21

THE ROOM stank of damp, and scuffling and scuttling noises coming from the semi-darkness indicated that Jim and Vanessa were not alone.

The hostages were gagged, bound and strapped to chairs. Only the flame flickering from a small candle on a table at the side of the room provided any illumination. It was a scene worthy of anyone’s worst nightmares. Fraser tried to provide some kind of encouragement to Vanessa with a strangled smile but saw that it was a waste of energy, failing to have any impact on the sobs racking Vanessa’s body.

He looked at the old brickwork walls and what he could make of the ceiling. Despite the agony of his headache he took in every possible detail of their environment and had a feeling that they were underground. His last memory had been of the lights going well and truly out before he was presumably slammed in the boot of the car.

The men had spoken mainly in Arabic when they had taken the hostages. Their English, although spoken in a thick accent, was better than half the population of Glasgow’s, thought Fraser with bitterness.

He returned his gaze to Vanessa’s dishevelled and swollen features. Fraser’s mind flashed back to their passion earlier that day. A rendezvous that had promised so much and now would have disastrous implications for both of them even if they escaped with their lives.

Vanessa had been so beautiful, the object of all his desires. He had hoped the rendezvous might develop into an ongoing affair. What he couldn’t understand was just how the gang had found out about their liaison. Who had tipped them off?

Fraser was also still in the dark over where Vanessa had been taken earlier. Time was now a blur, but he believed they may have been held overnight and that this was the second day of their enforced captivity. The truth was, he could not be sure of anything.

Fraser ached with hunger but his determination to escape from this disaster burned even stronger within him. After all he wasn’t just anybody . . .

As a student he had once entertained ambitions of a career in the intelligence community although his lack of personal discipline, poor judgement and an opinionated mouth had rendered that no more than a pipe dream. Ironically, Fraser now supposed he would be relying on operatives from that very intelligence community to save their souls. This was way above the remit of Strathclyde Police.

Now he again tried to give a shred of comfort to Vanessa by rubbing his foot against hers, hoping the slight physical contact would somehow offer her a shard of solace. Sure enough it drew her attention to him and her eyes locked on his imploringly, searching for some reassurance. Just then the door burst open.

Fraser immediately focused on the man who entered the room. His face was unfamiliar but his voice was not and the councillor had no doubt that he had been one of the men who had taken him and Vanessa captive.

The man was carrying a tray with two bowls placed on it which he put on the table with the candle. The flame flickered with his movement. A squeal from the semi-darkness once again made the hostages aware that not all the occupants of the room were human.

The man, dark-haired and swarthy, strode over to Vanessa and removed her gag. Into the silence her sobs broke and as she opened her mouth the guard backhanded her with a vicious swing of his hand. The ferocity of the blow knocked her and the chair over and she crashed to the floor.

For a second Fraser thought the man was going to kick her, his face, flickering in the candlelight, providing a study in cruelty. Then he bent over Vanessa, grabbed her chin and spoke.

“You listen, bitch. You do what told, give me no trouble. If you are good girl you get bowl soup to drink. Understand?”

Lying on her side, still tied to the chair, Vanessa managed to croak “Yes.”

The man then pulled her to an upright position in the chair.

He moved towards the table returning with the bowl and held it to her lips. She drank hungrily, her desperation for liquid seeming to dull her senses to the scalding heat of the brown soup.

“Good bitch, good bitch,” said their captor. He removed the empty bowl and snapped the gag back in the lingerie tycoon’s mouth.

He replaced the bowl and returned to Fraser with the other one. Pulling the politician’s gag down he proffered the bowl. Fraser curled his mouth round the rim and drank, ignoring the sting coming from his burning lips. The soup registered as similar to the Oxtail soup his mother had made him drink as a kid.

As the guard removed the bowl Fraser spoke before his gag was snapped back. One word echoed out. “Why?”

The guard registered surprise at the question. He spoke in his mother tongue. “La ila ha illa llah.” He paused before translating in his thick English. “There is no god except the one God, infidel. You need have no worries because soon enough, dog, you will die. But first,” and he gestured at Vanessa, “you will watch your bitch die.” He drew his finger across his throat to leave the two hostages in no doubt of the fate that awaited them.

Fraser mustered the last shreds of self control and spat straight at his tormentor’s face. “Fuck you!” he rapped as the soup bowl smashed into his face and the lights went out for a second time.

As Fraser and his chair toppled over onto the uneven, stony floor the door to the room opened again and a voice resonating authority uttered one word. “Out.”

The guard left the room.

Vanessa stared at the door as it slammed shut behind their tormentor.

She looked over at Fraser lying inert in oblivion and a shiver of raw fear ran down her spine.