Suffer the Flesh

Epilogue

A month had passed since the end of her ordeal, and Zoey was back in New York, trying to organize her life. Trying to make sense of it all.

December now, close to Christmas. When not in therapy or visiting a myriad collection of doctors and specialists, she spent time at Rockefeller Center, gazing at the seventy-foot tree decorated with tens of thousands of tiny lights. It gave her comfort somehow; amid the crowds of Manhattan, she found peace and solitude. Felt safe surrounded by vast numbers, and felt safer still in open, unrestricted areas.

Her cell phone rang. Detective Ambrose, the one who had headed the investigation. “James was indicted today.”

“So I heard.”

“Want to hear the list of charges?”

“Not really.” She closed her eyes and leaned against the back of the bench. She wished James was out of her life once and for all, although she knew that would never happen. James and his staff of torturers were an indelible part of her past, and would be heady ghosts in her future. Kevin, however, was never arrested. Zoey had allowed him to escape.

A wet, frigid breeze whipped her cheeks. She pulled the corners of her jacket closer together.

“So far we’ve arrested two of the three men who fled. We have leads on the third, Zachary Williams. His associates are squealing like stuck pigs. We have reason to believe he’s in Chicago.”

“That’s good work,” she said. There’d been a media circus when Zoey and the others had been rescued. Reporters dogged her around the clock, staking out her apartment, following her shopping or heading to appointments. A few of the other survivors gave interviews, and Jessica and Marie had even appeared on Dateline, but Zoey avoided it. Some were calling her a hero, a title she felt uncomfortable with.

“Paul, did they ever find my file? Did James mention what he’d done with it?”

James, it was revealed, was a filthy rich sociopath with little to do with his money. He’d been running his torture chamber for years, his employees either paid obscene amounts of money or blackmailed and threatened into compliance. Of the hundreds of women who had been kidnapped from up and down the eastern seaboard, and that he’d maintained files on, very few had ever resurfaced, dead or alive. Those few who survived worked for him—Robin, Mel, and the woman who had called herself Dr. Chambers and introduced Zoey to the horrors through a quasi-medical exam.

The underground complex he’d built five years earlier was nestled in the Adirondack Mountains, on a tract of land he owned, thirty miles from the nearest highway or dirt road. Densely adorned with trees, rocks, and wildflowers, the terrain didn’t attract skiers. Didn’t attract much of anyone, except for the occasional hiker.

“He told us he never touched your file, or Claudia’s. There were four files missing, of all the women being held prisoner at the time.”

“Four?” Ice skaters kept time with the organ music billowing from loudspeakers below the café. Dusk, Rockefeller Plaza. A light snow touched down, coating the city in a layer of baby powder.

“Yours, and Claudia, Jessica, and Marie.”

James must have had something nasty in store for them, to have singled them out that way. She’d wondered why she’d been sent to the Nursery when her experience with the visitors could have been so much less severe, especially since he had claimed to like her. He had to have moved the files before the visitors took over, because he’d been beaten and restrained after the coup. The missing files belonged to the four women who had attacked, who had fought back, the four who had saved the others. It could have been that James knew who his real adversaries were. But why remove the files? For what purpose?

When she hung up with the detective she called Claudia, who was back home in Saratoga Springs, taking some time off before returning to the police force.

“Hey, it’s Zoey. How are you holding up?”

Claudia sighed, cleared her throat. “You know how it goes. Hanging in there. How about you? Zoey, what did your doctor say?”

Her gynecologist had treated the extensive damage. It had taken two Xanax to get Zoey’s feet in the stirrups. “Punctured colon, severe lacerations. She thinks my uterus isn’t damaged. Not for the long term, anyway. They expect me to fully recover.”

“That’s wonderful news. My burns are healing, and my docs have given me a clean bill of health too. Hey—did you see my interview in The News?

Zoey laughed. “I bought ten copies. You were wonderful! Listen, have you heard from Jess or Marie lately?”

“Not in a few days. Why?”

“Just wondering how they are.” She was wondering about their missing files. “How’s Tamara doing?”

Tamara, back in Baltimore. Recovering from her puncture wounds, palms and ankles torn and shredded, veins ruptured, severe tissue damage. Years’ worth of recovery. “Still in the hospital, Zoey. Probably another month at least. Uh, Zoey…?”

When Claudia didn’t continue, Zoey whispered, “Yes?”

There was another pause. “Kim died this morning.”

“Oh, no…” Zoey muttered, tears splashing her cheeks, falling to the ground when she bowed her head. God, not Kim. They’d been through so much together. “But her wound…” she said, choking on the words, trying to spit them out before it became impossible. “The gunshot wasn’t that bad.”

“I’m so sorry, Zoey. For all of us. Kim lost too much blood, and then the wound got infected. She also had severe internal damage.”

“I’d better go,” Zoey whispered, unable to stop the tears now. Before hanging up, she said to Claudia, “I want to thank you again for the care package. It was an incredible thing for you—”

But she couldn’t finish the sentence. Had thanked Claudia before for the gift, had asked her if she’d get into trouble for sending Zoey something like that. Claudia had told her it was untraceable.

She doubled over she sobbed into her coat, trying to protect herself from curious stares from passersby.

“My pleasure, hon,” Zoey heard her say. “Please take care of yourself. And be careful.”

“You too,” she squeaked, unable to say another word.

The subway home during the rush hour commute was packed. Just the way Zoey wanted it. She exited the N train station and headed toward her apartment a few blocks away. The streets in her Queens neighborhood were relatively empty compared to Manhattan. The dusting of snow had chased everyone inside except for the smattering of children trying in vain to form snowballs from the loose powder.

Inside her apartment, she turned on the TV. News reports of her ordeal were scarcer now compared to when the news broke but occasionally appeared, particularly when there was something newsworthy.

Such as James’s indictment.

“James Price, the alleged ringleader of last month’s kidnap-torture scandal was arraigned today on charging including kidnapping, rape, and torture. He faces the death penalty if convicted.

“As many as fifteen men and women have been charged in connection with the underground torture chamber, which was discovered in the Adirondack Mountains. Eighteen women were rescued, most suffering from severe abuse. One woman, Kimberly

Solomon, died earlier today from complications sustained during her ordeal.”

James on the screen, sitting in court, his still-battered face looking solemn, his hands bandaged.

Zoey lay on the bed on top of the blankets. Too early to call it a night, just resting her eyes. Impossible sometimes to relax. Images assaulted her desire to forget, to get on with her life. Her hand caressed the pillow, and she smiled when she remembered what was beneath it. Sleep had been fleeting but she was exhausted, and she dozed.

Pressure on her body woke her, and she panicked, believing for one horrible moment that the escape had been part of an elaborate dream, that she was still underground in the torture chamber.

She shook her head and blinked, tried to focus her eyes in a room lit only by the streetlight outside the bedroom window.

Zack was sitting on her stomach.

She threw her hands up to protect herself and push him away.

He punched her in the face.

“Fucking bitch,” he snarled, hitting her again. “Do you know who you fucked with? Do you?” His hands wrapped around her neck.

She tried to pry his fingers away, punched at his arms, kicked her legs up. Reached forward until her fingers found his face and dug them into his eyes.

He yelled, released her, clutched his wound. “You cunt!”

She knocked him off and scrambled away, but he caught her leg.

She looked up, caught the glint of metal just before he plunged it into her side. The pain was excruciating, filled her body with razored claws of heat.

He pulled out the knife. She dragged herself toward the pillow. Felt the knife stab her thigh. Screamed in agony.

“Die, you fucking bitch!” He tried to pull her toward him but she kicked free. He struck again but missed, tearing open the mattress instead.

Finally she reached the pillow, groped beneath it, wrapped her fingers around Claudia’s gift.

He flipped her onto her back, straddled her, and with the knife in both hands he raised his arms overhead. Just as he drove it into her stomach she pulled the trigger, blowing away most of Zack’s stunned expression.

Blood bubbled out of her mouth, gushing from gashes on her body. Sobbing, reached for the phone. So weak… barely able to reach it. Picked up the receiver and listened. No dial tone.

“God…” she groaned, vomiting blood. Fell to her hands and knees on the floor, crawled toward the living room. Cell phone on the coffee table. Thick gore trailed her across the room.

She’d gotten him. Knew she’d probably saved Jess, Claudia, and Marie from the maniac. Knew they would have been next. She smiled, suddenly feeling no pain, feeling instead a comfortable warmth, like being immersed in a soothing bath.

Punched 911 on the cell phone keypad. “Need… help…” she muttered, leaning against the sofa, life’s blood escaping through fingers pressed against her stomach.

Couldn’t talk anymore, even when the dispatcher asked her questions. “Don’t hang up the phone. Help is on the way. Can you hear me?”

Zoey dropped the phone. Closed her eyes, the hint of a smile on her lips.

She was finally free.