by Riley Moreno
“She was dead, Juliet,” he swore. “She… she looked dead. And I… I would have gone back if she wasn’t. But… but…”
He couldn’t speak as forced his arms around her body. Julie tried to resist, but there was no escaping the feel of his arms, and she rested her head to his shoulder.
“But I had to save you,” he whispered as he stroked her hair.
As she rested in his arms, Julie was thrust back into those endless days of captivity. Carter McCord was the worst, but there were others. She recalled men that stripped and plowed into her at first sight. Others bit her until blood leaked from her lip and then made a show of kissing the pain away. Soon it became a routine that she had to endure, and at one point, Julie started to number the rapes. After what felt like scarcely a week, she had been violated twenty-three times. She had always imagined that just one assault would prove more than a body could bear, but as the number neared thirty, Julie began to resign herself to a life where there was nothing but rape, and that’s where she was when Carter ushered Ethan into her final prison. Julie was scared when she first saw him, when she had first doubted him, and now she returned to that space as she pushed him back and shook her head.
“But was really Kim dead?” Julie asked.
Ethan tried to reach for her again, but Julie shrugged him off and paced the room. She pressed her hand to the window and looked down at the city. It was still covered in snow, but now that the protective shield seemed to hide something that she needed to seek out.
“Was she?” Julie screamed as she turned to see his quaking body close to her side. Ethan held her arms and looked at her with anguished eyes.
“I… I thought so,” he said. “And I… I didn’t want that for you. So I…”
His voice trailed off as he took her hands in his and tried to bring her back to his side. Julie was so spent that she nearly fell back into his embrace.
Ethan…
As he stroked her cheeks, she relaxed into his touch and wondered how she would have survived without him. In that moment, without him was far too much to contemplate, and Julie settled into his chest and let him hold her close. There she was safe. There she could try to forget her fear and simply let him hold her.
But if Kim was still suffering without any hope of rescue…
“Let me go!”
Again her hand cracked against his face, and Julie bit her lip as he fell back. Her mind thrashed with a series of conflicting emotions. In her heart, she was safe in his arms. His hold was soft and loving, but Vivian Porter’s words echoed in her brain.
But there’s no way to know if they are responsible for whatever happened to poor Kimberly Beyer.
If Kim wasn’t an angel, if she wasn’t at peace, Julie had to find her.
And suddenly Ethan was only in the way.
“Don’t touch me! Stop!”
She strained around the hold of his arms and moaned when he pressed her close and reached for her hair.
“I said stop---”
“No, Juliet. No please.”
“Ethan---”
“I don’t know what’s happening here,” he said in a hoarse voice. “If she was alive, I didn’t know it. I’m as surprised as you are. But please. Please don’t leave me. Juliet…”
For a moment, Ethan’s anguish overtook her, and Julie fell into him and almost forgot when the door swung open and a frustrated voice filled the room.
“Oh come on!”
Morales’ cry pried Julie away from Ethan’s arms, and as she looked to the cop, Morales looked past her and focused on Ethan.
“You didn’t tell her,” Morales said. “And now you’re trying to make it all okay?”
As Ethan shook his head and started to protest, Julie’s body turned to ice. Morales held Ethan’s arms tight, and Julie approached him to ask her ultimate question again.
“Was Kim dead?” Julie demanded.
Ethan hung and finally shook his head. Morales held him the space just beyond her eyes and for the briefest of seconds, his face morphed into the leering visage of Carter McCord. Sometimes monsters came with hungry hands and brutal fists. Sometimes they hid in plain view and coxed a person to a place of trust. Wasn’t that the way with Greg? Julie, hell Kim for that matter, never saw him as someone who would engineer their degradation and what about the boys? Pete and Matt seemed sweet at first sight. It had never crossed Julie’s mind until the last possible second that they were going to allow other men to rip them apart until there was almost nothing left. For Kim, nothing was left.
Until now.
“And you just left her?” Julie asked.
Julie pictured Kim as she might be now. Were her hands bound? Was she showered with the icy water from a hose and praying for death?
“Juliet,” Ethan said. “I couldn’t be sure---”
“That’s not how it sounded yesterday,” Morales interrupted. “We laid everything out, and you were supposed to tell her. But you couldn’t even do that, could you?”
Julie blinked away from Ethan, quickly becoming someone else that she couldn’t trust, and then she saw Morales’ eyes blazing.
“So you knew, too,” Julie said. “And you didn’t tell me?”
The cop started to speak, but Julie cut in.
“You knew,” Julie continued. “And you made me take the stand without making sure that I knew what could happen? How… how could you do that? After all…”
Julie returned to the place where she was a captive in her own skin. Give it a polite name. Call it just a violation. She was forever raped by lies and undisclosed information. Maybe it didn’t hurt as much as men like Carter McCord tying her down and entering her body from every angle. But this new betrayal still burned like the flaming cigarettes so often pressed into her neck. She couldn’t stay here. She couldn’t stand the thought of spending one more moment with either person that had pretended to be her friend, and Julie bolted from the room.
And she ran right into Leo Barber.
“Miss Edwards? What---?”
“You’re no better!” Julie screamed. “You let me go up there and you knew!”
Leo started to speak when Morales appeared with Ethan at her heels.
“We wouldn’t have done it if he had just told---”
Ethan plowed past the cop and tried to take Julie’s hands.
“I’m sorry, Juliet. I---”
“Don’t you fucking talk to me!”
Racing away from the ungodly trinity that had led her to a humiliating slaughter, she started down the steps and caught her breath when she saw the light and the street poking through a glass door. Rushing forward to slam it open, her movements were arrested by a pair of strong hands on her shoulders, and her body was turned until she was back in the eyes of the bailiff.
“Emergency exit,” he said. “Is this an emergency?”
Julie nodded, and the man pulled her away from the door and down another flight of stairs. No one was running or calling after her, and for that she was grateful. When they finally hit the air, the bailiff pulled a set of keys from her pocket.
“Where do you want to go, Miss Edwards?” he asked. “Where’s a safe place?”
Julie trembled as she shook her head.
“I don’t know anymore.”
16
“How you doing, Miss Edwards?”
Julie was huddled in the backseat of an old Chevy Impala with more miles on it than she had years on her life. Yet she had clocked in ten lifetimes of painful moments, and as she sank into the seat, into the weariness of a life lost to lies, she could only think of one place where she might be able to hide.
“Julie? You okay?”
Her senses were assaulted by the scent of lilacs and roses. In the midst of the flowers, she saw Danielle, sans customers, and the curvy florist moved to take her into her arms as the TV blared behind her.
“You poor little thing!” Danielle said. “I know, I know, rough day.”
That was an understatement.
/> The bailiff finally introduced himself to Danielle as Ed Swanson, and Julie privately vowed to remember the name if she ever needed to call on him for help again.
“So this is good, Miss Edwards?” he asked. “You’ll be okay if I leave you now?”
Julie didn’t know if she would ever be okay again, but even though Ethan had brought her to Danielle, she had no one else to turn to.
“She’s fine,” Danielle said as she took her into her arms. “I’ll take care of her.”
Ed Swanson stalled in his tracks, but when Julie nodded, the bailiff bowed and took his leave. As soon as he was gone, Danielle patted Julie’s cheek and locked the shop’s door. Turning the sign to closed, she grabbed Julie by the arm and led her to back.
“Thank god for both of us it’s my cheat day,” Danielle said. “I have a whole pie waiting, and now that I have someone to share it with, I won’t feel so guilty.”
Like I can eat.
They sat over an overturned milk crate, and Julie tore at the pizza crust as Danielle ate heartily and slurped the mozzarella between her lips. She felt as if she would be sick again.
“I guess I should tell you---”
“No need, sweetie,” Danielle said. “It’s all over the news.”
There seemed to be no end to her humiliation, and Julie started to shrink away as Danielle took her hand.
“What’s going on in there?” Danielle asked as she dropped her slice and gently tapped Julie’s head.
Julie was trapped in thoughts of Ethan. The sound of his voice, the way he held her. The way that she had believed in him when all hope seemed lost. But now…
“I can’t trust him,” Julie said. “And if I don’t have him…”
Breaking down, she buried her face in her hands and did not resist as Danielle left her seat and took her into her arms.
“Did he really know all this time?” Danielle asked.
Sniffling into the air, Julie shook her head as she struggled to speak.
“No,” she started. “But… but he knew last night. He knew before I got up there in front of everyone. Why…?”
Her pleading eyes focused on Danielle’s sympathetic stare, and she sobbed aloud in the hope of answers that might never come.
“Sweetie,” Danielle started. “Maybe he really didn’t know if it was true. Maybe it isn’t.”
Julie darted back in her seat and wondered if she should have let Ed Swanson go so easily. Was Danielle in on it, too? Was there no place where she could ever be safe?
“I… no!”
“Julie.”
Danielle didn’t give her the chance to leave, and she folded her close as she stroked her ruffled hair with a kind hand.
“You never saw her,” Danielle said. “And don’t you trust his eyes?”
Julie sighed as she pictured Ethan’s soft blue pools burrowing into her soul. He had always looked at her as if he thought of nothing but her. But maybe that was the problem. If she allowed herself to fall into Vivian Porter’s version of events, she was still a slave, this time willing, and Ethan had held her captive from the second that he supposedly freed her from the men on trial.
“I… I want to,” Julie said. “But I don’t know…”
Danielle hugged her closer and patted her heaving back. Where was Kim? If she was alive, did she have a friend who would provide the same comfort?
“I think you need to lie down,” Danielle said. “Want to go back to my place?”
She started to say yes, but then she remembered that Danielle lived with Nick, just a few floors below Ethan. The thought of seeing him again was too much, and she started to shake her head.
“Julie, I meant upstairs.”
Her body went limp at the thought of lying down without worrying that Ethan would corner her at the foot of the stairs or pound at her door until his knuckles bled.
“Yes,” Julie said. “Please.”
Danielle opened a door on a small space with a tiny bed and a half bath to the side. It was hard to think of how to get clean here. Maybe showers were why Danielle sought out the likes of Nick. Truth be told, he was kind of jerk even though Danielle claimed to like him.
None of that mattered now. Right now she needed to sleep.
“Take a load off, Julie.”
Obeying Danielle’s voice, she sank into the soft mattress and let her boss arrange the quilt around her fatigued body.
“Better?” Danielle asked.
Julie nodded and started to slip into a dream. Behind closed eyes, the first image was Kim. Julie saw her tied to a stake, her teeth chattering against the wind. Julie knew all too well what that felt like.
“Fuck! What the hell is wrong with this whore?”
The first time a monster had tried to force his cock down her throat, Julie had twisted away. He was a big man with wild tufts of hair that pierced her eyes, and she tried to look anywhere else. Shutting her eyes tight, praying to leave the nightmare, she was pulled back into the most awful reality when the man pinched her nose. In search of air, Julie could do nothing but stretch her jaw wide. But there was no air. There was only a vile cock.
“Come on,” he said. Julie’s lips were still wrapped around his piece as she glanced past his length. He was dark and lean, and he never met her eyes. All he could do was stare at his meat in her mouth, and he took hold of her matted hair and forced her to suck. Julie trembled at the feel of his flesh about her tongue, and again she tried to back away when he rammed it into her. As she struggled for air, she thought that she would die, but then she remembered her teeth. Biting down for all she was worth, she tore into his cock and took some delight in the dark man’s screams as he tried to push her head away. Julie fought him and pressed her teeth deeper into his cock. The man tugged at her hair, and soon she was forced away by horribly familiar hands that slapped her face raw as she tried to spit out the foul taste.
“It’s kind of funny,” Pete said.
“What are you talking about?” Matt asked.
Pete dragged her struggling body to a lonely tree, and he bound her hands to the lowest branch. When Julie tried to get away, Pete slugged her, and she went limp. Incapacitated, he drew a piece of duct tape over her lips and held her close as he drooled into her eyes.
“Who would have thought that the sweet little virgin would be the one to put up a fight?”
Pete reached between her legs and tugged and her swollen flesh. Screaming through her gag, Julie saw Matt getting the joke.
“I know, man,” Matt said. “The other one is like everything.”
Matt lit a cigarette. He took a drag and pressed the end of the butt into Julie’s quivering breasts. In that instant, her world exploded into agony, and Julie tried to beg for release through the tape.
“She’ll learn,” Pete said as he slapped her face and laughed as her head fell to her breasts.
“Give her a night in the dark, and she’ll play.”
Julie struggled to free her wrists and actually cried out for them to come back when she was finally alone. Even the summer air grew cold as the night grew darker, and she moved liked mad to escape from her bonds. At one point, when she thought that she was nearly there, she heard a howl in the distance, and her body grew still at the thought of new harm. Wolves and bears had teeth that would tear every inch of her flesh from her body, so she waited and sobbed into her gag as her arms started to ache. The pain was so intense, that she whimpered for the chance to suck anyone in the hope of some kind of freedom. But Julie hung there until morning, and when Pete cut her down, she was brought back to the client that she had failed. And fearing the idea of having to hang against the roaring sun, she sucked as she sobbed and hoped for death.
“What if… what if Kimmy is still…?”
Danielle shushed her with a sweet whisper and a gentle hand.
“Go to sleep, Julie,” Danielle said. “You had a long day. And tomorrow will be here before you know it.”
Julie nodded and slipped into sleep. Her dreams,
mostly nightmares, featured Pete and Mat forcing her towards men that she never wanted to know. In the intervals, Matt raped her. He laughed into her ears as he took her from behind, and each time he attacked her, she saw Pete. Just watching. In some ways, he was just like her, as stranger in a strange land.
And she told him as much when they were finally alone.
“What’s the problem, Pete? Can’t get it up for me?”
His face darkened, but it morphed into a smile as he slapped her hard and fingered her mound.
“Stop flattering yourself, Jules,” he breathed into her ear. “Kim’s just better at the job.”
Kim.
She had always prided herself on being ready for anything, and Julie dreamed of her friend pinching her cheek as she moved into the next moment. Hadn’t she left Brian at the hope of something better? Kim was perfect and poised.
But no one would have ever wanted this.
Julie dreamed of Kim pleading for release even as was tied to a bed and pounded by one man after another. And then another. Maybe she played along at first, but now Kim had to want freedom, and Julie screamed out her name as her body thrashed beneath Danielle’s sheets.
“Leave her alone! Leave her---”
“Juliet?”
She struggled to catch her breath as she registered the presence of Ethan at her side. His arms started to surround her body when she called out for Danielle. She was soon there.
And so was Nick.
Everyone was in on this.
“No!” Julie screamed. “Get away from me! Let me go!”
She scrambled from the bed and started to crawl away from Ethan. She was barely at the threshold when she felt strong arms lifting her to her feet, and she found herself face-to-face with Nick.
“He’s not here to hurt you,” Nick said. “You need to---”
“I want to go home!” Julie shrieked. “I… I have to…”
“You’re out of the woods, Juliet,” Ethan said. “You are home.”
“No! You’re lying to me! You’re all---”
It fell to Danielle to bring her back t the edge of the bed and take her face into her hands.