Katia
When I felt the van slow to a stop, I started screaming with all the air left in my lungs. My chest ached as little black and red spots danced in front of my eyes, but I kept screaming even after my throat was raw.
“Shut up!” Ryan howled. He climbed out of the driver’s seat and held up the Taser in one hand. “Shut the fuck up! Do you want someone to fucking hear you!”
“Yes!” I sobbed. “Yes, I want someone to hear me. Help me!” I shrieked as loudly as I could. “Help! Please! Someone!”
Ryan backhanded me across the face. I tasted blood. Spitting on the floor of the van, I stared at him defiantly.
“You think you’re doing something good,” I said calmly. “But you’re ruining my life, and yours too if you keep doing this, Mr. Winter.” I shuddered. I hated calling him that.
Ryan grinned broadly. He jabbed the Taser into my thigh and laughed, shrieking hysterically as he watched me jerk and twist on the floor of the utility van.
“I don’t give a shit what you think is right and wrong,” Ryan snarled. “You’re a pretentious little cunt, and I want to teach you a lesson.”
My heart thudded in my chest as he advanced on me. Was this it? Was Ryan finally going to do the thing I’d always been afraid of?
Rape, a nasty little voice from the back of my head piped up. He’s going to rape you, Katia. He knows that you know it, and he’s going to enjoy it. He might even do it more than once. He might even rape you up the ass. And you’re going to have to take it because he has a gun and a Taser. By the time it’s over, you’ll probably be bleeding from the head and lying naked in a ditch somewhere.
A cold wave of fear washed over me. For a moment, I was afraid I was going to be sick. The wound on my head had begun to bleed again after I’d smacked my head into the wall of the van during a dangerous curve, and I’d swallowed so much blood from a cut in my mouth that I felt nauseous.
“Please,” I begged softly. “Please let me go, Ryan.”
Ryan sneered. “I can’t,” he said. “I’ve already got you, and I haven’t even gotten what I wanted.”
I licked my dry lips, tasting blood. “Yes, you have,” I said softly. “Mr. Winter, you said you wanted to teach me a lesson about rejecting you. And you have. I know better now.” I lowered my eyes, trying to act as demure as I possibly could. “Ryan, I wouldn’t ever reject anyone like you again.”
Ryan shook his head. “That’s not good enough,” he said. “I’m not through.” He raised his hand into the air and I cowered, waiting for the blow.
When a few seconds had passed, and he hadn’t struck me, I cautiously glanced up.
“Maybe you are learning something,” Ryan said. He crossed his stocky arms over his barrel chest. “And that makeup makes you look like a whore,” he added. “But we all knew you were a little slut, Katia.”
My cheeks burned, but I forced myself to look down at the floor of the van. I knew that I had to submit myself before Ryan and make him think that I was nothing but a demure little girl.
“Ryan, please,” I whimpered softly. “Please let me go.”
“Ah-ah,” Ryan said in a nasty tone. He reached down. The shock that penetrated my body was the strongest yet, and my limbs twitched and spasmed as I hit the floor of the van. Crying out in pain as the bump on my head hit the floor, I started sobbing and curled up in a little ball.
“Please Mr. Winter,” I begged. Mascaraed tears were dripping down from my cheeks, and I sniffled, feeling snot leaking from my nose. “Please, if you let me go, you won’t get in trouble,” I said softly. “If you let me go, I won’t tell anyone about this.”
Ryan’s lips curled into a nasty smile. “Unfortunately, someone already knows,” he said smoothly. “Besides, I didn’t spend weeks planning only to see this fall apart.” He smirked. “Katia, I spent weeks planning so you could be mine. I spent weeks planning, so I could take you and keep you. You know what they say: if she’s worth catching, she’s worth keeping!”
I couldn’t even force myself to meet Ryan’s eyes. Even though he’d barely touched me with his hands, every inch of my body felt violated. I felt like Ryan had somehow managed to turn me inside out, to expose my guts and my thoughts and my nerves.
I’d always thought I was stronger than this.
As Ryan climbed back towards the front seat of the van, I sighed. I knew I should be relieved that he’d left me alone for now. And besides, I had to start thinking of a plan. If he made good on his threat to bring me across the Mexican border, I was really going to have to make a fuss. I wondered if the border officials would search the car. I wondered if I’d be able to scream, to let a cop know that I was there, hidden in the back of the utility van like a sack of cargo.
Ryan was coming towards me again, with something shiny and made of rubber in his hands. He held it up and grinned.
“You ever worn a ball-gag before, baby?”
Panic seized me. I’m not sure what it was about the sight of the gag that set me off, but something inside of me snapped, and I started screaming and thrashing and kicking around as soon as I saw the device clutched in Ryan’s hand.
“Come here,” Ryan said in a menacing voice. “Come the fuck over here!”
“No!” I screamed. Ryan came straight at me. He dived towards me, pinning me to the floor of the van. As I felt his hands wrap around my wrists and pin them over my head, I shrieked and twisted under his soft, lumpy body. The foul scent of tuna and sweat washed over me, and I gagged as Ryan pushed me down to the floor with all of his weight.
Ryan clipped me on the jaw, and my head snapped back on my neck, bouncing painfully on the floor of the van. I cried out in pain as blackness momentarily overtook my vision. As Ryan pinned my arms down with his body, I tried to buck my hips and throw him off. But he was stronger, and he shoved the gag in my mouth and buckled it around the back of my head. It was so tight that I could barely breathe and I moaned softly as the foul-tasting ball of rubber wedged over my tongue and under my top row of teeth.
“That should keep you quiet for a while,” Ryan said. He was sweating and his chest was heaving with the effort of knocking me to the floor and pinning me down. I wanted to knee him between the legs, but he rolled off of me and got to his knees.
Just then, he grinned. The same fire inside of me that had sparked when Ryan had first come at me with the gag returned. Before I knew what I was doing, I’d rolled to my knees and raged towards Ryan with my nails extended. I hadn’t had a fill in weeks, but the acrylic was still strong. As I scratched Ryan’s face, aiming for his eyes, he let out a cry of anguish. I savored the sensation of the skin under his eyes ripping. Thin lines of blood appeared on his cheeks, and he screamed in pain as I raked my nails down his face.
“You fucking bitch!” Ryan screamed. “You’re a fucking bitch, do you know that?” He lurched towards me, falling on his hands and knees. For a moment, I thought he was going to shock me again. Instead, Ryan lifted his hands to his face and held his mauled skin. I hadn’t managed to scratch his eye out, but he was bleeding profusely. I could tell the cuts were shallow, but Ryan seemed truly enraged by what I’d done.
“You’re a fucking cunt!” Ryan screamed. “That’s fucking it!”
I cowered on the floor of the van and wrapped my hands over my face, trying to keep myself protected. The ball-gag was making me drool everywhere and a tooth towards the back of my mouth throbbed; I wondered if Ryan had broken it when he’d hit me before. Ryan made his way back to the driver’s seat and turned the key in the ignition. The van roared to life, and I shrieked as my body rolled across the floor, slamming into the side of the van’s wall.
I could tell that Ryan was now driving faster than ever before.
Please, Devin, I begged silently. Please hurry.