by Leanne Davis
“I already did,” she whispered.
“I know,” he said quietly with a solemn gaze at her. Then he added, “This is my job, Ms. Bains, and I’m really good at it. I’ll get you out of here.”
He suddenly tensed again. She heard the scrape of a heavy steel door opening. Footsteps. Running. Voices again. She waited to be spotted. It was dark up there, nearly black as her cell. Barely hidden behind a small lip of concrete and the edge of the building, they dared not move. If one of them fell, it was five stories to the ground.
She couldn’t wait. “What are you going to do?” she scarcely breathed the question.
“Shoot them,” he answered. She could feel his massive muscles stop and tense, priming for the conflict, and getting ready for whatever soldier stuff he expected next. At least, he hadn’t abandoned her… yet. In fact, he seemed prepared to serve as her human shield. Maybe he really wouldn’t repel off the building without taking her.
Two of the men walked over, and the spotlight one held swept over the rooftop. They seemed remarkably unworried. They thought she was alone. They must have presumed she somehow escaped alone. They had no clue about the lethal, silent soldier now on top of her. But she still had a hard time waiting. The tension of anticipation overcame her. She almost started screaming in fright. The soldier seemed to sense it, and his gloved hand came back over her mouth, muffling it. He moved slightly, and lifted his right hand over her head. Then before the spotlight illuminated them, he did just as he promised: he shot them. She heard the repeated pops of the silenced gun. Their bodies fell, like bags of concrete being thrown to the ground.
Then the soldier got up, pulling her with him, and they ran as if flames of fire were lapping at their heels. Racing to the door he told her about, that quickly, he shot the door handle off. In they went, down more stairs, before emerging into an alleyway. He went first, dragging her behind him. She stumbled, but obediently followed. Finally, they were away from the cursed building. They sensed movement in the area, and carefully followed the dark corners of the alley, before going down the street.
Jessie was appalled at the realization she was being held captive in a building smack dab in the middle of a city. Right in middle of a bustling city, she was chained, abused, and tortured, despite all the people who were around her, on normal every day streets.
Then, the soldier swiftly pushed her into an old wreck of a car. It was yellow and rusted, and barely big enough to contain two adults and the soldier’s personal arsenal. But they jumped in, started it up, and left the building where he killed four men.
Not a word was exchanged. The soldier drove fast, but remained cautious. There were only a few people outside. It appeared to be a dark, undesirable neighborhood, but after the hole she’d been living in, it was more like a sunny park. The soldier’s face was hidden in the shadows of his face paint. She observed his jaw locked in concentration while he drove.
He pulled into a parking spot beside a rundown motel. He looked around stealthily before getting out, then grabbed his arsenal and her. In an instant, they were locked inside a crappy, vacant, anonymous motel room.
It all took less than an hour.
Jessie stood there, unable to move. She stared at the two queen beds and center nightstand, as well as the flimsy dresser and bolted-down, old television. She finally raised her eyes to the man beside her. He took off the pack he was wearing. “That’s it?” Jessie whispered.
“That’s it,” he answered without glancing at her. He was rifling around in his pack, rearranging it, and his guns. God, after killing four men in a freaky escape like they just accomplished, how could he remain so unruffled?
“We’re out? Just like that? And you’re sure no one will find us here?”
“No. No one will find us.”
She had only about a thousand questions, but she was alive and free. Her legs buckled, and she dropped her body onto the dingy bedspread. Her head fell into her hands as tears filled her eyes and choked her throat. She was alive.
Lowering her hands, she asked, “Where are the other soldiers?”
“There are no others.”
Her head jerked up. “My father sent you here alone? Why didn’t you say no? My God! It could have been a death sentence.”
“It was do-able, so I did it. Your father couldn’t send a unit in. It had to be civilian. I’m here as a family friend, and just happened to find you. Get me?”
She didn’t get him at all. Her father sent only one man to rescue her? How did he know where she was? She didn’t even know where she was or why. “What next?”
“Next? We sleep, and eat. Tomorrow, we drive to the airport and go home. I’ve got all your paperwork.”
She shook her head. Tears welled in her eyes. No food. Not yet. Maybe not ever again. Her stomach cramped at the thought of it. “I can’t eat. And what do you mean we go home? As if we were on vacation in Mexico?”
“Exactly as if.”
She paused to look at the man before her. He was much more fierce looking now against the wallpapered background of the cheap motel room. Big, muscled, with broad shoulders, heavy dark boots, and his clothes as well as his head covered in black and camo.
“Who are you?”
“Colonel Hendricks.”
“I mean as in Jack, Bob, Joe? What’s your name? Not your rank. Who are you?”
He stared. His eyes reflected little personality, and absolutely no warmth. “Will. Will Hendricks.”
“Will.” She licked her lips before saying, “Thank you.”
“Not out yet.”
“Just tell me we will get out.”
“We’ll get out.”
“How did you get stuck on this mission?”
“Your father knew exactly where you were. It was only a problem of how to get you out. Your sister recommended me.”
She lifted her eyes to him. “You know my sister?”
“We served together.”
“Alone? They really sent you alone?”
“Limited resources. I don’t think your father was looking to start an international incident over one girl.”
Jessie dropped her head. No, of course not! Her father wouldn’t want to do that, even if the girl was his daughter.
“Do you have clothes for me?”
He nodded and tossed a duffel bag on the bed beside her. “Your sister packed it.”
She sighed. Her sister hated her, but hopefully, she probably knew what to pack.
“I’m going to take a shower,” Jessie said. She had to be reminded she was still human, still a girl, still alive.
“Are you sure?”
“Sure of what?”
“Showering.”
She paused. He knew what was on her besides filth. She looked at a spot on the wall. “It’s not like they’re going to be caught someday and held before a jury of their peers now, is it?”
She could feel him staring at her. The big, bad, camo-painted soldier uncomfortably shuffled his feet. Clearing his throat, he said, “You’re right. Just a thought. Uh…”
“What?” she snapped, when he kept twitching around strangely.
“Are you… hurt anywhere? I mean, do you need any kind of first aid?”
She shook her head. She needed so much more than his little first aid kit could ever contain to fix her up. Looking down, she noticed the wet spot on Will’s fatigues. She peed on him. She bit her lip, wondering what she should say to that? I’m sorry? He noticed what she was staring at and said, “Don’t worry about it.”
She looked up. “I was scared.”
He nodded. “You are a lot of things. Scared is probably the mildest of them.”
“I was sure we were going to die. Weren’t you scared?”
“No. I wasn’t scared. I told you I’m pretty good at my job.”
“Killing people?”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Killing people who hold a woman against her will? Yeah, I’m really good at killing those kinds of people.”<
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“I’m glad you are, or I would be dead.”
“Well, you’re not. I’ll get you home.”
Home. As if that would make it any better. Will, she noticed, wasn’t nearly as comfortable in close quarters as he was killing people and running from gun-toting psychos.
She didn’t dare look in the mirror she passed on the way to the bathroom. Dispassionately, she noticed the tub had some hair left in it, and a bug was crawling up the tile. She didn’t even flinch. After realizing how far she’d sunk, her perspective changed dramatically. A week ago, she might have shrieked and refused to use such an unclean bathroom. Tonight, however, she just sat down on the toilet and peed. Then she pulled off the reeking shirt with disgust, opened the door, and threw it far away from her. Let the soldier deal with it. She couldn’t bear to look at it anymore. She slammed the door again. Now naked, she rifled through the duffel bag for something to wear. Then she started running water into a bath, and finally collapsed into it.
The tepid water was barely warm and yellow-colored. But it helped. She started scouring her skin. With the first scrub, tears leaked from her eyes, and a sense of numbness began to overtake her. She scrubbed even harder, trying to take off the layer of skin that was touched by the vile beasts.
Then she cried.
Taking out the razor her sister so thoughtfully packed, Jessie wondered what her sister was thinking? After being held in merciless captivity, Jessie might like to shave her armpits? Or perhaps, smooth her legs?
Jessie held the razor up and looked at it long and hard. She ran her finger along the blade’s edge, and watched the soft bead of blood that followed it. Then she took the sharp blade and ran it across her thigh.
****
Will spent an hour of staring at the closed door, while dreading for the girl to come out. Come out and what? What would she do? What could he do? He had no clue. Nothing in his training, or civilian life could prepare him for what to do in this situation. He wasn’t a cop, so he didn’t know how to deal with victims. He didn’t even think he had it in him. But there was no stopping now. If anyone was a victim, it was Jessie Bains. He had seen people maimed, burned, killed, and massacred in war, but nothing like the evil Jessie Bains had to endure.
Now all that was left to do was survive until the morning. Then, he could get her out of there, and deliver her to the people who could help her, comfort her, and ultimately, save her: her father, her sister, her pastor. But not he.
Will had long since pulled the bandana from his hair, and washed off the last of his war paint. He stowed his weapons, but kept one close by and loaded, but well away from Jessie. He didn’t trust her. He sat on the bed, staring at the door. He preferred have her to stay in there all night. But why didn’t she come out?
Finally he got up, and tapped lightly on the door. “Ms. Bains?”
Nothing. No answer. No movement of water. Puzzled Will tried again, knocking and yelling louder. Still nothing. Unease started climbing up Will’s neck. Unease similar to what he experienced in the field when all looked safe, but his gut told him it wasn’t. His gut was usually right. Will turned the knob, knowing it was locked. The door was constructed of crap: flimsy particle board. He stepped back, lifted his boot and kicked it squarely on the hardware. The door popped open, after bending and cracking around the handle.
Then he entered and stopped dead in his tracks in shock. Moving closer, he pulled the still body of Jessie Bains from the pink water of her bath.
Chapter Three
Will’s heart skipped a beat as he grabbed Jessie’s still body. He almost dropped her when her eyes flashed open and she started to struggle against him. She was alive! He felt both shock and gratitude. He lifted her wet, naked body from the water and carried her out onto the bed. She screamed at him and pulled her legs up, grabbing the blankets to cover herself.
He ignored her and grabbed her wrists, but found nothing. There were no gashes. No spurting blood to steal the life from her. What the hell? She kept fighting like a cat caught in a bag, until he pinned her wrists over her head with one hand. Pushing back the piled blankets, he finally found the source of blood. A row of neat lines on her thigh trickled blood. They were small, shallow incisions, only about two inches long. Seeing her thighs confirmed what he suspected, she did this to herself. Both of her thighs were scored with the same sized scars. And they weren’t new.
He looked up at her face. She finally stopped struggling as she realized why he yanked her out of the bathtub, and manhandled her. Touching her was the last thing he wanted. She rolled over, pulling the covers with her.
“I thought—”
“Well, I didn’t.”
She stared at the wall, not at him. He stood next to the bed, his clothes now damp where her body was against his. He waited for her to explain why she took a razor blade to her thighs, then bathed in her own blood. Who does that? What kind of sane person would do such a thing?
He expected tears, screaming, shutting down, even freaking out, and tearing apart the room or something else to deal with the anguish that must be inside Jessie Bains’s mind. He understood emotion. But what was this? He didn’t know what to say, much less what to do. She made no move to explain, get up, or even acknowledge what just happened. She had simply cut her thigh, and then lay there as if she were dead.
He sighed. Shit. This was not what he signed up for when he joined the United States Army. He was the last person this girl needed. But he was also the only one who could be here for her now, tonight. And he knew. He knew to a large extent what Jessie Bains was suffering from. Still, it didn’t help him figure out how to help her. He went into the bathroom, where the door now hung askew on the hinges. He drained the pink water out of the bath, and found the razor blade sitting on the edge of it. He put it into one of his pockets where she couldn’t find it.
And still, she didn’t move.
“Are you hungry?”
Nothing. He sighed, gave up, sat down on the other bed, and turned the TV on to Spanish speaking shows he had no interest in.
“I need clothes.”
Will was drifting off. He jerked to attention at her statement. Glancing over, it was obvious Jessie still hadn’t moved. After long minutes of stillness, during which time, nothing occurred, she finally spoke. He jumped up and shook the sleepiness from his head. He went to her duffel bag and brought it over to her. This time, however, he sorted through it, making sure there was nothing else Jessie could use to hurt herself. His hands glided over jeans, the soft material of shirts, and silky underclothes: girl stuff he really didn’t want to handle. He quickly passed her the bag. Then he turned and stood near the window. Again, nothing, not a word. Five minutes passed. He stayed firmly away, staring out into the darkness.
Finally her bed shifted, and she sighed.
“Do you carry Band-Aids in that war pack of yours, soldier?” He turned to her in surprise. She sat up on the bed this time, wearing a silky, raspberry-colored shirt, with the bedcovers twisted around her middle.
“Band-Aids?”
She looked away. “You know, to stop bleeding.”
Bleeding as in the leg she cut. He moved towards his pack, and pulled out the small first aid kit. Grabbing a few Band-Aids, he headed towards her, and dropped down on one knee near her bed. She pulled her body away from his.
“I can do it.”
“I just want to make sure it isn’t too deep.”
“It’s not.”
Her gaze met his directly. She was challenging him. He held his hand up so she could take the Band-Aids. She opened them, and pulled back the dingy bedspread, revealing more of her legs.
“Why are you staring at me?” she finally asked. Her hand crumbled the Band-Aid wrappers.
“Is there anything else I can do for you? Any other injuries I need to attend to? I mean ones that aren’t self inflicted?”
“Lots. But none you can fix.” She carefully put the Band-Aids on. He stood still, and she glanced up at him. “A
ren’t you going to ask why?”
“No. Anything else that needs my attention?”
“Just my soul, soldier, can you patch that up too?”
He shifted his weight uneasily on his feet. He really wasn’t good at dealing with victims. She finally dropped her head. “There’s nothing else you can do for me, other than getting me out of this godforsaken motel.”
“It’s only a few more hours until morning. Try to get some sleep. You’ll need it to get through tomorrow.” He backed away from her.
“Yeah? And will sleep get me through the rest of my life too?” She mumbled as she leaned over, and grabbed her jeans to pull them on.
He turned away and looked at the TV. There was no reason to stare, and nothing to stare at. She might be pretty, but after what he witnessed tonight, he could no more conjure up a sexual thought about her, than he could a nine-year-old kid. She was so traumatized, so damaged, and so completely violated. His heart twisted in pity for her. There was no denying it. He’d have to be made of stone not to feel totally sorry for Jessie Bains.
She was a small girl: petite, short, and slim. She had a nice figure, with boobs too big for her frame, but pretty. Men drooled over her. She had silky, straight, black hair, which she wore to her shoulder, and big, brown, coffee colored eyes. Will might have glanced at her picture before, or maybe even saw her sex tape and thought she was kind of hot, and somewhat appealing. But he wasn’t all that attracted to her. To him, she was just young, stupid, and insipid in her behavior, something he couldn’t tolerate.
That is, until three days ago. And now? Now, all he felt was pity and sorrow for the unfortunate girl. She might have been a pill, a brat, and a brainless idiot, but nothing she’d done in her past deserved the punishment, the hell, and life-altering trauma she experienced. Seeing her naked left him cold, and seeing her pain made him wish he were jumping from an airplane into bombed-out pockets of an insurgent terrorist camp, rather than babysitting her. At least in war, he could fight back.
****
Jessie stared at a dirty wall for hours. She didn’t sleep. She didn’t think she’d ever sleep again. Her fear was suffocating her. She was clean, dry, and warm tonight, but that was all she was. Nothing else was much improved. Escaping that place only channeled her misery into a new environment, with a man she didn’t know, or even want to know. The only good thing about the cold, quiet soldier she could see was that he didn’t talk. He didn’t ask questions. He didn’t try to pretend he could help her, or that he could understand.