Freeing Lana (3 page)

“Here’s your fucking
breakfast.”

His voice sounded
strained and forced as he spoke, but he quit hitting her. She heard him walk
toward the door and slam it shut as he left the room, leaving her there in the
mess he had created with her breakfast. She managed to spit out most of what
had found its way into her mouth, feeling the pain intensify on her lips. She
was in fact bleeding, she now knew, perhaps badly, as she felt the warmth of
the blood on her cheeks and chin. She sobbed loudly as the dawning realization
she would probably die here on this bed gripped her mind tighter than the
restraints on her wrists. Her anguish would soon be answered, as the door
slammed hard against the wall and he entered the room again, crossing the room
quickly and deliberately.

“Plea…”

But it was all she
managed before the tape hit her mouth tightly. She heard the familiar ripping
sound more times than she could keep up with, as he repeatedly tore another
piece from the roll and slammed it across her face wildly, covering food, hair
and blood as well in a frenzied fury. Each piece came down harder and harder
and she could hear his breath become labored as he continued to ensure her
silence. Every sob that escaped her mouth seemed to enrage him more, but she
couldn’t keep them from crossing her injured lips. When he did finally stop,
what seemed like an eternity later, she felt him sit beside her on the side of
the
bed.

“You will learn to
appreciate what I am doing for you,” he said quietly, clearly out of breath.
“But right now, I can’t even look at you.”

With that, he crossed
the room and left again. She didn’t expect him to return anytime soon and she
welcomed the loneliness. She was definitely in some serious trouble. Any doubt
of that was now gone.

CHAPTER
FOUR

 
Sergio stood beside his car and stared blankly
at the mailbox beside the front door of the white, two-story home. He had
driven to Lana’s house the night before and she hadn’t been home then, so he
thought he would try again, but still her car was gone. He had almost convinced
himself Ol’ Ron had actually been right for once in his life and she had found
another job. But that was then, and this was now. Now, he saw a mailbox
overflowing with mail. Sure it looked to be mostly junk mail, but it sure as
hell was more than one day’s worth of junk.

Don’t
be stupid,
his mind told him, trying to make some sort of
sense to the entire thing.
She might have
had to leave town for a couple days, a family emergency of some sort.

Sure, it made sense,
but surely she would have called someone before she left, surely. Surely, she
would have…

What
call you?

No, of course not, but
she would have called work at least. She wasn’t the type to just take off like
that. But at the same time, he wasn’t naïve. They were good friends, but he
knew he would not be the first person she thought of in a bad situation. He
pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and stared at. It still wouldn’t ring,
no matter how hard he tried to make it, so he pulled her number up out of his
contacts and called her again.
Straight to voice mail.
That was the oddest thing about it. Sure, yesterday, when it was just ringing
with no answer, it was frustrating, but ever since the night before it had been
going straight to that stupid fucking recording... “The number you called has
not set up a voice mail; goodbye.”

He wanted to throw his
own phone onto the pavement in her driveway and scream, but he wouldn’t. No,
instead he would keep calling her, no matter how long it took for her to
answer. If she had gotten to the point she wanted to leave everything behind,
him included, or even him especially, she was going to have to tell him
herself. He shoved the Nokia back into his pocket and walked up the steps to
her front door, and just as he had done the night before, he hit the doorbell
repeatedly before banging on the door itself as hard as he dared. Just in case,
he told himself, just in case she was asleep.

Sure,
she’s asleep. She tucked a fucking Ford Ranger under her pillow and is grabbing
a few Z’s. Sure.

The car could be
anywhere, he reasoned. Hell, a flat tire, a wreck. The thought hit him hard and
he instantly caught his breath. Shit! She could have been in an accident. Dear
God, she could be laid up in a hospital, or worse. Shit! He sprinted off of the
porch, clearing every step, and pulling his phone back out of his pocket as he
ran to his car. As he opened the door and dove in, he had already hit 9-1-1,
and as the door closed behind him, he searched for his keys with one hand and
hit the send button with the other.

The conversation was a
lesson in retarded redundancy. The bitch on the other end, some crazy lady with
the worst attitude he had ever heard, told him the number was for emergencies
only, sending him into a rage. He tried to explain how dire he believed the
situation to be, but it mattered little to Officer Bitch. He was told to call
the non emergency number. When he asked if she could connect him, she informed
him she wasn’t an operator and hung up. Then why the hell did she answer the
fucking phone?

Black marks now adorned
Lana’s driveway, as did the street in front of her house, as Sergio raced
across town to the hospital, hoping beyond hope he would find her there. He
couldn’t bring himself to even think of the next place he would have to search
for her.

“Dear God, let her be
ok.”

CHAPTER
FIVE

Her lips still stung
like a mother fucker. The bastard had hit her hard, splitting both lips, but
the bottom one had been worse than the top. Every time she adjusted her mouth
to wet her lips or even to grimace in pain, she could feel it threatening to
open up again. But what was worse, and even worse than the stinging on her
upper cheek, was the need to urinate. She had to go worse than she could
remember ever needing to go. What she’d give for a toilet was not worth
mentioning, even to herself. She tested the restraints again, but it was no
good. They were as tight as ever. The blood on her ankle she had once hoped
would aid her in her escape had now dried, creating an opposite effect.

She had eventually
swallowed the few morsels of the breakfast which had been shoved into her mouth
and she hadn’t gotten a chance to spit out before he had come in with the tape,
but it had done little to quiet her hunger. What was worse, she could still
smell the fucking bacon. Its scent filled the room, mocking her relentlessly.
But even it paled in comparison to the pain of trying to hold her water. In all
truth, she wasn’t sure why she was holding it at all. After all the son of a bitch
had done to her, what she was certain he would eventually do to her, why should
she give a flying fuck about his fucking sheets? The final straw was the bacon,
the Goddamn bacon. She could kill two birds with one stone, empty her bladder
and cover the scent of that damn bacon. Why the fuck not? What was he going to
do, hit her? She doubted she had felt the last of his anger anyway.

“I want to tell you
something.”

She jumped when he
spoke. She had no idea he had been in the room, or how long he had been there.
She hadn’t heard the door, hadn’t felt the bed move, but she was quite certain
he was sitting beside her.

Three
birds, maybe you can piss on him at the same time.

Maybe, but the urge had
been pushed out of her mind immediately when she realized he was back in the
room. She started to answer him, but nothing came out but a mumble. “
What"
sounded more like “
mmm”
under the tape which covered her
mouth. What was worse, she felt the lip split again. He answered her as though
he knew what she had meant, just the same.

“I did not want to hurt
you earlier,” he said. His voice had returned to the even tone from before.
“But you are going to have to learn. It might not be something you want to do,
but you are no longer allowed to make those decisions.”

Well, no shit. If she
had any choice at all, she sure as hell wouldn’t be here, not with this prick.
She could think of a million other places she’d rather be, without even trying.
He continued without any indication he knew what she was thinking, or that she
even had an opinion.

“I had first hoped this
would go smoother, that you would recognize my kindness,” he said, “that you
would want to please me. You would have been rewarded quickly and to a much
greater extent. But you don’t yet realize I am helping you, so we are going to
do this in another way.”

He was helping her,
seriously? This guy was off his fucking rocker. He continued:

“From now on, I am
going to lay out the rules for each and every moment. It will be give and
take,” he said, rising from the bed. “Before, you were good, so I removed the
tape, but you didn’t recognize the connection at all, did you?”

He paused for her to
respond as if she could speak with the tape on her mouth. She had no idea where
this was headed, what kind of sick twisted game he was playing, but she needed
to hear what he was intending. It might buy her some time, or even better, her
life. So she nodded her head to indicate she had not recognized whatever
connection he was talking about.

“So, from now on, I
will tell you what I expect and what will happen if you comply,” he said, as
she heard him moving something up from the table beside the bed. “I will also
tell you what will happen if you choose not to comply. Do you understand this?”

Hell no, she didn’t
understand, but she nodded her head just the same.

“Good. I am going to
remove the tape now. You will not say a word unless I ask you a question, and
then you will answer only with yes or no, as there will be no other options. Do
you understand?”

Lana nodded.

“If you say so much as
a word other than yes or no to my question, you will be punished more severely
than you were this morning. Do you understand?”

Again she nodded,
though now she was beginning to wonder if there was any way this could be
better than death.

“Do you want to know
what the punishment will be?”

No, she didn’t want to
hear it. She could imagine how bad it would be, given the indication it would
be worse than before. She was still reeling from that. She moved her head from
side to side slowly.

“Very well then,” he
said, and she felt one of his hands on her cheek as he took hold of the edge of
the mass of duct tape. Her lips screamed with the pain as the dried blood on
her lips was pulled free along with the tape. She began to scream, but managed
to stop herself at the last possible second.

Worse
than before, that’s what he said.

She didn’t want to
imagine worse than before, so she held her breath as the last of the tape
pulled at her hair before its touch was no longer felt on her lips. She almost
wanted to thank him for removing the tape as she sucked in a deep breath, but
thought better of it. There was silence for a moment, and then he spoke again.

“Would you like to go
to the restroom and take a bath?” he asked.

For Christ’s sake, yes
she wanted to go pee, hell she needed to.
And a bath?
God yes.

“Yes,” she managed
weakly.

“Would you like
something to drink?”

That was a bit tougher.
She wanted to ask if she could get the drink after peeing, but was starting to
get the hang of this to some degree. She still had no idea, not to mention a
desire to find out where it would end, but she understood this first part.

“Yes.”

“Good. Let’s begin. To
get all of this I am offering you, all you have to do is apologize for kicking
me and making me spill the breakfast I had worked so hard on for you.”

Apologize?
To him?
Fuck’s sake, was he serious? But she knew the
answer. He wasn’t well, that was for sure, but she believed he was in fact
serious.

“I’m sorry I kicked
you,” she said.

“And…?”

“And for making you
spill my breakfast.”

“That wasn’t so hard,
now was it?”

Fuck
yes!

“No, it wasn’t,” she
answered.

His footsteps sounded
on the floor as he walked around the edge of the bed and Lana heard another
door open on the opposite side of the room. The distinct sound of water
beginning to fall from a faucet and hitting a porcelain tub could be heard,
before the footsteps made their way back to the bed. He was going to untie her!
Shit, she hadn’t thought of that, he was going to have to untie her in order
for her to go to the restroom and take a bath.

But any hope caused by
the realization soon faded as she felt him reach under her neck and place
something there. It was thick and heavy, and while she could feel it had been
softened where it touched her skin, she could also feel that its edges were
tougher. As she heard metal touching metal, and then a light clicking sound,
she realized it was a collar of some sort.
So much for that
idea.