Missing Lynx (23 page)

“You. Are. Mine. And I will brand you as such.” Brennon’s smile turned to a snarl and Anyuska’s eyes clamped shut. She screamed the lullaby in her mind as the ring pressed into her inner thigh.

She draped her body against the chair. We were held in place — as she slipped in and out of consciousness — by the bindings. Black, red, and orange. Baby cries and the lullaby…

I was roused from the stupor by the sharp bite of a whip. My eyes wide and fixed.

“I am your master. I control you!”

A moan escaped my lips.

“QUIET.” The whip rained down across my shoulders, licking hotly across my breasts. I focused on clenching my teeth and not allowing my lips to part; not allowing any sound to emit from my throat. Andrew held complete control, and he commanded silence.

I slipped limply in my chair exhausted from bracing taut muscles against the onslaught. He stood beside her panting with his gentle hand on her head, rubbing Anyushka behind the ears like she was a dog. “Good slave,” he whispered carnally.

My pants were sodden and sticky from blood. In the Brennons’ basement, Anyushka sat naked. Dark red ran down her legs to pool on the floor. I had sensed my teammates’ strong emotions brewing and swelling like a thunderstorm around me, as Anyushka’s welts, bruises, and burns appeared on my arms and chest, visible above the low scoop-neck of my top.

A clock chimed above me for a second time. I knew this had been going on for over an hour. Andrew’s erection bounced free as he stripped off his pants and boxers. He rubbed himself up against my wounds and groaned with pleasure. He slowly released her restraints – first the ankles and knees, then the wrists and elbows. My feet and hands were numb from lack of circulation.

Anyushka’s head fell forward and Brennon wrapped her hair onto his wrist. He dragged her from the chair, laughing perversely. With what thoughts I could gather I wondered what he would do next with his sex-slave fantasies. I was on all fours being pulled forward by my hair, crawling toward a bed.

The phone rang on the table beside him. A lick of hope flickered in my chest. He kicked her in the gut sending me flying. Anyushka landed under the desk; I hit against the wall. My head stopped with a solid thud. The wind was knocked out of me. I needed to puke — my diaphragm and stomach muscles convulsed in opposition so I garnered no relief from oxygen or vomit.

Anyushka floated in and out of consciousness — the basement scene coming in and out of focus. I heard Andrew on the speaker phone. His wife, with great apprehension, announced a car had arrived; the men waited outside.

Andrew hung up without a word to his wife. He went through a door – the bathroom maybe. We lay there, blinking, minds as numb as our limbs. When he emerged, he was dressed — the lines on his face were smooth, his eyes warm and intelligent; he was a well-groomed, fairly handsome, businessman. I heard his tread on the staircase.

I took a minute to catch my breath then dragged myself back to the table, up into my chair. Picking up the photo. I asked Anyushka to tell me what was happening. Her story filled my head. “I am an un-wed mother from the Czech Republic. Like many girls, I dreamed of coming to America to improve my English, so I could get a good job in the city back home. Or perhaps maybe I would fall in love and marry an American man and make a happy family for my Anastasia.

“Naomi hired me as a nanny for her two daughters. She told me it was fine to bring my new baby; she said her girls loved to play with babies. Within days of coming to Washington, I woke up with Andrew standing over me, his red face contorted like a crazed bull. He told me he gave Anastasia to another family. Her new name is Olivia. He said the only way I could keep her alive is to be a very, very good slave. If I ever cried out, or tried to escape, or to get help, then Anastasia would be killed.”

I got the image of an empty crib with a rumpled pink blanket in the corner. Dread. Engulfing bleakness. Panic.

“I asked Naomi what was happening. Naomi looked at me with hard eyes. She said someone had to take her husband’s torture and sadistic sex. She said Andrew promised her that if she found him a slave he liked, then Naomi would be safe. She would be his wife, and the slave would take care of his
needs.
She said this, and she walked out the door.” I related all of this out loud so my team would hear the story.

I saw the image of a well-appointed office. The Brennons, another couple I didn’t recognize, a man…maybe a lawyer? I sat in a leather chair, and they handed me a contract – papers stapled across the top, rimmed by the blue cover. English words danced but didn’t make much sense to me. Struggling for breath, I focused on not fainting. I wanted to wail and wring my hands, but I remembered what Brennon told me about saving my baby. The lawyer – yes he must be a lawyer – pointed out lines, and I signed my name with a pen that shook so hard that no one would be able to read my signature.

“I would do anything to keep my baby alive. God help me, I will survive to protect her.” Anyushka’s soft voice lamented in my head.

Holding the picture I had drawn of the baby, I asked Anastasia/Olivia where she was living. I put my pen to the map and let my hand be free as it drew a line from our headquarters and followed the highway into the part of Washington where the rich and well-connected had their mansions. Jack moved a computer in front of me, with Google Maps on the screen, showing the area I had pointed out on the map. I searched from house to house until I found the one connected to the baby.

I was devoid of personal feeling. Personal thought. I was being used as a vessel — an inanimate object. Robotically, I looked at Striker. “Confirm the address. The family’s name is Hildebrandt. Confirm the adoption of Olivia Hildebrand on March 15
^th
last year.” I repeated the information I saw on the contract at the lawyer’s office. My voice was the staccato drum beat of a funeral march. “Confirm the work visas and entry into the US of Anyushka Vlamnisch accompanied by her infant daughter, February 23
^rd
.” 

Striker was on the phone asking for computer searches. While we waited for the confirmations, Striker quietly worked on assembling three teams to make apprehensions, and one team included medics to rescue Anyushka.

I sat like a plastic doll, unblinking, unfeeling, a void.

Suddenly, I bent over the trashcan and vomited. I lowered myself back to the floor to rest. Awareness slowly returned along with physical pain. Ah, there was a feeling that belonged to me — exhaustion. I moaned, knowing now I could; Brennon wouldn’t hear me and punish me.

“Can you be touched? Can we help you?” Jack crouched down beside me.

“Not until Anyushka is safe. I have to keep the Veil open; this is my only opportunity…”

Jack hovered beside me. I clung to the picture of Anyushka; she had crawled behind a wall Brennon had been built to hide her. This was where she recovered unseen, so the Brennon girls would not stumble upon her, while her bloody wounds were visible. We rested together.

The phone rang again. “Confirmed, Anyushka Vlamnisch entered the US on February 23
^rd
with an infant girl named Anastasia. Also confirmed, Anastasia Vlamnisch, from the Czech Republic, was adopted March 15th
by Eric and Tesla Hildebrandt. Her new name is Olivia Clair Hildebrandt.” Striker said this out loud so we would all hear, then he directed his voice back into the phone. “Tell the teams it’s a go.”

I walked myself partially out from behind the Veil. “You will not be able to find Anyushka – she’s hiding. The rescue team will cause her more harm if they go in and try to get her. Anyushka is ready to kill herself. She believes if anyone discovers her, either Naomi or Andrew will kill her baby. Can you surround the house to protect Anyushka, but wait for the baby to be in our custody? Then we’ll walk through this carefully.”

“Do you know where Naomi is right now?” Striker handed me the stack of pictures, careful not to touch me. I found her at a restaurant with the children, eating ice cream and laughing. “Down the street from her house — a place called Vito’s.” Striker held his phone to his ear mobilizing a team.

My gaze fell on Andrew’s picture. “Striker, Andrew is using a key to open a box in a vault room. He’s putting three flash drives into his briefcase in a secret compartment in the bottom. Wires. The compartment is booby-trapped.” I dropped the photo and kicked it away from me like it was a rattlesnake. Horror. Repulsion. I couldn’t abide a psychic connection to evil. I gulped water from a bottle that Jack has set beside me and vomited. I aimed for the wastebasket, but I found it hard to hold my head up. Groaning, I collapsed on the floor. “I need to close my eyes.”

Time passed. My body ached, the burns screamed, the welts, covering me from the whip lashes, swelled, raw and angry. I cried and moaned from the pain. My team hovered. Fists tight. Jaws clenched. Their distress was tangible; I could taste it — thick and salty. It combined with the bile on the back of my throat and choked me.

Another phone call came in. Striker listened on speaker. “Sir, we’re at the address of the Hildebrandt home; there’s no one here.”

I pulled myself painfully up into the chair and picked up the drawing of the baby; I asked her where she had gone. I put the pen on the map, starting at the Hildebrandt house, and traced a route. This time I got a clear picture in my mind. I wrote down the address.

“The woman who lives in this house is a good woman. She has no knowledge of any of the horror that her son helped to create by adopting Olivia. Please treat her with the utmost respect; she is so fragile. The shock will be difficult. Have medical support at the ready. This is the home of the paternal grandmother. The whole family is sitting down to her birthday dinner. The baby is sleeping in a crib, up the stairs, third door on the left.”

The apprehension and extraction teams went out again, arrest warrants in hand, search warrants with the new address being faxed to the car. Iniquus got what it wanted, when they wanted it; that was part of their success.

I laid myself back down on the floor. It felt better down there. The phone rang; Striker put it on speaker so I could hear. “Striker, sir, we’ve apprehended Naomi Brennon. Social Services is en route to help with the two children. Once they’ve arrived, we’ll take her to the client for questioning,” Clay said.

“Affirmative,” Striker replied. “Make sure you’re recording at all times.”

“Yes, sir, Bonz had the camera on the entire capture.”

Jack put another bottle of water down beside me. I struggled to sit up, and drank some of it. It burned my throat, and I vomited it back into the wastebasket. I drank and vomited, drank and vomited. I needed to purge the toxins from me. I was panting from the exertion of sitting, and I dropped into a heap on the floor. I cried again. Softly, Anyushka and I whimpered and moaned.

Striker lay down beside me. “Lynx …Chica,” he called softly, careful not to touch me. I cracked my eyes open to see him. “They have the Hildebrandts in custody. The elderly Mrs. Hildebrandt is being taken to the hospital for observation. They have the baby; she’s sleeping and healthy. Andrew’s apprehension is in play. We need to get help to Anyushka. Please tell me how to do this.”

My voice squeaked from my raw throat. “They gave her poison that she wears in a vial around her neck; she’s supposed to swallow it if she thinks that she will be discovered. It will kill her, but in her mind, her death will save her child. I need to ask what to do.”

I rolled onto my back. I breathed in slowly and sank deeper behind the Veil. I called for help — to what or whom I didn’t know. I had never tried before. I was following my instincts. I waited, shivering now from the cold sweat covering me. Lights and colors kaleidoscope-d before my closed eyes. Then the answer played out for me in my mind’s eyes like a movie. I heard Naomi’s voice yelling down the stairs that she was going up to take a hot bath and relax. Anyushka was to get herself covered up, and take the girls up to Vito’s Pizzeria for dinner and keep them out of her hair because she had a sick headache. The girls were in the backyard playing. This was from a recording that was made of Naomi’s voice being played on a computer by one of our operatives.

In the movie came an image of Anyushka gathering herself up from her hiding place in the wall. She washed up in the bathroom, dressed herself, put on her coat and limped outside to find the girls. As she looked around the jungle gym and in the playhouse for the children, the team raced in and restrained her before she could do herself harm. They were careful not to have any weapons on them. Anyushka could not be asked to think or act rationally. She was immediately tranquilized for her own protection. When she came to in the hospital, a uniformed woman was holding Anastasia out to her mother.

I whispered, “Thank you.” and opened my eyes again. Striker was still lying next to me “Did I say that out loud? Do you understand the plan?” I asked him.

“Jack is on the phone arranging it. We’re telling Naomi we know about the drug, and she will be charged with first degree murder if anything happens to this girl. Naomi’s been cooperating so far. I’m sure she’ll do this. As soon as Bonz and Clay have the recording, they’ll send it to the rescue team’s computer. Medical is already in place. The tranquilizer is en route.”

I nodded; nothing to do now but wait and hope for speed of action. I wanted my own meds. I wanted to go blissfully into the deep, deep sleep I knew awaited me, when I came fully back out of the Veil.

I felt enormous pain as Anyushka roused herself and pulled her clothes on to her body. I cried out and sobbed in distress, though I knew Anyushka held her groans back behind clenched teeth. Her body swayed up the stairs, as she forced her legs to bend and straighten, bend and straighten. She stood outside in the cold air calling for the little girls — frantic when she didn’t see or hear them, afraid they were lost or injured - not for the children’s sake, but for her own, and that of her baby. Flashes of gray, as men sprang from nowhere; a scream of terror wrenched from our throats. In my office, my teammates jumped at the sound, their eyes wide with shock. Anyushka and I were restrained by the extraction team and a tranquilizer pricked into our vein.