Caught in the Act

by Lydia Thorn

  My thoughts turn even more morbid. Like I picture someone coming into the bathroom and just blowing my brains out, no warning, just a single shot and my lights are out. At least I won’t have to live with this fear eating away at me. I’ll know what happens, for the moment I may exist before the end.

  Knowing is better.

  I refuse to regret anything; I fought for my life as much as I was able; I guess that’s something.

  It seems like an eternity has gone by, but I now hear footsteps outside and the savory scent of a meal, the bathroom door creaks open and the door shuts again and I can hear the sound and smell of piss hitting the water.

  “You brought that on yourself.” It’s Xander. “I made a threat and had to stick to it, at least as much as I can...” He finishes, and now there’s silence for a beat. “Was there anything on your phone?”

  He loosens the straps of the gag, the ball falls from my mouth into the tub. He rips the blindfold off, assaulting my eyes again with the light. On the counter were a paper plate and a slice of pizza.

  “I’m going to uncuff you so you can eat, but I’m leaving the ankle cuffs on.” He says unlocking me and once again I’m forced to hold in my pain as I slowly reposition my aching limbs to their rightful place.

  He passes me the plate and although my appetite is shot, I still eat the pepperoni slice.

  “I have no idea why you’re so loyal to him.” Xander sits down and watches me eat. “I don’t know why any of them are…” He sighs. “Was there anything on your phone?”

  I shake my head because it's true. “There was something there that could ruin him but he deleted it.” Also the truth.

  “Then say what it is so you can get out of here.”

  “Will you really let me go?” I ask, not believing a word he says.

  “Should I have let Sam rape you to let you know I’m a man of my word?”

  I shake my head. “You’re going to kill me, anyway.”

  “Is that what you think?” He says taking the plate from me when I’m down to the crust. “So, you’re not loyal at all, you’re scared.”

  I nod, which was the truth. I love Ivan, but I love my mom more and I don’t want her to have to deal with a dead son.

  “We can work with that.” He thinly smiles. “I don’t have to kill you to shut you up, as a matter of fact killing you might open the door to more problems than I care to fuck with.” Xander leans close and I want to recoil, I almost do, but I hold my ground. “Your father, on the other hand, would be easier to put down. Lucky for you, I’m not eager to become a murderer.” For the first time I notice sheets of paper on the counter, I think the plate of pizza was sitting on top of them. He holds up one of the sheets so I can get a look at it. It’s a film waiver, the others are a release liability form and NDA. “We’re going to make a little movie instead, with you as its star.” He grabs a pen. “You sign the contracts, you film your scenes, you’ll even be paid, a nice little money trail from a certain porn company to you. Depending on what you tell me about what was on that phone, the script for your movie could be soft or hard.”

  So, I’m to agree to be raped. I close my eyes, just wanting this nightmare to end. I don’t know what Xander could possibly do without the actual pictures to prove anything, and it seems as if Mr. Bowie and he are close enough to where he will lie for him, but that I guess will be between him and Ivan.

  “Give me the papers,” I say prepared to sign them, speak my peace about what happened in the teacher’s lounge, and hopefully get this terrible ordeal over with as smoothly as possible.

  Glass breaking and the men shouting outside the door interrupts and Xander opens the door and runs out.

  “Louis!” I stand when I hear tapping at the window and when I open it Toby is outside coaching me to leave. “Hurry the fuck up, man.”

  “Thank god!” I let him help me up, unable to part my legs for the climb. “Look out!” I shout to warn Toby of the big guy behind him. Hands grip me, pulling us apart and dragging me into the old-timey looking room with a single bed. That gargantuan man, named Sam if I recall, the bastard that almost raped me pushes Toby into the room. This is the first time I’ve seen him in anything other than the uniform.

  A sad part of me is relieved he came for me, after everything that’s happened, he actually showed up to help and now I hate how I had gotten him in this mess. There was another in the room, the one Xander is pointing his gun at.

  Ivan, I can’t help but weep at seeing him. A part of me felt like we could make it out, the three of us together but maybe that was also my delusional mind at work. I had tasted freedom again however briefly, and they snatched it away.

  “Ivan…” His name barely escapes my cut lips.

  “Damn, who knew you were going to bust in here like that.” Xander breathes. “Wait a minute…” He looks from Ivan to me. “You two are fucking?” He laughs. “I knew something was going on, I thought he was blackmailing you.”

  “Are you all right, Raven?” Ivan stares only at me, his voice is calm and in control and I truly do begin to feel like we can get out of this mess.

  I nod. Ignoring my nakedness.

  “I’m here Xander,” Ivan says keeping his hands up. “Isn’t this what you want? You can let them go.”

  “I’ve never seen this look before. You actually care about this guy?” Xander chuckles in disbelief. “I guess you do have a heart. I hope you see that letting them go is not something I can do right now.”

  “You want to ruin my life?” Ivan lowers his arms; he’s wearing all black and the lights in this room is dim and flickering. How on earth did this place still have lights anyway? Old condom wrappers litter the corner near the bed. Was this place used by prostitutes? “Fine, Rav—Louis caught me sucking off Mr. Bowie while he was asleep in the teacher’s lounge. He was holding that over my head, and I had to pretend to be his friend. The jig is up. I’m sure he’ll be spreading it to anyone who’ll listen and give a witness statement to the police. Right?”

  “Why are you doing this?” I ask, overwhelmed.

  “Isn’t it obvious? I love you.”

  “You can’t say that now so casually.”

  “How romantic.” Xander lowers his gun and shoves it back in his pants. “What would you do in my shoes, Ivan? Would you really let them go?”

  “I wouldn’t be in your shoes, Xander,” Ivan answers, his face as hard as stone.

  “You can at least pretend to be afraid. I might have gone easy on you.”

  “Just let them go.”

  “See, I was going to shoot a movie, that’s the deal your boyfriend and I made before you got here. We even have waivers and release forms, all legally binding. I was going to have my boy Sam fuck him like he was going to do earlier, but why not let it be two lovers instead?”

  The three other men in the room began laughing, sick fucks.

  “What’s the point of this?” Ivan spits. “Going to record it and say I raped him, even you should know how dumb this is.”

  “No.” He shakes his head. “We’re going to livestream it from your Facebook account. I’m sure you and your prick brother will do everything in your power to settle the dust, but you and I know what people are like. The more exciting story always lingers like a smelly fart. Ivan Lorenson, the heir to a tech dynasty, likes to livestream himself fucking men up the ass which will then unearth several men who say the heir coerced them into sex too. Combine that with the rumor of what you did to your former math teacher, and it’s the perfect storm. Your brother might keep you on, but you will lose Maximillian, and everywhere you go you will have to answer for what happened here tonight.”

  “Go to hell!” I yell sick of hearing his shit. “I’ll tell everyone I did it consensually, and so will Mr. Bowie. I’ll tell everyone what you did to me! How you almost had me raped.”

  “Louis…” Toby says to shut me up. “Know when it’s over. He’s right, no one is going to research the truth even if you put it out. Hell, I’ll
do it and tell everyone Ivan raped me if it would get us out of here.”

  “Toby!”

  “He’s right.” Ivan agrees. “Nothing you do to defend me will matter. Xander needs to make this happen because he can’t compete any other way.”

  “Fuck you!” Xander reaches for his gun and I take a chance and dive at him pushing him against the dresser. I hear Toby and Ivan struggling and it all happens so fast. The only thing on my mind is to just keep him from pulling out that gun and using it.

  I grab at it and try to pull it to me when the blast rings my ears.

  I stumble back and land on the bed, the smoking gun in my hands…and the heat of the blood.

  “Holy shit!” One of the men yells and runs from the room, the other two following and Xander wobbles about clutching his side and hit the floor with a thud.

  “Oh my god!” Toby picks himself off the floor, blood running fresh from his nose.

  Ivan kneels in front of me, taking the gun from my hands. “It’s okay. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “Is he dead?” I ask. I can’t stop trembling. I killed him. I killed him. I…I…

  “You, get him dressed uncuffed and out of here.”

  “Yeah.” Toby wipes his face and searches the ground for the keys.

  A low groan is coming from Xander, he’s alive!

  Ivan checks on him, then points the gun at his head.

  “Stop!” I yell and rush to hold his arm to keep him from doing what I think he’s going to do. I won’t have him kill anyone, not for my or anyone’s sake. “What are you doing? You’re not going to kill him.”

  “Raven, listen to me. The hospital is obligated to report gunshot wounds and nobody’s going to believe he shot himself in the gut with his own gun.”

  “Wait, fuck!” Xander holds up a hand coated thick in blood. “I know a guy who can patch me up, no hospital bullshit. Take me there and I swear I’ll forget everything.”

  Ivan stares at him for a long while, Toby begins uncuffing my ankles but I can’t stop looking at Ivan, his face is cold, no feeling, he doesn’t even look like he’s thinking it over. “Raven, tell me everything that happened to you.”

  A man’s life is in my hands and there is a part of me who wants to see Xander suffer for what he did to me, but to kill him, and to know that Ivan might be willing to do so. I’m scared of him, but I feel so overwhelmed that he’s willing to do this for my sake. “Ivan…please don’t do this.” I breathe. “If you’re going to kill this man for me, then I’m telling you right now, that I don’t want this. Just take him to the hospital or take him to his friend…I don’t know what else to tell you.” I can’t look him in the eye.

  “There you have it, do whatever. We gotta go.” Toby says handing me my pants, shirt, and shoes.

  “I’ll take him to get patched.” Ivan sighs.

  “Thank you.” My feet are killing me but put the pressure to stand up straight because it’s the only way I can reach his lips. I give him a chaste kiss, careful not to linger.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  LOUIS

  It’s over, at least I hope it is. I stop once I can’t see that industrial area anymore and check my foot, a piece of glass is inside the flesh staunching the flow of fresh blood. I can’t grip it.

  “We’ll be at my house soon,” Toby assures me as he helps me up so we can keep moving. I don’t think I’ve ever felt this much pain in my life, like every nerve in my body is throbbing to a beat I’m helpless to follow.

  Toby was right, the lower-middle-class neighborhood he lived in wasn’t that far away. He helps me up the wide wooden steps of the narrow yellow house and unlocks the door. This the first time I’m in Toby’s house and it has to be under circumstances like this.

  “My mom’s spending the night with her boyfriend.” He says turning on the lamp on the side table near the floral couch. “You can spend the night after the party.”

  “I’m not going to any party, I kinda just want to go to sleep.”

  “I told you, we should go to be seen. Some friends of mine are already there who will swear we came with them, all we gotta do is be seen a bit and leave.”

  “Okay.” I nod, feeling my brain go foggy. “Got any Advil’s or something, I got a serious headache.”

  “I’ll get you something when you’re in the bath.” He says pulling towels from the hallway closet and taking them to the bathroom. He runs the water and places a stopper inside. “I don’t know what they did and you don’t have to tell me, but I think Epsom salts can help with any soreness.”

  “Thanks.” I can’t stop thinking of that big guy bending me over the table and pulling down my pants, tears drop on my shaking hands and Toby directs me to sit on the toilet while he takes some tweezers and yanks the glass from my foot.

  “When you tackled Xander I thought I would piss myself.” He says getting up to turn off the water. “Who knows how far it would have gone had you not done that, to think we went there to save you and you ended up saving us.” He stops and places his hand over my trembling one. “I know you think you’re weak. When my cousin held me down and started dry humping me, I felt powerless to do anything to that fat bitch. She was just stronger than me. She got her jollies off on telling me how weak I was compared to her, and for a while, I felt that way and hated it. Then I realized that I didn’t need to be as strong as her, just smarter. So I ended up buying a shit tone of chocolate and I melted it down and mixed laxatives in it. When my mom made me go to her house to stay, as usual, I knew that once she saw them, she would take them from me and she did just that. She ate them all and got the shits so bad she had to get hospitalized.”

  I laugh despite myself. “I wish I can do that to that asshole, that big one…”

  “Yeah, but the leader is down, that matters.”

  I get in the tub, my cuts stinging but it still feels good.

  Toby looks at himself in the mirror and begins nursing his own cuts and bruises. “At first, I didn’t even think it was you calling out to me, but when I saw Xander there was no mistaking it.” He rinses the towel and keeps it up. “I figured he was taking out some revenge on you for kicking him in the nuts so one of my friends had his bike with him, we followed and it led us to that motel. I knew we couldn’t do shit with just the two of us so I had him take me to Ivan’s place. He seemed protective of you enough from what I saw. If he didn’t do anything then I would have had to ask my friends or call the police.”

  “How do you know where he lives?” I ask curious, he never once told me of knowing Ivan that well.

  “Jealous?” He smiles at me from the mirror. “Seriously, last year of elementary school they bussed me to the so-called good school. I ended up in a group with him during a project, so I’ve been there a few times.”

  “If you’re worried about Ivan don’t bother. The guy is rich as hell and if he kills him then he’s made his bed.”

  I don’t know how to respond to that, Toby was always the one for brutal honesty.

  “Were you two really fucking?”

  “It was more than that.”

  “And all of that was true?” He turns to me, his nose much cleaner now. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to ruin the guy but damn…sucking Mr. Bowie’s cock while he was asleep…I don’t blame him but I wouldn’t actually do it.” He chuckles amused. “Actually, for a long time, I thought the two of them had something going on. Do you think he still likes him? I mean he did tell you he loves you so…”

  “Maybe he likes us both.” I shrug, feeling much better now that the grime, dirt, and the touch of that man was off me.

  “I’ve been sleeping with him…Mr. Bowie…Damien…”

  Now that I did not expect to hear. “What?” I say out of surprise. “For real?”

  “For real, for real.”

  “How? I mean what happened?”

  “He was giving me a makeup test and we started talking about being gay and one thing led to the next and we kissed, then we a
greed to meet up at a motel and the rest is history.”

  “So, he is screwing his students.”

  “He says its rumors but, he did it with me.”

  “You love him?”

  “No, he’s hot as fuck though.” He says leaving to get me some of his clothes. “Besides, I couldn’t get over how awkward it is, fucking a teacher, so I ended it.”

  I don’t know if I feel relieved or not. I’m far more concerned about Mr. Bowie possibly committing career suicide than anything else. He was nice to me and Ivan cares about him a great deal.

  IVAN

  I toss this asshole in the passenger seat of my car. He’s going to get blood all over my leather seats, reason enough to leave him to his fate. But I can’t avoid those black eyes staring up at me, pleading me to make the right choice. He was the one who was terrorized here tonight, I don’t have a right to be angrier than him. If he wants me to choose peace then that’s what I’ll do even if it would have brought me immense pleasure to see Xander’s brains scatter that outdated carpet.

  I took Xander as a spoiled brat and an asshole. I knew he always had a bit of a cruel streak, he had one ever since elementary and middle school and when he followed me Sophomore year, I knew it would only continue. Teasing sure, whatever, but it became worse until it escalated to kidnapping, forced porn, and rape.

  And of all the people in the world, this had to happen to my Raven. It’s all my fault, Xander did it to get at me, Raven’s association with me is what made him a target.

  “It hurts.”

  “You think I give a shit?” I say steering the vehicle but in no rush to get this bastard help and I’m in no mood to listen to his pleads and cries. Just as he ignored my Raven, I’ll ignore him.

  The building is still dark but I know the man I’m looking for is there. My brother didn’t like it when I contacted him asking him for the number of his back-alley doctor, but he trusted me enough not to ask. The man told me to meet him at this vet’s office.

  “What the fuck is this?” Xander groans when I pull him from the car. “I told you where to go.”