Detective Angela Hoffman entered the interrogation room and eyed the woman sitting at the table. She was sipping on some tea, trying not to nod off. In spite of her haggard look, she was a striking woman. Long brown hair drawn behind her at shoulder level by a simple, functional hair scrunch. Tall, fit and trim with creamy skin and a shape that seemed perfectly proportioned, she seemed almost casually beautiful. Hoffman walked over and she looked up at her.
Angela Hoffman didn’t look like a cop to Susan. Slim enough to make Susan envious and so striking that it was hard to take your eyes off of her, Angela Hoffman should have been the hostess at an elegant ball, decked out in a strapless blue chiffon gown and opera gloves. She had the palest blonde hair, a yellow so pale it was almost white. It was cut short to police regulations, thicker on top, thinning on the sides and ending at the collar. It looked mannish, but it was the only mannish thing about Angela Hoffman. High cheekbones, creamy skin, the smallest of button noses and thin, elegantly drawn lips surrounded pale blue eyes that seemed to see everything and reveal nothing. Her figure was very shapely—Susan debated for a few seconds whether her chest was natural or implants—and met a long, graceful neck. Hoffman wore a red dress that dipped low at the bodice and pulled short at the skirt, revealing long muscular legs, and a matching red bolero jacket with puffed sleeves at the shoulder. It was an expensive look—either cops got paid more than Susan thought or this woman sacrificed in other areas to look elegant. Right now, though, that was secondary to Susan. Right now there was hope in her eyes, hope that this ordeal was at an end.
"Are we done?" Susan asked. "I’ve been up for about nineteen hours now and I am really running on empty. I’ve told you everything that happened. This Marie has the disk and I hope to God you catch her and lock her up!"
"Just one more thing," Hoffman said neutrally. She handed her five photos of five women, all somewhat similar. "Can you identify any of them?"
Susan squinted at the pictures, seemingly trying to focus. Her eyes locked on number four.
"That’s her," she said definitely. "That’s Marie."
"Yes, ma’am," the detective said, gathering up the photos. "Marie LeClair. This disk must be really important if she and her partner are involved."
"Partner?"
"Armand Pleusse. They’re a pair of international criminals. Smuggling, art theft, grand scale cons, either on their own or for hire; Interpol suspects them in dozens of crimes. They’ve only been caught once, out in California." Hoffman paused, then glanced at Susan. "You’re sure Marie took the disk?"
"Yes," Susan sighed.
"You saw her take it? You’re not just assuming she took it?"
"I saw her take it," growled Susan.
Detective Hoffman looked at her for the longest time with those eerie pale blue eyes. Could she tell Susan was lying?"
"It’s just that if Pleusse and LeClair are involved, this disk has to be incredibly valuable-- valuable enough to murder somebody for it. If they didn’t get it, they’re probably going to come back for it."
"Fascinating," Susan said, head propped up on her hand. "Are we done now?"
"We’re done," she replied. "Your sister’s waiting for you out in the hall."
Susan trudged out into the hall, every bone in her body tired. At first she didn’t see Cindy. Finally she was attracted by Cindy’s singsong voice. Cindy was coming over to her and Susan allowed herself a tired smile.
Cindy was twenty-four and the polar opposite of her older sister. She had the family fine chestnut brown hair and model’s looks—sculpted face and curvy, leggy body—but she was bubbly where Susan was serious, flashy where Susan was conservative, and impetuous where Susan was sensible. "If they didn’t look similar," people often said, "you’d never know they were sisters."
"Suzie, what happened?" gasped Cindy, hugging her sister tightly. "They said your house burned down!"
"Uh huh," groaned Susan in intense fatigue.
"They said someone tried to kill you!"
"Cindy," heaved Susan, "I’ll tell you everything on the way to your place, but I have to crash. I’ve been up forever."
"Sure, Suzie, come on," Cindy said, nestling herself under Susan’s arm so her sister could lean on her.
"Cindy, you would not believe the night I’ve had," Susan said as they passed through the front door of the police station.
Detective Hoffman watched them walk out.
"I wonder just how valuable," Hoffman said to herself.
Marie recognized the place she was in only as a safe house used by one of the various intelligence forces that played global tag with each other while respectable people like herself and Armand eked out a living. It was a nondescript house in a nondescript neighborhood. The caretaker, a middle-aged Chinese woman who once may have played the game when she was young and alluring, was not in the basement with her and the other two. She had quickly excused herself to stand sentry above.
The other two were strangers to Marie. All she knew about them was that they worked for the Mainland Chinese Intelligence bureau, which was now obvious, that the woman was in command of both the man and the matron upstairs, and that the woman was a woman not to be taken lightly. There was a cool efficiency to her, an economy of movement and emotion that spoke of her formidability. There was also, just below the surface, a wellspring of rage that hinted at her deadliness.
Marie had been taken, bound up in a canvas laundry bag stolen from the hotel, to the basement of the safe house. Once there, her brutish male captor had none too gently stripped her naked and suspended her by her wrists from one of the basement rafters. While her gag had been removed, ropes were added to her ankles. It was a simple tie, but quite effective. Her weight dragged on her wrists, both hampering her struggles and inflicting pain on her. Once she was suspended, the woman contented herself to wait before asking her any questions. She stood off in a corner of the basement, talking with the man, ignoring Marie. This allowed the physical exertion to wear her down and the mental torture of anticipation to erode her will.
The French woman spoke a silent prayer that Armand had managed to free himself and was at this moment riding to her rescue, because this woman was good.
As Marie swung ever so slightly from the rope holding her wrists, she could feel the fire growing in her shoulders, even as the coolness of the basement made the nipples on her ripe melon breasts stand out. She tried to shift her wrists, but that only induced more chafing and more pain. The click of a boot on cement drew her attention. The Chinese woman was coming toward her. Her heavily lidded almond eyes, drawn to mere slits, intimidated Marie.
"Where is the disk?" Xia asked.
"May I ask who is speaking to me?" Marie replied with false bravado.
Xia allowed herself a hint of a smile. "I am Xia Min of the People’s Army of the Republic of China. Now where is the disk?"
"What disk?"
"The disk you took from the American woman tonight."
"I didn’t take any…"
"Please do not try my patience," Xia sighed. "You may spare yourself much pain and tell me now or you may endure the pain and tell me later, but do not insult me by saying you did not take it."
"We must all play our parts in the game," flirted Marie.
Xia replied by reaching out, seizing one of Marie’s nipples between her thumb and forefinger and twisted hard. A strangled yelp escaped Marie before she twisted her face and smothered the cry. Xia released her and Marie glared.
"This is no game," Xia said.
"Of course it isn’t!" spat Marie. "Not to you intelligence types! It’s all so deadly serious! Win your missions and lose your souls! Never question, never think and never, ever enjoy the travel, glamour and danger for its own exhilarating sake! All for God and country…or in your case, just country!"
"And you are so much better?" sneered Xia. "You trade in ruined lives and broken promises. You lie, you cheat, you steal, you betray anyone who makes the mistake of trusting you, and for what? For simple capitalist gain? The information on this disk could destroy entire races, could plunge the world into war or collapse entire governments. And you would sell it to anyone who met your price, regardless of their ideology or their plans? You are beneath contempt."
"We all worship our own gods," Marie sneered back. "Just because my god is wealth and yours is patriotism, don’t believe that yours is better than mine."
At once, Xia’s temper bubbled over. Her hand flashed out and struck Marie across the mouth with all the strength she could muster. Marie’s head rattled to a stop. She didn’t reply. She only glared at her captor, daring the Chinese woman to release her from bondage.
"You have delayed long enough," Xia said, willing herself calm. "Where is the disk?"
Marie remained defiantly silent.
"Huan," Xia replied. "Bring the weights."
Susan forced herself to her feet long enough to pull her tank top off and step out of her jeans. Then she surrendered to fatigue and sat on the edge of the bed while she reached behind her back and undid her bra. The muscles in her shoulders grabbed. They were still sore from being tied up. She managed to get her bra off, then let out a long sigh of fatigue. Sensing a presence, Susan glanced to her right. Framed in the door was Cindy, wearing a pinstriped white terry cloth nightshirt and her traditional fuzzy pink bunny slippers and holding her traditional hot chocolate nightcap. For a moment Susan was sixteen again and they were back in their mom’s house. She allowed herself a smile. Sometimes it was very difficult to remember that Cindy was twenty-four now, especially when she dressed like this. Cindy’s hand reached up and brushed her brown hair back over her ear, the way she had a thousand times before, and she flashed that goofy grin of hers, the one that silently told Susan that she was her own woman, but that she would also always be Susan’s little sister and that she was comfortable with that.
"Sorry if I’m putting you out," Susan said as she slipped into the spare nightshirt her sister had lent her.
"You even think that again and I’m going to smack you," Cindy replied. "After all you’ve been through tonight, the least I could do was let you stay here."
"Well, thanks just the same," yawned Susan. "I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye…"
"I don’t even think about those times anymore. I was a dippy kid, and besides you were usually right. You were just looking out for me. It’s about time I started paying you back for it."
"Well, I’ll be out looking for a new place as soon as I settle up with the insurance company," Susan told her, snuggling in the bed.
"There’s no rush," Cindy replied, sitting down on the other side of the bed they were going to share that night. "I’ve kind of missed this. I don’t like living alone and ever since me and Tony split, it’s been kind of lonely here." She thought a moment. "Do you think that French woman is gone for good? Now that she’s got the disk, she’s got no reason to come back, does she?"
Susan didn’t respond. Cindy peered over and found her sister sound asleep. Cindy smiled, leaned over and lightly kissed her on the cheek.
"Sleep well, Suzie," she said.
Marie was too tired and spent to even raise her head. She peered up as high as her eyes could look and saw the basement window covered over with some black substance, what she didn’t know. No light got through, so she had no way to gauge how long she had hung from the rafter of this basement.
She could no longer feel her wrists. Her shoulders burned. Her ribcage was sore and made breathing a chore. Her thighs and calves were screaming at her for relief from the drag on them. Xia had taken four ten-pound weights and tied them one by one to Marie’s ankle ropes. She would add a weight every time Marie refused to answer. The weight would drag on her wrists and on the ligaments in her shoulders and knees. After all forty pounds were dangling from her ankles, Xia asked again. Marie still refused.
A tear welled in Marie’s eye, then dribbled down her cheek. What Xia had done to her after that still haunted her. There was no reason, no justification for subjecting her to that. Marie had no idea the body could generate so much pain, let alone tolerate it. She held out for as long as she could. She tried to win, but the little bitch just wouldn’t stop.
It was so cold down here. She desperately wanted to be back in Cologne, in a soft bed, in Armand’s arms. She desperately wanted to be anywhere other than this basement of horrors, bound to this rafter, enduring all she had endured. Tears poured down her cheeks. She couldn’t even cry out in pain. Xia had made sure to tape her mouth shut before she left.
How long had it been? She hoped it had been weeks. The thought of this much pain and humiliation being visited on her in only hours was too horrifying a thought.
Footsteps on the wooden stairwell to the first floor roused Marie. Someone was coming. Was it Xia? Had she come to gloat, to wave the disk in her face? Had she come to torture her some more, just for the sheer joy of it? Marie felt a tightness in her chest. She’d known fear in her life, but dread was something she hadn’t felt since childhood. Her eyes darted to the left and saw the devil woman approach, her stride purposeful, her face draped in shadows. Something told Marie that, whatever had prompted this visit, she wasn’t going to like it.
Xia came face to face with Marie, looking up slightly at the helplessly suspended woman. She said nothing. She just stared into the French woman’s face, trying to read her expression or perhaps her mind. Marie tried not to quiver. She wouldn’t give this Chinese horror the satisfaction. She only stared back in naked loathing. The standoff continued for several moments.
"The disk was blank," Xia said neutrally.
It was the last thing Marie expected to hear.
"You didn’t know," Xia replied. "You thought it was the real one." Xia’s hand lashed out and slapped Marie across the cheek. "How incompetent you are! What an utter fool! You were so blinded by the money you sought to make, by your utter capitalist arrogance that you didn’t even think to check to see if it was the genuine CD! You have endured all of this pain and suffering for nothing!"
Xia stepped back, trying visibly to control her temper. When she got it harnessed, she returned her gaze to Marie.
"And more importantly, you have wasted my time."
Huan moved up behind his superior. Xia turned to him, dismissing the agony-wracked Marie from her mind.
"{Where do we look now}?" Huan asked.
"{We must backtrack. If the American nurse did not pass the CD on to this}," and Xia paused to throw a glance of contempt over her shoulder at Marie, "{thing, then she has either passed it to the American agent or still has it}."
"{If she even got it in the first place}," offered Huan.
"{Patience. We must take this investigation one step at a time. To jump ahead is to risk overlooking something and failure}."
"{You are right, of course. What are your orders}?"
"{Find the American agent. Determine if she has the disk or if she still searches for it. Be descreet. This woman is dangerous}."
"{And you}?"
"{I will speak with the American nurse and determine her role in this play}," Xia replied.
"{And what of her}," Huan asked, nodding at Marie.
Xia glanced at the suspended woman and smiled coldly.
"She may hang here," Xia said in English, for the benefit of her captive, "until she dies."