Chapter Six
Beat Down
I was careful not to spend too much money. I kept my and Rafael’s meager diets much the same as they had been before the advent of Clark.
I would give Clark a couple more days to return. If he didn’t show, then I and Rafael were leaving. I would find someplace else to live, where no one knew me and perhaps get a job. A good job, if I couldn’t find a job than I would leave Rafael with as good a family that I could find, while I would starve to death if need be.
One thing had become clear over the past week. I was never going to be a whore again!
It wasn’t worth it for any amount of money and life wasn’t worth holding on to, if it came at the cost of little chunks of my soul being eaten away every day.
I headed back towards the apartment with a small bag of groceries in one arm, it was already late afternoon and I wanted to get home before it grew any darker. I managed to get out half a scream before a hand clamped down over my mouth and crushing arms enveloped me from behind.
I was being mugged!
Then I got a glimpse of one of the two men restraining me.
Oh no! Came the horror stricken thought, as I recognized the men as being some of Victor’s men.
The crushing blow to the back of my head sent my consciousness reeling. I didn’t need to worry about starving to death now; rather it would be how long death would be in the coming.
I woke up from my induced unconsciousness and gradually came to an awareness of my surroundings. Where else, but Victor’s study. I was handcuffed to a chair and surrounded by Victor’s ever present henchmen. Some openly sneered at me, while others I didn’t think had anything upstairs to think one way or the other.
The doors opened behind me and I knew it had to be Victor from the nervous energy that suddenly filled the room with tension. My head was wrenched backward abruptly by a savage grip on my hair and I stared full into the demented eyes of Victor above me.
I knew that I was going to die, but it was up to me to determine how I went out. I spit full into his face and he reeled backward in shocked surprise. I turned my neck slightly to watch him wipe my spit off his face disgustedly.
I’d gotten into his personal space and he didn’t like it. He recovered from his disgusted surprise and screaming he charged me with a raised fist. I was mad and madness gave me courage. I pushed up with my feet lifting the front legs of the chair, I then abruptly leaned to one side putting the chair onto one leg and I spun it with one foot.
Unbelievably the chair didn’t fall over backwards with me in it. The straps to one of my sandals had finally worn out and I’d had no choice other than to go grocery shopping in my stripper stilettos. They were sharply pointed on the ends and I let Victor have both of them as hard as I could, one in either shin.
He screamed shrilly and dropped to his knees before me. Big mistake! I had the chair back on two legs as I thrust out with both of my legs. The points of the stilettos sank satisfyingly into Victor beneath each of his shoulders. He screamed like a stuck pig and threw himself backward before I had a chance to kick at him again. He had gotten to his feet and had backed away even further from me.
“What’s the matter Victor? Cat got your tongue, you limp noodled excuse of human garbage not big enough to have sex with a rabbit, even if it would have you!”
So trash talking wasn’t my thing, but at least it got the point across. He grabbed a gun and pointed it at my head shaking uncontrollably, as sweat flowed off of his forehead and mingled with the bloody stains at the front of his shirt.
“Go on you coward shoot me before you’ve even questioned me, as to what was stolen from you and show us all what a fish brained half crazed rabid squirrel you are!”
I swear I could feel his finger’s pressure on the trigger.
“You don’t even bother to hide your part in this conspiracy! You realize what you’ve done? I’ve promised something of great value to a client and I’ve already received half payment for it, but I don’t have the purchased item, because of you and the stranger that no one knows anything about! You’re going to tell me everything you know about this man and help me get my item of interest back! If you don’t I’ll have you tortured until you beg for death.”
“I wouldn’t tell you how many keys he has let alone where he was! You know why Victor? Why I won’t tell you anything about him no matter how you torture or molest me? I’ll tell you why Victor! Because he’s a man, which is something you’ve never been, you crazed mongrel son of a coyote that should’ve been drowned in your first bathwater! I’d do anything for him including die!” I screamed it all into Victor’s face.
Victor looked absolutely apoplectic and for a moment I wondered if he was having a heart attack. No such luck.
Like a little boy having a temper tantrum he yelled, while slapping his leg with his free hand and stomping his feet, “Hit her! Hit her! Make her scream or I’ll shoot all of you!”
In mass his henchmen rushed toward me five of them in all, but I wasn’t giving in yet. I picked the chair up by bending over forwards and I launched myself backwards. I felt the legs of the chair connect and sink into one of my assailants coming up behind me.
He screamed and fell away, even as I spun around to the side smashing another bodyguard broad ways with the chair legs, effectively cutting his legs out from underneath him. I half turned and sat down hard. I felt one chair leg sink deeply and somehow I knew I had just killed the man.
Another onrushing bodyguard caught both of my heels to the chest just as Victor had and I pushed off hard sending him crashing backwards into a wall.
The force of my push off sent the chair over backwards and it shattered on impact with the floor. I stumbled to my feet. The ropes that had bound me dangled from my wrists along with the chair arms.
Another bodyguard was in front of me and I swung one of the arms of the chair at his face, which he blocked with an arm, but he was unprepared for the other chair arm I brought up between his legs. He howled and clutched at himself and I brought both chair arms as hard as I could to either side of his head.
He dropped to the floor with a sightless vacant expression across his face. Then all I could see was Victor and I launched myself towards him with a scream of fury. He was shaking and the pistol in his hand fired. I felt the hot trace of the bullet whiz past my face and then I was smashing his hand aside with one of the chair arms.
The gun fell to the floor and all I focused on was smashing the little crazed weasel of a man into the ground, until he was as flat as a pancake. He wailed and screamed pitifully trying to protect his face and head with his arms, as I drove him down to his knees.
I felt myself abruptly pulled back and slammed to the floor by the remaining two bodyguards. I screamed in frustration at the interruption of me beating Victor senseless and flailed away at their feet and legs. I got kicked in the head and I saw nothing but stars in front of my eyeballs for a moment and then the pain of more kicks to my stomach, back, and hips.
It was hard to get a breath and I curled into a ball trying to escape from the kicks at least partially. Through the fog of pain and the struggle to breathe I heard Victor yelling for them to stop.
“Pull her out flat!”
I was yanked flat out on my back and oh the pain!
I wheezed for breath. My eyes flickered to stay open, as I struggled to keep from blacking out. Victor was standing over me clutching his pistol. I relished the facial swelling and the blood that I saw Victor embellished with and only wished that I could have had the time needed to finish the job. He was saying something.
“I’m going to blow off your feet and then your knees and then your hands working my way up to your heart!”
Flinging his hand wide he intoned, “You are about to find out what pain is all about!”
A knife that could have doubled as a small sword shot through the air and pierced through Victor’s arm and nailed it to the wooden paneling behind him. Victor dropped the pistol and clutched at the knife’s handle wailing in pain and fright, as he tried to free himself.
I saw the knife and I knew that Clark had come back for me. The bodyguard to my left was hauled off his feet and up into the air and then down sideways to be smashed backward across Clark’s knee. The sound of his spine being shattered was as loud as a gunshot in the room. The other guard leaped on Clark’s back trying to get a stranglehold, but Clark literally just reached back and caught a hold of him with one hand and pulled him up and over his shoulder to fall in front of him.
Clark snapped the man’s neck in one easy motion. The bodyguard done away with, Clark got to his feet and moved toward Victor, who shrunk back from him in fear. Clark yanked the knife free and with one swift slice of the knife disemboweled Victor. Victor sank to his knees trying to pull back inside the life that would never be his again and within moments he slumped forward in death.
Seeing Clark had given me energy from somewhere and the will to act. I started to push myself up and then he was there helping me. I couldn’t help the tears that spilled out as I clutched at his shirt and pressed my face into his neck loving the comfort of his warm presence.
His arms held me and his voice was a reassuring whisper against my ear, “See I told you that you would make a great warrior, if I hadn’t stepped in and intervened I shudder to think what you would’ve done to the rest of these rats.”
A slightly hysterical sounding laugh escaped me at his ridiculous words and I cringed from the pain that the laugh caused me.
“Don’t make me laugh.” I wheezed into his shoulder.
“We need to get you out of here! Can you stand?” I nodded, but it was him that lifted me up to my feet.
I didn’t think I was going to be able to walk very far. He must’ve sensed that, because he lifted me up by the back of my thighs, “Can you put your legs around me?”
I lifted them and crossed them behind his back.
“I need my hands free, until we get away from the house, can you hold on with your arms and legs?”
No I really couldn’t, but I was going to anyway.
I nodded my head yes, as I gripped him with one arm over one shoulder and the other wrapped around him under his other arm. I tucked my head down against his chest.
As his hands left from supporting my bottom and my weight sank onto my arms and legs my torso stretched out and I bit into my lower lip, until I tasted blood. I couldn’t help that my body was uncontrollably shaking or that I was whimpering from the pain into his shoulder.
He started walking toward the study doors pulling two pistols out of side holsters as he did so.
His voice sounding choked with emotion he said, “I’m so sorry honey! I didn’t think they would connect you with me!”
The thing I heard was the word ‘honey’. What did he mean by saying such a familiar term?
I could only hope as to the depth of meaning such a term could be referring to. He kicked the door open and then there was no more room for thought. I watched Victor’s house of glass shatter from my filtered view through my tangled hair. Gunmen popped out of everywhere blasting away with automatic pistols and rifles.
Clark just smoothly kept walking, always moving, as he twisted and turned about in the rooms he made his way through, as he headed for the door. The big pistols in his hands bucked slowly and repeatedly. Every measured shot a kill shot.
I don’t know how we weren’t hit! Everything around us was shattering and I could hear the whine of bullets that came within inches of us. The walls of glass shattered and tinkled to the floor in sparkling piles, as ceramic pots and vases exploded all around us.
Finally the big hand guns fell silent, but not because Clark was out of ammunition, but because there was no one else left to kill. He kicked the front door open. Nothing happened.
He holstered one gun and helped support me with his free hand. We were suddenly outside in the tepid night air. At some point I must’ve blacked out because the next thing I knew was when I opened my eyes to see Raphael’s worried little face in front of mine. I reached out and touched it loving the ability to do that. I hadn’t thought I would see Raphael ever again. He clutched my hand tightly with both of his and I squeezed back a little.
My eyes drifted upward aided by a jolt of pain. Clark sat astride me and he was pushing on my rib cage. Something moved under his fingers and I screamed and clutched Raphael’s little hand to tightly. I abruptly let go, but he didn’t.
“That’s all Evangelina I promise!” Clark said.
I looked up at him through pain slitted eyes. Sweat was rolling off of Clark in streams of perspiration and he was shaking. That last part, maybe that was me.
Yes, I was the one shaking and not him. Then Clark did something almost unforgivable. He pulled me to an upright sitting position on the bed. I wanted to scream, but I didn’t fearing that would hurt me even worse. Then Clark was behind me somehow and Rafael was standing on the bed between my legs trying to hold up my arms.
Clark wrapped a folded up white sheet around my torso, which is when I realized I was topless. Clark had to lift my breasts slightly to get the sheet up as far as possible. I flushed red with embarrassment that overrode the pain as Clark wrapped me tightly over and over with the sheet. Why was I so embarrassed?
I had been topless in front of clients countless times and next to topless for years during performances, why did this bother me so much?
The thought came softly to me that the reason was because I was no longer a whore and my body was privately mine again. Something I’d grown to treasure over the past week. It wasn’t so bad being exposed to Clark, because of how I felt about him.
I would have actually welcomed his touch. It was Rafael standing directly in front of me that was unbearable. I had always tried to shield him from what it was that I had done for a living. I had tried to appear decent in his eyes at least. Being exposed to him now was the height of embarrassment. I started to move my arms off of where they rested on his little shoulders, but his little hands wouldn’t let go of my wrists.
I looked up to ask him to let go, but I stopped when I saw his little face. Big tears tracked down his face repeatedly one after the other and when his watery eyes met mine I heard him say, “Please! Let me help you mommy!”
Everything went still inside of me as I heard him say what I had always yearned to hear the little boy say. I choked down a sudden rise of emotion and nodded my head and left my arms where they were. My fingers framed around his little head tenderly.
“I love you mommy!” He repeated with passion.
“I love you too Rafael!”
We stared at each other, as if seeing each other for the first time, as Clark finished wrapping me up tightly. The tight wrap was uncomfortable, but it took away a lot of the pain.
Clark spoke softly from over my shoulder, “Rafael could you get your mommy a drink of water please.”
Rafael nodded vigorously and I lifted my arms away and he jumped off the bed running for the other room. Clark held out the sleeves of a large flannel shirt that must’ve been his for me to put my arms into, which I did. He started buttoning up the front as I leaned back against him.
“He begged to help and I did need his help so I let him. I hope you don’t mind.”
I raised my hands to clasp over his large hands and laying my head back across his one shoulder I whispered, as my eyes met his, “I don’t mind anything you do to me.”
He stared back at me and I watched the pupils of his eyes dilate, as his head lowered toward me. His lips gently kissed only the side of my lips that weren’t swollen from where I’d bit them earlier.
I moved my head slightly to bring my lips against his in full contact not caring if it was painful. It was the sweetest kiss I’d ever had and the best one I’d ever had, because it was with him.
He pulled back abruptly and I heard the sound of running feet and I lifted my head off of his shoulder and let him finish buttoning me up. Within moments Rafael was holding a sloshing cup of water in front of my nose for which I thanked him graciously for. I took the cup from him with a smile.
I drank all of it, even though I didn’t want to, but I did it to let him know I was okay.
“All right Rafael off to bed with you; your mother needs her rest.
Rafael leaned forward and kissed my hand as a gentlemen would, “Goodnight mother.”
He ran off with a smile.
“When did all this happen?” I asked staring wonderingly at my hand.
“About time it happened.” Came the deep reply from behind me.
I turned my head to look at Clark a sudden thought occurring to me, “You talked to him didn’t you?”
His face was hard to read as he said, “I had a little conversation with him before I left several days ago. I told him about his mother dying, but I also told him that while he may have lost one mother that he also still had one. I explained to him that a mother isn’t just someone that gives birth to you, but also someone who does the natural kindnesses and provisions that a mother would do for her young. I swear I didn’t put him up to saying anything that he just did though! He came to all those conclusions entirely on his own.”
I let my head fall back against Clark again, as I felt him unwittingly unlock another corner of my heart. Clark was also the reason for the chivalrous kiss to my hand that Rafael had given me. Rafael had to have been emulating what he thought Clark would do. It was amazing what kind of a positive impact one good man could make on a young person.
I felt Clark start to gently slide out from behind me and I quickly asked, “Clark would you mind staying with me a little while longer?”
“No I don’t mind.”
His tone sounded almost grateful and I smiled to myself.
“I thought you’d be more comfortable laying flat than up against me though.”
“No this is good.”
I felt him pull some pillows out from behind us and we reclined back a little further, which did feel better. He reached up and turned the light switch off plunging the room into darkness. My hands found his and my fingers entwined with his softly.
Neither of us said anything for a while. I was still in a lot of pain, but being surrounded by him had a better effect on me than any painkiller ever could have had.
“Thank you!” I said softly turning and pressing my face to the base of his neck.
“For what?” He asked, as softly as I had.
“Everything!” I replied.
I was drifting off to sleep when I heard him say, “I have a confession to make.”
Sleepily smiling, as I detected no threat of impending disaster in his tone I asked, “Oh what?”
“My name isn’t Clark.”
I smiled. I had known that wasn’t his name.
“What is it?” I asked curiously.
“Talaric.”
I repeated the name aloud liking it instantly.
“I like it. It suits you better.”
After a momentary pause he asked, “How does it suit me?”
Almost asleep I slurred out, “It sounds strong and yet it’s noble just like you.”
Talaric listened to her sleep grateful beyond words that she didn’t seem to have any serious internal injuries other than several cracked ribs and one broken one.
She thought he was strong, even noble. He could see why she could think that. He had been like that at times in his life, but he could also think of times when he hadn't been. One thing was clear to him. He intended to always be strong and noble in her eyes.
He played with a ringlet of black curly hair and thought back to his previous thought. He would do his best not only because he didn’t want to ever disappoint her, but also because he had realized that he very much wanted a future with her to.
It was surely the wrong time to be falling in love with someone, especially with everything he had set before him to accomplish, but that was life for you. It rarely waited for you to be ready to handle what it threw at you next.
What was important to remember was that the Creator still ruled supreme over all facets of life. If the Creator wanted the enemy stopped before they could reach his homeworld than they would be. If the Creator was the one who had selected Evangelina out for him than that would also come to fruition and she would be his.
Talaric did what he saw as his part of faith, he asked for victory in battle and that the woman sleeping peacefully in his arms wouldn’t ever be taken from him again. Now he could only wait and hope the Creator’s will ruled in his favor. It was hard to just let it at that.
Perhaps he lacked faith, but he wanted the assurance that beyond the shadow of a doubt that everything was going to work out just fine. Talaric sighed; he was just going to have to trust God. Why was that so hard for him anyway?
The Creator had done so much for him, why did he still stumble with trusting Him with things and people that meant the most to him?
He hoped that area of his faith would get stronger, as well as his overall relationship with God, which it would if he trusted Him. It was that simple and yet it was also so seemingly hard at the same time.