Chapter 4

Dodging her flailing arms and legs, ignoring the tiny fists that pounded and beat with a steady staccato rhythm at their shoulders, arms, and chest, the three young boys carried the screaming policeman's wife to the one-room cabin. Jim took command of 'Operation Wife Bait, ' as he called it.

"All right, you guys," he commanded with a jerk of his blonde head, "Clear off that mattress and put down a blanket. We're gonna keep our little pigeon here as comfortable as possible." He stood with his hands on his lithe hips, his delicate features angling severely as he spat out the orders.

Kathy stared at him, a bewildered expression clouding her otherwise sharp features. "What are you doing?" she asked softly, trying to appeal to his sense of better judgment. "Her arms ached from the handcuffs and her wrist burned in the vise-like grip of the steel bands. Confusedly, she stared down at the handcuffs, raising her wrists to eye level. "What do you want of me? I-I don't understand? You're all so young! You should be out playing football or chasing girls, not kidnapping a twenty- eight year old married woman."

Suddenly the fear she'd felt riding the motorcycle rushed back to clutch at her, sending a shiver and chill through her whole body. She shuddered her shoulders trembling. It was so ridiculous, funny almost. It seemed like an eternity since she'd gotten up that morning drank her coffee, retrieved the newspaper from its brambled burial ground--all her routine, day-to-day activities that kept her alive, identified her as Kathy McGuire wife of Art McGuire.

Now, somehow, that had all been swept away from her, like driftwood carried away from the shoreline by an ebbing tide. She stared down at the prim pink sundress she wore; it was as if she had never seen it before. The sandals, too, the pink toe nails--they all belonged to another person someone foreign but certainly not Kathy McGuire.

She stared again at Jim, her own blue eyes penetrating his cold, steely ones. A cry of pure terror welled up in her throat, only to be strangled there. He was about fifteen years old she guessed, but a glint in his eyes told her that his experience was more than that. This boy, this delicate featured boy, with his aristocratic hands and acqueline nose looked like a young czar, a prince... a militant boy in command. With his erect posture and thrown-back shoulders, he carried a presence about him not to be denied, Kathy could tell by the way the other boys were waiting, staring mesmerically at their blonde haired friend, that he was the leader, indisputably. But he was so young! He hadn't even started shaving yet!

"Okay, take off her handcuffs!" boomed Jim, turning to point to Mark, who started fumbling in his pockets, pulling out the lining so the key could rattle free. Jim grimaced, but bent to pick it up. "Be more careful next time," he warned, handing the key to Mark then indicating with a jerk of his head in Kathy's direction.

Her hands free, Kathy shook her wrists, trying to get the circulation back in her favor. Like lead, her wrists felt heavy and weak; she rubbed them with her fingertips.

"Jim, how we gonna keep her from runnin' away?" Robert wanted to know, watching the cop's beautiful wife massaging her own flesh.

"Running away?" Kathy wrinkled up her nose, eyeing the door. Maybe she should try to run, but in her heeled sandals she'd be no match for this fifteen year-old sprinter. "What do you want of me?" she asked for the hundredth time. "Please, if it's money you want, I'd be happy to pay you. That's all I can offer you."

"That's what you think!" countered Jim, with a salacious grin, running his tongue over his lips. "Yeah," he said with a careless ease, "I think she's gonna serve our purposes just right. Your ol' man is gonna be pretty busy keepin' his eye on all the bare-breasted chicks chasin' after the dopers," he guffawed. "You think he cares enough about you to come looking for you?"

"Of course he does!" spat Kathy with a defiant jerk of her head, to spring her thick hair loose of her forehead. "He'll find you kids all right. And don't go making any slurring remarks about Art. He's a darned good husband," she pouted, her lips in a tight line as she glared back at her young captor.

"Listen, by the time he finds you, the marijuana is gonna be hidden away, tighter'n a drum. He'll never find it."

The room was silent, except for a mouse scratching its way free of a rumple of newspaper, yellow and water smeared. Mark and Robert stared at each other, waiting, wondering who would be the victor in this test of mental stamina.

"Okay, boys, ready for step number two of 'Operation Wife Bait?'" On Signal, Robert opened a suitcase and drew out the rope.

"What... are you boys going to do to me?" chanted Kathy, watching with saucered eyes as the young freckle-faced boy approached her, all the while testing the strength of the rope, jerking it hard. Satisfied, he handed it to Jim, then stepped back and waited for the next command.

"Now why don't you just have a seat down here on the bed," said the fifteen year old leader sweetly, with innocence.

"No!"

"I said get on the bed!" screamed Jim, pointing with his delicate index finger. "You get this straight now, you bitch! I am the leader here, and you follow my orders. Is that clear?" He might have been a Sergeant in the Army, or a Captain in the Navy judging from the way he ordered and commanded, with no protests.

Staring him in the eye, wondering what kind of child monster he was, Kathy obeyed, sitting down on the bed, her eyes never leaving the steely gray orbs that belonged to her captor.

"Okay, boys, now get the whiskey."

"No!" she screamed again, kicking her heels into the dusty rotting floor, making a hole in the weathered wood. She leaned back on her hands and screamed as a hand flew over her mouth, and she yelled, "Nooooo!" And then the neck of a foul-smelling bottle was forced into her mouth, bruising her lips; she gagged on some of the burning liquid and felt it searing its way all the way down her throat and stomach. The bottle was pulled from her mouth, and Kathy fought for her breath almost gagging and vomiting as the raw whiskey hit her empty stomach and sensitive nervous system all at once. She opened her mouth to speak again and the neck of the bottle was brutally rammed into her mouth. Again the fiery liquid gurgled down the back of her throat and tears came to her eyes as she choked.