Little Boy Blue

58

He was straining with every sinew, but getting nowhere. The fabric of the suit was smooth and the wooden floor so perfectly polished, that the more he moved, the more he spun in pointless circles. He couldn’t get any purchase and his attacker watched now as he exerted himself in vain. It was strangely moving to behold. This was what somebody looked like in their death throes.

It had all gone to plan. The only moment of danger had come when Paine had screamed to be liberated. That had been a surprise – a testament to his instinct for danger or perhaps his innate lack of trust in his new ‘client’. It was a mistake, but a small one. Duct tape had been quickly applied to the mouth and the danger had passed.

The foreplay had been completed, the preparatory work done – now it was time for the coup de grâce. Had the thrashing figure on the ground made the connection to Jake Elder’s death or was he as clueless as the rest? By the looks of things, he was still in denial, desperately trying to belly-slide towards the door. What was he going to do when he got there? Open it with his feet? It was a crazy last throw of the dice, but there was a possibility that his banging might alert a neighbour. So, crossing the room quickly, the figure lowered the rope from the ceiling pulley and slipped it through the hog ties, tying them together in a secure, grapevine knot under Paine’s wrists.

Alerted by the sound of the pulley, Paine bucked even more wildly, but, in the end, what could he do? His attacker yanked the rope tight and Paine lurched up into the air. He was only a few inches off the ground but this sudden development clearly alarmed him – he swung back and forth on the rope, as he made one last, desperate push to escape. It was hard to hang on, but his assailant moved steadily backwards, pulling sharply with each step, until Paine was safely suspended in mid-air. Securing the rope firmly to a wall hook, the figure then stood back to admire its handiwork – Paine, covered from head to toe in spandex, spinning in the air like an obscene mobile.

This had been more arduous than expected but the hard graft was done. Moving quickly, the figure now walked in and out of the bedroom, lifting a tablet and smartphone from the bedside table and popping both of them in a zip bag.

Satisfied, the figure headed for the doorway, flipping down the white plastic flap on the thermostat by the entrance. Casting a last look at Paine, his attacker punched the central heating up to the max, then quietly slipped out of the door.