by Don Winslow
Number “4” belonged to the skinny blonde the newcomers had seen, publicly displayed, on their arrival in the camp. Lena’s boyish, close-cropped hair, was just now was growing back into a faint stubble; the Commandante had ordered every single hair be shaved off her long thin body. Like the others, she sported an all-over tan, which invited the admiring hand to caress those lean, spare loins, the fine, velvety-smooth skin, and the taut-skinned, hand-muscled butt that the girl liked to wiggle with such impudence before the eyes of her snarling guards. In fact, although she loudly complained about her treatment, Lena went out of her way to seek repeated punishment at the hands of her captors. The others could only shake their heads about incorrigible Lena.
Numbers “5” and ”6” were often mistaken for sisters although they were, in fact, mother and daughter. Roxanne, who everyone called “Annie” and her daughter, Sarah, had been assigned numbers 5 and 6 respectively. Annie had been an attractive stewardess who had risen to a management position of some prominence with British Airways. A brisk, competent businesswoman, self-assured, and charming, she had never considered the risk in taking her teenaged daughter with her on a holiday trip to the Far East — a trip from which neither mother nor daughter would return.
Mallory found the almost identical good looks uncanny; one a smaller version of the other. Both had the same china blue eyes, the small upturned nose, the high cheekbones, the same determined, pointed chin. Roxanne had the fully developed figure of a mature woman, while her daughter was a long-legged, willowy girl, almost flat chested, although the emergence of petite, young breasts held hopeful promise. The mother wore her short blonde hair in a smooth helmet that fell to her collar, while her daughter’s hair, paler, almost silvery, was pulled straight back and allowed to fall into a perky pony-tail. The startling resemblance of the English pair was not lost on the perverted Commandante, who spared no expense in having special clothing delivered to the mountaintop. In time, mother and daughter were required to present themselves before this madman dressed alike, in the traditional uniforms of English schoolgirls, donated by an exclusive girl’s school, in response to a modest request from a very generous, and quite anonymous, benefactor. As she looked around at the assembled group, Mallory remembered that someone had once remarked on the evil Commandant’s preference for blonde women.
Mickey, Number “7”, rounded out the crew — a cute girl with pixyish features, and a short mop of dusky brown hair. Spry and slightly built, there was a quickness, an eager alertness about the girl; she engaged the world with her big brown eyes from under a splay of elfin bangs. The Commandante called her “Mouse,” and the nickname stuck.
With the addition of the newcomers, there were now ten women in General Hernandez’s “stable” — or would have been, had number “2” remained in the harem. The newcomers learned that Number 2 was the girl that kept hope alive; she was the one who, quite impossibly, had escaped. Margaret Donnereau was a cunning, duplicitous woman with a reckless disregard of danger; she played games with the guards, and only pretended to submit. Then, she would taunt them. She even once had spit at El Commandante! And of course, she was always being disciplined for one infraction or another. She had tried to run away repeatedly, only to be caught and punished by the most diabolical means the that their debauched captors could devise. Then, one day, she was gone! The rumors swept the camp: a pale, Yankee woman had been found wandering alone in jungle by sympathetic rebels, who took her in and managed to get her through the coastal mountains and down to the coast. That was several months ago; Maggie was the only woman ever known to have escaped from the remote mountain fortress.
***
“Prostituta Numero Nueve,” nee Ms. Mallory Channing, was sitting on her bunk with her knees drawn up, heels planted on the edge of the mattress, carefully painting each toenail, while standing behind her, attending to her damp hair, the ubiquitous ”Mouse” watched the primping woman in the mirror. For some reason, the nickname “Mouse” had made the transition from captors to captives. And with her typical good humor, Mickey readily answered to her nickname. Publicly, in front of their guards, the women had to refer to themselves, and to each other, by their assigned numbers, or punishment was swift; but when they were alone together, they made a point of using their given names. It helped to maintain some shred of dignity.
And dignity was just about as rare a commodity as privacy in the open, Spartan barracks with its neat row of bunks down either side. Even the basic privacy of the bathroom, so often taken for granted, was denied to the female prisoners. The doors had been removed from the toilet stalls, and it was not uncommon for a girl in the midst of squat, to look up and find herself caught in the act of relieving herself by a wide-grinning soldier. In a like manner, the female prisoner was forced to perform her ablutions in the wide, open-bayed shower room before the appreciative eyes of the camp’s delighted officers, who gathered each day to enjoy the sight of a bevy of young women soaping and rinsing their healthy young bodies in the steamy warmth of the large circular bay.
Cleanliness was a fetish with the Commadante, who insisted on daily hygiene; frequent showers became social events as the women were paired off, and expected to wash thoroughly. Each girl was to attend to her own needs, and then those of her shower-mate, sending soapy hands and washrags to probe the most intimate curves and crevasses, all under the shouted encouragement of their amused captors. It took only few minutes of this spectacle before the flushed and excited officers tore off their uniforms. With monstrous erection bobbing and weaving, the naked soldiers rushed to join in. Thus, these daily showers inevitably ended up as communal free-for-alls.
El Commandante himself never participated in these barracks games; preferring to take his pleasures in the privacy on his mansion where any one of his women — or two, or three, or more, could be instantly ordered up for an evenings’ entertainment. It was the two younger officers, Lieutenants Noriega and Ramirez, along with the ubiquitous Major Guzman, who were the most frequent visitors to the women’s quarters. The one remaining member of the General’s staff, the strange Captain Alvarez, a bony-faced man with close-cropped hair and a permanent frown, never joined in on the communal fun, but preferred to watch from afar as the wild debauchery took place under his detached, cold gaze. Captain Alvarez was not well liked by the garrison, but he was loathed and feared by the female prisoners. A man of overweening pride, he treated them all with equal disdain, even Guzman, who was nominally his superior.
Alvarez preferred to meet his women one-to-one, on the sun-baked parade square, or alone in one of the “holding cells” where recalcitrant prisoners were sent to contemplate their fate, or in the punishment hut, where a woman, on her knees and pleading for mercy, would find herself entirely in the hands of Hernando Alvarez. Those were the moments he longed for, most enjoyed; meting out, at his leisure, the sort of slow, deliberate discipline that earned him his evil reputation. So far, Mallory was lucky enough to have escaped the camp sadist and his ‘private sessions’.
In fact, except for being subjected to the singular degradation she met upon their arrival, she, of all the girls, has been largely left alone. She regarded that as strange. After those first few hours that she had spent staked out, spread-eagled in the sun, she had been released, allowed to clean up, and given some time to recover from her initial ordeal. Still, she couldn’t help feeling unclean, the feeling lingered: the vivid memory of her public defilement at the hands of the smirking General Hernandez; the lingering stink of piss that had splattered her face and body and soaked her hair. Their first night in the camp, Kip and Meghan had been ordered to present themselves for the General’s pleasure, but Mallory had not been required to accompany them on that, their first visit to the “Casa”. Thus far, she had not been used sexually, nor had she been publicly humiliated, although she had been subjected to the daily indignities that were a woman’s lot in the masculine world on the mountaintop.
She was idly contemplating this strange turn of ev
ents as she finished off her toenails, and capped the little bottle of paint. She looked up into the mirror before her, and meeting the eyes of the Mouse, gave the girl a wry smile. In the camp, the girls were thrown on each other’s company for long hours at a time, and the Mouse seemed to have attached herself to Mallory, much to Kip’s annoyance.
Mallory knew it was only a matter of time before the General would want her. She clung to the slim hope that the two-bit dictator might come to his senses; even now, she might try to find a way to negotiate out of this mess. Surely he would not want to call down the weight of the American government on his head! By now he must have realized a terrible mistake had been made. This time his net had yielded two American agents who had fallen into his hands by accident!
Of course, he might just as easily have them killed, quietly, with no one to know. But Mallory felt, deep down, that neither end was likely. For she, like all the others, would be useful to the warlord of the hills…as long as they could serve as sex toys. When she no longer amused him, or his officers, she would be given to the soldiers’ barracks — a prize gringa to be kept there, used and abused, to be made to perform with the common whores and camp followers. It was too horrible to think about!
Each day a duty roster was posted listing the prisoner’s work assignments. Half the women would be assigned to household duties: cleaning the officer’s quarters, the latrines, doing laundry, making beds, and cooking the meals; but a few would always be held back, assigned to duties of a more personal nature in the officers’ bedrooms. And of course, one or more would inevitably be assigned to the Commandante’s lavish Casa. While Mallory sat on the bunk waiting for her toenails to dry, the Mouse ran with the others to check out the orders that had just been posted inside the barracks’s door. She rushed back with the news: all three of the newcomers: Numbers 8, 9, and 10, had been selected to serve El Commandante that afternoon.
***
The veterans among the girls were full of tales about General Hernandez. Although he expected absolute obedience, and could show a terrible temper if crossed, he was said to be a man who treated his women well, relishing the role of grand seignior — a magnanimous, even generous host. The women who were called upon to service him, were allowed to fully enjoy the luxury of the big house: the oversized tub in which they could be treated to a real bath, even though he sometimes waded in to join them, his considerable bulk sending the water overflowing; the fine food, and the best of wine that the General had somehow managed to stash away in the mountain fortress. All in all, a few, not terribly unpleasant, hours. A smart girl would know how to use those hours to ingratiate herself with the supreme commander of the mountaintop, and in the process, suffer nothing more painful than the man’s thick, rutting cock up…up her ass, more than likely. For El Commandante was a devoted connoisseur of backdoor love. If a girl submitted with a smile to his perverse desires, he was content. And although his threats were taken seriously, his personal discipline was mild, provided the prisoner was careful not to provoke him. Once in the general’s beefy hands, the worst discipline would be one he would personally impose: an almost playful, over-the-knee spanking. Those familiar with the General’s ways readily agreed that this was a trivial price to pay, when compared to the sort of harsh treatment they might expect from the camp’s sadistic Captain.
It was Guzman who came for them — promptly at 12:55. The three anxious women waited for him, sitting side by side on Mallory’s bunk, collared, and dressed as ordered: their simple prison dresses augmented by black, thigh-high stockings, and high-heeled pumps, accessories the General dearly loved. In a short while, those shoes and stockings would be all the girls would be wearing. Each woman had been given time to attend to her hair and makeup. Lipstick and blush, eye shadow and liner, were strategically applied. All three wore the expensive Parisian scent the General favored.
Mallory, who, except for her trademark purple lipstick, tended to forgo the cosmetics of a well-dressed woman, now found herself taking a greater interest in those feminine arts since being confined to the mountaintop. She watched her little friend carefully applying lipstick, as if for the first time. Meghan, she decided, overdid it, thickening her lashes and painting herself up to excess so that she looked like some garish whore, although Mallory had to admit that the lovely mane of soft blonde hair framing her pretty face made quite an impression. Then too, Meghan’s richly curved figure nicely filled out her prison uniform: the first few buttons, always left undone, revealed the top slopes of those fulsome breasts, slightly drooping with that deep, generous cleavage, with weightiness that was seductive and inviting. Unlike Mallory’s thick pink nipples, Meghan’s were dark and large; excessive nipples with oversized aureolae. Those nipples could clearly be seen through the thin bodice when the big blonde smoothened it down with both hands as she stood and stretched. Mallory casually glanced down to check her own front. Her dress hung more loosely from her rangy shoulders, billowing slightly when she leaned forward. She brought up a hand to surreptitiously undo a further button down the front of her uniform.
Guzman, with brisk, business-like moves, attached the leashes to their collars and ordered the prisoners to their feet. Then the little parade set off for the long walk to the mansion, watched from behind shuttered windows by the always curious citizens of General Hernandez’s little kingdom.
The women were led through the carved door, and into the cool darkness of a long hallway. The sudden shelter from the glaring afternoon sun was most welcome. Gradually, Mallory’s eyes adapted to the heavily shaded interior. And she could make out the paneled walls and rich mahogany woodwork that lavishly adorned the pale stucco walls. She was led through rooms ornately appointed in a style that was hopelessly dated, feeling as though she had stepped back into the 19th century, complete with polished, ornate, Victorian furnishings and potted palms that seemed to sprout everywhere.
The Major led the three tethered women down the hallway, their heels clicking on the hardwood floors as they were brought to a set of huge double doors. The doors were half-heartedly “guarded” by a pair of slovenly sentries, who came to life with evil grins when they saw the party of women prisoners approach. Mallory, just behind Guzman walked tall with her usual elegant sway, cool and poised like a model on a runway, with shoulders squared and chin held high. The soldiers giggled, joked, and poked one another, as they drank in the long and delicious body of the chief gringa with longing eyes. Behind her, the blonde girl with the long hair pranced in her high heels, her voluptuous body moving seductively, unsupported tits jiggling with a titillating wobble with each step she took. Bringing up the rear, Kip shot the two grinning guards a defiant stare, as though daring them to look — which they did, with pleasure, whistling as they admired the girl’s skirted butt as she passed by, and playfully grabbing at her skirt to get a peek once the Major’s back was turned. The fiery girl cursed and swatted behind her at the offending hand that held her by the upraised skirt, briefly exposing her agile, nyloned legs and small, tight-cheeked bottom to the delight of the grinning apes. The Major turned to look over his shoulder, clearly annoyed; snapped an order. And the two buffoons sprang to attention, and made an elaborate ceremony of opening the doors to admit the little party into a large, gaudy, and brightly-lit room.
The room was meant to be sumptuous, to awe the visitor with baroque splendor; a receiving room where the monarch of all he surveyed might impress visitors. There were elaborate arches, and ornate, gilded mirrors. Miles of rich crimson velvet draped the paneled walls, and golden candelabra from another era, brought up now to the electric age, sparkled from the high ceilings. Along each side, a series of niches for statuary had been carved out of the walls. Mallory had heard all about these now-vacant alcoves.
The others told of how, from time to time, the General would stage an lavish entertainment for his cronies, a disreputable gang of smugglers, dealers, and drug lords, along with the corrupt police and local officials who profited from their dealings, the whol
e elaborate operation controlled by the master of the mountain. On such occasions, a female prisoner was assigned to each alcove, there to serve as a “living statue”. Their naked figures adorning the walls, they provided amusing decorations, enhancing the pleasant ambiance the General created for his esteemed guests. The last time such a party had been given, the women had been forced to shave all the hair from their bodies, though thankfully, not from their heads. They were ordered to step up into the alcoves to take their places, standing at attention, nude bodies well oiled and displayed, so that they gleamed as they stood poised under the bright lights, while the General’s guests freely walked the line, admiring those taut-muscled, shiny bodies with appreciative eyes, and fond, lingering hands.
At the far end of the room, seated in an ornate chair on a raised carpeted platform, (the resemblance to a throne, absurdly obvious to Mallory), sat their smirking captor, the warlord of the Mountains, General Humberto Emilio Hernandez. His naked bulk was wrapped in nothing but a short silk robe, loosely belted, and open at the front. The big man was corpulent, yet not grossly fat. His features told of his humble origins — the coarse, vulgar face and thick mustache of a common peasant. He repelled Mallory; yet there was something almost magnetic about the man. She couldn’t help being intrigued by his massive presence, the bare chest, broad and thickly furred, and the commanding sense of power the man so casually carried on those large, muscular shoulders.
