Smoke and Mirrors

73

Cynthia lay naked on her side on the ice-cold tile floor of a fancy bathroom. Her abductor sat on the toilet contemplating her, an empty insulin syringe in his hand.

He said, “Did that help? I’m new at this diabetes thing.”

“You need to give me more,” she said weakly, covering herself as best she could with her hands. “Let me measure my blood sugar.” Her vision was still blurred, but maybe clearing. There was a bottle of water on the floor beside her and she managed to keep herself covered until she took a long drink. He didn’t seem interested in her sexually. Maybe it would be better if he were. She had decided that, in exchange for a shot to make her feel better, she could let him screw her. It was no big deal. She’d had sex with a few men she wasn’t attracted to when they had something she wanted.

“The water in the tub is warm,” he told her. “Get in. You smell like piss and bile.”

“My clothes?” she asked.

“They’re in the washing machine. I have to wash them before you put them on. I have a nice warm robe for you when you get out of the bath.”

“Of course I ruined my clothes. What did you expect?”

“I’m no expert, but if I gave you more insulin, I suspect you’d be a lot more trouble.”

“Please,” Cyn said. “I won’t try to escape.”

“But you might, Ms. Gardner. I know a great deal about you. More than I care to, in fact.”

“My mother will pay you whatever you want.”

The man said, “All I want at this moment is for you to get into the bath.”

Standing, the man helped Cynthia up. Her knees buckled, but she stepped into the warm bath and sat. The man recaptured his former position on the closed toilet and watched her as she bathed, but the ugly bastard didn’t seem to want to do more than that.

And she made sure he saw plenty. She knew that men went stupid when she showed them even less of her body than he was seeing.

“You know,” she said, mentally bracing herself, “this doesn’t have to be so unpleasant. I mean, if you wanted to, like, have sex with me, I wouldn’t say you couldn’t. We couldn’t,” she said, smiling.

The man smiled back. “You want to trade sex for your freedom?” And then he laughed loudly. “I don’t think so.”

Angry at the rebuff, she thought, He’s gay.