Shaun Hutson - Captives

The smell of excrement hit him immediately, but he was able to ignore the stench; his attention was rivetted to the body of the man slumped against the far wall of the cell.

He was in his thirties, Dexter knew, but a stranger would have found it impossible to guess at his age.

His face looked as though someone had been across it in all directions with a cheese-grater. His skin hung in bloodied ribbons from bones which were visible in places through the crimson mess. The front of the grey overall he wore was soaked with gore and, as Dexter moved closer to kneel beside the man, he noticed a thick, reddish-pink piece of matter lying in the man's lap. A glance at his open mouth revealed that the reddish-pink lump was the end of his tongue. He'd bitten through it, severing it. His teeth, visible because what remained of his shredded lips were stretched back in a rictus, were also coated with crimson. It looked as if he'd been using scarlet mouthwash. One eye, torn from its socket, dangled by the slender thread of the optic nerve. It rested neatly on his mangled cheek, the orb fixing Dexter in a sightless stare.

The doctor looked down at the man's hands and saw that the fingers were drenched with blood, strips of flesh, some two inches long, stuck beneath the nails. He had used his fingernails like claws on his own face, gouged his own eye from its socket.

Colston, standing in the doorway, was aware almost for the first time of the uncanny silence that reigned over the rest of the ward. It was as if the other occupants were in silent mourning.

'The same as the others,' he said quietly.

Dexter nodded and got to his feet, the expression on his face one not of sadness but of anger. He looked at Colston.

'I want a report on my desk by the morning,' he said. Then he looked back at the shredded features of the man, blood beginning to congeal in the wounds. 'We have to know.'

SEVENTEEN

He gripped the headboard and thrust harder into her, each motion of his hips accompanied by a grunt.

Ray Plummer smiled down at her as he penetrated her, gritting his teeth in concentration, his efforts enlivened when he saw the look of pleasure on Carol Jackson's face.

She gasped and raised her legs, hooking them around the small of his back, raising her buttocks to allow him deeper penetration. She began to rotate her hips gently, coaxing him towards the climax she knew was close.

Come on, for Christ's sake get it over with.

She moaned loudly, knowing that the sounds she made, coupled with the clenching of her vaginal muscles around his penis, would, as ever, bring him to climax quickly.

He was sweating profusely; as she ran her fingers up and down his back she felt their tips sliding through a sheen of perspiration.

Come on, Ray. You can't hold out much longer.

'That feels so good,' she cooed expertly. 'Do it faster.'

'Faster, slower,' he panted, trying to keep up his rhythm. 'Harder, softer. How do you want it?'

'All those ways,' she breathed.

Only just get a bloody move on and finish, will you?

She reached over and began to squeeze his testicles, stroking them gently, breathing ever more deeply, her exaggerated show of pleasure becoming more pronounced.

She felt him stiffen, felt his body tense.

'Oh yes,' she gasped with relief, knowing the time had arrived.

He thrust into her with one final, deep lunge and she felt his hot seed filling her, seeping from her vagina as he continued to pound away, his breath rasping in his throat.

She reached up to stroke his hair but he pushed her hand away, content that she should run her fingers up and down his back.

Get off me for Christ's sake.

He remained on top of her, his breathing gradually slowing.

'Jesus, that was good,' she gasped, her own breath coming in practised gasps.

He touched her cheek with his fingers and smiled a smile of accomplishment before finally rolling off her and lying exhausted on the bed, wiping perspiration from his forehead. Immediately she reached for the tissues beside the bed and began mopping up the warm fluid seeping from between her legs.

'Leave it,' he said breathlessly, watching as his semen trickled through her pubic hair.

She rolled onto her side and began stroking his chest.

'It's all right for you,' she said. 'You don't have to sleep in the wet patch.'

He laughed humourlessly.

'You should be used to it by now,' he muttered, holding her chin between his thumb and forefinger.

I've done it to you enough times.

She moved away from him slightly and laid her head on his chest, listening to his heart pounding, closing her eyes in relief that it was over for another night.

'Felt good, didn't it?' he said, his tone self-con-gratulatory.

'Yes,' she lied.

She could feel his semen oozing uncomfortably over her thighs but she tried to ignore it, knowing that he would be asleep soon. Then, as she usually did, she would slip out of bed while he was snoring like a fog-horn and take a shower. Wash it all away. For now she lay where she was, aware that he was twisting her long hair around his fingers. Occasionally he would tug a little too hard and she would wince but she said nothing, content to let him play his little games.

It was warm inside the flat. In contrast, her own place was like a fridge. All she had to keep her warm was a two-bar electric fire close to the bed. Plummer's penthouse apartment was fully central-heated. In the large sitting room he even had an open fireplace full of mock logs. She would often sit gazing into the gas flames late at night while he slept, tracing shapes in them, wondering if some of those shapes were the shape of her future.

The flat itself was one of a group of four in Kensington, not too far from Kensington High Street. She knew that the other people who lived as Plummer's neighbours were well off. One was a lawyer, another a judge. She wasn't sure what the woman who owned the bottom flat did. Something in the City, she thought. It was ironic that a man of Plummer's means should be sharing the building with two people who, effectively, worked on the opposite side of the law to him. The apartment was worth, Plummer had told her (repeatedly), around three quarters of a million. He owned two houses in Belgravia as well, both of which were in the process of being converted into flats. He fancied himself as a landlord.

He reached across and picked up his glass of Jack Daniels, tiring of his game with Carol's hair. She heard the sound of his expensive ring clinking against expensive crystal as he picked the glass up. He took a sip and then swung himself out of bed.

'Where are you going?' she wanted to know.

'Don't be so nosey,' he told her, disappearing into the en suite bathroom. He emerged a moment later carrying a small rectangular box which he held out to her. As she took it from him she noticed that the lid of the box bore the legend: GARRARDS JEWELLERS.

He sat down on the edge of the bed and watched her open it.

The pendant was solid gold, twice the size of a thumbnail. The light from the bedside lamp caught it and sent golden beams radiating from it.

Carol opened her mouth in awe as much as surprise.

'It's beautiful,' she said, not taking her eyes from the velvet lined box and its costly contents.

'Put it on,' said Plummer, watching as she took it from the box and fastened it around her neck. It hung invitingly between her breasts. 'Do you like it?'

'Thank you, Ray. It's gorgeous,' she told him, touching his cheek with her fingertips. She stroked his hair, but again Plummer pushed her hand away.

'I got it today,' he said, reclining on the bed, not bothering to cover his flaccid penis. 'Probably cost more than you earn in a year.' He smiled.