Chapter Four: Where Are You Going, Said Meet-on-the-Road

A few hours later I was walking out of the school gates reflecting that life could definitely be worse. Maddy and I were becoming firm friends and I seemed to get on well enough with her immediate circle. I know I wasn’t at school to make friends but it was better than the alternative. Also it meant I didn’t have the added hurdle of trying to persuade Vincent to date a complete social outcast.

Most tangible of today’s achievements, I was carrying an apple and rhubarb crumble which I’d made in Domestic Science class and was now bearing home in triumph to Mrs Turnbull. We could have it for dessert , meaning I wouldn’t have to make a dessert this evening – frequently one of my chores. Mrs Turnbull was very traditional about chores for girls. Russell had chores too, but his mostly involved helping Mr Turnbull rake leaves or chop logs for the fire.

It seemed very unfair; I was only a few hundred yards from home and had suffered nothing worse than the discovery that it was very difficult to stop your skirt riding up when you were holding a crumble when a large figure stepped out of the patch of scrubby thorn bushes and woodland that bordered the road causing me to jump and send my culinary masterpiece crashing to the ground!

“You!”

“Yeah, me. “ said Mr Tait, scumbag, pervert and worst of all, muscle for The Organisation, whose bulldog jowled face I had hoped never to see again.

“Come with me.” He gestured into the patch of wood from which he had emerged like a low rent version of Banquo’s Ghost.

“Why?” I was still shocked but not so shocked that I’d forgotten to mistrust everything this guy did and said.

“Because I got a message for you. Because I got this and because I’m telling you to, you stupid cow.”

‘This’ was a flat black box a little smaller than a man’s palm with a button on it and the sight of it told me I was beaten. All he had to do was press that button and I would be in mind-scrambling, wordless, screaming agony for as long as he chose. Silently I abandoned the sad remnants of my afternoon’s work on the pavements and followed Mr Tait into the woods –an activity any girl in her right mind would normally be well advised to avoid. Although I didn’t want to admit it, and certainly wasn’t planning to show it I was afraid. Being groped this morning had well and truly reminded me that I was vulnerable in new and different ways now that I was female.

We stopped behind a little cluster of thorn trees maybe a foot or two higher than a tall man – quite enough to hide us from the road.

“Now what do you want?” You may have twigged that Mr Tait and I did not get on. Of all The Organisation’s minions I’d met he was the only one who I had every reason to suspect did this out of choice. Everyone else I knew or suspected had been put under intolerable pressures. Tait, I was pretty sure, did this because he enjoyed tormenting people. Of course, I may have been misjudging him.

“Kneel down first, slut.” Then again, maybe I wasn’t.

“Why?”
I hit the ground shrieking before he turned the Pain off.

“That’s why.”

I struggled to my knees.

“That’s better. You look way prettier that way, bitch.”

Did I mention that when I was first captured I’d put Tait down for the count with a blow to solar plexus? Something told me he was still holding a grudge. When I’d been waiting to be ‘deflowered’ on the orders of The Organisation he’d volunteered and been prevented by one of his colleagues in a public and humiliating way. I suspected he was still holding a grudge for that as well.

“I’m not a bitch.” Risky, but Tait was making my skin crawl. I had to say something.

“Yeah, you are. You’re a bitch to me and a whore for everyone else. I know you spread your legs for Elliott.” I flushed. Technically true, though not by the choice of either of us. Geordie Elliott was as trapped by threats to his children as I was by the Pain and the new body that had been forced upon me.

“The alternative was being tortured to death. And he was still way nicer about it than you. What do you expect? Do you think I could ever like you? Just give me the damn message!”

“There is no message from The Organisation. Just one from me. You’re a whore. They’ve been too soft with you and if you don’t get put in your place you’re going to fuck this mission up. It’s time to learn that mouth of yours isn’t for speaking. You know what to do whore, so do it.” He pulled his trouser zip down.

I was trembling with fear and disgust now. I’d once been strong enough and fast enough to flatten this man but that was when I was the salesman and martial artist Adam Bell not the schoolgirl April May and worse, before I’d had the implant that meant one press of a button could render me helpless and agonised. I calculated the chances of getting to my feet and disabling him before he could press the button. On a generous estimate, no chance at all. Shuddering, I reached forward to free a thick, stubby organ from Mr Tait’s pants, opened my mouth, winced at the thought of the taste – and prepared to bite down hard!

As it happened, I was saved by a whirlwind. A furious, screaming whirlwind in the form of a thorny branch lashing directly into Mr Tait’s face again and again in a frenzy driven by the stick thin arms of – Russell.

I was being rescued by my thirteen year old foster brother and as I struggled to adjust Mr Tait fell backwards, the black box flying off into a thicket of brambles and undergrowth. The branch Russell had chosen wasn’t thick or heavy enough to deliver a knockout blow, even if it had been in stronger hands but it was well equipped with thorns and spines and spiky twigs and a length of trailing bramble caught up in it only made matters better. As Russell struck again and again with hysterical strength Mr Tait’s face was becoming invisible under scores of tiny rivulets of blood. He wasn’t going to be happy about this. If he made it up I was in real danger – and so was Russell.

I scrambled to my feet, tights torn to ribbons and grabbed Russell by his shoulders.

“Stand back, stand back, or you’ll hit me.”

That was the only thing I could think of that might cut through Russell’s berserker frenzy and it did, if only for a couple of seconds of confusion. I used those seconds to step ahead of him and balance my entire weight one legged on the narrow edge of my wedge heel, right on top of Tait’s package. I’m not sure quite what he said but I think dogs could have heard it clearly.

“Next time you call me a whore, remember you’re not even fit to be a pimp!” I spat and then turned to flee, Russell and I supporting each other.
OK, it was more him supporting me. I don’t know how that undernourished, frail body of his did it, half hysterical and exhausted by reaction as he was. Tears were pouring down both our cheeks and I had to stop to be sick before we reached the road. God knows what I looked like but for once that was the least of my problems.
Now I had to worry about Russell.

Russell had done a truly heroic thing, in the face of potential death or serious injury, this neglected, unloved child who, before the Turnbull’s had never had so much as an example of decent behaviour, never mind heroism, in his entire life

Russell deserved thanks. He deserved a medal. He deserved anything he wanted. And I was going to have to hurt him, because what he wanted was me. I was the princess of his imaginings and he’d just been a genuine White Knight and rescued me. Everyone knows what happens next. I had to nip this in the bud before his heart got broken, because I couldn’t, for a thousand reasons, starting with the fact that he was only thirteen and including the fact that if he interfered with their plans for me to seduce Vincent The Organisation wouldn’t hesitate to do to him what they had done to me. If I hadn’t been crying already, the cruelty of it would have made me weep.

“Russell!” I grasped him firmly by the shoulders and looked him in the eye. “Russell, look at me and listen. You’re a hero, Russell. That was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen, so much so that I’m scared. You mustn’t ever put yourself in danger like that again.”
“April, I had to, I saw him lure you off the road when I was walking from the bus stop. I love you, April.”
“I know. And I love you too. As my foster-brother. You saved me Russell, and I’ll always love you. But as a sister. I can’t be anything else to you.”
“But-“
“I know, it’s not fair. But you’re a hero Russell. You always will be one of the good guys. In a year or two girls will be old enough to recognise that and they’ll be flocking around you. Trust me, I’m a girl, I know these things.”
Liar. You know nothing sneered my inner voice.
I know I will help Russell, whatever it takes. If that means I have to teach him the social skills to get a girlfriend his own age from scratch, I will. I’ll start by spreading rumours about how he saved me. What kind of salesman can’t sell a hero to adolescent girls?

“I love you, April!” He repeated.

“I love you too. You’re my hero Russell. My brother, who saved me. But next time, call the police before you go charging in against four times your weight.”

“I did. I called them on the cellphone Mrs Turnbull gave me for emergencies. They should be here any minute.”
Sure enough sirens could be heard in the distance. Two cars, driven fast. We hugged, and I cried again. The crew of one car went to search the woods while Russell and I staggered into the second and went home to face the music.

“Russell saved me!” were the first words out of my mouth as the police escorted us through the Turnbull’s front door, scratched, tear stained, the ragged remains of my tights falling around my ankles, so while, after the police had finished interviewing me, I had to endure long lectures on the sheer stupidity of allowing a stranger to lure me into a deserted place, Russell got the full measure of praise due to his heroism from the police and the Turnbulls both.
I had to think on my feet, mind you. Russell had seen me go with Mr Tait so I couldn’t simply claim he’d dragged me off the street. I had to tell them that he’d told me there was somebody fallen unconscious into a creek and he needed help dragging them out before they drowned. At least I got credit for being good-hearted if a bit gullible. ‘Well meaning airhead’ was the phrase I heard one of the police officers say when he thought I couldn’t hear. ‘Silly goose!’ was the one Mrs Turnbull used. I swear, who calls anyone a goose in this day and age?!

The upshot of it all was that Russell and I both got wrapped in blankets and fed hot, sweet tea and then I was sent to bed early in disgrace! Whether you count from my real age of twenty-one or my official age of seventeen that’s still bang out of order. I would have protested, but after the day I’d had I suddenly realised that a warm bed and an early night sounded like paradise. An hour later, as I sat sipping hot cocoa in my nightie, warmly surrounded by the sea of frills the Turnbulls considered suitable for a girl’s bedclothes Russell popped his head round the door.

“Can I come in?”

“Of course, come over here.” I patted the surface of the bedcovers.

“I just wanted to check how you were.” He said, perching on the edge of the bed.

“I’m perfect. Home and safe and happy, thanks to you.”
Russell coloured with pleasure and embarrassment, but looked awkward. No one had taught him how to cope with compliments. Given his family background, maybe he’d never had any.

“April, what you said earlier –“
“I can’t, Russell. I know what you’re going to ask and I can’t. Even if I could think of you like that it would simply be wrong.” On more levels than I can possibly explain.

“Besides, you aren’t going to need an old bag like me. Soon there will be plenty of girls flocking around you.” I smiled at him.

“Girls my age don’t – I – they don’t seem to talk to me much.” Russell mumbled looking down at the bedpane.

“They will. You can’t force these things or rush them, but they will, and I’ll help with tips. Consider me your spy behind girl lines.” We both smiled at that. “Now I’m going to collapse. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Goodnight April.” I kissed him on the cheek as he got up to go and he walked out of the room floating on air. Good! He’d earned it. And I’d earned sleep. After I dug my mobile out of my bag and called The Organisation. On the second ring Miss Erinye picked up.
“April.”

“Miss Erinye. I thought the Dacres wanted their property untouched. Is there something about this assignment I haven’t been told?”

“No. But you may have been told something which wasn’t true. I know Tait approached you this afternoon. I know that he has been arrested and is now whinging for me to pull strings to get him out. Now suppose you tell me what I don’t know.”
So I did.

“Very well. I will get him out.”
“What? I thought he was acting without orders, against his instructions?

“He is. That is why I am going to get him out. I can do much, much worse than the police can. Treachery is the one thing The Organisation will never tolerate.”
It’s nice to know you draw the line somewhere I thought.
“Can I ask what you’re going to do? I’d like to feel safe walking the streets?” Safe from Tait anyway, I’m starting to realise I may never feel safe walking the streets as a small girl in a short skirt. Or a short girl in a small skirt, or, oh, whatever.

“I assure you the former Mr Tait will never be seen on a street in this hemisphere again. I won’t tell you exactly what I’m going to do, because you sound tired and I don’t want to give you nightmares.” And with that she hung up. I could guess part of it by the reference to the former Mr Tait. I shuddered a little. For all the adjustments I’d managed I still wouldn’t wish this fate on my worst enemy. Which Tait probably was. Enough. Time for sleep.

As I drifted off my very last thought was to hope that tomorrow wasn’t quite as busy!