Page 13 of Torment

I made one last reach for the knife, and my attacker closed one hand around my throat, lifting me right off the ground as he turned me to face him. I tried to concentrate on the eyes visible in the balaclava holes, but I couldn’t see or think straight. All I could focus on was the crushing pressure in my neck.

Fighting was no longer the most important thing. Breathing was. Every instinct screamed at me to try and get out of the chokehold. I brought my hands up, trying to tug the man’s fingers off my throat as I drew in a ragged, gasping breath. His grip was too strong, and my vision began to disintegrate into disjointed flashes of red and black.

As the darkness began to take hold, all I could think was: I will not be a captive. I will not be a victim. Not again.

Somehow that gave me the resolve to kick out, and I landed my foot right on the man’s groin. He grunted and loosened his grip around my throat. I fell to the ground with a thud, gasping for air.

My victory was short-lived. The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a hypodermic needle. Beneath the balaclava, I could see his lips twisting into a sadistic grin.

“No!” I cried, skittering backwards as I tried to find somewhere to stand up in the slippery mud I’d landed in only seconds before. “Get away from me!”

The man kicked me in the chest and all the air flew out of my lungs again. He rolled me onto my back, covering my mouth with one big hand, the other holding the needle only inches from my face. I let out a moan and tried to shake my head, but it was pointless. The shot caught me on the side of my neck.

The pain was immediate, radiating out from the injection point and quickly engulfing my whole body. My brain seemed to freeze, turning everything I saw bright white. Then it faded.

I sank into the blessed blackness with a soft groan.

Several minutes later, I regained some sort of consciousness—barely—and I realized my hands were now restrained in front of me with white plastic ties. My attacker was several yards away, pushing my car into a watery grave in the deep swamp.

“No…” I whispered, watching him through blurred eyes. “Stop…”

I wasn’t sure why I bothered speaking, but the words kept coming, my brain functioning on some sort of strange autopilot. “Please… stop…”

He went for my purse next. After removing my cell phone, he threw the rest into the brown water and watched it sink rapidly. Then he strode back over to me and hoisted me onto one shoulder.

A moment later, he shoved me into the trunk of his car. He didn’t close it immediately. He stared down at me, his gaze cold and emotionless. Those dark eyes were so familiar to me, but I couldn’t think why. I was too dazed from whatever he injected me with. Perhaps this was all a dream...

I closed my eyes, sinking back into the blackness.

When I woke up again, the car was moving. I was trapped in suffocating darkness with a gag in my mouth. When did that happen?

I lay there in a spaced-out stupor for several minutes, trying to remember how I ended up here. When it all flooded back, I began to kick and scream, remembering my vow.

I will not be a captive again.

I will not be a captive again.

I will NOT be a captive again.

Hazy memories from the self-defense class played in my mind, circling around and around in a carousel of blurred thoughts. Finally, I found an idea to cling to. We had been taught to locate and punch out taillights in the event we were ever trapped in a car trunk and unable to activate the trunk release button. Obviously there was no way to escape through such a tiny hole, but there was enough room to wave a hand through and attract the attention of other motorists who could then call the police.

With my hands unavailable, I had to use my feet. I found the right spot on the other side of the trunk, and then I began to kick out, again and again. Eventually I heard a promising cracking sound, and light flooded into the trunk.

Using every ounce of strength I had left, I maneuvered my body around so that my head was on the opposite side of the trunk, where I’d just kicked out the light. Now I had a direct view through the hole.

The road we were on was empty, but it looked wide and well-maintained. That was good. It meant it was a road other people traveled on at least somewhat frequently, as opposed to a tiny muddy track way out in the sticks.

Hope appeared as a shiny speck on the horizon a few minutes later. A red car was gaining on us, fast. As it approached, I stuck my head as close to the brake light hole as I possibly could, making sure my hair flew out and whipped in the wind to attract as much attention as I could.

I saw a young man stick his hand out the passenger window and wave, cheering at me. “Woo!”

What the hell?

I squinted, trying to get a look at everyone in the red car. There were two passed-out guys in the back seat, along with a third who looked like he was about to vomit. The two in the front were wide awake and twitching, probably high on speed. On the side of the car was a large white college sticker. Obviously, they were frat guys on their way home from a rager that carried on until dawn.

They probably thought I was in the trunk as a joke, too high to realize the implications. Or maybe they thought they were hallucinating. Either way, they weren’t helping.

They cheered again and cruised past, overtaking my captor. I closed my eyes and sobbed.

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