Bound to Her - Deborah Pin (books for 9th graders .TXT) 📗

how not okay her situation was. The bright spring day was everything life was supposed to be, but her life was on the brink of ending and the beautiful warm day was a painful taunt.

He yanked her body from the trunk and directly into a cluttered and

garbage-filled garage that the car had been backed up to. Katrina

watched in dread when the sun disappeared slowly as the door of the garage was lowered and when the last of the real world was gone, she glanced to him.

He looked oddly normal in a boring sort of way. He was trim, dressed

just like any other person in the world and it was hard to imagine this man wanted to kill her. But he did. There was no doubt in her mind and

he was absolutely going to succeed if she didn’t do something to stop it.

She watched again as he cocked his hand back and his fist once more came flying to her head. And then there was more darkness.

But now she was rousing again just to find herself still bound, still with her mouth taped shut and still horrified this was how she was going

to meet her end.

She wasn’t ready and as tears pricked her eyes, she fought the

overwhelming urge to break down and give up. She was afraid to fight.

She was afraid to stand up for herself but she stomped her foot on the concrete ground she was sitting on and she kept on stomping until her foot hurt and her brain woke up.

She looked around. She was alone. The room was sparse and almost

empty. The uneven concrete floor looked old and it had the musty

mildew smell of an old basement but there were walls.

Dirty old unpainted drywall enclosed the small room and a single

lightbulb hung from the ceiling. There was a folding chair sitting along the opposite wall and a bucket sitting on the floor nearby. A small table

sat next to the folding chair and a roll of duct tape sat on top along with a box of garbage bags and a wound-up length of rope. The sight of those

items alone had the fear pricking her brain.

She tried to focus on what she’d learned in self-defense class but it was hard as hell. Every sound she heard convinced her the man was coming to kill her and concentrating on what she needed to concentrate

on was harder than it had ever been in her entire life. She closed her eyes, replaying the class in her mind, pushing the fear aside as much as possible.

She was fucked if she couldn’t get her hands free so she started working on the tape. She had nails and she whittled at the sticky strong

surface with the nails of her thumbs and middle fingers. She gouged at

the tape, one layer at a time. She’d stick her nail through, piercing one layer and pulling to tear through it. It was a slow, incessant process and

as her fingers worked through the layers, her hands started to cramp. She

forced her brain to go back to the training.

The eyes, go for the eyes. It doesn’t take much to throw a person off their game when it comes to the eyes. Just the slightest irritation could cause him to lose his defenses. The nose. The nose was also sensitive. The groin.

The hardest of all would be focusing if he choked her. It was

horrifying being unable to breathe but she had to concentrate. If he used two hands, it meant she had two hands free to defend herself and he couldn’t defend himself with his fingers wrapped around her neck.

She swallowed hard at nothing more than the thought alone. Could

she do this? Could she fight and live? Did she have a choice? Fuck no, she didn’t, and she wasn’t ready to be done with this life. Concentrate.

She just had to concentrate.

When the sound of a nearby door being opened startled her out of her

subconscious training session, she yelped and jumped and the panic

started setting in again. Her fingers were still working. She’d punctured

through a large section of tape but she’d been unable to tear through the

thickness and had to backtrack to tackle a smaller section.

She was trying to visualize what her hands were doing behind her

back, letting her mind see her progress. She had no idea if she was actually making as much progress as she hoped she was but she wasn’t

willing to consider that she couldn’t free herself. She had to free her hands. She had to have her hands.

Eventually there was a loosening around her wrists. She could feel movement that hadn’t been there before. It was subtle at first but the more punctures she made in the layers, the more movement she thought

she could feel until finally she was certain it wasn’t just her imagination.

She could do this. She had to do this.

When she heard feet moving toward her, her fingers instantly stilled

and her heart instantly pounded. She fought the panic but in the end panic won over and as she listened to the feet moving closer and closer,

her eyes filled with tears and terror squeezed her chest like a vise grip.

The doorknob turned and she watched the glint of the metal as it was wrenched slowly. She started fighting the restraint of the tape but while

her wrists were looser, she simply couldn’t break free.

The door was pushed open and the panic she felt before ratcheted up

to a level she didn’t know even existed. Then she glanced up, freezing in

place and holding her breath. The face looking back at her made her gasp

in shock.

“What are you doing here?”

* * * * *

“Hey, we just got the plates back.” Terrell was walking back toward them where Dillon was pacing, Stephens was talking on the phone to the

patrol officer who was on his way to Seth and Smith was staring at the

desktop. Dillon couldn’t seem to stop pacing and even as Terrell

approached, he kept walking back and forth. That was until Terrell spoke

again. “The plates are registered to Josh Grant.”

“What?” Dillon wasn’t the only one who said the word or who had shock plastered across their face. “Wait. You ruled this one out, didn’t you?”

Smith and Terrell both nodded and they looked as confused as Dillon

felt. Stephens hung up quickly, handing a slip of paper to Dillon, who grabbed his cell phone and stepped away to call Seth.

Seth still sounded rattled when Dillon spoke to him but he wouldn’t

even hear of Dillon staying on the phone with him when Katrina was missing. Dillon gave him the officer’s badge number that Stephens had written down and then Seth practically hung up on him when Dillon offered again to stay on the line.

He returned to the group of men. Greenwood had joined them and it

was the tensest group of men he’d ever seen. He was likely the tensest of

all and he stood by shifting from one foot to the other as they discussed

calling in SWAT. Smith ran to grab the file with Grant’s address in it. It

was mere minutes before Greenwood had given the okay to contact the

Incident Commander and request SWAT presence and as jackets were

grabbed and guns were checked and holstered, Greenwood grabbed

Dillon’s elbow.

“You’re not going in that house. Do you understand?”

“I’m not staying here.” Dillon’s jaw was tight and clenched as he spoke and he was struggling to keep his composure.

“You’re not going in that house!” And then turning to Stephens who

barely looked like he was breathing, Greenwood barked, “You keep him

in line or it’s both of your asses!” Greenwood stormed off in a rage but

Dillon was blind to it and more than that, he just didn’t give a shit about

it.

They watched Smith and Terrell leave after Smith hung up with the SWAT Sergeant and Dillon was back to pacing. He couldn’t seem to stop

pacing and as Stephens watched him, he swore under his breath,

grabbed his jacket and snatching Dillon’s up off his chair tossed it to him.

“You’re going to drive me nuts if I don’t get you out of here. Come on.

I’ll cuff you to the fucking car door if I have to but we can at least be there.”

Dillon breathed a heavy sigh and followed Stephens from the

building. Seth called as they walked to Stephens’ car. The patrol officer was driving him back to Molly’s house and they were only a block away.

The officer was to stay with them until he heard otherwise and when Seth commented that he could see Molly standing in the driveway

waiting for him, he was finally able to let go of one source of panic and

focus fully on the other.

“Dad, please get Ms. Page back. She has to be okay.” Seth’s voice was

barely a whisper and he could tell he was choked up. It broke his heart to

hear his son so emotional. Seth was the cool cat—he didn’t get emotional.

“We’re doing everything we can, bud. I promise. I’ll talk to you

soon.” He listened as Molly met him hopping out the car and then he was gone. Seth was right—she had to be okay. He understood the

desperation in Seth’s voice. It was the same desperation he felt. She had

to be okay.

* * * * *

Josh was eying her as he sat on the chair. He held a handgun in his lap and he kept staring at it as though he was confused by it. He’d not left the room in the fifteen or so minutes since he’d shocked the hell out

of her when he entered. She’d not expected to see his face.

He just watched her. He was as odd in this setting as he always had

been in her classroom. She tried to engage him in conversation but he refused to answer her. He just stared. She kept working on the tape, timing her questions to Josh when she was poised to puncture a

fingernail through a section of tape. Not that he would respond but she

hoped her incessant questions would be a good cover for what her hands

were doing.

“Josh, you don’t have to do this. You didn’t kidnap me, you’re not in

any trouble yet.” That statement left a large section of duct tape torn completely through and she wriggled against the wall as though she was

uncomfortable to hide the movements she needed to make. “Please, Josh.

You’re a good man.”

The fuck he was. He was a lunatic and she wanted to beat the shit out

of his creepy-ass self.

Then she heard it. More footsteps. It hadn’t escaped her attention they

couldn’t possibly be alone. The man who’d taken her from Imogen’s was

the man she recognized from the contracting company that had done

work on her bathroom, not Josh. How they knew each other was outside

her scope of reasoning and it seemed an unlikely partnership to be certain but it wasn’t her concern at the moment.

Josh seemed as weak and vulnerable even here as he always was and

it wasn’t he who concerned her most. It was the occasional footsteps above her that did. They were the other man, Clinton Lathrop. He scared

her—not that Josh didn’t but it was a different type of fear.

The footsteps she heard suddenly started moving around more and

when a door opened and the sound changed to footsteps coming down

stairs, her fear spiked and she started twisting against the restraints again and digging her fingernails through layers of tape, picking and yanking

at the fibers. If she pulled with the grain of the fibers there was little resistance and if she kept the sections narrow enough she could yank and

tear through the thin sections that went against the grain. But it was a damn slow process and she was struggling in her panic to hide her desperate movements.

She whimpered when Clinton suddenly opened the door and Josh

stood, looking at him nervously. “We ready to have some fun, kids?” His

voice was sickeningly jovial and she shuddered at just what that might mean to a fucking wackjob as himself. The erection that strained the front

of his pants almost made her gag but it was made all the worse when she

noticed a similar arousal in Josh who still looked nervously back and forth from Katrina to Clinton.

“You’ve met my dear friend Josh, I see. A pleasant reunion for you two? He’s sorry he had to drop out of your class but he was attracting a

bit too much attention for my liking.”

And then sauntering toward her, he spoke conversationally. “We met

a while back. He wasn’t difficult to find. Already a student in one of your

classes and he’d obviously taken a liking to you. Caught him jacking off

in his car to a picture of you and it was just instant friendship.” He

smiled brightly, as only a lunatic could in such a situation and Josh sheepishly looked away.

“Doesn’t say much but he’s proved helpful and I promised him a big

payoff. I mean, those photo creations alone were pure genius. I couldn’t

have done that. I clean pipes for a living, for fuck’s sake.”

And then walking to Josh, he placed his hand affectionately on the top of his head and continued in a whimsical voice. “Cleaned his pipes a

time or two, haven’t we?” When Josh started trembling and failed to answer, Clinton’s fingers curled and tangled in Josh’s hair before he yanked his head back to look up at Clinton. “I said, haven’t we?”

Clinton’s face was lascivious and his smile was pure lunacy.

“Yes…yes, Clint.”

“See, my good friend has had plenty of uses to me. We have a lot of

fun together. And since you’ve been so preoccupied with your cop,

we’ve had to be patient.” He looked down to Josh with a sympathetic, if

not sad, look on his face.

“But Josh isn’t you, dear.” His eyes returned to Katrina. “And I’m tired of making do with his ass when what I really want is yours.”

Katrina’s entire body started to tremble. She was digging into the tape but it was useless. She’d never make it in time.

He started moving slowly, tauntingly toward her. He tiptoed with a

completely contrived look of trepidation on his face. He was toying with

her, torturing her nerves, and he was good at it. The moment he’d get near her, he’d take a few steps back in a bizarre swaying dance. Katrina

started whimpering and crying as he tormented her and slowly closed in.

“All of you. I want you to scream, I want you to bleed, I want you to

beg and then I want you to die.” His eyes were wide and maniacal as he

glared with a sickening expression down to her. He was standing in front

of her, his crotch at eye-level. His arousal was quite obvious and Katrina

had bile rising up in her throat at nothing more than the bulge in his jeans. When he touched his crotch, she groaned in emotional agony.

The horrible tremble that was running through her body hid what her

fingernails were desperately trying to do behind her back, and she stared

straight at his pants as her mind focused on the tape. She gouged, she picked and she tore until she thought her fingertips must be bleeding.

When he kneeled down in front of her, he reached for her neck,

gripping with one hand. He was squeezing, slowly tightening his hold.

She couldn’t stop the panic from inching in as her air was cut off. Forcing

her fingers to work while his hand remained on her throat was nearly impossible but it was her only chance.

Her eyes filled with tears as he stared at her. She held his eyes as his

fingers tightened and then loosened and then tightened all over again.

He knew how to torment and every time she felt the constricting

pressure of his fingers around her throat the panic would cloud her brain

and her fingers would still. She used the occasional reprieve he gave her

when he’d loosen his hold to focus on her task. She’d cough as the air suddenly flooded back into her lungs and it was then she’d yank, stab and twist against the tape.

Josh remained sitting on the chair nearby. He looked terrified but he

also looked crazy and when she met his eyes she begged. “Please, Josh.

You don’t have to do this. He’s already hurt you but you can stop him.”

The moment she got the words out Clinton’s grip on her throat

tightened again and cut off her voice as she started struggling to breathe.

When he leaned his face down to her, he was close enough to kiss her and she wondered for a moment if he would. “Josh is mine and he knows his place. Now how about we get you out of those clothes so you

can show us what we’ve so patiently been waiting for?”

He released her throat and she gasped for air. When he grabbed her

elbow, yanking her up to her feet, she could feel the already partially torn tape tearing further and she instantly shrieked to hide the sound.

She was left standing in front of the men with her hands only loosely bound.

Her heart was racing. It was excitement, but terror, all in one breath.

There was little question she could yank her wrists free at this point, thanks to the weight of her body being pulled up by her arms but it didn’t mean she was ready to. She was terrified of what she needed to do.

Clinton pulled a long knife from his back pocket and though it sent a

driving urge to tear her hands loose and try to fight she held her ground.

She had to wait until he was distracted if there was any chance of keeping that knife out of her body. So she gasped and took as many tremulous breaths as she could. He started at her throat with the knife,

cutting through the fabric and when he’d finished with her shirt he reached a hand out to her breast, gripping her harshly through her bra.

He turned toward Josh, who appeared to be cowering as much as she

was. “Remember the fucking checkerboard I cut into her fucking tit?” It

was an opportunity. She might die taking it but it was now or never. The

knife was held slack at his side and he was turned from her. She was terrified—she was more terrified than she’d been in her entire life but if

she was waiting for a time when she wasn’t terrified to move she’d be waiting until this man killed her. And so she yanked.

* * * * *

The house was small and surrounded by overgrown bushes and trees.

It was obviously ill-kept and the bushes alone were going to make their

approach difficult. The black car was backed up to the garage and that was all the confirmation SWAT needed to enter.

There was a large bank of low-branching trees on the side of the garage and on the opposite side of the house. It was making it difficult for the SWAT team to circle the property effectively and monitor all sides

at once.

Dillon could do nothing but watch from a distance that made him

uncomfortable. Hell, the whole thing made him uncomfortable and he

was going to be on the brink of losing his mind until this thing played out.

Knowing she was in there and he couldn’t get to her was pure torture.

It was more torture than he’d ever felt and he knew, standing by Stephens’ car with him, that it had been a mistake to come.

He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t stand by and let someone else try to

save her. She was too close and he was just too damn unhinged to sit back. The moment he took even one step toward the house though

Stephens was there with his hand on his elbow, pulling him back. “Fuck,

Stephens. I can’t…I can’t fucking do this.”

“Then you need to leave!”

They watched as Smith and Terrell approached the front door of the

house behind the SWAT team. The men were in position. It was time.

* * * * *

The moment Katrina’s hands swung away from her body Clinton

whipped toward her. The snarl coming from his mouth coupled with the

monstrous sneer on his face froze her in place and when his fist shot out,

hitting her square in the gut and throwing her into the wall behind her,

she was effectively stunned into immobility. She also couldn’t breathe thanks to the air he’d knocked out of her lungs.

Her face was down toward the floor as she tried in vain to suck in enough air. When his palm met her throat again, gripping tight, she clutched at his wrist.

She was panicking. She knew she was and she knew she didn’t have

the luxury of her panic if there was any hope of surviving but then she

was no longer holding out much hope of that happening. She was

gripping and clawing at his hand but it was to no avail.

When she saw him lift the knife, he was taunting her. He was holding

it so she could see it clearly. She couldn’t breathe and he was showing her just how much control he had and just how much control she didn’t

have. But the knife glinting in front of her lit a fire in her gut and when

his fingers tightened just marginally, she fought. She brought her knee up into his groin as hard as she could and as his breath escaped in a rush

of agony his grip was loosened and the knife clanked to the floor. She dropped to her knees, grabbing blindly for the knife handle as he grabbed the hair at the top of her head and yanked up. But she found the

handle and as she looked up into his furious, vengeful eyes, she brought

the knife up and plunged it into his side.

His eyes bulged, his mouth dropped open and he let out a god-awful

guttural groan as he sank to the floor in front of her. The look in his eyes was shock. He stared wide-eyed at her before he found his bearings and

started reaching for the knife still sticking out of his side. But she was faster than he was and she grabbed the handle again, wrenching it from

his body as he fell back.

Josh stood from the chair whimpering like a scared child, but

however scared he looked, he held the gun in his hand. It trembled as his

whole body vibrated and as she raised her hands in the air, she started

pleading. “Please. Please, Josh. You don’t have to do this. Please.”

“Shoot that bitch, you stupid fuck.” His voice was gurgling and blood

was bubbling up from his mouth as he spoke. “You fucking loser. Shoot her. What are you waiting for?”

“Please. Please don’t do this.” Josh stood trembling and whimpering.

He could barely hold the gun steady but as she watched in horror he adjusted his aim. She cried out at the last moment and he fired.

* * * * *

Stephens tackled him to the ground as he sprinted across the lawn.

The shot was unmistakable and it was discharged before any of the SWAT team had made it into the house. He watched the group storm through the front door and as they disappeared he could do nothing but

listen to the shouts coming from inside.

Stephens refused to release him and kept him pinned to the ground as

the shouts continued. Dillon felt as if he were dying. He couldn’t endure

it if she died and he’d never felt closer to insanity than in that moment.

He was pinned like a crazed animal to the ground, listening to the fight

for Katrina’s life play out without him.

The garage door opener suddenly activating shocked them both and

Stephens leaped from Dillon’s body, pulling his sidearm from its holster.

Dillon followed his lead the second he was up off the ground and they rounded slowly and cautiously toward the garage from their place on the

front lawn.

The front SWAT team was all within the house, storming through the

residence in response to the shots fired and he could hear the men in the

back, fighting to get through the foliage and branches that blocked their

path around to the front of the garage.

They had no idea what awaited inside the garage but the second he heard Katrina’s whimpers he threw procedure out the window and ran

out into the driveway as Stephens cussed and yelled after him. He came

face-to-face with Josh and Katrina standing within. Josh held a gun to Katrina’s head and he was whimpering and shaking as much as she was

—but as frightened as he might be he was threatening her life.

He pushed her out of the garage in front of him. Dillon’s gun was trained on his head, and Stephens’ was too from his place on the lawn.

He wasn’t going to lower his gun until the man was dead or gave up his

gun in surrender. Dillon glared at him, holding his focus within the sites

of the handgun.

He wanted so desperately to look at Katrina, see if she was okay, simply see her alive but he forced his eyes to remain on Josh.

“I just…I just want this to be over. I don’t want this. Please. Just let me

go.” Josh was whimpering, sobbing as he walked farther out into the driveway.

“Let her go now!” He bellowed at the man. Josh flinched and cried out at the sound of his voice but he refused to let her go. “You let her go

now or I will kill you!”

Josh started sobbing but the gun remained in place. The man was

breaking apart. He was losing his mind in front of them. SWAT officers

were just finally breaking through the trees to the front of the house, and

the moment they rounded the corner with their semiautomatics up,

Josh’s grip on Katrina loosened and he raised the gun to his own head.

“Kat, get down!” He yelled as the SWAT officers started barking

orders at Josh. She dropped to her knees and just as she did, Josh discharged his handgun, putting a hole through his head.

His body crumpled to the ground beside her and she started sobbing

with her hands over her ears. SWAT officers surrounded Josh’s body as

though he might reanimate at any moment. They trained their M-16s on

his lifeless body and Dillon ran to her, scooped her up in his arms and walked with her to the front lawn where Stephens was walking in circles

with his hands on his head.

Dillon melted with her in his arms, sinking to sit on the grass with her

in his lap. She was crying against his chest and she seemed more in shock

than coherent. He wrapped his arms around her, feeling at last the panic

start to subside. He stroked her hair as she quietly cried and he held her

chest close to his to shield her nakedness from the men milling about.

Paramedics approached once SWAT gave the all-clear and she was taken

from him again. But this time she was safe.

He watched the ambulance pull away and he turned to Stephens who

was on the phone. He knew it was Greenwood and he knew the hospital

was going to have to wait lest he give the man even more reason to fire

him.

She was safe, Seth was safe and for the first time since he met her, he

didn’t doubt she’d remain that way if he stopped worrying about her for

more than one second. It was over.

Chapter Thirty-Two

“We’re keeping you overnight. It’s just a precaution but you’ve taken

a few good knocks to the head today and I’m concerned you could have

a concussion. If you’re doing okay tomorrow we’ll release you. Do you have someone who can look after you for a few days?”

Doctor Jorgenson was a kind older man who looked at her in much

the way her own father had whenever she’d get hurt. His sympathy

alone left her in fresh tears every time he said something nice to her.

“She’ll stay with me.”

“And you are?”

“I’m Imogen. I’m her best friend and she lives with me sometimes.

Err…I don’t know. Do you live with me now, love, or…I mean, I really

can’t keep up with the drama anymore.”

Kat chuckled and then winced as her laughter caused her head to

shoot pain through her like lightning bolts.

“Yeah. I live with you. At least that’s the last place I remember being.” The doctor smiled at her before turning to Imogen.

“You can stay if you’d like. I want to keep visitors to a minimum but

if she’d like someone here I’m fine with it.” He excused himself, giving

Katrina a kind pat on her shoulder.

Smith and Terrell showed up a