CONTENT WARNING
Please be warned that this story is not for the faint-hearted. It is an airport-paperback-type thriller as much as a stroke story. It is a novel of 45,000 words that contains rape and revenge, emotional and psychological cruelty, forced incest and bi, and other taboos. Please don't read any further either if such things offend you or you think they're a good idea in real life. There are nine chapters and they will all be posted within the next couple of weeks.
"La vengeance se mange tres-bien froide"
From 'Matilde' (1841) by Joseph Marie Eugene Sue, French novelist.
"Your enemy is sleeping and his woman is free"
From 'Famous Blue Raincoat' (1970) on the album 'Songs of Love and Hate' by Leonard Cohen, Canadian singer-songwriter.
CHAPTER ONE:
Songs of Love and Hate
The Chameleon watched dispassionately.
The gang rape was being carried out to a background of piped organ music with the same meticulous precision as the military manoeuvres of the previous 72 hours. A tang of incense pervaded the white-walled room adding an aromatic twist to the woman's pitiful wailing and the relentless male grunts.
It had all been worked out in advance. This woman should - at this exact moment - have been basking in happiness as 'The Mother of the Bride', proudly watching her elder daughter walk up the aisle.
Instead, she was now being held down, mounted and ruthlessly fucked by a succession of masked and uniformed men, each enjoying his allocated five minutes.
Cold hearted? Sure, ladies and gentlemen. After all, this is an ode to Love and Hate. And especially Hate.
So where do I begin? When do I begin? In one sense it all began so many years ago. Three decades, in fact.
Plenty of time to chill a splendid buffet that is best eaten cold.
But in another sense it really all went off just three days ago. The stretch limousine carrying the happy bridal party to the wedding rehearsal left the gates of the imposing Cumber estate at 14.40 hrs precisely on its way to the church. As usual, the limo chauffeur was armed, and the Mercedes saloon following carried a pair of uniformed heavies. All was going like clockwork.
But the chauffeur and bodyguards proved no match for the crack team of mercenaries that carried out the raid. Five people - the groom, the bride and her mother, brother and sister - were extracted and kidnapped at exactly 14.47, in less than sixty seconds, with a minimum of fuss and bloodshed. Only the father of the bride was missing from the party.
And, of course, that was the Chameleon's intention.
After that it was a simple question of making enough changes to cover their tracks. The five unconscious victims were transported north and east, then south and west, over 7,000 miles in total.
They zigzagged back and forth, shuttled in a miscellany of SUVs and trucks, then helicopters, a cargo jet, via motor launch and powerboats, eventually overland in ancient lorries. The final part of their journey through mountain passes was completed strapped over the backs of a train of camels.
Each time, the method of transport was 'cleansed' afterwards, and - in the case of the motor vehicles and powerboats - completely destroyed by fire. So, by the time their long, crisscross journey was finished, they were on a different continent, in a strange and exotic country, in an untraceable location.
Even with satellite surveillance, finding a needle in a haystack would have been a thousand times easier than tracing either the victims or their kidnappers.
The Chameleon smiled thinly and lit a Marlboro, amused by the woman's begging. The geographical trip had taken 45 hours, but her journey from arrogant 45 year old billionaire bitch to pleading, sobbing cunt had been a short one indeed.
It was the way she obviously thought she still had something to bargain with that caused his smile. As if, having failed to order them about like her domestic servants, she could negotiate her way out instead. Maybe she thought they took credit cards? Or she could send round her chauffeur with a wad of cash later?
But now, Leatherback was already the seventh man demonstrating to her that everything she had to offer them could be ripped from her for free. The mercenary's muscled buttocks hammered up and down in fierce, deep, impatient strokes as he prepared to fill her with his venom.
The familiar organ music being piped over the sound system on continuous loop started up again. The joyous 'Bridal Chorus' from Wagner's Opera Lohengrin is the standard march played at the entrance of the bride at most weddings in America and the Western World.
Now it was being used as a melodic accompaniment to Susan Cumber's terrible ordeal. Here comes the bride's mother, perhaps?
On second thoughts, probably not.
Susan Cumber was undoubtedly still a gorgeous woman. One of those Prom Queens who had been born beautiful, married young and the years since had been kind to her. She had popped out three kids in quick succession, got her figure back, exercised, ate well, rarely drank alcohol, and lived right. She hadn't even had to resort to surgery yet. No nips, tucks nor even botox. Her 45 year old skin was smooth, her butt was firm, and her boobs were natural Ds that still looked sensational even without a bra.
Of course, money helped; cooks, diet counsellors, full time personal trainer, a tennis coach, two masseuses, daily hairdresser, and the best doctors, gynaecologists, dentists, orthodontists, 'what-have-yous', all at her beck and call.
It was hard to envisage the groaning, sobbing, writhing woman as the same immaculately poised corporate wife and mother-of-three, whose photograph so often adorned the business press and society magazines.
She was a statuesque, green-eyed, platinum blonde, with perfect cheekbones and teeth that dazzled; a rare blend of Hollywood glamour and Manhattan sophistication. At 5' 9" tall, she was the ideal height to complement her handsome 6' 3" husband, her head at his shoulder, whether posing formally for press shots or snapped attending charity balls together. Her beautifully cut and cared for hair was thick and lush. Her figure was just a little curvier than those of her two daughters but it was absolutely in proportion to her fuller breasts and extra height.
The Chameleon stubbed out his cigarette. Leatherback had shot his bolt and was being replaced by Night Snake. There was no rush. As that old Satchmo love song goes, they had all the time in the world.
*** *** ***
Day Four
At the very same moment the Chameleon was extinguishing his Marlboro, at least one continent, six time zones, and several thousand miles away, John Cumber was pacing a room that was packed full of the best. From the President down, everybody had promised him anything, and dropped everything, to help.
It was a Saturday but they were all there; CIA, FBI, Military brass, others from agencies John hadn't even known existed, plus his closest hired hands and colleagues. The Cumber Corporation was a multi-billion dollar machine and all of its resources had been utilised or placed on standby to assist.
Today was the fourth day since his wife and children had been taken. The problem was there had been no progress so far. Sure, there were teams of agents combing the kidnap site. Officers were interviewing anybody and everybody, researching, collecting data, trawling every damned domestic and international contact for clues. Any clue. But the result so far was a big fat zero.
He glanced down at his gold Patek Philippe. Right now he should have been walking his darling Lorna up the aisle, in front of five hundred guests, standing proudly alongside his wife Susan throughout the service. His daughter Rachel and his son Ryan should be there smiling either side of them.
John crushed the empty plastic water cup that was in his hand, swearing for the thousandth time that he would find his family and save them.
And get the people responsible.
*** *** ***
20.07 hrs
The Chameleon sat at a bank of screens and surveyed his guests. He was dressed in just a white towel round his waist, his hair wet, his mind cleared by the ice cold needles of the shower he'd just taken.
Each of the five guests had a cell to themselves. The cells were not, of course, the five star accommodation such WASPs were used to. They were underground, humid and dank. There was a lingering odour of sewage. Rats and insects scurried under the steel bars.
Above ground, the house and its surrounding land had long since been converted into a comfortable but inconspicuous home. The thick compound walls that ensured total privacy had been built of mud, baked rock hard by many years of desert sunshine. Decades before, this site had housed a fortified prison used by the famous French Foreign Legion to incarcerate its prisoners, miscreants and deserters.
On an ancient caravan route, it lay on the edge of an oasis, with a stone mountain to the north and an endless sand dune field to the south. But the relatively high water table made primitive agriculture possible; citrus, apricots, almonds and figs were grown in the vicinity.
From the sky, a satellite or drone would merely see palm trees, a walled garden and courtyard, a swimming pool and a modest bungalow. There were even white dishdasha robes drying on a washing line and kids toys lying on the ground. There was no clue as to the evil concealed underground.
Although the bank of screens would suggest the five basement cells they had selected were located next to each other, in fact his men had a choice of over fifty, and had chosen cells spaced well apart. It was important that their captives be unable to communicate with or hear each other, at least during the early stages of their ordeal.
The cell walls and hard floors were constructed of dried mud and stone except for the front bars that were made of columns of steel. Just like those in the cowboy movies he'd watched as a child, the Chameleon thought.
Each cell measured only six feet by six feet square and they were totally devoid of furniture; no bed, chair, even sanitary facilities. The only 'decorations' were five iron manacles set in the outline of a starfish into the rear walls. Their positioning alone would have made it obvious they were intended for a captive's neck, wrists and ankles to be fixed in a stretched, spread-eagle position.
However, what made that fact even more evident was that each of the guests had already checked in and been fastened into the manacles. Microphones and night-vision CCTV lenses in each cell gave the Chameleon perfect sound and vision, even in the murky greenish light.
The middle screen showed Susan Cumber suspended on her tiptoes. She was naked with a glistening sheen of wetness still oozing between her thighs. The gang rape had been thorough. A dozen copious loads had been injected into her. And what goes up, must come down.
Her breasts, hips and abdomen were marked with red blotches and a couple of darker bruises. Her head sagged down dejectedly, face obscured, her shoulder length platinum tresses mussed and dangling.
The Chameleon shrugged. It was to be expected. After a lifetime of fidelity to one handsome man, you couldn't expect any woman to be thrilled about racing from male partners numbers 2 thru 13 within one hour. She deserved her little rest.
Displayed on the screens either side of Susan, were her two daughters. In one, Lorna Cumber - who should by rights now be Lorna Collins of course - was fastened in a similar uncomfortable starfish pose, arms and legs outstretched. She was wearing the same white outfit she had been kidnapped in, although it glowed dirty and torn in the green night-vision CCTV light.
