Page 8 of Save Us
Which will be never, I think to myself while tightening my grip around the silver, inscribed pendant.
“Good, because I have plenty of girlfriends who would love to go out with you, and not just slut bag Celia.”
“Daddy, daddy, come over here!” Rosie shouts from the shore, which I gladly respond to. Talking about being with anyone else in a romantic capacity makes me want to rip out my own eyeballs.
Chapter 3
Beth
After traveling through the busy streets of New York for what felt like hours, the car finally pulls up outside an area of the city I’ve never been to before. It looks a lot less salubrious than our Manhattan Street. In fact, it looks like the sort of place that appears in a movie when something bad is about to happen, something you might not come out of with your life still intact. However, my life was already obliterated into something unrecognizable years ago, so instead of being fearful, I look about my new surroundings with interest, wondering who the hell these people are and what they could possibly want with Angela Lawrence.
It’s now completely dark, befitting of the ominous atmosphere that’s falling all around me. Only a few of the streetlamps are working and the road seems devoid of life. Before I can contemplate what that may or may not mean, I’m yanked out of the car by a pair of rough hands. If anyone does see what is happening, they’re either desensitized to it or they simply choose to ignore my plight, no doubt already knowing that any attempts to help will be futile and most likely a danger to themselves.
The man who had had the gun held to my temple, simply points it toward my head again, then grunts for me to walk forward, down a shady-looking alleyway that is covered in cigarette butts and God knows what else. The driver walks out in front of us while the other two take up the rear. As we all take our places in this strange walk, everyone falls silent. Like soldiers, we march toward a fate which I’m sure is going to be just as abhorrent as the one I already have. This realization relaxes me a little, given that no one can scare me anymore; I lost hope a long time ago.
“Hey, we’re here,” the man out front grumbles into his phone. “Yeah, we have the goods, now open the fuck up. K is not gonna be happy if you keep us waiting around with your whining, motherfucker!”
One of the men from behind laughs over the little exchange of words. We then wait in silence for the door to finally open and for yet another shifty-looking guy to let us in.
Once inside the building, I’m surprised to find it doesn’t look as dilapidated and neglected as it does from the outside. It’s dark but modern, and shockingly clean, not the least bit resembling a filthy toilet as it does on the exterior. There is a waft of cigarette smoke and a hint of weed, but otherwise, it looks like the home of a young, trendy, and wealthy businessman. It’s both disorientating and unsettling. It sets the cogs in my brain to begin turning as I try to consider who I’m about to meet, and worse still, who would want to harm me.
My thoughts are disrupted when the man, who is still holding a gun toward my head, brings us before a door where he raps his huge knuckles against it. A few long, tense moments later, someone opens it, this time a woman, scantily clad and with a pissed-off expression written all over her immaculate face. When she runs her gaze over me, she tries to remain expressionless, but I can see confusion running through her eyes.
She seems to shake it off when I’m shoved inside of the large, black room with only a small lamp to provide any light at this time of night. I’m brought over to a well-organized desk and pushed down to my knees in front of a large figure of a man who is currently standing with his back to me. He stands tall and imposing, unflinching, even though a young, abducted woman is being forced to the floor before him.
“Angela Lawrence, meet K. K, this is the woman you’ve been looking for,” the guy with the gun announces to the entire room with a hint of glee in his voice. You can tell he already knows he will be well rewarded for his efforts today.
“Good evening, Mrs Lawrence,” K says without turning around to see me for himself. He sounds surprisingly well-spoken for someone wearing a loose pair of jeans and a scruffy, black hoodie. He wears his long hair in tightly woven dreadlocks which have been pulled back into a band, showing a hint of his ebony-colored skin at the base of his neck.
“Hello,” I reply timidly, then automatically drop my head in submission, something I’ve been conditioned to do when Oliver returns home from work.
When ‘normal’ life resumed after our honeymoon, the worst two weeks of my life, he told me he expected me to greet him in this way because it makes him feel like he can conquer anything. Apparently, my bowing to him cemented the fact that there would be no way I’d be going anywhere; that I was forever his to keep. I thought it was fucked up at the time, but perfectly rational given who was saying it. I learned the hard way that it’s just easier to give into his demands. That, at the end of the day, it cost me nothing to play the part of the frightened little mouse. There are plenty of worse things he makes me do, though I have come to accept that I have no choice in those either.
K laughs softly at me, a melodious sound that would soothe you if it weren’t for the situation. Still unflinching, I keep my head down and wait for him to slowly turn around. My ears are now highly tuned to work out the actions of men when I cannot use my eyes. In fact, all of my senses have heightened since being forced into the life of a perpetual victim. I guess that’s my unfailing fight or flight instinct refusing to give up on me, even though I have often felt like doing so.
The unknown man takes his time to complete the motion of finally revealing his face, but when he does, I only feel a cold, new barrel of a gun fixed firmly against my forehead. Strangely, I was in no way expecting this from him, so the shock of it has me gasping with a distinctive noise that echoes across the room. A mental image of the mess it will make if he so chooses to pull the trigger runs through my head, so I squeeze my eyes shut. In all likelihood, I’m about to be reduced to nothing but flesh and bone spread across the floor behind me. Such a morbid thought has my breathing hitching up a gear, but I remain silent to protect myself from yet another man who wishes to reduce me to a quivering, helpless target. I’ve lived a life that has stripped me of much of my dignity, but I will die with as much of it still intact as I possibly can.
“So, here sits Oliver Lawrence’s wife,” he chuckles menacingly, “motherfucker managed to find another blonde. As if he could replace her!” His words bring a sliver of confusion to my scrambled thoughts. “Unfortunately, your husband has pissed off a lot of angry men who would like nothing better than for me to pull this trigger, just to teach the asshole a lesson. You know the adage, an eye for an eye? Well, Oliver Lawrence owes a lot of eyes, sweetheart!”
“Do it,” I whisper, “please, do it!” I may have tears running down my face, and my hands might be trembling by my sides, but I’m more than ready to end this torturous existence. He merely expels a laugh, a mirthless sound for a moment or two, but clearly wasn’t expecting this reaction from me.
“So, it’s not quite happily ever after? Doesn’t surprise me living with a guy like Lawrence,” he mutters bitterly. “Look at me, princess!”
I don’t move, though not through defiance, more because I’m too terrified to do anything, or maybe too hopeful that this might be my way out. I am yet to decide which one.
“LOOK AT ME!” he roars so loudly; I tremble even harder against the wooden floorboards.
Slowly, I lift my head to the man before me, who looks more like a shadow considering his face is half covered. All I can see of his face is a pair of glasses resting on the bridge of his nose. The presence of which strangely makes him look all the more intimidating, as if his intelligence makes him more of a force to be reckoned with.
“Beth?!” he gasps before dropping the gun with a heavy thud onto the floor. I glance down to where it sits, impotent and useless on the wooden floorboards, before shooting my gaze back to his wild, searching eyes. Our confused faces match one another; it’s like looking in a mirror.
Xander
“Have you had a good day, sweetie?” I whisper to Rosie as I tuck her up tightly in bed, reassuring myself that no one is going to take her from me, not like they did Beth.
Her fairy bedspread begins to illuminate the glow of the fluorescent flowers that scatter across the fabric, and I find her looking at them as though hypnotized by their intricate patterns. Behind me, on the wall, is a whole display of her latest obsession - whales. Dozens of drawings, paintings, and collages of blue whales are pinned up for all to see, together with a picture of me and her mother. We sit, looking much younger, in a small, wooden frame that hangs directly opposite her bed. I can no longer bring myself to look at it, but I know it brings her comfort, and that’s really all that matters.
“Yeah,” she replies on a yawn. “I’m five whole years old, Daddy,” she says as she smiles and holds up her right hand with all her fingers flying through the air.