Harrowing (22 page)

My eyelids drooped and felt heavy. My head was hanging, and I could feel there was something tight holding me up. I dared to peel my eyelids open just a crack, and glance about me as best as I could through this minuscule opening. I could see I was sitting up stiff and awkward in some sort of chair, held upright by thick, knotted cords. I could hear vague noises close by, a banging, a shuffling of feet, but nothing that revealed to me what was going on exactly.

My head was swimming. Bile rose up in my throat and I gulped it down bitterly, stinging the delicate membranes in the back of my throat. I wanted to lift my head but I felt woozy. Suddenly, I remembered Romeo and Calvin. I wondered where they were and what had happened to them. I made an effort to move my head, even if only an inch.

I tried to flex my hands. My arms were tied up firmly to something, something hard and slender, like the wooden slats of a chair. I struggled to move, strained with all my might against whatever was holding me down, but nothing budged. I tried to raise my eyelids and caught a glimpse of Calvin hunched over against the wall behind the staircase, a dark bulk criss-crossed with corded ropes like the ones that were holding me.

Next to him, I was able to make out the slight form of Romeo plastered against the stairs, a look of utter terror in his eyes. Relief that he seemed unhurt mingled with rage and helplessness that I couldn’t do a thing to save him. I couldn’t comfort him, make it better or get him out of here.

I blinked. My eyelids felt as if they were made of plastiline. Coarse sand grated against the insides of my eyes. Someone cleared his throat, shuffling footsteps sliding slinkily to my side. I glanced up, deep into the scowling, twisted countenance of Bruno.

“Ah, you’re awake, Annasuya Rose Adler,” he hissed out in a sibilance. “Maybe now you’ll take the time to actually listen to me.” He clapped his hands together, cleared his throat again. “That day in my office, such a long time ago, it seems. You totally misunderstood me. You shouldn’t have gone running, you know.”

He looked about, as if searching for someplace to sit so he could lower himself to my level. At last, he crouched by my side.

“It was never my intention to hurt you. I merely wanted to get my message across to you.”

I gaped at him, uncomprehending. I didn’t know why I bothered to even try to follow what he was saying. We all knew he was about one hundred and ten percent nuts.

He cupped his hand about my knee.

I jumped as if an electric shock had just coursed through me.

He grinned.

“You should feel honoured, Annasuya Rose. I only choose women who are meant for greatness. So now you know. It’s your destiny to be great.”

I didn’t understand a thing he was saying. This didn’t seem to faze him one bit.

“You see, Annasuya Rose, dear, I was granted a special talent, a gift from heaven, you could say. I have the power of prophecy. I am able to tell when someone is destined for greatness. I simply am. It’s my gift.”

He clapped his hands together in satisfaction.

“And, naturally, I wish to share my insights. So when I meet one of these women who are destined for greatness, naturally, I want to let them know, somehow.”

He graced me with a warm smile.

“Let’s just say, I like to reveal your special, privileged position to you, so you can get started right away working at whatever it is that will make you great one day.”

I felt as if he were tying my head up in knots. He rose to his feet and chucked his fist under my chin, raising my head so I could gaze straight at him.

“I didn’t know then what it is you are meant to do. But when you walked in through my door that day, suddenly, I simply
knew.
It was like a halo was surrounding you, and I
knew,
beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you were meant to be great.”

Finally, I found my voice.

“If I were meant to be great, then why do you have me tied up here in this... this...
cellar?
” I whispered through clenched teeth. “Why don’t you let me go, so I can get to work doing whatever it is I’m supposed to be doing?”

Bruno shook his head, clucking with disapproval.

“I tried to let you go. I tried to give you a chance. But you wouldn’t
listen
to me.” His voice started rising unpleasantly. “That day in my office, I was
trying
to convey my message to you. But you wouldn’t stay and pay attention to me.”

Anger flared up in me.

“You
raped
me, you bastard!” I cried out. “You call that, trying to convey some sort of sick, shit message to me?” I battered against my bindings. “Let go of me, you son of a bitch.”

Bruno stroked his fingers along my cheek. I wished I dared to turn my face and bite him.

“That wasn’t rape, my dear. That was love,” he crooned.

I nearly choked.

“Let me out of here!” I screamed.

Bruno shook his head and clucked again.

“No, Annasuya Rose. It’s too late now. You should have taken my message when you had the chance.” He clucked in disapproval. “I was going to talk to you about the new world order I’ve been called upon to establish. I knew I was supposed to do it hand in hand with someone, but I had no idea
who.
But I knew the right person would be revealed to me in due time.”

He strolled over to one of the wooden counters and groped about in the dark. I strained my eyes, trying to distinguish what he was doing. A part of me was aware of how Romeo was gawking at me, his eyes nearly falling out of his face. But in spite of myself, now it was Bruno who had captured all my attention and fascination.

Bruno seized something hidden in his hand and idled over to Calvin, kicking at him where he lay crumpled in a heap on the floor.

“Wake up, you big oaf,” he goaded. “Come to already. I want you to see what I’m planning on doing to your girlfriend.”

He turned towards me, vindictive.

“What I’m planning to do to your girlfriend because
she
just so happens to be too mule-headed to pay any attention to me. Well, now she’s going to pay the price. The full price. And I’m sure you encouraged her so, I’d like you to watch.”

Calvin stirred ever so slightly. Hope battered in my chest, mixed with dread. Hope that maybe Calvin could somehow find the way out for us. Dread at what could happen to him, or that Bruno could hurt him.

Bruno kicked at him some more, and he started to rouse. He shook his head, his eyelids beating, fluttering like butterfly wings. And he himself as fragile and jailed as a butterfly before Bruno’s merciless assaults.

At last he seemed to come around. He opened his eyes completely and abject fear blanked across his face. Bruno smirked.

“Hello, Calvin.”

Calvin gaped at him.

“You remember me, don’t you? I hired you. Or rather, my boss did.” He grinned delightedly. “But when we started working together, I never in a hundred years expected we’d become such close companions.”

He squatted and hooked his arm around Calvin’s neck.

“Hey, look. Seems we’re as close as bosom buddies.”

He shook him amiably by the shoulder, then stood and ambled over to my side. Behind him, I saw Calvin straining away at the ropes that bound him, without avail.

“Look what I’m going to do to your girlfriend,” he said. “She was destined to be my consort, in the new world order. My queen. But this is what the two of you have gone and done to my gift. To my position. To the privilege I was about to grant her.”

He turned and spat viciously onto the floor.

“This is how you’ve treated
my
gift to you. So now you’ve lost it. You don’t deserve it.”

He turned back to me and revealed what he held hidden in his hand. It was a box cutter, glinting in the faint light of the dim light bulb.

Waves of chills streamed up and down my spine as I studied the hard weapon in his hand with morbid fascination. Streams of ice water cascading through and through me inside. I felt like throwing up.

Bruno strolled back to Calvin’s side and lowered himself to his level. He held the cutter knife before his gaze, turning it coyly so the dull blade caught what little light there was.

“Do you doubt this is real, hefty guy? You wanna know what I can do with this?”

He glanced down and pressed the slender blade lightly against his finger, drawing out a dot of blood with a slight prick. He moaned with pleasure.

“Ah, that felt good. Made me feel alive.” He shook himself out like a dog and raked his eyes over Calvin. “You wanna feel what I feel, knight in shining armour?”

A grin cracked across his face from ear to ear. A malevolent grin. Without warning, he slashed the cutter down against Calvin’s cheek. Calvin started, flinched back. Blood began oozing from a gash on the side of his face.

I screamed.

Bruno glanced over at me and grinned some more.

“That scare you, Annasuya Rose?”

He hauled Calvin around by the shoulder.

“That’s nothing compared to what I’ve got reserved for
you
– and your damn lout of a son there.”

My insides went ice cold.

“Leave my son alone,” I whispered, my voice barely making it past my lips. “Please, Bruno. I’ll do anything. Anything at all. Just please, don’t hurt him.”

Romeo stared at me, mute and trembling. Bruno stroked a finger almost lovingly along Romeo’s cheek.

“Yep, I won’t deny, he’s kinda cute, Annasuya Rose.”

He walked over to me.

“What will you give me, Annasuya, to get me to leave him alone?”

He fixed me with a penetrating glare.

“Anything,” I replied, my voice firm this time. “I’ll give you anything, do anything, if you leave my son alone.”

Bruno turned and lowered the cutter to Romeo’s cheek.

“His skin’s so lovely, Anita. Isn’t that what your friends call you sometimes? Anita?” He flexed his fingers with delight. “Don’t you just love baby skin?”

I flailed about, helpless and furious.

“I’ll kill you, Bruno,” I cried.

Bruno merely nodded his head in acknowledgement. He lowered the cutter to Romeo’s neck.

“And what about the rest of this little baby boy? Where shall I start?”

“Leave him alone,” I whispered, narrowing my eyes.

Bruno arched his eyebrows.

“Ah, Annasuya, but you see, I can’t leave him alone. I’m on a roll. I need... relief. I need release.”

He smirked.

“What would you do for me, Annasuya, if I decide to leave him alone?”

“I told you. Anything.”

I didn’t hesitate with my answer.

The grin that spread across Bruno’s face this time was slow and painstaking.

“Anything?”

He seized Romeo by the arm and dug the cutter underneath the sleeve of his T-shirt. Romeo whimpered.

“I’m of a mind to cutting into him
here.
”

His grin reached full bloom.

“Would you take that cut for him?”

“Of course.”

Once again, no hesitation in my reply.

“Whatever you want, Bruno. Anything.”

Bruno got up, levelled a kick against Calvin’s shin.

“Ah, Annasuya. It’s easy to talk when you’re still unhurt. When flesh is still uncut. When you haven’t as yet felt the pain against your own skin.”

He sneered at Calvin. Calvin only battled impotent against his bindings.

“This is what I’ve always wanted,” he said, crowing. “To control a full family all by myself.”

He returned to my side, ground the cutter against my arm, ferocious.

“Are you sure about it, Annasuya? Once this blade goes in, it’ll be too late. Are you sure you want to make this sacrifice for your son?”

I gulped. Nodded.

“I’d do anything for Romeo,” I whispered. “Whatever you were planning on doing to Romeo, do it to
me
instead. It’s me you want, after all. Isn’t it?”

“I hold thee by thy word, Annasuya Rose,” Bruno declaimed in an imitation cartoon voice. “As you know, I hold ze power of life and death over thee.”

He dropped his pose.

“Over your whole fucking family, in fact.”

He leaned over and clasped my chin in his fingers with spite.

“You would’ve made a beautiful queen to walk by my side, my lovely lady,” he said. “But now it’s too late. I can’t have you. So I’ll make sure no one else does either.”

I longed with everything to be able to snatch my hands up and bash them into his face.

The cutter knife glittered again in the pale light as Calvin finally found his voice and screamed: “You leave her alone, you fucking bastard.”