“You got lucky.”
“Lucky? Hardly. You know I hid in his trees for three days?”
He was incredulous, head jittering with disbelief. “Three days? How? Where did you sleep? Where did you go to the bathroom? What about water?”
“Sitting upright in the crook of an evergreen tree. Sleeping, I mean. I brought food and water in a backpack.”
“You’re joking,” he said, not writing this information down.
“You need to know: I am tenacious.”
Shackelford sighed, clicked his pen, began writing again. “What happened next?”
“I got the shot I’d been waiting for.”
She admired her photograph again. There’d been a series of shots done in burst mode from her tree. One shot was clear and focused and the obvious winner. Julian Mann and this other woman coming up from the metal trellis stairs that led from the back of his house down the rocky cliff face that dropped to a private beach. They’d only been visible for a moment, but she caught them. The girl, pretty, with long brown stick legs, her hair wet, wearing a white terry robe; Julian coming behind her, hair slicked back, wearing a robe the same as the woman’s, flapping open in the early morning breeze, showing off that body...
Shackelford was saying something.
“Sorry... What?”
“I said do you know who the woman is?”
She shook her head no. “I don’t know, some bimbo... Is she an actress or something?”
He wrote that down. “What did you do next?”
“Well, I knew I had my shot. You know, the money shot, as they say. So, I went home—I mean, back to the dorm—I show Marly my photo and we laugh our butts off. I have a shower”—she met his gaze to make sure he heard that—“then we went out, Marly and I and some of the girls, and we whooped it up. I knew I’d make money off it. I knew it. Somewhere around two in the morning one of us—shoot, it might’ve been me—gets the idea...” She waited for the lawyer’s scribbling to catch up with her.
“What was the idea?” he asked her, almost done writing, head still down.
“I’d queried three gossip rags, and they came back low five figures.”
“You sent them the picture?”
“No, I’m not stupid. Proof shots. Shots that show I was there on his property.”
“Okay...”
“But then I say to the girls, if that’s what they’ll pay, what will Julian Mann pay, he’s got to be worth more than all of those rags combined, right?”
“Possibly. When did you go see him?”
“That morning, like five hours later. Didn’t even sleep. Wanted to do it before I lost my nerve.” Or came to my senses.
“You went to his office...”
“Yep. It’s hard to get to him, believe me; he goes from his mansion—more like a fortress—straight to the facility in a blacked-out, bulletproof limo. But I go in to the front desk. You should see the place, it’s legit like out of a sci-fi movie. So I tell reception to send him a message. They say no, of course. I say, tell him someone wants to know how his swim with his lady friend went this morning.”
“It worked...”
“We’re here, aren’t we? They get the message to him, me and the receptionists wait, they’re staring at me... Next thing, two big guys in suits come escort me to his super-private office.”
“Rumor is,” Shackelford said, “no one visits his office. It’s like his Fortress of Solitude.”
“I was there. Place is like a museum. Like, literally a museum, with ancient artifacts, and huge ass artwork, like paintings from the Renaissance. Everything is black marble, walls, floor, columns, the ceilings are, I don’t know, thirty feet high. I’m standing there staring at a beautiful painting of a battlefield with horses and swords and fluttering pennants. It had to be ten feet tall, and I’m thinking this thing here is worth more than ten times what I’ll make in my lifetime and here it is tucked in his secret office where no one will see it alongside hundreds of other antiquities no one will ever see now that he’s got it.”
“He’s got a lot of money.”
“I’ll say,” she said, heart racing now she was getting to the scary part.
With the tips of her fingers on the base of the glass, she dragged her piña colada closer and put her mouth on the straw. A couple of long icy drags and she could imagine the rum doing its magic. She coughed, pressing a knuckle to her temple to chase away another brain freeze. “So, ow, that’s when I hear the door go boom, and then footsteps... I can’t see him yet, but wherever the footsteps were coming from, they were getting closer. The whole place is hard square edges and everything echoes like crazy. I get freaked out, start backing up—boom, walk right into him. He grabs me, rough, spins me around.”
“Did he leave any marks on you?”
“Like bruises?—on my arms? No, but take my word, it was rough. The guy is strong.”
“He wrestled at prep school, and at Yale.”
“I bet. He’s holding my arms and I’m looking up into the coldest gray eyes I’ve ever seen. He says ‘What do you know about my swim?’ I tell him to let me go. He does, but now he’s literally looking at me like I’m dog shit on his shoe. His lips curl up. Now I’m scared—this office is like a maze, we’re the only ones there, he’s super rich and powerful, he could literally strangle me and no one would ever find my body.”
“You think he’d murder you?”
“Listen, I tell him I have the photo, show it to him on my phone—dude takes my phone, drops it to the floor, puts his heel on it and grinds.” Now she leaned forward and scowled at the lawyer, imitating Julian Mann’s expression. With pronged fingers pointing back and forth between both their eyes, she indicated the intense stare that psycho had been giving her. “Whole time he’s destroying my phone he’s boring hate-holes into me with his eyes. I swear he was growling.”
“What did you do?”
“Punched him. Not hard, just once on his chest trying to get him to stop destroying my phone. Hurt my wrist. It was like punching a piece of furniture. He grabbed my wrists and almost lifted me off the floor. I swear my arms were going to break, I’m up on my tiptoes and I’m so scared I can’t breathe...”
She had to take a break. The lawyer was patient, waiting for her while she drank more rum. Time for some honesty. “Mr. Shackelford, I swear I didn’t want trouble. It was just a photo of him naked. What’s the big deal? Guy’s got a super-hot body, and his ding-dong is—now, I’m no expert, but it looks pretty huge. I figure I’m kind of doing him a favor if it gets out to the public.”
“He didn’t see it that way?”
“He did not. Definitely did not.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“He’s got my wrists, he’s saying all sorts of mean things, I don’t remember... Like insolent bitch, worthless scum, things like that. But he’s in control the whole time...”
She trailed off. The whole time Julian Mann had scared her like that, the worst thing was he wasn’t losing his shit. He was so calm and controlled she’d started to believe she was an insolent bitch. She’d had bad boyfriends before, and Julian Mann wasn’t like that. It wasn’t like she was worried he’d snap and haul off and hit her. It was more like he was convinced she was garbage and he was going to prove it to her, and he was going to take his time doing it.
“How did you get away?”
She sighed, feeling exhausted now. What she’d done was bad and now she was paying for it. Or more accurately, trying to get out of paying for it. “I screamed,” she said in a hollow voice that betrayed the bottomless terror she’d felt in that moment. Truth was she’d screamed and bellowed and kicked. And cried.
“That worked?”
“He dropped me. I fell on the floor. I started walking backward on my elbows and bum. He says to me I better run. He says I better run and get those pictures destroyed before he does. Then he says...” She exhaled till she was empty.
“What did he say?”
“He said,
‘You think you can own me? You know what I’m worth, and that’s why you’re here. You’re worth nothing and I will own you like this...’” She snapped her fingers.
Shackelford asked, “He snapped his fingers?”
“He did. And it like echoed a thousand times.”
“But he let you go?”
“Yeah. I ran around his stupid office maze bouncing off million-dollar paintings for a while but I found my way out. I must have looked like a crazy person running through the WaavvTek compound but, you know, eventually I found a bus stop and I made my way back to the campus.”
“And that’s when you discovered your dorm room had been ransacked.”
“Exactly. Like he knew who I was and where I lived and had whoever go out and turn my place upside down—all in forty-five minutes or less. The guy is scary.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure, shoot. That’s why you’re here.”
“What did you ask for when you showed Mr. Mann the photo of him with the woman?”
“What did I ask for? Well, money. I said, Hey, TMZ offered thirty Gs for this picture, think you can do better?”
“The implication being you would sell it to them otherwise.”
“Yeah, right.”
“That’s blackmail.”
“Yeah, but not really, right? I never said or else...”
“It’s blackmail, Miss Armbruster,” he said again, eyes turned down as he pushed all his papers into the manila envelope and used the elastic string to wrap it closed.
“Yeah, but you’re my lawyer...”
Now he closed his notebook and tucked it into the satchel at his feet. He slid her phone toward him, tossed it in as well.
“What are you doing? You’re leaving?”
The guy was ignoring her, showing her the side of his face as he closed the buckles on his bag and hooped the shoulder strap over his head.
“Seriously, this is it? It’s not blackmail, Mr. Shackelford. And give me back my phone.” She stood when he did. Still he ignored her.
When he turned on his heel and began to leave, she pushed her chair back and followed.
“What kind of lawyer abandons his client like this?”
No answer still, she kept pace behind him and his pace quickened. The pool area was a courtyard with three exits through archways. They both headed to the archway that would lead to the front parking lot and reception.
That was when she saw the island cop lurking in the shade of the arched passageway. Six-four, two-hundred-plus pounds, he wore the uniform of the local constabulary: crisp white dress shirt with black epaulets, black Bermuda shorts and black knee socks, red stripes everywhere. He smiled.
She skidded to a stop. Shackelford bustled through the shade, past the cop and out to his rental car.
“Oh, no,” she sighed. Now she shouted, “It’s not blackmail, Shackelford!” The lawyer started his car and looked over his shoulder to back out of his spot.
The island cop drew out a baton and twirled it by its leather thong. She backed up three steps, turned and ran—skidded to a stop again.
Emerging from the shade of the other two archways were two more island cops. The first cop loomed close behind her. She darted left, turned and darted right. His arms lashed out to encircle her, and she ducked, scrambling now on her hands and feet.
The other sunbathers jumped up, heads whipping around, trying to determine the commotion. The other two cops came around the pool on either side. She ran straight, hopped on the diving board—one jumping step and she was bouncing off the lip then slicing through the water.
When she came up for air, she was blind. Her eyes stung like they’d been spritzed with acid. She paddled and kicked, dug the heels of her hands into her eye sockets. Deep, baritone laughter bellowed around her.
The black in her hair. It was in her eyes.
Underwater, she scrubbed at her face, panicking, opening her eyelids—the sting of chlorine was better than the dye.
When she surfaced, she was surrounded. A big cop on all the compass points of the pool, some with hands in pockets, the first one still twirling his baton. Black, inky water swirled around her where she doggy-paddled. She winked and blinked, snorted water out her nose, the top of her brain stung with pool chemicals.
“I’m not coming out,” she shouted.
Baton cop, still smiling, rested his foot up on the diving board and draped a forearm over his knee. He looked at his watch.
Still she paddled, cursing Shackelford, knowing she wasn’t getting out of this, wishing if she was going to be abducted that she’d stayed in America where at least she’d have had some semblance of rights. Although, who could tell when you were up against someone like Julian Mann. Money like his bought a lot of power.
A huge whomp came behind her followed by a splash that showered her as something large dumped in the water. She didn’t even look. She just started a frantic side stroke.
A powerful hand grabbed her ankle, pulled her under the water. The man wrestled with her, tugged on her shorts, and dug strong fingers in her flesh. Big arms went around her, forced her to stay under the water. The man grabbed her sweatshirt hood and pulled it over her head. She drew in water and freaked out. Her legs kicked, and she scratched at him, yelling and shouting under the water as he tightened her strings and closed the hood over her face. They were going to drown her in a swimming pool...
Now the guy’s feet were on the shallow end floor and he hoisted her over his shoulder, marching through the water. She vomited a cascading lungful of water down the back of his uniform. The cops on the deck laughed in a roar of sadistic humor. The man spanked her ass, and it squirted water out both legs of her shorts. That brought more laughter from the men.
She was handed up to another cop who helped her to stand, her hood still closed over her face. She hunched over, roaring and coughing, trying to get fresh air in her scorching lungs. Arms twisted behind her back, they ran zip ties around her wrists and yanked them till they dug into her flesh.
They fucking had her now...
Chapter Three
Out front of the cheap hotel, the three cops walked her to a waiting police vehicle. It was a dusty, dirt-sprayed 4x4; a squat Japanese pickup truck with big fat tires.
Baton cop banged down the tailgate, and the wet cop pushed her into the bed headfirst. The third cop got in the driver’s seat and started the motor.
Pearl scurried along with her shoulder down and her butt up and the wet cop gave her bottom another smack. She rolled onto her hip and pushed her back against the inside of the pickup bed, scowling out the tight-tied sweatshirt hood.
Baton cop got in the cab and slammed the door, and wet cop sidled alongside her in the pickup bed, scooting on his butt, all smiles, and looking up and down her bare legs.
“What are you going to do to me?”
The guy didn’t answer, just began unbuttoning his soaking wet shirt. The truck went into gear and rolled out to the end of the hotel’s driveway, put on the flashing lights on its roof. The driver waved a hand out the window and traffic stopped. He merged out onto the roadway, bright sparkling sunlight glinting off the chrome and windows of the waiting cars.
She asked again, “What are you going to do to me?”
The cop still didn’t answer. Topless now, showing off the muscles, gleaming black and wet, his two big hands wrung out his shirt. Water streamed from it, splashing her knees. She got herself to sit higher, putting her back against two plastic gas containers attached with a bungee cord against the front of the pickup bed below the cab’s back window. The zip ties burned like hot wires.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked now.
Still no answer, just another smile and a lecherous glance over her bare legs. Sweatshirt drenched, water squished in the butt of her shorts where she sat. Both her soaking wet canvas Converse sneakers scratched at her feet. Should have worn socks. The big cop in the back with her shook his shirt out, then lay it flat on th
e bed to dry in the intense sunlight.
Soon they were out of the tourist traffic and on a quieter road; tropical forest on the left, grassy fields and ocean shoreline on the right.
Now they jostled and bounced after a hard left off the roadway took them onto a tree-lined dirt path.
“Wait—seriously, where are you taking me?” she said again, head whipping left and right, trying to turn around and at least see where they were headed. “This isn’t the way to the police station, is it...?”
The man chuckled now, ignoring her questions. He leaned with both arms along the lip of the pickup bed like he was sitting in a hot tub.
She said, “Do you speak English?”
The guy’s smile shrank into a frown. Deep voice with Caribbean accent: “Are you serious?—do I speak English?”
“Well, sorry, I don’t know—what do they speak here?”
“English.”
“Oh, what? Excuse me—it’s not crazy you might speak French or something, Spanish, I don’t know...”
The man shook his head in quiet admonishment as they both bounced straight up and down as the truck passed over a harsh, rutted segment of the trail. Leaves rustled against the side of the pickup, branches squeaking as they were bent.
“All right, sorry,” she said, showing the shirtless cop a sad face, “that was rude. I’m just scared and I don’t know anything about the island... Can’t you tell me where you’re taking me?”
If she expected a measure of sympathy, she was mistaken. He’d returned to ignoring what she said and letting his eyes enjoy the bare parts of her body. She scrunched herself up against the gas cans, drew her legs underneath her.
When the scratching of passing brush stopped, she sat straighter again. The hood was still tied tightly around her face, and she struggled to angle her head to look out of the hood hole, turning to see where they’d arrived.
The ride was smoother, the truck passing through a grassy field on a gravel trail. They traveled through the center of a wide open grass space, ringed by rainforest. When she tried to twist and see where they were headed, the back of her sweatshirt was tugged, making her topple onto her shoulder and cry out. The man laughed. Though she couldn’t see him, only her mouth and nose sticking out of the hood now, she could tell by the closeness of his laugh he loomed over her.
His Captive Page 2