Authors: Jack L. Pyke
I backtracked and eased my way up the stairs. Again to the left was Jack’s spare room, and I avoided that at all costs, heading for the shower. Opening the door took me through a long corridor, where his shower room sat at the end. Maybe they hadn’t had the room to extend the house properly and add it on, maybe... What the hell did I know?
I went in there first.
Water dripped from the showerhead, threatening to stain the wall, leaking like a lonely tear that didn’t know how to stop. I went over, so tempted to stand underneath it, dip my head, and just feel close to Jack again even if it was only in terror.
“You were cleaned here.”
Gray’s voice was soft, but it was a statement, not a question. He was leaning against the door, in much the same spot Henry had always stood.
“They’re gone,” I mumbled quietly, leaning back against a wall and screwing my eyes shut to block out Henry’s image. The smell of urine, sweat, blood, sex, and my cologne, it stained the air, turning my stomach. “He’s gone,” I mumbled in an even flatter tone, letting my head fall back as I closed my eyes. “But you knew that,” I said quietly, remembering the look Gray and Brennan had passed between each other outside. They’d been checking for heat signatures of tyre tracks; they’d seen more than one set. “You wouldn’t have let me up here otherwise, would you?”
I felt a tear fall, then more. “What the hell’s been going on here, Gray? What the fuck have they done?”
“You never saw outside of Jack’s home?”
“Here, his spare room, his—” The shaking that gripped threatened to tear me apart, and Gray was suddenly there, trying to rub at my shoulders. “Don’t—” I shook him off. “
Just fucking Don
—” That one word was strangled into silence and I hit the wall. “
Fucks, fucking sick fucks
.”
A whistle came from behind, up to the right, back in the direction of Jack’s master bedroom. Giving a tug at my sleeve to encourage me to move, Gray made sure I followed.
Brennan knelt close to where the hook was still fastened to the floor. They hadn’t even pulled that out. I hadn’t even noticed. Everything rushed in; the will to get out, forget the screw-ups, and....
Gray eased me to one side and went and crouched by Brennan. After slipping some gloves on, he ran his fingers over the hook, his attention transfixed on the patch of blood just beneath it. Maybe from Jack, maybe from the men he’d beaten.
“A few days old,” whispered Brennan, and Gray gave him such a hard glare. Brennan eased to his feet, away, seeing it.
Looking at me, Gray came over. “I need you to tell me everything, Jan. And I mean everything, start to finish. No detail left out, as best as you can remember.”
I stared at him, that feeling of fresh drugs being pumped into my system making me shiver, because like hell could I do anything but stare at him.
“Everything,” he said gently. “Seconds matter.”
Shivering came a little harder. I knew how this went. “We... the night you two argued, we got home. We slept eventually, Jack was so cold. People were there as we slept, and when Jack needed a shower in the night, they—” I frowned. “Videos. After I sent you a text to say Jack was okay, Vince, the main bastard in charge, he watched one of those videos of Jack and Cutter while Jack showered. He sat on Jack’s bed with me, watching them.”
“He had discs with him?”
I was back with Gray, nodded.
“He could have copied them off the porn sites,” breathed Brennan in Gray’s ear. Gray barely glanced at him. “Or he’s the uploader, or at least knows them.” Gray focused back on me. “And?”
I looked back to see people looking around the upstairs now, Carr, other men.
“Jan.” Gray stole my attention. “Everything.”
“They drugged Jack,” I said flatly. “They... when I woke, I was here. I thought, I thought we were at his. Everything, everything looked and smelled...” I glanced around. “Exactly like his. They’d dressed me in a suit, and Jack?” I pointed to where the bed had been, ignored how easily I let it fall back to my side. “Vince raped him while he was unconscious.” I frowned. “Then nearly drowned him, raping him with a studded whip. Blood. So much blood. And Henry, right after the branding, he picked up this note that he read, I don’t think I was supposed to see it, but... it looked like a BDSM list of things to do. And they wrote things on the floor.”
“Jan.” Mistress Carr was at my side and I felt her hand slip into mine as Brennan checked the floor over for chalk marks. “Take it slowly. Did they,” she looked at Gray, “did they touch you?”
I licked at my lips, focused on Gray, needing to focus on Gray. “Vince’s rape was systematic: at night, with different mind games, different BDSM equipment and techniques. How he did it... he, he twisted everything Jack knew, taping his mouth shut at first so he couldn’t use his safe word, then removing it and not listening when he did cry it. And don’t... they used the whole psychological play with saying don’t, saying ‘Don’t... tell me your safe word’.” I fought back that rush building inside of me. “He cried it, Gray. He cried for it to stop and they carried on the rape, raping him and they, they, us....”
“Anything else?” said Mistress Carr quietly, trying to focus my rush away from rambling.
“That phone call to you,” I said to Gray and he narrowed his eyes. “That was just after he’d first raped Jack, when Jack was unconscious. Henry had a knife to Jack’s cheek, he cut his shoulder, then threatened to rape him with the knife and—” I shrugged some tears. “I had to make that call, Gray. I needed to make that call an—”
“It’s okay,” said Mistress Carr, giving a sideways glance to Gray, but like hell was any of this okay.
“They were mostly silent, or whispering,” I said, “both wearing black leather gas masks, whenever we were forced together—”
“Forced together?”
I held Gray’s gaze, denying the memories.
“I need to know, Jan.”
“
Fucking mind games
,” I snapped, “always mind games with the masks, twisting everything, raping Jack when we were forced to cuddle up, raping him—” I stopped for a moment. I had to stop. “They made sure that I was the only one that made any noise. And my clothes, they had a selection of my clothes, my cologne, and they put my shirt by Jack when they hurt him. They said they were training him.”
Now Gray frowned.
“With your photo too.”
“Photo?” said Carr, but I was looking at Gray. “They wouldn’t let him go casual with it, and they had the message ‘Don’t... straighten me, Jack.’”
Brennan was by us, his look as frowned as Gray’s. “They knew his disorders and personal coping strategies?”
Gray nodded and looked back around the bedroom. “His home too. And they’d torture him at night with you?”
“At night?” I shrugged a little hopelessly. “I don’t know. It would be light in the spare room, dark in here. They...” I wanted to cry at how useless I was and rubbed hard at my arms just to make it hurt somewhere else. “They drugged him constantly, I think. He’d be really disorientated, just trying to hold on, but scared too, and aggressive, so bloody aggressive. Like with everything else, they didn’t know what they were doing.” I was fighting vomiting. “They gave him a concentrated dose, not a diluted one with the injection, that’s what they said. Jack started having convulsions here. They didn’t need it.” I wiped a hand over my face. “Gray, he struggled, he struggled so fucking badly with his OCD and conduct disorder. The last time after the photo of you was dropped casual out of reach, he blacked out, to the point he nearly killed one of the men. Left him bloodied on the floor. They wouldn’t let him free and you could see the build-up, what they put his body through, it was nothing compared to just needing to straighten the photo, to get to what was his.”
Something flickered through Gray’s eyes before it was instantly buried. “Psychological reconditioning,” he said flatly, and it was terrifying how calm his voice was. He filled none of his own details in, just focusing on mine.
“Why?” said Brennan.
Gray looked at him. “Remember how authoritarian Jack was when we first met him? Back with Cutter, how he’d exploit Jack’s disorders and push for his kick back against the establishment?”
Brennan seemed to search for the memory, then nodded. “Something similar here?”
“Only a reversal, forcing a calming down.” Gray glanced at me. “There’s a definite link to his OCD and Conduct Disorder... perhaps to convince Jack he only suffers both under supposed BDSM handling, but that BDSM handling only occurs in a dream-like state?” His eyes narrowed as he looked around the bedroom. “Maybe followed up by normality during the day, all three: OCD, Conduct Disorder, and his BDSM liking, they’re nothing more than a bad dream to him, perhaps?” He set his jaw tensing. “They knew what they were doing, all right. And to do it, we’re maybe looking at a date-rape drug, ketamine, perhaps enhanced with an opiate or the likes.”
Gray frowned at me. “What did they give you, Jan?”
I stopped rubbing at my arm. “Couldn’t have been the same,” I said, shutting out the memory. “It knocked me out and I woke in the boot of a car in a body bag. Maybe the doctor tried to help? Lowered the dosage?”
A look passed between Gray and Brennan. “Jan,” said Carr, where Gray stayed silent. “Ketamine is good at maintaining the respiratory system. It’s not a drug to use if you have no intention of waking the patient up. And if you woke in a body bag....” Gray gave her a look that quietened her back-track and my world became a whole lot smaller. She rubbed at my arm, then squeezed gently. “Not everyone has the same reaction to medication.” Her smile was small, thin. “You got away. But we really need to get you to the MC hospital now.”
I wasn’t meant to get away; I’d seen faces. That was her whole point. And that left Jack... where? That hit hard and Carr pulled me in close only for me to push her away. “Easy,” she said quietly.
Brennan had given a long, angered exhale. “So their MO is if they stop Jack craving BDSM, it cures his disorder.... We’re dealing with some sick fucks. Although...” His lips thinned. “If Jack was given ketamine throughout, even here.... It would be pretty useless overall: all of it would just have been one bad dream if Jack ever shook the drug off.”
“Towards the end, they didn’t drug him so much,” I said flatly, remembering how clear his look had been since Christmas day. “So fucking scared.... Him and Vince, they sat eating Christmas dinner as I was forced to watch from the corner, and Christmas Nigh—” I stopped that there as Gray levelled his gaze and didn’t let it shift.
“Vince...” I mumbled. “He didn’t give a fuck about any MO. He just got a real sadistic kick out of his control over us, over raping him.” I felt sick. “He told me what he did to Jack on Boxing Day. I heard laughter, beer bottles smacking together, then Jack....” I shut up not wanting to chase the images over Christmas night.
“Don’t go there, Jan,” said Mistress Carr, brushing her hand at my face, although Gray obviously was going there. “Sounds like they drugged him into thinking that the perpetrator was a safe refuge, that everything else.... It was just a bad dream.”
Yeah. That I was a bad dream, that Gray, BDSM.... “Jack....” I wiped a hand over my face. “He was so fucking pale.” Fresh tears fell. “Ill and battered. I don’t... after the fit, they wouldn’t tell me if he was—”
“Did you catch any other names?” said Gray, again focusing thoughts. “Vince would more than likely be a pseudonym, unless he....”
Unless he didn’t expect me to walk away. “Henry,” I said. “Leo, Doc...” I tried to force other memories that should stay buried. “No surnames. I counted about ten different men altogether.” Gray nodded, went to say something else, but a whistle from the stairs had him pushing past me. “And cameras.”
“Cameras?” Gray looked into the corner as I pointed. Wiring was hanging loose, the camera ripped out and nowhere to be seen. I felt like crying that it had been there. I wasn’t lying.
“You need to see this,” a voice called up. A look at Brennan, I eased down the stairs after Gray. We were led back out of “Jack’s” and twice I stumbled, twice Gray was there to catch me by the arm before Brennan took my weight. Helped up a stairway, I was led up into a little room just a few doors on the third floor.
“Ob’s room,” said Gray, flicking on a switch and highlighting the run of monitors. Jack’s bedroom came into view on one of them. A few clicks, and other places flashed on screen; Jack’s living room, his shower, his spare room. Computer hard drives were smashed on the floor, and a phone was pulled off the wall over in the corner. “Get Mike in here,” said Gray, only to have Brennan add, “We can call my CID techs in on this. We’re beyond the MC with all of this, sir.”
I rubbed at my head, everything hurting too much to connect the roles played here.
“Mike’s ex A Branch, technical support for MI5. He knows the setup for the MC; he’ll be able to tell where all of this,” Gray threw some parts back on a table, “this shit differs. Also where they would get the equipment and from which supplier.”
Brennan nodded, took out his mobile, and made a call. “On his way,” he said as Carr picked up some of the hard drive debris off the floor. “They chose to break the gear rather than wipe it,” she said.
“Hmmm,” said Gray. “Any good tech would be able to find a way around wiping files. Hitting the main board shows they at least knew what they were doing tech wise.” He weighed his options up by the look of it. “I definitely think we’re dealing with the uploaders to the porn site here. They had the savvy to bounce the signal between countries.” Gray glanced at me. “And the phone signals.”
He’d checked? Of course he’d check. “But won’t... won’t Mike be able to do anything with this?” I said, unable to go into the room as Gray looked over.
“If there’s a way, he’ll find it.” Gray went and picked up the phone, all the wires were exposed. “Harry.”
A man brushed past me as he looked into the room.
“Get onto the phone company,” said Gray. “Find out the who, where, and when behind the calls made to and from this building; see if there’s an Internet link and who the provider is. Get a full Internet footprint. Also find out who owns this place and who they’ve leased it to lately. Go back as far as you can. Check street CCTV, see if we can get makes and models of cars that came close to this building. But get forensics into the mock-up of Jack’s home first.”