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A week later, Harry and I met up in Harry’s office in the Prep Centre. It was only about an hour’s drive to the Emir’s new home but we wanted to give ourselves plenty of time.
Harry summoned Sarah. “Have you got the folders?” he asked.
Sara, neat and efficient as ever placed a pile of file folders on the desk. “Yes, sir,” she said. I think you’ll find that it’s just as you wanted. There’s a folder for each of the potential acquisitions and a summary sheet for each category. I’ve tried to make it all as clear as possible and….”
“That’s all right Sarah, I’m sure it’s fine.” Sarah allowed herself a smile of satisfaction.
“Well, I like to do a good job, as you know.”
“Sure Sarah,” said Harry. “Still we’d better get you ready if you’re coming with us.” He reached into his drawer and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.
“Oh,” she said, “but surely you don’t need that. I mean, I’m part of the team now, I’ve done all this work with Rick and…”
“I’m sorry Sarah, you know the rules.” Harry said, bluntly. “I can’t take you out of here unsecured. Even with your collar on,” she fingered the tags that held her identity details. “In fact, I think you’re forgetting your place, young lady. You’ll be gagged as well.”
Sarah looked pained but did nothing further to object. “Now put these on.” He passed her a pair of handcuffs.
She picked them up and fastened one of them around her wrists. “Is that tight enough?” she asked, falling into a more compliant mood.
“That’s fine,” said Harry. “Now this gag, please.” Harry handed her one of the gags that Rick had been experimenting with since the client presentation we had given at Freddie’s club.
“Shouldn’t there be a strap with this?” Sarah asked, turning the object over in her hands. It looked like the mouth piece of a snorkel but with a small ball shaped rubbery swelling where the air hole would normally be.
“No, that’s all right. Just push the ball into your mouth and grip the rubber piece between your teeth”
Sarah looked confused. “Oh, but it’s far too small. It’ll never work. Let me get one of the standard gags from my desk.”
“Sarah,” said Harry. “Please just do as you are told.” Sarah looked sheepish and put the mouthpiece between her lips, taking the small ball into her mouth. Within a moment the gel began to swell with the warmth of her mouth. The startled look on Sarah’s face was a delight. She squealed as the golf ball more than doubled in size, stuffing her mouth until her cheeks bulged with the pressure of the expanding gel. A rigid tube through the centre of the gel maintained an airway but her mouth was completely filled and there was no question of her pushing the gag out, even without a strap to hold it in place. Her hands flew up to her bulging cheeks but there was nothing she could do about the mouth filling gel. “Humwumhumph,” was the only sound she could make.
I had to confess to being impressed. Harry was too. “It’s the first time I’ve tried one,” he said. Sarah looked distressed at the idea of being a guinea pig for the technology. “But after that, I think I’ll be using them on field operations.” He reached into one of the drawers of his desk and pulled out one of the nylon sacks of the type we’d used on the Questor pick up. “This will stop our friend here from getting too messy on the journey,” Harry said adding to Sarah’s confused concern as he fitted the bag around her and zipped it up to her neck collar before tightening the straps so that her arms were locked against her sides and her legs were locked together. “Let’s go.”
He picked up the bagged and gagged Sarah and tossed her across his shoulder. I followed him out to the car park, grinning at Sarah’s plumped out cheeks as she wriggled around on Harry’s shoulder.
We put Sarah into the boot of the car and strapped her in so she wouldn’t bounce around. “Just remember, girl, you’re not staff, you’re stock,” said Harry, bluntly, as he shut the lid.
I rode up front with Harry. An hour later we turned off of the road past a broken down sign that had been put up for the hotel. The drive wound through trees and then the castle itself appeared. Far more imposing than the model had suggested, the grey bulk of the old circular castle keep rose behind the red brick of the Tudor house, slowly filling our view as we approached it.
The Emir was there to greet us. “Nice to see you guys. Welcome to Worcestershire.” Harry opened the boot. “And you brought the girl too, great. She’ll love some of the facilities.” Sarah looked unconvinced as she climbed out of the back of the car. The Emir made no attempt to conceal his pleasure at the sight of her legs as Harry unzipped her from her sack and helped her to clamber out. “We might as well start the tour right away,” he said waving us in through the door.
The manor house itself was unremarkable. Comfortable and well furnished but hardly anything unusual. The castle keep however was very different. We walked across a covered way from the manor house into the keep at first floor level, emerging into a circular room in the middle of the keep. Ranged around us were a series of heavy wooden doors.
“These were the hotel rooms,” said the Emir, “but your man Clegg’s made them better suited for less willing occupants. Look at this one.” He pulled open a door. It was solid oak with a heavy lock. We looked inside. It wasn’t too small. There were four bunk beds, solidly built and equipped with shackle rings at each corner. The room still had its bathroom but there was no door. The room had one window but criss-crossed bars covered it. As we looked around it was obvious that anyone staying in the room would have little opportunity to escape. “Freddie’s team do a real neat job.” He gestured to the ceiling. “Audio and video surveillance of course, linked to voice and movement activated recorders in the main building. And the whole building has RFID sensors fitted so we can put tags on the girls – we’ll use anklets – that will let us track any of them wherever they are in the complex. Same sort of technology that you use in the Prep Centre, Freddie tells me. That way we can let them get on with their duties but still have them under control. You can let your girl out of handcuffs if you like; her collar will be tracked here too.”
Harry looked impressed as he freed Sarah from her cuffs. He took a small cartridge from his pocket and screwed the nozzle into the front of Sarah’s gag. It gave a hiss as the CO2 rushed through the tube that wound, capillary like, through the gel. As the gas discharged the gel inside Sarah’s mouth was cooled and shrank back to its original size. Harry prised the mouthpiece from Sarah’s lips to her relief and popped the device in his pocket. Sarah coughed, spluttered, worked her aching jaw, and looked sheepish but said nothing. “Well when we get them it looks like you’ll be able to hang on to them,” said Harry. “We’ve got some files to go through with you, possible pick ups. Like we agreed.”
“Yeah sure,” said the Emir, “but I’ve got something else to show you first. Come through here.” He showed us the way through a low stone arch. “Look at these walls – seven feet thick – solid stone, terrific building – these guys knew how to make things to last.” It led to a spiral staircase cut into the thickness of the wall of the castle keep. He pointed upwards. “There’s another three floors up there,” he said. “Plenty of room for expansion. But I want to show you down here. This is the real goods.” We followed him down, Sarah tagging dutifully along behind us.
The foot of the stairs brought us out into a dark stone line cellar. The Emir turned a control by the door and the lights came on slowly revealing that one half of the circle had been divided up into a series of cages. Some of them were small with a single low door, their occupants would be unable to stand up when inside them, two in the middle would allow some movement, two on the right were very narrow; once inside the occupant would be unable to sit down or lie down. “This used to be the dungeon,” the Emir said. “They’d converted it to a wine cellar. Well, I like wine as much as the next man but there are limits, I thought I’d put it back to its original use. Plus, I get to keep some of my toys in here.” he pushed a switch that turned on a battery of spot lights. Whoever had the misfortune to be occupying the cages would have an unrestricted view of a range of unpleasant devices that could be used on them.
Sarah was obviously disconcerted by the sight of a series of medieval implements of restraint and torture but said nothing.
“Ain’t this the goods?” the Emir
said. “They’re all accurate replicas. Had some guys from your
“Oh,” said Sarah. “I’m not sure. They all look horrid. I don’t think….”
“Now, Sarah,” Harry interrupted. “I think you’ll look good in the pillory. You ought to oblige the Emir.”
Sarah still looked uncomfortable but agreed and walked across to it. She was about to lift the bar that would lock her head and wrists in place when the Emir stopped her.
“Say, what’s your name, why don’t you take that jacket off, give us all a better view.” Sarah looked across at Harry but if she was expecting him to intervene she was disappointed. He just nodded. The blouse she was wearing was pale pink, tight and high necked with long, loose sleeves. “Hmm,” said the Emir, that’s not going to really show it off well, you’d better lose the blouse.”
Sarah complied, putting it with her jacket on a chair. “Perhaps you’d like me to take of my skirt as well, Sir,” she said. Harry looked approving.
“Excellent, excellent, you’ve got the idea,” said the Emir, grinning as Sarah unzipped her skirt. “Now put your head in the centre there and you wrists up here. Then all I have to do is to lower this beam. See how it just fits around your neck,” Sarah gave a cough as the beam came down, “and your wrists. Nice and snug fitting, see. Then all we do is clip a padlock in this fastening here and you’re all secure.”
Harry picked up a device from the table opposite the pillory. “Isn’t this a scold’s bridle?” he said. “Let’s try this on as well.” Sarah looked distressed. But the Emir was obviously pleased that his toys were attracting approval. Harry picked up the bridle, amused by the fact that it carried a pair of metal asses ears, as well as the metal bands designed to enclose the head.
“Be my guest,” he said, watching as Harry unfastened the cage of metal bands and fitted it around Sarah’s head, postioning the inverted Y over her nose and pushing the metal piece into her mouth to press down on her tongue. He fixed it shut at the back of her head with the small padlock that hung from the neck band. He pulled Sarah’s hair through to let it fall loosely around her face.
“Gech icch goff,” complained Sarah, “icchs eggy ng icchs hurging ghi goucth.” She shook her head without effect. Nobody took any notice.
“It’s all authentic stuff,” the Emir said. “I studied this at college in the States, never thought I’d get to actually put it to use. She’ll find that a bit heavy after a while, it’s made of steel same as the original.” He walked around behind her. “This girl of yours might have been built for this,” he said, licking his lips at the sight of Sarah in her bra, panties stockings and suspender belt, locked in the pillory with her head trapped in the scold’s brindle.
Harry smiled. The Emir ran his hands across Sarah’s thighs and buttocks. “Yes,” he said, “very nice. She’s a cute girl like I said. How much do you want for her? Can we add her to the shipment for here?”
Sarah gave a squeak of alarm from inside the bridle. “Well,” said Harry. “We hadn’t thought about selling her. I guess it’s a possibility.” Another squeak from Sarah. “But we couldn’t do it straight away. We could lend her to you, I guess.”
“Yes,” I said. “Your Minister of Trade was kind enough to lend me his secretary for an evening in Kushtia, this seems only fair in return.”
The Emir looked a little concerned. “Well, I don’t want to take advantage and Kushtian hospitality is never given in the expectation of any return. I mean like I know youse brought her over here and everything. So, well, look how about if I rent her for a while. You can see how you get on without her, I can see if she fits in.” Sarah squealed again, the scold’s bridle stopping her from making any articulate protest.
I remembered a paper I had back in my brief case. “I’ve got a rental agreement with me,” I said. Elly had been drawing one up and I’d printed out a copy. “Our legal department has been working on a standard one for us. It covers all the usual stuff; waiver in the event of damage caused by the item being rented, acceptance of liability for any permanent damage caused to the item, that sort of thing.”
“Sure thing, said the Emir. “That sounds fine. Youse got to protect your assets. Especially if the assets have arses like this.” He smirked, giving Sarah’s backside a pat. “If we go back to the house I’ll sign it. Plus you can show me what you’re proposing.”
Harry gave Sarah a wave. She looked distressed as we left her in the dungeon to head back to the house.
Back in the Emir’s lounge, I got out the rental agreement that Ellie had drafted up for me. I filled in a few details to cover the rental of Sarah. He didn’t even read it but scrawled a signature across the bottom. I rummaged in my case and found the summary that Sarah had typed up from our earlier meeting. “Well, Emir,” I began.
“Hey, come on,” the Emir, let’s not keep this so formal. Call me Brad.”
“OK, Brad,” I responded. “Now, I think what you were looking for was a beautician, a nurse / dietician, hairdresser, a fitness coach and four house maids, plus three or four for entertaining. I hear you’ve already picked out some stock for the entertainments, so we’re only talking about the staff at the moment. Right?”
“Spot on Larry, spot on,” Brad smiled. “Four very nice pieces from your stock room, I must say. We don’t have to take so much trouble over the fuck-bunnies but they look as though they’ll give my guests a good time. Your man Rick seems to have a good training programme going there.”
“Well yes, he does, I guess. Anyway we‘ve got some proposals for the rest of the staff. Our research people managed to track down these two as possibles for your beautician / hairdresser. They are two sisters, set up their business last year specialising in an in-your-home service. They go out with a sort of travelling beauty parlour. They also run a web site where they give beauty tips on-line and show some examples of their work. Here look,” I took out my lap top and turned it on. I’d canned a version of their site to show the Emir. I took him through it.
“They seem to do quite a good job, looking at this stuff,” Brad said. “Sisters, you say?” I nodded. “Well they’d be unhappy if we split them up. I reckon you should get the pair of them. I’ll be able to use them. Got to keep the girls looking cute, haven’t we?”
“Fine,” I said always happy to add to the quota. Harry grunted approvingly. I knew he’d reckon it was easier to snatch both of them than one. “Now, I’ve got some video of the next one. We thought this would do for your fitness coach.” I fired up the video we’d had taken. A group of girls were playing beach volley ball. They all looked fit but of the four, one team was of a rather muscular build while of the others the girl playing at the back was long legged and blonde, her partner equally leggy but with short cropped dark hair. “That’s our suggestion,” I said pointing to the blonde girl as she leapt forward to knock the ball back over the net to her opponents. It came straight back. Her partner intercepted it and pushed it high and away towards the back corner of their opponent’s court. They just reached it. A diving, two handed blow pushed the ball back up again towards the net. The other girl batted it up intending for her partner to slam it to the floor across the net but instead the ball headed over the net. As it did so, the blonde dived forward, tipping the ball back over the net to fall between two of her opponents. She and her partner threw their hands up in excitement. It was obviously the winning point. They embraced one another, but it was fairly obvious that the kiss between the two girls was more than you’d normally get for a winning point. Giggling the two of them fell to the sand, locked together while their opponents looked on amused, hands on hips.
“She’s 28 years old, a qualified physiotherapist and a diploma in sports medicine. She’s trained volleyball, tennis and ladies soccer players. Plus as you can see, she’s pretty well set up herself. Prefers the company of girls to men, as you can see, but I’m assuming that won’t worry you.”
The Emir gave a smirk. “What about her girl friend? She’s cute too.”
“She’s 26, not qualified as far as we can tell. She runs, middle distance stuff mainly, pretty good club performer but she’s never going to make it to the Olympics. She’s been shacked up with our target for about six months, but she’ll get over her soon enough.”
“Seems a shame to split them up,” said Brad. “Being so fond of each other and all. I think I can run to the two of them.”
I tried not to grin, but things were going pretty much as
I’d hoped. “OK,” I said. “Now for your nurse, we found this a bit further down
the beach.” I pushed a series of grainy photographs towards Brad. Obviously
taken with a telephoto lens and then blown up they showed two girls, both
blondes, sun bathing in bikinis. “The one in red is our suggestion. She 25, Dutch, qualified as a nurse last year in
“Are these two candidates for the little Dutch boy?” Brad asked. I looked blank.
“You know, the one that saved the country by sticking his finger in the dyke. They look like an item too.”
“Yeah,” I said, “you could be right. We think they’re that way. But don’t let that worry you. We can set things up so it looks like she’s responsible for the fact that her friend’s gone missing. The papers love that sort of stuff.” I was thinking back to the coverage that Rachel’s disappearance had generated when the press had found out that her chauffeuse had gone missing too.
“No, no, I can’t have that,” Brad smiled. “Gotta have the two of them as well.”
”I think that will put us rather over budget, Emir,” I said. “I wouldn’t want there to be any difficulties with the Trade Minister as a result.”
“Don’t you worry about that. I can square him. This isn’t all on his budget anyway. I’ll be picking up quite a bit of the cost. But then like I say you got to be in to win. Eh, Larry boy???”
“Just as long as you’re happy,” I said.
“Sure, sure,” he answered.
“Well, it’s fine by me,” said Harry. “Leaves fewer loose ends around. Makes the pick ups easier.”
“OK then,” said Brad, “that’s about it I guess.” His mobile phone bleeped and he looked down at it. “Uh oh,” he said, “message from the boss.”
“How about the house maids?”
He was looking down at his phone. “Uh, oh, yeah. Look I’m sure you can pick those out. I’ll trust your call. Give me one of your order forms, will you?” I pushed the document across to him. He scribbled in “14 items, as agreed,” and signed it. “Look, I’m sorry I’ve got to go. Urgent meeting. I’ll be off for a few days. Don’t worry about your girl, Sarah. I’ll brief the guards to see she’s looked after. We’ll sort things out when I get back. Just get on with the pick-ups can you? I need to grab some stuff.”
The Emir’s signature was good enough for me. Harry and I gathered up our things. We were just about ready to leave when Brad came dashing back into the lounge carrying a small overnight bag. “Can youse guys give me a lift to the airport?” he said. “Only my driver’s in town and I don’t want to miss the next flight.”
“Sure,” said Harry. I agreed with him. After an order for 14 pieces and a rental for Sarah, I felt it was the least we could do.
It was as we were on the way back I could tell that Harry was working himself up to say something. He was never the most talkative but he developed a tense look that told me he was worried. It turned out that it wasn’t about the Emir or Sarah. He wasn’t happy about what was happening with Rachel. He thought I was giving Rick a good enough steer.
“Look, Larry,” he said. “I don’t want to talk out of line and you can tell me it’s none of my business but you’ve always been pretty straight with me about things. You need too do something about Rachel. You commissioned Rachel’s collection but now she’s a problem and you seem to be leaving it all up to Rick. It’s too much of a mess.”
“Hang on,” I said. “He’s the expert.”
“He’s the expert at doing what he does. It ain’t no good if what he does isn’t what’s needed. You’re going to have to pick up the ball. The ‘see if she can survive being fucked ten times a day’ approach hasn’t worked and the ‘let’s take her mind off it with drugs’ approach looks close to disaster too. You’re the only one who can tell Rick that he should be doing something else. And the fact that you think you can get by without her now isn’t an excuse.”
I’d taken on board what Harry was saying but I really hadn’t decided what to do about it. If what Harry had to say hadn’t been enough, the earful I got from Freddie the following day made the point even more strongly. He asked to see me in his office. When I got there Elly had evidently just finished a conversation with him. He didn’t look happy. Elly just looked at me, dropped a file on Clegg’s desk and said “See you later,” to him She gave a nod to me but said nothing more and left.
Clegg gestured for me to take a seat. “How’s things with the Emir?” he asked.
“OK,” I said. Harry’s got research to do some collection proposals. The Emir’s happy with them. He’s going to take 14 pieces from us. Some will come from stock but most will be custom collections.” I’d expected him to be pleased with the news but it didn’t look like he was.
“Larry,” he said, “That’s fine. Good news.” He moved quickly on, evidently keen to get to what he really wanted to talk about. “Look, I know operations aren’t your responsibility but I’m worried. There’s been too many cock-ups recently in the field and in the Prep Centre. And then there was the business with Brian. The difficulty with all this custom collection work is that it means we’re being more selective about targets. I’m not sure we’re taking account of the extra risks the you get when you go after someone specific rather than just collecting opportunities. It was your idea to go down this track. The business needs to deal with the consequences but you need to get on board with that too. I got Elly to do some rooting around on some of the problems. She’s just been filling me in. The only good thing is that it looks as though the Brian thing was well contained. Seems like he wasn’t just keeping down sales prices he was skimming the receipts as well. The people who thought he was helping them are most upset. They actually sounded grateful that we’d taken him out. Sure, they like to make a bit of money but they don’t like things be de-stabilised any more than I do. Not sure where that leaves him when I’ve done with him though. Nobody’s even interested in him as meat. As to the rest of it, Elly was pretty scathing. The whole team’s got too bloody casual. It needs to be tightened up. If we carry on like we are doing then someone’s going to get killed or worse.”
“Well, hang on,” I said defensively. “I’m not sure that you can point deficiencies in operations or the prep centre at me. I know Brian was pissed off because of what I’d been doing but that’s hardly my fault is it?”
“No,” said Clegg, “it’s not. But, and it’s a big but, if this organisation as a whole can’t cope with the attentions of that incompetent better than we did then we’re in trouble. If one of our own folk gets snatched by amateurs; if one of our own folk lets herself get snatched by amateurs; if we only avoid you getting picked up by chance; if we let your writer run amok and break out of the Prep Centre; if we have our sales director running scams on the inside of the business and no one knows; if the Prep centre is so heavy handed it gets to blister the mind of one of our assets,” I looked blank, “your bloody writer – Rachel; then I think the business has a problem. And if you don’t think that’s part of your responsibility then maybe I have a problem with you.”
“Hey, I’m not backing away from any of this but I can’t do other people’s jobs. You didn’t hire me because of what I knew about this business, remember?”
“No, I didn’t. But I do expect some level of involvement. And I need to see some follow through on the consequences of getting into this approach to market. Now I’ll admit I haven’t pressed you on this. But I’m pressing you now Larry, I’m pressing you now. And you won’t want me to press you any harder. Believe me.”
Something about his humourless smile made me very certain that I agreed with him.
“The first thing we’re going to do is fix your writer,” he said bluntly. “I don’t like wasting assets. You wanted her, you can take the lead.”
“Well, I ‘m not sure we can, I’ve spoken to Rick and ….” Clegg’s cold stare cut me off.
“I said it’s going to be fixed. I’ve spoken to Rick about a few things too, including this and he’s feeling much more motivated now.” I imagined the conversation had been along similar lines. “He’s made some progress. Got a new approach. Looks as though it might work, Go talk to him again. And then come back and tell me how you’re going to fix it. That’s not ‘if’, Larry, that’s ‘how’! Don’t take it personally. I’m going to be pretty intolerant of cock-ups all round from now, but this one is very much on your priority list. I’m interested in your continued well-being Larry. Don’t disappoint me.”
I left Clegg’s office feeling somewhere between deeply uncomfortable and scared shitless. Whether or not it was personal it was pretty clear that any failure would result in some personal attention and I didn’t think it was about to be a quiet coaching session. In fairness, I had to admit he was right but it didn’t make me any more comfortable about the possible outcomes.
I bumped into Rick in the corridor at the Prep Centre and told him Freddie had asked me to talk to him about Rachel. “Yes,” he said, “Freddie had a chat with me, too.” He gave a look that suggested he’d left his discussions with Clegg in about as comfortable a state as I had. “So, it looks like we need to try and fix this.”
I asked whether he’d made any progress with Rachel, whether he’d found anything yet that might be able to help her.
“No,” he said. “We stopped the drugs and we’ve put her on a fairly minimal security regime while we’ve been trying to think of some other stuff. The good news is that she seems to be recovering. No more compliant than before but certainly less damaged than I thought. There could be something there to work with after all but we need a different approach.”
“What sort of ‘different approach’, more drugs or what?”
“Nuh,” Rick shook his head. “There’s one idea that one of the team came up with. We were working on it before Elly got Clegg all wound up about things. They thought that maybe instead of trying to break her we should just give her a really comfortable environment, let her recover as best she could, and then, well…. Look have you got some time?”
I looked at my watch. “Mm, sure,” I said. “I want things to turn out for her. I am responsible, I guess. I had her snatched after all. It’s not her fault things moved on. Plus Freddie wants some feed-back on what we’re going to do. He’s taking a personal interest. I can see it wouldn’t be a great idea to disappoint him.”
“Yeah, I know. The good thing is that it was what Freddie has set up for Brian’s family that gave us the idea for this. You know he was really angry about all that you know. I wondered if there wasn’t going to be blood spilled in a deliberate, unpleasant and terminal fashion over it.”
“You’re not telling me that he’s mellowed? Decided to send them all off for a pleasant holiday somewhere with his compliments?”
“That’s not really Freddie, is it? Look at what he asked us
to set up for the wife, the sister and the two girls. Here.” Rick pulled back a
curtain that had covered a viewing panel. Behind it were four tables each of
which had one of Brian’s family strapped down to it. They weren’t struggling.
“Something more intense? Hang on. Did you say they’re distressed when you turn the current off?”
“Oh yes. They are becoming addicted to the stimulation. So the next stage isn’t really to make it any more intense. Quite the reverse in some ways. What we do next is to provide them with a highly normalised environment. Comfortable surroundings, bright colours, good food, opportunities for relaxation. Except they get to learn that they can have intense sexual stimulation whenever they want it. We’ve designed a device that fits like a thong, a radio receiver triggers it. Using that, we can let them learn that they can gain stimulation with conforming behaviour. They can try self stimulation of course but they’ll find that it’s not as intense as what we can deliver through the thong. Pleasure is very addictive.”
“But I’m not sure I see how this helps us with Rachel. I don’t even really see what the end point for them is. How does this help Freddie’s need for revenge on Brian?”
“Well, can’t we use the same approach on Rachel? The end point for this lot is that Clegg gets four females, completely addicted to sex that will do almost anything for the sexual stimulation that they crave. I am sure he can find a use for that.” Rick gave a smirk.
“And Freddie’s revenge?”
Rick pressed another button and a light lit at the back of the room. There, strapped to a chair, fully able to watch every aspect of the proceedings, was Brian. “He’s watching every last part of it,” said Rick. “Freddie’s really quite pleased that he’s going to be able to watch his wife, sister-in-law and daughters turning tricks because they want to.”
“Sounds like something the Emperor Tiberius would have thought of.”
“Funny you should say that,” Rick came back. “Freddie’s got a copy of Suetonius ‘The Twelve Caesars’ on his desk at the moment.”
“I think we should all be worried by that. From what I remember it didn’t turn out too well for any of them or many of the people around them.”
“No,” said Rick, I’m no classicist but I think you’re right. Still to come back to the point in hand. I thought we could use something similar for your writer. Do you want me to put her on the same regime?”
“Let me think about it,” I said. It seemed like it might offer some possibilities but I was worried. I suspected that Rachel’s almost catatonic state had been the result of trauma from her use of the memory of rape as the diversion from her conditioning added to the effect of the drugs. I wasn’t sure that more sex was the answer. Leastways not at first.
“Yes, that’s right, Janice, it’s for a photo shoot. …. Well, I saw the stuff you do on your web site and I thought you’d be ideal for this. I’ll cover your fees of course but I’ll credit your work on the pictures too. They’ve been commissioned by a new magazine: South Coast – it’s going to be promoting all sorts of businesses around here, this shoot is for their launch issue. It should get a lot of attention. Anyway they want us to do a feature on a couple of volley ball players, we’re going to want to do a sort of make over shoot, some pics of them in their volley ball kit and then in evening dress. So you’ll need to do a fairly high-energy make up and hair for the first shots and something a bit more sophisticated for the evening look. I guess you and Jilly can handle that? …. I thought so. OK well if you can be at my studio tomorrow lunchtime, that will be great. Keep it quiet though, the magazine doesn’t want anything to get out about this until they do the launch. If it goes well you should have plenty more opportunities like this. … Right, see you there.”
I over heard Tricia’s phone call. It sounded like she had no problem setting up Janice and Jillie, the make up girls. Karen and Peta weren’t any trouble either when Tricia called them. They were keen for some publicity as they saw it and, like she said, the worst that can happen is you don’t like what the make up girls do.
The next day in the photo studio we’d hired for the occasion, Janice and Jillie were setting up their stuff on a couple of tables to one side when I saw Karen and Peta coming up the alleyway towards us. They squeezed past the van that almost blocked the alleyway and onto the stairs that led up to where we were.
We were using Tricia and Eva, the girl she’d worked with on the Questor pick up, for this. We thought the targets would be more comfortable with a couple of female photographers. I was there ostensibly to rig lighting. I just liked to watch the girls at work I guess. Tricia and Eva seemed to get on and it looked like everything was working so far. Tricia was keen to get a lead role but she didn’t mind working in to Eva and Harry had been adamant that she needed a few more pick-ups under her belt before he’d let her take charge of one. She and Harry had had a bit of an up and downer about it. I was trying to stay out of it. At least it didn’t seem to be interfering with this job.
The six of them were enjoying a glass of chilled wine before getting started while I fiddled around with the flash stands and the reflectors. Karen and Peta stripped down to their bra and panties to let Janice and Jillie get started on their make up and hair. There were some robes hanging by the chairs at the make up desk but they didn’t bother with them.
Janice was just about to start on Peta’s hair when Tricia and her friend went to work. The targets found themselves staring into the barrel of an Ouzi and a pistol. “Sorry, ladies,” Tricia announced. “Just be careful or it will be a different type of shoot to the one you expected. Now keep your hands over your heads and sit down on the floor.”
Janice, Jillie, Karen and Peta followed instructions, staring up from the floor at their attackers.
“Karen, Peta, on your face, please, hands behind your backs.” Tricia passed two pairs of handcuffs to Janice and Jillie. “Put those on them,” she ordered watching as Janice and Jillie cuffed the two volley ball players, “and squeeze them closed real tight. Tricia’s associate was rummaging in Karen and Peta’s sports bags, she pulled out four pairs of sports socks.
“One pair each, ladies,” she said tossing them to Janice and Jillie. Seeing their puzzled look she pointed to her own mouth. “In the mouth, girls, in the mouth. We want you four quiet. You two roll the others over and stuff their mouths. Then do your own.”
“No, please,” begged Janice. “We won’t make a sound. We’ll be quiet.”
“Will we, fuck,” growled Karen.
Tricia grinned. “That’s what we thought,” she snarled. “Now get on with it.” She aimed a swipe of her gun butt at Janice who fell into line quickly. Cramming a pair of socks into Peta’s mouth before doing the same for her own. She looked back plaintively at Tricia. Jillie did the same for Karen. “Now some tape,” said Eva, tossing a roll of gaffer tape across to Janice. Jillie knelt on the floor with her hands in the air, staring in fear at Tricia’s gun. “Three strips - two diagonal cross ways over the mouth, one horizontal, use plenty and make sure it’s pulled tight over those socks.” Eva ordered Janice, watching as she did as she was told. “Great, you’ve done that really well. Now do your own.”
As Janice pulled the strips tight across her own face she gave a muffled grunt. “Grunghhh,” she went.
Eva smiled. “Yeah, it works doesn’t it? Now do the other two.” Janice taped over Peta’s mouth and then did the same for Jillie before dropping the remainder of the roll on the floor. She looked up at Tricia and Eva and raised her own hands in resigned surrender.
“Very good,” said Eva. “Now let’s get you two tied up.”
“Hang on,” I said, interrupting things for the first time. “Let’s have these two strip off. They’re looking a bit over dressed alongside our sporty two.” Tricia and Eva exchanged a look that said, “Men! Huh!” but they knew as well as I did that the more you did to humiliate them early on in the game, the easier they were to deal with as things went on.
“You heard the man,” said Eva. “Stay down on the floor but get out of those dresses.” Janice gave a muffled whimper. Eva responded by jamming her pistol into the girl’s cleavage. Get started if you don’t want an extra button hole,” she snarled and Janice began to unfasten the buttons up the front of her dress. As she pulled it from her shoulders, I got a good look at her tits, she tried to hold her hands across her chest but Eva wasn’t having any, ordering her to put her hands behind her. The gag muffled Janice’s sobs but the tears on her cheek told the story of her distress and terror. Jillie offered no resistance as Tricia prodded her into stripping like her friend. She gave each of the make-up girls a pair of handcuffs and told them to lock their own wrists behind their backs before she pushed them face down alongside Peta and Karen. We let the four of them whimper helplessly while we cleared the place up.
It didn’t take long to get the girls down the stairs and into the van; the alleyway wasn’t overlooked so we didn’t even have to wait until dark. They were soon on their way. I suggested to Tricia that she and I might go for a drink but she turned me down. She claimed that she and Eva still had another pick up to plan but I thought it might have had something to do with me insisting that Janice and Jillie strip off.
Later it looked like I needn’t have worried. I was laying in bed in my hotel room, later that evening, flicking idly though the channels on the TV when there was a knock at the door. “It’s me,” said Tricia’s voice. “I thought we might have that drink……” I’d hoped we might have some fun or maybe even talk through some of my problems. Instead Tricia spent the time telling me that Harry really ought to let her lead a pick up and she didn’t see why she had to go on playing second string to Eva. I sat there listening or looking as though I was, and thinking that an evening with Kelly would have been more amusing. In the end she went back to her own room.
I spent the rest of the time thinking about what I was going to suggest to Clegg about Rachel. I’d had a long talk with the Prep Centre doctor – the one that had helped me the time that Rachel attacked me. She had agreed with me that the whole sex orientation thing was unlikely to work in the short term after the traumatising effect of Rachel’s multiple rapes. She argued that what Rachel needed was a chance to draw a line under that, to set herself free from her past, to start again. In the longer term, having done that it would be possible to use Rick’s approach but she was too unstable now. The Doc argued that one of the ways forward could be to induce some sort of near-death experience; to give her something to recover from and then to help that recovery. That way she would come to see us as her saviours rather than her oppressors; at least as long as she didn’t suspect that we were the authors of her fate. The fact that she’d been on a less oppressive regime already would help. After that we could probably introduce the sexual programming.
I’d felt the Doc was making sense. It sounded like a better bet than trying to shock her into sexual compliance from where she was now. I had the ideal nurse available in Sukie, and from what I’d seen Rachel trusted her. The Doc knew how to engineer the near death experience. We just had too organise it and make sure no one else knew about it.
The discussion with Clegg turned out to be a lot less difficult than I’d expected. But then I’d thought a lot about it.
“You wanted me to tell you how I was going to fix the Rachel problem,” I said, taking as positive an approach as I could.
“Uhhuh,” said Clegg.
“Well, I’ve got the answer. It depends on inducing an immediate crisis for Rachel and assisting her recovery.” I talked him through the Doctor’s hypothesis that Rachel would respond to the opportunity to draw a line under her past life and start again. I didn’t explain how we were going to achieve that and he didn’t press me. “After the induced crisis she’ll need an extended time in recovery. I’ll want a minimum security suite. I’ll be living in it myself – I want to keep this very close to me and I don’t think I can do it in my flat. And I want Sukie assigned to the project as well. I’ll need some help from the Doc too.”
Clegg looked thoughtful. “How long is extended?”
“It could be six months. It could be less.”
“We’re not talking ‘horse might talk’ here are we?”
“Sorry,” I said. “How do you mean?”
“It’s a parable on the value of delaying tactics.” Clegg was watching me closely. I looked him straight in the eye. “A man is about to be executed by the King and he says, ‘Surely you wouldn’t execute the man who could make your horse talk? Give me a year and I’ll do it.’ The King agrees and as the man is dragged off to the stables, one of the guards hisses at him, ‘You can’t make his horse talk, can you?’ And the man says, ‘In a year a lot can happen. I might die, or the horse might die, or the King might die, … or the horse might talk.’ You see Larry? I’d hate to think you were thinking along those lines, Larry.”
“Freddie,” I said, “I don’t have any other horses to back on this one.” Clegg laughed. “I thought about using the techniques that are being worked on Brian’s family but that’s not right for this. At least not at first. This is the best bet.”
“Good,” he said. “At least you’re committed. What shall we call this project? ‘Mr. Ed’?”
© Freddie Clegg 2006
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