Willing Hostage Read online

  No dark-gold car. But it was harder to distinguish the colors of cars that came up behind the Volks and invariably passed it.

  A ranch and two brown horses with white flashes stood at the fence with their ears back, glaring at her, reminding Leah that she was an alien.

  And finally a lake, long and narrow, with more campers around more fires. Leah felt alone in the little car surrounded by darkness. The road rose away from the lake in curves that twisted back on themselves.

  “Well, I want to be alone. To start fresh, new.…”

  A yowl came from the back seat. Leah’s start forced the car off the road and up the side of an embankment. Headlights stared into space. The engine died.

  “Damn you!” she yelled at the luminescent eyes suspended above a suitcase. “I thought I left you back at … are you trying to kill us both?” The Volks slid down off the embankment and stuck. She revved the engine but couldn’t back up. The motor stalled again.

  The Siamese purred behind her.

  Leah set the emergency brake and stepped out to peer over the embankment. She thought she saw the tops of trees far below. Her stomach lifted breathlessly at the thought of the Volks flying out and over the bank, falling down as if from the sky in a sickening free flight.

  “Sorry, kitty, but you’re going to have to go.” She reached into the glove compartment for the flashlight. “No hitchhikers allowed.” She swiped the flashlight at the glowing eyes.

  The cat swiped back, its claws making a scratching sound on metal. The eyes disappeared and the narrow beam of light could find nothing in the jumble of luggage that had upset when they’d climbed the embankment.

  “Look, kitty, I’m so tired. I’m a stray, too. I can’t help you. You’re too big to lose yourself in this tiny car.” But it had. It either moved every time she moved a suitcase or a dress bag or had crawled under the front seat.

  She gave up and flashed the light on the back tires. They sat in a small indentation with water running down it. A car came up and passed without slowing. “Nobody helps strays,” she muttered.

  Strange rustling sounds in the darkness.…

  Leah jumped back into the car, put it in reverse, and tried rocking her body and the Volks. She put the gear in first and the front end lowered as part of the embankment gave way.

  Into reverse again … the door ajar … one hand on the handle in case she had to jump. Tires whined, then buzzed … then caught. They all backed onto the road.

  “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you, cat, but if I don’t get to Walden soon I’m liable to twist your neck. You picked the wrong stray.”

  An answering rustle behind her.

  The Volkswagen groaned up and around curves. Shadow pines tried to block the stars, crowded in on the road.

  No houses, no campfires. Just the headlights that seemed to be keeping a constant distance behind her. Why didn’t that car pass her like all the others? Was it dark-gold?

  Slow, grinding mile after mile. Her bottom ached with the flatness of the seat, her back with fatigue. Her vigilant stomach began its sour burning.

  Sleep and nausea waved through her alternately.

  A sign loomed in the dark, CAMERON PASS. Surely Walden was near.

  Stars winked on one side of the sky and lightning on the other before trees closed in on the road once more. The lightning revealed a strange nature world with which Leah could not identify.

  The cat crawled to the back of the seat next to her and purred in her ear.

  “I wish you’d go away. You remind me of Mother.” Her mother with the long tapered fingers hanging over the side of the tub, blood oozing off the nails to drip to the floor.…

  The pavement ended and Leah fought gravel. Enormous road machines slept in a hollowed-out space in a mountain. Over two hours since Ted’s Place and still no Walden.

  The gravel ended finally, and the bump as she hit the pavement knocked the big cat onto the seat beside her.

  Still the headlights showed only trees and road. Still the headlights behind her kept watch.

  She was half asleep by the time they passed a lighted sign that she thought said Pair-O-Vancy. A motel?

  “Kitty, let’s see if that car is following us.” Leah pulled over and turned off the lights. “Or maybe I’m as neurotic as I think I am.”

  Lights appeared behind her, moving slowly. The car passed in the dark.

  Leah waited.

  “It doesn’t look like it’s coming back. Should we go see what a pair-o-vancy is? What do I mean, we? You’re getting dumped again the minute I get a chance.”

  The sign, at closer, slower inspection, read PAIR-O-, with a picture of two dice burned in the wood followed by the word CABINS.

  Leah turned into the drive. “Paradise. That I can use right now.”

  A gas pump directly in front of her … STANDARD. OIL. GAS. SORRY, NO GAS.

  Shadow cars and unlit cabins and in the center a log house with a light over the door.…

  The rustling of a mountain night settled over her as she walked to the house. A heavy chill wrapped Leah and the smell of pine and dirt in a dark bundle. She knocked.

  No sound from within. She knocked again.

  Leah decided to sleep in the car, here in this oasis of civilization. But as she turned away, the door opened and a man stood on the step tying a rope around his bathrobe.

  “I’m sorry to get you up, but the sign said there was a vacancy.”

  “Don’t matter.” He had a beautiful warm smile that was missing two teeth. “Thought we were done for the night so I turned in. But there’s a cabin left.” He looked toward the Volks, sitting dimly beyond the porch light. “You alone?”

  “Yes. I’ve been traveling all day. I was trying to get to Walden.”

  “I know.” His chuckle was sleepy, soothing. “You’re a flatlander. Long way to Walden still. Good thing you stopped. Flatlanders always think they’re going to make good time. Not used to mountain roads.” He yawned and stretched his arms above his head.

  “I don’t have much money.…”

  “All I have left is a double.” He stepped off the porch into shadow. “They go for ten a night. But I’ll let you have it for the price of a single since it’s late. That’d be seven.”

  “Seven dollars?”

  “These are only fishing cabins. Not the Holiday Inn. But you’ll sleep better without all that machinery controlling your air. Real mountain fresh air. Good for you, believe me.”

  A few minutes later Leah believed him. She stood under a hanging sixty-watt bulb with a chain and felt the real mountain fresh air coming in through cracks in the roof, the walls, the floor. Leah was cold to her teeth.

  Two iron bedsteads covered with worn white chenille, more chenille hanging on wires at the windows, a refrigerator, a round table with oilcloth and four wooden chairs, a stove with a sign that warned: DANGER—OVEN DOES NOT WORK. DO NOT HEAT WATER IN WATER BUCKETS. THERE ARE TEAKETTLES FOR THIS. THERE IS HOT WATER IN LAUNDRY ROOM IN HOSE BEHIND WASHING MACHINE. THANKS, THE MANAGER.

  The manager walked in with a pail of water and set it on a stand beside a metal pan. He hung what looked to be a huge gravy ladle with a curved end over the edge of the pail. On the wall behind the metal pan another sign: IF YOU LEAVE DIRTY DISHES, LEAVE THREE DOLLARS.

  Shaken by more than just the cold, Leah walked out to the car and drove it up to the door, carried her coat, purse, food and a suitcase into the cabin.

  The manager was now stuffing raw boards into one side of the stove.

  “I thought the oven didn’t work.”

  He stuffed some newspapers on top of the wood and lit it. “This part of the stove is for heating. It’ll take the chill off quick.”

  She handed him seven dollars.

  “I see you’re not quite alone.” He looked to the floor. The Siamese sat proprietarily next to her left shoe.

  He bent to pet the cat. “He’s a beaut. Looks well cared for. You’d be amazed how many people dump
their animals around here. Makes me boil.” He stood and looked into Leah’s eyes. “I can see you’re not that kind of person. If I thought you was, I wouldn’t even rent my last cabin to you. The bathroom’s lit all night and it’s behind my house. Hot water in the shower. Have a good sleep.”

  And Leah was left staring at the Siamese, who jumped onto the round table and settled next to the groceries.

  She looked under the chenille on one of the double beds. There were four heavy wool blankets. The cabin was scrupulously clean and the snapping fire in the oven began to warm it.

  She pulled the chenille curtains across the windows and tried to feel cozy.

  Odds and ends of dime-store dishes sat on a shelf. Leah poured milk into a thick white mug and met the chilly blue eyes on the table.

  “You’re going to eat me out of pocket and you’re not even mine.” But she poured milk into a bowl for her companion. “You know, I used to have dishes like this in my apartment in New York?”

  The animal hunched over the milk, studiously ignoring her.

  Leah sat on a straight chair and lowered her face to his whiskers. “I used to try to paint little flowers on them to class them up, but the paint came off in the dishwasher.”

  The big cat raised his head to sniff the tip of her nose and returned to the milk.

  “I had the paints left over from a sorry attempt at oil painting. But I couldn’t afford the lessons.” She whispered it into his ear and the ear twitched in irritation. “That was after needlepoint and before ceramics or was it macramé? I know it was before short-story writing and poetry.”

  The cat licked the last drop from the bowl, then yawned in her face.

  “I dabbled. Leah, the dabbler, that’s me. I worked so hard to pay the rent on that apartment I was too tired for hobbies and too broke. I don’t like roommates,” she said pointedly and remembered the tiny bedroom she’d shared with two sisters in the redevelopment house in Chicago. “An apartment is very expensive for one person, even a tiny.… Kitty, are you listening to me?”

  The kitty was washing behind his ears.

  “And I class you with roommates. Oh, I’ve had plenty of offers, but nobody moves in with me. Get that?” Leah sat back and watched the cat ignore her.

  Dabbling had led her nowhere. She’d scrapped each project after a few weary weeks. Scrap.… Leah turned to the suitcase on the bed behind her. “This time, kitty, I’m really not going back!” She stood so suddenly that the cat arched and spit, elongated eyes widening to a circle.

  Leah opened the suitcase and reached beneath her clothes for the scrapbook. “My only claim to fame. But not something I could display on a coffee table.” She tore out the first page and looked at Leah Harper smiling comfortably in a girdle she didn’t need. Lifting the metal circle above the fire by its handle as she’d seen the manager do, she consigned page one to the flames.

  “Look at this.” She displayed page two to her feline companion. “Would you believe that is Leah Lorraine Harper? How could I ever show this to my grandchildren?” The bottom half of Leah, in panty hose, went into the fire. And the next page, and the next … Leah in bras with invisible stuffing in the cups. And one of her hands with a diamond ring … long tapering fingers like her mother’s.…

  “Of Iris’ three girls,” she had heard someone say, “Leah is the spitting image of her mother in looks and temperament.”

  “I will not be another Iris, kitty. I will never fail that completely.”

  But the cat slept, curled blissfully between the Velveeta and milk.

  Leah burned the scrapbook and threw the plastic cover into the wastebasket. “Here I go, burning my bridges again.”

  The moon lit the encampment when she stepped out of the cabin to look for the bathroom, but there were clouds around it and thunder rolled through the pines.

  The ladies’, and men’s, and the laundry room shared a building. She showered behind a folding screen feeling sleepy again as she groped her way back to the cabin, wearing her coat over pajamas.

  Warm air greeted her as she opened the door. The loud purring of the Siamese seemed homey and welcoming.

  She could barely see the light chain in front of a lighter patch of covered window, had actually started to reach for it before she remembered that she hadn’t turned it off before she left.

  Lightning flashed soundlessly to outline the room and the man at the table, tipped back on two legs of his chair, stroking the cat on his lap with one hand, raising a dark stubby gun with the other.

  “Turn on that light and you’re dead,” he warned her.

  Chapter Four

  Leah Harper had never had much sympathy for namby-pamby women who allowed themselves to be victimized by men.

  But this was the first time she had faced one holding a gun.

  During the second that thunder detonated over the cabin’s roof, Leah thought of a surprising number of things she could do. She could run for the door, scream, kick the gun out of his hand, overturn the table, pretend to faint.… Could he see her better than she could see him? Was the weapon real?

  Her mother’s often-repeated advice to her daughters had been, “If a man gets funny with you, knock him in the nuts with your knee.”

  But these nuts were well protected by a fat cat and a hard-looking gun. Leah began to sweat. Each tiny pore seemed to react with a sticky, sickly ache.

  “Sit.” His voice was low and flat. Lightning had revealed the face of the man with the murderous look at Ted’s Place. He had a voice to match.

  Leah’s hands found a chair. She sat.

  Even when she heard the cat hit the floor, even when the man came to feel in her coat pockets, run his fingers over her pajamas, Leah sat meekly, hating herself for her fear and the sickly sweating.

  She didn’t fear rape. The man’s hands, his breath were as cold and impersonal as the big cat’s eyes. He was searching her.

  Leah feared death.

  The air still hung with the chill of the passionless tone of the few words he’d spoken. She knew the weapon was real. And that it was loaded. She knew the man was dangerous.

  Cracks on top of the stove blinked red. He moved behind her and her suitcase clicked when he opened it. How could he see?

  But she was beginning to see. Not just the red glow from the stove or the yellow-blue flash of cat eyes on the table, but other shapes. Her purse between the cat and the dark milk carton. The Maalox bottle—he had already rifled her purse. The shadow of the chair he had vacated, even, dimly, the door.…

  A mosquito buzzed her ear, landed on her neck. Leah found herself rising from the chair, taking a quick step toward the door.

  “Don’t.” It came with swift, sharp finality from behind her. The image of his gun, the estimate of his size, the tone of that one clipped order stopped her.

  And then, in astonishment, she heard her own voice saying, “If I’m going to die, it won’t be sitting down.” She felt her foot rise for another step.

  The brutality of the arm that encircled her from behind and the force of the hard metal in the small of her spine left her breathless.

  “No tricks, Sheila.”

  “I’m not Sheila,” she gasped through the crushing of the arm across her chest.

  “You’d better be. Or we’re both dead.”

  Headlights turned off the road and brightened chenille curtains. Leah relaxed against her captor, hoping for more room to breathe.

  He had stiffened, alert to what was happening outside.

  A car door slammed. A repeated knocking sound and then the manager’s voice telling someone that there were no cabins left.

  The arm loosened and Leah took a deep breath. One more and she could scream. His hand moved up to cover her mouth, leaving her free for a fraction of a second. She swiveled to face him … brought her knee up hard … fingernails finding his face. The gun clunked as it hit the floor.

  God, he was big. Her knee struck too low.

  She managed only the beginning of
a scream before his fist in her stomach took care of any air she might have used for voice.

  Leah doubled over with her face almost against her knees. Something hit the back of her neck. Lights sparked behind her eyeballs and then darkness.

  Her first awareness, even before she opened her eyes, was the instant recollection of all that had happened. Her second was that she was all in one piece. And every piece hurt.

  She heard the asthmatic rattling of the cat and felt a measured poking, prickling on her chest.

  Leah opened her eyes to discover her hands were tied together above her head to the metal bedstead, and her ankles to its foot, her body stretched savagely taut between, a gag rapidly drying out her tongue.

  The Siamese stood with its front paws rhythmically kneading her sternum where the coat had pulled away, its claws pricking her skin through pajamas. He purred exuberantly, his eyes half closed. It was the dance cats do when they’re full, safe, contended. Those cold-blooded eyes, closed to slits now, pretended that they loved Leah, were thankful for her protection and care.

  Leah raised her head and saw the outline of the man at the window. His gun held aside a corner of the curtain. Agony moved from the back of her neck to her head. There was an answering fury from her ulcer. What was he watching for?

  The Siamese stepped off her chest, turned around three times, and curled up, using her armpit for a pillow.

  Damned useless animal. Why couldn’t he have been a Doberman pinscher?

  Raindrops plopped on the roof. Lightning snapped. Thunder rolled in close behind. The man added wood to the fire in the stove.

  Leah’s hands and feet were without feeling, the muscles in her back, legs, and arms stretched to the limit.

  The man left the window to rustle around on the shelf. And then he stood over her, lighting a candle stub in a saucer.

  Holding the saucer, he sat on the bed, his thigh against her thigh, and put the gun to her head.

  Chapter Five

  Leah closed her eyes and waited. She thought of the violent way her mother had died a week ago.

  Tears pushed beneath her eyelids. This couldn’t be happening. No!