Stolen Lust (Beauty in the Stolen 1)

“I destroyed it,” he says from the doorframe.

I clear my throat and feign innocence. “What?”

“I had to destroy your phone. I didn’t want your pussy date to use it to trace us.”

“Did you blow it up with your truck?”

“Yes.”

There’s nothing to say. Denying I was looking for it will only sound like the lie it is. My gaze slips to his hands. My shoes are dangling from the one hand, and in the other he’s clutching disinfectant wipes.

He crosses the floor in silence. Crouching down in front of me, he drops the shoes and takes my right foot in his hands. He places my heel on his thigh and uses the wipes to clean my foot until all the black from the dirty floor is gone. Then he fits my heel and fastens the strap around my ankle.

When he’s done the same with the other foot, he straightens and offers me a hand. I place my fingers in his palm, letting him pull me up. He takes a T-shirt from a bag behind the sofa and pulls it over his head.

A cock crows somewhere.

There’s life around, a nearby smallholding or settlement maybe.

“Cold?” he asks.

As if provoked by magic, an involuntary shiver runs over me. “No.”

He grabs his leather jacket from the back of the sofa and drapes it over my shoulders. The chivalrous act baffles me, but I don’t let it give me hope. Cruelty and kindness often run together. Sometimes they run into each other, making a gray portrait of black and white.

Leaving me there, he goes back to the kitchen and returns with the gun. My stomach drops. Trepidations fills me as he ushers me outside and locks up.

Instead of taking the Porsche, he pulls a camouflage cover from a truck parked next to the house. It’s a Land Rover, not old but not new either. It’s the kind many of the guys from town and the surrounding farms drive. Inconspicuous, it will blend into the traffic on the roads.

Like last night, or rather early this morning, he seats me, fits my safety belt, and closes the door before taking the wheel. He slips the gun under his seat, far out of my reach, and drops my bag on the backseat.

The horizon is dark purple, the night barely diluted with day. It’s the worst time for me, a time when I usually lie awake and my thoughts are silent enough for guilt to gnaw at my conscience. I get that same blues, that strange sensation of nostalgia and loss, as he starts the engine and follows the dirt track to the road.

Instead of following the big road to Rustenburg, he goes off on the smaller one. The potholes make for a bumpy ride.

When the engine has warmed up, he switches on the heater and adjusts the blowers to send the warm air my way. The smell of early morning wood fires from the informal settlements behind the hill carries on the toasty air that blows inside. He’s a good driver, easily navigating the gravel road, and I can’t help but admire his skill. His hands aren’t clenched on the wheel, but his grip is firm. He’s at ease and in control.

When we’ve passed the worst part of the road and the tires are quieter on the gravel again, he says, “The police are going to ask questions.”

I sag in my seat. My breath catches, but I don’t let him hear my sob of relief. He’s not going to kill me. He’s going to keep his word.

“You don’t know my name, and you don’t know where I took you.” He waits for the instructions to sink in. “I blindfolded you and drove for a long time. You tried to count, but you lost track.” He glances at me. “Got it?”

“Yes.”

“I tied you up and kept you for the night, then I drove you to town and let you go. You didn’t see or hear anything. You hardly got a look at my face. If they ask you for a description, you can’t remember. It was dark. The lights of the truck were in your eyes. You were too stressed. You can say any of those things. No one will hold it against you.”

“Okay.” I nod to emphasize my compliance, anything if he’ll let me go.

“Good.” He smiles, but the gesture is tight. The same strain from earlier hangs in the air.

That strain isn’t because he’s worried about trusting me not to spill the beans. He knows he can make me comply. He can stalk or terrorize me. He can come back for revenge. His worry is about something different, but I can’t make sense of it.

The drive takes more than an hour. It’s after six-thirty when he crosses the railway tracks and enters Rustenburg.

I sit up straighter. Mint must’ve gotten home by now. Hopefully. The police will be looking for Ian. There may be roadblocks, or maybe he’s already used some app to check where they’ve closed the roads.