The Woman. Part 11

He could feel his face flush, the pulse pounding in his forehead.

Easy, he thought. Calm down, kiddo.

He took out the wad of gum and rolled it in the dirt until it was completely covered and plugged the hole and then smoothed it over with his hand. Looked good - the same brown color as the door. He stood up and dusted off his a.s.s, grabbed the scoop and drill and raced back to the barn, dropped the drill on its shelf and walked back to the house all laid-back and casual.

His mother was carefully dumping boiling water from the chili-pots into a pair of wash buckets. His father was reading his paper.

"Where you been?" he said.

"I was playing around with the dogs a little."

His father put the paper down.

"You?" he said.

"Yeah. I do, sometimes."

His father shrugged, then stood.

"We ready, Belle?"

"We're ready."

"All right then. Brian, take a bucket. Careful not to spill."

"Yessir."

And that was it. He'd gotten over.

FIFTEEN.

Light pours through the musty room, and wind. She is grateful for the breeze and the scent of land and living things. For a moment she is blinded again to all but the dust-motes swirling in front of her. She sees the figure above like a black ghost which gradually resolves itself into the man, her captor, descending the stairs.

She braces herself. For anything.

"How we doin' today?" he says and sets the towels and dish rags and Lava soap down beside the winch.

"Sorry about this. But with you I'm taking no more chances."

He cranks the winch. One turn, two. He knows this is uncomfortably tight now, can see the pull in the tendons of her arms and thighs. But it's necessary. The woman makes no sound of complaint, not even a grunt. Again he admires her. Tough b.i.t.c.h, this one is.

He gives the winch one more turn.

And she can feel the bolt at her right wrist give give slightly. The man has done damage to his own handiwork. Not enough damage, not yet. But some. Her wrists are oozing blood but when the boy and the woman walk down the stairs to join him he turns his back to her for a moment and she works the wrist as best she can. slightly. The man has done damage to his own handiwork. Not enough damage, not yet. But some. Her wrists are oozing blood but when the boy and the woman walk down the stairs to join him he turns his back to her for a moment and she works the wrist as best she can.

Belle and Brian set the buckets of steaming hot water down on the cellar floor.

"The scooper, Brian."

"Right. Forgot."

The kid takes the stairs two at a time. He knows his son's enjoying this. Let him. His son's practically a man.

He unwraps the bar of soap, folds it into a dish rag and dips it into the water. d.a.m.n! that s.h.i.+t's hot that s.h.i.+t's hot! It practically burns his fingers. He works it into a lather experimentally as Brian bolts back down the stairs with the scooper. Thinks, this'll work just fine.

"Gonna scrub her down, pop? I never seen anybody - smelled smelled anybody - that nasty before! Jeez!" anybody - that nasty before! Jeez!"

His son is grinning.

"Your mother and I are. But first you need to clean up her mess."

"Me?"

"Yes, Brian. You."

The grin's disappeared now. Cleek doesn't blame the boy. It's not a job anybody'd want. She's missed the Tupperware bowl entirely with her s.h.i.+t, though most of her p.i.s.s is in there.

"Use the scooper and one of these rags here. We'll just have to clean up after her until we get her..."

"Potty trained?"

The grin is back again. His son is nothing if not resilient.

"Exactly."

Brian sets to. And it's not lost on him that the boy is concentrating on those long firm legs as much as he is on the job he's doing. Brian points to what's left of the food and the food bowl.

"This too?"

"Yeah. Let her think on eating for a while."

When he's done he just stands there, scooper in hand.

"Okay, now get."

"But I can help you..."

He gives his son a look. It's a look that's always stopped him dead in his tracks and today is no exception. Fun is fun but he's not about to let his boy wash down a full-grown woman. Brian sighs and trudges up the stairs.

"And close the door behind you."

Cleek turns on the overhead light and snaps on a pair of rubber work gloves. The cellar door slams shut.

Belle's standing behind him, twisting nervously at her wedding ring.

"You might want to take that off," he says. "And put on a pair of these. This is going to be messy."

He watches her work the ring off her finger and shove it in the pocket of her Bermudas. It occurs to him that all this time down here Belle hasn't yet said a word. He's guessing she's not too sanguine about all this. He wishes she were but he knows his wife. She's always been a timid thing. When they met as kids that was attractive to him. It's not anymore.

She puts on the rubber gloves.

"Grab a bucket."

They move to within about three feet of the woman and set down the buckets. He dips the soapy dish rag into the steaming water, lathers it up more and presses it to the woman's forehead and ~ * ~.

she smells it long before it touches her, a disgusting mix of fats and other scents not of her world and when it touches her she can feel her skin crawl beneath the hot cloth and b.a.s.t.a.r.d! son of a wh.o.r.e! b.a.s.t.a.r.d! son of a wh.o.r.e! she screams and tears at the shackles holding her, every muscle in her body working to get to him and tear at him screaming all the while as he stumbles back and she screams and tears at the shackles holding her, every muscle in her body working to get to him and tear at him screaming all the while as he stumbles back and ~ * ~.

kicks the pail at Belle's feet, which nearly overturns, sloshes steaming water all over his wife's bare legs so that she screams and the woman is screaming at him too "Bastart! Mac dar striapach "Bastart! Mac dar striapach!" over and over, thras.h.i.+ng side to side and forward and back - he can hear her spine banging against the shelf behind her and the rage comes riding through him like a runaway train.

"That's how you want to play? Fine!"

He bends down and picks up the bucket at Belle's feet and flings its contents. The water that has scalded his poor wife's legs now leaps out of the bucket all over the woman's shoulder, her neck, her cheek, her belly. Her scream goes hoa.r.s.e and guttural.

And abruptly, stops.

It burns! Hot enough to take her breath away.

The man picks up the second bucket. And she is immediately aware of two things simultaneously. The first gives her hope. The bolt to her right has loosened considerably. The second gives her shame. Because she knows that the look in her eyes has changed.

From a look of defiance to one of fear. Fear of that second bucket.

And knows he sees this too.

Brian sits at the screened window staring out toward the cellar. It isn't fair, he thinks. But then, when were adults ever fair? He jumps up at the sudden screaming outside coming from the cellar and heads for the door. No way he's missing this. f.u.c.k it. Peg pa.s.ses him in the hall. She's chomping on an apple.

"Hey! You're gonna catch h.e.l.l if you go back down there, Bri," she says.

"Suck my d.i.c.k, sis," he says.

He races outside.

"This what you want? You want more?"

And she gets his drift. He can tell she gets it. There's something in her eyes that's almost humble - almost pleading with him. He likes that. Likes it a lot. He wonders if she's ever looked at anybody that way before exactly and he likes that thought even better. That he should be the first.

He sets the bucket down.

He looks to his wife.

"You okay, honey?

Her legs are splotched beet red. She hisses in a breath, speaks through gritted teeth.

"Yes."

"Good. Let's try this again."

She shakes her head like this is crazy which he doesn't much care for but unwraps her own bar of soap and folds it into a dish rag which he likes.

His mom and dad are standing in front of the woman with dish rags in their hands and he doesn't see what all the commotion was about. The woman seems calm enough. His view through the peephole is perfect but he can barely hear them through the door. He listens carefully. He doesn't want to miss a thing.

"Maybe we should let this cool down a bit before..." his mom says.

His father interrupts her. "Now hon," he says, "you know as well as I do that the best way to get something clean is with good hot water. Might as well be shuffling germs around if we go cold or h.e.l.l, even room temp. Remember, we're totally in control here."

His dad approaches the woman with the rag and squeezes some soapy water out over her head. It runs down her forehead and cheek and neck all the way down to her t.i.ts. Even from here he can see that her nipples are hard.

So is he.

The woman doesn't move. His dad is pleased.

"Good," he says.

He dips the rag into the water again and brings it to the woman's cheek and scrubs. Brian can see her wince at his touch.

"Look there. We got a clean spot."

His mother says something he can't quite hear.

The woman sneezes. The soap tickling her nose he guesses. Brian almost laughs out loud but he stifles that. She looks so miserable hanging there. He'd bet she's never had a proper civilized soap-and-water bath in all her life.

This is awesome awesome fun. fun.

His dad washes her other cheek. Her forehead, then her nose and chin and around her mouth. That's a little bit scary, this part. He remembers - and he knows his father sure as h.e.l.l remembers - that she took off the tip of his finger just yesterday. She could easily take off another right now if she wanted to but she doesn't for some reason. Then he notices that the whole right side of her looks scalded. So that was what all the screaming was about.

His dad's tamed her. With scalding hot water. Way to go, dad. Way to go, dad.

The woman's face is still streaked but way cleaner and gleaming wet and bright from the heat. His mother's just standing there with the soapy rag in her hand, watching him. He wonders why she isn't helping. He sure would.