by Lauren Rico
I take a deep breath through my nose and try to calm myself. I give him a slow, grudging nod.
“Good!” he chirps, his tone suddenly pleased. “Now, if I take my hand off your mouth, can you keep quiet?”
I start to nod but he stops me.
“Wait. Think about it for a second, because you screaming is the difference between life and death. Do you need a second to calm down?”
Strangely enough, I do, though how he could have possibly anticipated that, I have no idea. I nod again. Yes, I need a second.
“Fair enough,” his voice says softly. “Go ahead and breathe in, through your nose.”
I do as he instructs. One breath. Two breaths. The third time, I feel my breath catch in my throat and I start to cry.
“You’re going to suffocate like that,” he informs me coolly.
He’s right. Without use of my mouth, the crying is causing my nose to run.
“Can I take my hand away now?”
I nod and he very slowly uncovers my mouth. I don’t move.
“Okay, good. I’m going to let go of you but so help me God, if you try anything and I mean anything, Jules, I’ll kill both of you. Him first so you can watch. Do you understand me?”
I close my eyes and nod again, not trusting myself to speak yet. Jeremy lets go of me just long enough to grab ahold of my shoulders and spin me around so we’re facing one another. His newly blonde, clean-shaved image smiles down on my tear-stained face. So, Natalie’s instincts were right. I want to kill myself for not paying closer attention.
“Hello, Jules!”
“What do you want, Jeremy?” I rasp, my eyes meeting his.
“Everything, Jules. Absolutely everything. And you’re going to give it to me.”
“Where’s Natalie? Did you … is she alright?”
He’s still smiling.
“Oh, she’s just fine. She’s passed out on your bed. I put her there after I shot her up with a sedative. She’ll wake up in a couple of hours with a nasty headache.”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, trying to steady my frantic pulse and concentrate on the situation at hand. I have to keep my baby safe.
“What’s next?”
“We’re going to leave now. All three of us. Like a happy little family!”
I look over my shoulder to the crib where I can see David pulling on his feet and hear him chattering nonsense to the mobile animals hanging over his head.
“Where?” I panic.
He doesn’t reply.
“Jeremy, do you have any idea how much work he is? He’ll fuss and cry and whine. He runs all over the place now, and he throws temper tantrums at the drop of a hat. You don’t want to take him anywhere, believe me. He’s more trouble than you need,” I entreat him, trying to sound sincere and reasonable even as the panic within me is starting to reach critical mass.
I see him considering this. He looks at David, then at me, then back at the crib again.
“Fine. He stays here. Let’s go.”
“But we can’t just leave him here alone!” I exclaim a little too loudly. He gives me a warning look.
“I’m sorry.”
“He’ll be fine,” he says, grabbing my forearm and pushing me toward the door of the nursery.
“Jeremy, please …”
“Now, Jules,” he orders, clearly starting to lose what little patience he has.
I notice the diaper bag on top of the changing table, a bottle sticking out of one of the front pockets. Jeremy wasn’t bluffing, he’d been prepared to take us both.
“Let me just give him his bottle …” I say, reaching for it, but he yanks me back hard.
“Uh-uh. I don’t know what the hell you and Xena Warrior Princess have hiding in that bag.”
Dammit! Think, Julia. Think.
“Then you get it,” I blurt. “Please, Jeremy, it’ll keep him quiet, and then he’ll probably fall asleep.”
From the crib, David is starting to become agitated.
“Mama!” he calls to me, peeking through the slats of the crib. In another second he’s going to pull himself up to a standing position and once he does that, I won’t be able to get him back down to sleep. I turn back to Jeremy and put a hand on his arm, meeting his gaze squarely.
“Please. Just do this for me and I swear I’ll go with you without a fuss. Please. You know me well enough to know I’m not lying,” I plead.
He scrutinizes my face, as if he can see something written across it that will confirm what I’m saying to him. At last, I see the acquiescence in his eyes.
“Alright,” he mutters, reaching around me and sticking his hand into the bag. He pulls the bottle from its pocket and hands it to me. “You have thirty seconds.”
“Thank you,” I say sincerely.
He lets go of my arm and I rush to the crib and help my son to lie on his back again. He smiles up at me. I put the bottle in his mouth and his chubby little hands latch onto it as he sucks happily. I brush the hair off of his forehead and watch as his eyelids grow heavy.
“It’s okay, baby,” I whisper. “Everything is going to be just fine.”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t count on that this time,” Jeremy mutters from right behind me. He grabs my upper arm and pulls me from the crib while pushing me toward the door.
I swipe at the tears, which are running down my face again, looking over my shoulder every inch of the way down the hall, through the living room and to the front door, where we stop short.
“I’m dead serious, Jules. Don’t even think about sending a signal, making a run, screaming, anything.” He holds up Natalie’s key ring for me to see. “I can be back in this apartment and snapping his little neck before you can even get someone to notice you. And you know I’ll do it.”
“I understand, Jeremy,” I assure him quietly. “I just don’t know if I can get through the lobby looking like nothing’s wrong.”
“Yeah, well, we’re going out the back, so that won’t be a problem.”
“I – I don’t have a key for that elevator …”
“I do,” he cuts me off as he opens the front door, sticks his head out and looks both ways down the hallway. It’s silent.
He gestures for me to step out ahead of him. I do, and before I know what’s happening, he’s ushering me all the way down and into the service elevator, which he does, indeed, have a key for. We’re out of the building in under two minutes. There isn’t anyone back here in the alley, but I look up and around, hoping the security camera will catch me and the security guard will notice. But no one comes as we approach a nondescript white commercial van.
“Where are we going?”
“Right here,” he says, pulling the back door open. He nods for me to get in. When I look over my shoulder one last time, he gives me a rough shove. I scramble inside on my hands and knees, him following close behind me, pulling the van doors shut and securing them from the inside. Then he turns around and gestures to a mattress I hadn’t noticed.
“Lie down on your stomach.”
“What?”
“You heard me.”
I do as he says.
“Jeremy, you don’t have to do this,” I plead desperately, but he doesn’t respond. I hear the rustle of a plastic bag, and then I feel his weight next to me on the mattress.
“Put your hands behind your back,” he orders.
“What?” I repeat.
“I’m not going to keep repeating myself, just do it the first time I tell you or I’m going to get pissed off. And you know what I’m like when I’m pissed off, Jules.”
I do. I put my hands behind me and he pulls them together roughly before fastening my wrists with a zip tie.
“Ouch! It’s too tight,” I complain as the plastic bites into my skin.
“Oh, come on, Jules. You can’t fool me! I remember how much you like to be tied up,” he teases me as he repeats the process with my ankles.
I have no response, I just bury my face in the soft pillow in fron
t of my face. But he doesn’t allow me that luxury for long. Without warning, Jeremy grabs a handful of my hair and yanks my head up with one hand, while holding a cotton bandana in front of my face with the other.
“Open your mouth,” he barks.
I just stare at it, realizing what he intends to do. My panic is renewed and I start to struggle again. He jams his knee painfully into the middle of my back, his weight pressing me hard down into the mattress.
“What the hell are you thinking? Huh? I’m more than twice your size … and you’re tied up! Who do you think is going to win this little tussle?”
I have no response for that.
“Okay, you know what? Maybe little David should come with us. It seems as if that’s the only way you’re going to do what I tell you to do.” He starts to get up.
“No! No, no, please, wait!” I beg, twisting my head and trying to catch his eye over my shoulder. “Please, I’m sorry. You just – you scared me with the gag. I’m so sorry, Jeremy. Please leave him here. Please.”
He seems to consider me for a moment before holding up the bandana.
“Last time, Jules.”
“I know,” I agree quickly.
This time, when he pulls the bandana around my face, I open my mouth wide and he ties it tight around the back of my head. He’s close to my face again.
“Excellent,” whispers against the shell of my ear. Then, I feel his hand on the back of my bare leg. He runs his palm up and under my skirt. It’s all I can do to keep from recoiling.
“Don’t you worry, Jules, we’ll have plenty of time to play later, you and I.”
I cringe at the implication. His hand keeps moving upward. When he reaches my panties, he gives the elastic waistband a snap and squeezes my flesh. And then, suddenly, there the unmistakable pinch of a hypodermic needle. I grunt in surprise.
“Oh, yeah,” he drawls, back in my ear again, his breath warm on my face. “I’ve missed fucking you, Jules. You get your rest now, and when you wake up, I’ll show you a real good time. I promise.”
He kisses my cheek, and then his weight lifts off the mattress. I don’t know what it is that he’s just injected into me, but it’s only a few seconds before I start to feel its effects. He climbs over me and into the driver’s seat, starts the van and turns the radio on. But it’s not the radio. This is my new CD.
“Off we go!” he calls back to me cheerily, as if we’re off on a road trip.
I realize as I feel the van pull away from the curb, that I am totally and completely on my own. The thought terrifies me for the thirty seconds more that I’m awake, and then it doesn’t matter. Nothing does.
Matthew 32
Clusterfuck. It’s a highly improbable and extremely destructive confluence of events that transpire in the same brief period of time, rendering the victim well and truly fucked.
What’s unfolding right now, onstage with the Gotham Chamber Players, is a textbook clusterfuck. It started with Vivian in the horn section. After using an aluminum mute earlier in the concert, she left it sitting on the floor next to her chair. Which wasn’t a problem … until the player next to her accidentally kicked it over during a super-soft section of the Brahms Serenade No.1. The mute, which is essentially just a large, hollow, metal cone, fell over onto the stage floor, bounced once and then ricocheted off the leg of Vivian’s music stand. It then rolled – loudly – under the chair of Bill, the bassoonist sitting in front of her.
It was bad, but maybe if it had stopped there, it would have just been an unfortunate disruption of an otherwise uneventful concert. But it didn’t stop there. Not by a long shot.
Rather than waiting for us to finish the Brahms, Bill the ever-helpful bassoonist tried, unsuccessfully, to fish the mute out from below his seat. While half the audience, most of the orchestra, and the conductor looked on in horror, Bill leaned as far to the left as he possibly could. A triumphant smile lit his face as his fingertips grasped the neck of the mute. That’s when the strap that holds his bassoon in place slipped out from underneath him. As if in slow motion, the top of the instrument, a tall, wooden pipe known as the bell joint, slipped and swung to the left, hitting Marie, the second chair oboist who happened to be sitting next to him.
Marie’s oboe jammed back into her face, its hard reed smacking into her mouth and splitting her lip. Poor Marie started to bleed like a stuck pig.
It was bad, but maybe if it had stopped there, it would have just been a really unfortunate disruption to an already eventful concert. But it didn’t stop there.
The first chair oboe, Sarah, tried valiantly to continue playing, even as she turned a sickly shade of green. Finally, she pulled the oboe away from her face and slapped a hand to her mouth in an attempt to keep from vomiting. She failed in her attempt and, sickened by Marie’s blood as well as her own bile, she simply slid out of her chair and onto the floor, as if she had suddenly become liquid.
Inexplicably, with only a couple of minutes more in the piece, the maestro stubbornly continued to conduct even as a half dozen orchestra members got up to tend to the two oboists. By the time the Brahms came to a weak and sputtering finale, the double doors at the back of the hall burst open and a pair of paramedics came rolling in with a stretcher, radios squawking, having been summoned by an alarmed audience member.
That would be a clusterfuck.
****
“I don’t know, I don’t think it was that bad …” Brett is saying as we cross the parking lot to his car.
“Dude! It was that bad!” I can’t help but laugh and shake my head.
It’s been really nice, this new, friendlier relationship I have with him. After nearly a decade of being fierce rivals and enemies, I find I’m enjoying this time he’s spent subbing with my ensemble. I’m also enjoying the time he’s spent building a relationship with Julia and me. And with our son, David, who is Brett’s own flesh and blood.
“How long do you think it’ll take us to get back to the city?” Brett wonders, glancing at this watch.
I shrug. “Depends on whether or not there’s construction traffic. But, if you’ve got to pee, I’d go now …” I smile.
He holds up a hand. “Nah, I’m good, thanks,” he laughs and then jumps a little in surprise. “Oh, hey, my pants are vibrating!”
“Excuse me?”
“My phone, Matthew. Please, as if you’d be the one to make my pants vibrate!” he chuckles and shakes his head as he pulls the phone out of his pocket and looks at the screen briefly. “Hey, give me just a second, okay? I need to take this,” he says, turning his back and walking several feet away.
I glance at my own watch and see it’s quarter till ten. If we hit it just right, Julia and I could be curled up on the couch laughing our asses off over tonight’s debacle before midnight.
When I look up again, Brett has the phone to one ear and his hand to the other ear, blocking out the extraneous noise around us.
“Alright already!” I call out. “Can we put the phone sex on hold so we can get on the road already? I’d like to be home before tomorrow morning!”
Brett ignores my teasing. When he ends the call, he continues to stare at the screen in his hand and I get the distinct sense that something’s not right. That’s when he looks up at me slowly. Too slowly. Brett’s eyes are wide and his jaw is slack. I can see the phone shaking in his hand.
“What? What is it?” I ask calmly and quietly, preparing myself to jump into damage control mode – whatever it is that’s happened to him.
Brett just shakes his head. He seems to be having trouble finding the words. I walk to him and put a concerned hand on his shoulder.
“What is it, Brett? Tell me.”
The look in his eyes … Oh, Christ. A look like that can only mean someone is dead. His mother, maybe? I hope not … not so soon after his father. Or … no! It couldn’t be Maggie, could it? And then it strikes me with the force of freight train. My breath catches in my throat and I feel my blood run cold even as a film of per
spiration breaks out on my face.
“It’s not …” I close my eyes and shake my head. I can’t look at his face when I ask. “Is it Julia?” My voice is barely a whisper.
The half-second delay in his response answers my question. My eyes fly open now, and I can feel them darting, squinting, looking for answers. “Oh, God, no … the baby?”
“Matthew,” Brett begins, leveling his eyes on mine, “It’s my brother. It’s Jeremy …”
My grip on him tightens as the panic seizes me from within. “Tell. Me!”
“He forced his way into your apartment and knocked Natalie out. He was waiting when … when Julia got home tonight. He took her … somewhere …”
Suddenly his voice sounds so far away, and the starry sky above me has started to spin. I can’t stay upright for a single second longer, so I drop to my knees as my viola case slides off my shoulder and into the grass. Brett is there, squatting in front of me, shaking me.
“Oh, God. Oh, my God,” I whisper. “When? Is David with them?”
“No,” he says firmly. “No, David is still with Natalie. She wants to call the police …”
“No! No police!” I hiss, grabbing his arm and staring at him in wild-eyed desperation.
I don’t know what’s happened yet, but I know enough – I know him well enough – not to get the police involved. He’ll hurt her … No, he’ll kill her before he lets himself be caught by the police. Besides, the fucker’s brilliant in that crazy, cunning, dangerous way. He’s most likely got a fool-proof back-up plan in place, should he have to make a run for it. And then Julia is dead for sure.
No. My only chance to do this myself.
“Matthew?” Brett is shaking my arm.
“No. Police,” I grit out.
He takes a deep breath and nods. “Okay, man, no police. I promise. But we need help. Come on, you have to stand up now so we can get moving. I’ll tell you everything in the car, but we have to leave now, Matthew. Do you understand?”
I swallow hard and nod. He extends a hand to help me get back up on my feet. I take it, and allow him to lead me by the shoulder toward the parking lot. In the meantime, he’s dialed someone else and seems to be waiting for a response.