Chapter 1
Chapter 1
My fingers are rapidly going numb, exposed to the chill wind as I use my hand to keep my long coat shut tight. It’s been a long time since I’ve been in Moscow at Winter, and it’s just as cold as I remember. Maybe colder.
I can see the lights of the Kremlin in the distance, beautiful at night. The outside appearance doesn’t even hint at the nest of vipers within. I savor my anger, because I’m frozen half to death and it helps keep me warm like a shot of vodka.
Not for the first time since I began my midnight sojourn, I wished for a car. The problem is my own vehicle is so obviously a government car that I can’t use it. Not for this kind of work. No, the people I’ll be seeing tonight would not respond well to government intrusion. I suppose it’s for the best that this is a freelance gig, after a fashion.
I turn a corner and am blasted by a strong gust that threatens to tear the fabric from my hand. Stubbornly I hang onto it, and am able to make out my destination through the tears brought on by the frigid air. A tacky neon sign depicting a woman with bare breasts buzzes in the night. Stepping over what might be a passed out drunk or a dead drunk—it’s hard to tell with an inch of snow over him—I arrive at the front door.
The doorman peers out of a tiny rectangle set high in the heavy steel door. One look at me and he’s swinging it open wide. I’m not exactly dressed like a stripper, in my sturdy black khakis and turtleneck sweater, not to mention my sensible shoes, but what other kind of woman would be knocking on their door at this hour?
Indeed, he seems to have mistaken me for someone else, swaddled in winter clothes as I am.
“Dmitri wants you waiting tables until one, then you’re set to go on stage,” he holds a hand out for my coat. Such a gentleman. Too bad I can’t respond in kind.
As soon as my furry hat comes off my head, his eyes widen in surprise. His mouth opens, chest swells as he prepares to raise an alarm. Using the ridge of my left hand, I pop him once across the trachea. It’s not hard enough to shatter his windpipe, but he won’t be singing drinking songs for the rest of the night.
My knee crushes his testicles against his pelvis, and once he’s doubled over from that attack I send him into unconsciousness with a knife hand chop across the back of his head. Stepping over a prone body for the second time that night, I enter the club itself.
The music’s loud, a thudding bass that I can feel in my belly. Eyes turn toward me, mostly aglow with lecherous intent. I’ve been told that I’m beautiful, but of course a woman never really believes that. Just under six feet tall, I’m taller than most men when I’m in heels, with long blonde hair I keep in a braid most of the time. After I was done with my Spetznas training, I vowed never to cut it again. My features are considered fine, delicate even, with the pale white skin of my Lithuanian heritage. Add in the fact that I keep myself in quite good shape for a woman in her late thirties and I suppose I might be enticing to an inebriated individual.
I elbow my way past a couple of would-be suitors and belly up to the bar. The barkeep, a massive man built like a tree stump with legs, flicks his eyes over me. In an instant he deduces that I don’t belong there.
He plays it cool, though.
“What’s your poison, Tovarisch.?” He says with a thick Croatian accent.
“Vodka, and a beer chaser,” I say, adding a smile. For the time being, I’ll let him believe I am unaware I’ve been made.
“Come to Moscow often?” He asks, offering me a cigarette. I take it in my still-tingling fingers, noting the smooth, rich aroma. This pack probably cost more than a week’s worth of kerosene. I lean forward and allow him to light it for me. The smoke drifts toward the ceiling, making lazy progress until it’s caught in a draft from a vent. Then it’s blown into oblivion.
“Not in the winter,” I say and we both laugh.
“You looking for work?” Of course, that would be a logical reason for me to be there, but I’m growing impatient. Also, I don’t much care for strippers and don’t want to pretend to be one even for a moment. Seriously, I have less respect for them than I do for hookers. At least the prostituki give you what you pay for.
“No,” I say, still smiling. I take a long drag on my cigarette, blow the smoke pointedly in his face, and lean on my elbows. “Actually, I’d kind of like to speak to Sikorski.”
He flinches as if I’ve slapped him. Even those denizens of Moscow who have the courage and the need to meet with a member of the mob wouldn’t be so obvious about it. I’ve crossed a line, and will probably have to hurt people soon, but that’s all right.
I hate mobsters more than I do strippers.
“Just a minute,” he says. Then he turns to a barmaid in a g-string and whispers in her ear. Wiping off his hands, he doffs his apron and comes around to my side of the bar. “I’ll take you to him.”
Now I know I’m being set up. A long time ago, when I was just out of basic training, I remember learning how to make lighting quick assessments based on quick and subtle observation. Thus, I can tell by the way the barkeep swings his arms wide at his sides that he’s wearing a gun at his belt. He doesn’t seem nervous, which means he’s either a real pro or he’s underestimating me because I’m a woman. Ridges of scar tissue along his knuckles say he’s not afraid to get into fisticuffs.
I follow him through a long, narrow hallway, shrouded in smoke. I can hear people coughing behind the curtains that line the hall, and smell the thick acrid smoke of their opiates. At the end of the hall is a set of double doors. He pushes them open, and then stands sideways so I can move past him.
The interior is posh, with thick blue carpets and matching velvet drapes. Four men sit around a highly polished table, playing American poker. They glance up at us, eyes narrow and cunning.
“Where’s Sikorski?” I say, putting my chin in my hand thoughtfully, while I cradle my elbow with my other hand. It looks like a non-threatening, passive posture, but I can get my hands into guard position instantly if need be.
“Sikorski is a busy man,” says the barkeep. The doors thud shut, and the men carefully fold up their hands and lay them face down on the table. “How about if we keep you company a while, eh little princess?”
I can feel my eyes narrow. No one, and I mean no one, calls me princess.
Barkeep moves up behind me, clapping a hand on my shoulder. Without turning, I drop my hand to my side and grab his nutsack in a crushing grip. When one has cultivated power in one’s hands that allow for the crushing of walnuts between thumb and forefinger—as I have—this is a most effective maneuver. I add a vicious twist and pull, then release him to crumple whimpering on the floor.
His fellows are up and moving, chairs hitting the carpet with muffled thuds. The first man to stretch his hand toward my throat ends up with a compound fracture of his thumb. Another rushes in behind him and I bend at the waist, allowing him to slam into my shoulder. I use his own momentum and straighten up, flipping him over my head to smash through a glass coffee table. It explodes into a thousand glittering crystal shards.
I take a pretty solid right cross to the jaw, but roll with it and somersault across the carpet. I angle my path so when I unfold to my feet I’m in the perfect position to crack the fourth card player with an uppercut to the chin that drops him cold.
The man who struck me manages to grab me, pinning my arms to my sides from behind. I snap my head back, relishing the wet crunch as his nose crumples like foil. His hands drop away, and I finish him off with a reverse crescent kick, snapping his head to the side.
The man with the broken thumb is in the best condition, so I drag him to his feet and slam him back first on the card table. Money and alcohol go spilling onto the carpet as I persuade him that silence isn’t always golden.
In short order, he leads me up a twisting staircase to the top floor. My boot smashes the locked mahogany doors open, peppering the carpet with splinters.
Sikorsky looks up, and his eyes narrow in recognition. He puts a hand on the behemoth man’s arm next to him, and the latter stops reaching for his pistol.
“Well, well, well,” he says, grinning though I can tell he’s quite nervous. “Look what came in from the cold.”
“Mr. Sikorsky,” says the big man, looking back and forth between us, brow furrowed in confusion.
“It’s all right, Viktor. She would only hurt you anyway.”
When Viktor looks dubious, Sikorsky laughs.
“You’re in the presence of a living legend, Tovarisch. Meet Svetlana Breshnev, the only woman to ever earn the Maroon cap.”
Now Viktor is gawking. Earning the Maroon cap involves defending yourself—unarmed—from three determined attackers at the same time. Attackers who have had the same training as you, an d—in my case—are much larger and stronger. I allow myself to feel a little pride and even smile.
“What brings you to Moscow, my dear?” Sikorsky takes a cigar out of a shiny silver case and neatly snicks off the end with a knife. The move is supposed to intimidate, but I can see how his hands shake. “Last I heard, you were dealing with that little temper tantrum the Ukrainians are throwing.”
I resist the impulse to glower. Being taken off assignment was a sore spot for me. Yes, my mother was born in the Ukraine, but the Kremlin knows I’ll do my duty. I always have, and I always will. You see, the rest of the world may think us boorish bullies, but the fact is they don’t understand Russia or its people. The level of toughness, of grit, that even the most mild mannered of us develops requires a stern hand to rule over.
“I’m on a different assignment now,” I say, being bold enough to perch my bottom on his desk. “And I’ve been told you are just the man I need to see.”
Sikorsky takes a pull from the cigar and lets the smoke linger in his mouth. When he blows it out, I can see a cunning light in his eyes.
“So, what will it take this time?” He reaches in his desk and I am on my feet in an instant. Smiling, he moves much more slowly and allows me to see the item he withdraws: A large bundle of rubles held with a rubber band. “Let me make you an offer; You walk out that door, and I buy you a Porsche.”
“You can’t bribe a Spetznas, Sikorsky.” I sit back down. “Relax. I’m not interested in you or your ‘activities’ here in the Motherland. I’d rather talk about your new friends in the human trafficking business.”
“What about them?” Sikorsky is still trying to play it cool, but he’s begun to sweat. His left hand tugs at the handkerchief in his blazer pocket.
“An agent disappeared while investigating them. I want to find him.”
Sikorsky’s eyes light up, and he visibly relaxes.
“I will help you in any way that I can,” he says with an oily sneer.
“You’re agreeing awful easily,” I say, leaning on his desk until my eyes are inches from his. “You know what I will do to you if you lie to me, yes?”
He can’t repress a shudder, and his bodyguard looks like a lost little boy. We Spetznas have a certain reputation, and for the most part it’s deserved. After all, we’ve all been trained in how to torture people without leaving a mark on their skin...
“I won’t.” The conviction in his voice is almost comical, and I allow myself to smile. “The truth is I’m only marginally involved. I only provided a bit of security at the docks I own.”
“You mean, you took a cut,” I say. “I’m going to find our man, Sikorsky, and if I can’t I’m going to find out what happened to him. When I do, I’d better be certain you had nothing to do with it.”
“I know better than to cross off a government agent.” Sikorsky holds his hands up, palms facing out. “I’ll tell you all I know, I swear on Lenin’s beard.”
“So tell me.”
I end up nibbling on some peanuts in a glass bowl during his tale. It seems that there are a number of differences between this human trafficking ring and others I’ve dealt with. Usually, the women abducted are drug addicts, homeless, or the disenfranchised. They’re not so much held captive with physical restraints as they are by logistics. Often, they’re taken to a country where they can’t speak the native language, thousands of miles from their home. Thus, the captives grow to depend on their captors, and to most people’s eyes would seem free to come and go as they saw fit.
This bunch is not fitting into the status quo. For one thing, the women who go missing come from all walks of life; Housewives, students, lawyers, and secretaries. Also, they tend to sell their captives to just one client, who keeps them for life, instead of pimping them out on the streets.
“They’re not human,” says Sikorsky, adding stiff shot of vodka for emphasis. “When I was at the docks, I saw inside their cargo. The women were bound and chained like animals, and looked as happy as if they were headed off to the slaughterhouse. I was glad when they moved their operation out of our fair country.”
“So where have they gone?”
“Where the police are incompetent, and the governance soft and stupid,” he says with a shrug.
“And where would that be?”
“America, of course,” he says with a laugh.
** *
I’m on the next red-eye to the states. I call in a few favors and get to fly what we call ‘government’ class. Basically, I’m not searched before boarding, so all of my nasty surprises are still stowed safely away inside my clothes. Also, when we arrive at the states, I shuffle off the plane disguised as the baggage crew. Since I’m not on an official assignment, I can’t rely on the Kremlin covering for me, and have to enter the country illegally.
The info I got from Sikorsky has me in St. Louis. Using cash, I buy a rusted Ford Tempo off a junk lot and fill up the tank. The brakes need work, as they whine at every red light, and the upholstery has pet stains—and smells—all over it, but the engine runs well enough.
I end up across the river in Illinois, driving up the old River Road until I’m in a place called Madison County. It’s a land of high bluffs, dense trees, and limestone quarries. The people are friendly enough. I’ve worked hard to speak English without an accent, and since my skin is snowy white most of them accept me without batting an eye.
I rent an apartment in a run-down, shady subdivision, and set to work. I picked this area for a reason. It’s roughly in the center of a spate of recent missing persons cases. Once again the victims seem to have nothing in common other than being pretty women. Using a map of the area, I try and extrapolate their methods.
Most of the women disappeared in the middle of their normal routines. That would indicate that the traffickers have studied their victim’s habits for at least several days, if not longer. What’s odd is that there are no witnesses to any of the abductions. Then I consider the landscape, with so many old dirt roads and dense copses of trees. I’ve made more important people disappear with less to work with.
After I have a rough idea of where the Traffickers are doing their hunting, I begin the next phase. I have to get into character. These men are professionals, from what Sikorsky told me, and they would likely spot a Spetznas just by the way we carry ourselves. It’s hard, much harder than the prep work I’ve done so far. Years of honing my muscles to obey lethal purposes does not yield nonchalance.
It takes a couple of hours, but soon I have my character figured out. Svetlana Breshnev becomes Lana Brown, a student at the nearby University, aficionado of all things fitness. I’m NOT about to let my toned, supple body go to waste just for a role.
The next order of business is getting a routine so I can be snatched out of it. I take a job at a local watering hole, putting up with pinches and slaps on my bottom, but only as much as a willful American woman would. My boss is an old railroad worker with no teeth and less common sense, but he does play it relatively straight with me.
I go through all the motions of having a life. Setting up a bank account under my false name, going to the gym on a rigid schedule five nights a week, and spending time at the college.
Then boredom sets in. I’m at it for two weeks and there’s not even a hint that I’m being followed. I begin to think that maybe this was a bad plan. There must be a lot of pretty young things out there, and I’m a fool to think that I’d show up on the trafficker’s radar in so large a pool of potential victims.
It all changes one day during the third week when I notice the tail. I doubt that anyone else could have detected them, because they really are quite skilled. They follow my car, but always at least a block away, riding in a nondescript black sedan. I can’t get a good look at their faces, of course, but I get the inkling I’m dealing with seasoned pros.
They follow me for another two weeks, to the gym, to school, to work. I decide to make myself a little more vulnerable, and start jogging early in the morning before the sun has risen. Still they don’t make a move, and I’m beginning to wonder if I’ve been made.
I’m at work when they finally set their plan in motion. The local high school team has recently won their homecoming game, and spirits are high. The streets of the small town I have taken residence in are packed with people, jubilantly shouting, drinking, and mingling. Live bands play music on almost every corner, while clowns toss out candy to the children. It’s a festive, manic night, alive with energy.
It’s also the perfect environment to make someone disappear, but not if I’m busing tables all night. I end up faking a sour stomach, which doesn’t go over well with my boss. After I vomit all over a table—a little bit of ipecac syrup does the trick—he’s more than willing to let me leave.
Once I’m free of work, I walk around the carnival-like proceedings. I try to take dark alleys, and stay away from crowds, but there’s only so much of that you can do without rousing suspicion.
Then it occurs to me I can make myself even more vulnerable. I stop in a dive bar and get on a mean drunk. It’s risky, of course, to have dulled reflexes, but I’m tired of waiting.
The man I’m searching for isn’t just some simple agent. He’s a man I have known well, intimately, even. Boris’s bright blue eyes and square jaw come unbidden to my mind. For over ten years we’ve watched each other’s backs on ops.
When he wasn’t at our annual pub crawl in Donetsk, I grew concerned. Neither of us has ever missed a pub crawl, not in seven years. I would be fool not to realize it’s because of some leftover feelings from when we were together, and often we end up spending the night together, only to part in the morning.
I’m going to find him, no matter the cost. Even if we’re not in love anymore, I still owe him my life a dozen times over, and vice-versa. And if the traffickers have killed him, well...
I am a wetworker, after all. He won’t go to the grave alone.
After stumbling out of the bar and down a back alley, I finally hit paydirt. I have to fight my instincts when two shadows loom on the pavement beneath my feet.
They’re not as subtle as I thought. Each of them grabs me by the arm and drags me behind a dumpster. I scream, kick, and fight, because that’s what they expect. My blows are clumsy, though and ill-timed, since that’s also what they expect.
The two men are quite burly, an ax handle across the shoulders, with hairy limbs knotted with muscle. I catch a glimpse of their casual blue jeans and flannel shirts before I’m shoved up against a brick wall, cheek scraping the rough surface.
As I scream and plead—the sounds of which don’t carry far in the festive night—they jerk my hands behind my back. A plastic zip tie soon binds my wrists together. They pull it so tight it digs into my skin, nearly drawing blood.
“Get her feet, her feet!” growls the man pressing my head against the wall. He speaks English, but with an accent I believe to be Spanish.
“She’s a feisty one!” The other man has red hair and a goatee to match. I place his brogue as Irish, but then again he could be Scottish. I could never tell those apart. He wraps a tree trunk like arm around my knees and holds me still while another zip tie links my ankles together.
“Let me go!” It’s hard to yell without revealing my Russian heritage, but I think I do all right. “Why won’t someone help m-”
The Latino silences me, shoving a thick white bar towel into my mouth. I gag, nearly retching, as it stretches my jaw apart and tickles the back of my throat. A roll of duct tape is used to hold the packing in.
Irish grabs me around the waist and hurls my bound body into a pile of cardboard boxes. Instantly he sits across my belly and produces a knife, and I wonder if I’ve made a mistake and am about to be killed.
I wince as the knife slashes my top button free. I struggle with sincerity as he uses the weapon to cut my garments from me one by one. As each item of clothing, from my khaki pants to my shredded pink panties, hits the ground, the Latino puts them into a plastic bag. My cell phone and wallet are confiscated, disappearing into his pockets.
Barely able to breathe with my mouth obstructed and a heavy man across my gut, I still try to struggle. When they started stripping me, I got a bad feeling that they were going to sample their new merchandise on the spot.
I’m not disappointed. Irish squeezes my nipples hard between his fingers, eliciting a muffled yelp from my gagged mouth.
“Go watch the street,” he says to the Latino. By the speed with which the younger man obeys, I figure Irish must be in charge. Then he grins down at me, and I know exactly what he’s planning. I was expecting this, tried to steel myself for it as an inevitable aspect of being taken captive, but now that the moment is upon me I find myself bucking wildly beneath him.
“Shh, shhh,” he says, caressing my cheek with the dull edge of his knife. I shudder, pretending to be cowed, though I’m actually close to panic. “Just relax, and you won’t get hurt...too much.”
He stands up and doffs his pants. An impressive erection nearly ten inches long lunges out at me, and I whimper. I’m expecting him to cut my legs free, but he steps inside my knees and just forces them apart while he sits down. My bound ankles now behind the small of his back, it’s simple for him to drag me by the hips until the head of his cock is warm against my twat.
I growl behind the gag when he pinches my clit. My wrists jerk at the zip tie, drawing blood. If I could, despite Boris, I would free myself right now and put an end to this. If I could.
I groan as he enters me, without preamble or lube. I’m not in the mood, but my body’s reactions take over and a shudder of pleasure erupts from my abdomen and spreads like fire.
“There you go,” he says, caressing my hair almost gently. “It’s not so bad, is it? I do this a lot, my little tart. You’ll be thanking me for this cock in a week...”
He thrusts his hips into mine, and I feel the bulbous head of his cock drive deep. Irish must trust his lackey, because he spares not a glance to the mouth of the alley. His eyes are focused on me, mouth slightly open as he grunts with exertion. Rough hands paw my firm breasts as I gurgle behind the bar towel.
It’s over mercifully quick. Irish’s eyes roll back into his head, his mouth twists, and he pulls his shaft out just before he pops. Hot, sticky fluid stains my belly, running down between my legs.
“Sorry about the mess,” he says with a sneer “but we don’t want you getting pregnant...at least not until we have a buyer for the baby lined up.”
There’s no hiding the repugnance on my face, even with a gag in my mouth. Irish laughs, enjoying my impotent rage.
I’m dragged to my feet. The Latino notices the fun is over and comes back to assist. As the revelers party on a short distance away, they prepare me for transport. A stout rope is used to glue my elbows together, then run through the zip tie around my wrists. My hands are now bound to my waist, completely useless. Then they slash my ankles free only to re-tie them with cord. They leave about a foot between my ankles, so I can walk but not very well.
I’m starting to wonder how they plan on sneaking me out of the alley, since I don’t see a vehicle anywhere, when Irish produces a brightly colored vinyl cloth. It ends up being a clown costume, one of the kinds where it appears as if the harlequin were walking on his hands at all times. An ingenious way to hide my bound, naked body. After it’s pulled over my head to sweep the pavement by my feet, I can only see through a tiny rectangle.
Each of them grabs me by straps sewn into the clown suit, and I’m dragged out into the street. Few people give us more than a passing glance, though one child does come up before me and demand candy.
“Piss off, brat!” says the Latino. I can’t see Irish’s face, but his tone sounds annoyed when he speaks.
“It’s all right, little fellah.” I can hear the crinkling of a wrapper, and then the boy bounds away.
“What was that all about?”
“Now that kid won’t bitch about the mean clown who wouldn’t give him candy.”
“Oh. Right.”
After walking for a block, we pass a bonfire. Irish tosses the bag with my clothes in it into the blaze. A white van door is slid back, and I’m tossed inside on my belly. I struggle to a sitting position as I feel the van jostled by their heavy forms in the front seat.
Then we’re rolling along. I’ve met with success, of a sort. I chew on my gag and flex my fingers in their bonds, trying to stay upbeat.
I’m coming Boris. I’m coming.
Chapter 2
Bound and helpless in the back of the van, my training takes over and I force myself to relax. I focus on the path we take as best I can, using the senses not denied me. The jostling of the undercarriage is rough against my skin. The thin clown costume offers little protection, but I am able to sense every bump in the road. Thus, I can tell when we pull off of smooth pavement and onto a gravel lane.
My captors don’t talk much. I get the feeling they’re nervous. The little bits of fleeting conversation I do catch are all business; “Turn left.” “Don’t go that way. There’s a police checkpoint.” “Keep it on the double nickel, fellah.”
I do catch one of their names, at least. Irish turns out to be named Miles. My ears prick up when I hear them discussing me.
“She’s a quiet one,” says the Latino.
“Some of ’em are. Some of ’em scream their heads off and then you have the good ones, like this lass.”
“Lass?” He snorts. “Her license says she’s thirty-three. Wouldn’t call that a lass.”
“Bah, you’re talking out your ass, Eduardo.” Funny, he doesn’t look like an Eduardo. “She’s got a lot of good years on her yet, and let me tell you....”
I bite down hard on the towel in my mouth, fists clenched into fists as he laughs lasciviously.
“...her poon tang pie is tight as a Jew’s pocket and sweet as German chocolate cake! You know, I have a lot of furlough earned up. Might be that I trade it in for this lassie myself.”
You, Mr. Miles, have just earned yourself a very painful death. It struck me as a bit ridiculous, trussed up and helpless as I was, to be making vows of vengeance, but doing it still made me feel better.
“I wouldn’t take one of these broads,” says Eduardo. “No way. They’re all...weird and shit, once they get done with the training.”
“Weird?” Miles chuckles derisively. “Compliant, you mean. Compliant and very, very horny.”
“If you say so, Mr. Miles.”
Again the deference. I note that Eduardo is likely a novice, and therefore a possible weak link. Miles is causing me some concern. It takes a certain type of man to ravish a woman in the middle of a street, one who crosses lines and doesn’t even blink. There are many other things, vile things, he is likely capable of.
I turn my attention to my bonds. Maybe I can’t escape until I find out what happened to Boris, but that doesn’t mean I can’t make myself more comfortable. The zip tie is a washout. It’s pulled too tightly for me to wriggle free, and will have to be cut. Since they didn’t leave me a knife—or a stitch of clothing—I give up on it for now.
Normally I would slip my bound wrists down my back, under my legs and get them in front of me. Then my teeth could finish the job, once I’d gotten this miserable gag out. Unfortunately, the rope binding my wrists to my waist prevent that. My elbows are touching, bound tightly as well, which further limits my mobility.
“Hey, she’s thrashing around back there,” says Eduardo.
“So? We’re way off the grid at this point. No one’s gonna know.”
“She’s making me nervous. Something about this broad, I don’t know, she puts me on edge.”
“Oh, please. Look, I’m driving. If she’s making you nervous, get back there and hogtie her or something.”
“I don’t want to go back there alone!”
“Fella, are you kidding me? We know for a fact she’s not concealing any weapons, and she’s trussed up hand and foot! Christ, man, she can’t even bite you!”
“Okay, okay!”
I stopped struggling as soon as they started talking about me, but it seems it’s too late now. Of interest to me is Eduardo’s paranoia. Is he always this nervous, or is he smarter than I gave him credit for?
It’s all irrelevant as he whips the clown costume off and stares at my naked body. I blink, then do my best to look terrified. It’s not much of a stretch.
“You need to settle down, mama,” he says, pulling more cable ties from his pocket. I whimper as he uses them to bind my ankles more tightly together. With a grunt he rolls me over onto my belly, the icy cool metal stiffening my nipples. Using another cable tie, he attaches my feet to my hands.
Not satisfied, he opens a pocket on his vest and removes a wide, folded cloth. I shrink back as he approaches, but he manages to tie it around my face anyway. Now I’m completely blind, bereft of even the thin rectangle of dim vision I had enjoyed in the clown costume.
“Yeah, not so scary now, are you bitch?” His hand caresses my bottom, pinching and kneading the supple flesh. “Man, your ass is tight! Could bounce a quarter off it.”
He adds a hard smack that makes me yelp into the gag. Then I feel the van jostle as he rises to his feet and re-takes his seat.
“Take care of it?”
“Yeah, she’s not going nowhere.”
“Did you run a line of rope from her neck to her toes? That seems to discourage ’em from struggling too much.”
“No, but she’s not going nowhere. Trust me.”
“Don’t matter. We’re here.”
I’m not sure where ‘here’ is, but when the van door slides open I’m struck with the strong aroma of pine trees. I hope to confirm my suspicions that we’re in a rural coniferous forest by pressing my bare feet to the ground, but they aren’t taking any chances. Miles slings me over his shoulder like a side of beef, and I’m carried down a flight of stairs.
The odors turn dank and musty. A constant drip of water and the drop in temperature make me believe we’re underground, perhaps in a natural cavern of some sort. When I hear the two men bickering about who gets the dim flashlight, I’m almost certain of it.
I don’t know who got the better of it, because I can’t see regardless. I’m carried for a long way, bouncing on top of Mile’s shoulder for almost twenty minutes. Once in a while his finger finds its way into my snatch, probing around idly as if he’s bored with the long trek. Maddeningly, my traitor body responds, which only makes him more enthusiastic.
At last, I hear the sound of a door opening and I’m carried up a brief flight of stairs. The musty smell diminishes, but doesn’t go away. I can hear the whirr of machinery, and hear soft whimpering that could only be coming from other captives.
“It’s about time you two got back,” I hear a voice say, and I’m shocked to find it’s a woman speaking. “We’ve been putting off Orientation for hours.”
“It’s a long goddamn way from-” Eduardo starts to say.
“Shh, not in front of the bitches,” says Miles. “We got back as quick as we could, Sheila, so why doncha stop busting our balls?”
“My father isn’t going to be pleased. He wants this batch finished ahead of schedule so we can pull up roots and move.”
“Again?” Miles doesn’t sound too pleased. “For god’s sake, love, I just found a nice apartment! Signed a damn lease, I did!”
“That’s your problem, not mine.” I haven’t seen Sheila yet, but I can imagine the look of disdain on her face. She sounds young, and in charge, though it seems her father is the one to truly fear. “Get them ready.”
Lucky me, I get to go first. Miles rips the blindfold off and I blink in the bright light. I’m kneeling on the floor of what looks like a finished cellar. The walls are dark cinder block, and light is provided by new fixtures buzzing overhead. The room we’re in is about the size of a typical bank lobby. Boxes and crates are stacked against one wall, some of them open to reveal the glint of metal manacles.
My attention turns to my fellow captives as Miles slashes the zip ties holding me in the hogtie. To my left is a plump but attractive black woman, probably in her early twenties. She has large, natural breasts, and I shudder to think what will happen to her. Innocent brown eyes peer around hopelessly over the duct tape silencing her. Her forearms are mummified behind her in the stuff.
Next to her is a woman I realize has been making most of the noise amongst us captives. She’s a lithe little redhead, her nude freckled skin striped with lash marks that look fresh. The spitfire has chewed a hole in the scarf cleave gagging her, and her hands twist tirelessly at leather cuffs that have yet to yield to her efforts. Green eyes meet mine, and I sense a kindred soul.
There are others, seven in all, making us ten captives. I notice an Asian, a somewhat chunky dark skinned girl I believe to be Indian, and the rest are Caucasian. All pretty, some beautiful, and all of them bound, gagged, and terrified.
Miles cuts my hands free from the zip tie, and I groan in relief. My wrists are cut, but not deeply. I only have a moment to examine them before he and Eduardo pull my arms roughly behind me. My hands are manacled, and they use a little wrench to screw them shut. I’m bent over a low metal anvil set into the floor. I wince when I see a hammer being lifted over my head, but it’s only to bend a steel bar around my neck, forming a collar. The chains between my shackles is attached to the collar by a convenient ring located in the back. My hands are pulled up uncomfortably, but not painfully, between my shoulder blades.
Next they hammer shackles around both my ankles. I am really not liking the look of this. They attach a chain barely ten inches long, forcing me to stand awkwardly.
I vomit as soon as the bar towel is taken out. Miles surprises me by offering me a drink of water from a bottle. I tilt my head back and greedily swallow the cool liquid. Any gratitude I may have had is short lived, as he then rudely shoves a huge ball gag into my mouth. He pulls it taut, and then uses the little wrench to screw it on as well.
As it turns out, I’m not so lucky. I have to stand against the wall while the two men prepare the rest of the captives in a similar fashion. When it’s the redhead’s turn, she bites down on Miles’s finger so hard she draws blood. I catch a glimpse of the mangled digit, and realize he’ll need stitches. Good for you, Red.
Or maybe not. Once she’s been chained and gagged Miles selects a five-bladed whip from among the crates. He steps on her long hair to pin her in place and proceeds to lash her brutally. He doesn’t draw blood, but her skin is stripped and streaked in scarlet. He doesn’t stop until Red is sobbing uncontrollably, burbling like a baby behind her gag.
Each of us is forced to our feet and made to get in line. During the brief moment some of them were ungagged, there were those that tried to plead and question our captors. They were met with stony silence.
At least I get a good look at Sheila. She’s a dark-haired, slender woman, with hard gray eyes and a mouth that looks incapable of smiling. Some men would no doubt find her beautiful. From the longing looks Eduardo is giving her, I’d say he certainly does.
She doesn’t earn any points with me when she approaches and loops a wire around my neck. It slides shut and I choke. She releases it about a half centimeter and then loops it around the next girl’s neck, and the next’s. We are then led in coffle out of the cinder block room.
The hallway we pass through has a bare concrete floor. I can hear, and smell, what’s happening before I can see it. The narrow hallway opens up suddenly into a room roughly the same size as the first. We are led past pillories, slanted rails, wooden horses, and things I cannot name, most of them occupied by a naked and helpless woman. I can hear the sharp intakes of breath behind me as my more sheltered companions soak in the debauchery before us.
One blonde woman is bent over a rail, her arms and legs bound to the floor. A hairy giant of a man stands behind her, pants around his ankles. Little grunts escape his bearded mouth as he takes her ass hard. The blonde can’t complain, though due to the large black man shoving his cock down her throat. Biting him isn’t an option, not with the ring gag buckled so tight.
Another woman, a brunette with a porn star’s body, is astride one of the horses. Balancing on her tip toes, she struggles to keep her weight off of her pussy. Her hands are chained up behind her just like ours. A line of drool slips past her gag as she sobs for release.
I can’t take in all the horror. Women with their mouths held open by cruel devices, unable to stop the hot load of spunk from sliding down their throats. Men who apply punishing studded dildos to pussies that already look red and well-used. And all around, from seemingly everywhere, the squishing sounds of sex.
I know what’s being done. Leading us past that room wasn’t an accident. This is psychological warfare, something I’m quite familiar with. Once we’re past what I can’t help but call the Rape Room, we enter another hallway and then pass by a few empty chambers. At last, we are led shuffling amid the jangling of our chains into a roughly circular room. Racks, chains, and posts mingle with modern gym equipment. The floor is padded with a foam rubber substance, spongy beneath my bare feet. There seem to be a lot of stains on them, but I smell fresh cleaning solvents.
We’re forced to line up against a cold wall. A man enters from a door directly across the room from us. He’s wearing a black suit in a spartan style, his gray hair slicked back. His mouth is smiling, but his gray eyes seem hard. After nodding brusquely to Sheila, he takes something from Miles. It’s a small metal can, probably used to hold coffee at one point. He rummages around inside of it and withdraws something small, flat, and white.
“Lana Brown,” he says, reading my license and looking up at me. I do my best to cringe and look fearful. He holds the card in his palm and withdraws another one.
“Sarah Joel,” the man says, this time looking at the fiery redhead. He goes on down the line, reading each of our names in turn. Then he sets the can on the floor and motions to Miles.
“These people no longer exist.” Miles hands him a can of gasoline. The man pours a little in the can holding our licenses, and then sets it ablaze with a match. The young black woman, named Tenisha, begins whimpering anew.
“I am called the Director,” he goes on to say, walking up and down the line of us and meeting us all with that steely gaze. “You have no names because you are nothing. You will be trained to become something once more, a being who lives to please men. But only after you have been broken.”
The dehumanization is apparent. He wishes us to believe ourselves worthless, and that our old lives are over. It’s a common tactic for brainwashing, and I’m certain I can resist it.
But my companions? I’m not so sure.
“The next two weeks will be brutal,” says the Director. “You will be kept bound twenty four hours a day. You will eat, sleep, shit, and fuck in your chains. After two weeks, if you are worthy, you may be allowed to move up to your Training phase. Those who are compliant will be rewarded. Those who are not...”
As if on cue, Eduardo shoves a stumbling, naked woman into our view. Her hands are chained behind her like the rest of us, and her gagged mouth pleads for mercy right up to the point that the Director pulls out a pistol and shoots her in the head.
