The interior of the warehouse was a wreck of scattered cardboard boxes and piles of gunny sacks strewn from one side of the second story level of the building to the other. Ellen noticed a musty smell that gave away the fact that the building had been long in disuse. Most of the windows were shattered, and, even though it was still summer, it felt a bit cold.
The men forced her up still another stairway leading to some vacant rooms that looked like they once had served as the office headquarters to the building. Ellen slowed her pace as she entered the doorway, and Billy turned and pulled her in.
"Goddamn it's cold," Billy said, rubbing his hands together for warmth. "I wish we had some way to build a fire here."
"It'll be daylight in a couple hours. The heat'll be on soon enough… when they find us gone," Cash quipped, and the others guffawed in knowing laughter.
"There's one quick way," Vito said, leering at Ellen. "Just get plugged up inside that little hot pussy, and you got electric heat."
"You get anything inside that, and you'll never get inside nothin' again. Not after the stunt you pulled in the truck," Billy reprimanded Vito, walking into a back room and switching on the light.
"Damn, Billy, what you think she is, exclusive territory or somethin'?" Vito shouted in Billy's direction.
Billy turned from the doorway of the next room and cast his gaze steadily on Vito. "Look, Vito, we got a job to do, and messing with the valuable property ain't gonna help none of us."
"What's so valuable about that?" Vito said, gesturing toward Ellen. "She's just another hot little piece of tail, as far as I can see."
"That piece of tail may make the difference between spending the rest of your life in the pig's pen, or living nice and easy on the outside."
"You call this nice and easy?" Vito retorted. "I'd take solitary before I'd stay in this dump for more than two days."
"Hold on, you guys," Cash intervened between the two men. "We gotta start thinkin' straight. Now Billy, when's the man comin'?"
Billy scratched his head and looked towards Cash and Pop sitting in broken down chairs on either side of Ellen. "We just sit here and wait. It should be soon from what I heard before we jumped the cage. That was a real smooth job. But remember, he can get us back in there as fast as we got out if we don't follow through with knockin' off the senator. We get plenty of loot for doin' it, so don't get all anxious, not yet anyway."
"That sounds real nice," Pop said, running his tongue across his lips in greedy anticipation. "We get the loot and just disappear."
"But politics is somethin' I don't fancy messin' with," Cash said, standing up from his chair. "They'll hang you fifty times for shootin' a senator, then fry your carcass in the chair."
"There are chances, but we been playing our cards right this far, and I say we make a go of it," Billy answered, asserting his authority once more.
He smiled at the three men in a superior manner as though he had mapped out the entire plan beforehand and had some information that he was withholding from the others. Ellen listened as he went on discussing the details of what now appeared to be an assassination plot. Her dazed mind was beginning to focus more clearly on what was going on around her, and she became more and more aware that this was no ordinary band of escaped criminals. Her own position as a hostage – and that surely was what she had become – now was quite obvious. Her hopes of freedom fell into the knowledge that the men not only intended to use her an object on which to vent their long pent-up lust, but they would hold her in case something went wrong with their murderous plans.
"And what about the cunt over here?" Cash asked. "She could blow the whole thing if she gets loose."
"You let me take care of her," Billy said, a glint of self-satisfaction in his eye. "Like I said, she's a valuable piece of property, and she'll be treated as such. And like I say, she ain't gonna get loose."
"I don't like the idea of the little bitch maybe sneakin' out on us. The city's only a mile away, and she could have the whole Goddamn FBI down on us before we had time to get the scratch and run outta here."
"Look, we're pros now, part o' the big time, and we gotta act like it," Billy said, raising up to his full height. "You get all shook about our girlfriend here runnin' loose and two to one you'll blow the big kill. This here senator is money, you gotta remember that."
"It's startin' to sound more like you don't even know who the fucking senator is! I always like to know whose head I'm puttin' a bullet into before I get itchy fingers," Vito spoke up, moving towards Billy.
"That's your big surprise. Not knowin' gives things a little more suspense, don't you think so, honey?" Billy said, looking down at Ellen.
"I-I don't think I know what you're talking about," Ellen said, feeling the tears well up in her eyes once more.
"Now that's what I like to hear," Billy said. "You just be a nice little girl, and nothin'll happen to ya. Meanwhile you can start helpin' us clean up this dump. We got some food in the back room, and after you finish feather-dustin', you can fix us up some chow."
Ellen sat back, resting her head against the wall behind the chair. She tried to pull the ripped material of her tee-shirt across the exposed pink nipples of her breasts, but this gesture seemed to bring more lewd stares from the men around her. The struggle in the car had left Ellen utterly shaken, and she now tried to cover her half-nakedness by pulling her legs tight around the long tear the men had made in her jeans and folding her arms across the lower part of her breasts and the whiteness of her bared stomach.
"I said we gotta get on with it," Billy repeated viciously, reaching down and grabbing Ellen by the arm. "I don't think you heard me right."
Ellen instinctively pulled away, feeling the hand increase its grip around the slightness of her wrist. Then Billy wrenched her up from the chair, sending her head spinning in another surge of anguished fear and humiliation as he swung his arm in a wide arc and brought the palm of his hand down hard against her face.
Ellen stood and covered her tear-stained face with her hands.
"Look, we ain't just playin' at any of this," Billy said, standing back for a moment. "What we want is real sweet and simple. You start cleanin' up this old furniture and these mattresses and fixin' up the joint so that it looks nice and respectful for the gentleman comin' shortly. Now tell the boys you understand, like a good girl."
"Yes, I-I understand," she finally said quietly. She understood too well, she thought to herself, glancing fearfully across the room at Billy who stood under the overhanging light shining harshly over his fierce-looking face. Ellen was beginning to comprehend the laws that guided the band of desperate criminals. Their years of imprisonment had turned them into near-animals who worshipped the strength of the leader of the pack more than anything else. At the same time, like the snarling dogs they were, they challenged that strength and, as in Vito's case, would try to destroy the leader's prestige at any possible moment. She had become a pawn in their game, and the man who finally ended up possessing her would simply take over that position of power. Now it was Billy who ruled over her ultimate fate, but she knew that the outcome of the struggle that was developing would depend on how he dealt with their challenge to his authority.
"Now honey, you look real sweet," Billy said sarcastically. "You get that pretty ass of yours moving into the next room, and maybe we'll give you a nice treat if you clean up good and proper."
"And don't forget the chow," Pop exclaimed from his chair. "It ain't enough just to have a maid, we gotta get some vittles in our guts if we's gonna make a good job of it tomorrow. Be real nice to have some home cookin' after ten years of penitentiary soup."
Ellen felt a strong wave of humiliation rush through her as the men laughed heartily at the old man's remarks. She was completely unaccustomed to being treated this way, and, despite her fear of any further struggle over her already violated body, she suppressed a rebellious feeling that increased as they assigned her the demeaning task of cleaning up the filthy, so-called apartment.
"All right, Cash," Billy said, thrusting his thumb towards Ellen. "You show the little lady what's got to be done."
Ellen followed Cash through the dimly lit doorway into an adjacent room. God, she had never seen such a slovenly mess in all her life! Piles of filthy mattresses were heaped below the tall warehouse windows, and pieces of broken furniture covered with mold and dust were scattered across the rotting linoleum floor. She thought she would become sick when she breathed in the stale odor coming from a pile of dirty dishes lying in the sink in a far corner of the room, but she didn't. It seemed as though her humiliation from the insults to her body and spirit had strengthened her somewhat. Perhaps she was already becoming accustomed to this animal world, she thought. It was possible that the law of jungle survival had been affecting her in ways her own civilized mind could only instinctively understand.
"First, get them mattresses nice and clean," Cash commanded, pointing towards the window. "We may need them later on if there's any trouble with the fuzz."
Ellen stooped over the mattresses and broken furniture, and with a rag he had flung to her, she began dusting them off. Although it was Cash commanding her, she felt Billy's unseen presence directed through Cash's forceful orders. There was no longer any sense in the hopeless resistance she had put up at first. She had at least kept herself close to Billy, and as long as he retained his power she was relatively safe. Cash and Pop, and to some extent Vito, were under Billy's control, but if she aroused the leader's displeasure she would be thrown to them as the vestal virgins of ancient Rome had been thrown to dens of wild untamable lions.
"After that, them dishes in the sink need some washin'," he added with a certain sense of authority. "You don't want to get Billy mad, cause when he gets that way there ain't nobody can stop him."
Ellen nodded dully in assent and shrugging in resignation continued her task of cleaning up the mess. Cash had helped her pile the mattresses against the windows, and it occurred to her that the men were preparing for a possible gun battle when she observed the way the mattresses were arranged. They were piled up as though they had planned to use them as a shield against bullets that might be shot towards the windows from the vacant lot behind the warehouse.
The dishes were clean now, and she stood them up on a rack she had improvised on a table beside the sink. Cash had left the room to bring in some groceries from the truck, and she felt free to gather her thoughts for a moment. Her biggest problem had been believing that all this was really happening to her. The incredible nightmare had actually begun on the beach when she had seen Jennifer fondling the long hard penises of the two young men below the sand dune. The series of emotional shocks that had followed had fused in her mind into an agonizing blur of painful and humiliating thoughts and images, and now it seemed as though the horrible evening would never end. It must be almost early morning, she thought, yet the four men had shown no signs of retiring for the night.
Cash reentered the room and placed the bag of groceries beside the sink. "Billy says you're to get us some supper. And make it quick," he added with an authority of his own.
"There's nothing to cook on in here," Ellen said, surprising herself at the boldness of her statement.
"Them's all canned things," Cash retorted roughly. "We can eat cold for a couple days."
"W-what can I fix?" she asked with a slight tremble in her voice, feeling her fear returning as Cash stared at her cruelly. It was evident that she had angered Cash by speaking out so abruptly, and that was just what she had been trying not to do. She was intent on being as docile and unobtrusive as possible. She knew that everything she said to this man went directly back to Billy. She dared not alienate Billy completely or he might be forced to show his control over her by letting the others take advantage of her as he had done, and this was the last thing she wanted to happen – she would rather die than have them molest and prod her like that again.
"Open up them sardines and start fixin'," Cash shouted, interrupting her thoughts.
Ellen reached into the grocery bag and set a can of sardines and a loaf of bread onto the table. She was a bit surprised to find that the soreness between her legs was not as acute as she thought it might be, but as she bent over the table she felt a surge of pain come from inside her thighs and pulse upward into her groin. Yes, the tenderness was still there, and she couldn't escape the fact that she had been ravished and her cherished virginity had been stolen from her forever. The assault Vito had subjected her to with his fingers had accomplished this, and now she hoped beyond hope that she could escape any further violation of her body from this group of escaped convicts.
Ellen tried to shake the memory of the dreadful incident from her mind, but she couldn't. It just didn't seem possible that all of this could have happened to her in such a short, unexpected, period of time and yet she recalled now that there had been a rash of kidnappings and political assassinations recently that had caught the attention of the press and the entire nation. She remembered with bitter irony that she had once believed that such a thing could never happen to her and that her world was safe and secure, just as millions of other Americans had probably believed about their own lives. But why had these men treated her as they did? This was the unwritten account of what probably happened in dozens of such incidents. The poor victims, fearful of the horrible stigma that would go with them the rest of their lives, had refused to tell the real stories of rape and ravishment that lay behind their abductors' political purposes.
Ellen was still uncertain of what exactly had gone on in the truck only a few hours before. The bitter details were a confused jumble in her mind as she had been in a state of complete shock since the escapees had first grabbed her. Yet one thing was crystal clear to her. Her sister had betrayed an important trust by behaving as she had on the beach, and in some barely comprehensible manner Jennifer was responsible for her being here at the mercy of Billy and his fellow intriguers.
"Man, I'm starving to death, where the hell's the food," Billy's voice rang out from the next room, interrupting Ellen's thoughts.
"She can't go no faster than she is," Cash answered, looking over at Ellen who was placing the sardines on slices of white bread. Cash's voice had a note of irritation in it, and Ellen hoped that this did not signal the beginning of a conflict between the two men. Cash had patiently watched as she prepared the sandwiches and was now making a salad, but she knew that this apparent gentleness would turn into violent passion if he were provoked. She was aware of her breasts hanging out from the tear in her tee shirt, and she could feel the cool air rush against her leg from where they had ripped open the leg of her jeans up to her crotch, exposing one softly-rounded cheek of her buttocks. She tried vainly to conceal herself by pulling her legs close together and keeping one arm pressed next to her half-bared breast, but she couldn't. If Cash would just keep his eyes off her she would be able to work much faster, but as it was she felt his gaze pass over every soft curve and lewdly exposed crevice of her body, and she twisted uneasily as she sensed his eyes glued more tightly to the smooth white firmness of her buttocks.
"You're one of the most appetizing cooks I ever seen," Cash joked salaciously. "But you are also one of the Goddamn slowest."
"The food's ready now," she said weakly, turning with one plate piled high with salad and another with sandwiches.
"Chow's ready," he shouted towards the next room, without taking his eyes from her voluptuous young body.
"Then bring it in here," Billy laughed. "Pop looks so hungry he might eat me up."
Ellen followed Cash into the next room and set the plates down on the floor in front of Billy who lay back on the mattress looking at her with an amused expression.
"Goddamn, girl, I ain't gonna eat off no floor," Billy growled in irritation. "You go and get a table or somethin', so we can eat like civilized human beings."
Ellen returned to the kitchen and pulled the table from beside the sink into the makeshift living room. Then she set the plates on the table top, watching Billy all the while to see if he was still displeased.
"Now that's more like it. Them there sandwiches look mighty good. And what we got here, a nice little salad," Billy said, a note of viciousness in his voice. "Dig in boys, we's gonna need all the nourishment we can get."
Ellen stood back by the door and watched as the four men gathered around the table and began to eat. It was the first time she really had an opportunity to see all of them clearly, as she had tried to avert her gaze from them while they had attacked her in the truck, and when they had entered the warehouse she had been too filled with shame to look them in the face. Now she could see them clearly under the strong glare of the overhanging light, and a sharp stab of fear cut like a knife through her stomach. Their faces were drawn in what she suddenly realized was a prison pallor and their expressions, as they ate, were those of desperate animals who seemed to fear that the food that had been set in front of them might be quickly removed.
Cash was the nearest of the four men; he appeared to be in his middle thirties, a few years older than Billy, but quite a bit younger than Pop. He was slightly balding with shortly cropped blond hair that was graying at the temples. As he bent over his food he displayed a kind of brute strength that was emphasized by his huge forearms and a thick neck that bulged out from a large muscular chest. He reminded Ellen of some dock workers she had seen on the Tampa waterfront earlier that summer. They were a tough vicious breed and she had heard that when they became drunk they frequently got into fights that often ended fatally.
Pop, who had been driving the truck when they abducted her, was a heavy set middle-aged man with rough looking skin and bulging red eyes. Of the four men he appeared the most inhuman and depraved. Years of prison confinement had transformed his every movement into a gesture of animal cunning that Ellen could sense now as he shifted his eyes from his plate of food to her body. There was an innate cold cruelty in Pop's eyes that she couldn't really explain, but she knew that his easy-going attitude was just a front hiding a bestial inner-self that needed only a nod from Billy to be released. Pop had been trained to obey the commands of any one man, but at the same time he seemed to harbor a deep resentment against that authority. Like an old dog who had stored up years of hate against an unjust master, he only waited for a moment of faltering when he might spring and destroy…
Billy was a tall, sandy-haired young man who carried himself with an arrogant confidence befitting his position as gang chief. He had well formed features and a square strong looking chin that revealed a strong willed character that Ellen had already learned to fear and respect. His arms were large and well muscled and sloped down to powerful hands that Ellen remembered had held her so brutally in the car. She winced when she recalled the movement of his wrenching fingers across her buttocks: she could still feel the painful marks he had made on her sides as he had plunged into her and ravished her so viciously. Although Billy was quite handsome in an obscene animal like way, there was something about him that repulsed her. He was colder and more aloof than the other men, and he seemed to lack a warmth of feeling that could lead him to commit acts of violence without having a second thought about it.
Vito, on the other hand, was bony and skinny with a shock of black greasy hair falling across his forehead. A long scar was slashed across his cheek that emphasized the paleness of his face and brought out the shiftiness of his character. If Pop appeared to be the most inhuman and depraved of the group of criminals, Vito was the most conniving and jealous. His dark darting eyes and his constantly tensed thin mouth suggested the born criminal personality who would have entered the world of crime even if the circumstances of his life had not sent him in that direction.
Earlier Ellen had feared an inevitable clash between Vito and Billy over leadership of the gang, and now as she watched the two men finish their sandwiches, she knew her fears had not been unjustified. Although they were completely opposite physically and mentally, both men had the driving desire to dominate and master the weaker human beings who crossed their path.
"Hey, little girl, what you lookin' at," Billy said, staring up at her from his empty plate. "Get into that kitchen and make us some more sandwiches."
Ellen darted back into the next room and began looking for some more food to fix the four voraciously hungry men. The sardines were all gone, but she found some cold cuts in the bottom of the grocery sack and quickly placed the slabs of meat on slices of bread and returned to the living room to set the full plate on the table.
The men dug into the sandwiches again and continued consuming their food in silence. As they ate they cast their gaze up from the table to her face and then dropped their eyes slowly in a lewd movement down to her half-exposed breasts and legs. There could be no doubt about what they were thinking about, and she kept her eyes on Billy as she cowered back from the table.
He was her only hope now, and as much as she was afraid of him, she feared the others more. She had been forced into a dilemma where she had to choose from one of four evils, and she truly felt that he would be her best bet if she hoped to survive the next few days without suffering a fate far worse than losing her virginity. Yes, she had come a long way from the innocent young thing she had been a few short hours before. She had believed in the absolute preciousness of her female dignity, and had thought the preservation of that purity should be striven for at all costs. But now she realized there were far greater indignities to be suffered – humiliations that in her virginal innocence she had never even thought of, never in her wildest dreams. So she, as though she were living in some primitive, war-like tribe, was forced to choose Billy as the strongest of the group for mere survival sake, and she hoped ultimately she would be accepted by him.
But she wasn't too sure.
Billy's actions were confusing. His strong assertive confidence appeared almost businesslike at times, and watching him eating now, she noticed that he didn't seem as concerned or even aware of her presence as the others. She was just there, a mere object to be toyed with at will; yet he knew she was his by virtue of his leadership of the gang.
"That was real good," Pop said, licking his lips in satisfaction. "I could use a couple shots to polish it all off."
"That sounds like a great idea, Pop," Billy said, yawning and stretching backwards on his chair. "Now you trot your sweet little ass into the kitchen, honey, and get a bottle of booze for us fellas."
Ellen went into the kitchen and found a bottle of whiskey wrapped in a paper sack at the bottom of the grocery bag. She brought the bottle back with some glasses and watched silently by his side as he poured a drink out for all of them.
"You only brought four glasses," Billy said, winking up at her. "We want five. You gonna drink with us, don't you understand?"
Ellen winced and began to turn back to the kitchen. "Here, save yourself some trouble, baby, and drink out of mine," Billy said, a note of disarming tenderness in his voice.
He poured his glass completely full and handed it to Ellen, who in an unconscious gesture of revulsion pushed the glass away from her face.
"Goddamn it, I said drink it you little bitch," he commanded, smiling broadly at the three men who sat with their eyes glued on Ellen.
The young girl slowly moved the glass of amber colored liquid toward her lips. It smelled bitter and strong, and she flinched involuntarily as she took a small sip and felt the hot liquid burn all the way down. This was the first time she had drank any liquor straight, and she felt momentarily sick as the whiskey began burning the walls of her stomach. She choked as Billy thrust his hand around her wrist and forced her to drink the rest in one gulp.
"Damn, she drunk all of that stuff," Vito laughed. "She's a regular pro at it."
"She's comin' along real well," Billy smiled. "And with me teachin' her the ropes she'll be a professional in no time."
"We's gonna get some of that too, ain't we, Billy?" Pop gloated. "We can't just sit here and watch. I mean, hell, I ain't had no woman for nearly fifteen years."
"Ya waited that long, another couple weeks ain't gonna hurt ya," Billy laughed.
"But that ain't fair, Chief. She's just as much ours as your own," Cash shouted. "We's the ones who helped you grab her up off that beach road. I say she's everybody's property."
"I say she's mine," Billy said sternly, rising up to his full height. "Anybody messes with this little pussy, and he's gotta answer to me. Remember, she's here because we need a hostage, not to knock off a piece of ass whenever we feel like it."
"Look, Billy," Vito said, speaking up for the first time in awhile. "You already fucked the stuck-up little bitch. You can't change the facts."
Ellen listened in astonishment at the vile exchange of words, pulling instinctively closer to Billy as the argument continued. She knew that her fate would be sealed with the outcome of the discussion, and she hoped somehow that Billy would be able to keep the three men off her.
"The facts are plain and simple," Billy answered. "But if you'd like to take a little look-see at the merchandise you're welcome a quick glance, with no touchin' that is."
Billy reached for Ellen's arm and pulled her violently toward the group of men. Ellen could feel the palm of his hand tighten around her wrist, then she sensed his fingers loosen slowly, as though he was intending to show his power to the men but did not want to hurt her. She let herself go weak under the strong pressure of the man's hand and found herself being pulled down toward the mattress.
"Now just look," Billy said, grasping her chin firmly in one hand while he still held her wrist strongly within his other fist. "Ain't she a sweet cunt? She's a real wonder."
Then in one swift movement Billy's hand reached down and ripped open the flimsy material of her tee shirt completely, throwing the tattered cloth onto the floor. Ellen fell backward for a moment in surprise, suddenly feeling the nakedness of the upper part of her body and trying to cover the exposed pink fleshed nipples of her large full breasts.
"Now you take a look at that boys," she heard his voice hiss. "That's what I call a real damn hostage, what dya think, Pop?"
"J-Jeeze, look at them Goddamn titties," the old man exclaimed, lurching forward from his chair.
"Now hold on, boys. You just keep your hands off them pretty knockers, cause I got somethin' better to show you."
Ellen pulled away again, rising and trying vainly to escape her final exposure to the lewdly staring criminals seated before her, then she felt Billy's hand reach under the tightly clasping waist band of her jeans, and she heard and sensed the thick denim rip and slide down over the voluptuous young curves of her hips. The jeans fell in a useless pile to the floor and now she was standing naked and completely defenseless before them. She felt the cool air rush around the blonde silken treasure lying up between her thighs, and she clenched her legs, futilely trying to hide herself from their obscene glances.
"Now just walk around a bit," Billy commanded harshly. "I want the fellas to see what ya got that they can't get. But be nice about it, they been without it a bit too long."
Ellen shuddered and drew back from them, trying to bring herself to run to the door of the kitchen but somehow she was frozen in her tracks with a fear that increased as she watched the three men slowly rise from the mattress. Ellen pulled close to Billy and looked up into his cold expressionless face for some reassurance, but it didn't come. The men were coming closer now and she found herself trembling as the lewdly fascinated group shambled forward, the obscene glare of their vision clamped vise-like on her nakedly shivering young body.
Billy had done nothing to ward the three men off. He just sat impassively in his chair while they began their lust-incited appraisal of each curve and soft dimple of her body, gaping with unadulterated admiration and animal-like lust at her luscious fullness of her breasts and the soft-downed blush of sparse blonde pubic hair curling between her legs.
"Jesus Christ," Cash breathed, almost in a groan. "That is really something."
Vito stood only a few inches from her, his beady eyes glazed over with a film of lust and his tensed mouth working spasmodically. It was all he could do to keep from rushing the young girl again, and he seemed to struggle to avoid raising his arm to fondle her softness in his hand. Vito knew that this would be fatal, as Billy still had claim to her as gang leader, but he would wait until the opportune moment, if that moment ever came, and then he would vent all of his hate and passion and would show Billy and the other men just what kind of a man he was.
"There ain't no reason you got to hold us off like this, Billy," Pop said, rubbing the palms of his rough fat hairy hands together, as his eyes followed the smooth contours of her body from the lust curve of her ripely upthrust breasts to the smooth fleshy contours of her hips and thighs.
Billy stood up from his chair, exulting in his power to tantalize the other men with this young captive who was his and his alone. His strength seemed to know no bounds, and his arrogant authority shone through his bright blue eyes that seemed to revel in the control he held over her and the others. Slowly the imprint of a contemptuous smile began to curl over his lips.
"Now I know you fellas need a little pussy, and I sympathize," he said, smirking viciously at the men. "And I plan to make it so you can have the chance to get her fair and square."
"That's what we been talking about ever since she was brought in here," Cash exclaimed, covetously running his eyes down the long smooth arc of Ellen's hips to the long curve of her tanned perfectly formed legs.
"Then, what I suggest is a gentlemanly game a' craps," Billy smiled. "I win, and you gotta pay me from the loot we get after the job – but if I lose then she's all yours."
"You know that ain't fair, Billy," Pop said, raising his voice in weak protestation. "Everybody knows you're a champ at craps."
"You play the game if you like the idea. Remember it's you three against me. All I do is roll the dice; you all call my bets." Billy laughed, and poured the glass Ellen was holding half-full with whiskey again.
Ellen pulled the whiskey glass up to her lips and took a long deep sip. She just couldn't believe what was going on around her! Here she was about to be used as stakes in a dice game, and she had absolutely nothing to say about it! The thought of being gambled for as though she was some kind of slave girl in an Arab market place sent strong spasms of revulsion through her stomach. There was no turning back now, and she could only pray to the Gods of chance that Billy would be lucky or conniving enough to retain his power and control over her.
"I-I can't take it," she mumbled, almost incoherently to Billy. "Wh-what is going to happen to me?"
"You just keep your little ass quiet and everything will turn out just fine, honey," Billy said, his voice sounding slightly irritated with her.
Ellen sat back and sipped nervously from the glass of whiskey, feeling the clammy tingle of self-degradation and fear creep over her again. She was almost at the point where she would beg, grovel, or do anything possible to escape from the three men; but some final vestiges of pride remained. Although she knew that total subservience to Billy was her only choice at this point, she vowed to herself that at the moment when either of the two evils was forced upon her, she would at least have some remaining sense of her female dignity still intact.
"All right," Cash shouted, full of expectant excitement now. "I'm ready. But what do we use as money until the loot gets here?"
"Just take some pieces of paper and rip 'em up and we'll use 'em as stakes for the time bein'," Billy answered, picking up a piece of newspaper from the floor. He tore long even shreds of the paper and placed them on the top of the table, one pile in front of each of the escaped convicts who counted their share as though it were real money.
"And if we win, we get to do what we like with her, is that right?" Cash asked, gazing at Billy with a pleading look in his eyes.
"That's absolutely kerrect!" Billy asserted. "Just gimme the bones, and we can begin."
Pop reached in his pocket and brought out a pair of worn-looking dice and placed them in Billy's outstretched hand. Billy dropped the cubes on the table several times, then seized them and threw them back into Pop's face.
"Goddamn, Pop, you sneaky old bastard," Billy shouted contemptuously at the old man. "Snake eyes every time. You guys got any dice that ain't fixed?"
Cash tossed a pair of his own on the table, and Billy shuffled them around a few times, finally satisfied that they were good.
"I get the idea that I'm in on this, Billy," Vito's jackal-like voice suddenly sounded out. "I can get some of it too, can't I?"
Billy looked up, obviously gloating in his self-assurance and the sense of power that he held over the thin-lipped young man who was practically begging in front of him.
"You get a slice of the cake, of course you do, Vito," Billy said slyly. "But it ain't gonna be anything important. You just might do a little eating, understand?"
Vito slunk back from the table, a cruel hurt look apparent in his dark eyes. Ellen watched him carefully out of the side of her vision, fearing that Billy might provoke him beyond the point where Vito could take any more of the gang leader's vicious jibes. It was obvious that Billy was glorying in the salacious glances the others were casting at her nakedly white body, and it seemed as though he wanted to extend his domination over them as far as he could under the opportune circumstances.
While the men rose and went to the opposite side of the room, Ellen began clearing away the table. She watched for a moment as they bent a few feet from the wall, and she took the dishes into the kitchen. After she had set the dishes in the sink and returned to the living room, Billy made her drink from another glass of the whiskey. She had now consumed nearly three glasses of the strong-tasting liquid, and although it made her feel somewhat light-headed, it was preferable to the horrible fainting feeling she experienced when they looked at her so obscenely. She needed something to shield herself from the shocks that had been assaulting her mind and body all evening, and though she usually found drinking distasteful she now welcomed each additional glass of the warm liquid he made her take.
The craps game was going at a slow pace. Ellen didn't quite understand the rules they were following for tossing the dice, but she could see by Billy's worried expression that things were not proceeding as he had planned. He would toss the dice against the wall, and it appeared that the three men would bet on the number of dots that came up. She noticed several times that when both dice came up with two dots face up on each cube the men would scream out "snake eyes" which seemed to mean that Billy had lost that particular toss. But when Billy tossed the next time and came up after the first throw with a combination of seven or eleven as a total number, the men looked disappointed. However, this did not happen often. Usually seven came up after the initial throw, and Billy would curse and snarl at the dice almost as though they were alive.
Cash knelt on the floor and watched Billy toss the dice. He smiled exultantly as his leader's losses piled up. Cash was not only slowly whittling more and more of Billy's money away from him, but was betting the other two men on what numbers might come up… and he seemed to be winning there besides.
After two and a half hours of intense play Vito rose, and growling something incoherently, he threw the remainder of his stakes on the floor in disgust. Ellen breathed a sigh of relief at this turn of events. At least she needn't be bothered with Vito any more this evening; yet the game between Cash and Billy, with Pop still betting, was growing close and more intense.
Each throw of the dice seemed to send up those glittering snake eyes that took on a more evil quality as Ellen tried to concentrate her will on making Billy's luck run better. But it was impossible. Billy was now drinking heavily, even though Ellen tried to down most of the liquor in the glass he had poured for himself, and Pop and Cash seemed to sense his growing impatience, and they played it for all it was worth. At one point, Ellen got up with the liquor bottle tucked in hand, intending to go into the kitchen and secretively dilute the whiskey with water. Cash's watchful eye caught her as she was about to disappear into the next room, and silently she turned around and seated herself again at the table. The game went on. Billy drunkenly pushed his glass next to the bottle, bidding her to refill it, and with a growing sense of anguished helplessness, Ellen obeyed his command.
The shapes of tables and chairs and dice throwers was growing quite hazy, and Ellen had difficulty focusing on the movement of the players crouched down on the floor in front of her. If she could have her way she would drink the whole bottle of whiskey in order to send herself into complete unconsciousness, but the truth was she couldn't. The men had carefully kept their eyes on the bottle knowing full well what her intentions had been. They were not going to let her get away with blotting out their actions from her mind if they got hold of her – and at this point it looked like they just might succeed in winning her away from Billy. Now she had become nothing more than an exalted pawn in a dice game that had turned into a play for power among four desperately gambling escaped convicts whose main purpose in life had been and still was to dominate and destroy every defenseless being that came within their grasp.
Ellen leaned back in her chair and took another long sip at the glass of whiskey, almost forgetting her own nakedness as she concentrated on the game going on before her. But now as the dice continually came up craps, snake eyes or box cars for Billy's first throws and sevens after he had established a point, and as Cash gathered in more and more slips of paper she became aware of her nakedly defenseless flesh open to all four men's view.
"You about to call me on this one, huh," Billy said coldly. "Well, just try it." His expression changed as Cash immediately covered his bet.
Vito and Pop who both were now out of the game shuffled forward to see what would happen next, and Cash sat silently watching as Billy's hands trembled slightly as he gripped the dice for a final throw.
"We'll make a break in the game," Cash said, hardly able to conceal his glee. "I say you're about to crap out on this throw." He pushed a bundle of paper slips toward the center. "Crap out and I get the girl. Don't crap out and you win enough to play a little longer."
"Man, you got some kinda nerve to be pushing like that," Billy said, seeming to regain his confidence.
"I got all kinds of nerve," Cash said shortly. "Luck's with me tonight, you can see that plain as daylight."
Cash stood up confidently from the floor and passed his eyes from Billy's hand to Ellen's smoothly curved body that stood defensively close to Billy. He smiled expectantly as he surveyed every inch of her voluptuously tensed young figure that seemed to be unaware of its own provocative nakedness, then he glanced back at Billy who was still shaking the dice in his cupped hands. "Man, get a move on, I think I got a little appointment with a lovely lady over here."
Billy shifted his weight, looking back at Vito and the other two men who faced him with anticipation, their leers of expectant triumph dissolving as he regained his arrogant confidence momentarily; but as he turned back to face the wall, they broke into knowing smiles again. "Here goes your ass, Cash," Billy hissed and tossed the dice sharply against the wall.
"Goddamn!" the chorus of voices went up in unison as the dice turned up with Cash's predicted craps glaring directly into Billy's face.
Silence reigned in the room for several interminable seconds as Pop, Billy and Vito looked worshipfully down at the dice which had conformed to Cash's incredible prediction. Then Cash slowly rose up, and took a deep gulp as though he had crossed some important threshold in his life and there was no turning back.
"Jeezus, would you look at that," he said in a deep throaty voice. "This little old piece of ass is gonna get it tonight! Yes sirree, Cash is gonna give it to her good, and, fellas, you're gonna watch this stuck up little prissy enjoy it like nothin' she ever had before."
"It don't mean a shit to me," Billy lied, rising from the crouch he had been kneeling in for the past three hours. "It just means somethin' off my back. But, you take it easy on her. Remember, we wanna let her outta here, so she looks like we didn't do nothin' to her."
"Look here, part of the deal was I get to do anything I like, ain't that so, Pop?"
"He's absolutely right, Billy. You can't go back on nothin' you already said," the old man reminded, grinning from ear to ear. "As a matter of fact, I gotta make up for some lost time myself, fifteen years to be exact."
Billy began moving towards the three men, his face grimacing in anger and his fists clenched in a combative position, but halfway across the floor, he threw his hands up in the air in resignation. There was nothing he wanted less to do than stir the men up to the point where he could control them no longer. They had gotten to where they had really begun to enjoy the challenge they had presented to him, and there was no use risking his position as gang chief on something as foolish as a cunt, no matter how young and voluptuous she might be.
"Hey, baby, don't look so damn shook up, you're gonna like this, much better than you ever liked anything before, don't you understand that?" Cash said, his harsh Florida accent cutting through the silence. "But first you gotta get us a little warmed up, if ya know what I mean."
Ellen stood open-mouthed before the men, still standing close to Billy where she had frozen when the final dice had been tossed, but moved forward when Billy dug his elbow into her side in a gesture of rejection.
"Listen, honey, you pour us some more whiskey," Cash continued. "There's another full bottle in the kitchen."
Ellen moved quickly toward the kitchen, feeling the harsh glare of Cash's eyes burning through her back as she withdrew from her position of protection close to Billy. Her naked thighs and round smooth buttocks swaying unintentionally as she turned to the door brought out a deep groaning sigh from the men that resounded lewdly through the room, and Ellen felt a cold sensation of fear shoot through her spine just as she approached the kitchen sink.
"Man, oooowwweee! Look at them ass cheeks swing. Am I gonna get my rocks off on that sweet lil piece of pussy tonight," Cash said vulgarly.
Ellen found another full whiskey bottle beneath the sink and she immediately opened it and drew it to her lips, taking long deep gulps without stopping. Another rush of fear scurried over the paleness of her skin, but was gradually replaced by a lightheadedness induced by the whiskey she had just taken. She tried to focus her mind on ways to escape from the next attack on her humiliated body from Cash, but no solution came. She just couldn't stand the idea of the stocky, vicious looking criminal running his hands over her naked body and skewering his penis into her – especially as she recalled how she had been treated in the back of the truck, yet she saw no way out. She might drink the entire bottle of whiskey – that would be a slow way of committing suicide, yet she knew she would become sick before she finished half of it. Getting sick would be a good way out, and she anticipated a nauseous feeling as she gulped from the bottle again, but it didn't come. She was lost. Bob probably had assumed she had walked home from the beach party after their argument and her mother had gone to sleep hours ago, and wouldn't miss her until sometime this morning. Her mother would think she had stayed the night at a friend's house, and by the time she discovered something was wrong it would be too late…
The naked young girl raised the bottle to her lips again and drank as much of it in one swallow as she could get down. Tingling sensations began to sweep over her even as the liquor was still settling in her stomach, and she knew she was approaching a state of numbness that was deadening her senses somewhat. Suddenly she felt a dizziness race through her head and sensed her legs begin wobbling beneath her, and she clung to the side of the sink in order to support herself. If she could only get drunk enough to make herself completely repulsive to these men, if only she was just a bit less desirable than she appeared to be – a thousand ifs raced through her reeling brain, but she knew deep in her heart that there was nothing now that could save her from the horrible fate that awaited her. In a moment Cash would be on her, venting all his brutality and lust just as Billy had done in the truck only a few hours before. But the difference now was that she had time to understand what the vile purpose of this rapacious band of criminals was. Before, the wrench and squirm of bodies above and below her had been a mere flicker of images that seemed to have jumped out of an insane pornographic movie; but now, even in her numbed, half-intoxicated state she was fully conscious of what they wanted to do to her.
She reached for the bottle of whiskey again, but before she had a chance to bring it to her lips, she felt Cash's strong hard grasp on her arm as he pulled it violently downward.
"Looka here, honey," his voice boomed coarsely throughout the kitchen. "I ain't waitin' for no dead drunk chicken lyin' under me, ya got me?"
Ellen lowered her head in a gesture of complete resignation before him, then nodded slightly in dumb agreement, watching as he loosened his vise-like grip from her hand. Struggling now would be of absolutely no use, she knew, as they seemed to derive some sort of perverse joy in watching her attempt to resist their brutal advances. It would only make matters worse if she demonstrated any will to escape, but she would wait for that impossible moment and take immediate advantage of it if it ever came.
Cash picked up the bottle from the sink and walked in front of her into the living room. "Ain't ya comin' honey, or do I gotta do some persuading?" he said, peering back through the door at her nakedness.
Ellen meekly followed him to the table, her head bent in submission as she approached the three lewdly staring men who hunched up in their chairs beneath the harsh glow of the overhanging light. Cash made a strong movement of his hand toward the bottle of whiskey, and commanded her to pour the three glasses full; then she noticed that Billy was no longer drinking, in fact he seemed hardly aware of what was going on around him, as he slumped down in his chair with a blank cast to his dulled eyes that focused onto the floor. Suddenly Ellen felt the renewed effects of the liquor race throbbingly through her brain. She poured Cash's drink with trembling hands, trying with all her concentration not to spill the whiskey.
"Hey, this bottle is almost gone," Cash spoke out. "You run into the kitchen like a good little girl and get old Cash and these boys another one, huh?"
Feeling momentarily reprieved, Ellen slipped back into the kitchen and found another full liquor bottle beneath the sink. She waited for a moment, hoping Cash wouldn't appear again, then opened the bottle and pushed it toward her lips. God, she would need more of this, she really needed to get absolutely drunk! But her shock was so great that the whiskey seemed to have no effect on her, except for that momentary unsteadiness she had felt in the living room.
She looked down at the fullness of her breasts that curved out smoothly from her warm body and noticed a small rivulet of perspiration trickling between the swelling white mounds. God, it was getting hot! When they had entered the warehouse it had seemed almost cold, but now the closeness of the summer night seemed to wrap her in its warm humid shroud; and she found her breath coming in small desperate gasps, as though she were choking on the very thickness of the room's suffocating atmosphere.
"Let's have some of that whiskey, and make it quick!" Cash shouted in obvious irritation from the next room.
Now her violation was about to begin, and all she could do was attempt to bear her humiliation and the indignities that would follow with as much strength and fortitude as was possible under the incredible circumstances.
She shuddered in horrified anticipation of Cash's thick callused hands coursing over her tender body, and when she turned towards the living room an image of beastly mouths and contorted arms and legs and faces raced through her mind. There was nothing she could do now – there was nothing in all the world to help her but her own will power and courage. She was completely alone.