by Sam West
It made me think of the bondage photo-shoots I used to do and how much of a clumsy amateur this guy was in comparison.
“You ain’t getting out of that one, bitch.”
I listened to his footsteps retreating, and hauled myself into a sitting position as before. It was effortless for me to sit upright, but I tried to make it look as difficult as possible. The truth is I have one-hundred percent control over each and every one of my muscles. Sometimes I feel like I defy the laws of human physiology, it’s almost preternatural the things I can do with my body…
Again, I digress.
“Don’t go running away, now,” the man laughed.
He disappeared back through the kitchen door and I pondered my situation. Scott was out cold – no help there. And there was nothing I could see that I could use as a weapon. If only there was a way I could grab his gun… But he was wildly underestimating me and I knew I would be able to use that to my advantage when an opportunity presented itself.
I flinched when the door opened and the man’s hunched-over back came into view as he dragged his next victim into the room. It was a woman, and could only be Mrs Jones.
The man dropped Scott’s mother’s ankles and she lay there unmoving in the middle of the vast room. My gaze swept over the unconscious
dead she’s dead
woman, taking in every last detail of her in less than a second. She was pretty much as I had expected her to be, apart from being out of it and at the mercy of a lunatic, of course. She looked to be in her early sixties, a handsome woman with neat, white, bobbed hair, a knee-length tweed skirt that was actually quite fashionable right now and a silk blouse.
The man remained where he was for a moment with his back to me and Scott, staring down at Mrs Jones. When he turned round, my heart lurched in my chest.
“Who are you? Why are you doing this?”
The questions fell unbidden from my lips and instantly I regretted them.
“I already told you, that’s none of your god-damn, mother fucking business. And every time you ask a stupid fucking question, then something really fucking bad happens.”
The man reached down, not breaking eye-contact with me and picked up Mrs Jones’ leg by the ankle. The sensible black court-shoe hung off her foot and he threw it across the room. For some reason, I found the sight of her toes in the flesh-coloured hosiery deeply wrong. Somehow, her tight-clad foot took on a whole new meaning. It became symbolic of my plight, of how something so seemingly ordinary could turn so awful and seedy. How any situation could descend into madness at the drop of a hat.
The rest happened in a blur. I think I screamed, it’s kind of hazy in my mind. I just remember the blood. And from the way the woman’s blood seeped rather than pumped from her foot, I also remember entertaining the possibility that Mrs Jones was dead.
Nothing seemed real, I felt detached from everything and everyone, including myself. It was as if I was watching myself from afar, a ghostly witness to the end of my own days.
The man held a serrated bread-knife –I hadn’t seen a knife in his hand until that very moment–and was slicing into Mrs Jones’ foot. Well, not so much slicing as hacking.
Fuck me, he’s sawing her toes clean off…
I couldn’t tear my gaze off the bloody spectacle. From this distance, it was hard to make out exact details, especially with all that oozing blood. The man was in profile and I could see the veins standing out in stark relief against his thick neck and in his clenched jaw.
The man toppled backwards, the end of Mrs Jones’ foot coming away in his hand. He only just managed to right himself in time so he didn’t land smack on his arse. Still crouching on the floor he smiled at us, popping the bloody lump in his mouth and sucking it like a kid sucking an ice-lolly.
I watched the man in mounting horror as he turned Mrs Jones over onto her front. I decided in that moment she was, indeed, dead and I felt a surge of relief mixed in with the terror. At least she hadn’t felt it when he had hacked her foot in two. For her at least, the nightmare was over.
“Wait there, you three, I’ll be back in a mo.”
I knew where he was going; to get Mr Jones.
“Scott,” I hissed. He didn’t reply. “Scott!” I said again, louder this time.
He mumbled something incomprehensible into the floorboards and I felt a rush of gratitude.
“Hang in there, baby,” I said. “I’m going to get us out of this.”
He didn’t reply, and my fleeting relief vanished. The puddle of blood around his legs was expanding by the minute and I knew he would die of blood-loss if I didn’t do something soon.
Is this how my life is going to end? I thought, giving in to the tears of self-pity and frustration.
To my surprise, the man burst through the door with Mr Jones, who was very much alive. Mr Jones was ashen-faced as he lurched into view, thrust before the madman.
“Scott,” he called to his son, but Scott didn’t answer and continued to groan into the floor.
“Move it,” said the man, pushing Mr Jones towards me.
I saw then that his hands were tied behind his back and his neck above the collar of his blood-splattered blue shirt was a reddish-purple, like he had been strangled.
When he reached me, the man shoved him to the floor. Mr Jones cried out and landed in an ungainly heap on his side – that wasn’t going to make his sixty-something bones feel very good, I reasoned.
“Chloe, I’d like you to meet the real Mr Jones. I have to admit, I’m kind of insulted you would think that I was even old enough to be Scott’s father.”
“Why are you doing this?” Mr Jones asked in a surprisingly strong voice that belied his slender frame and bookish, academic appearance.
“Shut up old man, why do you even care? You should be more concerned about whether you are going to live or not. So what do you think of your son’s fiancée? She’s hot stuff, isn’t she? A real fucking looker.”
Mr Jones struggled into a sitting position, holding his body as awkwardly as I was. Steadfastly, he refused to look at me.
“Why did you kill my wife?”
“Questions, questions, questions. Christ, I might just have to gag you again.” The lunatic turned to address me and I withered inside. “I inserted a kebab-scewer into her heart, minimum mess that way. I want her intact for what I have planned for her.”
Tears stung my eyes and my nose clogged up, but as much as I hated myself for showing my fear, I couldn’t stop.
“Is this your doing?” Mr Jones said suddenly, turning his hard glare onto me. “Are you in on this?”
“What?” I said, taken aback by his sudden venom. “No! Of course not.”
The man laughed. “Maybe she is.”
“Fuck off!” I cried unthinkingly, “I’ve never seen you before in my life.”
“I told you, bitch, do not fucking answer me back.”
I cringed when in a blink of an eye he was crouched down before me, his fist curling in the neckline of my dress and yanking me forward so I was nose to nose with him. I caught a waft of stale garlic and whiskey on his breath, and something else, something awful and meaty and coppery…
Mrs Jones foot oh God that’s the stink of the severed toe he sucked on…
My stomach gave an almighty lurch and I came close to throwing up in his face. Luckily, he let go of my dress and his foul breath was no longer hitting my nostrils. My relief, however, was short-lived. As I was sucking down great mouthfuls of air and working on getting my nausea under control, I felt a tugging pressure around my waist. I looked down and inhaled a scream.
“No,” I gasped, trying to twist away from him.
“Oh no you don’t,” he said, slapping me across the face.
The slap was a sharp, dizzying hurt that cut my protests dead. Dimly, through the sudden pain, I realised he was cutting through the front of my dress.
And my bra, sweet Jesus my bra, I thought, when cold air hit my breasts. And he’s using the same b
read-knife he used to hack off Mrs Jones’ toes...
I closed my eyes in absolute disgust as he concentrated on the job at hand. What he was doing to me – the possible consequences of his actions – was in that moment too horrific to contemplate. The tugging sensation continued at the waistband of the sensible black tights I wore, and the simple black knickers. I could feel the ruins of my tights clinging to my thighs, and cool air hitting every inch of my exposed front.
“Look at her,” the man instructed Mr Jones.
Mr Jones turned his gaze to look at me, his expression unreadable apart from the smallest flicker of his eyes. Whatever that was due to, be it the horror of the situation or something else, it was impossible to say.
“Fucking hot, isn’t she? Look at those tits, aren’t they great? They must be a D cup, at least. Have you ever seen such a big pair that are so fucking firm.” Mr Jones looked away, a red tinge shading his hollow cheeks. “I said fucking look at her fucking tits.”
I gasped in terror when the man unexpectedly aimed a kick at Mr Jones’ forehead. Mr Jones flopped sideways, an angry red Greg on the side of his head where the black boots had made contact. He lay unmoving on the floor, his expression vacant and staring into space.
“You people will do well to do as you are told,” the man said, kneeling at my feet to hack through the tape that bound my ankles.
I thought about aiming a kick at his face, but from my awkward position on the floor I didn’t fancy my chances much.
“Sit up, Mr Jones, I want you to get properly acquainted with your son’s fiancée.”
“Please,” said the man, and right then he seemed far older than his sixty-odd years.
An intense pang of pity gripped me and I vowed to kill this fucking bastard the first chance I got. Mr Jones, obviously not wanting to incur any more damage to his person, pulled himself into a sitting position once more.
“That’s better, Mr Jones. Now, I want you to pay close attention here, I don’t want you to drop your gaze from this lovely lady for a second. And if I ask you a direct question, then you bloody well answer me, do I make myself clear?” The old man was silent. “I said, do I make myself clear?”
“Yes,” the man said in that surprisingly commanding voice of his.
“Good. Now tell me, Mr Jones, have you ever seen such a fucking gorgeous body on any woman?”
The look of hatred on Mr Jones’ face was indescribable; his eyes flitted from side to side and his cheeks were flushed. The side of his head seemed to swell and darken with every passing second. None of this was his fault, but a wave of hatred for him washed over me. I hated the feel of his eyes on my naked body; it made my skin crawl.
“No,” Mr Jones said through gritted teeth.
“No, what?”
“No, I have never seen such a fucking gorgeous body on any woman.”
“Not even your wife?”
My brief surge of hatred was replaced by pity. What this fucker was putting us through was unspeakable, it was beyond anything I could ever have dreamt up when writing one of my sick books.
“Leave my wife out of it,” he said in a low voice. “She’s dead, what more do you want?”
“Oh, I want a whole lot more, Mr Jones. Chloe, open your legs nice and wide, show Mr Jones what fresh, young pussy looks like. So much sweeter than Mrs Jones withered old cunt.”
That’s when Mr Jones screamed. It was the oddest sound I had ever heard and made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. It started out low and deep, like a growling dog, getting higher and louder as the scream progressed. In the weirdest way, it reminded me of a surge of electricity, thrumming into life along a power-line…
The man jumped to his feet and kicked him in the chest with his booted-foot, effectively silencing him. Mr Jones hunched over, struggling to breathe.
“You’re giving me a headache, you silly old fool. Chloe, you haven’t opened your legs. Fucking do it, now.”
Trembling wildly, I shifted my position slightly so I was sitting properly on my backside and despite it going against every natural instinct I possessed, I opened my thighs.
It felt awful, the surge of hot shame that accompanied the action made my mind lurch in protest but I resolutely held the position.
Mr Jones’ shoulders were heaving, his head bent.
“Look at her,” the madman said. Mr Jones did, his eyes red-rimmed with tears and defeat. “That’s better. Now tell me, do you think Chloe has a beautiful cunt?”
He crouched down next to me once more and reached out to trail a finger over the folds of my pussy. I sucked in a sharp intake of breath, repulsed by the feel of him touching me in my most private place.
“Nice,” he murmured, his gaze latching hungrily onto my exposed pussy. “Shame about the pubes, I prefer ‘em bald myself. Still, at least you trimmed for the occasion. What do you think, Mr Jones? Do you prefer hairy pussy or bald pussy? Was Mrs Jones au natural or hairy? Shall we take a look?”
Mr Jones glared at him and I admired his strength of character. It was plain from the expression in his eyes that he wanted to kill him. “Do not touch my wife.”
What about me? I thought petulantly. Your wife is dead, I’m not.
Yet, a dark little voice whispered in the corner of my mind.
“Relax, Mr Jones, we’ll leave Mrs Jones out of it. For now. You have one more chance to answer my question. Do you prefer bald pussy or hairy pussy?”
“Hairy,” he said through gritted teeth.
“I see. Don’t you just wish you could bury your face in that succulent little cunt? Nibble on those nice juicy lips? Look at those pink, plump inners peeking out, I love it when they do that, don’t you?”
I squirmed in abject misery, the attention of these two men weighing heavy on my soul.
“Yes,” Mr Jones said.
Beads of sweat ran down his ever-swelling forehead, making him blink.
“Then don’t just look at, fucking eat it. Lie on your back, Mr Jones. And Chloe, I want you to sit on his face…”
CHAPTER FOUR
“Jesus Christ.”
The exercise-book fell from Greg’s trembling fingers. He simply couldn’t take anymore. It was fucking sick. He let out a trembling breath, his mind reeling. It was, without doubt, the most horrific thing he had ever read.
Why would she write it down like that? It was just so…. lurid.
Yes, that was definitely the word he was after. Lurid. Lurid and salacious. It read like one of her novels.
But wasn’t that the whole point? She wanted to fictionalise events so she could get her head round it?
Even so, it still struck Greg as strange, especially the further he got into the diary. He wanted to understand, really he did, but it just didn’t sit easy with him.
Her fucking shrink has a lot to answer to. This isn’t right…
A creaking sound from the bathroom startled him – the noise flesh made against the sides of a bath when being hauled upwards – followed by the sound of water gurgling down the plughole.
Greg was suddenly and inexplicably uneasy. Without fully understanding why, he scooted down the bed and pulled the duvet up to his chest. He closed his eyes, balancing the exercise-book on top of the duvet and pretended to be asleep. He just couldn’t face the discussion that she was obviously so keen on having, he needed to sleep on it, to get his head round why she would write it down in such a sleazy way.
I’m being unfair, this is just her way of dealing with it, I should be more supportive.
And I will be, I just need a little time…
The bathroom door swung open and he forced his facial features to slacken.
“Greg? Are you awake?”
Even if I were asleep, I wouldn’t be now, would I?
He groaned and stretched, hoping he was doing a passable imitation of a bloke who had been caught napping.
“Mmm, baby, did you have a nice bath? I must’ve dozed off.”
She sat next to his chest and trai
led her fingers lightly over his cropped hair. “Did you read it?”
“Most of it, I think. I fell asleep,” he added unnecessarily.
“Oh. Was my writing that bad?”
“No, it was excellent. It kind of reminded me of Richard Laymon, you know, really sleazy and horrible. Or never mind Laymon, it was just like one of yours.”
She seemed to brighten at that. “Really? You think it was like Laymon?”
It wasn’t a compliment, he wanted to say. “Yeah. Come on, you know you’re a good writer. And you know I’m your number one fan,” he said truthfully.
“You think the writing was good?”
Greg was beginning to feel completely baffled by the turn in the conversation. Why the hell were they discussing her writing abilities? It was hardly the point.
“Yes, of course I do.” An unpleasant thought suddenly occurred to him. “You’re not thinking of publishing it, are you?”
“No, of course not, that would be really weird.”
You don’t say. “Look, sweetheart, it’s been a long day, do you mind if we get some shut-eye? I’ve got a big order of oak coming tomorrow, I need to be on top of my game.”
“You want to be fresh for your office party, you mean.”
“It’s not a party, it’s just an after work, drinks thing.”
“You mean a party.”
“No,” he said with exaggerated patience. “An after work, drinks thing. We do it every June, it’s like tradition. We don’t go anywhere, we just all sit around in the office after work and have a few drinks.”
“Hmmm, where I come from, that’s called a party.”
“It’s not. We only do it once a year. Well, apart from the Christmas party, of course, but that’s always in a hotel and partners are invited.”
“Why do you have to go?”
“I just do, you know what crappy work politics are like. There’s only like twenty of us, including office staff and all us guys on the work-floor. The boss thinks it’s good for staff morale, or team-building, or some such bollocks. It’s not a big thing and it usually wraps up by ten.”
