Bad Games (26 page)

Amy said nothing. Her breathing was enough. Had she said yes it would have been too much. Too unbelievable for her to actually
like
what she saw. It would never sell. So she kept her head down, letting her calculated breaths become her words. He could have his pick. Were they breaths of desire, or breaths of fear? She knew his ego would choose desire. Scratch that.
Fear.
This man almost assuredly got off more to fear. And if Amy was to find even the tiniest morsel of joy in this situation, it would be that whatever fueled his sick desires was ultimately irrelevant. It would not stop her. Her objective was the same.

Let him think I’m afraid. Let him think I’m aroused. Let him think whatever the hell he wants. It doesn’t matter. I’m biting that thing off and spitting it back in his fucking face.

She steadied herself, pulse hammering her chest. She lowered herself a few more inches. She was moving in for the kill. Her stomach churned, adrenaline teasing nerve-endings without remorse. Bile rose in her throat and she winced it down like cheap whiskey.

Here we go.

And then Jim spoke and she flinched, nearly crying out from being startled out of her zone.

“Wait,” he said. “I want you to take your shirt off. I wanna see those titties you wouldn’t show me in the supermarket.”

Amy tried to swallow. Her dry throat refused. She coughed lightly to clear it. His penis was still hard, only a few inches from her mouth. Should she lunge for it? No. He would flinch at her sudden movement and pull away. She needed to ease into it. She needed to be the cat slinking along its belly towards its prey.

“I can’t,” she said, still looking at his penis, unable to look up. At this stage she feared her eyes would give away her intentions. “My hands are tied.”

Jim stroked her hair, increasing the pressure with each glide of his hand. Before long he had removed the band on her ponytail, her hair falling around her face. He stroked some more, tucking it back behind her ears as if trying to give her profile to a camera in the room.

“We can manage, lover,” he said. “Pull your shirt over your head and down your arms. You won’t
need
your hands for what your about to do, will you?”

Amy sat up, trying to erase the doubts sprinting throughout her psyche. She needed to stay quiet and strike without warning. She needed to be the cat.

Still avoiding eye contact, Amy obeyed without thinking. Her shirt was off and resting along her forearms in one swift movement. Her breasts were out now, but still covered by a black bra.

“Nice,” Jim said. “But you know the bra is gonna have to go too.”

Amy made eye contact without intention. His question was preposterous. “What? I can’t reach behind my back.”

“Pull your straps down. Pull the whole thing down to your waist,” he said.

Amy lowered her head again. She searched hard for the right response. “It’ll look…
strange
,” she said.

Jim reached out and pulled one of the straps down past her shoulder. “I don’t think it will look strange, lover,” he said. “And besides, I don’t remember asking for your opinion.” He tugged the second strap and let it snap back onto her skin.

Amy kept her head low and slowly removed the other strap with both hands. She paused there for a moment.

“Keep going,” he said. “Pull it down to your waist.”

She took a deep breath, her chest expanding, hating that the deep breath made her chest heave, assuredly exciting him further.

With both hands she gripped the center of her bra and inched it down to her stomach. She could not bring herself to look at her own breasts in this man’s company. She closed her eyes and looked away.

Jim moaned lightly under his breath. “
Oh yeah…
” He briefly touched himself. “Nice and firm. I guess you never breastfed those two rug rats in there did you?” He aimed a thumb over his shoulder towards the bedroom door. “You know I read somewhere that if a mother doesn’t breastfeed her kids, she loses that special bond between mother and child during those crucial developmental years. Is that true? Is there a bond lacking between you and Carrie? You and Caleb?”

Hearing her children’s names made Amy’s heart burn. She’d been desperately trying to put her family out of her mind during this most recent nightmare, and she would have bet anything that Jim knew this; that his speaking Carrie and Caleb’s names as opposed to something like
your children
or
your kids
was intentional. It brought her anger back full-steam.

“I breastfed them,” she said with an instantly regrettable defiance. She could feel the cold on her bare breasts and prayed her nipples were not hard for him. She did not look and see.

“Really?” Jim said. “Wow. I guess you’ve just got some winning genetics then, yeah?” He reached out with his index finger and circled the perimeter of her left nipple. Then her right.

Amy tried a swallow and her throat caught, forcing a cough. Her rage was the only thing keeping her from crying.

“Thanks,” she whispered. It was barely audible.

Jim stopped his exploratory finger, brought his whole hand to her cheek, stroked it. “You’re welcome,” he said. His began caressing her hair again. Amy kept her profile to him. “Look at me,” he said.

Amy didn’t move.

“Turn and look at me.”

Amy bit harder into her cheek and tasted the coppery hint of blood. She forced herself to turn and lock eyes with him.

He winked at her, leered, then established a quick, firm grip on the back of her scalp that made her gasp.

“Much better,” he said. “Now…where were we?”

The pressure on her scalp was painful. She took her eyes off him immediately and attempted to lower her head back to his groin. He allowed her, but kept a strong hold on her hair.

Do I try and sell it again? Or are we past that? I need to say something. I need to hear my own voice…

“I think we were here,” she said. Her voice was a weak, defeated offering—as she’d intended. She was inches from his penis for the second time.

He gripped her scalp harder. “Well then what the fuck are you waiting for?”

Amy swallowed dry again. She had no spit whatsoever. If she were with Patrick it would be difficult to do a decent job. But she didn’t need to prolong this act. She didn’t need to be concerned with performance. She would take him in her mouth for as long as necessary. Once the moment presented itself, she would chomp down with everything she had then jerk away violently like a wild animal. Hell, the dry mouth would even give her a better grip wouldn’t it? Fuck yeah. Keep the damn thing from slipping out.

Amy knew the assault would not stop her attacker, but she was hoping (
praying
) the intense pain would buy her the precious seconds needed to hop off the bed, snatch the giant lamp on the dresser, and then bring it down onto Jim’s skull, knocking the son of a bitch out. Maybe (
hopefully
) even killing him.

After that? After he was incapacitated? She had a plan. A damn good one.

Amy allowed the tip of his penis to touch her lips, her breathing coming in short, rapid bursts. She opened her mouth and allowed the first inch to enter. She didn’t need to slide too far down onto his shaft. Biting the head off would do just fine.

She bit.

And her teeth clacked together, catching nothing. Jim had suddenly pulled out, his member unscathed. Still gripping her scalp, he ripped her face into his, their noses mashing. She saw lunacy in his eyes, smelled his sour breath as he started laughing.

“You think I’m fucking
stupid
?” he said. “You think I’m gonna let you bite my fucking dick off?” He gripped her hair harder, causing Amy to cry out. “You’ve got to be the most predictable bitch I’ve dealt with yet.”

Amy’s panic was electric. There was no plan B. Not even a sliver of one.

Jim stepped back and yanked Amy off the bed by her hair. She cried out again, moving with him willingly to relieve the pain on her scalp. Jim spun her around and pushed her up against the dresser, stomach impacting along the furniture’s edge. With one hand still gripping her hair, he began to tear at her pants. Amy struggled but his strength overwhelmed her.

She was bent over now, her hands slamming down onto the dresser’s counter, knocking over a small jewelry box and spilling its contents.

Jim’s pants were still around his ankles, his manhood still erect and prepared to violate her.

Amy’s pulse was off the charts, her chest and head pounding, each throb threatening a blackout. And then, as if handed to her by an invisible savior, her frantic hands fell upon a metal nail file that had spilled from the jewelry box.

She snatched it up and leaned forward, hoping her upper body would shield her find. She needed something else. She needed him to release the grip on her hair so she could spin around. She had no available target from where she was positioned. She needed to face him.

So she screamed. She screamed until her throat hurt. And it worked. Jim let go of her hair and slapped it over her mouth.

Amy didn’t hesitate. She thrust her hips backward into his groin, doubling him over and knocking him back a step. She then spun, and with both hands gripping the metal file, drove all six inches of it deep into his scrotum.

The expression on Jim’s face was that of a man who had jumped into a frigid pool. He froze, his breath gone. What followed was a pitiful groan of both excruciating pain and disbelief. Blood began to seep from the wound, and when Amy let go of her weapon, she saw that it remained stuck and standing to attention in a deliciously ironic similarity to his erection from only moments ago.

Jim backed up another step and looked down at his wounded groin. His hands shook as he went to touch the file. It looked as though he considered pulling it free, but fear of possibly making matters worse caused him to jerk his hands away.

Amy used both hands on the heavy lamp’s neck, her adrenaline giving her the strength to lift it overhead with little effort. A forceful grunt that started in her abdomen matured into a ferocious battle cry as she brought the lamp down onto his skull, shattering the whole of its porcelain bulk on impact. Jim hit the floor hard—out cold.

Amy spit on him a fourth time.

The occupants in the bedroom across the hall heard Amy’s scream. They heard Jim’s low, guttural groan follow. Then another scream. The sound of something breaking.

It all made Arty smile. He thought his brother’s groan was one of ecstasy. He thought Amy’s screams were those of terror. He thought the sound of something breaking was Jim getting carried away like he usually did.

Moments later, when he heard his mother’s cry for help coming from downstairs, and he took in the upsetting scene now being broadcast on the television, Arty realized he had it all wrong.

Amy was a whisper as she exited the bedroom, gently pulling the door shut behind her with the face of someone waiting for a balloon to pop; not a click or a clank could be afforded with Arty holding her family a mere few feet across the hall.

Her wrists and ankles still tied (there was nothing else in that jewelry box that could cut through her binds; and she certainly wasn’t about to pull the nail file from Jim’s bare balls, lest the pain wake him up), she shuffled softly past the closed door that held her family.

Upon reaching the stairs, Amy decided to do something she hadn’t done since she was a child: she sat on that first step, then slid and thumped the rest of the way down on her butt. However, unlike a child, who would almost deliberately thump their butt as hard, and
loud
, as they could on each step, Amy’s butt was fine china.

Arriving at the bottom, Amy hopped through the den and into the family room where Maria Fannelli lay in her recliner, asleep, the iPod’s headphones still in her ears—still blocking out any and all noise.

Straight ahead, past the family room, was what Amy was hoping she’d find. It was the kitchen. And in that kitchen would be a knife. A knife she could use to cut her binds, and a knife she could use to make a life-threatening deal.

When Arty looked at the television and saw Amy holding a kitchen knife up to his mother’s throat, his first thoughts were of his mother’s safety.

Then of his brother Jim, and why he had allowed Amy to escape.

Then of a way to regain the upper hand.

Maria Fannelli’s headphones were ripped from her ears, waking her instantly. She was seated in her recliner with someone standing behind her. Someone with one hand wrapped around her forehead and the other holding the blade of a kitchen knife against her neck.

To Maria’s great surprise, the stranger was a woman. A woman had broken into her home and put a knife to her throat.

The stranger’s demands were odd to Maria. The strange woman had first begun to yell at the ceiling for someone named Arthur to come downstairs. Now, the stranger insisted that
Maria
should be the one to yell—to yell for this Arthur to come and help.

“Call him,” the stranger said as she pressed the blade hard against Maria’s skin. “Call him and ask for help. Tell him you’re scared and that you need his help.”

Maria’s voice caught. She coughed once, cleared it, and barely spoke above a whisper. “Help. I need help.”

“Louder. Tell him you’re scared.”

Maria swallowed and her throat bounced against the blade. “Help! Help I’m scared!”

“
Louder!
” The stranger pressed the knife harder against Maria’s soft skin.

“
Help! Help I’m scared! Please help!
”

Silence followed. The stranger was breathing heavy and seemed to be listening for sounds above them with great intent.

“
Arty, you fuck!
” the stranger yelled. “
I know you can see me! I’ll cut her
throat, I swear to God!
”

Maria wanted eye contact with the stranger behind her. Wanted to read her face, understand what was going on. She tried to turn her head. “Why—”

“Shut up,” the stranger said, forcing Maria’s head back around. “Shut up and I won’t hurt you.” The stranger paused and listened again. A brief shuffle of footsteps from above. “
ARTY, GODDAMNIT! GET THE FUCK DOWN HERE OR SHE’S DEAD!
”