When I opened her front door, she was there waiting for me.  She was on her knees, legs spread wide open, their flesh dimpled with goose bumps from being pressed to the cold tiles of the foyer.

Her hands were held behind her back in a submissive posture, elbows clasped.  There was a slight bulge to her cheeks, and a glimpse of something pink between her teeth: a pair of her own panties.

The underwear in her mouth was the closest thing my slave had to clothing at the moment.  The rest of her was on display and completely exposed to me.  I could see her nipples standing stiff, and the way her wet pussy glistened in the light.  If I didn't know better, I'd think she was aroused.  But her blue eyes told a very different story.  Her nipples were hard only from fear and cold, and whatever liquid was currently lubricating her cunt, it was nothing natural.

I was a little surprised to see Holly like that.  After all, it had been nearly a month since my last visit.  I hadn't told the bitch when I would be back either.  I pictured her life for the last four weeks, waking up every morning knowing that when sunset came it would be time to strip down and wait for me again, to spend the entire evening kneeling in her own hallway, naked and scared and shivering and alone, wondering if this would be the night I show.  How stressful it must have been, and how utterly tedious, to waste every waking moment waiting to be raped and tortured again.

Not that she had much of a choice.  I've got fond memories of the last time I came over here and didn't find her waiting for me the way she was supposed to.  Not that I could really blame her for the lapse, since she had just spent the whole day partying with me and some of my friends at her house.  Well, we were partying.  Our hostess had been a little too busy serving us drinks and food, fucking us whenever we liked, and being our toilet and ashtray.

My fucktoy even served a brief stint as our piņata that day.  That had been John's idea, of course.  He brought along a bunch of tiny chocolate bars, the kind of shit people give out at Halloween, and we unwrapped them and had fun seeing how many of them we could cram into her holes.

Now, Holly has this beautiful mane of brown hair, long enough to reach the small of her back, and I just love playing with it every chance I get.  For that bit of fun, I fashioned it into a braid and tied it to the center of the ceiling fan, then set it on low to leave her slowly spinning in midair.  The first time I ever tried stringing her up like that was a disaster; the fan broke under her weight after just a few minutes.  But since then I'd bought her an ugly but sturdy one that could easily support her.  Usually when we do this, we have to put up with a lot of moaning and whining about how her hair is going to be ripped out, but thanks to the chocolate stuffing her mouth, all she managed that time was a few pathetic little gurgles.  Before raising her up, we tied her hands behind her head too, her elbows nearly touching her ears.

As she spun, disoriented and helpless, we took turns punching her, usually in the stomach.  Poor Holly was flopping and twisting around like a fish on a hook, trying to dodge or at least deflect our blows, but we had all the time in the world to aim, and just about every strike hit her square on.  The goal was to get her to expel all the candy, and whoever had made her lose the most by the time it was gone would be the winner.  To give her some incentive, I promised Holly that we would stop after fifty punches, but that if she lost all the candy before then, she'd earn two strokes of the whip for every punch short.

The dumb cunt tried, she really did, but she barely made it to thirty.  The ones in her mouth were the first to go, coughed up after a solid blow to the kidneys.  Her pussy held on a bit longer, but after all the use it had gotten that day it was already loose, and when the heat of her insides began to melt the chocolate, it just started dribbling right out of her.  Eventually another good punch sent it all splashing to the floor.

Her ass lasted the longest.  No real surprise there; I'd given her enough enemas to make her an old pro at holding things in.  It was Sean who figured out how to get her to open up.  Instead of punching her in the stomach or thighs like we'd been doing so far, he wedged his fingers and drove his arm wrist-deep into her rectum with one smooth thrust.  That sure made the bitch scream.  When he pulled his hand out, brown goo that wasn't entirely chocolate followed.

We declared Sean the winner, which technically meant he'd won the candy, but none of us were too eager to touch it at that point.  So we made our piņata eat it instead, after we'd whipped her a few dozen times and let her down.  She was looking real colorful by then: red welts on her back, black-and-blue bruises on her front, and chocolate everywhere.  All of us had already fucked Holly plenty of times that day, but the sight of her beaten and battered form kneeling at Sean's feet, slowly licking his arm clean, was enough to get us all hard again.

It was late evening by the time the party ended, and we left her sprawled on the floor of her living room, covered inside and out with cum and chocolate.  At some point after we left she must have picked herself up, made it to the bathroom to shower, and then collapsed onto her blankets to sleep and put it all behind her.

That was how I found her when I came back just a couple hours later.  I wasn't surprised that she had assumed the day was over and that she didn't have to wait for me like usual.  It was an easy assumption to make, and most of the time she would have been right.  But that didn't mean she got a free pass.

I loved the way Holly reacted to the belt.  The first hit, which left a red line across her thighs, woke her body up, but her mind was slower to respond.  I doubt she even knew what was happening for the first few minutes, only that she was in agony.  She hunched up in the fetal position, and you know what she did next?  Started begging for her husband to come save her.  The guy had already been in the ground for over two years by then, but she's still crying out his name like any minute he's gonna rush through the door to rescue her.  I was almost laughing too hard to aim.  For several minutes she just laid there sobbing like a little baby, while I kept hitting her with the belt, watching her already exhausted body spasm as the pain ran through it again and again.

So she finally came to her senses a little, and began pleading with me to stop.  I didn't even bother replying, just kept hitting her until the stupid bitch realized what she was supposed to be doing.  She stumbled out of her bed and half crawled, half fell down the stairs, making her way to the foyer.  I walked behind her, laying stripe after stripe on her jiggling ass.

She reached the foyer and got into position, chest heaving as she gasped for air.  I reminded her that she was missing her gag and struck her again.  She had to make another wild scramble up and down the stairs to find a pair of underwear, earning her plenty more welts in the process, before she was finally where she was supposed to be, kneeling on the floor sucking on a pair of dirty panties.  She was exhausted, bleeding, and crying, and I hadn't even started fucking her yet.

Like I said, that was the last time Holly failed to wait for me.  That had been close to a year ago, long enough for the injuries we'd inflicted to fade.  The physical ones anyway. Looking at her now, she was one sexy piece of fuckmeat.  Tanned limbs, full breasts, pouty lips, flowing hair.  She'd managed to pretty herself up too, despite the lack of clothing.  She'd done her hair up all nice, put on lipstick and makeup, made herself look elegant and sensual and every other word that means MILF.  And she'd done it all for me, made herself look good so that when I showed up to fuck her, if I showed up to fuck her, I'd find a hot little bitch waiting.

I spoke a single word, "open", and she obediently opened her mouth and let me draw her panties out.  I checked that they showed signs of use, and hadn't just been a clean pair taken from the laundry.  As I expected, they were clearly dirty, with more than a faint whiff of urine.

It had been a long, long time since she'd last tried that trick, even before that party.  I knew that she hated the idea of putting her own soiled underwear in her mouth, which was the whole reason I made her do it.  When she first started, I deliberately didn't check their condition, 'cause I knew that she would eventually try to take advantage of me and weasel her way out of it.  Sure enough, the first time I did check a pair, they were so clean and fresh I doubt they'd ever been worn at all.

Well, those panties weren't clean and fresh for long.  I decided Holly's house needed some cleaning up, and so that's how she spent the next few hours.  She cleaned the gutters, the attic, the toilets, the basement.  Every dark, grungy corner of her home was given attention.  And of course, there were no mops or brooms or gloves involved.  I didn't let her use anything but that one pair of panties, and a single bucket of water that didn't take long to become murky and gray.

When she was finished, that underwear was far and away the most disgusting thing I've ever seen.  The piss and shit it had picked up from the toilets wasn't even close to the worst stuff it was encrusted with, and the stench was making even me nauseous.  Holly can be a smart cunt sometimes, and she knew exactly what was going to happen next, but that didn't stop her from vomiting when I told her to suck on it.  Throwing up sure didn't help her any, because I just made her clean the puke up, and guess what she had to do that with?  She retched the whole time she was mopping her mess up, even after her stomach had been completely emptied out onto the floor.  Dry heaves, over and over.

The look of horror on her face when she finally mouthed the filthy thing was wonderful.  She probably would've spit it out immediately, orders or not, but I had some duct tape ready, and her mouth was quickly sealed shut.  Then I pulled her wrists behind her and wrapped them up in duct tape too.  The cleaning had taken a long time, and it was close to morning, so I led her to bed and we both got in.

Neither one of us did any sleeping that night.  She must have been too grossed out and nauseated to relax.  Me, I was a bit wary about her vomiting again and maybe choking.  It would have sucked to lose such a pretty bitch to an accidental death.  But even more, I was fascinated with the way her whole body squirmed and rippled in revulsion.  I held her close for a long time, my hands on her stomach to feel it quivering and churning.  I'd whisper in her ear from time to time, asking if she could pick out the taste of rotted leaves, or bird shit, or any of the other hundred disgusting things I’d seen that sorry piece of cloth dirtied with, and feel her shudder in response.

Several times it was too much, and I just had to take her.  This was back when she used to cry every time I fucked her, but she only shed a few tears that night.  I'm betting the slut was secretly grateful to have something to take her mind off of her taste buds.

I still have that underwear around somewhere.  I keep it sealed up, because the smell has only gotten worse.  I've reminded Holly about it before, threatened to make her chew on that one pair every single night if I ever catch her trying to use a clean pair again.  Want to hear the funniest thing in the world?  The bitch pisses herself regular nowadays.  Lets loose like she belongs in diapers, just to make sure I can tell her panties have been used.

So yeah, no surprise to find her current chew toy was dirty.  I balled it up and tossed it into the living room, and Holly promptly scampered over to it on all fours. She mouthed it, then crawled back to the foyer and resumed her position, mouth wide open again.

I continued the game of fetch for a few minutes, then gave her another command, "dinner."  She nodded, and began to crawl to the kitchen to fix me a meal.  I watched her ass sway as she padded away on all fours, then took a quick stroll through the house.

Technically, the place wasn't actually hers.  She'd signed the deed over to me long ago.  She'd also closed her bank accounts and transferred the money to me, given me her car, etc.  Holly owned nothing and had zero savings.  I'd made her quit her job too, so that she wouldn't have anything to do all day but wait to get raped again.

Usually after me and mine grab a girl for keeps, we move her somewhere else, a safe house where we can keep track of her.  Hell, Dave's got a whole fucking apartment building full of his whores.  But Holly's place was a good location, out in the country with no one around for miles, so I graciously allowed to her to stay in her former house.

Well, maybe 'allow' isn't the right term.  While Holly was still being trained, I'd had iron bars put on all the windows, and installed two-way locks on all the outer doors.  The only ones with the keys are me and the guy who delivers groceries and other essentials and takes away the trash every week.  Her home is now her prison.

And like any prison, her activities in it are strictly regulated.  She isn't allowed a phone, or a computer, or anything else that could let her interact with the outside world.  She doesn't even get the newspaper.  She does have a TV, but that's solely for my use when I'm here.

Her afternoons are spent doing mandatory exercises.  The fun kind.  Her pussy and ass muscles get a workout with special electronic dildos that respond to pressure.  She clenches them tight for a few seconds until they beep, relaxes, then clenches them again.  Repeat for a couple hours.   By following the routine every day, she keeps her holes nearly as tight as a virgin’s.  She also has to give herself enemas and hold them in for certain periods of time, test how long she can deepthroat, and do various other exercises that are intended to both humiliate her and make her a better fucktoy.  Naturally, she’s required to film her entire sessions, and occasionally on visits I’ll review the tapes with her so I can critique her performance.

Her meals are regulated too.  The only normal food that comes in her weekly deliveries is for serving me if I come to visit.  My little vegan now eats only sausage for breakfast, a ham sandwich for lunch, and boiled chicken for dinner.  Not the healthiest or most complete diet, but as long as she stays thin, I don't really give a shit.  Not like she's going to live much longer anyways.

After I'd made my rounds, I headed to the kitchen, and came up behind her while she stood by the counter chopping up some vegetables.  When I began to play with her ass, she stiffened and stopped working, knowing what was coming next.  She was naked, but not physically restrained in any way, and for a moment I could feel her tensing up, thinking about the knife in her hands.  The old Holly would've tried something for sure.  She was a real wildcat when I first met her.  That Holly, the one I had to keep in a dog cage in her living room at first, the one who wore a bit gag for months until she stopped biting at any cock that went near her lips, the one whose fingers I had to break one night when she made a sudden dash for my cellphone, that one would've done something, knife or not.  But that Holly was long gone, and the docile slave that had taken her place only hesitated for a second before resuming work on the vegetables.

She kept chopping as my fingers poked and prodded at her asshole, and when I pulled her panty gag out and brought them up to her face she sucked them clean without complaint or comment.  She didn't make a sound until she felt my cock replace my fingers and ease past her loosened rosebud, and then it was just a small, sad whimper.  My dick was no stranger to her ass, and even though it had been a month I settled in easily, like slipping into a familiar pair of shoes.  I fucked her in slow, deep strokes as she prepared the food, in no hurry, enjoying the feel and the smell of her.

At one point she told me in a quiet voice that she needed to get something out of the fridge.  Rather than pull out, I simply wrapped my arms around her in a bear hug and lifted her up, leaving her impaled on my cock.  She started at first, her feet scrabbling at the ground, but soon stopped and passively let me walk us over to the fridge and set her down.

I had no desire to let my cock slip out of her sweet ass for even a moment, so we made several more trips like that before she was finished cooking.  I still hadn't cum, so she spent mealtime seated on my lap, gently bouncing.  I'd spent no small amount of time training Holly in how to use her asshole, and she performed flawlessly, rising up just enough to leave her anal ring tightly squeezing my head, then sinking all the way back down, her muscles constantly massaging every inch of me that was in her.

Since Holly was between me and the table, she also fed me by hand while her ass worked.  My slave is allowed only enough food to keep her alive, which means she's hungry nearly all the time.  Even though I couldn't see her face, I could feel the longing in her as she held each morsel up for me.

When I was done eating, I stood her up, my dick still in her ass, and whispered into her ear.  "Does my slave want something to eat too?" She nodded slowly.  I walked us over to the refrigerator and rummaged around until I found something suitable: about a pound of raw hamburger.  I unwrapped it and plopped it onto the center of the kitchen table.  "Well, eat up."

Holly looked at the lump the same way she would've looked at road kill, but she bent forward until her upper body was lying on the kitchen table, and put her face directly into the raw meat, already knowing that she wouldn't be allowed to use her hands.  While she chewed away at it, I rocked slowly against her.  "Ain't this nostalgic, bitch?" I asked her cheerfully.  "This is right where I fucked your ass that first time, and in the same position.  The first time anybody'd fucked this tight hole.

Not quite as tight as it used to be, is it?  You bled like a stuck pig when I busted it open back then.  Squealed like one too.  But that's alright.  I've trained you into a good little anal slut."  I slapped her ass.  "Come on, show me how much you love my cock.  Fuck your asshole on it.  Fuck me as hard as I fucked you that day."

She obeyed, scraping her tits against the table as she bucked her hips and grinded herself against my crotch, her hands gripping the table's edge to give her leverage.  Me, I just stood there and enjoyed it.  I mean, why should I have to do all the work?  "You remember what you said that first time?  I want to hear it again.  For old time's sake."

Holly gritted her teeth and mumbled something.  "Louder," I commanded.

"I'm going to kill you for this," she said in a flat voice.

"That's it.  Say it again."

"I'm going to kill you for this."

"And you're doing such a good job too, bitch.  Strangling my cock to death, that's what you're doing."  I shoved her face into what was left of the hamburger.  "Now finish your fucking dinner."

The sight of Holly licking the table clean afterward was a sweet picture indeed, and I rewarded her for it by filling her guts with my jizz.  "Enjoy your meal, slut?  Time for dessert."  Holly finished with the table, then obediently knelt in front of me and got to work tonguing the shit and cum off my cock.

After dinner, I settled down in the living room to watch a movie.  I moved my chair to be at an angle to the television, so that Holly could kneel in front of me and suck my cock while still watching the show.

I've seen it many times by now, but it never gets old.  It's one of Dave's, one of the best he's ever made, and Holly's the star.  It's a decent hit among the BDSM crowd, and can be found in just about any adult video store around here.  Every time I find a copy in a store that didn't use to carry it, I like to take a picture, so I can show Holly how popular she is.  One time, I bribed a store clerk to give me the name of the person who'd rented it the most, then took Holly out to give her fan a special performance.

Anyway, the vid itself is very tame at first, the usual boring shit you'd see at a wedding or something.  In fact, I think Dave grabbed a lot of it from her actual wedding video.  It's a showcase of her life with baby pictures, spliced shots of home video, that sort of thing.  All stuff where Holly is happy and smiling.  And everything's got captions on it, like "My First Day at School" and "Going to Prom".  Then that footage begins to be replaced with stuff a bit more provocative.  A picture of her in her graduation gown fades into Holly face down on her kitchen table with Sean on top of her, captioned "My First Gang Rape".  After a couple innocuous shots of her in a Wal-Mart uniform (My First Job), you get a clip of her with her hair tousled and face bruised, a cock buried so deep in her gullet that its balls are resting on her chin.  You can see her throat working furiously, then the cock pulls out, leaving a line of cum dribbling out of her panting mouth and past the caption: "The First Time I Swallowed".

It goes on like that for a while, the scenes of Holly's old life giving way more and more to scenes from her new one.  No more wedding pictures.  No more family photos.  Just stuff like My First Whipping.  My First Hogtie.  The First Time I Licked Someone's Feet.  My First Collar.  My First Double Penetration.  My First Triple Penetration.  The First Time I Tasted My Own Shit.  My First Clit Piercing.  My First Lesbian Experience.  The First Time I Cleaned a Toilet with My Tongue.

It went on and on.  I could hear Holly sobbing as she worked at my cock, the way she always does when I make her watch this.  During the scene labeled "Why I Will Never Bite a Cock Again", a particularly bloody one that begins with her trying to chomp John's dick off, and ends with him pulling several of her back teeth out with pliers while she screams and begs him to fuck her "tamed face cunt", she scrunched her eyes shut, but a simple tap on the nose got her to open them up again.

I finally shot my load near the end, while on screen Holly shrieked above the caption "My First Fisting".  Real life Holly didn't let her tears keep her from swallowing my cum and licking clean my softened cock, then spending the rest of the movie gently sucking on my balls.

The movie ended with a shot of Holly naked and kneeling in her hallway, just like when I first came in.  It must have been taken at the end of the night, because she was a mess.  Her hair was matted with cum, her body criss-crossed with welts and bruises, her pussy red and swollen.  The smiling Holly of past photos was long gone, and this one just stared dully at the camera, waiting for her next abuse.  The caption was "The Rest of My Life".

I got up from my chair and pulled Holly into a standing position next to me.  I cupped her butt with one hand to draw her close to me, kissed the bridge of her nose, right between her red-rimmed eyes, and gave her a fond smile.  Out of all my possessions, she was definitely one of my favorites.  "Come on babe", I purred.  "Let's move this to the bedroom."

Holly reluctantly crawled behind me as I made my way up the stairs and peeked into the master bedroom.  The king size bed in it was pristine, as I'd expected, since she wasn't allowed to sleep in it.  Her own sleeping area was the pile of blankets on the floor.  That's not to say the bed never saw any use, of course.  The shackles attached to each bedpost were a testament to the many hours of fun I'd had with her in there.

I put a hand on Holly's shoulder to stop her from going into the room, and she looked up at me questioningly.  "Not that room," I told her, smiling.  "I feel like playing in the other one tonight."  She paled, but made no protest as I pulled her along.

The other bedroom looked the same as always.  Pink walls, bright colors, stuffed animals.  It was a little girl's room, with a little girl's bed that was far too small to fit both of us.  I laid on my back and got as comfortable as I could manage, then ordered Holly to straddle me.  Her cunt was as soft and warm as ever, and it swallowed my cock with ease.

She rode me for several minutes, eyes shut.  Neither of us spoke.  Aside from the bars on the window, the room hadn't changed in years, and both of us were remembering times gone by.

"It's really a shame what happened to her," I said. Holly remained silent, but more tears began to trickle from the corners of her eyes.  "Complete waste.  If it had been up to me, I would've kept her.  Shit, it would've been so much fun having her around too.  There's nothing like a mother-daughter team.  But the vote was one-to-three.  They all said she was just too young, too much trouble to take care of.  Bullshit if you ask me.  No such thing as too young.  Not like she didn't have holes.  It was such a waste to kill her.  They didn't even film it."

Holly flinched as I put a hand around her neck.  "I did it just like this.  Put one hand around her throat and squeezed.  Figured if I wasn't ever going to fuck her, I'd least be the one to off her.  She never struggled, just stared at me with those cute puppy dog eyes.  I don't think she even understood what I was doing to her.  What a goddamn waste."

"Now, your husband," I said.  "That was a completely different story.  He was just a worthless piece of shit.  No regrets there.  I bet you feel the same way.  I mean, he's the whole reason I'm here, right?  Stupid son of a bitch took out a loan he couldn't pay back, so I had to come down here and collect.  I even gave him a second chance, since he had such a pretty little wife.  Told him he could rent you out to us a few nights a week, pay us back that way.  But the moron refused, even threatened to call the cops.  Gave me no choice but to blow his brains out."

Holly had stopped moving.  She just sat there on top of me, sobbing.  I gave her ass a light slap and she slowly resumed fucking me.  I continued my walk down memory lane.

"Mmm, that sure was a fun night though.  I still remember the look on your face when you came home from work and found us there with the bodies.  Perfect timing, by the way.  Killing people is always so damn depressing, you know?  Makes you think about your own mortality and shit.  Getting to bend you over the kitchen table and fuck that squirming virgin ass of yours really cheered me up.  I never thanked you for that."

Holly's stare was glassy-eyed now as she looked through me, reliving that day.  "Did I ever tell you that was when I fell in love with you?" I asked.  "It wasn't because of your ass, though it was a good ride.  It was what you said.  Your family's bodies were still warm, you were getting buttfucked by their killer while his friends waited their turn, and what did you have to say?  'I'm going to kill you for this.'"  The memory made me chuckle.  "And with such certainty too, like I was about to drop dead at your feet.  That's when I knew I had to make you mine.

"And I did, too.  I've taken you every way a man can take his bitch, and trained you to thank me for every one of them.  I've turned your life into a miserable, tedious hell."  I tilted her chin with one hand, so that we were looking directly into each other’s eyes.  "So why aren't you dead yet?"

Holly tried to turn away, but I forced her to keep looking at me.  "Most of my girls kill themselves within half a year.  You've been with me for three.  Every time I come back here, I've expected to find you shriveled up in the bathtub or swinging from a rafter, and every time you've disappointed.  I've done everything I could to make your life unbearable, and yet you get up each morning and keep going.  Drove me fucking crazy trying to find out why.  But I finally figured out your secret."  She froze.  "It's because you still haven't given up, have you?  You still think things are going to change somehow.  You still think you'll get to kill me one day."

The dam broke, and the expression on Holly's face changed to undiluted hatred.  "Yes," she hissed, and suddenly she was clawing at my eyes, but I was ready for her.   I grabbed both her hands in mine and rolled so that she was pinned beneath me, then began to pound her cunt, heavy thrusts that made the tiny bedframe creak and threaten to give way.  "I knew you still had some spirit left in you," I told her.  "Enjoy it while it lasts.  One day I'll come back here and find your body, and I'll know that you finally gave up and accepted that you could never win.  That I put a bullet in your lover's head and choked your baby girl to death, and the closest you ever came to revenge was making my dick sore from fucking you too much.  I just hope your body is still in good condition when I find it. I'd like nothing better than to give you one last screw, then dump you in an unmarked grave with a belly full of sperm."

I began to cum, my seed gushing into her writhing cunt.  "That's your future, Holly.  Rotting in the ground while I go find a new girl to play with.  The only question is how long it'll take to get there.  And how many more times I'll get to fuck you before it happens.  Because that's all you are, just one more disposable fucktoy."

I spent the next several hours enjoying all three of her holes, until even the sound of her wracking sobs couldn't get me hard anymore.  Her daughter's bed had collapsed beneath us at some point, and I left her lying in the wreckage of it, her face and thighs and buttocks streaked with cum.

As I opened the front door to leave, I turned back and called upstairs "I'll be back sometime soon.  Don't forget to wait up for me."

I couldn't wait to see what I'd find the next time I showed up.  Would she keep on living, enduring one abuse after another in the empty hope of one day getting her revenge?  Or would she would she admit defeat and kill herself?  Either way, I win.

God, I love visiting Holly.

Epilogue – The First Crack

Holly woke in the morning, tired and sore.  She gingerly picked herself up and left the room, not looking back at the destroyed bed.

The shower water was icy cold; she hadn’t been allowed hot showers for years.  But it was a familiar trial, and she endured it without a single flinch.  Modesty didn’t mean much to her anymore, so she didn’t bother getting dressed when it was over, just toweled herself off and headed downstairs.

She prepared her breakfast quietly and efficiently, and ate it in much the same fashion.   When it was finished and the dishes were clean, she padded over to the couch in the living room to sit and wait.

Mitch wouldn't have recognized the naked woman on the couch.  There was no sign of the fear and uncertainty that usually covered her like a shroud when he was around.  Her expression showed nothing but grim determination.  She sat in perfect, unmoving silence as the morning slowly passed.

A few minutes before noon, she rose and headed upstairs.  Holly entered her daughter's room, pointedly ignoring the wreckage of the bed, and pulled the toy chest out of the closet.  It was large, plastic, and pink, filled with nostalgia.

At the very bottom of the chest was a music box.  It had once been her daughter's favorite possession, and Holly had opened it every night to let its soft lullaby usher her little girl to sleep.  It made no such sounds when she opened it now, its insides torn out long ago.  Nestled where they used to be was a cellphone and charger.

At precisely noon, Holly turned on the phone and dialed a number.  It was answered before the first ring had finished.  "He was here last night," she said without preamble.

"So I've heard.  He let anything useful slip?"

"Not this time.  Mitch was more interested in... reminiscing.  But I did go through his coat and get a look at his cell while I was supposed to be making dinner."  She closed her eyes and repeated the phone numbers and times she had memorized.

"Good work.  I recognize a few of those, but the others are new.  I'll look into them when I have the chance."  The person on the other end coughed.  "Are you... okay?"

"I'll live."  She closed her eyes.  "I almost couldn't stop myself for a moment.  I had a knife, and that stupid motherfucker was so sure I wouldn't use it on him.  It was all I could do not to stab him in the eye."

"Don't."  The order was sharp, but not unkind.  "I know it's hard.  Believe me, I know.  But as long as they think we're broken, we can get information.  If any of them dies, the others will tighten up their security, maybe go looking for other women that aren't really as cowed as they act."

"Relax, I'm not going to ruin the plan.  I'll stay here and play the scared, crying slave for as long as it takes.  But when the time comes..." Holly's hand tightened on the phone.  "I've got a promise to keep."

Author's Note: I hope you’ve enjoyed the five stories I’ve published so far.  As you’ve likely noticed, all five have been loosely connected, and are meant to be taken together as an introduction.  There are still more stories to tell about these characters, but this seems like a good place to take a break from them and publish a few one-shots that I hope will be well received.  Regretfully, I doubt I'll be able to continue posting a new story on every Library update, but I'll do what I can.  Thank you for reading.