Chapter 11

 

Had she been drugged again, or had life simply devolved into such a hellish existence that her mind refused to operate at full capacity?

Madame had gone away. Gabrielle didn’t know where and didn’t know why. She rested one shoulder against a hay bale. She couldn’t feel the straw jabbing into her skin anymore, though she was sure she’d have marks from that too, if she survived the night.

Wait… what was that light shining through the cracks between wooden slats? Had the sun come up? Disappointment weighed heavy on Gabrielle’s heart. At night, she could hide her shame under cover of darkness. Now, when the daylight illuminated the many sins committed against her flesh, she couldn’t deny what kind of woman she’d become.

A willing victim. A captive whore.

Her asshole ached. She had to pee, so she did, all down the smooth skin of her calf. What difference did it make? She was dirty on the inside. Might as well be dirty on the outside, too.

When her nose itched, she reached up to scratch it before remembering her wrists were bound behind her back. She tried rubbing her nose against her shoulder, but she just couldn’t reach. The itch would drive her crazy.

A latch clicked and she thought, “Here I go, over the edge…”

She expected Madame’s heels to click-clack against the concrete. She was ready for anything, at that point. If the woman rode in naked like Lady Godiva, she wouldn’t have been surprised in the least. But when a dark-haired man peeked over the stall door, her shoulders shook.

“Who are you?” she asked. Her jaw hung loose and she had trouble closing her mouth.

When he unlatched the stall door, Gabrielle’s feet started moving of their own accord, sliding in loose hay. She pressed her shoulders back against one bale and then another, urging her body to stand. Alone, she’d nearly forgotten she was naked. As soon as that man’s blazing eyes found her flesh, she felt not only naked but inside-out. He could see everything about her. She was sure of it.

He stepped inside and stood by the door, which he didn’t latch. His skin was golden. His hair was slick. She tried not to think of him as handsome because she wasn’t sure what he might do to her.

“Don’t you know me?” he asked.

“Should I?” She gazed down at his dusty jeans, his leather shoes. He had on a threadbare T-shirt and held a pile of folded clothing against his chest. Wait… that was her clothing! The outfit she’d been wearing when she committed herself to this place. “Who are you? How did you get my stuff?”

“After everything that’s happened you really don’t know me? Look into my eyes.”

She couldn’t look away from her bundle of clothes. “That’s mine. I want it. Leave it here. Leave me alone.”

“You don’t know me?” he asked again. “You would if you looked deeper.”

Wait, she couldn’t put her clothes on if she was bound up. She wanted him to undo the leather straps that held her hands behind her back, but she also didn’t want to turn her back on him. “You need to let me go.”

“I will,” he said. “That’s why I’m here. Don’t you know who I am?”

“My guardian angel, I hope. Because if you’re real then you’re a man and I don’t have a lot of faith in men right now. Or women, for that matter. Humans generally. So you’d better be an angel.”

He chuckled and his voice was so warm and caring she felt it in her spleen. “I’m no angel, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to hurt you. I’ve done enough of that for one week.”

She did look at him, then. She looked into his eyes and let her gaze mingle with his. Yes, there was something familiar in there, like she knew him from a dream.

“You wanted to see me with my mask off. Well, here I am. The mask is gone. I’m no longer your beast, Gabrielle.”

Her heart beat uncomfortably slowly as she put the pieces together. “You know my name. You know my real name.”

He nodded. “I need to tell you something.”

“Give me my clothes. Untie my hands. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? To let me escape?”

“There’s a little more to it than that.”

When she heard those words, her heart wept. You can take the beast out of the mask, but you can’t take the beast out of the man.

“What now?” she asked. “Did Madame send you to stick pins in my eyes?”

He scrunched up his nose. “Eww. Gross. No, why would you… never mind. We don’t have a lot of time. Turn around.”

She did as he asked, putting her faith in him because she had nothing left. He’d failed her before, but she needed him now. “Do whatever you want to me. I honestly don’t care anymore. You and your lady friend broke my spirit.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Why? Isn’t that what you were going for?”

“No!” He set her clothes on a hay bale, gently, like he was laying an infant in its crib. “And she’s not my… anything.”

The unmasked beast worked the knots in the reins, pinching Gabrielle’s skin as he struggled to untie them. She bit her lip, trying not to make a sound, trying not to reveal any weakness after everything he’d put her through. But her flesh was cut and bruised and when the leather dug into her, she couldn’t help but gasp.

“Sorry,” the beast said. “Mme de Villeneuve is a pro with these things.”

“Yeah, no kidding.” Gabrielle wriggled and struggled against the binds.

“Stop moving.”

“But I want out.”

“I’m getting you out!”

“Go faster!”

“I’m…” He let go of the reins. “Look, do you want me to just leave?”

“No!”

“I’m trying to help. Don’t you trust me?”

“Hey, there’s a stupid question.”

She could feel his gaze burning into her naked back, but he did nothing for a moment. He didn’t even touch her.

“Keep going,” she said. “We don’t have all day.”

Without turning around, she could see his smirk. He untied her binds, let them fall to the floor, and then took a step back. “There. You’re free. Happy now?”

“No.”

The word just slipped out. Gabrielle had no idea where it came from.

“Look, your skin’s all scraped up. Let me clean those cuts before they get infected.”

The beast opened her stall door and left it like that as he stomped across the stables. She could have run. The barn door wasn’t locked. She could see it. It was still open a crack.

He wasn’t lying. This wasn’t a trick. He was really going to let her go.

“Who are you?” she asked, though it came out as an angry shout.

He returned to her with gauze and a bottle of iodine. “Fidel.”

“Fidel Castro?”

Rolling his eyes, he said, “Yes, you’ve been fucking Fidel Castro all week. Surprise!”

“He’s been fucking me,” Gabrielle grumbled, trying for a joke, but the memories of all that had happened left such mixed emotions in her heart that she really didn’t know how to feel.

Pouring iodine on the gauze, Fidel asked, “Is it okay if I touch you?”

“Now you ask.”

He gazed at her blankly, and his shoulders fell. Looking away, he said, “You signed the consent form. I thought you knew what you were getting into. I didn’t realize…”

“So that was meant to be therapy?” Gabrielle cocked her head, suddenly filled with rage, though not entirely sure why. “Does that mean you do this to other women too? I’m not the only one?”

With a sheepish chuckle, he said, “You’re the only one this week.”

“You bastard!” Gabrielle’s eyes filled with tears. “I said no and you didn’t listen. I said no and you did it anyway.”

“That’s the therapy,” he told her.

“But I shouldn’t have been here. I didn’t know. I mean, I…”

“You’re not Suzanne,” he said.

“That’s right.”

“You’re Gabrielle.”

“Right.”

She stared at him, and he returned her stalwart gaze. “Why did you get so mad when I tried to take off your mask? I thought you must be hideous, but you’re not. You’re really…” She stopped herself before she could say “handsome.”

“It was all part of the therapy. I’m supposed to represent your desire. My body’s a metaphor. I’m not supposed to be a real person, for you.”

“But how could you not be?”

“It’s therapy.”

“But you touched me,” she said, her voice quivering as it rose in anger. “I don’t go around sleeping with random men. When you touched me, it meant something. When you made that concert happen, it was like magic. You made me…”

…fall in love with you.

“Never mind,” she said, bitterly.

He didn’t apologize. He just held out the gauze and said, “Give me your arms. I want to clean out those wounds.”

“I can’t,” she growled.

“Come on. You just have to trust me.”

“I can’t!”

“I’m not going to bite you.”

“No, I mean I can’t move my arms. They’re stuck.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“So turn around, then.”

She looked into the same eyes she’d beheld in the grips of deadly fear, and saw them in a different light. “Who are you?”

He glanced away. “Looks like your chest is scratched too.”

“It’s from the hay,” she said. “I’m scratched all over.”

He hesitated.

“You can clean my chest for me, if you want.”

“I don’t want it to get infected,” he said, and brushed the gauze gently across her scraped-up skin.

“Ouch. Goddamn it!”

“Hurts?”

“Yes.”

“Sorry.”

She let him clean her wounds, despite the sting to her belly and breasts as he traced the iodine along her skin. As he helped her, she tried again. “Who are you really? You came in here without that mask, so you must be willing to tell me.”

“Turn around.” He grabbed her shoulder unexpectedly firmly and spun her around.

She wasn’t prepared for it. She fell forward, catching her knees on the hay bale. Still, she wouldn’t give up. “Why won’t you just say who you are? You don’t think I deserve to know? After everything you put me through?”

“Don’t blame me for that,” he said, though there was a trace of insecurity in his voice. “I was just doing my job.”

“Oh, were you?”

“Yes.” He traced a fresh pool of iodine down her forearm and she screamed bloody murder.

“Shut up! She’ll come out here. You want to get caught?”

Gabrielle whipped her head around. “You mean she seriously doesn’t know you’re letting me go?”

“No! Are you kidding? Mme de Villeneuve doesn’t take kindly to people who flee before their program is finished.”

“Oh my goodness.” Gabrielle suppressed the urge to howl as he traced gauze down her other arm. “What’ll she do to me?”

“Nothing as long as you actually escape the grounds. It’s not like she’ll come chasing after you. She…” Fidel looked shifty, now. He wouldn’t meet her gaze. “She can’t exactly do that.”

“Why not?”

“Well, she doesn’t know who you are, for starters. She thinks you’re this girl Suzanne.”

“I know. I played along. I shouldn’t have played along.”

“Yeah, why would you do that? This place is creepy as hell. Why would you want to stay here?”

“Why would you want to stay here?” Gabrielle shot back. “What’s so fucked up about you that you’re willing to rape people for a living?”

She expected him to get angry, but instead he said, “Thaaat’s… a fair question.”

“So what’s the answer?”

He ran the gauze all the way from her elbow to her wrist. “There. That should do the trick.”

“What’s the answer?” She wasn’t letting this guy off the hook.

With a sigh, he strode to the hay bale and picked up her clothes. “I just… I’ve always had a complex relationship with my mother.”

Gabrielle’s eyes bulged so hard she was amazed they didn’t fly out of her head. “Mme de Villeneuve is your mother?”

“Eww. No! Why would you… no!”

“Sorry! Jeeze.” Gabrielle tried to grab her clothing, but her arms remained locked. “Fidel?”

“Gabrielle?”

“Could you help me put on my clothes? I can’t…”

“Oh. Yeah. Sure.” He got down on his knees, spreading the waist of her black yoga pants open so she could step in inside.

“Fidel?”

“Yeah?”

“Underwear first.”

“Oh.” His cheeks reddened as he grabbed her panties from the stack.

The idea of him seeing her underwear made her feel ridiculously embarrassed, especially considering she was standing in front of him naked. She stepped into one hole and then the other. He pulled them up quickly, snapping the waistband around her waist. “Oww.”

“Sorry.”

“You still never told me why you’re here.”

Spreading her pants open in front of her, Fidel said, “I was a patient, just like you. But I earned my place. I deserved to be here.”

“You were an addict?” she asked, in a voice so small it barely squeaked out. “A sex addict?”

“No, not a sex addict. I was a junkie, but a high-functioning junkie. It was the eighties. Everybody did coke. It was like… work hard, party hearty.”

She put her left foot into her pants, and then paused. “Wait, the eighties? You must have been, like, ten years old.”

“No, no. I was thirty-three when I came here. That was right after the crash. 1987. My portfolio tanked bad. I lost investors millions. It was rehab or death.”

“Eighty-seven? I would have been like… a baby. How could you have been in your thirties?” Gabrielle shook her head as it filled with numbers. “Does that mean you’re in your fifties now? Or, wait… are you sixty years old?”

Fidel cocked his head. “I don’t know. I guess so. What year is it? Actually, don’t tell me. I like not knowing.”

“You’re in your sixties,” she said, flatly. “And you look like… that?”

He shrugged. “It’s complicated. Now put your other foot in these pants. We gotta get you out of here.”

She did as he asked, but when he tried pulling them up he couldn’t. She was stepping on them from the inside.

“You need to raise your feet. Here, put your hands on my shoulders.”

She tried swinging her arms forward, but the propulsion made her want to cry. “I can’t. It hurts too much.”

“Then lean your body forward.” He turned his head. “Rest your belly against my cheek.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“My cheeks have been between your thighs, princess. Come on. We’ve got to get you out of here.”

Gabrielle let herself fall gently until Fidel took her weight. She stepped up with one foot then the other. As he pulled her pants up her thighs, his warm breath made her skin tingle. She tried not to grin, but she couldn’t help herself. It felt good, being close to the beast unmasked.

“So you were a drug addict,” she said. “And Madame was your therapist?”

He nodded, knocking her breast with the top of his head. “Oops sorry. Yeah, she was. Things were different, back then. Maybe I was just young and inexperienced, but she didn’t seem as unstable as she does now.”

Gabrielle tried to ignore the lusty bounce of her breast, but all she could think about was feeling his tongue on her nipples. Shaking the thought away, she asked, “Inexperienced? What does that mean? Did she… experience you?”

Fidel grabbed her purple yoga top. “Is there a bra with this, or…?”

“It’s got a built-in bra,” she said, trying to point and regretting it. “Damn. My arms.”

“Can you raise them over your head?”

She tried, and stifled a scream. “No, no, no, no, no.”

“Okay. It’s okay. We’ll figure it out.” He hooked the top around her hand and slid it up her arm, then over her head.

“Umm…”

“What?”

One arm was trapped inside, and the built-in bra remained flipped up at the top of her chest. “I think we need some adjustments, here.”

“Oh yeah.”

She shook her head. “There’s no way you’re Freedom 55. Did you come to this place and never age a day?”

Fidel’s eyes widened, and Gabrielle felt hers do the same.

“Oh my god, that’s it. The house, the manor, whatever it’s called… it’s possessed or something. It’s stuck in time, isn’t it?”

Lowering his voice, Fidel adjusted Gabrielle’s top. “I don’t know all the details. All I know is the years went by and I never changed, and neither did Mme de Villeneuve. We had a thing when I first got here, yeah. She helped me see that my insecurities and addictions were rooted in that whole my-mother-was-a-cold-unaffectionate-bitch complex.”

“Unlike Madame Chuckles…”

“Well, yeah, but she let me see that I was projecting my need for my mother’s affection on to her. It was a long time ago.”

“Sounds like she’s still got you wrapped around her little finger.”

Fidel’s brow furrowed as he tugged Gabrielle’s arm through the slit in her yoga top. “I told you it was complicated. When we were together, I felt cured.”

“But she’s a therapist! She’s not supposed to cure you by having sex with you.”

“Well, I know that now.”

“Aren’t therapists supposed to have a better grasp on these things than their patients?”

“I don’t know. I thought she loved me. But as I watched what she did to you last night, I realized Madame de Villeneuve has got to be the least self-aware person in this building.”

Shame burned in Gabrielle’s core as Fidel pulled down the bra portion of her yoga top. “You saw what she did to me?”

He shook his head. “No wonder the staff left. That’s why she had to bring in the monkey butlers, I’m guessing. People were saying she was crazy even before I got here. Nobody would work with her. This place lost its certification ages ago. Still, I believed in Mme de Villeneuve, god only knows why.”

The answer was clear. “Love makes us so crazy we can’t recognize the real thing. We get swept up, swept away, and we start believing in miracles.”

“Yeah, well… I should have found something real to believe in.” Fidel’s eyes bulged, and he pulled a phone from his back pocket. “I almost forgot… oh shit, I meant to tell you this first.”

“That’s my phone!”

“Yeah, I found it in the parking lot. How else would I have known you really are who you say you are?”

“Hmm. Good question.” She hadn’t thought about that—she was just so relieved somebody believed her. “Here, give it.”

“Wait a sec, because I need to tell you something.”

“Tell me what?”

“You got a text message.”

“Wait, if you came here in the eighties how do you know how to work a cell phone?”

“I’ve seen cell phones before,” he said in exasperation. “People come here all the time. You’re not the only… look, be quiet and listen to me, okay?”

“It just seems kind of weird.”

Gripping her shoulders, he said, “Listen to me! Your father was in an accident.”

Gabrielle swallowed every bit of joy like a bitter pill. “What did you say?”

She swiped for her phone and he gave it to her. “You got a text from your sister, I guess, saying your dad’s car was hit. That’s why I’m letting you go. Madame will come after me when she finds you gone, but I don’t care. I never got to say goodbye to my parents. I can only assume they’re dead by now. I don’t want the same thing to happen to you.”

“So my dad is… he’s still alive? Is he okay?” She tried to read her messages, but her eyes blurred with tears. “Tell me what happened.”

“I don’t know. That’s why I’m letting you leave. You need to go and find out.”

“He was in the states. He does these car shows…”

Laying a hand on her back, Fidel pushed her out of the stall.

“Wait, where are my shoes?”

“I didn’t see them.” Kicking off his leather loafers, he said, “Here. Wear mine.”

They were far too big, but they were warm from his body.

“Come on.” He grabbed her wrist and pulled. She screamed from the pain, then tried to cover her mouth with her hand. That only made things worse. As she slipped across the stable in Fidel’s shoes, he said, “You need to move fast. You need to get off the property and then you’re in the clear. It’s morning, so the streets should be safe. Do you have far to go?”

“No,” she said. And then, without thinking, she begged him, “Come with me.”

“I can’t.” He stopped just inside the barn door. On the other side was freedom, but before she could taste it, she had to sample the bitterness of disappointment. “Gabrielle, I’m sorry. I can’t explain it, but I belong here.”

“No you don’t. Maybe you did at one time, but you don’t anymore. It’s time to go.”

“Not for me.” There was sadness in his eyes when he said, “Go now, and don’t look back. You should never have been here in the first place.”

“I know.” She blinked back tears. “This is a terrible place, but if I’d never come I would never have met you, and…”

He didn’t let her finish that though. His urgency met her despair in a kiss that stopped the earth from turning, if only for a moment. She already knew she loved him, though she couldn’t fathom why. Now, through the force of his kiss, she knew he loved her too.

And she knew she’d never see him again.