She felt like a snow bank perched on a Swiss Alp, slowly beginning to collapse under its own weight. Once she got started the avalanche would be an unstoppable force cascading downward, except instead of ice and snow she would be nothing more than a mass of blood and tissue, tumbling end over end. If she did survive the fall, she would undoubtedly lay helpless until Jack or the demon found her. Abby was unsure of which one she feared more, it seemed they were becoming analogous these days.
She placed her hands on the first step and edged her body forward, so far, so good. Another step followed, and then another. Her feet cleared the top step and now she supported her entire bodyweight within her shoulders. The lactic acid and adrenaline poured into her muscles, burning them like scalding water poured over her back. She gritted her teeth and dropped another step. Her shins banged against the edge of the oak step, sending a jarring vibration throughout her entire body, culminating at the tip of her nose. Abby flinched thinking about the incredible bruising her shins and thighs were taking, happy for the first time about the lack of sensation in her legs.
She continued on, one step at a time, walking on her hands and listening to her shins whack against each passing step. Thud. Thud. Thud. The bruising pounding stung her ears instead of her nerves. She pressed onward counting the steps. Fourteen, thud. Fifteen, thud. Sixteen, thud. Seventeen, only ten more to go. She was sweating profusely now and beads of perspiration dropped on the stairs below her, making them slick and wet. They threatened to send her skidding out of control. The heel of her left hand slipped out beneath her and she slid down the next five steps, banging her knees, shins, and chin in rapid succession one time each with every passing step. Just before she lost consciousness Abby managed to stop her slide by locking her elbows and bracing herself with both palms. She felt something snap inside both elbows simultaneously, sending waves of fire up her arms, and for a moment she was sure she had dislocated them, but they held fast despite the intense pain.
Abby braced herself one more time and took the last five steps in a continuous movement of one hand in front of the other. When she reached the bottom she collapsed in exhaustion onto the floor, lying in a cool puddle of her own sweat. She was there for several minutes with her eyes closed tight, trying to control her pain and catch her breath. Then she opened them and peered left then right, scanning the main entryway for any sign of movement, human or otherwise. To her relief she found none. She had done it, at least the easy part anyway. Getting up was going to be an entirely different problem, but she didn’t want to worry about that now. First she needed to get some rest.
On Abby’s first trip down the stairs she didn’t even attempt to get into her chair, content to spend the next three hours lying on the floor. When she was rested, she would ascend the stairs.
Wooding tailed Darrow’s van from a distance, staying behind just far enough to avoid detection but not so far back as to risk loosing him. He had followed him down the winding twists of highway four. This was an easy tail. The bends in the road gave him significant cover and still allowed him to stay close. There was really nowhere for him to go. Darrow had headed into Bremerton, and in town the tailing became substantially more difficult.
Wooding spent the entire day following Darrow as he made errand after errand, hoping that he would incriminate himself somehow, but he never did. It seemed as though he were just out running some routine shopping errands. He stopped at the Pizza Hut, no doubt gorging himself during their lunch special, and then he made his way over to the Albertson’s supermarket, where he loaded a bunch of groceries into the back of the van. The morning faded into the afternoon and Wooding had yet to see any incriminating evidence. He was getting bored. He glanced at his watch, it was four-thirty, and the daylight was waning fast, he began to think that his efforts were all in vain, and then Darrow made a stop that piqued his interest.
He stopped the van outside a well-known and infamous pornography shop. The residents of the small community had put up quite a fuss when the Backdoor Video and Adult Toy Store decided to settle into their small naval community. The city had been engaged in a major court battle for the last twenty years. Proprietors of the porn industry saw the military town as a great location to peddle their videos, magazines, and other pornographic items to horny sailors fresh off the boat from months at sea. The large retirement community, comprised of elderly couples saw it differently however, contending that the explosion of pornography shops, topless bars, and liquor stores would send an open invitation to sexual pedophiles, perverts, and common criminals.
In the end the shops won out, the courts deciding that it was a matter of free speech and free enterprise, and as long as they stayed within the rules of verifying the age of their patrons, there was nothing that the residents of Bremerton could say about it. Still it was a sore subject among the locals, and numerous town meetings were held trying to find some way to stop, or at least slow the growth of the so-called adult industry.
Wooding watched as Darrow exited the van and headed into the pornography shop. He couldn’t help but think that Darrow look like a punk, the kind of scum that deserved to be locked behind bars with his own kind. He wore a ratty baseball cap backwards, with dirty torn jeans, scuffed boots, and a novelty t-shirt with a naked lady across the chest. On the back the words read: “LIQUOR IN THE FRONT, POKER IN THE REAR. BLUELIGHT TAVERN.”
Darrow was in the shop for quite some time, almost an hour and a half. Wooding shuddered thinking about what he was doing in there, well aware that the store had a large section comprised of adult viewing booths, where the perverts went to get their jollies, not content to masturbate within the privacy of their own homes. When he finally emerged he was carrying a large plastic bag. He had obviously made a few purchases but Wooding was unable to decipher what they were because the bag was dark black plastic. He smiled to himself; apparently perverts were ashamed of their choice of lifestyle.
He radioed into Peterson, knowing that the detective would be pleased that he had managed to catch their prime suspect in at least a less than pious act.
“Jeremy, come in over.”
The voice on the other end crackled through the distortion of the radio waves. “Talk to me.”
“Just spotted the suspect entering Backdoor Video and Adult Toy Store in Bremerton, just off of Avenue Four. Suspect made purchase, and I need someone to investigate.”
“Shit Wooding you know we don’t have that kind of manpower, do it yourself.”
“You want me to stop tailing the suspect then?”
There was a pause on the other end of the line. When the voice came back it was laced with irritation. “No, stay on him. I guess I’ll radio Jackson.”
“Roger that.”
Wooding pulled the cruiser out and followed Darrow back through town and onto highway four. Shit. He thought to himself, it looks like Darrow is headed back home. And that’s exactly where he went.
Randall got the call at exactly six -O- seven. He had been parked along Main Street looking for the random car that might exceed the speed limit and offering him an opportunity to generate some much needed revenue for the town, but everyone was driving like little old grandmas on their way to Sunday tea.
Finally, some damn action. The excitement prickled underneath his skin. Anyway that he was involved with the Darrow investigation was good news to him. He ached to put the scumbag away for murder if he was indeed the one responsible for chopping that girl up. The request from Peterson had caught him by surprise. However, he didn’t expect to figure much into their plans, but supposed that the detective didn’t have much of an option when he radioed him. That didn’t matter. He would play his part.
He pulled into the parking lot of the adult bookstore exactly fifty-four minutes from the time he got Peterson’s call. A young prostitute was standing directly outside, scamming an opportunity to grab some horny john directly from the exit door of the store. Upon seeing Randall’s police truck she pretended to be nonchalant, but made a
speedy exit around the east side of the building, not wanting anything to do with the police. Randall watched her disappear, sashaying her hips and clicking her stiletto heels against the concrete as she fled. The prostitutes in this area were getting bad. It wasn’t his problem; let the Bremerton cops deal with that.
He exited the Cherokee and headed for the entrance, staving off the sense of revulsion he felt oozing from the seedy premises. Inside he found the usual fair for such an establishment. Books and videos lined the walls, lonely men made their way up and down the aisles searching for new titles or ones they had missed during their previous visit.
A lone clerk sat behind the counter reading a magazine entitled: SMUT WORLD. He looked up immediately as soon as Randall entered, his eyes growing wide as he peered at his uniform. Randall knew undoubtedly that some cops frequented these types of establishments when they were off duty, but they would not be so brazen as to enter while wearing their uniform. The clerk apparently knew this too by the way he slapped shut the cover of his smut magazine and slid it beneath the counter. This pig was all business.
To Randall the clerk looked like the typical punk that would work at just such a place. His hair was matted together in brown dreadlocks that hung down about his face, fastened together at the tips with assorted color rubber bands. His fingernails were long and uneven with dirt embedded beneath them. He wore torn blue jeans and a tattered and dirty flannel shirt left un-tucked and swaying about his midsection. Randall guessed him to be in his early to mid twenties.
“Good evening.” The kid recoiled in his chair, not wanting any part of Randall Jackson but having no say in the matter.
“Hello sir. How can I help you?”
Randall marveled at the way these punks were able to change demeanor like a chameleon changing its color. When he left the kid would no doubt be cursing to his friends about the God damn pig that had entered the store. He brushed it off and addressed the kid.
“You had a guy in here, about an hour ago, mid-forties, brown hair, missing front tooth. Ring a bell?”
The kid took his time, measuring his response. “Yeah I remember. What’s it to ya?”
Randall resisted the urge to grab the kid’s hair and smash his head into the glass countertop, giving him a bloody bird’s eye view of his rubber dildos.
“I want to know what he bought.”
The kid smiled a wry grin out of the corner of his mouth. “You got a warrant for that?”
Randall’s patience was at an end, he wanted to grab the punk’s nose ring and rip it clean off his face. Instead he reached across the counter, grabbing the kid by the collar and yanking him inches from his face. His feet dangled beneath him six inches from the floor.
“I don’t need a fucking warrant to smash your face in, and believe me I’d be happy to do it, so why don’t you just cooperate and give me what I want, and maybe I’ll let you go home to your bong and your stroke books without a busted nose.”
The kid’s eyes were mostly white. He tried desperately to suppress the terror harbored behind them without much success. “Cool officer, whatever you want. Just calm down okay?”
Randall let go of his collar, letting his feet drop back down to the floor. “How’d he pay?”
“Excuse me?”
“Cash, check, or credit? How’d he pay?” Randall spat, fury in his voice.
“Ca-cash.”
Son of a bitch, there would be no paper trail. “Okay, cash receipt. Let’s see it.”
The clerk opened the till and pulled up the cash tray, fumbling desperately through the stack of receipts with shaking hands. After a few awkward moments of fumbling he held out a single receipt with trembling hands. Randall snatched it from him and stared at the ink markings. The list read like a sexual addict’s how-to manual. He scanned through the purchases until a particular item caught his eye.
“What’s this?” He pointed at the item in question, it read:
2 LT. BNDG BOARD $ 98.90
The clerk peered at the receipt. “Light bondage board.”
“What the hell is that?”
The clerk’s face turned red. “You know, for tying your woman up, or yourself if that’s your thing.”
The look on Randall’s face begged for more information. “Let me show you.”
He headed over to one of the shelves and withdrew a four-foot long cedar board with six sets of holes drilled through the frame and a pair of leather cuff links.
“See you drill screws through here, he motioned to the ends of the boards, preferable through the studs behind your wall. Most people use it over their headboards, and then you can place the cuffs through any one of these holes depending upon your preference.” Randall’s face still drew a blank. “You know, how wide you want her spread.”
“Yeah okay I got it. Thanks. You’ll have to write a hand receipt for this.” He held up the receipt and exited the store.
“Hey you can’t take that.” But Randall was already gone. “Fucking pig!” The clerk cussed to himself, and then he returned to his magazine.
Outside Randall entered his Cherokee and radioed Peterson. He depressed the button. “We have an item purchased that might be of interest.”
Peterson’s voice was full of static. “Go on.”
“Bondage board, used for tying down sex partner’s, or victims.”
“Good work Jackson. I want that receipt on my desk in the morning.”
“You got it.”
The radio hummed with silence. Randall depressed the accelerator and pulled out of the parking lot, heading for home.
Inside Talcott Manor Abby was pitted in a test of wills. The stubborn weight of the wheelchair refused to give easily to her efforts. Sweat seeped from every pore in her body, the drops on her forehead rained down an incessant barrage, falling off her brow and stinging her eyes. She shut her eyelids and leaned back in stubborn defiance. Pulling hand over hand she felt the chair lurch up one step at a time. She had tied one end of the rope around the handle at the back of the chair, pulling at the other end and watching the rope slide around the banister at the top of the stairs. With each pull the chair ascended another step, but her muscles burned more and more under the strain. She began to wonder if she had the strength to accomplish the task, but her determination forced the negative thoughts from her mind. Inch by inch, step by step, she strained until the chair rested on the last step from the top. Abby pulled with all her might, but the chair refused to budge. It sat just beneath the banister at the top of the stairs. The rope hung straight down forming a near ninety-degree angle and destroying her leverage. She would not be able to pull the chair over the final step.
No matter, she tried to convince herself. I’ll just push it over when I reach the top. Abby gritted her teeth and began to pull her body up the stairs, using the rope as a climbing aid, her own body weight holding the chair fast to its position at the top of the stairs, teetering between the summit of the top step and a devastating plunge to the floor below.
The flesh of her palms burned with each pull, blisters forming in the meat of her hands. She continued to pull herself upward, counting the steps like she had done on the way down. At last she reached the final steps, her wheel chair balancing precariously above her head. With one final heave she forced the chair over the last step and breathed easier when it rested stationary on the floor above. Her strength was nearly gone, but somehow she managed to pull herself over the last step and onto the hardwood of the second story. Breathing deep ragged breaths she forced herself to regain control of her own body, a body ravaged by injury and suffering from the atrophy of her sedentary lifestyle. She had done it. Euphoria sprung from her mind. She had descended and climbed a massive set of steps, now all she had left was to pull herself up into her wheelchair before Jack arrived. It was another monumental task.
She braced her palms on the footrests of the chair and pressed upwards until the majority of her torso rested upon the seat. She reached up and gripped the handles behind th
e chair, using the rubber grips for a sure handhold, Abby pulled her body up with every fiber of her being, convinced that the muscles in her shoulders were going to tear free of their ligaments. Miraculously they held fast, until her hips had elevated above the seat of the chair. She twisted her body until her butt rested flat against the seat. She had done it. A moment of exhilaration passed and then she began to pull the rope upward, wrapping it end over end around her right elbow and between her thumb and index finger until she had coiled the rope into a perfect circular bundle.
When she was finished she began the agonizing trek back to her bedroom, stopping momentarily to relieve herself in the bathroom. When she was finished she climbed back into the chair and resumed her journey. Her palms burned beneath the rubber wheels and her muscles screamed in agony, but she rolled the chair hand over hand until she sat next to her bed. With one final effort she pushed herself into bed and pulled the covers up about her. Jack would be home soon, and when he was, he would be none the wiser.
TWENTY-FOUR
Ellie shuffled her feet along the tile floor. Her depression had reached an all time low. If it had not been for Aiden and Randall, she’d just as soon be dead. The love of her child and future husband kept her going. How had she let her life come to this? The thoughts kept spinning inside her head. She was drug free once, happy, alive, but now her world was shrouded in a veil of misery, covered by the darkness of her addiction looming just overhead.
Her body wretched constantly from the withdrawals, each passing moment seeming like an eternity. The first night hadn’t been so bad, at least not as bad as she had thought. The chemicals released from her system in a few violent shudders, and streamed from her pores in rivulets of sweat, soaking her sheets and chilling her to the bone, but she felt as though she could handle it. The second night however was as though she were thrown into the pits of hell itself. She vomited continually throughout the night. Her stomach muscles twisted themselves into knots, making her feel as though she were going to wretch her own guts out in a series of violent heaves. She screamed in agony and clutched her arms to her chest as she defecated upon herself, long sticky strands of mucus and bile that spewed from her anus, staining her nightgown and defiling her sheets. The nurses were phenomenal, going about their business as though nothing were out of the ordinary, but Ellie felt the shame of her sickness and a lack of dignity deep within her heart. When her twitching and convulsions became too violent they gave her a shot. Ellie found it twistingly ironic, drugs to combat the drugs. She made her way to the bathroom, a six-stall facility located directly in the middle of her hallway wing. At the sink she turned the faucet and let the water run, feeling the cool liquid flow over her hands before splashing it upon her face. The freezing droplets of water stung her skin but felt soothing at the same time, reminding her that she was still alive despite her precarious predicament. She splashed a few more handfuls over herself before turning and exiting the bathroom, making slow but steady progress to the counseling center and her dependency group.
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