Rude Awakening 3 – The Baits

At the time, all she could think at first was that she didn’t remember that Louise’s father manor by the beach had sturdy chairs with strong arms. In fact she didn’t remembered how she had managed to arrive at Louise’s father manor in the first place. And if that was the case she would be waking up on a bed, not sitting on a chair... naked?

Humm... no, she wasn’t naked. There was a breeze coming from somewhere at her left, OK girl time to wake up and close the window or door and find a bed, you’re still groggy...

Why couldn’t she lift her right arm from the armchair? Or the left one? Or her torso from the back of the chair? And why wasn’t she able to see anything?

Oh no...

It was tape, TAPE!, again. Somebody had wrapped tape around her forearms and the armchairs, around her torso and the back of the chair, around her ankles and then around her ankles and one of the front legs of the chair and finished by slapping a few strips over her packed mouth and eyes. She was, AGAIN!, a captive...

Calm down girl, don’t panic, breathe deeply, calm and deeply... breathe... breathe...

‘Hey, one of them woke up...’

The voice was male, and she heard a pair of bare feet hurrying towards her.

‘The white or the black?’

‘The white.’

So... there was only one of her friends with her? It wasn’t Louise nor Hiroko, so it could only be one of the ‘twins’; Autumn or René. And where were the others? And how did they get captured in the first place? It was all a blurred and out of focus memory, a bit painful to remember actually. And there was still that cold breeze... she was barefoot and with only a string bikini to protect her from it. It wasn’t really cold, she could feel some sun over her legs so she was near the window, but she would love that a window or door was closed.

She felt fat and strong finger holding her chin.

‘Now listen up... ********!!!’

It was a woman, and hardly a pleasant one...

‘Your friends are with us. They are fine for the moment, for the moment. Stay put, don’t move, don’t do anything that we might not like and your friends will not ‘entertain’ my boys tonight. Do you understand me? You are to stay put!!!’

She nodded as soon as the woman removed her fingers from her lower jaw. She couldn’t believe it! It really seemed that the whole situation was worst than six years before!!!!

She remembered being locked inside a closet and hearing her father being beaten by them... they sent him to ICU for nearly a month! She and her mother (who shared the confined space of the closet with her) weren’t touched after they found themselves balled up and resting on their sides, they had broke four ribs of her father (among many other bones) and destroyed his studio, and all the incident still gave them all nightmares... and the police couldn’t find who had did it or why since they had no clue to check on!

But now... rape threats on three of her best friends, if SHE didn’t stayed put! She started to breathe audibly through her nose, and somehow it helped to wake her captivity’s pal...

She heard the woman repeat the threat to a woman on her right and leave, a gun being cocked and then nothing... until a finger touched her own...

She yelped, and attracted the guard’s attention. Little did he know that his next action would be his last. He slapped them both, with such force that he sent her friend, with chair and all, backwards and she heard a loud ‘thud’ indicating that the chair had fell. Of course, since she was blindfolded she couldn’t see the action, but after the ‘thud’ she heard the woman ask what had happened and he, using very harsh words, described it to her. Not ten seconds later she heard another thud, albeit this one passed unobserved by everybody else in the place. And then there was another hand over her mouth. Another woman.

‘I will remove this and you won’t scream, understood?’

She nodded again. The tape and whatever was used to pack her mouth were removed and she felt a straw being placed inside her mouth. She drank what seemed to be fruit juice.

‘Who are you?’

‘Annemarie... Annemarie Bernard. What’s going on?’

The hand was now covering all the lower half of her face.

‘I do the questions, you do the answers, now where are they?’

‘They who?’

‘Hold on a minute...’

She felt a couple of fingers touching her face and moving it, to the right, then to the left. When she opened her mouth to ask the newcomer what was going on again she felt a pull and the upper part of her bikini was yanked from her body, and quickly stuffed inside her mouth! And shortly after something was wrapped around her head, it felt like silk, keeping it inside. And then shots, many shots!, and two or three people running towards her and a door slamming, more shots and a sudden impact on the side of the chair that made her fell on her side. She hit her head on the floor and became really stunned for a while...

Funny, she was back in Hiroko’s brand new car, with the owner of the car being sandwiched in the backseat while Louise was at the wheel and she was on the passenger’ seat. Hiroko’s ex-boyfriend was acting like he would not follow the restriction order issued by the court, and to relieve their friend from all the worries and fears she had about that loose cannon freaking loser(!), they had... sort of... kidnapped her...

She had protested, at first, but as Louise described what they would do to and with her during that weekend... she was game. They had stopped at a drive-thru near the interstate and all of them had drove wolf whistles from the teenager at the counter.

Well, she was beautiful, Hiroko was beautiful, Louise was ‘smoking-hot-drop-dead-sultry-beauty-gorgeous-babe’ according to some male sources (her cousins Frank, Bernie, Ralph and Bill), and Autumn and René had been considered by the Playboy magazine to pose for one of their special editions about co-eds... And all were wearing bikini tops or T-shirts (it was summer and they were going to THE beach) and shorts or Bermuda shorts (that deserved the ‘short’ in their name)... And the manager, when he decided to appear to them and apologize for the behavior of his soon-to-be ex-employee, had also whistled and stood with his jaw open... They all shared a good laugh inside the car...

Then what? They had had a quick brunch... they had reached the town they were heading to and then... she simply couldn’t remember...

There was someone cutting the tape that held her body tied to the chair, but her freedom was short lived. Cuffs soon adorned her wrists and ankles, and then someone grabbed her, threw her over a shoulder and started to walk. It was the woman; she had small breasts that were being pressed by her legs as she was being carried over the woman’s left shoulder. She was also strong and tall, and had ‘big’ hands. They went downstairs, a large and curved downstairs. Then there was still some fight outside the house and huge commotion coming towards them as they reached the bottom of the stairs.

‘Castor!’

‘Pollux! In here guys!’

Soon they were surrounded by many men and women, eight at the very least, who seemed disappointed as they realized that she wasn’t ‘her’. By the numbers of ‘Who’s she?’ or ‘Where’s she?’ she calculated that there were six men and three women with the woman still holding her over her should... Hey! Watch the hand will you?!!!

‘Oooops sorry girlfriend...’ –yeah sure!- ‘Guys, this Annemarie... Gerar... no, Bernard. As you can see she bears a great resemblance to our mutual friend and the other one, who was conked by a bastard a few minutes ago and must still be out, bears a remarkable likeness to her new ‘babydoll weekend busty babe’. Not good enough to fool us at such a short a distance, but good enough to fools us at a long one.’

‘We... we’ve been...’

‘Yeah. Anything on the police?’

‘Yes they received a call about five minutes ago, when the ‘party’ started, but our friend received the call and traced it to a house on the other side of the town!’

‘And the law enforcers?’

‘Still locked and sleeping in their undies inside the cells, all nine of them, the two gals in a separate cell than the boys of course. Shouldn’t we be leaving now?’

‘No. You two go and get her friend and take her to point A! You four, check the whole place, the rest come with me... oooops! Sorry again girl...’

The woman rushed to an awaiting SUV, she was placed in the backseat with two big guys flanking her and the woman sat at the passenger seat, whoever was at the wheel was the first to break the silence a few minutes later.

‘So what now?’

‘One moment, how things are going there?’

There was a radio device, like they were inside a patrol car?, and it was loud enough for her to listen. It was a man on the other end, stating that the girl was still out, a mild concussion according to their ‘lady doctor friend’ –they had arrived at ‘point A’ and had already removed Autumn/René from the place–, and there was no useful data on the whole place. The woman ordered that a full check-up was done in the place during the next two hours, and then they would leave. The woman then switched to another frequency.

‘Report.’

‘Nothing in here, except for three beach bunny bimbos bound with the strings of their own bikinis I found locked in the cellar and a guard that had to be dealt with. The girls are alright; actually they seem to have been drugged and will not wake up for the next few hours. The house itself is completely bare, save for the mattress the three shared.’

‘Any trace of the two?’

‘Nope, the call came from a pink and white cellphone that is inside an SUV parked inside the garage. Strange enough, there are personal belongings of FIVE young women in it.’

‘Check all the cellphones and cameras that you can find there, after you took all three babes to the SUV of course, and then you take them to point B.’

‘But…’

‘Do as I say!’

She could sense the tension growing up exponentially in that confined ambient. So, the reason of it all, was that she and Autumn/René were to be used as baits for a ruse?

The leader said to the others to ‘cross your fingers’ and got in touch with another person.

‘It was about time that you called. Let me guess, the girls you managed to see through the open window weren’t them, right? And they were setting a trap to us, right?’

‘YOU HAVE THEM WITH YOU???!!!’

‘Yeah… a bit beaten up, just a few bruises, and with ropemarks that will last for a while. They were drugged and prepared to be sent to…’

‘Hold on a second… why is she still awakened?’

One of the guys flanking her answered in a very grave voice.

‘The knock-out stuff stayed behind, nor I nor anyone of us has anything to put her to sleep painlessly unless with hit her, something that you are usually against boss…’

She leaned forward and started to plea automatically, then a pair of very large hands held her head and covered her lower face completely, and forced her to seat back in her place.

‘You, cover her ears with something. Stop the car at the next alley…’

Something like cotton was placed on her ears and tape was pressed over it. Not the most efficient deafening stuff since some sound did manage to pass, but no discernible words reached her and she sensed that there was some discussion… no, the leader was giving orders. The man on her left leaned forward and then left the car, the leader replaced and quickly made sure that she was well gagged with more strips of tape, finally she was forced to lean and leave her head on the leader’s lap and the car was put in motion.

After a few minutes drive, during which she felt the woman’s big finger tenderly dry her tears and her voice tried to soothe after the deafening stuff was (a bit painfully since some hair went along) removed by the man on her right.

Then the car stopped. She was quickly forced to lay on the whole backseat and put into a very strenuous position that they called ‘hogtie’. Her fingers were touching her soles! And she was left alone inside the car after the leader kissed her forehead.

Minutes passed agonizingly slow, the leader had given orders that a ‘tiny overture’ was left in the car’s glass windows so she would not suffocate. That overture also allowed her to hear her surroundings, but since the vehicle in which she was locked in seemed to have been parked in another deserted alley there wasn’t anything really worth listening. Plus the weather was really great for a hot summer day, so she was starting to feel like inside a sauna inside that car. Then… there was a lookout? Somebody, who seemingly was simply standing a few feet away from the car, shouted ‘I am on it!’ and opened the driver’s door, and the car was put in motion so suddenly that if she wasn’t strapped with two of the passenger’s seatbelts she would have fell forward!

After no more than one minute the car stopped and the leader and another gagged girl entered the car. ‘Move move move!’ was all that the leader said as she finished the new captive (who had fell on top of her as she was pushed inside the car) bondage.

After a few minutes of a wild run through the streets, that only happened because the local law enforcers were still trapped inside their own cells, they arrived at a deserted place. The leader grabbed the new woman as the driver grabbed her and both were rushed into…?

She couldn’t remember.

She had woken up a few minutes before, she was lying in what looked like a small bed (perhaps a medical examination one?), a bit dazed and confused at first but then everything had returned to her memory at once. Except for the two big blanks; how she and her friends had been kidnapped and how she had ended up where she was; everything was very clear to her. Which she couldn’t say if it was good or bad, considering that she was blind and unable to move a single muscle! And there weren’t any restraints over her body!

‘Girls?’

She tried to attract the attention of the owner of that voice, was she being rescued? And she heard the same unintelligible sounds coming from other mouths at her left and right.

‘It’s alright girls; you are neither permanently blind nor quadriplegic. We used drugs to keep you five… hum… shall we say ‘manageable’ during the past two days. The drugs are already starting to wear off, albeit it will take a good four hours for you to be able to move, and at least six for you to be able to see clearly again.’

The next thing that the voice said was the order to have them all gagged. Strips of tape were pressed and smoothed over her lips and strong palms enhanced the desired effect. Then she told them that they were fine and that, actually, no one knew about what had happened to them. The hazardous kidnapping of a famous Italian actress; perpetrated by criminals bold enough to capture the entire local police force in their own base and greed enough to shoot each other and thus cut their numbers almost in half, and the dead half was well known by the FBI and Interpol; was all that had happened in that weekend at that county.

And the voice reminded them that they had told their families that they would stay ‘under the radar for as long as Hiroko needed’, so they weren’t exactly expected at the moment back at their homes. The whole real incident, which included their kidnapping, was to be kept a secret no matter what the ‘voice’ had to do, so the voice asked them what would have to be paid for that to happen. Then the ‘voice’ said that the gags would stay on until they had strength enough back in their arms and hands to remove it, a registered nurse would stay with them and if there was any need all they had to do was attract her attention.

‘But, I must warn you of that; she’s here to help you, not to become your prisoner. So she has my authorization to deal with any troublemaker the way she sees fit.’

Minutes passed very slowly. She could actually feel her strength and stamina returning to her limbs, but without any warning she heard a mild commotion, followed by a ‘You were warned!’ and a series of… slaps? No… someone was getting spanked!

Hiroko? No, she couldn’t tell much about her friends state of mind after all that happened to them, specially because she didn’t knew exactly what had happened to them but herself, but of one thing she could be sure was that Hiroko would never try something that stupid.

Autumn wasn’t likely to do that either, René… well, perhaps René could try something, but her money was on Louise. Always the ‘hothead’, always the daredevil, always the one that ended up needing their help. Yeah, more like Loui…

‘Please stop it!’

Louise’s voice, after a ripping sound, had came from her left side and the spanking was happening right at her right one. The voice was cranky and a bit ‘towed’ as her Latino boyfriend would say, but it was Louise’s. Then who was getting spanked?

‘I will spank this Japanese chick as much as I want! You girls shut up or…’

‘…Or nothing.’

The voice was back, but it seemed that it was coming from some speaker. Of course, they were probably being monitorated by cameras and the spanking frenzy of the one in charge hasn’t passed unobserved. The heels of three women entered the room and she heard tape being ripped and someone trying to protest, but she was soon well gagged for that.

‘Sorry about that, Hiroko is fine, although we are providing a cushion for her. Stay put for a while more, I will be there in exactly one hour. PLEASE, do not try anything until then.’

She heard a squeezing sound at her right, then another and her face was struck by a spray.

She slept for over two full hours.

She awoke with a delicate touch in her right cheek, it was Autumn, and only when she (again) realized that she wasn’t being able to see was that she (again) remembered her current condition. She was still blind, but her arms and legs, her whole body actually, were fine. Autumn, who seemed to be standing at her side and leaning toward her, quickly whispered to her what little she knew about everything.

René had been the one that had shared the role of the bait with her, but of what they did not knew. She, Louise and Hiroko were taken to a place by a ‘very disgusting guy’ whom they could not see due to their blindfolds, and who had explained very little for them. According to him she and René were to be used as baits to trap ‘their enemies’, and supposing that they survived the whole thing, they were to be sold (just like the other three) to some brothel overseas. If Autumn had told her that yesterday she probably would not believe in her friend, right now was another story… the guy wasn’t supposed to ‘damage the goods’ as he had put it. Then at some point he received orders to put them to sleep. The last thing that she remembered was that a cloth was rudely shoved over her face.

Next thing she knows she’s on a plane, which was airborne, and there’s a very angry Italian lady somewhere behind her. She was sitting on a passenger seat with her head pressing the plane’s window and was tied up and gagged very efficiently, yet far more bearable than her previous bonds. Her ankles and knees were lashed together and there was a rope tied around her waist to which her crossed wrists were tied to. She was sporting a blindfold like those that were used to see in airplanes and was gagged with what seemed a towel.

The Italian lady was very furious, she probably had awakened thanks to one of her remarks about the ‘indignity’ she was suffering, but Autumn couldn’t be really sure of what the woman was saying. It was mostly in Italian, albeit with a few phrases in English, and the woman whom she was talking to seemed to have no problem in following her. Then the second woman got tired and obviously gagged the first woman saying that ‘regardless of what you think of yourself, you’re just a suitable excuse and nothing less!’

Twenty seconds later someone pressed another cloth over her face and she awakened lying on that small bed. After a while the ‘voice’, which she didn’t recognized as of any of the women aboard the plane, had made herself known and there was the spanking incident.

With a little help of Autumn she was able to sit and then stand on her own. Only then she realized that she was wearing some underwear over her body, she quickly checked it with her hands and realized that it wasn’t like anything she had back home or had brought with her, way too big even for a prude (yet it was in her size). Then Autumn, after a couple of attempts, managed to grab her hand and guide her to a corner of the room. The others were there and were fine, even Hiroko (who would have a problem to sit on hard surfaces for a while) was fine. All were as scared as she was but were managing to hold it very well.

Whispering a bit too loud sometimes when one of them got agitated, they managed to get a good idea of what was happening and it scared them even more.

‘Hello agaiiinnn… oh, there you are.’

The voice was back, and she seemed alone. She asked the girls to disassembly, stating that she was a doctor and needed to check on their eyes. Reluctantly the girls obeyed.

When it was her turn she managed to see and follow a pale white dot when the woman held a tiny flashlight over her eyes, just like the others. Their eyes were fine and in a matter of hours they would be able to see again, then the doctor asked if they were hungry.

They were eating yogurts and sandwiches and drinking water a few moments later, at the same time that the doctor explained to them which were their options:

‘To put it simple girls, if my superiors wanted that, you would all disappear. I AM NOT SAYING THAT WE WOULD KILL YOU!!!!! That’s completely out of picture! But, the chances of you EVER see anyone of your relatives and other friends for the rest of your long natural lives… nonexistent. Nonexistent and I do mean that. But the fact is that the simple disappearance of five young women in the same area where a daring kidnapping happened would attract unwanted attention to that place. And we have plans for there. So we will let you all go, ‘how’ or ‘when’ is what you may be asking yourselves right now, isn’t it? Well, the water you just drank was drugged. When you wake up you will realize that you are in the outskirts of your hometown, inside Miss Ayama’s car and wearing your clothes. Not the ones with which you left town a few days ago, but part of the lot you took with you back then. There won’t be any visible and physical proof that you were restrained in any way, and actually all of you will have realized that you are tanned, very well and giving you a great look I might add, with the predictable bikini lines. What you will do then is what will determine our actions towards you…’

Someone, probably René, grabbed her right hand and instinctively she hugged the girl.

‘If you go to the police and tell a fantastic story of which you have no proofs or accurate memories to back it up, you will attract attention towards that little town and you will pay for that. How much and in which length is something that my superiors will find out AFTER the losses your action caused to us are properly accounted. But, if you keep your mouth shut and claim that ‘someone’ stole your cameras and cellphones, and thus you have no memos of your past days at the beach, while the police force was writhing in their cells, well… ‘quid pro quo’. That’s Latin for ‘We will owe you gals BIG time’. In fact, as matter of proof that we can be your best secret friends or worst secret foes, let’s just say that three of you five will have a very pleasant surprise when you return to Miss Ayama’s condo…’

Even with Louise and Autumn, which were the informal leaders of the group of friends, doing their best to have the doctor explain what she meant with that there was no real answer. One by one the girls felt the effect of the drug, and sat on the floor with their backs to the wall or simply lay on the floor, and were all out less than five minutes later.

They all awoke as the doctor had said that they would. Tanned, dressed and inside Hiroko’s car. They could see perfectly and had no rope bruise or mark all over their arms, legs and torsos (Louise was adamant about checking on that part), and nothing in her or René’s face indicated that they had been hit there. Their clothes and wallets were inside their bags and sacks, including those who seemed to have been used by them (and were inside plastic bags of a famous grocery store of the town they were supposed to have been for the past days). And their cellphones and cameras were gone.

There was a single piece of paper in the glove compartment with a number on it, a local number of their hometown, and the words ‘Any emergency, call this number’.

They were unsure of what they should do then. Go to the police? They had nothing but their words that they had been kidnapped so two of them could lure a bunch of criminals to a trap, no descriptions of anything (like the places were they had been kept or their captors) except for the phone number. Then René remembered them that three of them would have a pleasant surprise if they went to Hiroko’s address. So they went straight to there.

And what a pleasant surprise they had!

There was some confusion happening there, two paramedics ambulances and four patrol cars were parked in front of the place, many reporters and curious folks were there too. They parked the car and rushed to there… right on time to see Hiroko’s ex being led to an ambulance strapped to a gurney and looking like he had received everything he deserved!

Then Hiroko’s father saw her and soon they were surrounded by their loved ones (who were frightened out of their minds due to the lack of communications) and received the news from them before the police could ask them any question.

A burglar had broke in one of Hiroko’s neighbors, a never lonely immigrant from Belgium who was very friendly and with a fun-loving attitude, tied her up and tried to steal her TV and DVD player, among other things that he obviously had plans to. But as he was carrying the TV to his awaiting (robbed) car he met Hiroko’s ex, who was armed and carrying a suicidal letter, in that alley behind the condo. A fight started and the ex got quite a beating which attracted police attention, and the burglar was forced to leave the place without anything in his hands. The suicidal letter indicated that the ex had plans to kill Hiroko before he took his own life, so he was arrested while receiving the first medical help.

Plus, the men that had attacked her family years before had been finally identified by the police who, after receiving a tip from an informant, had arrested a man who sold stolen stuff but had kept her father’s camera for himself. After a few words with his lawyer the man made a deal with the DA and told the police from whom he had bought it and the whole story became clear. Apparently, her father had photographed a councilman and an infamous millionaire exchanging envelopes while he was taking pictures of some people on the streets. He hadn’t identified them and they were in the background of the picture of a guy reading a paper at the park, but they had seen him and recognized the famous reporter. Now the councilman was denying everything, the millionaire was in a country that hadn’t extradition treaties with the USA and those dreadful thugs were behind bars…

Finally, Autumn’s father wasn’t going to lose his job anymore. The new owner of the small restaurant in which he worked (and who had declared that he was going to close the place) was having sudden problems with his investors, for a ‘modern’ mall he planned to build in the block where the restaurant was located, and was under public scrutiny for a series of pictures of him with a minor at the beach…

A few days later, when they all gathered together and commented on the kidnapping of the Italian actress (who not only had ended up well without any ransom being paid but had given to the actress a large visibility in the US, and was about to be turned into a TV Movie), the subject quickly changed to the lies they had told to everybody.

They talked about it for a long time, and then decided to never talk again. It remained as their dirty weird little secret, and they never realized exactly why they should stay silent about it or why, in the two occasions one of them had to use the ‘emergency number’ many years later and it worked beyond their expectations, it was such a big deal for their unknown captors/helpers that they stayed silent.