by Paul Blades
The man led her even deeper into the building and into a room much like the first one except that this had a table and some chairs and no windows. As soon as she was alone, Leslie removed her ayala and sat in a chair. About a half hour later, the man returned with a plate of mixed beef and vegetables and a Coke. Leslie wolfed them down.
She sat in the room for hours. Twice, Colonel Abib came back to assure her that all was well. When he saw Leslie’s long, bare legs, he brought himself up quickly and returned his gaze to her face. In the middle of the afternoon, an officer came back with more food and another Coke. He let her use the bathroom down the hall and then brought her back.
Leslie didn’t know how late it was when the colonel finally came to get her. He had his officer’s cap on and was wearing a heavy jacket. She saw, to her dismay, that he was carrying a pair of handcuffs.
“These are just a formality, Miss Harrington,” he said to her apologetically. “I can’t have my officers seeing me take you out without them. Please turn around and let me put them on you, and then we will leave.”
Reluctantly, Leslie got to her feet, turned around and put her arms behind her. The colonel had trouble putting the cuffs on her because of her scarlet leather bracelets, but he managed.
Down about thirty feet from the room in which she had spent most of the day was a door to the outside. Leslie was able to glance out of a window and she saw that it was dark. Colonel Abib unlocked the door with a key on a chain that led to his belt and they stepped outside.
It was a little chilly, maybe 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Leslie shivered as they walked along a macadam path and then into a parking lot. Colonel Abib had a loose hold on her right arm. They were walking quickly.
“There, ahead is my car,” the colonel said, pointing out a shiny, black, late model BMW sedan. When they approached it, by its rear, they came to a halt. “Excuse me while I get my keys,” the man said. He reached into his jacket pocket.
Swiftly, he stepped behind Leslie. In a second, he looped over her head a long cloth with a 6’ by 3’ pad in the middle. He pulled the pad over her mouth and quickly tied the cloth off behind her head. Leslie barely had time to protest. He used his key chain to pop open the trunk. He pushed the shocked Leslie towards and then into it. She screamed, but only a muffled sound came out. He swiftly had a rope around her ankles and tied them together. While Leslie struggled and screamed, he flipped her to her belly and connected the rope around her ankles to the handcuffs, hogtieing her. Leslie had just turned her head back to issue a plaintive whine when the trunk lid closed.
The car drove for about 45 minutes. All kinds of things were going through Leslie’s fevered mind. Was he taking her back to Dar Al Jamah? If he was, was it to the Moussa’s or to the prison? Or had he kidnapped her on his own behalf? If he intended her to go back to prison, all he would have had to do was put her in the back seat of his car with the handcuffs on and take her there. The same went for the Moussa’s house. Therefore, she concluded, he had taken her for his own purposes, whatever they were, although Leslie knew that they wouldn’t be good.
She then realized that there would be no record of her at the border crossing. As far as the authorities were concerned, and they must be looking for her by now, she would have just disappeared into thin air. But then there was the car. Hajib’s car was at the border crossing. Someone would report it and her trail might be tracked from there. But what good would that do her? She would be returned to the Moussa’s or prison. It was no choice at all.
But what did Colonel Abib intend to do with her? If he intended to rape her, she could handle that as long as it was the price of freedom. She remembered how he had looked at her legs. Maybe that was it. She hoped that was it, because anything else was too dreadful to bear.
She felt torn apart. She had been so close to freedom she could taste it. What he had told her in his office had lifted her spirits so high that many times during her wait in the small room, she had had to resist the urge to get up and dance. Now she had no idea what her future would bring. Had she gone from the frying pan into the fire?
When the car stopped, Leslie’s heart went into her mouth. She dreaded the opening of the trunk and what it would reveal about the man’s intentions. She heard the car door open and close and then, for a few moments, nothing.
When the trunk lid opened, Abib leaned over and freed Leslie’s ankles. He took hold of her arm and began to lift her out. “Come on, sweetie pie,” he said merrily. “We’re home.”
It was dark out, but from the lights on neighboring properties, Leslie saw that they were in what seemed to be a middle class neighborhood. She didn’t have much time to look around because Abib quickly dragged her towards his house. The building was one storey and had a car port with an older model Toyota Celica was parked in it. There was a grass lawn in front of the house and a walkway to the street covered in small white stones. A side door off the carport led into the house. Abib took her through it.
They were inside a regular, American style kitchen. It was small and unkempt with dishes in the sink and packages of food, some of them open, strewn around the counters. Leslie heard a woman’s voice and a moment later, an older, somewhat plump woman with long, loose, salt and pepper hair came around the corner. She was dressed in thin, purple cotton pants and a yellow pullover blouse. When she saw Leslie, her face fell. She looked at Abib and she started to yell excitedly in Arabic.
Abib started yelling back. It was clear that the subject of the argument was her. The argument went on for a few minutes. Then Abib, dragging Leslie along, pushed the woman aside and went into the next room. It was a living room and there was an old brown couch and a dark blue reclining easy chair along with a long coffee table. They passed through that room and went down a short hallway. Leslie tried to fight the man, but he was immensely strong and just yanked her every time she tried to dig in her feet and stop. Abib opened a door and they entered a small bedroom. He snapped on the light. It was painted in blue, with a made up twin bed, an old oak dresser and a nightstand with an old brass table lamp on it. There was a closet with sliding doors. One of the doors was off track.
The woman had followed them and was still shouting excitedly in Arabic. Abib ignored her. He threw Leslie down on the bed. She tried to scramble off of it, but he was on her quickly. He pressed her belly down on the mattress. The rope he had used on her ankles was still tied to the handcuffs and he captured Leslie’s ankles one by one and tied them off with it, returning her to her hog tie. Her short, black skirt had risen up over her hindquarters, and before he got up, Abib rubbed his rough hand over them appreciatively. The Arab woman’s screeches got louder and she went up to Abib and started hitting him with her fists. Abib relented his assault on Leslie’s ass and got up off the bed. He took the still arguing Arab woman, presumably his wife, by her arm and pulled her from the room. The light went out and the door slammed shut.
The arguing went on for a full ten minutes. Leslie struggled to free herself from her bonds, but could not. She tried to scream, maybe one of the neighbors would hear her, but all that came out was a barely audible screech. She gave up her struggles and waited for whatever would happen next.
Eventually, the voices calmed down. They faded away as if they had gone into the kitchen. She heard more shouting and what sounded like pots and pans and dishes flying. Abib was undoubtedly complaining about the state of the kitchen. After a while, those sounds calmed down too.
For a long while there was relative silence in the house. She heard the TV go on and the voice of an Arabic announcer. Shortly afterwards some kind of drama show came on with police sirens and gunshots and a lot of talking.
It was about two hours later that the door opened again and the light came on. It was the woman and she was holding a tray with some food and a glass of juice on it. She came over to Leslie and sat down on the bed, putting the tray on the nightstand. She spoke to Leslie.
“I give you food and some drink. I take off cloth on mouth and feed you, you make
noise, no eat, cloth go back on. Okay?”
Leslie was famished. She didn’t want to go the night without something to eat. She was thirsty too. Leslie nodded.
The woman leaned over and released one of Leslie’s ankles. She looked at the scarlet bracelets around them curiously. The she helped Leslie sit up with one leg under her. She untied the gag. When she released it, Leslie whispered urgently, “You’ve got to help me! He’s kidnapped me! I’m an American citizen! You’ve got to help me get away!”
The woman put her finger to her mouth and said, “Shhhhhhhhhhhh! If husband hear he beat me. He beat you too. No talking. He said.”
Tears went to Leslie’s eyes. The woman looked kindly. She obviously had sympathy for Leslie’s plight. But Leslie clearly saw that she would not help her. This was not America where women had rights. If Abib wanted to beat his wife, there was no law stopping him. This woman obviously, despite her vitriolic temper, lived under his thumb. If she let her escape, Abib might kill her.
And so, Leslie disconsolately silenced herself. The woman took the plate from the tray and started spooning out food to her. It was a salty stew which seemed to have some bits of lamb in it. The woman ladled it into Leslie’s mouth gently. Leslie chewed it slowly. She figured the longer she took to eat, the longer she would not have the gag around her mouth. And maybe, just maybe, the woman might be convinced to help her. Maybe not now, but maybe later, depending on how long Abib expected to hold her as his prisoner.
Every once in a while, the woman let Leslie have something to drink. The drink was a carbonated lemon juice with what seemed like a ton of sugar in it. While a prisoner at the Moussa’s, Leslie usually had only water to drink so she actually delighted in having something to taste. When the stew was gone, the woman took up a pita, tore some off and scraped up the rest of the sauce. Leslie ate every bit.
When the meal was finished, the woman put down the bowl and spoon and said to Leslie, “You turn over now. I tie foot.”
“Please,” Leslie sad, “I have to use the bathroom.”
The woman hesitated. This was not within her instructions. She thought about it for a moment. Then she pointed to her loins. “You make?” she asked.
Leslie got her meaning. “Yes,” she said.
“You move,” the woman told her. Leslie realized that the woman wanted to take off her underwear. Unfortunately, when she had escaped from the hotel, she hadn’t thought to grab any. She moved anyway, shifting herself so that her loins were raised off the bed. The woman leaned forward to raise her short miniskirt. When she brought it up Leslie’s thighs, she gasped. Not only did she not have any underwear on, but her pussy was shaved bare, outlined in red and there was a golden medallion hanging from her loins. She leaned over and took hold of it, reading it carefully. The she looked up at Leslie, horror in her eyes.
Leslie grimaced both in embarrassment and sorrow. “You see, I need help,” she said.
“You name Ghaniyah,” she said quietly. “You belong to Moussa.”
“I’m trying to escape, please help me,” Leslie asked again. The woman shook her head. She took the bowl from the tray and placed it under Leslie’s loins. Leslie concentrated for a few seconds and her flow began. She filled up the whole bowl.
The woman carefully brought the bowl back to the tray and put it down. “You lie down now,” she told Leslie after wiping her. Her voice had grown a little sterner. Leslie bit her lip and, seeing no choice, obeyed. The woman tied off her free ankle to her hands. Then she took the cloth gag, centered it over Leslie’s mouth and tied it off tightly. She picked up the tray, turned out the light and closed the door. A few moments later, Leslie heard the toilet flush. A few moments after that, the argument outside her room began all over again.
The house eventually quieted down. The TV went off. Leslie heard someone in the bathroom brushing their teeth. She heard the unmistakable sound of liquid going into the toilet from a high distance and she concluded that it was Abib taking a piss. Soon, there was another person brushing their teeth. There was quiet and then the toilet flushed. A door down the hallway closed. And then there was silence.
For about an hour, Leslie tried to free her hands from the handcuffs. She could not get them past the heel of her hands. She moaned in frustration and gave up. Soon, she fell asleep.
She woke up to someone untying her ankles. It was dark in the room. For a moment she thought hopefully that it was the woman. But when she felt a rough hand on her thigh, she knew that it was Abib. When her ankles were free, her quickly flipped her to her back. She knew that he was intending to rape her and so she kicked out with her feet, landing one blow to his belly. He swiftly captured her feet and flung himself on top of her. His hand went around her throat. He squeezed it until Leslie started to choke. “If you give me any more trouble,” he told her, snarling, “I’ll choke you to death and bury you in the back yard!”
A chill went through Leslie. She gave up her struggle. For all she knew he would do just as he said. No one would miss her. No one knew she was here.
Abib was naked. He insinuated himself between her thighs and then raised them with his arms. He took hold of his cock and pressed it against her opening. Despite all her nonconsensual fucking while the Moussa’s sex slave, nothing about Abib turned her on. She was as dry as the desert when he went to enter her. She moaned with pain as he advanced. He placed his heavy thumb over her clit and pressed it down, but that did nothing for her. She whined desperately under her gag. This slowed him down a bit. He pressed and he pressed and he pressed, slowly but surely until her cavern lubricated in self defense. When he was fully inside her, he began an energetic rogering. Leslie did not assist him, but lay still and lifeless, absorbing his thrusts. It did not take him long. He groaned and stiffened, thrust into her four more times and then collapsed.
He lay there for a few moments, panting. Then he arose, slipping his softened cock from her slit. He flipped her to her back once more and retied her ankles to the handcuffs. Then he tiptoed from the room and closed he door.
CHAPTER TEN
Leslie did not get back to sleep for a long time. She cried for a while. And then she stopped. She just lay there, miserably recounting all the terrible things that had happened to her since she had come to Tunisia. She thought of home, tried to visualize the faces of her family, but had a hard time doing it. She thought of her friends and how excited they had been for her when they found out about the great job she had gotten. She would certainly trade places with any of them now. She thought of how close she had gotten to getting away and then realized that it had not been close at all. She would have been better off going to Tunis and trying to find someone who would smuggle her out of the country. Maybe she could have stowed away on a cruise ship or something. Why hadn’t she thought of that before? Trying to cross the border without her own passport had been a foolish decision.
She eventually did fall asleep and awoke when she heard noise around the house. It was early morning. She heard Abib using the bathroom again and taking a shower. A little while after, he came into her room.
“Let’s see if we can get you tied down a little better,” he told her as he released her ankles from her wrists and then pulled her to a sitting position. He tied her ankles together again and then released her hands from the handcuffs. He pulled her arms in front of her and examined her scarlet leather cuffs. He saw the chain dangling from her right bracelet and drew the right conclusion. He passed it through the ring in her collar and then hooked it to her left wrist. For good measure, he slipped the rings on her wrists together too. He untied her ankles and lifted her from the bed. He took her to the bathroom and sat her on the pot. “If there’s anything you have to do, you better do it now,” he told her.
Leslie emptied herself. She had done it so many times in front of Latifah, it didn’t bother her one bit. He raised her from the seat and wiped her and then brought her back to the bed. He made her lie down on her back and then clipped the rings on her ankles togeth
er. He tied them to the bed frame at the end of the bed. Then he did the same at the head of the bed with the ring in the back of her collar. “Now that’s much better, isn’t it,” he said happily. “My wife will be in later. She has strict instructions not to loosen your bindings except to feed you and let you pee. She knows that if you somehow get away, I’ll slit her throat and chop her up into little pieces.”
He went to leave and then turned. “In case you’re wondering, the car you were driving was taken over the border yesterday into Libya. It’s probably already been sold. It will bring a nice price, but not as much as you will.” He laughed and left.
An hour later, the woman came in and released the tie to the back of her collar. After helping Leslie to sit up, she fed her some oatmeal for breakfast. It had raisins and honey in it. She let Leslie drink another glass of carbonated juice and then regagged her and tied her back down. They hadn’t exchanged two words.
Leslie had a lot of time to think. The idea that Abib was going to sell her to someone had already occurred to her, but now she knew that her speculation had been true. She worried fretfully as to who it could be. She realized that her escape had actually landed her in a much worse position. While she was at the Moussa’s, everybody at least knew where she was. She had a paper trail. It was actually possible, although unlikely, that someone would intervene on her behalf. Now, God alone knew where she would end up.
She had heard about harems in Saudi Arabia and such places and had always wondered if they were true. A harem had to be a better place than the Moussa’s or prison, she thought. She would probably have to fuck only one guy and that only once in a while. They would treat her nice and she would have a nice bed and good food. Maybe she would get pregnant and the Emir, or whoever her captor was, would marry her and make her a queen. She did not have to worry about pregnancy at the Moussa’s. They fed her a regular diet of birth control pills. Mrs. Moussa was happy when she observed that they made her breasts bigger.
