sThe Quiet Wart (21 page)

Liz struggled again against her restraints as Koryalov tugged violently at Praew's jeans. She screamed as loud as she could through the tape, but just muffled noises came out.

‘Shut her up, man. She's stopping me from getting hard,' Koryalov said to Belov, as he finally pulled Praew's jeans over her feet.

For some reason Praew still wasn't fighting back, which was unlike her. When they were confronted by Finlow, she'd fought hard, kicking and biting.
Maybe she's given up hope?
Liz thought, tears welling in her eyes again and hatred coursing through her veins.

When Belov copied Koryalov by sticking his penis in her face, Liz butted him in the testicles sending him backwards crying in pain. Just then, she thought she saw a glint of happiness in Praew's eyes.
There's still hope!

‘You'll pay for that, whore!' Belov said, regaining his composure. He slapped Liz hard across the face with the back of his hand and then grabbed at her breasts through her pullover. ‘The older slut's got better tits,' he said, as Liz saw the sadistic lust in his eyes.

The sight of Belov's out-of-control lust sent a jolt of fear through Liz's body. They'd passed the point of no return: they were out of control and anything could happen. Liz wriggled and squirmed to get away, but couldn't. As he continued to grope at her breasts, she looked over to Praew, where Koryalov had ripped her white kickers from her body, leaving her naked and tied to a radiator.

The fifteen-year-old Russian pawed at Praew's body: first her breasts, then her vagina, but Praew didn't move, or try to resist. Liz, on the other hand, twisted and turned, fighting the groping of the hapless Belov at every possible opportunity. When he tried to copy Koryalov again and rip her top, the material proved too strong for him and he just returned to groping at her breasts and grabbing between her legs.

Belov was young, drunk and stupid, but Liz wondered how long she'd be able to fight him off for, especially if Dementyev joined in.

On the other side of the room, Koryalov had removed his jeans and underwear. His erect penis was sticking out beneath his shirt.

When he started masturbating and pushing his penis into Praew's face, Liz vomited again into her own mouth, almost choking on the sickly fluid. But still Praew didn't move.

‘She wants it, man. Thai whore! She loves it,' Dementyev said, saliva bubbling from the side of his mouth.

Buoyed on by his friend's shouts and numbed by the alcohol. Koryalov's thrusting became more pronounced and he was knocking Praew's head back with each thrust.

‘Stick it to her, man. Fuck her in her in her yellow cunt and dirty arse. You know she wants it,' Dementyev carried on.

Koryalov was losing control as he continued to masturbate, pushing his penis into Praew's face.

Belov was leaning over Liz, groping clumsily at her and she waited until the right moment and pushed her knee up hard into his groin, sending him to the floor by the bath screaming.

As he fell, out of nowhere, Praew's hand was suddenly free. As quick as lightning, she ripped the tape from her mouth and grabbed Koryalov by the testicles. Then she opened her mouth and clamped her jaw onto his penis, biting hard.

Koryalov, let out a high-pitched scream and hit Praew on the side of the head, but she didn't let go, biting harder. Suddenly her other hand was free and she scratched at the boy's skin, while he hit her again and again on the head. But she still didn't let the grip with her teeth go.

Dementyev moved forward to help, but as he passed, Liz stretched out and kicked him on the kneecap. Then, when he fell, she kicked him in the head.

Losing his balance, Koryalov suddenly fell backwards into the corner of the bathroom. Still Praew didn't let his penis out of her mouth, instead she sprang up and on top of him athletically and grabbed his testicles with her left hand, while she gouged at his eyes with the other. With a final swipe and a gasp, Koryalov passed out on the floor and Praew finally let his blood-soaked penis out of her mouth.

When Liz caught sight of it, the limp piece of torn flesh was bleeding heavily from the end and was deeply severed in two places.

Praew stood to face Belov and Dementyev, with blood running from her mouth. Both quickly backed out of the bathroom away from her, fear spreading across their faces.

Seeing them back away, Praew quickly found something to cut Liz's ties with and removed the tape from her mouth. Once free, Liz put Praew behind her and went into the living room to deal with Belov and Dementyev. The sight of Liz coming into the room with hate strewn across her face and Praew behind her, brandishing a pair of scissors, made Belov and Dementyev turn and sharply exit out of the front door of the apartment, abandoning their friend in the bathroom.

As she heard the footsteps running down the hallway, Liz turned to Praew and held her tightly. ‘Thank you. You're so brave and I love you so much,' she said.

After she'd put Praew down, Liz looked through the door of the bathroom. Koryalov was unconscious in the corner, losing a lot of blood through his penis. Wondering why she was even contemplating saving his life, she quickly searched through the bathroom cabinet and found a bandage. Making a loop, she tied bandage around his penis at the top completing a tourniquet. The bleeding stopped almost immediately.

‘That should keep him alive,' Liz said.

‘He doesn't deserve to live!' Praew replied, gathering up her clothes from the bathroom floor.

‘Don't worry. That tourniquet, while it'll keep him alive, will almost certainly render the rest of his penis useless with gangrene or the like, and they'll have to amputate it at the hospital.' Liz smiled.

‘Good. He deserves it.'

After Praew had washed her mouth thoroughly and dressed in her jeans and a jumper that she found in the wardrobe, she joined Liz back in the main bathroom. Liz was watching Koryalov as he slowly came to.

‘We'd better get out of here before his father arrives. We need to find Sean and Clive, they'll know what to do. How did you get your hands free by the way?' Liz asked.

‘It's a trick I learned in the Russian place in London. They used to tie us up at night and I couldn't sleep with my hands like that, so I learned to make my hand smaller than my wrist and slip it through the ties.'

As they moved towards the main door, it suddenly burst open and Belov came stumbling back into the apartment.

‘The apartment takes up the whole top floor. When you come out of the lift, you'll be in a corridor with a large double door at the end. Wait there if you get there before us, we'll take the stairs. I've disabled the security cameras,' Dorsch said to the team assembled in the lobby of Koryalov's apartment building.

Clive, Sean, Pete and Steve went to the lift. When it opened on the third floor, they stepped out into a grand entrance hall.

One minute later, the door to the fire exit opened and a teenage boy was pushed through, followed by Dorsch, then another boy, followed by his two guards.

‘What the—?' Sean said.

‘These two were running away from something. I'd like to find out what,' Dorsch said. He grabbed Belov by the ear and pushed him forward to the security pad, where he entered the code. When the door clicked open, Dorsch shoved Belov into the apartment first.

‘Aarrrg!' the shout came out. It was a girl's voice.
Praew,
Sean thought, pushing his way forward. As he stepped through the door behind Dorsch, who had his pistol drawn at the ready, he saw Praew collide head first with Belov. A cracking sound came from his ribs as he fell to the ground screeching in pain.

‘Sean, thank god!' Liz shouted.

Momentarily confused, Sean grabbed Praew and pulled her close to him as Liz reached him and flung her arms around his neck. Behind them, Dementyev was pushed into the room by one of Dorsch's guards, then Clive and the team filtered in. Upon seeing Liz and Praew, Clive suddenly broke down, tears forming in his eyes and Praew instantly moved over to comfort him. The sight made Sean realise just how close Clive had become to them, and just how good a friend he was.

‘It's okay, Uncle Clive, we're fine,' she said, wrapping her arms around his shoulders.

‘What the hell happened here?' Dorsch exclaimed when he looked into the bathroom.

‘It's a long story, but that boy's called Nikolai Koryalov and he and his friends kidnapped us and tried to rape us,' Liz said.

Seemingly unshocked, Dorsch nodded his head. ‘He won't be raping anyone again,' he said, examining the tourniquet.

‘Are you okay?' Sean said, still holding Liz.

‘I'm fine. Praew saved me yet again,' she said, tears streaming down her cheeks. ‘His father's on the way though.' She pointed at Koryalov.

‘Let my guys deal with this mess. You come back to my apartment. If Vladimir Koryalov's after you, you'll need to be protected.' Dorsch said.

Liz frowned at Sean, clearly not understanding where Dorsch fitted in. ‘It's okay. He's on our side,' Sean said.

‘Deal with them? You can't kill them! They're children!' Clive pulled Dorsch to one side and whispered to him.

Dorsch laughed. ‘Even evil mercenaries like me don't kill children. But if I'm right about his father, he's going to come looking for us. If he has to get his son to hospital first, it might just buy us enough time.'

‘So you're just going to give them over to his father? Is that wise?'

‘Nikolai's not seen me and the other two don't know me, so his father won't be looking for me. Along with the injuries to his son, it'll give us a couple of days,' Dorsch explained, to Clive's nodding head.

Clive quickly explained the situation to Sean.

‘What about the police?' Sean said.

‘And explain the teeth marks on his penis, the fact that we broke into his apartment, didn't report a kidnapping, and illegally accessed police CCTV footage? We'd spend longer in prison than them.'

‘What happens in a couple of days when his father does come after us?' Sean said.

‘Then we'll deal with his father too,' Dorsch replied, overhearing the remark, with a determined look on his face.

Back in Dorsch's apartment, Pete made his excuses and said that he needed to check that Terry was okay. Before he left, Sean took his phone and deleted the image of Dorsch in the gay sauna. Pete nodded his quiet agreement and Steve also deleted his copy. Dorsch had proved himself trustworthy, so it was the reasonable thing to do.

‘I can't thank you enough, Herr Dorsch,' Sean said, still holding Liz and Praew's hands tightly.

‘Please, call me Stefan. And it looked to me as if these young ladies didn't actually need any help.' Dorsch smiled at Liz and Praew. ‘The next time I need soldiers, I may send for them.' He smiled.

Praew giggled and threw a mock punch into the air. Liz had explained what had happened in the bathroom on the short walk between the two apartments. Given this, Sean was pleased to see her spirits so high, her resilience never ceased to amaze him. The experiences she'd had in her short life would condemn most people to a lifetime of counselling, but Praew just seemed to soldier on, parrying the blows she been dealt like a champion boxer.

By comparison, Liz was visibly shaken by the incident and from her narrative. It seemed that the fact that her captors had been fifteen-year-old boys had disturbed her most. ‘You can reason with an adult, but fifteen-year-olds haven't mastered the art of reason yet, especially drunk ones,' she said.

‘Now, you said you had some problems with the Nazis?' Dorsch asked.

‘We may have kicked that particular hornets' nest, yes. Why?' Clive said.

‘Call it loyalty to my country, or my inherited religion, but I'd like to help… if I can, that is.'

‘Why? You intimated earlier that you weren't interested,' Sean asked.

Dorsch sighed. ‘Tonight's little escapade made me think. I've done a lot of bad things in my life — killed people that perhaps didn't deserve to die, and worked for people that perhaps didn't deserve to live — it felt good to do something worthwhile for a change.'

‘What are you offering?' Clive asked.

‘Myself and my resources. For instance, you said you had a critically ill friend in Munich. You can use my plane to transport him to safety, if you wish?'

‘That's very generous of you, thank you.' Clive smiled.

‘And the rest of my services?' Dorsch asked.

‘Which are?' Clive queried.

‘Not dissimilar to what your two friends do,' Dorsch said. ‘And I'm very good at it.'

‘I learned a long time ago never to turn down a genuine offer of help,' Clive said, extending his arm. ‘Welcome to the team.'

‘Okay, please prepare your friend for his journey. A private ambulance will collect him from your hotel in two hours. Where will the flight be going?'

‘Aberdeen,' Clive said.

Sean remembered that the hospital where Clive had been treated anonymously following his shooting was in Aberdeen.
He must be planning to send Terry to the same place.

‘Okay then. I think we should all get some sleep. It's been an eventful day. Why don't we meet here at 8 a.m.?' Dorsch suggested.

‘Done,' Sean said. ‘And thank you again.'

On the short walk back to their new hotel, Sean asked Clive whether he trusted Dorsch.

‘Yes, I think so. He had no reason to help us out like that if he was involved with the Nazis,' Clive responded.

Nodding his agreement, Sean filled Liz in on the events of the day at Faustein's house and the contents of the folder.

‘Brazilian? I wouldn't have picked it. She seemed as German as bratwurst to me,' Liz said. ‘My head's still spinning at the moment, so I won't be able to sleep. Perhaps I'll spend some time on the Internet; see what I can dig up on her.'

At that moment, Sean realised that it was the first time they'd looked at Anna properly, as a real target of their investigation. He wondered what Liz might find.

‘I'd like to help. I'm not tired either,' Praew said.

‘That's wonderful, darling. I'd love to have a clever assistant researcher like you,' Liz kissed Praew's forehead and Sean noticed that she beamed with pride.

Forty-five minutes later, just fifteen minutes after Liz had settled down to work, she climbed in bed next to Sean.

‘I'll do it in the morning. I'm suddenly tired after all,' she said, snuggling into Sean's shoulder.

‘I'm so glad you're safe. I don't know what I'd do without you,' Sean said.

Liz suddenly lifted her head and looked into Sean's eyes. ‘I'm sorry if I've been distant since the lawyer told me about Praew. The situation tonight made me realise that I love you more than anything, and I won't let them come between us. We'll fight them together.'

Sean dropped his head down to hers and kissed her passionately on the lips. The intimate lovemaking that followed felt like it was their first time, as they gazed intensely into each other's eyes, silently committing to the words they had just spoken.

When they'd finished, Sean rolled onto his back. ‘Would it make any difference with the Home Office if we were married?' It was never the way he intended to propose and he hadn't prepared; there was no ring, but in that moment it felt right: to him, there would never be a better time.

Liz instantly sat upright on the bed. ‘Are you saying what I think you are?'

‘Yes, I think so,' Sean replied.

‘Then my answer's yes. Not because of Praew — and by the way I checked; it won't help — but yes, because I love you with all my heart and I want to spend the rest of my life with you.'