Chapter 1: The beginning

Jenny was pissed. This wasn't what she had signed on for. She had gotten up at about five in the morning to feed all the animals. Her fourteen-year old daughter, Stephanie refused to get up that first day after the school year was out. Her husband had already driven into town to get some more supplies.

Jenny started the big John Deere tractor, used it to pick up one of the big round bales and dropped it over the fence into the steel feed bunk. She made about eight trips back and forth between the barn and the feed bunks along the fence. The cattle had already lined up, waiting.

Her husband, Joe was ten years older than her. She was thirty six and her daughter, Steph, was fourteen. Jenny had met him in high school. He was the track coach. He was the local boy who had come from the little school, gone on to the university on a track scholarship and lasted several years on the professional circuit, almost beating Jeremy Wariner in the KU Relays in his senior year.

Joe had made and saved quite a bit of his personal appearance money on the international circuit during his four years after college. In the years after his retirement, he was talked into coming home to his home town to coach the local track team. That is where he met Jenny.

At the time, she was a skinny, long-legged fourteen-year-old freshman on the girls track team. She ran the hurdles, 800mm and 1600mm events. He didn't have much to do with her at that age. Somewhere between her junior and senior year, she seemed to explode. Her short, reddish blonde hair grew down past her waist. Her breasts bloomed into beautiful half-mound grapefruits with long pink nipples that rippled under her perspiration covered cotton t-shirt.

The short-short track shorts with slits up the sides seemed almost obscene when she glided over the hurdles and they seemed to slide up almost to her waist.

Her innocent admiration of her coach left him almost terrified of talking to her. He knew he could not have any contact with these under-age girls. Once she turned eighteen, Joe paid a lot more attention to her.

Joe easily got her a full scholarship to the state college, which was about two hours away. Once she was out of town, they met regularly on the weekends. Joe was there at every track meet to encourage her, and take her home after the meets.

Nobody knows what went wrong. Either Jenny missed a few pills, or a condom broke, or both. Anyway, somewhere in her second year, she missed several periods. They eloped and got married. Jenny dropped out of college to start a family. It seemed to work out alright, because Joe was making a pretty good living as a track coach. He had saved up quite a bit of money, and decided to make some changes.

An older couple in the Ozarks was retiring, and Joe decided to buy out their business. The couple had about a section of land along the Niangua river and had struggled for years to start a river float business.

Joe took Jenny and their daughter out to look at the property. They had a large "beach front" facing the lake. There was a long pier going out into the lake. There was a large square stone building on piers at the edge of the water.

The level on the water had a large nine foot high and wide opening that one could navigate a boat into it and raise it out of the water for storage or launching. The floor above it had continuous screened windows on all four sides. The forty by forty building could be used for parties, barbeques or meetings.

There were about ten small stone cottages that stair-stepped their way up the hill and overlooked the bluffs along the bank. From there, they could take people about four or six miles up the river that flowed into it; drop them off in canoes, and they could drift or canoe their way back to their cabins.

The elderly couple that owned it just didn't have the energy to take care of the upkeep. Joe talked Jenny into buying the property.

During the summer, they were busy taking lots of boy scout troops, girl scout troops, church school groups and families on canoe trips. They had a clubhouse where they sold supplies and modest meals for those who didn't want to cook.

During the winter, they had about a hundred forty cows they had to feed through the winter. They bred the cows and sold them off once they were about four hundred pounds apiece. Life seemed manageable.

The difference was probably that Joe had enough money saved up, to not need a loan. They didn't have to worry about a mortgage like the other couple did.

They also were able to be productive in their winter months by feeding the cattle. Along with that, Joe could teach during the school year. They could also keep an eye on their daughter during the summer months when they had to work. Stephanie was also beginning to be a money maker too. At fourteen, she could now drive to work and school. That meant she could feed the cattle with the tractor, or drive the buss which carried the canoes and canoers.

Although neither Joe nor Jenny would admit it, Jenny and Stephanie were also probably causing an exponential explosion in their business. At the age of thirty six, Jenny was still in her high school running shape. Out of necessity, Jenny usually wore knee high leather logging boots that laced all the way up. Her logging socks folded over the top of her boots. She wore form fitting faded denim bib coveralls that were cut off just below the crotch. Her plaid, checkered, long sleeved cotton shirt was loose and the arms folded up just below her elbows. Her wide brimmed, black Stetson was a little large, and fit down over her ears.

Jenny's perpetual work outside left her with a beautiful tan, and her legs sparkled with the slight covering of perspiration that she almost always seemed to have. Because of all the work she was doing outside, she seemed to always have her incredibly long hair up in a French braid. Her large hoop earrings were a bit of a hazard, but she wore them anyway. There was always the danger that they might snag on something, but it was one of the few concessions she would not give up so that she could feel like a woman, not a young boy.

Stephanie was pretty much the identical image of her mother when she was fourteen. This budding young woman was tethering on the edge being a child and young woman. Her breasts were there. The long tanned legs were those of a young woman. The difference was only that Steph tended to let her long hair just blow in the wind under her brown leather Stetson.

Stephanie probably didn't quite understand what her short, cut-off jeans did to the young boys and dirty-old fathers and grandfathers.

Nobody would admit it, but business was booming because of the way Jenny and her daughter innocently dressed. But anyway, Jenny was a little pissed. Her husband was away and her daughter was refusing to get up. Still, the cattle, horses and chickens had to be fed. She didn't know who might show up at any minute wanting to check in to the campground, so she had to keep an eye on the main office too.

The chaos from spring break was over. The weather was unseasonably warm. The Magnolias had bloomed. The daffodils were blooming. The ducks were flying back north. School would not be out for a few more weeks. Having a lull over the weekend was good and bad news. They secretly enjoyed the calm, but were never at ease when there was no business.

Jenny heard some engine noise over at the office, so she parked the Deere, and started back over to the office in her 1944 Jeep. When she came over the hill and around the trees, she could see four Boss Hog Harley Davidsons parked in the handicap spaces. This alone seemed a concern on several levels.

She was never comfortable at the office if there were no obvious signs of other women. She parked the Jeep and went into the office. There were three big black men, all well over six-feet four, and two hundred fifty pounds. No wonder they were riding the big V-8 powered Hogs.

"We'd like to camp out here for a while, ma'am." Said the biggest one. Jenny was very uneasy with the situation.

"I'm sorry fellas. We're all booked up. You will have to come back another weekend or make reservations in advance." Jenny said with a week smile.

The biggest of the bunch was leaning on the counter. He gave Jenny a long stare. He looked her in the eyes. Then he looked her up and down, admiring her long tanned legs. Without saying anything, he turned around to face the counter. He turned the guest register around. There was nothing written down for that weekend. The calendar for the previous weekend showed dozens of names with their check-in and check-out times, license numbers and phone numbers.

The black men felt that they were probably being excluded because of their race. The three men started to head for the door. At least that's what Jenny thought they were doing. They all seemed to be moving at different speeds. The first one that got to the door, got there about the same time that the big man at the counter was even with Jenny.

When the first man got to the door, Jenny heard the door "click" as he turned the thumb-latch to lock it. The sound was almost imperceptible, but to Jenny, she knew what it was, and it sounded like a clap of thunder because of the meaning.

As the biggest black man was even with her, he pulled a huge hunting knife and stuck it under her chin. "Now you wouldn't just be shitting a bunch of us Niggers would you, young lady?"

Jenny tried to spring away from him, but the third man was already behind her and grabbed her by the shoulders with a grip that almost broke her arms.

"Please, guys; I'm hear all by myself and I don't want any trouble. My husband will be back any minute! Please leave!" Jenny whimpered.

About that time, everybody heard the shuffling of somebody in the back room. "Run Stephanie! Get out of here!" Jenny screamed as loud as she could.

The man behind Jenny grabbed her mouth with his huge hand to keep her from making any more noise. Jenny tried to kick the man holding the knife. He caught her foot with one hand, and then backhanded her with a loud "smack!"

Instead of Stephanie running away as ordered, she did the opposite. Hearing the commotion, she ran into the room to see what was going on. The man with the knife spun around and was onto her before she had time to blink.

He pinned her to the wall with his big hunting knife. "You shut the fuck up and get in the room with everybody else!" he snarled at her. His ice cold stare let her know he would have used the knife if she didn't follow directions.

The men found some nylon rope and duct tape in a store room in back, and quickly bound them with their arms behind them and their feet stretched back to their hands. Their eyes and mouths were covered up with duct tape so that only their noses could be seen. They were taken out into the barn and tossed into the hay where they could not be seen or heard.

Jenny was lying on her stomach and was soon in excruciating pain because of the position she was in. Soon she could hear the familiar sound of her husband coming back in his half-ton pick-up. She knew it would be loaded with alfalfa pellets, flour, milk, a few kegs of beer and pop. She had no way to warn him!

The men had moved their Hogs around behind the barn, so Joe wasn't aware of the visitors, but they left the front door open and the lights on to raise his curiosity about what might be going on in the office. Jenny's Jeep was there, so he had to know his wife and daughter were probably in there.

Joe walked in, and they were waiting for him. Between the aluminum baseball bats and large hunting knives, he didn't have much of a chance. They didn't hurt him, but he knew instantly that it would be useless to resist. With a knife at his throat, he did not resist them tying his arms and legs. Once tied, he had no way to avoid the duct tape over his mouth. They tied and duct taped him into a large oak captain's chair. His feet were taped at the ankles to the legs of the chair. His arms were behind him. Joe was in terror; not for himself, but he did not see his wife or daughter. What had he done to them? Had they escaped and gone for help? It did not look good with Jenny's jeep there.

The men were not sure whether there would be other guests coming to register, so they drug Joe and his chair over to the big stone structure that overlooked the water and above the boat launch.

Once they had Joe secured, they went out to get the women. The women were loaded on long poles, like slaughtered pigs. The pole was strung through the space between their arms and legs and they were carried over to the big screened room they had Joe in.

Joe couldn't say anything because of the duct tape. They cut the ropes tying the girls hands to their feet. They put Stephanie into another oak captain's chair and tied her arms around behind her.

They arranged six chairs into a bit of a semi circle. Joe was in the middle, and Stephanie was on one end. Jenny was on the ground on her stomach. The three black men were sitting in the remaining chairs.

"Well folks, we are a little pissed at the hospitality we have been shown." The big man sneered. "We came here with the best of intentions of hoping to spend a quiet weekend in the country. The little miss here, doesn't seem to care for people of color. We feel a little slighted and are not quite sure what to do about it." He continued.

The big black man walked over to Jenny and pulled out his hunting knife. He cut the ropes holding Jenny's arms behind her and walked back to his seat between Joe and Stephanie.

Jenny's body ached from being tied up. Once her hands were free, she was able to untie her feet. She was now free, and began to slowly take the duct tape off of her face so she could see and speak. Her body trembled as she removed the last of the tape. She didn't know quite what to say, and was even more terrified wondering what she should say.

"Please, fellas; I didn't mean any harm. With my husband gone, and the three of you here, I just didn't feel comfortable here by myself. I was also afraid for my daughter. Please let us go. Isn't there anything that we can do to make this right? You can stay as long as you want."

Jenny was trembling and her lip was quivering at her situation.

"Well, young lady. You have insulted us terribly and an apology just isn't enough. What do you guys want to do?" The men were quiet for a while and looked at each other. Jenny started to recognize some knowing smiles. She could see where their minds were going. She looked down, not really wanting any answer to her questions.