Stop wallowing in guilt and self-pity. There’s nothing you could have done to stop them taking Roxana. Had you confessed they would have taken her anyway, and they probably would have killed you.
Gritting her teeth, she steeled her will and did her utmost to swallow the bitter tonic of guilt, apprehension and fear. Another thought then entered her mind; getting past the crippling negativity of these emotions was one thing, but now just over twenty minutes remained until she needed to sneak out and remove the air conditioner grille. This meant that another problem was looming: Tippawan had said he was coming right back, but when would that be? In five minutes or in an hour? He could thwart the entire plan completely if he arrived at the wrong moment.
This was her only shot at freedom; the janitor had been very clear about that, and she herself understood this well; she was locked up in this place as securely as any maximum-security prisoner in a jail, except the only end to her prison sentence would be death, when she was riddled with disease and too broken and worn-out from the ravages of this reprehensible industry to continue drawing breath.
No.
She would not go out of this world like that. Come hell or high water, she was getting out of this room in twenty minutes, and Tippawan would not stand in her way. She hurried into the bathroom, her mind awash with a scramble of thoughts.
Come on, come on Adriana, think, think!
Both the room and the attached bathroom were bereft of everything but bare essentials. There was a closet in which the girls’ few clothes hung on plastic coathangers, a bedside table with nothing but condoms, lube and wet wipes in it, and the bedding on the beds; there was nothing else the room. The bathroom contained towels and toiletries, but nothing else.
Well, almost nothing else. Behind the toilet sat a plunger, the wooden handle of which was about two feet long. It wasn’t ideal as a weapon, but it would have to do, and besides, Adriana had never done anything violent in her entire life. Even if she had had access to an actual weapon, she wouldn’t have had the slightest clue about how to use it effectively.
With a boost of dogged determination, she retrieved the plunger from behind the toilet. She stood on the rubber part and then twisted and tugged at it, grunting and groaning with effort until the handle was torn free from the rubber plunger head, which she kicked behind the toilet. As she gripped the shaft in her hands, she noticed that the wood was a dense and heavy type, and it seemed quite solid. She wasn’t physically strong by any means, but she was sure that desperation would inject some sort of power into whatever blow she was able to strike with this makeshift weapon.
But where should she try to hit Tippawan? The head, of course, was the obvious choice. Adriana knew, though, that television and movies, and their scenes of one-blow knockouts, were a far cry from reality. It could take multiple solid blows to fell an opponent, and the human skull was far tougher than Hollywood made it out to be.
I’ve only got one shot … I have to make it count.
With these thoughts running through her mind, she had a clearer idea of what to do now. After hurrying back into the room to retrieve the watch and the key, she returned to the bathroom and shut the door behind her. There was nothing she could do now but wait; should Tippawan arrive before the appointed time, she would be forced to deal with him. If he didn’t, she would be free to break out without a fight and complete her task.
Tippawan, however, did show up. With just two minutes to go until the time of the mission, Adriana had begun to cling to a blossoming sense of optimism, in which it really seemed that he wouldn’t come back. These hopes, however, were dashed when an angry banging rattled the room door.
‘Storm! Storm you stupid whore, I’m coming in, and I’m going to find out exactly what the fuck you’ve been trying to hide from me! You’re about to enter a world of pain, you slut, a world of fucking pain!’
Adriana’s heart hammered violently in her ribcage, and her breath began to come to her in sharp, heaving gasps as adrenalin started pumping its nerve-tingling electricity through the entirety of her body. In a moment of quick desperation, she reached over and squeezed out a handful of shampoo into the palm of her left hand, gripping the plunger handle in her right. The shampoo was a cheap brand, and it burned a lot if it got into one’s eyes – which was not particularly nice when taking a shower, but ideal for what she was about to do. The moment she heard Tippawan opening the door and coming into the room, she turned on the faucet to allow a splash of water to dilute the lump of shampoo in her palm a little. That would make sure the liquid got exactly where she wanted it to go.
‘Oh, so you’re trying to hide in the bathroom, are you?’ Tippawan sneered from outside the bathroom door. ‘Just like the pathetic coward you are. Fuck you Storm, you’re really fucked now! I’m coming in and there’s nothing you can do about it! And all the better if your dirty little panties are already around your ankles…’
Stepping swiftly and breathing fast, Adriana pressed herself up against the wall next to the door, holding her breath and waiting in panicked anticipation for it to open. Such was the degree of
