Triptych

Michael’s handcuffs were on Jasmine. He had used rope to tie up Angie.

“You fucker,” she breathed, a mantra to herself. Michael Ormewood didn’t make mistakes. He was always in control, always on top of everything. Everything but the fact that glass could cut rope.

“You stupid fucker.”

Blood soaked her hands, wet the rope that bound her wrists together. Angie stopped sawing, trying to catch her breath, take it slow. She’d almost passed out the first time she’d tried to cut the rope, but with each new attempt, she honed her technique, learned more about the knots he’d tied, the way the rope bound her wrists. She could feel that the rope had shifted down a little, was rubbing raw a new section of skin. Her blood was acting as a lubricant.

She would get out of this. She would saw off her own hand if she had to.

“Oh!” She gasped as the rope skipped down the glass, her hands slipping, the razor-sharp edges slicing into her fingers.

Angie held her breath, listening for Michael. God, she had never hurt so bad in her life. She couldn’t stand it, couldn’t take the feeling of the flesh being sliced off bone. She leaned forward, her forehead touching the ground as she cried.

“Will,” she whispered. She couldn’t pray to God, not after everything she’d done, so she prayed to Will. “I’m going to get out of this,” she promised him. “I’m going to get out of this and…” She didn’t say the words, but she knew them in her heart. She would leave Will for good. She would finally let him escape.

Overhead, footsteps walked across the floor. Angie reared up, her hands fumbling for the glass. She furiously worked the rope, fear anesthetizing her against the pain.

“Angie?” Michael called. He was on the other side of the locked door. “Answer me. I know you hear me.”

She stretched the rope taut, wrenching her shoulders, desperate to break free. “Fuck you, motherfucker!”

“Get away from the stairs, Angie. I’m go

She didn’t answer, couldn’t answer. Faster, faster, she sawed the rope up and down the jagged glass.

The key scraped in the lock.

“No,” Angie whispered, forcing herself to hurry. “Not yet, not yet.”

“Get away from the stairs,” he said. “I mean it.”

“No!” she screamed, jumping away from the glass just as the door flew open.

The light blazed on. Angie looked at Jasmine, saw the girl’s face was turned toward her, the eyes slit open but unseeing. Her mouth was open. Blood pooled around her head.

“Don’t try anything,” Michael warned. He stood at the top of the stairs with the gun in his hand. He was bare-chested, jeans and sneakers the only thing covering his body.

“Fuck off,” Angie told him. She’d felt the rope give, but not enough. Blood wet her hands like water. She was still trapped, still helpless.

He tucked the gun into the waist of his jeans, then reached into his back pocket.

“Go away,” Angie told him.

He put on a black ski mask, holes cut out for the eyes and mouth.

“Go away!” she screamed, backing into the wall, scrambling to stand.

He took out the gun and started down the stairs. Slowly, one tread at a time.

Angie’s shoulders tensed to their breaking point as she pulled at the rope. She had felt it give before. She had felt it give.

He kept up his steady pace down into the cellar. The ski mask was u

Angie’s throat tensed. She could barely speak. “No…”

He stepped over the last stair and stopped. His eyes were dark, almost black. She could see dried blood around the mouth of the mask.

The sight of him sent an uncontrollable tremble through her body.

He looked at Jasmine lying in the corner, then took a step closer to Angie. They both stood there facing each other, the room quiet but for the short breaths Angie was taking.

His voice was so soft she could barely hear him. “Michael is going to hurt you.”

“I’ll kill you,” she breathed. “I’ll kill you if you touch me.”

“Lie down.”

She kicked out at him. “You sick fucker.”

He still spoke gently. “Lie down on the floor.”

“Fuck you!”

He brought up his gun and slammed it down on her head.

Angie slumped to the ground. She couldn’t keep her head up, couldn’t remember for a moment where she was.

He cupped her chin in his hand, his words still soft; the tone he would use with a child who was misbehaving. “Don’t pass out on me,” he whispered. “You hear me?”

She saw Jasmine lying behind him, her body limp. What had Michael done to her? What had the child endured before her body simply gave up?

“Look at me,” Michael said, gently, as if this was some kind of seduction. “Keep looking at me, Angie. Look at Michael.”

Her head rolled to the side. She couldn’t make her eyes focus.

“Come on, darlin‘, don’t pass out.” He cupped her chin with his hand again, tilted up her face. “You okay?”

She nodded, mostly to prove to herself that there was still some part of her body that she could control.

“That’s good,” he soothed, placing the gun on one of the shelves above her head, high out of the way. He took the knife out of the sheath and knelt down, holding the blade to her face so that she could see.

“No…” she begged.

He used his knife to cut open her shirt-Will’s shirt-pushing it back on her shoulders. She tried to watch him, tried to see his hand as he traced his fingers across her breasts, but she could only feel what he was doing.

“No,” she pleaded. “Don’t.”

“Lie down,” he coaxed. “Lie down and I’ll be sweet to you.”

She rolled back her head, trying to look at his face. Who was behind the mask? Was it John? Had she tricked her mind into thinking it was Michael when it was really John?

“Angie?” He was so calm. Like Will. He knew that was the best way to make her angry. She would fly off in a tantrum and he would just stand there, patiently waiting her out, staring at the floor. Oh, God, Will. How would he live with this? How would he live with himself knowing that he’d failed to stop this bastard?

“An-gie,” he sang. “Look at me.”

She knew that voice, knew that body.

“An-gie…”

She squeezed her eyes shut, seeing Will’s arm, the angry scar where the razor had cut into his flesh.

“Okay,” she said. “Okay.”

She fell to her side, her uninjured shoulder thumping into the packed-dirt floor. He helped her lie flat on her back, tugging at her shirt when it got caught around her arms. All of her weight rested on her hands, her pelvis arching up as if it was on display for him.

“That’s good,” he whispered, straddling her legs. She saw his tongue dart out of his mouth as he traced the tip of the knife down her abdomen, stopping just shy of her snatch.

Where was the gun? Where had he put the gun?

“Look at me.” He leaned over her body, pressing the knife against her neck.

The shelf. He had put it on the shelf.

“Look at me.”

She looked at him.

“Kiss me.”

Too high. The shelf was too high.

“Kiss me,” he said.

Her whole body shook, but she leaned up, pulling at the rope as hard as she could as she brought her mouth to his. He was still trying to be tender, his lips soft against hers. She could taste her own blood, feel his heart pumping against her chest as he pressed against her. When he put his tongue in her mouth, she gagged, instinctively trying to jerk away, but he pressed the knife harder against her throat, and Angie had no choice but to let him kiss her.

He made a smacking noise as he sat back up, satisfied. “If you’d kissed me like that in the back of the car, maybe it would have gone differently.”

Angie looked up at him. The bare lightbulb made a halo behind his head. She turned, saw Jasmine, saw the blood in the girl’s mouth, the dead look in her eyes.