Chapter 3

The door burst open, and a bulky man in an enclosing black rubber suit burst in, followed by two younger men in similar all-over rubber suits. The latter were carrying white plastic cases, similar to toolboxes. Cordelia gasped in shock. Were they here to help? Or just another threat? She wasn’t safe yet, and kept the pressure on the chain, crushing Jessica’s neck.

“What the blazes is going on here?” the man yelled.

He wrenched the mask off his head in a single movement, revealing close-cropped white hair and a bushy white moustache. He blinked, apparently stunned by what he saw. Jessica was still clawing at the chain, her fingers unable to get purchase under it. Her face was purple, her eyes bulged.

The white-haired man wrenched the chain away from Cordelia, just as Jessica’s eyes flickered and closed. Jessica slumped as soon as the tension was released from the chain, her body limp.

The old man hesitated, then put his ear to her chest. “Still alive, for now, thank goodness.”

Wasting no time, he unbuckled Cordelia’s gag-trainer harness and popped the ball out of her mouth.

“Thank you. Thank you. She was trying to kill us,” Cordelia said, amazed she could move her jaw enough to speak. She couldn’t ignore the pain and hysteria in her own voice, knew how crazy she must sound.

The man stood up and looked around, his gaze taking in the blade, Zeb, hanging limp in his bonds, Dan, dollified and standing close by, his ankles hobbled by the spreader bar.

“Likely, it is as you say,” he answered, after a pause. “Luckily, you didn’t kill her.”

He gestured towards Zeb. “What about him?”

The two younger men set about releasing the chain holding Zeb’s arms.

He tugged at Cordelia’s cuffs. “Where are the keys to all these?”

Cordelia shook her head.

Her relief was fading. She was completely naked at an anything goes fetish party, three strangers were looking at her, and her hands were locked behind her back.

The old man gave a long sigh.

* * * * *

Dan groaned inwardly. Nobody had checked his situation. He might as well be invisible.

He whispered through the small hole between the lips of his mask. “I think they’re in the bottom of the clothes rack.”

The old man seemed to ignore him, continuing to search randomly.

“The clothes rack,” Cordelia repeated.

The old man immediately slid the outfits aside and looked in. “Ah yes, there are some keys here.” He nodded to Cordelia. “Thank you.”

He began to try them against her cuffs, one at a time.

“I’m your host by the way.”

“The Curator?” Cordelia said, surprise evident on her face.

He nodded. “You can call me that, if you wish. I prefer Jerry. It’s up to you. Most people who know me find Jerry a little less theatrical.” He tried another key, again, without success. “People were complaining about this room being locked. I should have known something fishy was going on.” He shook his head. “I did mean to check earlier. It’s been a more troublesome night than usual.”

Dan recognized the voice. Here was the old man who’d released him from the stocks at the first party. He’d been dressed differently, but his build matched.

One of the younger men was checking Zeb’s pulse. “He’s alive sir. The wounds seem to have missed the arteries, some internal bleeding. Pupils blown, and he’s lost some blood. He needs to get to the ER as soon as possible.” He pulled a blood pressure cuff from his case.

The other man stood up. “Right back. I’ll fetch the stretcher.”

Jerry, the Curator, checked Jessica’s airways and put her in the recovery position, leaving the younger man to attend to Zeb.

“Yusef and Sherman are medics,” Jerry explained. “And I’m a doctor. Which is a good thing, it seems. A party like this, it pays to be prepared. There’s an ambulance ready in the car-park. I thought I’d gone overboard when I arranged it.” He took a long hiss of breath between his teeth. “Goes to show, no such thing as over prepared.”

“An ambulance?” Dan said, his voice quiet out of necessity.

“Speak up miss. I can’t hear you.”

“I’m a man, sir.”

“Honestly, be a good dolly and speak up. Or at least come closer.”

“Sorry sir, it’s the mask.” Dan, of course, could not come closer, due to the spreader bar, and the corset mean't he couldn’t sit or crouch.

Jerry lost interest in him and turned back to Cordelia. “As I was saying, accidents… One year we had three heart attacks. Men my age should know their limits, I say. All those damned drugs. I don’t allow them, but they try to sneak them in anyway. Sniffer dogs this year. Still, can’t stop everything. Where was I? Yes… What happened? You were in a scene and then?”

“There was no scene,” Cordelia said, her voice sharp and loud. “These lunatics ambushed us, chained us up and stripped our clothes. Then they put Dan in that costume. Then she drugged her partner in crime, and chained him up too. When he came to, she went mad, stabbed him, bit him, I don’t know what… All the time she was sucking his… You can see what he’s like. Then she said she was going to stab me next.”

“She did?”

“Um, not exactly. It was weirder than that. She said a lot of crazy stuff, and came at me with the knife. I was trying to escape, and she meant to stop me. The chain fell on my head. Sorry… Sorry… I’m just…”

“Take your time.” He dropped the keys back in the tray. “None of these keys work. Decoys to waste your time if you try to escape. An old trick. It’s anyone’s guess where she put the real ones.”

Dan silently seethed with frustration, Jerry had only tried Cordelia’s cuffs. The keys might well have fit his collar, his boots, the spreader-bar, or even his cuffs.

“Please, can’t you at least get this mask off?” Dan whispered.

“For the love of Jiminy, speak up miss. I’m an old man, hearing’s not what it was.”

Cordelia groaned. “Can you take his mask off?” She was mumbling and slurring her words too, clearly the strain of past events was catching up with her.

The other medic arrived carrying a folding stretcher, and began to set it up.

“Sorry, just a second…” said Jerry, and he turned to help the medic, still talking. “Perhaps it’s better I don’t know what happened. I’ll get these two to a hospital, and send the locksmith to sort you out. We have one on hand, but he’s had a busy night so far. People lose their keys all the time, or think they have. Don’t worry, as long as you don’t run off, I won’t inform the police until you’re free, unless you want me to.”

“The police?” Cordelia whispered.

“It’s going to be a rather troublesome. If your story bears out, this woman intended murder. I think it’s fair to say you won’t be blamed, given that she had you chained up. With any luck, she’ll be fine. The law should be on your side.”

“Good grief. I’ll lose my job,” Cordelia said, her voice hollow.

Jerry grunted, as he and the medics got Zeb onto the stretcher. He was facing away from them, but continued anyway. “I can also imagine some considerable inconvenience to myself will result, but it is a risk I have always been aware of. Would you rather that this woman remains free to commit more crimes?”

“I guess not,” she answered. “But...  But, my family... It doesn’t seem fair.” Tears welled in her eyes. All the things that had happened to her, and this was the first time that Dan had seen her feel sorry for herself.

“I shouldn’t have mentioned it. Try not to dwell on what might yet be avoided. They may be able to protect your identity” Jerry shook his head. “I’m going to help Yusef with the stretcher.”

He left with Yusef, the pair of them rolling the stretcher, leaving Dan and Cordelia still cuffed.

The remaining paramedic, Sherman, had removed the hood of his suit and was checking Jessica with a stethoscope.

“I need to get this woman out of this fetish outfit, her breathing is increasingly shallow.”

Dan considered a response, but knew he’d be ignored and decided not to waste his effort trying to speak.

Cordelia echoed his thoughts. “We’re both cuffed. We can’t help. Sorry.”

“Just explaining. I’m not assaulting her,” said Sherman, as he began to remove her hood.

Cordelia dragged herself to her feet and began to search the clothes rack for something to wear. There was nothing she could put on without freeing her hands.

After a few minutes, the medic had removed Jessica’s hood, corset, boots, rubber socks, gloves, and even the heavy rubber chastity belt that was under the corset.

Dan watched helplessly as Sherman pulled down the tag on the zip at the front of the suit. He did it carefully, ensuring the unconscious woman’s breasts remained covered.

He checked with the stethoscope again. “I need to get the oxygen. Her breathing is too shallow. We’re going to need another stretcher for her, I think.”

Cordelia looked at him. “I can’t help you, I’m bound and naked. If I go out of that door I’ll be eaten alive.”

“Just keep an eye on her, alright?”

Cordelia wriggled her bound arms. “Don’t you have one of those squeezy things? Shouldn’t you wait for Yusef, or Jerry?”

“There’s no point me being here without the oxygen, but I don’t want to leave her alone. If she stops breathing, you have to get help, no matter what.”

Cordelia nodded to the medic.

Dan began to object, “Look-”

Cordelia’s words drowned him out. “Alright. We’ll watch her, but that’s all we can do.”

* * * * *

Dan felt sluggish, weighed down with the heavy boobs, and the equally encumbering padding in his leggings. The corset was long, tight, and unbearably restrictive, he was locked into skyscraper heels, and his ankles were cuffed to a spreader bar that reduced him to a nervous creeping shuffle. The shoes made it a literal pain for him to stand, but the heavily boned corset laced down to his thighs, and made it impossible for him to bend at the waist, or hips, so he had no alternative. If he fell over, he’d never get up again without help.

With the medic gone, it was just him and Cordelia, alone together. Dan sighed, and shuffled closer to her so they could talk, but he didn’t really want to talk, and she probably didn’t want to either. Neither of them had the energy.

She just stood there, next to Jessica’s body, staring at the person she’d nearly killed. It had been a shock, to see her like that, so determined. She’d saved them both, and he was thankful she’d done it, but it was a part of her he wasn’t ready for.

The long scratch on her face from Jessica’s glove had turned a deep red. Would something like that leave a scar? He didn’t know much about such things. Maybe it wouldn’t be a problem, there were all kinds of creams and products.

“Do you think you could get this mask off me?” he whispered. “It should just pull off.”

“I’ll try,” she said. “Wait… What was that?”

“What was what?”

“Jessica. Did she move? Don’t tell me she’s doing that horror movie dead villain faking thing.”

“She didn’t move.”

“I saw something move, from the corner of my eye.”

Dan examined Jessica as intently as the lenses would allow him. Without her weird cat-eared hood, she was bald. The bright red hair hadn’t been hers. She was still lying in the recovery position, exactly as she’d been left by Sherman. Her unconscious body hadn’t moved. But something else had. The pile of discarded rubber and vinyl that the medic had stripped off her had vanished.

“Her stuff,” Dan whispered. “It-”

“I know. It’s gone,” Cordelia said, finishing his sentence. “Too many weird things tonight.”

Dan turned back to Cordelia, “Sherman must have moved it.”

“Yes, that must be it.”

“Please. This mask?”

“Alright, but I’ll have to do it blind. Can’t get my hands in front either.”

She shuffled around until she was in front of him. He bent his knees and leaned forward as much as he could, trying to get his head was at the right height for her hands. She had to bend forward too, to get her hands up to his head. By feel, she found his head, her fingers seeking a grip on the cowl where it went under his dress.

Her fingers groped around the neck of the leotard. She dug her fingernails in and pulled. There was some pain, but the cowl didn’t move.

“No good. Try again,” he said.

She groped around and tried another spot. Again, the rubber wouldn’t come away from his skin.

“It feels like it’s stuck,” she said.

“You’re kidding me.” He took a calming breath, then several more. The restrictive corset did not encourage relaxed breathing. “We’ll just have to get the dress off, and the leotard thingy. We can do that without removing the cuffs, right?”

Dan glanced around for the scissors. That would be the easiest way. No. It was probably too dangerous, given that Cordelia couldn’t see what she was doing.

“I’ll move around, I’m pretty sure I saw her just zip the dress up at the back.”

But Cordelia didn’t move. She stayed frozen to the spot.

She screamed.

“What is it?” Dan said. He lurched upright, wobbling uneasily on his heels. For a moment, there was nothing but the fear of falling, and then he had his balance back.

“Look.”

He shuffled around, and saw what Cordelia was looking at.

Jessica’s body was almost naked, her pale, bruised flesh exposed. The suit was gone, vanished, leaving only a pair of rubber panties, that looked suspiciously like they had two built-in plugs. But she was still in the same spot, still in the recovery position, as if she’d never moved.

Dan blinked. His vision wasn’t good through the strange distorting lenses, though the initial headache had eased. But even he could see that Jessica’s body was covered in scars, scar layered on scar. Amongst them were fresh welts and partially healed cuts. In places, the stitches in deep cuts had yet to be removed. The only part of her free from scars was her face.

“That’s awful. Who could have done that to her?” Dan whispered.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Cordelia said, her tone flat, “She did it herself.”

“Well then, where the hell is her suit? Who took it? There’s no way-”

“We would have seen?” Cordelia said, cutting him off, though her voice was also only a whisper.

Dan glanced around for a trace of the suit, and when his attention returned to Jessica, even the panties were gone.

She was utterly naked. Dan watched, helpless as Jessica coughed and convulsed, her naked body twisting and writhing.

Dan and Cordelia froze, silent, watching.

Jessica coughed and sputtered. She gasped, a hoarse, rasping sound. “My throat… What happened?”

Both Dan and Cordelia stared at her, neither of them answering.

“Oh God. Oh God, it’s off me,” Jessica said, her voice rising an octave. “Please. Quickly. While you can. Kill me. Kill me now. Before it comes back.”

“What do you mean?” Cordelia said, eyes popping wide.

“Four years… Four years… A puppet of that thing. It knows how to hurt you, not just physically. It made me work in human resources for godsake.”

“Is that bad?” Dan said, simultaneously horrified and puzzled by a statement that had to be the exemplar of cognitive dissonance.

“I was supposed to be helping people… the things I did to them… I can never make amends. Forgive me, let me be free. Please. If you have any mercy, just help me die.”

“I’m not going to kill you,” Cordelia said. “Don’t be stupid. Look, maybe you can get help? I mean…”

“You don’t understand. It’s let me go before, to give me hope.”

Jessica pulled herself up onto her hands and knees and crawled towards where Zeb had abandoned the empty champagne bottle. On the way, she saw the knife. Even through the lenses, Dan couldn’t miss the way her eyes lit up. She snatched it like a lifeline.

“Shit,” Dan hissed. “Not again.”

As he said it, Jessica plunged the blade into her neck. She must have hit an artery, because the blood sprayed over both of them, and then she managed to widen the gash, turning the spray into a less dramatic, but quickly terminal, gush.

Dan stood, frozen in horror, watching the life pump out of her onto the floor with each heartbeat. Her blood beaded and dribbled down his rubber costume.

Jessica was grinning again, though there was no doubt that she was genuinely dead.

Blood trickled down the fitting for the single black-light tube. It shorted, fritzed, flickered and went out, leaving them in perfect darkness.

* * * * *

Cordelia froze. The darkness was so complete that she couldn’t see anything besides floating after-images, mixing, and drifting across her vision as they faded. Jessica’s dead grin, her perfect teeth glowing in the black-light, her flawless face, and a body scarred and ravaged by years of wounding.

The sound of rubber sliding over rubber caught her attention.

“Dan? You there?”

There was no reply. How could that be? Dan had been inches away from her before the light went out.

The sound of rubber sliding and folding, a mass of rubber, loose and floppy, nothing like the creaking and squeaking of the tight doll-suit over Dan’s muscles. Dan’s outfit was noisy, but it definitely didn’t slither.

Cordelia took a step back, Dan should be right there behind her.

Nothing.

She took another step. Her foot caught on something soft. She tried to regain her balance with her arms, but they were cuffed behind her back. She tumbled over backwards, landing not on the hard carpet-tiled floor, but on something soft and slippery.

It was as if she’d fallen into a puddle of rubber. It brushed her skin, with a caressing touch, almost as if it were moving by itself.

She froze completely, waiting for the noise and movement to stop.

It didn’t stop.

The slithering and flopping was all around her, and the rubber was squirming across her legs.

Something cool slipped over her feet. Impossible, but it felt like a pair of panties.

She tried to trap them with her feet, to push them away, but the rubber panties were crawling up her legs as if they were alive. Before she could get a grip on them, they were already past her ankles, and with her hands bound, there was nothing she could do to stop them.

How was this happening? How could panties crawl by themselves? They were wet with something warm and sticky, and she had a dreadful premonition that it was Jessica’s blood, fresh from her body, and the panties were Jessica’s panties, with the plugs, the ones she’d been wearing just before she died.

“Dan. Dan. Help me. They’re on me. Get them off. Please.”

Something was licking her face, lips pressed against hers, a rough tongue probed her mouth. Her hands were cuffed, she couldn’t push her violator away. It couldn’t be Dan, who was it? Not Jessica? The mere thought made her want to vomit. It couldn’t be Jessica, it didn’t even feel human.

“Where are you?” Dan called out. His voice seemed far away, so quiet she could barely hear it. “I thought you were right next to me. Where’d you go? Cordelia? Cordelia?”

She tried to answer, but the tongue slid down her throat, making her choke, silencing her as effectively as the gag-trainer had. It pulsed and throbbed in her mouth, a vile knot of gristly flesh, too tough to bite, forcing its way in, until her jaw was straining to accommodate it

It was too late. The panties were all the way up. And it was worse than she’d thought. They had twin plugs. They could only be Jessica’s panties, the panties of a dead woman. First the front one slid into her sex, then the other that invaded her from behind. No matter how she clenched, they kept on pressing in, until she was completely filled in both holes.

She tried to scream a denial. All that came out around the thing in her throat was a voiceless wheezing gurgling. The plugs, they were inside her. Every way into her body was being invaded.

Then they began to grow. How could they be growing? How could they be swelling inside her, stretching her to the point of pain, filling her, and staying there, keeping her filled.

Like some giant worm, the tongue began to slither down her throat, and before she knew it, she swallowed, and it had slipped down her throat as eagerly as an oyster. It filled her stomach to bursting, and it was moving inside her.

She gave a heavy moan. Despite the horror, there was something irresistibly arousing about being so full, and having no way to do anything about it…

The pressure in her stomach felt hot, as if she’d been drinking scalding water. The sensation began to spread, soaking through her, as if every organ in her body that she’d never felt or noticed had become intensely sensitive and separate, yet connected, individually, and collectively, longing for a sexual relief.

The plugs throbbed inside her, stretching her, pleasure and pain indistinguishable, but it wasn’t enough. The panties caressed her skin, but it wasn’t enough.

A voice whispered close to her ear. No. There was no voice. It was just her memory, Jessica’s voice from earlier. But they weren’t the words Jessica had said then.

“Imagine being me. Imagine yourself in this suit, it’s little finger nubs ceaselessly teasing and frustrating your most sensitive parts? Or imagine going to work, the underwear, the corset, and the belt, hidden beneath your respectable clothes. Imagine being fucked by your panties every moment of every day? Locked in a chastity belt, desperate to get off, but you know you can’t. You never can. There’s no key, and it never comes off, but even if it weren’t there, your hands wouldn’t move if you tried to touch yourself.

“You’re sitting in a meeting, trying to listen to someone talking. It’s something important, but you can’t concentrate, it’s pulsing inside you, pulsing and swelling, front and back, it’s on your nipples, driving you insane. It’s on your clit, and everyone is looking at you because you’re looking kind of flushed, and breathing kind of heavy.

“Or you’re driving, and your nipples are itching so bad, and you just have to rub them, but it won’t let you. It makes you promise things before it will allow you that privilege. You give in, you promise, and you’re rubbing, rubbing like crazy. Then, bam! You were distracted, you hit something. Something heavy. You almost lose control of the car. It jolts violently as something big is pulled under the wheels. You regain control, look back in the mirror to see what it was. There’s a body in the road behind you. A few hours later, you find out your sister was killed in a hit-and-run? And you know, at the instant you hit, you were the one in control, busy pinching your nipples instead of paying attention to the road.”

The socks were slithering onto her feet. After the experience of being attacked by the panties, that seemed almost benign. Socks, that moved on their own? Why not? They felt good against her skin.

“Imagine being me… Imagine yourself, in the suit. Every day. It goes on, and on, and you think maybe tomorrow it will end, but it doesn’t. You look back in your memory, and you can’t remember a time you weren’t wearing it.

“You’re at home in bed. It’s dark. The wind is loud in the trees, and you just want to get some rest, a moment’s peace, but it makes everything so loud. And every time you try to sleep, or every time you try to put your thoughts in order, to plan, or decide what to do next, it’s there, swelling inside you, tiny nubs tingling against your nipples, sucking on your clit like a mouth, or fucking your face with the giant demon tongue, that lives inside you, and crawls up your throat to choke you at the worst moment. It doesn’t matter how careful you are, or what you try to do, because it’s infinitely patient. It never tires, never gets bored, and it always catches you out eventually.

“You can fight it, and sometimes, just sometimes, you can win. But when you don’t behave, when you don’t do what it wants, it punishes you. It has so many ways to make you feel pain. But the physical torture is nothing compared to the regret, despair, guilt, the overwhelming remorse. It can be creative when it feels like it, but often it doesn’t bother. It just grinds you down instead, because it can. It has time, and there’s never a moment it’s not there, and it knows all your secrets, because it’s inside you, and it will never let you get away.”

Something heavy and rubbery slithered over her. It too, was covered in something warm, wet and sticky.

It moved across her body, and no matter how she kicked and tried to crawl away from it, it stayed stuck to her. She knew, despite the darkness, she knew what it was. It was the suit, and it had changed its movements now, crawling up her legs, enveloping her. The worst part was that it felt wonderful.

At least it wouldn’t be able to get over her arms. Not with the cuffs in the way.

The cuffs fell open. Which made no sense. She had to be dreaming. She’d fallen, and hit her head, and she was lost in some crazy nightmare. That had to be it.

She screamed at the top of her voice. “Dan! Please. This might be my last chance.”

“Where are you? Cordelia? Cordelia?” He could barely be heard. His desperate whispers sounded so desperate. So sad. So alone. “Why aren’t you answering?”

The gloves were on her hands, sleeves slithering up her arms. But her hands were free. Free! She tried to push away the suit that was tasting her, like some giant wet tongue that had found its favorite flavor, licking her body all over.

But her hands were numb, her fingers wouldn’t answer her. Instead of pushing the suit away, they tugged and pulled at it, making things worse. They wouldn’t do what she wanted, and before she could try again, it was on her.

She felt the cups on the front suck her breasts into place, enveloping them, touching them all over.They suckled onto her nipples, sending shivers through her body. It felt like a thousand tiny massaging nubs, squirming, teasing, biting. She shrieked at the pain, at the pleasure. She longed for its touch, though it wasn’t enough. If she was dreaming, it was one nightmare after another.

The zip clicked closed, tooth by tooth, the sound growing louder as it approached the top.

She tried to shout for Dan, but the hood was on her face, smothering her, sliding into place. Her mouth wouldn’t move the way she wanted. Like before, like when Jessica had pulled that trick, she couldn’t resist, she was moving, but the movements weren’t her own. She was just a puppet, the suit moving the body and not the other way around.

It fastened on the chastity belt, and then the corset. The last two items went quickly with the help of her eager, helpful hands.

The black-light light flickered back on.

Dan was right in front of her, his face an enigma, just an emotionless rubber mask.

“Cordelia?” he whispered through his little breathing hole.

She tried to answer him, but her mouth just grinned instead, showing him her teeth.

* * * * *

Her laughter hissed between her teeth. Dan was standing, staring at her in horror.

Even with his eyes hidden, even with the mask, unlike Cordelia, she could see the fear in every part of his body. A trickle of urine dribbled down his leg. The poor thing was terrified. It would have been nice to see his face, but she could feel his fear perfectly well without it. She could have homed in on it from the other room, just from the taste.

She took the leash from the clothes rack, clipped it onto the padlock on Dan’s collar. Dan? Dan really wouldn’t do as the name for a pet rubber dolly. Danni. Yes, Danni would be better. It would be weeks of fun teaching her to respond only to her proper name. She would leave just enough of his personality intact for him to keep loving Cordelia, enough to remind her who he was, and that she was to blame for his unending misery, and that despite her betrayals, he would still give himself to her.

She gave the leash a tug, and the helpless maid stumbled forward, clumsy and awkward in those pretty shoes, hobbled to a zombie shuffle by the bar between her ankles.

She clicked her tongue. “You’ve been such a dirty girl. Wetting yourself, embarrassing yourself. It reflects on me you know? You are going to get such a beating, you won’t be able to sit down for a week.”

The maid whimpered, struggling uselessly against the leash. Another tug, and she had no choice but to follow. “Not that I have any intention of letting you laze around, a maid should always be ready at attention. You’ll have to learn to sleep on your feet young lady. Discipline builds character you know?”

Once again, the maid whimpered, this time even more piteously than before.

She smiled to herself, and took a deep breath through her nose. She could smell the delicious fear, so invigorating. She clipped the free end of the leash onto the chain dangling from the remaining ceiling hook, and swapped the spreader bar for a hobble chain that would allow the maid move more quickly.

As she worked, she gloated over her success.

Being Jessica had been fun for the first year or so, but after four, the girl was just a shell, every shred of hope she’d possessed torn away, and there’d been nothing precious left to take from her. It was still possible to punish and terrorize her, but without any hope remaining, it was a hollow pleasure, a mere subsistence diet.

Cordelia had so much more, boundless optimism, generosity, a loving family, close friends who genuinely cared for her, and of course, the pathetic maid, who adored her. Ruining them, or taking them away from her, little by little turning her treasures into curses, would be wonderful, torturing them all, divine, such a feast, so many delights. But it was Cordelia’s mental resilience, her ability to bounce back from failure, catastrophe, and trauma that made her such a cornucopia. After three years of increasingly slim pickings, finally, the all-you-can-eat buffet had arrived.

It had been worth the waiting, and the difficulty, to get this one. Even though it had taken years to finally lure her in, meticulously sabotaging her marriage, turning her on to rubber, getting her onto the forum. Then, at the last minute, Danni has shown up, unplanned, though not unhoped for, adding the seasoning of a loved one as a victim and hostage. It was art, pure art.

Cordelia and Danni had set the foundations, provided the inspiration, but it still hadn’t been easy to get them together so quickly, she’d had to spoof some of their private messages to each other, to push things along, and the airport meeting had required so many variables to be manipulated into place.

It would be amusing now, to pretend to let her back in control, then do something that disgusted her, let her think it was her own idea, or her bad temper, or her carelessness, or her desperate, uncontrollable senseless lust. It was possible to build up their guilt for a while that way, wear down their self-worth, but they always caught on eventually, began to second and third guess themselves, struggling against their fate, trying make bargains, pleading for redemption, or forgiveness, or just a moment’s peace.

Cordelia, silly Cordelia had already soiled herself, with her readiness to kill. Without that mistake, she might have remained out of reach. Her willingness to deal, to offer anything if she had to, it was expected, but nonetheless, if she hadn’t behaved true to type, she might have got away.

Once they understood resistance was possible, if only in theory, that was when the real games started. Once they grasped their situation, and fought against it, resistance could be punished in so many ways.

Jessica, had developed a phobia of blood and sharp objects over the years, not surprising given how things had started for her. Building on that theme during their relationship had made that fear into something delightful. When she’d been stabbing Zeb, and reveling in his blood, the real Jessica was shrieking helplessly, trapped, helpless in her own head, paralyzed with revulsion, and terror. It took tricks like that to get any joy out of Jessica.

But a need for esoteric pleasures like those, was years away with Cordelia. For a while, the joys would be crude, bright and fresh, full of vibrancy, as she took her first wobbling steps on the road to ruin and damnation.

Zeb had been a tasty rush of negativity. He’d probably live, but he’d never be the same again. That gut wound would turn bad, and he’d spend the rest of his life on a restricted diet, stinking of shit, limping, stuttering, paranoid, ever nervously checking over his shoulder. Somebody had to be the example that pushed Cordelia to desperate action. Easily digested darkness like his was like eating too much sugar, but it gave her strength, and she’d needed that boost to take Cordelia by force.

She prized the blade from Jessica’s dead hand, licked it clean, and slotted it down into her busk. It only took a moment to find Jessica’s keys stashed down the back of one of the seats. Her car was parked near the fire-exit. There was no need for Cordelia’s things, somebody was sure to find them once the investigation into Jessica’s death began. That would be interesting.

She stepped over the blood covered corpse in the center of the room, unhooked the chain, and yanked her pet towards her. They’d never connect the bodyback to Jessica’s current identity.

“Come along now Danni, it’s time to go home.”

She gave another tug on the leash, and pushed open the door.

Everything she needed was already perfectly prepared at Jessica’s. The dungeon would see so much more use with a full-time occupant. She could even get rid of Aneka’s dismembered body from the freezer, and use the space for new victims. Yes. An all you can eat buffet. Delicious.

Cordelia would need a make-over though. Hair dyed red, eyebrow threading, white SNS nails, and dentistry, most important of course. Her uneven teeth would never do. She was a little overweight, but that would be fine, her dolly loved her that way, and she had the build to get away with it.

30.10.17