by Dan Wells
Using a smaller knife I cut the plug from the other end of the cord, and slipped the whole thing through the knife block. The cord came out the bottom just fine, and I shaved away about four inches of plastic coating from the end. I placed the block on the counter, passing the cord hanging off the side behind the oven, and looked out the window.
Nothing yet.
I pulled the oven away from the wall, unplugged the power cord, and wrapped my newly-exposed wire around one tine of the plug. Assuring myself that everything was ready, I plugged the oven into the wall, connecting a straight line of current from the wall outlet to the handle of the knife. I pushed the oven back against the wall and examined the scene. Everything looked normal—except for a few inches of cord running out from the bottom of the knife block to the gap by the stove.
I looked around for something to hide it with, and found a half-damp rag in the sink. I brought it up to the counter and set it on top of the cord; I just had to hope he wouldn’t notice it was out of place.
I glanced out the window again and saw the car on the road, just coming around the nearest bend. Don’t panic, I told myself. Stay calm, but not too calm. He’ll feel fear from the women, just like he always does when he gets here. Just blend in. I allowed myself a touch of fear, but no nervousness, no desperation; I forced myself to walk slowly around the room, gathering the tools I had used, putting them back into their drawers with calm, measured precision. Just enough fear to look normal, but not enough to stand out.
I closed the drawers and walked to the fridge, pulling out the grapefruit juice and taking it back to the table—if I tried to look too innocent he’d get suspicious. I opened the juice and took a drink straight from the bottle; it was acidic and strong, and I grimaced at the shock. I heard the car park outside, and the engine went off. I took another drink and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. The front door opened, though I couldn’t see it from my seat at the table.
“Thank you again for coming,” Forman said as he opened the door. “I’m sure you can appreciate the need for secrecy, and we normally wouldn’t do this at all, but he did request you specifically.”
“And you’re sure he’s okay?”
No. No! I knew that voice, and it wasn’t Kay or Mom.
Forman stepped into the kitchen, grinning like the devil. “Hello John,” he said. “I brought us a new toy.”
The woman came around the corner. It was Brooke.
21
“John!” cried Brooke, half smiling and half staring in shock. I must have looked terrible. “You’re alive!”
“Brooke,” I said, standing up slowly, “you shouldn’t be here.”
“You should never trust a stranger,” said Forman, “but everyone trusts a policeman.”
Brooke frowned and wrinkled her brow. She was confused. “What?”
I can’t do this, I thought. I can’t go through with it—not with Brooke.
“Brooke,” I said, taking a step toward Forman, “turn around and go.” He’ll sense my emotions and attack me, but at least she can get out. The chain scraped across the floor as I moved, and she tilted her head to see it moving slowly behind the table.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
“Run!” I shouted, and lunged for Forman, but he was perfectly prepared for the attack and punched me straight in the face. I staggered back and Brooke shrieked. She turned to run, but Forman leapt and grabbed her by the hair, wrenching her to a stop with a violent yank that sent her sprawling to the ground. I ran toward him again but he had his gun out now, pointed straight at my stomach.
Back off, I told myself. The plan can still work, but only if I’m empty. I can’t feel anything. I’m completely empty.
Brooke was crying, fighting to get away, but she stopped abruptly when Forman swung his gun around and pressed it up under her chin.
“Betrayal,” he said. “It really is the sweetest, John, just like I told you.”
Brooke looked at me, her eyes going wider, and Forman took a deep, luxurious breath.
“There it is again.” He closed his eyes, gritting his teeth. Brooke and Forman began crying, almost perfectly in unison.
Brooke was mortified now, scared literally stiff, and Forman gripped her tighter, pulling harder on her hair. “No! No! No!” shouted Forman, then pulled his gun sharply to the side and swung it back powerfully, slamming it into the side of her head. He let go of her hair and she stumbled to the wall, grasping it desperately for balance.
Nothing, I thought, pushing down the anger. Attacking him now won’t do any good at all. Just wait, and feel nothing.
“Please,” said Forman, regaining his composure, “take a seat.” He was using my neutrality to recover from Brooke’s intense emotions of betrayal and fear. He waved his gun toward the table. Brooke clung to the wall with one hand, rubbing her face with the other. She didn’t move.
“You will learn quickly,” said Forman, “that I don’t like to ask for things twice.”
Brooke looked up at him, eyes wide with fear, then at me. After a moment she grabbed the back of a chair and pulled it out, sitting down warily.
“What are you doing with us?” she asked.
“Whatever I want,” said Forman, gesturing for me to sit as well. I sat in the chair opposite Brooke, facing the living room. The counter, and the electrified butcher knife, were just in the corner of my vision.
“That’s the short answer,” said Forman. “The long answer is that I am teaching John a very important lesson about deception. You see, he wanted me to go out and get Kay Crowley—so I could learn some kind of valuable tripe about love, I believe—and he thought he was being very sly about it. He was manipulating me, and I don’t like to be manipulated, so you, Miss Watson, are going to help demonstrate the consequences.”
“I’m not going to help you do anything,” said Brooke. I was a little surprised she had that much fight in her, and I shook my head, almost imperceptibly. The more she fought him, the more he’d enjoy it—just like with Radha.
“Actually you are,” said Forman, opening one of the drawers. “But the nice thing about this kind of help is that you don’t have to lift a finger.” He pulled out a pair of snub-nose pliers and snapped them open and shut. “I’m going to do all the work.”
Brooke’s face paled, and I knew that she finally understood the situation. She jumped to her feet, pushing back the chair, and looked at me desperately. I shook my head.
Don’t leave the room, I thought silently, you’ve got to stay in this room.
“Sit down,” Forman demanded. He still had his gun in his other hand, and he used it now to persuade her back into her seat. Brooke shook her head and backed against the wall.
Forman smiled, wolfish and evil. “Can you talk some sense into her, John?”
I didn’t want to have to do this to her. I could do it to Kay, to my mom, to anyone else in my life, but not to Brooke.
“Forman is a psychopath,” I said, trying to keep my voice even. If I gave her any kind of hope—even if all I did was tell her to trust me—Forman would realize I had a plan. “He killed a woman yesterday, and he has four more in the basement. I’ve been trapped here for two days, and I know enough to tell you that the more you fight, the worse it gets.”
“No,” said Brooke, shaking her head. She was crying. “No.”
“Please sit down,” I said. “Please.”
She sat down, and Forman threw me his keys.
“Unlock yourself, and put the chain on her.”
I opened the lock on the manacle and brought it over to Brooke. She looked at me with vacant eyes, as if she couldn’t understand what was happening.
“I’m so sorry,” I said.
“Not just her ankle,” said Forman, his breath speeding up. He was feeling the buzz of her emotions—the betrayal she felt with every command I followed, and every evil I went along with. “Wrap it around her,” said Forman, “and loop it through the back of the chair. As many times as it will g
o around.”
I wanted to say something—anything—but I didn’t dare. I forced myself to stay calm. Don’t give anything away, even to her.
“Why are you doing this?” asked Brooke. “Why are you helping him?”
“It’s easier this way,” I said. I didn’t want to drag this out any more than I had to, so I tightened the chains firmly to make sure Brooke couldn’t get away. Forman whimpered behind me, and I knew that Brooke felt even more betrayed. Even if we survived this, she’d probably hate me.
“Excellent,” said Forman, his eyes half closed. His smile was broad and lecherous, like he was drunk. He picked up the pliers again. “Now, let’s get this party started.” He holstered his pistol and stepped toward Brooke, working the pliers eagerly.
I couldn’t just let him hurt her. The idea was to shock him before the torture started, but how many tools would he go through before he got to the knife? I had to think of something.
“Wait,” I said. Forman stopped. But what could I say? I wanted him to touch the knife, but anything I said to trick him would be false, and he’d detect the lie immediately.
“You want to stop me?” said Forman. His voice was sharper now; I was feeling anxious and worried, and that meant he was too. I didn’t have much time.
There was only one thing I could say and mean it—only one thing that would lead him to the knife, and still be totally true. I looked at Brooke, pale and terrified and beautiful.
“I want to do it,” I said.
Her face wilted, fear and confusion twisting it into a devastating grimace. Just like Forman, I pushed her emotions away; I pushed mine away. I ignored everything about the present and drew on the past. I remembered my dreams of her, of cutting her, of hurting her, of making her wholly and completely my own. Everything I’d ever tried to ignore and avoid I embraced now, filling myself with thoughts of Brooke’s soft skin, of Brooke’s bright scream, of Brooke’s pale body lying still and motionless.
“Yes,” said Forman. He was feeling it too—the forbidden anticipation, the pounding need of my desire, the sweet agony of her terror. This was what he’d wanted for days—to feel the emotions of a torturer, not just the victim. “Yes,” said Forman, stepping back. “Do it. She’s yours.”
I stepped closer, watching her eyes as they watched me, feeling the electric buzz in the air as our minds connected—more closely and more purely than when we held hands, more completely than I’d ever connected with anyone. The thrill of fear was a like a tether between us, a conduit from one mind to another. No, it was deeper than the mind; there were no words, there were no thoughts, there was only us, Brooke and me, together at last.
I leaned in, smelling her—a hint of perfume, a touch of fruit from her shampoo, a clean, crisp scent of laundry soap. She was mine now. All mine.
“Hand me the knife.”
“Yes,” he hissed. He stepped behind me, once, twice, and then the lights dimmed and he screamed, a low-pitched grunt through gritted teeth. Brooke screamed with him in high counterpoint, and I savored the sound like a stream of crystal water.
There was a smell of burning meat, and Brooke shook her head.
“Help me, John, please help me.”
Why did she need help? What was . . . ? There was something I was supposed to do. It was Brooke. I was supposed to cut her; she wanted me to cut. . . . No, no that wasn’t it at all. I turned and saw Forman, his body rigid, his hand still on the butcher knife, and I remembered. It was my trap. I didn’t really want to hurt Brooke, right? It was only a trap for Forman.
I couldn’t touch him or I’d be shocked too. There was a pan in the lower cupboard with a plastic handle—I could use that. I skirted past him carefully, pulled the pan from the cupboard, and raised it up like a club.
Brooke spoke desperately. “John, what are you doing?”
“I’m making sure,” I said, and slammed the pan into his face. It knocked him backward, pulling his hand away from the knife and sending him tumbling to the floor. Brooke screamed, and I jumped to follow Forman’s body, standing over him with the pan raised. He looked up at me, his eyes barely open.
Slowly, painfully, he smiled.
“I beat you,” I said. “You’ve lost.”
“And for the . . .” he coughed, raspy and painful, his voice charred and black. “For the first time in . . . ten thousand years . . .” he coughed again. “I feel like I’ve won.”
I hit him with the pan and knocked him unconscious.
“What’s going on!” cried Brooke, hysterical. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know how long he’ll stay down,” I said, dropping the pan. “We have to work fast.”
“What?”
The keys were still on the table, and I ran to unlock her manacle and unwrap the chains. She struggled out of them like they were living things, tentacles trying to eat her alive.
“I know you’re freaked out but you’ve got to trust me,” I said. “Do you trust me?”
“You were going to . . .”
“No,” I said, “it was just a trap for Forman. Now listen.” I dragged the chains over to Forman and started wrapping him up, looping it through itself and under his arms and around his legs, doing my best to make sure that even if he woke up he’d stay completely immobilized. His hand was a blackened lump of cooked meat. “Everything I said about this house was true,” I said to Brooke. “There’s four women downstairs, and Lauren’s boyfriend is tied up in the back. We need a knife.”
I locked the manacle around Forman’s leg and stood up, walking to the counter. Brooke was staring at the butcher knife in wonder, her hand half extended. I knocked the block over carefully and pointed at the cord in the bottom.
“Don’t touch.”
I pulled a steak knife from the sink and led Brooke into the back room where Curt hung from the ceiling. He was awake, but only barely; whatever Forman had drugged him with was powerful. I handed Brooke the keys and pointed at the handcuffs on Curt’s feet; she dropped to her knees and fumbled with the key ring, still terrified, while I started sawing on the ropes.
“Wake up, Curt,” I said, shaking his shoulder as I worked on the ropes. “We’re cutting you loose, and we need you to stand up. Can you stand up?”
He didn’t nod, but he pulled his feet closer and raised up, bracing himself against the sudden loss of support when the ropes gave way. I cut through the first rope and he dropped his arm like it weighed a ton, but he didn’t fall. I cut through the other just as Brooke finished unlocking the handcuffs, Curt reached for the duct tape around his mouth. He was waking up.
“Let’s get outside first,” I said, pulling his arm over my shoulder. He was a huge man, and he leaned on me heavily, but I staggered with him through the door and down the hall. He stumbled in the kitchen, tripping over Forman’s chained up body, and a few steps later doubled back to kick him solidly in the gut. I pulled him back.
“Let’s get outside,” I said, “I don’t know how much time we have.” There was more room here, and Brooke grabbed Curt’s other arm to help guide him to the front door. I let her take him and stepped away. “Take him outside,” I said, “I’m going for the women.”
Brooke nodded, and I took the keys from her hand and went to the basement door. Forman was still unconscious. I opened the lock and started to throw it away, then thought better of it and locked it through two links of Forman’s chain, keeping him that much tighter.
“Get up!” I shouted, throwing open the basement door and flipping on the lights. “We’re leaving, and we’re leaving right now. Can everybody walk?”
The four women looked at me in shock, climbing painfully to their feet. None of them had shoes, and their clothes hung thin and ragged on their emaciated bodies. Stephanie was healthier, but her wounds were more recent and she took the longest to stand.
“What’s going on?” asked Carly. I unlocked her first.
“Forman’s unconscious,” I said, moving on to Jess, “and he’s tied up. He migh
t be down for good, or he might be back up any second; I don’t know how he works.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nevermind,” I said, unlocking Melinda. “Just get upstairs and get out. We can take his car to town, and get you to the police and to the hospital. Go!” I unlocked Stephanie’s chain and helped her to the stairs.
“Do you know why he did this?” she whispered.
I shook my head. “I don’t.”
I followed the women upstairs and met Brooke in the kitchen.
“Take them outside,” I said, “I need to rescue one more.”
“We need a phone for the police,” said Brooke. “I don’t have mine, and I can’t find one here.”
“Forman has a cell,” I said, and dropped to the floor by his body. I reached in past the chains, struggling to reach his jacket pocket, and finally managed to fish out his phone. I handed it to Brooke along with the keys. “Start the car,” I said. “Even after we call the police, we need to get out of here as fast as we can.”
I started to head back to the torture room, but a distinct scent caught my attention. I’d smelled it before, several times, and I’d never forget it—acrid and thick, like an invisible caustic cloud. I turned around.
Forman was melting.
His body seemed to collapse inside the chains, hissing and sinking and curling in on itself like paper in a fire. In seconds the flesh was gone, leaving a blackened suit wrapped in chains and stained by greasy ash.
“Exactly like Crowley.”
I hesitated, half-reaching out to touch it, then stepped back and turned again to the hall. I needed to rescue the woman in the wall. I started toward the back room again when another scent stopped me—woodsmoke and gasoline. Something was burning. I heard muffled shouts from outside, and suddenly the kitchen window shattered in a hail of splintered glass. The smell of gas was overwhelming, and I heard Brooke scream.