The Girl at the Spa Ch. 04

I shouted that he should press the green 'exit' button. 'Tried that' he shouted through the glass and pointed at the panel again. I tried again, and again, and once more - nothing. I shouted that I would run around and try the front doors. To get there I had to skirt the main buildings and take the footpath that would lead to front car park, I didn't think about the path and it's closeness to the cliff edge.

I ran preoccupied with finding out what was going on and not noticing the black shoe lace tied at ankle level across the pathway and I flew across it landing heavily and badly with the breath knocked out of me and temporarily stunned, with complaining knees, hands, wrists, shoulders and only quick thinking prevented me from a black eye and some missing teeth.

"Rich boy!" said a voice, "I was wondering when you would get here!"

"Sean," I said rolling to one side, "what have you done with Ali?"

"Lots and lots rich boy," I looked up, and there was Sean.

"You've hurt her haven't you," I said.

"Had to," he said simply.

"Yeah, I just bet you did."

"You don't think that I could just walk into the security system here did you?" he moved closer to me, and I saw the glint of a blade. The bastard had a big cooks' knife that I recognised from the kitchen at the flat in London. On reflection I should have fought him for it but I was still pretty stupefied by the fall.

A rope was pushed around my neck and tightened then he pushed my shoulder flat and what I guessed was a cable tie around one wrist. He pulled at my other arm and I struggled.

"I'll cut your fucking throat McNair." He said, so I allowed my arm to be taken and tied with the other one. The rope was pulled into my throat and I was pulled to my feet by it. I felt the knife point at the back of my neck.

"Walk," said Sean.

"Where?"

"Where I fucking tell you," he said. A burning sensation from my neck told me that the point of his knife was into my flesh, "quicker!" snapped Sean. I walked quicker. "Alice left you a message didn't she?" said Sean as we walked.

"No."

"She must have," said Sean, "You came straight here, I'd barely got the wiring sorted! Fucking helicopter pad, your Dad never told me about that."

"Probably didn't think it was any of your business."

"No, just like he thought that the rescue cage was none of my business, still it did what I wanted it to do." He chuckled mirthlessly, "so what made you fly down here with such speed, what made Ralph and Megs fly back from America before the end of their trip?"

"Lucky guess..." I felt the tip removed from my neck and pain under it. He must have slashed the back of my neck.

"Don't fucking lie to me rich boy," he snarled, "I beat and cut information out of your fiancée, I'll fucking do it to you."

"We found the note she scrawled in the wardrobe back," I said, "guessed it meant you were coming to the Spa."

"Oh well, it got YOU here at least, not all bad." he said with a grin, "You see Rich boy, for my next trick I'll remove you from the face of the earth and every memory of you, might even cut that fucking tree down that she's so proud of, then by the time I've finished with Alice she'll hate your memory. I've already convinced her that all of the pain she went through is because of you. Classic aversion therapy." He said with a grin. We were getting closer to the end of the Spa and the cliff edges.

This didn't look good and I slowed, but this just led to the point of the dagger pushing into the back of my neck

"Brain washing torture," I said, "Don't try and make it sound like a medical treatment, call it what it is."

"Potato, potaahto, means to an end. She'll hate you and love me, simples."

"If you think so." I said.

"So do the police outside know I'm here?"

"No," I said in all honesty; right now three of them they were stuck in the offices with no way of contacting the outside world. Dad was quite security conscious because of his clients of course and had only used the strongest of materials to secure the Spa against anyone that shouldn't be here. Obviously Sean knew that no one was going to be smashing their way out of the place.

"So pleased," he said, "left a few surprises around the place," he said, a cheer to his voice.

"Really? Do tell."

"Yeah, like I'm going to do that. Only Bond villains give the plot away in the last reel Mr McNair, fuck off." He jerked the rope again pulling me off balance and I tried to swing around out of knife range at least. "Don't try anything Richie," I looked and he was holding a yellow remote control. "One press of this button here and the cage that Alice is tied up in will crash to the rocks beneath." He waved the remote at me. "Richard, do what you are told and Alice with live, mess me around and she dies," he held up the remote again, "with the touch of a button."

"Sean no!" I shouted, confident that he probably had wired the cage to drop.

While I was still shaky he pulled me through some bushes and I saw that one of the high, strengthened safety fences that Dad had put up had been taken down, the light of the waning moon let me see what was going on and I could hear the crashing waves in the pitch blackness below.

"Jump," he said.

I turned,

"Fuck you!" I could see he was filming me with his camera, and the end of the rope he had around my neck was anchored to one of the fence posts still standing. The bastard was going to hang me and film it.

"Jump!" he chuckled, "Come on Rich boy, I'm filming this for posterity! Don't you want to go with a bang?"

"I'd rather not go at all," I said.

"Yeah, well I'm afraid that's a foregone conclusion, the only difference is how much it hurts beforehand."

"You're fucking insane," I said, "What did I ever do to you?"

"Everything," he said quietly, still filming, "you took everything I wanted, everything I'd planned for."

"Sean, what are you talking about? Alice? You were never interested in Alice, she told me."

"Like I said Richard McNair, I'm not telling you the whole story but know this, you are only partly to blame;" he looked down, "This is your Father's fault, don't blame me, this is all your Dad... the WONDERFUL RALPH McNAIR!"

"What did my Dad do?" I was stood at the edge of an extremely tall cliff with a rope around my neck and my hands tied with a psycho filming me. Perhaps this year wasn't going to turn out as good as the last one did...

"Goodnight Mr McNair."

I discovered what Sean had been looking down at; it was the rope at my feet and in second he snatched it whipping it around my legs and dropping me to the floor. Next he was kicking me and pushing me with his feet I felt the edge of the cliff face then a drop. My life flashed before my eyes - I had hoped it would be longer.

Fortunately the drop was quite short and I saw darkness, and hoped it would be quick.

I landed with a thump on my side, the pain in my ribs was intense and I must have cracked at least one of them.

The surface I was laying on was gritty and grainy and I could feel a sand-like substance on my face.

The pain in my ribs, the grit on my face and the lack of my life passing before my eyes led me to believe that perhaps something in Sean's best laid plan for revenge had gone wrong. I was quite certainly alive and not hanging by my broken neck slowly strangling to death. It was pitch black on my little ledge.

"Oooooookay then Richie," I said to myself, "this requires some very gentle movements and some quite considerable thinking about."

I was laying on my right side, my hands still tied behind my back, laying on the rope pinned taut beneath me. I lay quiet, hardly daring to breath even.

I heard a voice.

"Two minutes," it said, "That should about do it." I could feel some tension on the rope against my back and hips as my executioner pulled against it. I hoped he wouldn't pull too hard. The tension which represented most of my body weight anyway was obviously enough to convince him that I was hanging from it. "Sorry Richard," said Sean, "Didn't want to do that. If your Dad hadn't brought you into all of this you needn't have died. At least it was quick... sayonara Richie McNair, seems that right does prevail sometimes after all."

I felt some gentle movement at my hips and I guessed that he was cutting through the rope! Shit! To come this far, saved by an anonymous cliff ledge and rolling on to the rope only for it all to give way when he cut it.

I moved my weight into the cliff edge as much as possible just as the rope pinged and fell down.

"No splash," said Sean, "Ah well, bit messy on the rocks but the fish, crabs and lobsters will do for what the Atlantic doesn't wash away." He chuckled, "Don't think I'll eat the best seafood in the world from Port George ever again." His giggles grew fainter as he got further away.

What the fuck do I do now?!

I moved sections of my prostrate body slowly and slowly until I was back to the cliff edge and then I found what I wanted. Sharp shards of rock and I proceeded to so slowly rub the plastic cable tie and against it, and it took for ever, until I could flex and twist my arms feeling it give way and snap. I threw it to one side then moved my hand to the rope around my neck. It was thick cordage probably three quarters of an inch and I could feel the shape of a hangman's noose. I moved it around my neck until the sliding knot was at my chest and slowly pulled it down, then removing the loose loop up and over my head.

I kept hold if it just in case I might need it to climb up. No fucking way would it reach down to the beach.

Feeling towards the edge of the cliff with my left hand I found that it was about two feet wide. With my right hand I reached up for a hand hold so I could attempt to stand up and climb back to the surface.

There were some quite significant ones, so I slowly pulled myself up and onto my feet, my eyes closed and my back pushed so fucking hard into the cliff face, then bravely I spun around feeling for hand holds desperately, then realising that I was quite safe for the time being.

I opened my eyes expecting to see nothing but darkness but there some distance away was the faintly illuminated edge of a bungalow, and bushes that Sean had pushed me through. There was even the loose end of the rope he had cut to drop my dead body into the sea It was level with my left shoulder and I had only to flex my arm to reach for the thing and in moments I had pulled myself up and into the brush, panting and gasping with the effort and I suppose the stress.

I mean, I had survived my own execution for fuck's sake. If I had jumped I would have cleared the ledge and would now be food for next week's fish course. I started to shiver, it was fucking cold and I guessed I was seriously suffering from shock. I shook my head as if it would clear my fear, but just then went into hospital mode and checked myself all over. My ribs hurt but I figured I could live with that, so dropping low on my knees I walked towards the light I could see. I came into the back service area of one of the larger bungalows, and sat catching my breath and calming my mind. Sean had used the system against us, and we were now spread across the length of the Spa, with the staff and the three police officers all trapped inside, our phones and their radio's useless.

I needed to stay out of sight, and try to contact Dad in the apartment, and to get a message to the police officers stuck in the buildings. But I knew that Sean was monitoring the CCTV somewhere so had to be careful. Hugging the shadows (I played all of the Call of Duty games, Xbox for 4eva...) so used my surroundings and the available cover.

I got to the best bungalow where the offending cage was, and I crawled to the front door. It was still locked of course and I knew that it was empty.

I heard a whirring sound to my left and looked back and up at a CCTV camera. Fuck, Sean would know. The camera pointed at me then I could see that the ball was moving up and down, then it slowly pointed to the right and towards the cage. I thought about that camera and the fact that it was overtly moving around. I looked at the camera closer. It moved back to me. I looked and listened. There was no noise to suggest that Sean had set the cage free and my love had gone crashing to the beach below. Staring at the camera I used both of my hands to make the pointed head shape that in UK represents the traditional 'custodian' helmets that Bobbies have worn for hundreds of years.

The camera nodded again. I hoped that it was the police back in control of that camera at least. Once the camera had stopped nodding, again it moved to the right towards the cage and I pointed in that direction.

It nodded again.

I moved towards the edge of the cliffs through a mess of trimmed borders and box hedging. As I pushed through their was the cage swinging gently and laying in it, shivering against the March chill was a figure. It was Ali.

She was shivering and gently weeping so she was alive at least and I slipped closer to it. There was another camera and it nodded to me again.

I pointed to the cage and made an 'untie' motion with my fingers. The camera nodded once more.

I was about to stand and step on when I thought that this might have been Sean trying to get me into the cage to carry out some nefarious deed, so locking my feet against a nearby shrub I reached out under the gate and grabbed Ali's right arm and shook it. She flinched.

"Ali, Baby it's me, it's Richie, I've come to get you..."

She turned a face that in the ambient light I could see was all eyes but battered and bruised. That bastard her beaten her quite significantly and I fumed. I moved closer and she shook her head, getting more panicked the closer I got to the cage.

I looked at the workings and the supports and even I could see that the once beautifully constructed lifesaving cage now looked decidedly Jerry-rigged. There were wires sticking out in all directions and even I could see cables going to the twin hooks now had something attached to them, electric possibly explosive but definitely not good with electricians tape all over it. I saw that the cage had a large gates on either side and saw that there was a connector and wires touching between them the bared copper wires glinting in some ambient light. I guessed that this a little something that Sean had left behind and should someone try to opened the gate the whole thing would drop. Fuck.

I got my mobile phone and used the torch app to look closely at it. Ali was watching me just as closely. I took one of obviously pre-prepared strips of tape stuck along the top beam that the electrician had left for his nefarious usage, and connected the two contacts keeping the circuit made, to stop the thing falling into the sea at worse, at best to tell... well Sean I guessed that the cage gate had opened. This thought made me wrap a second piece around it.

Obviously pushed for time, he had just strung this wire along the top of the gate, so I carefully undid the tape strips holding it in place so it was hanging inside the cage. A quick check of the hinges told me that the gates swung out from the cage and away from the wire and Ali.

This could work. I lifted the latch and pulled the gate open and it rested in a pre-prepared groove in the cliff edge. The connection above was still made. Thank fuck.

I grabbed her shoulder and upper arm and pulled and she moaned behind the black tape stuck across her mouth. I pulled her again and her shoulders came off of the cage and onto dry land, and she realised and started to push with her feet coming closer and closer to me, until she was totally out of the cage and in my loving arms squeezing her tight, or as tight as I dared; I had no idea what the mad bastard had done to her in the days since he imprisoned her.

"It's alright honey, you're going to be fine," I kissed her cheek, "I'm nearly a Doctor remember?"

I pushed the gate closed.

She was trying to smile but the tears came. I thought about pulling the tape off of her mouth but I could now see that Sean and wrapped it around her entire head, including her dark brown hair. With my cold, sore fingers I set about undoing the ropes binding her hands behind her and extended up to her elbows. The knots Sean had used were quite extreme and took forever to undo, and I was left with six or seven feet of rope on my hands. It was hemp rope, so I felt no environmental compunction when I balled it into a big mass and threw it over the edge and into the sea as hard as I could. I didn't want Sean to have too many supplies should he decide that he was going to retie Ali or decide to do something unpleasant to me or my Dad. The tide was probably at its highest now so I guessed that the rope would go out to sea.

Ali was slowly bringing her hands back around her front with little gasps, gently as they had been secured like that for hours, days even, and she gently moved her shoulders and arms bringing them back to life. I felt across her face feeling where the tape was. It was black duct tape, gaffer tape, black and nasty, the shit that held rock concerts garages, airplanes and battleships together and I knew how to tear it. I pinched the tape high on her cheek and tore down, doing the same on the other cheek easing the strip away from her face.

"Hey Baby," I said.

There was a pause,

"Hey Richie," she smiled, or at least she tried very hard to.

"Let me untie your feet," I said, and Ali struggled to raise her feet and swing them around.

"Richie," she hissed, "where's Sean?"

"I'm guessing he's back at the buildings, he's after Dad."

"Richie, he's messed around with the CCTV, the phones and the security..."

"The police know Baby, I think they're gradually screwing over his locks and blocks he's installed."

"He made me let him in the system and show him..." her bottom lip started to tremble, "he beat me until I showed him," she started to cry, "he cut me Richie!" she hissed, "with his knife, said he was cutting his name into my back!" She was borderline hysterical now, "Richie, he's a fucking psycho, we have to get away - me, you, Ralph, he'll kill all of us. He showed me a video of your execution..."

"The Spa saved me baby," I said, "he won't succeed honey, the place will be crawling with cops soon."

"But he's trapped them all inside, he told me! He contacted the control room and told them that the perpetrator had been found inside and the Met were flying him back to London, and they could stand everyone down until nine tomorrow. There's no one coming! We've got to get him before he gets Dad and Mum outside."

"Yes, we do. Don't forget we have an advantage now - I'm dead, and you're tied and trapped in the cage. What did he do about the phones?"

"He's put some machine on the cable here," she turned to look at the cage gear, "he's using it and all the metal as an aerial to jam mobile phone signals and the police radios. We can't call in or out."

"Which bit?"

"That," she pointed at a strange looking black waterproof box with a power cable going in to it.

"This one?" I said pulling the power lead out of it, not thinking that it might be rigged to something nasty. Fortunately it wasn't.

"Looks like it," she said.

I retrieved my mobile. The signal was not spectacular at the best of times but I could see that I now had three bars rather than none. I decided to ring Devon and Cornwall Police and asked to be put through to the control room. I explained who and where I was and in no time was put through to the radio room who contacted one of the uniformed officers locked in the office.

"Hi Richard," it was Detective Dave, "It's so good to hear your voice, we were played a video of your execution."

"Yeah, the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated. Do you have the CCTV back?"