Page 21 of Resurrect Me

He scratches the top of his head and smiles at me. I thought I’d forgotten his face. The way he moves. I thought I’d repressed those memories…shoved them down to the deepest depths of my consciousness never to see the light of day again. But when your abuser is standing right in front of you, it’s hard to ignore those memories.

“Got absorbed into something bigger,” he says. “Why would I go to jail? I didn’t do anything wrong, Tacy. You joined of your own free will. And pushed those men off the cliff out of self-defense. And it was a church group. Not a cult.”

“Ha,” I laugh defiantly. “I beg to differ. When you use brainwashing and mind control techniques to force your members to be entirely loyal to you, you’re not a church group. You’re a cult.”

My captor shuffles closer to me, and I recoil. I close my eyes and push my back into the wall behind me, hoping the wall will just envelope me and spit me out the other side. Instead, when I open my eyes again, I’m still sitting on the bucket. And Orion Starkey is leaning over me, smiling that big toothy grin. I shudder. What is he going to do to me? And who is he delivering me to?

“Didn’t we have some good times, Tacy? You and me? Out in the woods. Right on top of that altar. You gave yourself to me. To the Solar Lord. Entirely.” He licks his lips and bites his bottom lip. “And I loved every minute of being inside of you. Possessing you. It was like being in Heaven.”

“You’re fucking twisted!” I yell and my flight instinct kicks in as I rush past him. I’m caught in mid-air, but very near the bottomstep. And pulled down onto the unfinished, cold basement floor. On top of Orion. He grunts and wraps his big arms around me again. A move that’s all too successful in keeping me subdued. I was so fucking close.

“Mother fucker!” I scream at the top of my lungs as I twist and turn. Trying desperately to free myself still. Every cell in my body is screaming at me to fight. To liberate myself from this nightmare. But Orion squeezes tighter and grunts out his demands.

“Stop fighting, Tacy! I swear to the gods, I will fucking slit your throat and spill your blood onto the ground. Then I’ll burn you in the name of Belenus. Don’t fucking try it again.”

I stop fighting and rip myself away from him. Stand and make my way back over to the bucket with Orion’s knife held to the small of my back.

“Fine,” I rumble. “Fuck.”

I sit and watch as he walks over to the garden shears on the wall and pulls them down. Walks up the steps with the shears in hand and then returns seconds later with a paper plate of what appears to be a pile of spaghetti. He sets it on top of the washing machine and looks at me. “You hungry?”

I seal my lips and stare past him. Ignore him entirely. God if I had my hands free, I’d steal his knife and gut him.

“You stop fighting me and screaming and shit, and you and I will get along just fine,” he produces a solo cup from a cabinet above the dryer and fills it with water straight from the faucet of a dirty utility sink.

“Just like old times.” He holds the cup up to my lips and allows me to drink. I sip it, because I know I’m dehydrated. Then heuses a spoon to twist a bunch of spaghetti noodles onto a fork and holds it up to my mouth. I pinch my lips shut even more, resembling a child who refuses to talk. I shake my head and turn away.

“Not hungry? Okay, Babydoll,” he says and sets the plate of food on top of the dryer. “It’s here if you change your mind.”

The hairs on my arms stand on end. There’s that nickname. It must be him. He followed me across the country, stalked me for a month, and broke and entered my home. Now he’s captured me. God knows what he plans on doing to me. I don’t believe this shit about delivering me to someone else. That’s just a way for him to act like the good guy. Try to Stockholm syndrome me, mother fucker. I don’t think so.

“Don’t fucking call me that either,” I snarl. “It’s Tacy.”

“Now, I’m going to go upstairs for a bit. But you stay down here and be a good little girl. Don’t try to run. There’s three of us upstairs, the door’s locked, and we all have guns. And the others? Well…they’re a whole lot meaner me. I don’t want you to get hurt. At least not until the delivery.”

“Delivery?” I ask. “Are you handing me over to someone else?”

“Well, now, I can’t tell you that,” he hums. “It’s a surprise.” He plods up the bottom three steps then bends over to deliver one last final threat. “And if you scream one more time, I’ll come down here and give you something to scream about. And it will be something I enjoy tremendously.”

“You piece of shit,” I spit at him again. The wad lands on the floor inches away from his boots. Orion Starkey snarls, then ascends the wooden stairs, slamming and locking the metal door at the top behind him.

I survey the room again. I walk over to the window that leads to the outside. There’s absolutely no way I’ll be able to fit my ass through it. It can’t be bigger than twelve inches wide and ten inches tall. I don’t even think my head would fit through. Scratch that. I scan the wall of tools. The fucker took the garden shears and there’s nothing left on the wall except for more zip ties and a rubber mallet. With my hands tied behind my back, a rubber mallet won’t do shit either.

My stomach hurts. But I’m not going to eat anything he gives me that I don’t see him make right in front of me. Why? Orion Starkey, High Priest of the Belenus Coven (a.k.a. cult), has drugged me in the past. More than once. I’m fucking sure he’d do it again. Then convince me I asked for it.

I walk over to the cup sitting on the dryer, lean down and grab the rim between my teeth. Then stand, and tip backwards, just enough to pour the water into my mouth. I choke on it as it hits the back of my throat. But the coolness of the water. The freshness of it. Even if it did come from a dirty tap basement faucet.

I contemplate things I’ve seen on TV or read in books on how to escape a captor. The sun is going down, and I know at this point the kids are terrified that I’m not home. I hope my mother has already filed a missing person’s report. Maybe they’re out there looking for me already. How will they find me if I don’t even know where I am? How far away from home am I? Am I still in the city?

Bingo. Most of the houses in the city were not built with basements. Which means I’m somewhere in the suburbs. Or possibly even farther away in the country. Fuck, we could be anywhere. All I know is, I have to get out of this. My kids can’t lose another parent.Won’tlose another parent.

Hours later, it’s pitch-black outside, and I’m pacing. My feet are sore, my stomach is in knots, but I’ve been listening intently to what’s going on above me. I heard Orion’s voice once, but I haven’t heard any others. Which means he was talking on the phone. I’ve only heard one set of footsteps. So, I pretty much figure out, there’s only one person here with me – and it’s Orion. He lied and told me there were other men up there to keep me quiet. He must think I’m still the dumbass teenager that he brainwashed and abused years ago. Maybe I play that persona up a bit. Act stupid. Innocent. Easy to manipulate. Then sneak by him when he’s least expecting it. I don’t have enough time for all of that, though.

I’m sitting on the bucket again when the heavy door opens and Orion returns. This time he’s wearing a pair of sweatpants and a red hoodie with a football on the front.

“I didn’t know you liked conventional sports,” I chortle. “I thought you were just into blood sport.”

Orion smirks as he pulls something out of his pocket and approaches me. “You always were the comedian, Tacy.”

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