“Yes,” I say.
“Yes?” Rachel says. “Yes, what?”
“I like fucking her.”
“You’re a lying, cheating bastard!” Rachel hisses.
“Sam,” Karen says. “Please. I love you. Tell me that what we have is real.”
I look at Rachel. She says, “I can’t believe you’ve been fucking this piece-of-shit whore. When did you fuck her—while I’m at work every day? In some hotel room?” She gives Karen a withering look. “Or maybe you offer a discount for in-call at your place.”
Karen says, “I don’t even know what that means.”
Rachel turns back to me and spits her words. “Real classy, Sam.”
The three of us are quiet a moment, though Karen continues whimpering. Rachel finally breaks the silence. Her voice has changed. She’s no longer screaming. She seems sad, hurt.
“These bastards kidnapped me,” she says, “slapped me around, threatened me. And all the shit I was going through, terrified, I kept thinking about you. No matter what they did to me, I thought I was going through it for you.” She lowers her eyes. “I never would have taken you for a cheat. With all your flaws, this is something I never saw coming. What a fool I am.”
“Rachel, I—”
“Oh, shut up, you son of a bitch.”
Karen says, “Sam—”
I say, “I’m sorry, Karen. I should have told you.”
“Her?” Rachel says, suddenly angry again. “You should have told her? You should have told me, you son of a bitch!”
“You told me you loved me,” Karen says.
Rachel gives me a hard-as-nails look.
“I do love you,” I say.
Karen says, “You do?”
Rachel says, “Excuse me?”
“It’s complicated,” I say.
“You no-good fucking bastard,” Rachel says.
At which point, the voice interrupts us, saying, “Sorry to break in, people, but it’s time to take this to the next level.”
Chapter 23
“Who are you?” Rachel says to the voice. “Why are you holding me?
I don’t have the fucking codes!”
“What are they talking about, Sam?” asks Karen. “What codes?”
I look down at my feet, ashamed. “It’s complicated,” I say.
The voice says, “Ladies, allow me to explain. As you may know, Sam has developed a system to hide money from the authorities. By our estimate, he controls at least eight billion dollars for his clients, most of whom are terrorists, murderers, and thieves. The reason we’re all here, my associates and I want that money. Sam has the access codes. All he has to do is type in the eighteen codes, and we’ll set him free.”
“What about me?” Rachel says. “I’m not involved in any of this. Why are you keeping me here?”
The voice says, “You’re here to help motivate Sam to do the right thing.”
I say, “What’s the next level?”
The voice says, “You wanted proof we’d let you go. But we can’t let you go until you give us the codes. So we’re going to do the next best thing: we’ll give you the opportunity to save one of your women.”
All three of us are visibly shaken. I say, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Choose one of them, Sam.”
“Choose one for what?” I say.
“Choose one of them to live.”
I look at Karen and Rachel. They’re wearing matching expressions of horror. I’m sure I look just as bad. I start retching. The sandwich I ate is trying to come back up. I jump to my feet and force myself to gain control of my body.
“I’m not going to sentence one of them to die,” I say.
There was a momentary pause. “You’re certain about that?” the voice says.
The girls are making all sorts of sounds, I’m sure, but I can’t hear them. My captors have turned off their microphones. The girls are both terrified, of course. I can see them banging their fists on the wall. I’m not an accomplished lip-reader, but the word “Sam” is pretty easy to decipher. They’re both screaming my name. I’m standing in my cage, turning both palms down to show them a “try not to worry” gesture.
“I’m certain,” I tell the voice. “I’m not going to sentence one to die.”
Another pause, this one longer than the previous one, and then, with a weary, almost defeated tone, the voice says, “Very well, Sam. We’ll kill them both.”
I’m not sure of much that’s happened since whenever it was I made love to Karen in the hotel room, which could have been today, yesterday, or a week ago. But I am sure of one thing: these guys, my captors, need me. They’re not going to kill Karen and Rachel. At least not until they’ve gotten my codes.
“You’re bluffing,” I say.
The voice says, “Sam, we had to disconnect the microphones while we made an adjustment. In a moment, you’ll hear a whirring sound coming from the ladies’ cells. That sound is a vacuum pump, and it will be removing the oxygen from their cells. Once the pump powers up, the microphones will come back on, and you’ll be able to hear their last words.”
I shake my head. “That’s absurd,” I say. “Nice try, though.”
I look at Rachel and Karen, wink, and make a circle with my thumb and forefinger to show them everything is okay.
Then the sound comes on, and I can hear the vacuum pumps sucking the air out of their containers.
Chapter 24
Addressing the voice, I say, “And now I’m supposed to believe that all the air is being sucked out of their cubicles? Not possible.”
The voice says, “Sam, you’ve got a scientific mind; you should be able to follow this. Think of these cells as vacuum storage containers like the ones you might use in your kitchen, to keep things fresh. You, Rachel, Karen, Donovan Creed—you’ve all been placed in hermetically sealed plastic storage containers. Every twelve minutes since you became our guest, we’ve pumped fresh air into your cell. The new oxygen-rich air forces the carbon dioxide-laden air out. If we stop pumping fresh air in, you’d survive maybe three or four hours.”
I look at the containers holding Rachel and Karen. Both women are sitting on the floor. Their mouths are moving, but they appear lethargic. It doesn’t seem possible they could be affected to this degree in such a short period of time. I search my brain, trying to come up with an alternate theory. I think I might have one.
“If you suck all the air out of the containers, the walls will implode,” I say, having no idea if this theory makes the slightest bit of sense.
“Sam, once again, we’d ask you to think about the vacuum storage containers used in kitchens all over the country. Those containers are also plastic. When you attach a pump to the rubber valve on top, you can vacuum seal the container. That’s the whole idea behind keeping the food fresh for a longer period of time. In the same manner, each of our containers is equipped with a check valve in the floor that allows air to be pumped in one direction only. We’ve already turned on the pumps, and they will make short work of the air quality. We don’t have to remove all the air, just enough for them to suffocate. Which they’re about to do. But don’t take my word for it. Here, I’ll turn on the microphones, and you can hear for yourself. On the bright side, your women will be almost perfectly preserved. You’ll hardly be able to tell they’re dead.”
The mikes go on, and I can hear them suffocating. It’s excruciating. I ask myself if it’s possible they’re in on it, that they’re faking. Rachel, the woman I loved more than any other, is lying on her side, her back to me. If she’s faking, she’s not even trying to let me see the effect the treatment is having on her. Karen is on her back, in a reclining posture, her torso propped up on her elbows. She’s looking at me in horror, as if she’s just met a demon in an alley. She’s probably wondering what sort of monster would allow this to happen to her. She’s no longer saying my name. She’s gasping for breath. It appears to be a major effort for her to get even a half breath. She still looks
beautiful, but she’s aged five years in the last two minutes.
Karen’s head hits the floor, and I can’t bear it any longer.
“Okay, okay,” I say. “I believe you. I’ll enter the codes. Please stop.”
The voice says, “Sam, you don’t have time to enter all the codes. Enter one and I’ll stop the process.”
I enter the code of a man who is almost certainly a terrorist and hope they don’t have a way to access his money. Nothing’s worse than an angry terrorist.
“We need the name, Sam.”
How did they know what I typed? They must have a keystroke link set up that bypasses the Internet. Is that possible? Or maybe they’ve written some code to block me from accessing the Internet.
“The name, Sam. Your ladies are near death.”
I look at the cages. He’s right. There’s not much movement to see and no sounds left to hear.
I type in the name of the terrorist and instantly hear the vacuum pump stop.
There’s a slight pause. Maybe they’re checking the name against some sort of list. I don’t give a shit about the codes anymore. I’m staring into the girls’ cages, praying they’re okay.
The voice finally says, “Thank you, Sam. That’s a good start. We’re pleased. In fact, we’re so pleased we’re going to give you another chance to save one of the women.”
“What are you talking about? I gave you the code.”
“We’re past that, Sam. It’s time to choose.”
My heart hammers in my chest. If I hadn’t been sitting, I would have certainly fallen to the floor.
“N … No!” I stammer. “Look, I’ll give you the codes … and the names. I’ll give you the codes and the names. I’ll even help you rob them. I’ll do whatever. But please. You have to let them go. It’s not their fault. They’ve done nothing to you, nothing wrong. Please. I’m into it now. It’s over. I’ll do whatever you say. Let them go.”
“Sam, your eloquence is touching, if tedious. Tell you what, we’ll pump a little air into their containers each time you give us a code.”
I enter the codes and names as quickly as possible and then turn my attention to the girls. They’re still lying on the floors of their containers. I can’t detect any movement or hear any sounds of breathing.
“Are they okay?”
“They’re lucky,” the voice says. “Another minute, they might have suffered brain damage.”
A half minute passes before Karen starts moving. A few seconds later, Rachel screams. Over the next few minutes, both girls vomit. Now they’re crying. Their actions and responses are practically mirror images of each other. Finally, I hear Karen speak.
“Sam … are you okay?”
I want to shrivel up and slink away. This incredible goddess—the one I tricked into sleeping with me, the one I betrayed, the one who nearly died just now because of my greed—is actually worried about me. Rachel, on the other hand, has grown mute. She’s sitting in the corner of her cell, arms hugging her knees. Her face is pale. She appears on the brink of throwing up again.
“Your women appear to be fully recovered,” the voice says. “I’ll give them a few minutes to compose their thoughts.”
“W … What are you talking about?” I say.
“Time to choose, Sam. We’re going to give them a chance to plead for their lives. You get to play God today; you’ll hear what they have to say, and then you’ll decide which one gets to live.”
Both women scream in protest, though each scream is unique. As they continue to beg our prison master to reconsider, I feel the bands around my chest tighten, as if I’m being constricted by a giant python. I look at my two women and can’t believe this is happening. I can’t believe it’s come to this. My heart feels too large for my chest. I’ve reached my limit. I can’t allow this to happen. There must be something I can do or say to stop the madness.
“Kill me instead,” I say.
Both girls stop begging. There is complete silence as the voice seems to consider my request. Moments pass, moments that allow me to wonder if this is the end for me. As one of the most selfish people in the world, I’ve just shocked myself by offering to exchange my life for theirs. It’s the right thing to do, but I haven’t exactly made a life out of doing the right thing.
But I’m serious. I would rather die than have to sentence a loved one to death. The voice comes back in all three containers.
“Sorry, Sam. We like it better the other way. Girls, take a few minutes to compose your thoughts. We’ll flip a coin to see who goes first. You’ll each have one minute to convince Sam why he should choose you instead of the other one.”
Chapter 25
The prison master turns off the girls’ microphones. They take a moment to look at each other. While they do that, I try to imagine what must be going through their minds.
Until recently, Rachel thought she was married to a loyal, hardworking, successful man. True, the last six months or so, she’d grown distant, but things never got so bad that we felt the need to talk about it. In other words, we weren’t ready for a marriage counselor. By and large, her life was stable, predictable, and reasonably content. But this last day or so has found Rachel going through a rough patch. In this short time frame, she’s been kidnapped, slapped around, threatened, and forced to strip. She’s learned her husband has been cheating on her and had to meet the “other” woman. She’s been suffocated nearly to death, and now she’s being forced to beg me to spare her life—me, the guy who caused all these terrible things to happen to her.
Thank God she hasn’t yet learned that her only sister has been murdered.
Again, my fault.
Nor has the last day or so been a picnic for Karen Vogel. This singular beauty fell in love with a man she thought was loyal, wealthy, and single. She trusted me, slept with me, and found a dead man in her trunk. She’s been kidnapped and threatened and discovered she’s been dating a married man. She’s been forced to meet my wife, has been nearly killed, and now finds herself in the position of having to beg me to spare her life—me, the guy who caused all these terrible things to happen to her.
Rachel turns away first. She goes to her cooler, takes out a bottle of water, and drinks it greedily. That must seem like a good idea to Karen, because she does the same. Rachel glares at me a few seconds before going back to the spot she seems to prefer, with her back touching the far wall. She still has on the suit she’d worn to work, a lightweight black Italian tweed with a shawl-collared jacket. The matching skirt would have stopped about two inches above the knee had she been standing. But she slides down the wall now and assumes her former posture of hugging her knees close to her chest. This is not a time for modesty, nor is it appropriate for me to notice, but she is inadvertently flashing her panties. Maybe I’m noticing because of the photograph I’d seen this morning—or yesterday, or whenever it was. They’d used a body double with black panties and the white bra with Karen’s initials. In light of all that’s transpired since that moment, I have to wonder why they went to so much trouble. What was the point of the photograph? I’ll probably never know.
At any rate, Rachel is not wearing black panties today. They’re tan, like the ankle-wrapped sandals she’d removed earlier to bang against the wall when trying to get my attention.
Karen is pacing the floor. She keeps glancing at me, giving me hopeful looks. She’s scared, but there’s hope in her eyes. She knows she has the advantage. She’s younger, prettier, nicer, and has no baggage. I look at Rachel again. Her eyes are shut tight, and she’s rocking a bit and appears to be moaning. I wonder if she’s wishing she hadn’t been so distant these last few months. I don’t like the position I’m in, can’t stand the thought of having to choose one of these women to die, but somewhere inside of me—God help me!—there’s a tiny voice that wonders if Rachel might be rethinking the way she’s treated me since being in the cubicle. It couldn’t possibly escape her notice that while she was cursing and bitching and begging our captors
to set her free, Karen was saying she loved me. Indeed, the first words out of Karen’s mouth when regaining consciousness were to ask me if I was okay. I’m not proud to admit to that tiny voice inside me, but I’d be lying if I didn’t tell you that some part of me is actually looking forward to hearing what Rachel might say to me. Will she beg for her life? Of course she will. Will she mean it? That’s the billion-dollar question, isn’t it?
I watch Karen gather the blanket around her. She’s using it to shield herself as she pees. Rachel notices her too. She sneers and shakes her head in disgust, and I have a strong feeling these two could share a foxhole for the duration and never be friends.
The voice interrupts my thoughts.
“We tossed a coin. Rachel, you get to go first. Remember, you have one minute to make your case. Sam, pay attention.”
Chapter 26
Rachel stands and crosses the floor in her bare feet. She places her hands on the Lucite wall. She’s standing as close to me as she can, and she gives me a sort of half smile and says, “Sam, I don’t know quite what to say. We’ve been together all these years, and I’ve always tried to be there for you. If someone had told me a week ago that you had the power to decide my fate, I wouldn’t have worried for one second, because I thought you loved me as much as I’ve always loved you.
“Now, I’m not so sure. I look at the cell across from me and I see a woman who’s younger than me, prettier than me, a woman who says she loves you. And worse, a little while ago, I heard you say that you loved her.
“I can’t tell you how badly my heart hurts right now. Try to put yourself in my position. All I’ve done to be here is to love you. A part of me understands why you cheated. I know I haven’t been the most attentive wife in the world, but you know I’ve always been faithful to you and I’ve never stopped loving you. And, Sam, I love you still.
“I’m not going to lie. If you choose to let me live, we’re going to have some stressful times. I can’t promise we’ll make it. But I promise I’ll try.