“Get on the freeway and go east,” I answered. “And if you try anything, I will cut your throat. I’ll kill us both before I let you get away. No honking. No trying to get out. Just sit tight and drive.”
“I – I won’t do anything,” he stammered. “Just – please don’t hurt me!”
He obediently pulled onto the freeway ramp and merged into traffic. I had fixed myself in the back of the car so I looked like a passenger who was just leaning forward to talk to the driver. It might look strange for me to be in the back without a passenger in the front, but unless someone looked straight in the front window, there was no way to see the knife I held to him.
“Where are we going?” he asked again.
“Just shut up and drive!” I shouted in response.
I could see tears forming in the reflection of his craven eyes in the mirror. He wasn’t such a big man now that someone else was in control. That was how it always went. The ones who were the most abusive were always the biggest cowards. Kyle was no exception to that rule.
“Not so tough now, are you?” I asked tauntingly. “Come on Kyle – show me how tough you are. I thought you were a man!”
“Shut up, you bitch!” he screamed back, but there was a waver in his voice and his eyes were still wet with tears.
“What’s wrong?” I mocked again, “does it make you mad when a woman doesn’t let you control her? Hmmm, Kyle? Do you want to hit me like you hit you wife?”
There was a dangerous glimmer in his eye and I knew I’d hit a nerve. I let my voice drop to just above a whisper. “I know you, Kyle. I know what you’ve done – and I know why. You liked it. Hurting your wife gave you a sick twist of pleasure, didn’t it? Did controlling her make you feel powerful? Did you make her beg you to stop?” I held the knife so tightly to his neck that he couldn’t risk speaking. He could only listen. “Well, it’s not as much fun when we hit back, is it? You’re pathetic! Today you’re going to be the one begging! You’ll piss yourself like the coward you are, and you still won’t have gotten everything you deserve. Just wait.”
I could see the rage filling him as he clenched his jaw and tensed, but with the knife on him there was nothing he could do. He drove, silent in his anger as we left the city. I knew just where to take him. Once we were far enough out, there were country roads with no one on them and miles and miles of farmland and forest. That would give us more than enough space and privacy for what I had planned. We drove several miles out into nowhere before I had him get off on a dirt road and head toward a greenbelt in the distance. I could see a farm house at the top of the hill, but when I had him pull off the road and drive in behind some of the trees, I bet that you could scream at the top of your lungs without anyone hearing. It was perfect.
Kyle shut the car off, handed me the keys, and sat still, waiting for me to tell him what to do.
“Toss your phone out the window,” I ordered.
He obeyed, and continued to stare out the front window, avoiding eye contact with me since I’d chosen to humiliate him so much. I had to get out of the car first, but the only way out was past the front seats. How could I do that without giving him the chance he needed to try overpowering me? I kept the knife pressed tight as I leaned the passenger seat forward. Kyle was looking straight ahead still, but I could see the wheels turning in his head. He sensed this may be his only opportunity to escape. I needed to take that away.
In a flash, I drove the knife down into his thigh. In the same moment, I turned and flew out the door before he had the chance to think about anything aside from the pain he was in. It was a shame to have to waste some of his pain in a manner that I could not fully appreciate, but it was the safest option.
“YOU BITCH!” he screamed from inside the car while clutching his leg. “YOU STABBED ME YOU PSYCHOTIC BITCH! WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU?”
While he howled in the car, I made my way around to his phone and picked it up, putting it in my pocket. There was nothing he could do. He had no way to call for help, and no keys to drive away. All he could do was face me. I was more than confident enough to take him at full strength, but now that he was injured it would almost be too easy.
As the initial shock of the pain wore off and Kyle became aware that he was alone in the car, he stopped clutching his leg long enough to quickly lock both doors. I guess he thought he was safe in the car. Catching his eye through the window, I dangled his car keys in front of him. Kyle dropped his head in defeat as I pressed the unlock button. With a click, the locks released at my command. I gestured to the ground in front of me. He took a few deep breaths and then opened his door. His jeans were soaked in blood from the wound, but it wasn’t actually as bad as I’d imagined. He seemed capable of putting some weight on it when he swung his legs out of the car and stood up.
The fire was back in his eyes as he glared at me. I met his stare coldly, taking in my prey, paying more attention to him than I had the first time. He was actually even less impressive than I recalled. He was much bigger than me, of course, but he wasn’t in as good of shape as I’d thought. More of his size was fat than I’d noticed upon our first meeting and he didn’t look nearly as threatening.
“Give the keys back… NOW!” he shouted as though he had any control over the situation.
“Take them,” I replied with a smile, holding them out again, waggling them in front of his face. He lunged forward, reaching for my arm, but he was slow. With a quick slash, I opened a thin line across his forearm and he recoiled as blood began running down his hand.
The cut was enough to send him boiling over and he charged at me. I was ready. I lifted my leg and drove my heel forward, catching him right in his injured thigh. His mass was enough to knock me back a little, but his leg buckled under him and he dropped to a knee, his body curling slightly as he screamed in agony. I drove the butt of the knife down hard on top of his head, right into his thin, brown hair. The blow broke the skin and released a torrent of blood that streamed through his fingers as his hands flew to his face. This was too easy.
I spun fast and kicked my foot out again, this time bringing my boot hard across his jaw and knocking him right over onto his side with a loud grunt. Kyle was still trying to process the first kick by the time he landed, open mouthed, in the dirt and coughed – sending a cloud of dirt up into his face. He was already beaten.
I stepped over his body and dropped down on top of him, pressing the blade back against the very front of his throat before he tried anything else.
“That was fun. Do you want to try again?” I asked with a grin.
Kyle looked up at me from the ground in what should be a familiar position for him by now. I imagined how he must have felt leaving the parking lot that day. Driving home seething, wondering how a woman could have bested him. Of course, he’d had to knock his wife around to remind himself what a big man he was – each blow he gave her bolstering his ego, each cry from her lips driving away his own pain, until he barely remembered how he’d felt on the ground before me. Well, he remembered now. His face was naked with fear as he watched me, wide-eyed.
“Are you going to kill me?” he sputtered.
I smiled back down at him, showing him just how much I was enjoying the moment. “Did you kill your wife?”
“No!” he shouted, desperate hope filling his face. “I didn’t! I swear! You can call her!”
“Hmmm,” I mused, “what did you do?”
All at once, the hope vanished from his face, like a dam bursting. “I – I…”
“Don’t lie to me!” I snarled.
“I hurt her,” he said in a small voice.
“That’s right, Kyle,” I said, “you hurt her. And I’m going to hurt you. I’m going to torture you. I’m going to make you suffer for all the times you’ve brought suffering to the woman you’re supposed to love. When I am through, you’ll wish for death.”
“Please… no!” he begged. “I’ll do whatever you want. Please – just let me go. I’ll never touch Jenny again. I
swear!”
“You had your chance, and you wasted it,” I replied. “So tell me, did Jenny ever beg you to stop?” He cast his eyes downward, almost like he was ashamed, but I knew better. He didn’t regret what he’d done, but he would.
I picked up a rock with my free hand while he was looking down. Kyle had just started to look up to see what I was doing when I brought it hard into the side of his head.
“How does it feel, Kyle?!” I shouted. “How does it feel to beg and get hit anyhow?”
“PLEASE!” he sputtered, clutching his head.
I brought the rock back to the same side, hitting the back of his hand and his head together with the second blow.
He cried out, rolling to his side and hiding his head in his arms.
“Just as pathetic as I thought,” I muttered, dropping the rock and standing up.
I left him curled up in the dirt and walked back to the car to fish my bag out of the back seat. When I returned with it, he was sitting up, crying like a baby. He was bleeding profusely from the new gash on his head, and he held the swollen fingers of his injured hand in his good one. I pulled out some zip ties and tossed one at him.
“Put it around your wrists and pull it tight,” I ordered.
Kyle ignored me and sobbed as he faced the thought of truly not having any control over the situation. I picked up another rock and hurled it at him. It bounced off his shoulder and I shouted again, “do it now or the next one hits your face!”
Crying the entire time, he grabbed the tie and put it around his wrist, pulling it tight with his teeth and flinching as he moved the injured hand. He kept his head and eyes down, like a disobedient dog slinking at the feet of its master. I ordered him to stand and watched him as he struggled to get his fat legs under him and rise without the use of his hands. Once he’d done it, I order him to walk deeper into the trees.
“Your wife trusted you once,” I spoke as we walked. “She was in love with you. Did you beat her before you were married? Was she already scared of you when she walked down the aisle, or had you hidden your true self from her before that?”
The only reaction he offered were sniffles from the pain mixed with his continued fear. He thought he was done talking, but I’d make him talk more in a minute.
I continued the one-sided conversation as I walked behind him, fishing something else out of my bag. “I bet you beat her before that. She probably didn’t even love you anymore when she said her vows. You couldn’t have waited that long – pretending to be a decent man. She saw something in you that you didn’t like, and you had to scare her. You knew you couldn’t keep a woman who wasn’t afraid of you, didn’t you? I bet you can’t even satisfy a woman. You’re probably impotent – is that why you hurt her?”
I’d finally hit the nerve. He turned back, red in the face and was about to shout something when I shoved the taser into his chest and pressed the button. His scream of anger turned into one of pain as he spit from his mouth and fell down to his knees. I held the contact for a few seconds and watched as he twitched and nearly fell over sideways before removing it. Kyle took a few deep breaths, then opened his mouth again, as if, even through all his pain, he still felt the need to counter my last insult. I pressed the taser to his neck and zapped him again, sending him face first toward the ground this time. He was able to partially break his fall with an elbow, since his wrists were bound, and it looked more painful than it would’ve been to just fall straight to the ground.
“That’s what it feels like, Kyle. When you want to say something, but someone stronger than you doesn’t let you. I bet that makes you really angry. Jenny was probably angry too. She probably wished she could kill you herself. How does that feel? If she was here, I wonder if she’d even try and save you. I don’t think she would… I saw her face in the parking lot before I left. She was happy. She’ll be happy tomorrow too when you don’t come home.”
Kyle looked up at me from the ground, still groggy from the last shock, but aware of what I’d just said. All this time, he’d held out hope that he would walk away from this; that when I’d finally finished inflicting pain, I would go and he would make his way home. Now, he knew. He wasn’t ever leaving this place.
“Get up,” I demanded.
The man shook his head. It was less defiance than fear, but it pissed me off nonetheless.
“You don’t get to say no, Kyle. Did Jenny get to say no? Did she get to say no when she was disgusted by you and you made her sleep with you? Did she get to say no when you beat her for having an opinion, or for getting the wrong groceries? You would’ve been lost without her, and you treated her like shit. Did she get to say no, Kyle?”
He shook his head again, sobbing harder than before. My heart surged within me, he was breaking. He was realizing that he’d brought this on himself. He’d been afraid before, and certainly angry, but he was finally facing the truth that he’d earned everything I was giving him. He deserved to be here, and he saw that now.
“GET UP!” I shouted, driving my boot into his legs.
Sobbing like a baby, he rolled over and started to get to his knees.
Part of me wanted to kick him back down in the dirt a few more times, but I needed to get a little further from the road before going any further, so I let him stand. The wound in his leg was bothering him more, and his limp intensified as we moved along. I looked back after a few hundred paces and decided that we’d come far enough.
“Sit down against that tree,” I said, pointing to a bigger trunk off to the right. Kyle collapsed, crying uncontrollably while I pulled some rope from the bag. He offered no resistance as I walked a wide circle around him and then pulled the rope tight, securely binding him to the tree. I then took two more zip ties and bound his ankles with both of them. I’d expected a struggle and was prepared to cut him a time or two, but he was still in his resignation.
“Please don’t kill me,” he pleaded again. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I’m a pathetic man. I need help. I won’t ever hurt her again. I’ll leave her and disappear, just don’t kill me. Please!” He shouted the last word desperately, and it proved to be more than his lungs could handle. After the abuse he’d taken, his crying, and the effort of heaving his body along the hilly terrain he began to cough violently. His body spasmed as he struggled to regain his breath.
I looked on pitilessly.
“You don’t understand,” I said. “Jenny was broken by you, but you didn’t stop. You weren’t teaching her a lesson; you were just hurting her. That’s what I’m going to do to you. There’s no lesson here, Kyle. There’s nothing you can say to make this stop. That’s the punishment you’ve earned. Not some pain to teach you better. You’re beyond teaching. You can’t be saved. You’re already dead, you just haven’t suffered enough yet.”
“NOOOOOOOO! PLEASE NO!” he screamed at the top of his lungs.
I was certain no one could hear us, but I still didn’t like the risk. I dropped down beside him and shushed him as I dragged the knife across the side of his ear, cutting through the hard cartilage and slicing his earlobe open. He wailed as he was pierced by the knife, but seeing the look in my eye, he clamped his mouth shut in obedience. He stopped screaming, but couldn’t prevent himself from grunting in pain. I smiled. I could allow that.
“No screaming or I will have to make it even worse.”
He nodded his head, bringing both hands to his ear where he could feel the blood running down his palm. “I’m sorry…” he whispered.
“I believe you,” I said with a smile. “But you’ll be even sorrier soon.”
I was just begging him to scream again now, and when he started to, I grabbed the taser again and pushed it down into his crotch. Even through his jeans, it delivered a white hot jolt of pain and he instinctively lowered his hands to try to cover his groin. With his hands down, I grabbed his wounded ear and pulled hard, opening the cut even deeper and feeling his blood on my fingers for the first time. I could smell it now, the sharp metallic scent t
hat I loved so much. It brought a feral smile to my face and when Kyle looked up at me, he was seeing me for the first time.
I’d seen the range of nearly ever emotion cross his face: sorrow, guilt, shame, anger; but this was something new. He was looking at me with recognition. He could tell how much I liked this, and that seemed to horrify him beyond all else.
“Let’s play a game,” I said with an even more sinister smile. “I think you’ll like this one. You’ve probably played it before with Jenny. Guess what I want you to do. Come one – what do you think it is? Guess.”
Kyle just looked back at me absently. I was about to ask again when he finally muttered, “Die?” as a question.
I stood up and dropped my foot into his groin which caused him to squeal again.
“Nope!” I said gleefully. “Come on Kyle. You’ve got to try harder than that. You got so mad when Jenny didn’t do the right thing, didn’t you? I thought you’d be better at this. Try again,” I said, giving him an expectant look as I held the knife up threateningly.
“I’m sorry,” was all he could muster again. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Please…. I’m so sorry, Jenny.”
“I asked you a question, Kyle!” I shouted, dropping the knife down into the top of his other thigh and getting a blood-curdling scream from him. “Try again!” I ordered.
Even if he had been able to think and guess, he would never get the right answer, because there wasn’t one. I wanted him to feel the futility that Jenny had certainly felt all those years. I wanted him to try to placate me again and again, and every time he was wrong the punishment would be worse; I wanted him to try and try and try, getting more and more desperate, all while I laughed at him. Just like I wanted, he pleaded with me, every ‘sorry’ and ‘please’ garbled by snot and spit.
I pulled the knife out and pushed the blade to his cheek. That at least stifled his blubbering for a moment, and he looked back at me, completely unsure of what to do next. I dragged the blade lightly down his cheek, cutting a sharp, shallow line that made him grimace before I slid it deep across the bottom of his jaw, cutting right to the bone and winning another agonized scream.
Evil Unbound- Death's Mistress Returns Page 12
