up for a fight where I’m at a distinct disadvantage as my hands are cuffed in front of me and I’m also blindfolded.
Here they come, running at me and I duck just as they get to me and take a few steps back. I hear one of them shriek and some water splash as they must’ve hit the hot water.
The other has turned and I take a swing at her with my bound hands. They connect with what feels like her face and she makes a loud grunt as I knock her backward.
The other girl grabs me by the hair so I throw my hands at her and hit her in the face too. Then I hear the other girl running at me so I do a little hop and kick one foot straight out and it hits her in the stomach.
I can hear the air leaving her lungs as she falls back. The other girl isn’t letting my hair go so I give her three quick whacks with my bound hands in succession then she finally lets it go and I take off running as fast as I can to get to my bedroom door.
It’s not very fast as I can’t see and have to be careful not to fall down or they’ll have even more of an advantage over me. A sound comes from the door. It sounds as if someone has hit it.
Then I’m yanked back by the hair and a fist hits me in the face. It infuriates me and I manage to get my cuffed hands over her head and pull her over my shoulder where she lands at my feet with a hard thud.
The girl is big, and that was hard but I managed it and stand up to try to catch my breath. Then the other, girl, who’s smaller, runs up behind me and wraps her legs around me as she hits me in the head over and over with her little fists.
I move backward with her until I come to a wall and ram her into it then squish her between me and the wall. The big girl makes a sound like a bull and I can hear her running toward me.
The sound of wood splintering fills my ears then I hear Benny and Gage yelling, “Stop!”
I’m hit by the big girl as she mashes my body between hers and the other girl’s. The small girl shouts, “Fuck! You’re killing me, Donna! Stop!”
Then the big girl is pulled off me and the blindfold is removed and there’s Benny. “Thank God!”
He pulls me into his arms and picks me up and carries me into the bathroom. “I’m shutting you in here while I help Gage. Just wait here, Baby.”
I nod and he turns and leaves, shutting the door behind him. I sit on the closed toilet and try to catch my breath. My hands are still cuffed but at least I can see again.
After a few loud whacks and several screams, Benny comes back into the bathroom with my white robe. He pulls the little set of keys to the pink cuffs out of the pocket of his robe.
My hands are finally released and I throw my arms around him and start crying like a little kid. “Benny, it was horrible.”
He holds me and shushes me as he rocks me back and forth. “It’s okay. We have them tied up and the police are on their way.”
“I was so afraid,” I cry as he holds me. His strong arms feel safe and I’m not sure how long it will take before I can leave them.
Then I hear sirens and know the time is at hand for him to have to let me go. “Here, let me get this robe on you.” He lets me go and I find I’m shaking like a leaf.
I look at him as he puts the robe on me then runs his fingertips over the place on my face that’s beginning to hurt. “One of them got in a hit,” I tell him.
He smiles. “It’s amazing there’s only one. Want to see what they look like, Pumpkin?”
I nod then he takes my hand and leads me out of the bathroom. The first thing I see are the two bitches who broke into our home, lying face down on the floor. Their hands are behind their back
s and tied with bungee cords.
It’s Sandy and the chick from the bar who I knocked out!
I stop shaking as I grow furious. Walking in between them I look them over as they lie there. Both have quite a few red and swollen places on their faces.
“I don’t know how I managed to do that much damage. But I’m glad I did.” I squat down next to Sandy and pull her back by her hair so she has to look at me.
“Fuck you, bitch,” she says then attempts to spit at me but I hold my hand over her mouth before she can.
“No, mam.” I press her mouth hard with my hand. “Now you listen to me. We’re pressing full charges on you both. Attempted murder is what you’ll be charged with amongst other things. You see, you dumbass, you broke into a house full of lawyers. Not just any lawyers either. The lawyers of the prestigious New York law firm, The Worthington Law Firm. So you can expect to be sent away for a very long time.”
I remove my hand to give her a chance to speak but she chooses the wrong words as she says, “Fuck you!”
“No, fuck you, Sandy. Now I need you to tell Gage the truth about things. Tell him how you are the one who ran him off the road that day,” I say and yank her head around so she has to look at Gage.
Her eyes go wild as she asks, “How did you know about that?”
I laugh and so does Benny. Then he answers her, “She didn’t. You just confirmed her suspicions.”
“Fuck,” she mumbles.
I look up at Benny as I drop her head and she face plants into the carpet. “So there’s two counts of attempted murder then.”
He smiles and takes my hand as the first set of police officers comes to our bedroom door with their firearms drawn. “Everyone okay in here?” the taller one asks.
The three of us nod then I see Benny’s parents, my grandmother with his grandfather, and the two drivers looming in the hallway behind the cops. “Maybe I should let them in on what happened,” I say and leave Benny and Gage to explain things to the officers.
One of the officers takes me by the arm and asks, “Are you okay, mam?”
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