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RavMe Ch. 01

By: torquedtales



The decrepit elevator gasped and wheezed to make its climb up to the fourth floor. Its frame rattled like old bones in a tin can. Finally it squeaked to a jerky stop. Kelly bit her lower lip for the worrisome pause before the thick doors with the ripped vinyl quilting decided to open. She leapt over the threshold onto the solid flooring of the hallway that led grimly down to apartment number 41, the overpriced dump on the lower East Side she called home.

The keys in her hand chattered noisily to coax the three cranky locks to release their hold on the door. Every night she faced the same argument with the stubborn door that would eventually heave to with a disgruntled groan. Once inside, she would hastily relock them and secure the chain guard. Every night she would step into darkness for the chintzy landlord sealing up all the ceiling fixtures where bright and happy lights should click on with the flick of a switch to welcome the weary tenant with reassuring iridescence. Instead, Kelly entered a dismal arena where she fought off the fear of things hiding in shadows.

This night, instead of rushing to turn on her one and only lamp with a heavy cut-glass base and no shade -- a fifty-cent special from the thrift shop -- she actually made it all the way into the bathroom before succumbing to her hunger for light. Her small hand reached up to jiggle the faulty toggle on the wall. The flickering fluorescence lit up Kelly's young gaunt face in the warped and cracked mirror. Then the bulb petered out. "Damn," she muttered in the dark. She unbuttoned her blouse and rubbed the tightness from her throat when a deep voice resonated from behind.

"You said eight o'clock. It's half past nine. I don't like to be kept waiting."

The mirror revealed the dark outline of man standing at the door. With the fleet reactions of a white-tailed doe caught in the cross-hairs, she swung around hard, braced herself against the sink, and kicked a black leather hoof into his firm abdomen. He went reeling backwards. She bounded past him and ran for the door. Her fingers tripped over each other to unfasten the locks. Just as she pulled the door open, it slammed shut with the force of the man at her back. She shrieked in glass-shattering high C.

The intruder at her back grappled to pin down her flailing arms. Kelly managed to twist her willowy frame around and hurl a right hook that glanced off his chin. "Hey!" he carped. "That's gonna leave a mark." The momentum of the swing lost her her balance. She fell to the hardwood floor with a slap. Before she could right herself, he was on her. "You should have told me you wanted to play rough. I would've put on protective gear." He pulled her up and pushed her to the bed where he forced her to lie face-down. Kelly cleared all the air from her lungs with another piercing scream. 

"A screamer, huh? Good thing this is New York where no one pays the least attention. Now, hold still. The tie-up job you requested is gonna take time and concentration, and your fighting me doesn't help. Geeze, and I thought this was going to be an easy gig." He fastened her wrists together with a plastic zip tie. He lashed her feet together with a second tie. 

Kelly's tears soaked the bed cover. He ears picked up rummaging sounds. She craned her head but couldn't catch him in her limited field of vision. "Please, take anything you want just don't..."

The sound of an approaching siren made him look up. Kelly played on his apprehension. "You can get out before they come. I'll tell them you didn't hurt m--" Before she could finish he flipped her onto her back then he clicked on the lamp. Shock surged in Kelly's sea-green eyes to see her attacker. It was a lean man dressed up as an insectile-looking superhero -- or villain. 

He breathed hard under his black mask with the airbrush yellow streaks and silver eyes. "Don't what?"

"Don't rape me, please," she cried. Her hopes of rescue faded out with the passing sirens.

A light chuckle jiggled his balaclava-style mask. "God, you're good, but rape isn't part of our contract."

"What contract?" she cried.

"Uh-uh, don't play coy, Ms. Roy. This is your scene. You know perfectly well what contract." 

"How do you know my name?" she stammered.

He bent down toward the floor and rose back up with a thick roll of duct tape in one hand and a bunched up white cloth in the other. "Now, what kind of gag would you prefer? You didn't specify so I brought two options." When she didn't answer promptly, he decided, "I think the cloth would match the rope better and probably be more comfortable. Although, I don't know why I should be so thoughtful after the pugilistic welcome you gave me. I don't mind a little tussle. In fact, I sort of half expected some resistance as part of the scene, but you really didn't have to hit me so hard, you know."

Kelly fought the thick cloth being laced through her teeth. "This is a special creation," he explained as he tied the ends at the back of her head. "I take a rolled terrycloth hand towel and wrap it in white silk. That way, you get the muffling quality without the rough texture." He reached back down into the black gym bag that he had brought along for the job. He pulled up a bundle of white nylon cord and began winding it methodically around her ankles and up her legs. "You tell me if I make this too tight, although I think you'll find my roping technique comfortably snug."

Kelly squealed and jerked her legs. 

"Please, Ms. Roy, if you want this scene played according to your specifications, stop messing it up, okay?" He held her legs firmly and worked the rope quickly around her knees, thighs, hips, and waist. "I hate doing sloppy work," he grumbled. "But since you're being so unruly, I guess this'll have to do. What, are you on the rag or something?" 

She squealed loudly.

"Sorry, that was impertinent and insensitive of me, but you have really put me on edge with your belligerent attitude," he chastised as he bound her up. "That really kills the buzz for me, you know." In a matter of minutes, he had her in coils from heel to shoulder. He pulled the knot taught above her sternum. "I was so looking forward to a fun scene with you too." 

She squirmed like a worm in a chrysalis. Tear-filled panic rose in her eyes. 

"Your fussing is making me lose my concentration. Now, I can't remember what your contract stipulates." He sighed and reached into his bag. In his hands he held several sheets of printed paper. He ran a black-and-yellow gloved finger across the text. "The party of the first part agrees to... yada-yada-yada," he murmured. "Ah, here it is." He read silently then set the page down on the nightstand. Propping himself on his well-toned arms, he hovered over her and purred, "Ready for those caterpillar nibbles you requested?" He peeled back her blouse to the extremes of her clavicle. Kelly swung her legs hard into his side. 

"Ow!" The caterpillar man yelped. He grabbed his cocooned prey by the shoulders and held her down. "What is your problem? Why are you so combative? I'm only following your instructions." He noted the confused horror in her stifled screams and snatched the paper. He looked at it, looked at her then looked around the room. He read aloud, "614 E 9th Street, Apt. 41. That's here, right?" 

An anguished keen rose from her throat.

"Your name is Kelly Roy, right?" She heaved and gasped for air. Her pale complexion turned an apoplectic red.

"This is your picture, right?" He showed her an image on one of the pages. "And your signature?" He showed her the name signed at the bottom of a legal looking document.

Kelly began to choke.

"Okay, okay. Take it easy. I'm only asking. Here, let me get this out of your mouth." He pulled the cloth down over her china-fine chin. The intake of oxygen powered up her lungs into a fitful wail. He covered her mouth with his smooth nylon-covered hand. "Your caterwauling won't help me figure this mess out." His hand moved from her lips to brush tangles of her fiery red hair from her face like smoothing the feathers of a trapped tropical bird. "Settle down now."

"Look, I don't have much here in the way of valuables," she blurted, "just a computer and fifty dollars in my pur--"

He put a finger to her trembling lips. "Hush. I'm not here to rob you."

Her face balled up into a dreadful contortion.

"Just, chill, okay?" he ran a hand over the tight-fitting hood covering his face and skull.

"Please untie me," Kelly mewled.

He looked down at her with a disappointed sigh before undoing the coil of rope. "Where did I screw up? Did I get the date and time wrong? How could you not know I was coming? It's all laid out in the contract," he puzzled with each pull to loosen the strands. "All this beautiful work for nothing." He dropped the rope to the floor with a brush of his hands and reached into his bag for a box cutter. Kelly gasped at the sight of the blade. "What?" he asked. "I've got to cut the zip ties." Remembering her swing to his jaw, he paused. "I think I'll free your feet first." He sliced through the tie around her ankles then snapped the binding about her wrists. He helped her sit up. 

Kelly furtively wiped away her tears while the human caterpillar walked over to the kitchenette. She heard a rush of water from the spigot and saw him return with a glassful. 

"Here, drink this." He sat down on the bed next to her, passed the glass, and watched her quaff it down. He took up the printout in his hands and mused, "I don't get it. This is the right address. You are the Kelly Roy as shown in this picture. I followed your instructions to the letter, and you act like I was about to cut your throat. What gives?" He looked at her through expressionless lenses.

"Look, I have no idea who you are, or why you're here brutalizing me," Kelly spat out between sobs.

He read from one sheet: "'Hi, I'm Kelly Roy, and I want a naughty boy. I love being gagged and bound by the handsomest man around. But my real fantasy that suits me to a tee is to have Spiderman creep in and put me in his spin.' He broke off in an ad hoc on his superhero attire, "I like being original and didn't want to infringe on copyright... you know," then resumed, 'I want to be wrapped up in his web so tight and feel his tingling spider bites in places on my body unseen, in places on my body obscene. So, surprise me at my place by coming up the fire escape. The window is never locked, and I'll have loads of moaning pleasure stocked. Let's make it a contractual date, this Friday at eight. Follow the agreement to the letter, and I will feel all the better. Rav me, Spidey baby.' It's not exactly Longfellow, but it definitely conveys an explicit message."

"Can I see that?" Kelly braved. The sheets rattled in her trembling hands. "How did you get my signature?"

He handed her the documents. "I don't get it. If you didn't want me to come in and play, why did you write this scene and send it?"

"I never wrote this... this... what did you call it?"

"A scene."

Her upper lip curled in distaste. "What the hell is it and how did you get it?"

"It's a scene, you know, where we act out our fantasies. It was emailed to me last night at 12:02." He drew his finger across the date and time signature.

"But how did you get my picture and my signature?" Anguish wracked her voice. 

"Is that your laptop over there?" He stood up and moved toward the dresser where he saw it. 

"Yes, but I didn't send this. I couldn't have. I don't have Internet access from here," she exasperated. 

"Got wireless capability I see." 

"Yeah, but I've never been able to use it."

He unplugged it and brought it over to the bed where he resumed his seat, opened it up and powered it by battery. His masked face glowed in the bluish aura of LCD screen. His fingers summoned the World Wide Web before Kelly's eyes. 

"How did you do that?"

"I have access." After a dazzling display of clicking and stroking, he connected to a site. "Here's your profile page. You're twenty-four years old from Davenport, Kentucky. You recently graduated from the University of Kentucky with an M.F.A. You're an award-winning graphic artist, I see. Take a look." He pulled back to make room for her to see. 

Kelly leaned in for a close look. "That's my picture from a portfolio page I posted last year." She bit her knuckles and shook her head at the appearance of her face bordered by licentious advertising. She began to cry.

"You sure you didn't put this up?" the Spiderman poser asked.

A hoarse denial fell from her lips.

"Well, then someone's playing a very cruel prank. Got a jilted lover out for revenge over a broken heart?"

Kelly shook her head and rouged. 

"Come on," he cajoled, "a pretty girl like you. You must have dozens who've fallen by the wayside."

"Just one, and he certainly doesn't possess this level of sophistication or imagination." 

"And who would that be?" he nosed while rolling a finger across the mouse pad.

"Jimmy Thornblatt," she spat out, "all-American quarterback hopeful who dropped out of university his sophomore year due to bad grades and a blown-out knee. He made couch sitting, channel surfing, and beer swilling his prime vocation. To him, a computer is a whittled-down TV set while the Internet something the lunch ladies in the cafeteria wear to keep their hair from falling into the greasy fare he shovels into his bulging gullet with everyday. But why am I telling you this? Nerves, I guess." A lingering sob provoked a hiccup. 

"Well then, if not him, then someone else. Got any enemies at work?" He manipulated the cursor to open the dropdown menu then clicked on the "config" command.

"I've hardly put in enough time for that. I've only been there a week."

"Sometimes a week is all it takes." He clicked through screen after screen of streaming information. "How about someone you met in a bar, or maybe a woman you experimented with at college?"

"What the dickens are you implying?" Her southern drawl intensified with her defensiveness.

"All right, don't get testy. Let's see if I can find out how this was transacted." He tapped the keys like Horowitz playing Rachmaninoff. More cyber windows opened and closed. "You wouldn't know your password for your account, would you?" He looked at her blank expression and kept typing. "Of course you wouldn't, since you didn't create it. Okay, then, I'll just have to resort to my old hacking tricks." He linked his fingers together and cracked his knuckles before calling up software from a remote source. It juggled number and letter combos. A screen opened up. "In through the back door... Here's your account info. Damn, it's encrypted." He tapped and clicked with determined fury. "Looks like you paid with a VISA card but the number's incomplete. I don't think I can find out anything more from this station." He spied a pen in a cup and took it to scribble down the partial card number showing on the screen. "Do these digits match any of your credit cards?" 

Kelly looked at them. "I'd have to check. My cards are in my purse."

He closed the lid to the laptop to make use of its flat service. "Check them out when you get the chance, okay?" He continued writing as he spoke. "Look, it's obvious something is very wrong here. I advise you go directly to this address here in the city and tell them to remove your name from the list, or else this is bound to happen again. If it does, you might encounter another mystery ravisher who may not be as understanding as I am." He set the pen down on the nightstand and handed her the paper.

"Ravisher? As in rapist?" 

"As in sexual fantasy role-play carried out by pre-arranged signed and sealed contractual agreement." He pointed to the pages in her hands. "It's a very lucrative business."

"I don't get it. What kind of business is it when women agree to be assaulted by a comic-book figure who breaks into their apartments to do mighty disturbing things?" Once more, her upper lip curled from disgust.

He set the laptop on the bed then bent down to gather up the rope. "I know it sounds perverted, but it's perfectly legal, quite popular and effectively harmless, really." He stuffed the rope into his bag then saw the cloth draped around her neck. "Uh why don't I get that?" He untied the knot at the back of her head. Kelly gasped with the sheering of strands from her scalp.

"Sorry. Got some of your hair caught in it." He smoothed down her fiery curls. 

Kelly flinched. Then she saw him picking up the roll of tape from the bedcover.

"Easy. I'm just going to seal up that window to make sure no one gets in the same way." He got up and plastered the window frame with layers of tape. 

"How can you call this sort of thing harmless? It's cruel and demented." Kelly opined.

"One person's dementia is another person's ticket to ecstasy," the man with the V-shaped figure in the cartoon hero costume replied. "Besides, we all undergo heavy-duty psychological screening and extensive training. Since everyone involved is a consenting adult, there are no issues." 

"Well, I surely didn't give my consent."

"No, you are an unfortunate victim of misappropriated information for probable malicious intent." 

"You talk like a lawyer. But in my book rape is rape is rape."

He tossed the tape back in his bag and sat down next to her. "It's called ravishment, and as long as penetration isn't forced, it's not rape, not by any legal definition."

"I knew you had some loophole to snake your way out of from under a judge's gavel," she sneered.

"Let me enlighten you here." He folded his hands across his lap. "I belong to a society of people who hold regular sessions to discuss our desires to be physically and sensually overwhelmed. Different members of the group play different roles. For example, I only play a masked ravisher. The women I contract with never see my face."

"Why not? You ugly or something?" She grew bolder.

"Well, at least my mother didn't think so," he jested. "No, you see, by wearing a mask, the woman whose fantasy I am catering to can imagine me however she pleases. A person's face can be an immediate turn on or a turn off. Maybe I'm too old. Maybe my teeth are crooked or my eyes are set too close. Maybe my ears are too big. Whatever the case, I choose to hide my features in order to keep her fantasy alive so that she gets the most from the experience."

"And what, pray tell, would a woman in half a right mind hope to get from pretending to be raped by a masked villain?"

"I'll let that villain crack slide, along with the punch in the jaw," he scolded and rubbed his throbbing chin. 

"Fat lot of good growing up with five brothers did me," she snorted.

"Five brothers?"

She didn't elaborate.

"Back to your question," he redirected, "believe it or not, a good number of women fantasize about experiencing forced sex but of course don't want to really be brutalized by a monstrous stranger. Most women keep it to themselves, while a few are daring and inquisitive enough to join groups like ours to enter the world of sensual distress without the fear of being seriously harmed. It's safe, conducted in a secure environment, and usually involves more toying than actual sex. Just because a woman wants to be overpowered by a tall dark stranger doesn't necessarily mean she wants him inside her. 

"On the other side, there are men who'd like the experience of seizing a desirable woman and forcing her to do their bidding. Our exclusive society offers mutually interested parties to work up contracts and arrange scenes. And there are others who just want to watch the scene in play, which could be as light and fluffy as dressing up as a sheep for Little Bo Peep or as dark and painful as being a sex slave riding the wooden pony."

"The wooden what?"

"Use your imagination. On second thought, forget it. It's too excruciating to even picture. At any rate, we have subscription Web viewing for that. Keep in mind, it's all an act. No one is actually forced into doing anything he or she doesn't want to do." 


RavMe Ch. 01



"How grotesquely prurient." Kelly slowly smoothed the wrinkles in her brown cotton skirt and straightened the collar on her yellow blouse. "What sort of people would even want to engage in such wickedness?" Perplexity twisted the freckles on her face.

"Believe it or not, ordinary work-a-day people: bored housewives, stressed-out salesmen, lonely computer geeks, frustrated underpaid civil servants -- people like me, who sit at a desk for hours and stare at gray corporate walls. By day, I'm a really dull dispassionate business executive bogged down in meetings, but by night, I can be whatever a woman fantasizes about – a stealthy cat burglar come to steal her jewels, a callow Casanova, or a superhero whose powers will sweep her off her feet. Above all, it's totally consensual," he emphasized.

"What ever happened to meeting people at barn dances and church socials?" Kelly posited.

"Not in today's fast-paced, money-grubbing world. Now, it's flash dating and Bluetooth trysts in public toilets." 

Kelly crinkled her nose.

"What planet are you from that you don't know about this? Oh, I forgot. Davenport, Kentucky. So, that explains your naiveté as well as your accent."

"I have an accent?"

"You know, you might try developing an open mind and ask about sitting in on a session while you're taking care of this misunderstanding, which I'm sure is all it is. Maybe it's not a malicious prank at all. You might have a secret admirer out there who merely wants to get to know you better but is afraid to ask."

"You're joking, right?"

"In this intimidating and impersonal town, don't be surprised by how people network. I could tell the coordinator, Dr. Karillian, that you're coming. I'm sure he would meet with you in a private session to explain what it is we do and why it is no threat to you."

"Now, you really are going too far."

"Please don't take offense by it. I meant none." He zipped up his gym bag and noticed her sobs resurfacing. "Look, are you going to be all right alone here tonight? I mean, you've had quite a shakeup. Is there anyone you can call to come over and, you know, sit with you?"

"Not a blame soul. Hell, I don't even have a phone. I couldn't have called the police even if I had the chance," she lamented. "I've only been in the city for a little over a week. I came here for a job, and so far they've been working me way past normal business hours, the only time available to take care of convenience matters. And since living here is so darned expensive, I need the overtime." She looked around the small apartment nervously. She jumped at the touch of his hand on her shoulder.

"I know you'll make it, Kelly Roy. You have a sweet face and a mean right hook -- perfect attributes for surviving in this city." He picked up his bag and stood up. "My advice, get a phone as soon as possible. Get that account cancelled and call your credit card company first thing in the morning. Lock your door when I leave, and don't open it to any stranger. And finally, don't drink the tap water."

Kelly glanced at the glass she had emptied and smirked.

The towering superhero looked down in apologetic posture. "I'm really sorry for what happened tonight. No hard feelings?" He put out a hand.

Kelly gingerly took it. Her fingers slid from the silky grip as he walked toward the door. She stood up. "You're not going out like that?"

He paused in the half-opened door. "Like I said, this is New York. Nobody pays attention to anything." 

(To be continued...)



RavMe Ch. 02



Kelly stepped out of the subway and walked up the block to the bustling entrance of the building at 5 Times Square. A mendicant vet held out a cracked and bent plastic cup. The hood of the gray fleece beneath a camouflage military jacket partially hid his face wrapped up in bandages. He was wearing the dark glasses designed for the blind. 

Kelly hunted for some spare change. "Look like it's your lucky day, Mac," she commented. "The smallest I got it is a fiver." She rolled up the bill and slid inside his cup. She flinched slightly to feel the wool glove of his hand grasp her fingers in gratitude.

"You are an angel," he said in a husky voice.

Kelly smiled at the square black lenses and withdrew her hand. "I gotta get to work now."

Her creative ideas cranked out slowly that day. She found herself staring out the window from her workstation. The smiling face of a devilishly handsome male model dolled up in a glamorous tux and angel wings gleamed up at her from a billboard. The product name underlying his classic-cut features and brown wavy hair curled in fancy cursive script: Caravaggio Eveningwear, Celestial Fashion.

"Hi, we haven't met yet. I'm Trisha."

Kelly looked up to see a petite woman with the complexion of mocha topped with frothy blonde curls. She wore a sleek black pantsuit and lavender blouse. A silver ring clamped through her left eyebrow while a glittering stud pierced her right nostril. A rectangular pendant dangled from her neck. Kelly forced a smile to the strange girl whose interruption came like a gush of cold water on the fire of creative process.

"I'm the IT specialist," the young woman announced. "I'm here to check your network settings." Deep dimples punctuated her smile.

Kelly suppressed her irritation through rapid blinking. "Does it have to be done right now?"

Trisha shrugged her shoulders to insist. "This should only take a few minutes. Maybe you wanna take a coffee break or something."

Kelly got up from her desk chair to allow the technician access to the PC. "That's an interesting necklace. Looks like letters. That a name or something?"

"Huh?" Trisha looked to see Kelly studying the pendant. She drew the lapels of her shirt over it. "Uh, no. Nobody's name. Just a fad, you know." She called up a screenful of folders then made them disappear with a keyboard stroke. 

The name Jill Beverly blipped on the screen then vanished. Kelly had run across the name while searching for design templates. She had opened a couple of the files to find memos on project details and rollout schedules. They revealed she was in the midst of a massive ad design campaign with award-winning potential. Why she walked off the job wasn't evident, but a letter of complaint about a contract issue dated two days before Kelly's hire suggested disgruntlement. She had to ask. "That Beverly person, she left right before I came, huh?"

Trisha flashed a wan grin and continued moving file folders.

Kelly cleared her throat. "She seemed to have left in a hurry, and in the middle of a huge project. That's kind of odd, don't you find?"

Trisha's fingers stopped. She sighed, stood up, and looked at Kelly. "I'm not supposed to tell you this, but I'm sure you're going to find out." She stepped intimately close and lowered her voice to a whisper. "Jill Beverly hanged herself in her apartment just a few days before you came on."

"What about the project? Are you going to delete the files?"

"The project died with her." Trisha dropped her gaze from Kelly's eyes to her neck. She scoured the lily-white skin with a sharp focus.

Kelly raised a hand to her throat. "What? Something wrong?"

Trisha's eyes brightened with a glib smile when she caught a glimpse of the ligature bruises on Kelly's thin wrists. "Nope. Just thought I saw a mark, but I was mistaken. Sorry. Love your hair, though. What a brilliant color." She waltzed away from Kelly's station with nary an explanation. 

Kelly used her lunch break and the fifty bucks in her purse to go to Soho by cab. It was a twenty-block bullet ride dodging cars, buses, and other taxis, but it got her there with time to spare. She entered the tall building with the black glass windows and located the suite number for the business written on the paper, Enrapture, Inc. "We make your wildest dreams come true," read the motto emblazoned in silver across the front of the reception counter. Kelly walked up to her reflection in the polished onyx. "Excuse me, who do I talk to about correcting an error?" she asked the dark-haired woman with the caked-on mascara sitting behind the glossy facade.

The woman didn't look up. "All emendations are handled online. You can access your account and—"

"You don't understand," Kelly interrupted. "I don't have an account, I mean, I never created one, but someone sure as hell did." She passed the wrinkled printouts to the thin dour woman dressed in the black suit and white blouse.

The dull receptionist glanced at the paper then at the pale freckled face looking at her over the counter. "This is you."

"Yes, the photo is of me, but the page isn't mine. Someone set this up without my permission." Kelly's patience chafed at the bit to see the wall clock ticking down the precious minutes of her lunch hour. 

The woman stared at her blankly. "What would you like me to do about it?"

"Could you please tell me how I can cancel this account?"

Like a clairvoyant seeking answers from a crystal ball, the woman looked into her computer screen. Independent of her owlish eyes, her fingers worked the keyboard. "What's your password?" she asked flatly.

"I don't know since I didn't create it." Kelly ground the words in her teeth. 

"Then I can't help you."

"Look, can I please talk to someone in charge, before I begin proceedings against you for fraud, identity theft, and sexual assault?" Kelly's green eyes grew wide.

The receptionist picked up the phone with immutable ennui. "Dr. Karillian, I have a dissatisfied customer out here." She hung up and resumed typing. "He'll be with you in a minute. Have a seat."

Kelly retrieved her documents and sat down on the plush black leather sofa to the right of the reception counter. A door across from her opened. Out stepped a short man with long wavy black hair graying at the temples. He had burning coal-black eyes. He wore a sharkskin suit and a black silk shirt. "How may I help you, madam?" he softly intoned. He sat next to her and listened to her plight. Without batting an eye, he assured, "I apologize for the confusion and shall see that the matter is rectified immediately. I hope our mystery agent didn't harm you in anyway."

"No, he was a perfect gentleman," she half lied. She didn't have time to go into the depth of her grueling ordeal. 

"I can see you're on the clock, and I imagine that is your taxi waiting outside." Dr. Karillian took her hand to guide her to her feet. He noted the lines on her wrists. The edge of his mouth arced slightly. Not understanding why she found this perturbing, Kelly carefully withdrew her hand. 

He reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He pulled out a fresh C-note and handed it to her.

"No, I couldn't," she refused. " Take it for your cab fare. It's the least I can do to compensate for your distress." His eyes fixed on her throat. "I'm sorry for staring, but you have the most exquisite neck."

She meekly pulled her collar closed then slipped the bill into her suit-coat pocket. She couldn't help but feel somewhat soiled.

He escorted her to the door. Kelly shuddered in spite of the man's considerate manner. Throughout the entire encounter, he had never once blinked.

Dealing with the credit card company proved far less enjoyable. She had to deal with calling from a payphone where the street noise added to the misunderstanding. "No personal calls on company phone lines," read the signs posted in the work areas. 

"What? I told you," she shouted into the receiver. "I never took out a second card. No. Someone has done it in my name. Police? Why should I go to the police? You should cancel that damned card then investigate the matter. No, don't put me back on hold! I have to get ba--" She grunted like a pirate and slammed the phone into its cradle. After two days of juggling phone calls, a rep assured her the card was paid for and duly cancelled. Who had paid for it remained an unknown that Kelly didn't have the means to uncover. A city bus passed by bearing the same handsome face that eyed her through her office window. 

A week passed without an intrusive incident. Kelly followed her grinding routine day in and day out. She languished at her workstation to produce prototype composites for the Caravaggio Fashion House catalogue. She'd look to her muse on the billboard and pray for inspiration. Odd how she wound up working on promotional material for the celestial designs he smiled about. Frustration fevered her brain for the senior editor's tirades over petty flaws. "You call this a textured look?" screamed the tall bony woman with the stiff platinum hair. "This looks like my cat's diarrhea!"

"Sorry, Ms. Wilmont. I thought you wanted a soft watery look," Kelly justified.

"Yes, but not in the color of bile! And just look at these patterns. They're all wrong. What's it going to take to get you to understand?" She bit down on the tips of the gold frames of her glasses and set a hand to a thrust-out hip. Jeanette Wilmont looked lean and classy in her hand-tailored peacock-blue silk ensemble she bought in Bangkok. Her salon-tanned skin hid the fine marks of the plastic surgeon's scalpel along her aging face. 

"I'm doing my best Ms. Wilmont," Kelly quietly insisted. She gathered up the proofs from her boss's desk. 

"I hope this is not representative of that," Ms. Wilmont snottily retorted. 

A man's voice sounded on her intercom. "Mees Wilmont," it said with a Latino flare. "I've got the new projections ready."

A long-nailed finger pushed the "speak" button to order, "Bring them to me," then released it. She caught Kelly staring at the brash blue diamond ring on her hand. "Well, what are you standing there for, Ms. Roy? Fix this mess! I'm counting on you."

Kelly scampered out of the corporate diva's office. She brushed by Julio Galvan, Chief of Operations for the Emvar Design Group. "Hello, Kelly. How are you today?" A warm smile radiated his exotic charm. He had a flawless face with smooth olive skin. A neat moustache accented sensual lips. Short and muscular in stature, he posed an attractive figure of a man. His soft almond eyes roved her face and neck.

Kelly gave a shy smile in return and watched him disappear into the mad editor's den. When she finally turned to look where she was heading, she saw she was on a collision course with Brad Ferukka, the fashion editor. 

"Watch it, girl!" he warned with long arms outstretched to deflect her course. He stood a lanky six feet and looked crisp in his white Enro dress shirt, red Raffaello tie, and creased beige pinstriped trousers with the brown leather belt circling his trim waist.

"That man has the wickedest effect on people. Makes you loose all sense of yourself." He studied her through sky-blue contacts. "What's up with the witch?"

"Oh, she's not happy with these proofs. Guess it's back to the drawing board for about the tenth time," Kelly enlightened. 

He looked at his Tissot watch and declared, "I think it's time you and I go grab a bite, right?"

"I don't know. She's got a rush on these and I'm kinda short on cash."

"My treat."

"Really?" Her freckled nose crinkled with the query.

"I think I can splurge for one of New York's specialties. There's a hotdog stand right across the street by the park." He held open one of the etched glass doors.

They ate their meal while sitting on a bench near the fountain. Traffic buzzed by and kicked up street dust. It was early May and the air was thick with pollen and the scent of blossoms. Kelly took a nibble and sneezed.

"Gezuntheit," he blessed through a mouthful. He watched her eat and studied the swallow reflex in her throat. Still chewing, he smiled for spotting the purplish lines around her wrists just above the hem of her cuff.

Out of the corner of her eyes, Kelly caught him fixing on her. "What?"

"Nothing."

"Why is everyone staring at my neck and my hands? Do I have a growth or something?" She became self-conscious of the bruises and tugged her suit-coat sleeves over them. 

"No, it's just that..."

"That what?" She grew defensive.

"Don't think I'm fresh, but your neck and hands are lovely to look at. So," he segued, "let me see those proofs and try to read the beyotch's mind." He swallowed the last bite and wadded the wrapper into a tight ball. He took out a neatly folded handkerchief from his back pocket to wipe his fingers. He handled each composite as though it were a treasured work of art. "These are good, but I imagine she's upset about the texture and color."

"Exactly," Kelly affirmed with a sip through the straw in the cup of soda she held. 

"Here's what I suggest. Add more shading here," he pointed out with a brush of his forefinger along the length of the dress depicted. "Subdue the background color, and avoid the pattern combo. Too busy." He handed them back to her.

"Thanks, Brad. I appreciate the tips and the lunch. You are truly one of the nicest people I have encountered in this hard-driven city." 

"I just hate to see fresh talent like yours get buried under the giant turds T-rexes like her dump onto the market as graphic art," he commiserated. He stood up in indication lunchtime had ended. "If she gets on you again, and if I have the time, don't hesitate to ask for my help."

Kelly frantically reworked the designs and scanned them to CD-Rom. By end-of-business, she noticed a distinct change in Ms. Wilmont's demeanor. She received the new proofs with repressed glee. "I am impressed. Look how much better these stand out. What brilliant color and sassy montage. Very nice, Kelly. There is hope for your best after all."

Kelly lowered her head to diminish her grin of pride. She was about to go out the door when she heard Jeanette Wilmont's sultry alto call her back. "Kelly, I hate to ask, but would you be able to do some mockups over the weekend? We've got this potential client, a costume designer." She rifled through the drawers of her polished desk as she talked. "They have a new line of designs for theatrical productions." Her long nails hooked onto a shiny round disc. "Here are the specs and prelims. Take it home if you like." She handed it to Kelly, but noted hesitancy crossing her creamy young face. "You do have a computer at home."

"Yes, but isn't it against policy for an employee to take proprietary information from company premises? I mean, the guard downstairs is going to check my bag like he does every night, and if he finds this."

"Give him this," the senior editor wrote out a permission statement on official letterhead with a 24-karat gold pen. "You should have no problem. And if he does give you grief, call me at the number listed at the top." She shot Kelly a plastic smile.

The guard never even checked Kelly's bag, a fact that set her spinning on a roll. "That's four for four," she told herself. "A free lunch, a completed deadline, the boss's faith, and an indolent security guard. How could I ask for more?" Stepping from the elevator into the dingy corridor of her apartment building, she was met by another esteem-boosting treat. Hanging from her doorknob was a plastic sack containing a large shiny black box with gold trim. The locks seemed to glide open as she examined it for identifying marks. As soon as the door pushed away from the frame, a strong force pushed Kelly from behind.

"Quiet! It's me," said the familiar voice. He hustled her inside and closed the door behind him.

"Does it always have to be an ambush with you?" she griped with a curt toss of the box and her purse on the table. "Why can't you wait and knock like normal people? How did you get in the building anyway?" She looked over at the window to find it securely sealed with tape.

"I rang buzzers until a guy named Lemont answered. I told him I had a singing telegram form a secret admirer, and he opened up." He flicked on the lamp. "I hid out in the stairwell across the hall and watched for your arrival."

"Great. Now some poor girl in the city is about to get hounded by love-crazed Lemont. You just love creating deviant monsters, don't you?" Her pupils shrank to pinpoints with the flare of the bare bulb. They adjusted quickly to the light to see the spidery superhero of a week ago in a guise reminiscent of Zorro, with a black broad-brimmed hat, black mask covering the head and upper face, sleeveless leather vest, tight leather pants, riding boots, gloves, and a coiled bullwhip. 

Before she could react to the sight of him, he handed her a fresh printout of documents – a second scene with a signed contract. "Read it, but don't please don't weep. I hate it when you cry." From the gym bag slung over his shoulder, he pulled out a six-pack of beer in emerald bottles and set it on the table. He popped the top off of one and handed it to Kelly. "Here." 

She eyed it with suspicion.

He heaved a sigh of dismay over her distrust. "It's not drugged or anything. You just saw me take it from the pack and open it. Or would you like me to pour it in a glass for you?"

"No." She warily received the offering.

He nodded upon her acceptance of the truce libation then opened another for himself. "Cheers," he toasted with a pleasant grin boasting even-set teeth. "Shall we sit?" He motioned her to sit on the edge of the bed. She cautiously complied. The springs creaked with the settling of his weight next to her. "I think you could do with some chairs."

"How come your facial features are showing? I thought you said allowing them to show destroyed the illusion." she asked after taking a swig.

"To be honest, I'm rather proud of my dashing smile and chiseled jaw."

"So it's the area under wraps that's ugly then. You got one of them uni-brows or a receding hairline?" She teasingly reached up to touch his mask, a gesture she hardly fathomed considering the potential threat he posed.

He pulled away. "Did you read the scene?" 

A crease formed in the middle of her porcelain brow as she skimmed the text. She dropped it to the floor. "It's thoroughly appalling." 

He bent over to pick it up then curtly asked, "Did you send it?" 

Her eyes flared wide with ire. "Hell, no!"

"Okay, okay. I'm only asking because I heard you talked to Dr. Karillian. I thought he might have talked you into joining up. I just needed to be sure. This means whoever did this before is doing it again." He paused. 

She pulled the bottle from her lips. "He never broached the topic. Then again I was pressed for time. He was certainly one of the most polite people I've met in this city."

He detected a hint of doubt in her delivery. "But something bugged you about him. It was the way he looked at you, right?"

"Yeah, his eyes, they were, like, feeling me up all over. Gave me the heebie-jeebies." She tipped her head back to finish the bottle.

Zorro took the empties and brought them to the table. He returned with two fresh ones.

"No, I shouldn't."

"Hey, it's Friday night. Live a little."

"It's just that I have a shit load of work to do." She took the bottle he offered.

"And I'm supposed to have you lashed to a chair with a long-stemmed rose planted in between your teeth with your lips taped shut. Instead of dripping hot honey on your naked body and licking it off, I'm sitting here having a beer and civil conversation. Do you see me complaining?"

"Will you stop?" she huffed. "That filth has already soiled my eyes. My ears needn't suffer more insult to injury." The beer sloshed inside the bottle as she took a drink.




RavMe Ch. 02



"Sorry. Guess I wanted you to know what I'm missing out on," he teased.

"Why can't you just sit nice with a girl and talk? What happened to the genteel art of spooning with quiet walks under the cherry trees and sharing a hot fudge sundae down at the corner drugstore? Huh?" She shot him a challenging look and considered how the masked stranger sitting beside her could swiftly whip her senseless. Yet for some strange reason, perhaps out of simple need, she felt she could trust him.

"I can, and I have, but..." he let it dangle before her.

"But what?"

"I find vanilla a very boring flavor."

"What the hell does that mean?"

He didn't answer. He drank down his beer and stood up. "I'm afraid I must take my leave. I've got promises to keep and miles to go before, you know..."

"Something to do with sleep, right?"

"Right." He walked toward the door. "You'd better go back and talk with Karillian on Monday. Or..." he led her down a dubious thought trail.

"Or what?"

"We're having a munch tomorrow. He's certain to be there," he enticed.

Kelly crossed her arms. "And what exactly is a munch?"

"It's a very informal meeting of people into fantasy role-playing over a bite to eat. I'm sure you'll learn a lot and enjoy a nice dinner to boot."

Kelly slowly but adamantly shook her curly carrot top. 

"Monday's better for you, huh?"

"Much. Besides, I got an awards ceremony to attend that I nearly entirely forgot about."

"What award?"

"Oh, something I was nominated for months ago when I submitted a graphic design to a magazine contest. It's teensy-weensy potatoes when you compare it to big ones like the Tonies or Oscars."

"Well then, I bid you good luck as well as good night." He took her hand and raised it to his lips for a gentle kiss. He was mildly surprised she didn't jerk it away.

"Oh, wait a minute. What about this?" She pointed to the box in the plastic sack.

He rubbed the side of his nose. "Gosh, I forgot. Those are for you, in apology of my, er, tying you up the other night. Open it."

Kelly pulled the box from the bag and removed the sleek cover. Inside was a lovely arrangement of orchids and callow-lilies. "They're lovely." She went to her cupboard to find a tall glass that could serve as a vase. "I hope this will--" She heard the door creak slowly shut. "—do." She turned to look where he was standing, but he was gone.



RavMe Ch. 03-04



Part III

"And the North American Graphics Award for best cover design for Western Women's World goes to..."

Kelly floated to the podium on the mention of her name. Her thank you speech buzzed through a mouth brimming with glittering teeth. The moment of triumph crested and fell on the rolling wave of time. Before she realized it, she had been washed from the spotlight and out into the dark cold streets. 

She stepped into a phone booth in front of the Convention Center where the ceremony was held. She dropped a fistful of coins into the slot. She pulled up a fallen spaghetti strap on her little black dress with the slit up the right calf and adjusted the fringed wrap over her shoulders. She flexed her ankles in the black pumps that pinched her feet. "Hello, Mama?" her voice pealed into the receiver. "How are you feeling? Good. I'm fine. Working hard. Just wanted to tell you, I won a NAGA." She raised the shiny trophy with the shape of a flame in a gesture any proud child would show a parent. "Remember that contest I entered? Well, I--" She cut off. Her glee crumbled to dust, like dried petals crushed in her mother's fingers and tossed to the ground. "I see. Sorry to have awakened you, Mama. What's that? Yes, I'll be sure and send you a check just as soon as— Okay. Good--" A sharp click sounded in her ear. "Night," she finished and hung up the phone. 

Kelly shrieked to see a man dressed in cowboy getup eyeing her through the glass. A black bandana covered his lower face. He jerked open the folding door and pulled her out. "Kelly, come on. I'll give you a ride." He clamped his suede glove around her hand and dragged her over to a black Porsche with silver-frosted windows purring at the curbside. He opened the passenger door. "Get in."

"What are you doing here?" She looked around nervously. "What if someone sees me with you dressed like a guy about to rob the local five-and-dime?"

"Don't argue with a gift horse." He gently pushed her inside, shut the door, and climbed in on the driver's side. The shoulder belt automatically slid protectively over their torsos. "You might want to buckle your lap belt," he suggested. The rumbling sports car rolled down the street.

She clicked herself in. "Look, I'm real tired and just want to go home, okay?"

"I see you won." He nodded at the trophy in her hand.

"Yeah, I figure I could use this either as a doorstop or a weapon against marauding cattle rustlers." She saw him glimpse at her from under the brim of his black Stetson. 

He reached inside his denim jacket to pull out a folded sheaf of papers which he passed to her. He reached up to tap on the overhead light.

She frowned at it. "I've had enough disappointment tonight." 

"But you won. How can that be disappointing?" Her glance out the window directed him back to the phone booth. "Who were you talking to on the phone that got you so upset?" he gently probed.

Kelly chewed on her knuckle. "My alcoholic mother is all. Can we not talk about it?"

"All right." 

She sat in silence for several blocks. The car stopped at a red light and signaled left. It prowled the streets searching an access to the 9W expressway. Kelly noticed the direction westward. "Where are we going? My place is on the east side."

"I thought we'd check out the location mentioned in your new scene." He reached over to poke the page with the tan suede finger of his work glove.

Kelly strained in the dim light make out the detail. She slapped the paper shut on its fold and handed it to him. "First, it is not my scene. Second," she insisted, "I want you to take me home now," to add, "please," in measure to defuse an intense situation.

"Aw, come on, where's your sense of adventure. I'm curious. Aren't you?"

"No. I'm tired and hungry, and I would simply like to go home if you don't mind." A twinge of anxiety caught like a fine bone in her throat.

"Kelly, I assure you. I have no intention of perpetrating any of those sordid acts on you. I just want to figure out why the elaborate abduction scene. Maybe there's a clue we'll come across."

Kelly cringed at the mention of abduction. "And maybe there's a team of thugs just waiting to pounce on us when we get there. I don't think it's a wise decision." She noticed him taking the exit toward the Cloisters. She shrank back into her seat at the sight of the pitch black streets. 

The Porsche whirred around a curve to come to a remote wooded area. The headlights caught onto the cast-iron letters spelling "cemetery" on a great gate. The masked desperado stopped the car and turned off the ignition. "Wanna go in and see the tree?"

"No!" she screamed.

"You sit here then. I'll go look." He slipped the keys on the chain with the miniature flashlight into his pocket, opened the door and got out. 

Kelly watched him run into the blackness. She hastily locked the doors and waited. Kelly whistled a tune to stir up the disturbing stillness. The deeper she peered at the night-shrouded tombstones, the more her heart raced. What if he'd been attacked and couldn't come back? What if the evil person setting her up for torment would fly out of the cemetery with a swinging axe? What if the masked cowboy was counting on her losing her cool to go running into the spooky cemetery to look for him? Her heart jumped hurdles to hear the door suddenly unlatch. 

"Worried I wouldn't come back?" he quipped and jumped inside. He started up the car and tooled slowly back toward Manhattan. 

"What did you see?"

"Nothing but a big tree growing right in the middle of a mausoleum. A perfect spot to do the things described in this fantasy. Whoever thought it up has a wicked imagination" He slid the papers back inside his jacket.

"Will you please take me home now?"

"You said you were hungry. How about I treat you to a late dinner?"

The lights of the city washed relief over Kelly's face. She basked in the light of the all-night burger joint whose drive-up window opened to receive her. She ordered a junior burger meal.

"Will that be all?" the scratchy teenage voice asked.

"Yes," the cowboy replied. 

He pulled up to the window to pay and noted the look on the pimply face of the attendant who asked drolly, "So what, you planning on robbing a bank or something?"

"Oh, you mean the mask. Naw, I just got off a commercial shoot and need some chow is all. It's been a long night," he explained and drove off. He passed Kelly the bag of food and drove toward the Brooklyn Bridge. He pulled off to a waterside overlook with a stunning view of the towering suspension bridge shimmering with lights and parked.

Kelly chomped on her burger and slurped her Coke. "Aren't you eating?" she asked. 

"I already ate." 

"Why are we stopping here?"

"Thought you'd like the view."

"It is spectacular." She took a big bite. "Why do I get the feeling you're stalling? You're not gonna dump me in the river or anything?" She let go a nervous titter.

"It's not in the contract," he teasingly reminded.

"Nor is buying me a fast-food supper, but you did it anyway. Want a fry?"

"Good point and no thanks."

Kelly gulped the last of her greasy fare and licked her fingers. She noisily sucked the last drop of Coke and put the cup inside the bag the meal cam in. 

"All finished?" he asked.

"Yup. Can we go now?"

The car started up and headed down to East 9th Street. He found a convenient parking spot in a red zone and shut down the car. "Wait. Let me get the door for you."

"You don't-" she said as he jumped out and bounded around the car. "—have to," she finished to his opening her door. "I can make it the rest of the way on my own, you know." She checked the street to see if any neighbors might be spying.

"I wouldn't have it." He rode the rickety elevator with her up to her apartment and stood over her as she unlocked the door. He followed her into the dark efficiency. In a crackle of sparks, a shock ran through his body. He collapsed to the floor with a loud thud.

Kelly screamed and blindly swung her trophy in the darkness at an unknown assailant firing up a stun gun. Kelly dodged the electric bolt and crashed into the table. She saw a dark figure run out the open door and into the hall. She scrambled to the lamp. In the 75-watt dome of light she saw the cowboy sprawled on the floor. She fell to her knees and shook him in an effort to revive. Tempted by his defenseless posture, she gingerly reached to pull the bandana from his face. She gasped when his hand shot up to stop her venturing. "Don't," he rasped.

Kelly pulled her hand away. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he grunted and sat up. "Wow! That was quite a jolt." He reached for his hat that had tumbled across the floor. He set it atop his thick chestnut mane, stood up and brushed the dust from his jeans. He looked up to see Kelly absolutely aghast. Illumined by the single bulb was a heart-sinking scene. Violent slash marks shredded her mattress and bedcovers. Strips of cut-up clothing covered the floor. Dresser drawers lay in smashed heaps over tattered undergarments and sundries. The bathroom mirror hung in jagged fragments from its frame. 

"Oh my God, it's gone." Kelly brought her hands to her face.

"What's gone?" He rubbed at the singed area on the back of his neck.

"My laptop and the CD Ms. Wilmont entrusted to me. My skinny-assed goose is totally cooked." She fell to her knees and cried. "Who's doing this to me?"

He helped her to her feet. "Kelly, you've got to call the police and report this. Is there a neighbor her who will let you use the phone?"

"Don't you have a cell phone?" she wept.

"Have you seen me with a cell phone? Look, you need to call the police and get them here to investigate this. But..."

"But what?"

"I can't be here when they arrive."

"Why not? You're a witness to all this." He moved toward the door. Kelly grabbed his jacket. "You can't leave me. What if he's waiting for you to leave? What if he comes back to hurt me?"

He braced her shoulders. "I'm sorry, but you can't even tell them about me or the email fraud or anything about the ravishment society."

Her hackles rose. "Why not, unless you're involved with these crimes committed against my person? Why the hell did you take me way out yonder tonight and stall in bringing me home, huh? Did you know this guy was coming in here to do this? Do you know how he got in? Is there another way to break in that you're not telling me about?" she ranted. 

He took her by the shoulders and squeezed to make her stop. "Please understand, it's imperative I do not become involved," he paused then added, "for your own safety." He released his hold and flew out the door.

"Is that a threat?" she shrieked after him. "You bastard!"

The elderly woman in the apartment at the far end of the hall let Kelly use the phone. The police did not hurry to arrive on the scene of a B&E where there was no imminent danger. During a cursory visit, Kelly gave them sparse information about the attack without mentioning her cowboy companion or the Web pages feloniously concocted in her name. How could she explain it? The police took pictures of the vandalism. One of the officers gave her the name and number of a detective she could call to check up on for any breakthroughs in the case. Gathering from their air of indifference, she guessed the prospects were doubtful.

The rest of the night, she sat up in the sole chair she possessed in the lonely glow of her shadeless lamp to ponder her fate. She worried about how she would explain the stolen company property to Ms. Wilmont and braced herself for the inevitable end of her career with the Emvar Design Group.

Part IV

Sunday dawned with slow dull pain. In the haze of sleeplessness, Kelly shuffled about her trashed apartment. She slowly bent down to pick up the card the police officer had given her from the floor where she had let it drop from despair. It bore the name Detective Coretta Kaine, Violent Crimes Division. Kelly flicked it against her fingers and imagined when she would deign to call the detective. She scratched at the static in her head to spark up her memory cells. Did the officer say she was to call the detective or wait for the detective to call? Kelly set the card on the kitchenette's narrow counter and determined she would do the calling.

She spent the vibrant late spring day picking up the remnants of her destroyed wardrobe. The pieces filled several tall kitchen garbage bags. Amongst the detritus, she managed to souse out a clean cotton tee-shirt bearing a single scar from the perp's knife on its backside and a pair of jeans whose natural fray had defied all attempts of damage. She sniffed back the tears to see her precious suits, blouses, and shoes go into the trash. To replace them would cost her the small fortune she did not possess. She hoped the thrift shop would have something that could serve as passable corporate attire. He hopes faded when she realized the thrift shop wasn't open on Sundays. Kelly sat on the edge of her ripped up mattress and cried. Monday was a matter of hours away hurtling at her like an asteroid on a collision course. 

She sought reassurance and reinforcement in a wholesome PBJ on wheat and a glass of milk. Wiping up the crumbs as a deterrent to cockroaches, she grabbed her bag and set out to shop. 

In mid-town, she found a reasonably priced clothing store where she picked up a blue blazer with matching skirt, two pastel-colored blouses, and two bras and pairs of panties. She brought her bundle up to the register and handed the cashier her credit card. 

The effeminate man in the white shirt and narrow tie swiped the card. Kelly didn't appreciate the twitch to his mouth. "Is anything wrong?"

He uttered the dreaded words no customer cares to hear. "Uh, I'm afraid your card has been declined."

"What?" She peeked over the counter to see where he was getting his information.

He handed it back to her. "I'm sorry. You'll have to call the company and find out what the problem is."

Kelly stormed out of the store to the nearest phone booth. She slammed coins into the slot and pounded the 800 number on the keypad. She fumed her way through the tedious options menu. The sappy easy-jazz sounds filling her ear made her stomach churn. Finally a voice came on the line. 

Twenty minutes of waiting followed by two minutes of being told her card had been cancelled as per her request resulted in serious abuse of telephone company property. The service rep had assured her they could issue a new card in twenty-four hours at the low, low fee of fifty dollars, but Kelly didn't have the patience. She needed access to credit yesterday.

She left the battered phone booth to find an ATM. To her festering anguish, the machine swallowed her card and bleeped the taunting message that her card was invalid. The watchful eye of the security camera spied the look of rage on her face and the image of her fist about to sock it. Kelly thought twice about being caught on camera, lowered her hand and left. 

The forty-block walk home helped work off her anger. She passed under the watchful gaze of the smiling Caravaggio angel. "You're the only nice thing about this city, and you ain't even real," she importuned to the immutable image. 

Dusk had faded to dark by the time she stepped inside her apartment door. She stumbled over the piles of trash bags sitting in the middle of the floor. "Shit!" she cussed. She flicked on her lamp and gathered up two of the bags. She decided she was too tired to lock and unlock her door with every trip. She spotted the trophy on the table and dropped her load. "Doorstop it is." She propped it at the foot of her door. Trip after trip, she trudged with her crinkling bundles down the hall to the garbage chute. When she shoved the last bulging bag in, she wiped the grime from her hands and headed back to her desolate place. She picked up her flame-shaped trophy and turned to lock up. The award flew from her lands to land on the threshold. Her hands flew up to claw at the tight strap being drawn across her mouth. A round rubber ball pushed past her teeth and onto her tongue. In a painful twist, her hands landed behind her back in handcuffs. Fiercely strong hands dragged her backwards and threw her on the bed. 

Lust-filled eyes leered down at her through a black leather mask. Her attacker was bare to the waist and bulging with muscles. His black leather gloves unzipped her jeans and pulled them from her waist and down to her ankles. He reached into a bag on the foot of the bed and pulled out a long steel bar. He ripped her jeans off to fasten her ankles to the ends of the bar forcing her legs apart. From the satchel, he pulled out a leather blindfold and slipped it over her head. He hitched it tight at the back of her head. 

Distressed moans pushed through her throat. She jumped to feel cold water pouring on her, soaking her through and through. She panted in horrific anticipation of what would happen next. The burning pinch on the skin of her neck sent her into convulsions. One by one, unseen clamps fastened onto the loose skin of her neck, breasts, abdomen, along her arms and inside her tender thighs. She squirmed under the firm pressure of the hand that held her down. 

The pressure abruptly lifted from her agonizing body. The sounds of a scuffle danced around her ears. The bed shook with sudden impact. The sound of glass shattering pierced the tumultuous air. Hurtling shards nicked her exposed skin. The hardwood floor reverberated with a definitive crash. Kelly's groans reverberated against the walls of the small room. 

Fingers tugged at her blindfold. At first, the light angling upwards from the floor disoriented her. Then she saw the man in the leather mask. Her shrieks bounced off the ball in her mouth to the back of her throat. She tried pushing away. The familiar voice calling her by name turned her stomach into nauseating guacamole. 

"Easy, Kelly. It's me. I came as soon as I knew." He unsnapped the ball gag and pulled it from her mouth. He watched her heave. "God, what did he do to you? Hold still." He removed the dozens of clothespins clipped to her flesh. 

"Why did you do this to me?" she wailed. 

"I didn't," he assured with the release of her left ankle from the torturous spread bar, "he did." He pointed to a man dressed in identical fashion. He was lying face down on the floor amidst the remains of the glass base of her lamp. He pulled her right ankle free and checked the restraints on her hands. "Gotta find the key." He stepped over the fallen ravisher to search the satchel that had been knocked to the floor in the fight. 

"Who is he?" she whimpered.

"Not sure." He lifted the bag and set it back on the foot of the bed. He searched every pocket. "Ah, ha," he exclaimed and pulled out a small key. 

"Look out!" Kelly shrilly alerted.

He turned in time to deflect a blow from his risen foe. He fell back onto the mattress, his head landing right between Kelly's thighs. The doppelganger attacker fled out the door and disappeared down the stairs. 

Her masked rescuer righted himself and set to unlocking the cuffs.

"Aren't you going after him?" she asked frantically.

Sirens raced down the street. "No time. Someone's called the cops. You just tell them you managed to club him with the lamp. I gotta go." He took her frightened face in his hands and plopped a soft kiss on her lips before dashing out the door.

"Wait!" she called after him. Shaky fingers rose to her quivering lips.

This time the police brought Kelly down to the station to obtain pictures of her injuries and a statement. This time Kelly met the detective belonging to the name embossed on the card. 

"Hi, I'm Detective Kaine," the statuesque black woman with the sleek straightened hair extended a stylishly manicured hand. She sat across the desk from Kelly and began entering the data into her computer. "So, tell me exactly what happened."




RavMe Ch. 03-04



Kelly watched the long-nailed fingers excite the keyboard to her telling of torturous detail after torturous detail. When she stumbled over the lamp bit, Detective Kaine caught it. "You claim he had you handcuffed, yet you managed to swing the lamp at him."

"He, uh, had unfastened my hands at that point," she made up as she went along, "and I seized the opportunity."

"I thought you were blindfolded and unable to see." Kaine poked around for deception.

"He, uh, pulled it off before uncuffing me."

"Why would he do that?"

"I don't know why!" Kelly growled testily. "I don't know why he put clothespins all over me either."

"You sure you don't want to do a rape kit?"

"He didn't rape me. He didn't touch me with bare hands or bare anything. He just held me down and tortured me."

"Until you hit him with the lamp. Then he ran away," the detective confirmed. She typed in the words when a sudden hiss flew from her glossy bee-stung lips. She lifted her left hand to discover a chipped nail. "Damn." She foraged through desk drawers and came up empty handed. She looked to Kelly. "You wouldn't happen to have an emery board on you?" Her dark eyes peered through a heavy-duty application of eye makeup. 

Kelly's jaw dropped in disbelief. She had lost everything she owned. She had suffered a brutal attack, and this vampish enforcer of the law wanted an emery board. "Uh, no, sorry. Are we nearly through here?" was all that she would contribute. 

"Unless you have any further information to add at this time," Detective Kaine said with a rote tone while she dug around in her handbag and searched under piles of paper.

Kelly had plenty of information to add as concerned the fraudulent emails, the unauthorized use of her credit card, and the unknown man who paid mysterious visits. She was reluctant to share it for fear it would affect the presumption of her innocence. She left the station sore and weary from the grueling events of the day. A uniformed officer brought her home in a patrol car to the questioning looks from reclusive tenants who never gave her the time of day.

To be continued... 



RavMe Ch. 05-06



V

Kelly considered calling in sick Monday morning, but figured she should face the tooth-wrenching music and get it over with. During a cathartic subway ride to work, she decided to come clean with Detective Kaine. Armed with copies of the contracts bearing her electronically forged signature and falsified Web pages, she would call Kaine and set up an appointment over her lunch hour. She hoped the good detective with the nail complex would help her cold-cock two birds with one stone by accompanying her to the Enrapture Inc. office in Soho for a face-off with Dr. Karillian.

The blue orb on Jeanette Wilmont's right hand bobbed on the wave of her drumming fingers. Her sallow cheeks stretched tight from her bony jaw. She waited for Kelly to finish explaining why she had come to work covered in cuts and bruises in a little black dress with thin straps and a fancy fringed shawl. Her professional cool cracked apart when she heard Kelly mention the stolen CD. The blue diamond flew up with her hand in frantic gesticulation. "I really don't know what to do with you, Ms. Roy. You are still on probation with this firm, and so far you have proved yourself highly unreliable. This is a very serious matter which I am going to have to take up with the board of directors, and that puts me in a bad position not to mention a very bad mood. Ugh," she grunted in disgust. "This could lead to copyright violations and costly litigation, Ms. Roy. Do you realize that?" The burning question lit the funeral pyre for Kelly's self-esteem.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Wilmont." The tear-gates opened.

"Stop blubbering and get to work on whatever Brad might have. Just get out of my sight." Jeanette Wilmont had long ago sacrificed all womanly sympathies on the altar of cold-hearted corporate gods. 

Kelly crept back to her workstation and wept. 

"What on earth happened to you?" It was Trisha who was sporting a fiery new do. She touched the soft red curls. "Do you like it?"

Kelly pretended not to be disturbed. "Sure," she sandwiched between two sobs.

Trisha checked around to see if anyone was eaves-dropping. She spoke in low tones. "I heard about your attack." Her hazel eyes hopped across the markings on Kelly's neck and arms. "Must have been terrifying for you." 

Kelly drew her shawl to cover what she could of the eye-catching atrocities on her skin. "It surely was, but I put up a fight and chased him off," she lied and recriminated herself for not having proved a better fighter from all that her dearly departed brothers had taught her.

Trisha noticed the NAGA trophy on Kelly's worktable and picked it up. "When did you get this?" 

"Saturday for a contest I entered months ago. I thought it might convince Ms. Wilmont I'm not a total loser." She took it from Trisha's hand and sighed. 

Out of the corner of her eye, Trisha saw Brad approaching. "If you need to talk," was all she offered in the way of hasty consolation. She greeted Brad and walked back to the secured server room. 

"Kelly." Brad dropped her name like a lead plumb. "My office. We need to talk in private."

Kelly followed him to the small room with the park-side view. She sat in the chair in front of his desk and endured his harsh gaze. Her skin crawled with his ogling her exposed injuries. She could not contain her crying for the sight of the lurid grin on his face. "Why are you looking at me like that? Do you think this is funny?"

He pulled some tissue from a box on his desk and passed it to her. "Don't cry, Kelly. I'm just smiling for the fact you're all right."

"Get real," she sassed and blew her nose.

"You're right. I guess I find your getup a little silly. No offense," he rebounded.

"It's all I got to wear. That maniac destroyed everything. I should be getting a new credit card today or tomorrow, so," she settled down with the self-reassurance. "Ms. Wilmont said you had something for me to work on."

"Ah, yes. You can begin by sorting and filing these clippings." He pointed to a cardboard box brimming with glossy images on the floor beside his desk. "The file cabinet's out in the main area. You will note the categories listed on each folder and sort accordingly."

Kelly swallowed bitterly. "You're relegating me to menial clerical work?"

"Don't take it that way. I just don't have anything else at the moment."

"What about that Beverly woman's project?" Why the idea sprang from her head onto her lips was beyond her reason. Her eyebrows perked to the stunned look on his face.

"How do you know about that?"

"I found some of her files on my workstation computer. Looked like a great project. I would be happy to--"

Brad cut her off and made her jump with a slap to the surface of his desk. "I want you to do filing work, is that clear?"

Kelly had pushed a sensitive button. The reins of control had briefly changed into her hands, and she felt good. She stood up, picked up the box, and set out the door in subtle albeit shaky triumph.

During her break, she contacted Detective Kaine via the payphone in the building lobby. The lawwoman said she was indeed available to meet Kelly during her brief lunch hour. When the time arrived, Kelly hastened to the front of the building. As she stood waiting for the detective to arrive, she sensed a presence behind her. She stood to see the blind beggar tapping his white cane behind her. Feeling sorry for his plight, she opened her bag. "Man, you are on a roll with me, Mac. All I got is this fiver." She put it in his cup. Before he could utter his thanks, the plainclothes detective drove up to the curb in the unmarked Chevy Caprice. 

"So, Ms. Roy, you told me on the phone you might know who's behind your assault, which could prove very helpful since our investigation has turned up new information as well." Detective Kaine deftly navigated the congested streets of mid-town Manhattan. 

Kelly reached into her purse and pulled out a sheaf of folded up papers. She opened them up to read the address to the detective. "If you don't mind, we need to go here and talk with this Dr. Karillian guy. I think he's behind all this, but I don't rightly know how or why."

"Karillian," Kaine repeated and steered southbound. Within a quarter of an hour, they pulled up to the black high-rise building. They rode the steel-lined elevator to the floor where Kelly expected to spot the onyx reception counter. Instead, she saw the psychedelic colors of a hip hair salon. "I don't understand," she murmured.

Detective Kaine asked for the manager who stepped out from a back office. The bald man in the yellow-tinted glasses and pointed goatee assured his visitors in a suave Brazilian accent that his salon had occupied the suite for several years. Before Kelly could react, Detective Kaine pulled her from the scene of inquiry.

"I'm telling you, he's lying, I was here but a week ago and this place was not in existence!" Kelly's insistence bordered on hysterics.

"Take it easy girl." Detective Kaine cautioned. "You might have confused the address. After all, you are new to the city."

Kelly settled back in the passenger seat of the detective's car and second-guessed herself. "I'm certain this was where I came." She watched street signs pass overhead then noticed the police station's façade looming up in her line of vision. "What are we doing here? I have to get back to work."

"Not until we get some answers, Ms. Roy." Detective Kaine rolled into her designated spot and turned off the car with a decisive twist of the wrist. A tinkling sound drew Kelly's eye to the charm bracelet the detective wore. An elongated silver rectangle beckoned a curious stare but was gone in a flash when the detective got out of the car.

Kelly found herself sitting in a folding chair with a torn padded sear at a metal table surrounded by walls of white-washed cinderblocks. A large two-way mirror filled up one of the walls. "Would you like some water or coffee?" Detective Kaine offered.

"Some coffee please, black if you don't mind." Kelly rubbed her throbbing temples. "Am I under arrest?"

"Have you heard your rights read to you?"

"No."

"Then you're not under arrest." The detective went out the door and expeditiously returned with a steaming Styrofoam cup. She set it on the table in front of Kelly then took a seat opposite Kelly. She leaned back in her chair and crossed her long legs. Her badge shone from the belt of her black skirt. Her loaded shoulder holster peeked suggestively from under the lapel of her tan blazer. 

"Then why, pray tell, am I here?" Kelly fussed and sipped.

Detective Kaine leaned over the table and laced her long-nailed fingers together. "I have serious concerns about your account, Ms. Roy."

A sharp rap at the closed door turned both their heads. In stepped a young male officer with a precision crew cut and sour demeanor. "Here's the file, detective." He handed a manila folder to Kaine and left the room. The door shut with a click.

Kaine flipped it open and drew out the documents. Her brown eyes swathed in cosmetic enhancement surveyed the news. She looked up at Kelly and slid the pages across the table over to her side. 

Kelly read the glaring black on white. "You think I'm responsible?"

"The evidence points that way. See the credit card receipt for the online sex paraphernalia store? It bears your account number and user name." The tip of her long red nail landed on the item in question. "And look here," she added more slush to the pile. 

Kelly's eyes bulged to see copies of the ravishment contracts and scene descriptions brandishing her picture and name. "How did you get these?'

"Is there something you're not telling me, or are you simply ashamed to divulge a secret vice, Ms. Roy?" Kaine's brow crinkled with feigned concern. Fearing her blush would denote embarrassment not fury, Kelly She shied away from the detective's gaze.

"Look, Ms. Roy. This is New York City where people do all sorts of things they're not proud of, but that doesn't necessarily make what they do criminal in nature. Nothing evident in this file, for example, merits a chargeable offense. However, filing false reports with the police does. Now, if you want to avoid prosecution, you'll come clean with me about all this." She spread her hands out in a gesture of magnanimity. 

The dangling charms on the detective's right hand swam in Kelly's watery eyes. "I swear on the holy souls of my beloved father and four brothers that I had nothing to do with this sick behavior." She unwound the spool of the sordid events that had befallen her from the pseudo-Spiderman encounter to the incident with the masked sadist. She described her meeting with Karillian and her credit debacle. She showed the crumpled, grease-stained copies the mystery agent had given her. Detective Kain reached over and took them into her claws. "Can I keep these? Maybe we can get trace evidence."

"I don't think you'll find any prints except my own. He always wore gloves," Kelly hazarded.

"And you've never seen his face or heard him mention his name?" Kain queried.

"I've seen parts of his face but not enough to put a composite together." 

"Well, maybe you should work with a sketch artist anyway. You never know what you might come up with." Kaine stood up and collected the papers into a batch.

Kelly balked. "Not that I don't want to be cooperative and all, but if I don't get back to work, my boss'll have my skinny Kentucky behind served up on a platter." 

"All right, Ms. Roy. Come at your convenience." She stood up and pulled open the door and graciously arranged for a patrol car to take Kelly to her place of work. 

As soon as Kelly approached the reception area for the Emvar Design Group, she was met by a building security guard in a gray uniform. A cardboard box sat on the floor by the door. She peered down to see her personal items -- her headphone set, her disc player, a pell-mell collection of CDs, a picture of her family set in a silver frame, a bottle of fruit-flavored water, a bottle of kiwi-scented lotion, a hairbrush, a rainbow slinky, a mini Zen garden -- beneath a pink slip and a sealed envelope. "What is this?"

"I have to ask you to come with me, Ms. Roy," said the guard. "I've been ordered to escort you out of the building."

"But, why?"

"Apparently your employment with this firm has been terminated." The large man with the greased-back hair and oily complexion picked up the box and handed it to her. "If you'll please follow me." 

"Now just hold on a doggone second!" she shouted. "I'm not leaving without my trophy."

"What trophy?"

"My NAGA award that I won with my work -- It's on my desk, and I want it." She moved toward the work area.

The second guard blocked her way. "Sorry, ma'am. You're prohibited to go in there."

"Oh, you can't trust me not to pilfer a company pen, but you can outright steal my stuff!" she shouted at the top of her mezzo-soprano range. 

"Please, ma'am, simmer down." The guard spread his arms to block her passage. 

"I am not leaving without getting back that which is rightfully mine!" She stomped her foot like a mad mare.

"Don't force me to call the police and have you forcibly removed," warned the burly guard.

"What's all the ruckus?" Brad challenged as he stepped into the reception area. He cast her a pitying look from his towering height. 

Kelly muzzled her howling rage. "Why are you doing this to me and where is my trophy?"

"I'm sorry Kelly. But your personal problems are interfering with your productivity. You understand," he condescended.

"I want my friggin' trophy. If I don't get it, I'm going to do some real damage, come hell or high water or the police."

"Take it easy. I'm sure someone overlooked it. Stay here and let me see what I can do." He sauntered away to return in a few minutes with the twisting golden flame. "Her you are. It was right on your desk." He placed a hand on her shoulder. "Look, Kelly. I like you. I think you're a sweet girl. If you need a recommendation, don't hesitate to call me." She clenched her jaw in vexation over his feigned concern. "I'll be fine without it, I'm sure." She slipped out from under his paw and took her box, trophy and all, down the hall. "Mind if I use the facility before I go?"

Brad shook his head. "Not at all. But, uh, Kelly. Be sure to turn in your key badge to security downstairs." He winked and smiled before walking back into the office.

Kelly went quietly into the restroom immediately unleashed her Celtic fury. With no concern for possible occupants, she violently kicked in the stall doors to set them flapping wildly on their hinges. She threw all the rolls of toilet paper into the bowls and flushed. She turned on all the faucets and emptied out the paper towels from their dispensers. She pulled out a tube of lipstick from her purse and wrote the words: "How dare you fuck with my livelihood, you egomaniacal pricks." 

The guard approached her in the hallway. He was munching on a bear claw and chugging back coffee from a paper cup. "What happened? I thought I heard a disturbance," he mumbled through a mouthful.

"Nothing," Kelly declared before walking to the elevator. She rode the fourteen floors and summarily deposited her key badge with the desk officer. She pushed through the revolving doors and out into the street. Her tears dripped onto her meager possessions inside the box. She took up the envelope and fumbled to open it with a single hand. There was the payoff for her humiliation staring her in the face: a check for one thousand dollars, not even enough to cover her rent. She headed south on Broadway to the nearest First Bank where she intended to cash in her token and find out about her confiscated ATM card.

"What do you mean I am overdrawn?" she asked incredulously. "There has got to be an error. I haven't made a withdrawal since I arrived in the city."

"It seems several ATM transactions were made over the past week, amounting to $5,000. You are overdrawn by $2,000," the teller with the unpronounceable name and distinct Indian accent explained from behind the bulletproof glass. Kelly shook her fiery mane. "No, no, no, no, no. I'm telling you it's not possible. I only tried to use my card yesterday and the machine ate it. I—"

"This check will help cover the deficit, but I'm afraid you are still overdrawn."

The bank manager was of no more help or consolation than the teller with his professional indifference. He ogled Kelly's bruises and cuts that she had ineffectively tried to cover with her skimpy shawl; he feebly shook Kelly's hand in limp promise that they would start an investigation into the matter.

"Well, what am I supposed to do? Hell, I gave my last five bucks to a homeless guy this morning. I don't even have enough to buy a stick of gum."

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but there is nothing we can do at this time." He urged her toward the door before she erupted in an ugly scene.

Kelly walked out of the bank burdened with far more the weight of her box. The entire world was flattening her like a steamroller. She looked up into the late afternoon sky and saw the Caravaggio angel looking down from the side of a building. "Yeah, well, fuck you angel! Fuck you for looking at me but not after me!" The impact of a person slamming into her rocked her back on her heels. She dropped the box to the ground. When she bent down to pick it up, she saw the tip of a white cane. She looked over to see the rag-covered blind man with the wrapped up face staring at her. He had fallen to the ground. "I am so sorry!" she scrambled to help him up before one of herd of passersby tripped over him.

He latched firmly onto her arm without saying a word. "Why do you curse him?" The vagrant asked.

"Pardon me?"

"I heard you," he wheezed from beneath his bandages and held firm. "You cursed the angel above. Why?"

Fearful of his intent, Kelly tried to pull free. "Look," Kelly said on the brink of tears. "I... I don't have any more money to give you, but here." She reached into her box and pulled up the trophy. "Take this. I'm sure you can sell it. In fact, take the whole box. There's a CD player and... and..." She placed the cardboard box in his arms and ran off toward the subway. She scampered down the stairs and scoured her purse for the token that would remove her from the scene of her crumbling life.

VI

Kelly rode the trains for several hours to empty her soul. She hopped from transfer to transfer until she circumnavigated the island. Finally, she steered herself homeward. 

It was dark when she came out onto East 9th Street. She trudged wearily over to the phone booth in front of her building and punched "0" for the operator. "I'd like to place a collect call, please." She droned the number to her mother's house. When her mother's slurred voice came on the phone, Kelly broke out into tears. "Mama, I hate to ask but you gotta help me. I need money to get home. I--" she broke off to listen to the drunken rant on the other end. "Yes, I know I promised you money, Mama, but something terrible's happened and I--" Kelly clicked the receiver up and down. "Mama, don't hang up! Mama!" She let the receiver drop to the end of its cord and pushed through the folding doors. She crept up the stoop to her building and rode the rickety elevator to her floor. She entered the foreboding darkness of her poverty and tripped over a cardboard box. "What the--?" she exclaimed. The hairs rose on her nape to see a figure sitting on the edge of her bed.

"Where've you been?" he asked.

"How did you get in here?"

"I have my methods." He stood up to pounce in case she'd rush for the door.

Kelly considered fleeing but found herself too low on steam. Her eyes squinted with the flick of the bathroom light. There before her stood the man with the white cane, bandaged face and dark glasses.




RavMe Ch. 05-06



"You," was all she could produce in the way of recognition. She walked over and plunked down on her shredded mattress. "I can't believe you'd play a blind beggar and take ten bucks off of me."

"I bought us dinner with your money. Look in your box."

Kelly bit her lip and turned to look toward the taped-up window.

The man in the head bandage and tattered hooded fleece reached down to pick up a bag containing various cartons of takeout Chinese. He opened the boxes and set them on the bed then handed her a pair of chopsticks. 

"My, how generous of me," she snidely commented. He slipped a biteful of lo-mein through the slits of bandages covering his mouth.

Kelly ate in spite of her knotted-up stomach. She had gone all day without so much as a stale saltine pilfered from a sidewalk café. 

"Oh, I forgot." He stood up and walked to the fridge where he pulled it open and brought out a six-pack of beer.

"I suppose the drinks are on me too."

"Naw, I forked out for these." He opened one, passed it to her, then took one for himself.

"So, times must be hard in the business world."

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, you're panhandling for lunch money, and I'm out on my skinny Kentucky behind."

"So I gathered." He nodded toward the box. She chugged back a desperate draft. "Yeah, and my bank account's cleaned out, my credit is fucked, and my own mother is too busy mulling about in her bottle of bourbon to... to..." she launched into a barrage of tears. She finished the beer and threw the bottle into the wall. She reached into the box and pulled out items to further hurl in her rage. Her music CDs sailed into the shadows and crashed. Her portfolio flew across the floor in a scattering of prints. Her hairbrush caromed off the ceiling and onto the floor. She was about to hurdle the trophy at the mirror of the dresser when a sturdy grip bracketed her wrist.

"Stop," he said. He pried the shiny metal flame from her hand and set it gently on the nightstand where the tacky lamp used to stand.

"I don't even have a frickin' lamp anymore," she sobbed heavily.

The intruder set to picking up the abused items to put them back in the box. His eyes fixed on a small rectangular medallion attached to a fine silver chain caught in the hairbrush. 

"What's that?" Kelly asked.

"You don't know?"

"Let me see it." She reached up and took the vertical pendant in her fingers. "It looks like Trisha's necklace."

"Where did you get it?" he asked.

"She must've cleaned out my desk and it got caught and fell in the box." She snorted with derision, "I noticed Detective Kaine with the same type of pendant on her charm bracelet. Go figure." 

He took it from her and set it on the nightstand. "So, are you quite through punching the walls?" 

Kelly took a bite of the oriental grub and regained her strength. "Guess I should conserve my energy for more constructive endeavors like finding a new job." She plopped the chopsticks into a swell of brown noodles and sighed. "At least Brad was nice enough to offer to write me a recommendation. Do you think he meant it or was it simple lip service?" 

He slid a pinch of shrimp into his mouth and asked, "Brad?"

"Yeah, a nice guy I worked with, but now..." She suddenly regarded her lunch as though it were toxic waste.

He looked at her though the black lenses and said, "My advice. Don't trust him. In fact, stay clear of him completely."

"And what would you know about it?" Kelly felt her irritation rise on a wave of glucocides and glutimates. "Is there something you're not telling me here? What do you want from me, huh? Why are you constantly tailing me like a drooling hound dog out to hump my leg? Why are you wreaking havoc in my life? You cost me my job. You cost me my credibility with the authorities. Aaarg!" She drew back and threw the carton of wormy noodles in a long pass across the room.

"Hey! You didn't have to waste perfectly good carryout!" He raised his hands just in time to fend off a dousing of sweet-and-sour pork. The contents spilled onto the bed. He grabbed her arms. "What is wrong with you? I'm here to help you."

Kelly struggled against him. "Help me, my skinny Kentucky behind. You tricked me into thinking you were some homeless bum. You stalled the other night so that your accomplice could come in and ransack the place."

"So, I pretended to be a blind burn victim. So what? Did it ever occur to you that I might have been watching over you as you went to work and went home?" He forced her arms down to her sides and pinioned them to the mattress.

Kelly kicked at him. "You ran out on me when that guy attacked me and made me look crazy to the police." 

He wrestled her back onto the mattress. "What's more important? The fact I saved you from that maniac or an indolent police officer's cynical outlook on your moral rectitude? At least give me --"

"Then you had the audacity to kiss me!" she harped from under his weight.

"--credit for realizing something foul was afoot and coming to your res--" He caught up with her last accusation. "Did I?"

"Did you what?"

"Kiss you?"

"Yes, now let me go, or I'll scream bloody murder." She twisted in his grip.

"Go ahead. Who's going to respond in this building?"

"Mrs. Shumaker down the hall. She's well tuned to the weird goings on in this apartment!"

"Well, I'll have you know that I spoke with the super, who is the one who let me in by the way, especially after I told him I was your brother just returned from Walter Reed hospital after having my face destroyed while serving in Iraq. He told me the kindly old lady was visiting her sister in New Haven all week. So, be my guest and raise the roof." The dark glasses concealed the truth of his claim. Kelly ceased her remonstrations rather than risk undergoing a very unpleasant and unimaginable experience at his hands.

"That's better." He sat up and straightened the layers of gauze covering his face. He set a hand on her sobbing body. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be menacing. I just need you to settle down and trust me." 

Kelly clammed up. Tears rolled quietly down her cheeks.

"With all the commotion, I nearly forgot." He reached inside the pocket of his jacket.

"Please, I don't want to see any more shit about kinky scenes or--" Kelly looked down to find a shiny new cell phone glinting at her. "What's this?"

"You need a phone, so I got this for you. It's a pre-pay with a hundred dollars' worth of minutes on it."

Kelly pushed it back. "No, I can't take that from you."

"Why not?"

"It wouldn't be right."

"I took ten bucks from you. Why can't you take this from me?"

"I don't think the value is exactly equal."

"Look, here's the charger. I want to you to keep it charged and leave it on. That way I can call to check in on you instead of scaring you out of your wits all the time. You can call your family in Kentucky anytime too."

"What would be point of that now?" She turned away in her shame over the incident with her mother. 

He set the phone and charger on the nightstand and spoke softly. "Kelly, I'll see to it that you get a new job and a place where no one hurts you again. I promise." 

"Oh, really?" she sneered. 

"Yes, really." He zeroed in with disarming sincerity.

"I wish I could believe that, but..."

"But what?"

"How can I trust a person who won't let me see his face or even give me a name to call him by? How do I know you're not a wanted felon? You scare me, mister, with your weird costumes and stalking ways." She drew her arms tight about her to fend off an unseasonable chill.

His bandages fluttered in a puff of air jettisoned from his lips. "I assure you I'm not wanted. I wish I could reveal who I am but I can't, not at this time."

"Why not? You a secret agent with the CIA?"

"Let me just say the reason I have to keep my identity hidden is because of my prominent social status."

"Oh, so you're a king."

He smiled at her quip. "No, just a high-profile case. Can I ask you to accept that for now?"

"As much as I can accept being clothes-less, credit-less, and jobless," she fretted.

"Here. Take this too," he said and stood up.

She looked up and asked, "What's this then?" 

"It's your ten bucks back along with a little interest." He set a wad of bills in the cup of her hand and moved toward the door.

Kelly gingerly unwound the bills and counted five showing the number one followed by two zeroes on them. "No way. I can't take this." She got up to hand it back to him. "I could never--" She looked up to se the door closing shut. She ran to catch him in the hall but he was nowhere to be seen. "How does a burned up Iraqi vet come up with this kind of dough? I guess begging's not such a bad business," she jibed to the faces of Franklin glaring at her with their wry smirks .

...Keep following this story. Next, Kelly falls prey to a conspiracy too sadistic to imagine...