“Sit down and we’ll discuss it.” He patted the couch again.
Laura swallowed and forced herself to sit beside this creature. He put his hand on her leg and smiled, revealing a set of perfect teeth. She willed herself to allow his touch. His hand was as hard and cold as marble. Bloodless.
“Last time I did this, you tried to slap me.”
“I didn’t know what you were then.”
“Very good. Honesty. I admire that… in my fucks.” The last word hung between them, leaving something fetid in the air, like a creature long dead and visited by parasites.
He moved his hand to the point where her legs came together-resting on the ridge between them. She shivered involuntarily but made no move to resist. Let him have me if it helps Reb. I can take it. I can take anything for Reb. God, keep him behind that door.
“Why don’t you slip out of these?” he said.
“But, Martin, I don’t think you-”
The sudden slap across her mouth brought white light to her mind, a dull ache to her lips.
There was blood on her hand when she moved it from her mouth. She could feel the lip starting to swell. But instead of frightening her, the strike set her resolve. She knew that if she could, she would kill him as easily as she wiped paint from a brush.
His fingers tightened around her arms. “Rather I fuck Erin? Or the boy, maybe? I don’t mind young and tight, and gender is irrelevant. I’m doing you a favor. I’m offering you what I promised you years ago. Now, take ’em off, or I’ll take ’em off my way.” He pulled a folding knife from his pocket, opened it with a practiced flick of his wrist, and slipped the blade underneath her sweater, stopping at the neck. He pulled the knife, and the material parted under the blade silently, leaving her bra exposed to his view. “If you can satisfy me, maybe I’ll leave the kids alone.”
He doesn’t know Erin is gone.
“Promise?”
“No,” he said. “But I’ll consider it.”
Laura stood and removed what had been the V neck like a coat. Then he reached over with the knife and slid it under her bra, between her breasts, and pulled gently; the apparatus fell away, exposing her breasts.
He moved toward her and took one of her nipples between his fingers. He pinched it hard and let it go. Then he stabbed the knife into the beam behind the couch. He moved back and watched.
“The pants,” he said.
Laura closed her eyes briefly, steeled herself, and then removed her slacks and then her panties. Slowly, deliberately, playing for time. They’re coming. I know they are. Then she sat beside him, closed her eyes as he pressed her shoulders against the cushions, opened her legs. She waited for him to get it over with. Tears were streaming down her cheeks. He placed his cold hand over her vagina, manipulating the clitoris with a deft and delicate touch. As the finger moved inside her, she prayed she could stay dry as the only form of protest left to her. The idea of giving him any lubrication made her furious, but despite her revulsion, fear, and anger, her body defied her as his finger became slippery with her juices.
“You like this, don’t you?”
She bit her lip and tasted the new blood that came to her tongue. No, no, no. “Yes.” Kill me now.
“Can I fuck you? Are you ready?”
“Yes,” she said. God help me. Revulsion threatened to turn to vomit. She felt full of bile and fought the urge to throw up the way a child will-by lying very still, willing it away.
“Beg.”
“Please, Martin. Please…” You bastard.
“What?”
“Please…” She knew what he wanted to hear, and she forced herself to lip the words like a curse from the depths of her soul. “Please, fuck me.” She clenched her eyes and waited for him to take her, but he didn’t move. Then he stopped massaging her and removed his finger slowly.
He stood and, instead of taking down his pants, wrenched the knife from the beam, folded it loudly, and slipped it into his pocket.
She looked up and realized that he was not sexually aroused at all. Speed. Can’t get it up. She had to fight to make sure her overwhelming relief didn’t manifest itself with laughter. Her eyes must have asked the question, though.
“You don’t do anything for me. You’re too old.” He walked across to the kitchen. “I couldn’t help but notice Reb has your ass.”
She reached for her purse, grabbed it up, and knew from the heft that the gun wasn’t there.
He said, “I’m disappointed in you. Go back into your hole, Laura. Tell the children I’ll be coming for them soon. Tell them if they’re really good, I’ll share them with Kurt.”
Laura was crying as she pulled her jeans back on, wrapped herself in a lap blanket that had been folded over the back of the couch. As she slipped back into her jeans, she saw something on the floor. It was a curved, lens- shaped piece of the wineglass. She reached down as if she were cuffing her jeans and cupped the glass in her hand. She straightened and looked at Martin.
Get him close. “If you touch my children,” she said, “I’ll kill you.”
Martin laughed and walked over to stand in front of her. “You’ll what?”
She moved her hand through the air between them and struck at his exposed throat with the shard of glass, coming down and across as hard as she could. He pitched his shoulders back and tucked his chin reflexively. The glass opened a line across his face from the right ear to his nose. She had the impression that the lens-shaped blade had broken all the way through his cheek, glass against teeth. He punched her hard, and she hit the wall and slid down it, collapsing onto the floor. She looked up to see the line open and blood find an escape route and pour down his face in a bright sheet. Missed the artery.
“You fuckin’ bitch!” he growled as he gripped the wound. “You have any idea what I went through for this face?” Then he looked at the blood on his hand and laughed, pitching his head back. The sound filled the cabin. She could see teeth as the cut opened like some horrible second mouth. “You’re going to get me excited if you keep this shit up. Go back in there.” He walked to the sink, wet a dish towel, and pressed it against his cheek to stem the flow.
She stood and tapped at the door. “Reb, open up. Quickly.”
If Thorne doesn’t come… before I’ll let that demon touch my baby I’ll… do whatever I have to do.
Did he hurt you, Mama?” Reb asked. She fumbled in Erin’s suitcase and pulled out a knit shirt. She turned her back and put it on.
“No, baby. I hurt him, though.” She held up the hand showing the piece of glass, smeared with his blood.
“I’ll kill him if he hurt you.”
“Kill him?”
“With this.” Reb held up a metal file.
Laura sat back down on the bed and put her arm around his shoulders. “It’s okay, buddy,” she said. “They’ll come soon. Thorne will come.”
“ ’Less he got killed in those bombs.”
“I’m sure he didn’t. Besides, there are other people watching out for us, a lot of people. They’ll come. You’ll see.” She tried to project some confidence but wasn’t sure she had managed it.
“Sure,” he said. She picked up the disbelief in his small voice. It saddened her, made her realize how slim their hope of survival really was.
“Reb,” she started. “We have to look around in here for anything we can use to fight him. Just until help comes.”
“Like what?”
“Like a flare gun, anything.” She opened the closet and started pulling things out. “Check under the bed-in the cabinets.”
“The flare gun is in the cockpit,” he said. “Under the seat. I think.”
“Anything.”
