Flee (19 page)

For
a while, I let the flood of emotion carry me. I didn't cry, not in the normal
sense of tears rushing down my face. But I didn't think, either. I didn't try
to control the flood of pain. Wave after wave shook me, and I did nothing to
stop
them.

Even
after the worst subsided, I couldn't regain control. Emotionally I was a mess,
and my focus wasn't helped by whatever shit Victor had injected me with. My
heart was beating so damn fast I could feel it in my throat. My whole body
quaked, and even though my hair and blouse were wet and I was freezing cold,
sweat slicked my skin. I guessed he'd given me norepinephrine or noradrenalin, fight-or-flight
hormones administered to make the waterboarding even more intense.

As
if that needed any enhancement at all.

When
the sound reached me, coming from the living room, I almost jumped out of my
skin.

There
it was again, the doorknob rattling.

It
was too soon for Hammett and Victor to be back. And a cop called to investigate
the earlier screaming would identify himself.

The
door opened and shut again. A soft shuffle of footsteps moved across the living
room floor, slow, tentative. Two sets, one heavy, one light.

A
scent reached me, almost too faint to discern. But even though it was light as
a whisper, I could tell it wasn't Claiborne for Men. It wasn't cologne at all.

It
was a scent I had known far longer, a mix of cigarettes, leather and sweat.

The
scent of a very bad man.

"At some point you might believe that death is inevitable. Once
that thought enters your head, you cease fighting. Once you cease fighting,
death
will
be inevitable. The only way to stay
alive is to never give up."

"Looking
good, babe," the familiar voice said.

I
probably should have felt something, but after all that had happened in the
last hour, I had nothing left to feel. "Hello, Cory."

He
must have followed me from the John Hancock building. I'd been more focused on
Kaufmann's health than avoiding tails. Careless of me, but at this point it
didn't really matter.

The
second set of footsteps apparently belonged to the girl. Cory's replacement for
me.

"Don't
tell me the two who just left did this to you," Cory said in an amused
tone. His face loomed into my field of vision. The girl lingered like a shadow
behind him.

Even
in the midst of my despair, I couldn't help noticing the irony of the moment.
If I'd been free, I would have had little to fear from Cory. He was insane,
certainly, but of the two-bit variety, not the highly-trained, I'm-going-to-dominate-the-world
type, like Hammett. He'd controlled me as a vulnerable girl, but that had been
a long time ago.

Yet,
here I was, once again at his mercy.

Cory's
thin lips widened in a grin. "Why didn't you tell me you had a twin?"

I
didn't particularly feel like talking about my sister, so I kept my mouth shut.

"I
see your precious Kaufmann didn't come to your rescue." A fleshy thud
reached me, the unmistakable sound of Cory's boot striking Kaufmann's body.

I
closed my eyes.

"It's
too bad. It really is. I was looking forward to cutting off the rest of his
body parts while you watched."

My
throat felt thick. I couldn't summon the energy or the will to answer.

"Don't
tell me your sister did this to him. You must have pissed her off."

"Cory?"
The girl's voice wasn't much more than a whisper. She hovered near the kitchen
entrance, her big brown eyes darting around like those of a hunted animal
expecting an ambush."What if her sister comes back?"

Cory
grinned and winked at me. "Then I'll fuck her, too. I've never done twins
before."

"Cory,
I'm serious." A touch of whine worked around the edges of her voice, reminding
me what Kaufmann had told me, that even with the make-up and short skirt, she was
only fourteen.

Twenty
years had passed since I'd been in her place, but I still remembered the
feelings that drove me to Cory and convinced me to stay. Still, I could muster
no pity for this girl, no understanding. If anything, I wanted to shake her,
slap her, punish her for staying with Cory, for folding to his will, for being
afraid of him.

Like
I had been.

"Why
don't you go outside for a bit, Di? Have a smoke or something. Let me get reacquainted
with my old friend, here."

"Come
on, Cory. You said—"

"Shut
the hell up and let the grownups talk."

The
girl flinched, as if Cory had physically hit her. She pressed her lips together
and focused a look of pure hatred on me. "Cory, you said you were going to
kill her."

"I
am."

"Why
don't you then, so we can leave?"

He
gave me a look full of swagger. "After I'm done having some fun."

"But,
Cory…"

"Go
watch the door. I won't be long."

Normally
I would have gone for the obvious insult, but I was too busy watching the girl.
When I was in Di's place, I'd never questioned Cory. At first I'd been too
afraid of his disapproval. Later I'd been too afraid of him.

"What
am I supposed to do if someone comes in?"

Cory
rolled his eyes. He glanced around the room and then focused a glare on me. "Where's
my gun?"

"How
the hell do I know?" I answered.

"You
took it. Where is it?"

I'd
never realized how dim Cory actually was. "If I had a gun, do you think I'd
be in this position right now?"

He
turned away from me and stepped to the kitchen table. When he returned, he was
holding the stun gun Victor had used to…

I
swallowed into a dry throat.

"Use
this." He handed it to the girl. "Now get out of here."

She
grasped the stun gun and took a few steps before pausing in the kitchen doorway
and glancing back. Jealousy was written all over her face, an emotion common to
teen girls, especially when they'd convinced themselves a manipulative psycho
was the man of their dreams.

Cory
didn't wait until she was out of the door before he grabbed my blouse and
yanked. Buttons popped. He gave me a grin, as if waiting for me to gasp or
plead or give him some kind of satisfying show of fear.

He'd
wait forever.

Whatever
he did to me, I didn't care anymore. He might as well be raping a mannequin. I
looked in the direction of the hall, trying to catch a glimpse of the girl. I
couldn't help but wonder how often she'd talked back to him like that. Cory
chose young girls for a reason. They were pliable, easy to control. If she kept
showing signs of having a will of her own, I doubted an inadequate,
narcissistic shithead like Cory would keep her around much longer. And he wasn't
the type to break up peacefully.

He
rummaged through a kitchen drawer and pulled out a knife. A smile snaked over
his lips. "Ah, this'll do." He slipped the blade between the cups of
my bra and sawed the sharp blade upward. The honed steel sliced elastic and
lace. My bra flapped open and cool air rushed over my skin.

He
took a nipple between thumb and forefinger and pinched hard.

Another
wave of sweat bloomed over my skin from the pain, but I stared back at him as
if I didn't feel a thing.

He
gave the other breast the same bruising treatment. "Your nips are erect.
You enjoying this, babe?"

"Sure,
Cory," I said, laying the sarcasm on thick. "I'm thinking of all the
things I want to do to you."

He
gave me a big ass grin, as if he actually believed those things might bring him
pleasure… or involve sex of any kind. "Do you know what I'm going to do
after I fuck you?"

"No,
but I'm sure you're dying to tell me."

He
scraped the flat of the knife blade against one breast. "I'll cut off your
nipples first. Then your whole tits. Then I might just fuck you again before I
slit you down the middle." His nostrils flared. His scalp pinked under the
short, graying stubble. He unbuckled his belt and lowered his fly.

"Cory…"

"I'm
busy, Di." Leaving his jeans gaping open, he spun around to the girl. "Watch
the door."

She
glanced at me, then down at Cory's pants. A flush crept up her neck and blazed
in her cheeks. Her lips tightened into a hard knot.

I
locked eyes with her, then forced myself to look at Cory. "Come on, big
boy," I said. "Give it to me."

He
chuckled. "Yeah, I know you want it, bitch."

Turning
his back on Di, he started on my jeans.

With
Cory hulking over me, I heard the snapping hum before I realized the girl had moved.

Cory
lurched forward, his back arching, a loud growl grounding out between clenched
teeth. Tendons stood out in his neck.

Di
kept the stun gun's juice going.

He
stumbled forward, hitting the counter. When she finally relented, he collapsed.

She
stared down at the weapon, as if suddenly realizing what she was doing. Jerking
her hand back, she let it clatter to the floor. She stared at him for a few
seconds, as if she wasn't sure what she was seeing, then tears swamped her eyes,
and she covered her face with her hands.

"It's
okay, Di. It's okay." The situation was ridiculous. Here I was strapped
down, half undressed and unable to move, and I was trying to soothe this
confused, jealous girl who'd just zapped her boyfriend and more than likely
wanted me dead.

She
lowered her hands, sniffing, her thick lashes spiked with tears. "Aw,
Christ, he's going to be so mad when he wakes up."

"It's
okay."

"What
the hell do you know?"

"I
was in your place, remember? I used to be you."

She
glared at me, as if she remembered far too well and wanted to make me pay for
that sin.

I
pushed ahead anyway, taking a chance. "I can help you get away from him.
All you have to do is cut these ties."

"Get
away from him?" She shook her head. "You just want me to get away so
you can have him yourself."

"Trust
me, that's not it."

"Like
I would believe anything you say. I should just kill you."

"Cory
won't like that, and you know it."

Her
lower lip trembled.

If
she didn't want to escape Cory, there wasn't much I could do. Even if I could
convince her to leave, she'd likely find her way back to him. And when she did,
he would make her suffer for it. "Listen, if you free my hands, you can
say it was my fault. Tell him that I stunned him."

She
shook her head and sniffed. "He knows you didn't have the thing."

"Stun
guns cause something called critical response amnesia. He won't remember
anything from the thirty seconds or so before the attack."

My
statement wasn't exactly true. While some people experienced amnesia, it was
far from all and generally didn't encompass that much time. But at fourteen, I
doubted Di was well versed in such things, at least I hoped not. And since she
needed a way out, I hoped desperation would override skepticism.

"He
won't know it was you who pulled the trigger."

She
wrapped her arms around herself as if she was cold. But although her body
language suggested she was closed off, I could see her mind working.

I
pressed on. "If you help me get out of here, when he wakes up, you can
tell him I stunned him and got away. He won't blame you, and I'll be gone. You
can have him to yourself. All you have to do is cut the zip ties on my wrists."

She
looked at my hands, then at Cory.

"Hurry.
He'll be waking soon. Then it will be too late."

She
took a step closer. The fact that she didn't pick up the stun gun or the knife
Cory dropped and use them on me seemed encouraging, but the hate in her eyes
hadn't faded. "He'll keep looking for you," she said.

"Let
me worry about that."

She
shook her head. "He always talks about you."

"That's
only because he's been in prison so long, and I helped put him there. The more
he gets to know you, the more opportunities he has to see how perfect you are
for each other…he'll forget me."

"You
think so?"

"I
know so."

She
nodded, as if trying to talk herself into swallowing the bullshit I was feeding
her.

"It'll
work out, Di. I'll make sure he doesn't find me again. I'll disappear and you
two can be together."

She
held out her hands, palms up. "I don't have anything to cut the ties."

"Check
the drawers."

She
opened drawers and raked through their contents. Finally she held up a pair of
utility scissors.