The Bridesmaid by Mario Caliente

The twenty-eight year old woman—a stunning blonde that made men run into lamp posts when passing her on the street—had come to a strange city to be a bridesmaid at her good friend’s wedding the following day. She was returning from a bachelorette party, where she had had a little too much to drink, and was therefore not as attentive to her surroundings as she should have been when pausing at her hotel room door and fumbling in her purse for the magnetic room key card. She was therefore not aware of the man standing behind her as she finally opened the door, nor was she aware of the fact that he followed her into the room before the door closed behind her. She was aware of nothing until the man suddenly and with great strength locked her from behind in a full nelson, her purse still on her shoulder, and hustled her to the king size bed in the middle of the room where he forced her face down onto the mattress, his weight heavy upon her. Before she could summon the wherewithal to scream—before she could even fully comprehend what was happening—a thick rag was stuffed into her gaping mouth, quickly followed by a cloth cinch that secured the rag when tied tightly around her head. When comprehension at last came flooding over her, a scream that emanated in her throat died a muffled death in the gag.Comprehension was further reinforced as the young woman next felt the cold, hard steel of handcuffs around her wrist and then heard the disheartening click that the cuff made when snapped tightly shut, pinching her skin in the process. This washed away her semi-inebriated state in a flood of terror. Feeling her purse being pulled from her shoulder, and then her arm drawn roughly behind her back, the young blonde screamed again into her gag and mounted her first struggle of resistance, kicking her feet in wild desperation as the man sat upon her buttocks. She managed to pull her other arm away from the man’s grasp when she felt him reaching for it. Her attacker, however, quickly tracked down this arm and forcibly yanked it behind her back to join her other one, causing the young blonde to shriek in pain. The cry was muffled to such an extent, though, that there was no way anyone in an adjoining room could have heard her. There was quickly a second click of the handcuffs and the young woman’s wrists were firmly secured together behind her back. Her body twisted and jerked beneath her attacker’s weight in futile protest.

The young woman then felt the man’s considerable weight lift off her. She was able to roll away from him and onto her side. With her heart pounding and her eyes wide with fear, she sucked in air through flared nostrils above the gag in her mouth. She tried desperately to bring her arms around, but cried in pain as the handcuffs bit into the flesh of her wrists.

The man then left the bed and began walking back to the door of the hotel room. The young woman rolled off the far side of the bed and landed on her feet after almost falling to the floor—one of her medium heeled shoes had come off in the brief scuffle and now, with one shoe on and one off, her balance was compromised. She watched, wide eyed, as the man, now at the door, turned the deadbolt and set the chain lock in place. A sickness enveloped her when she saw the man turn around at the door and face her, a non-humorous smile contorting his lips. Again she yanked at the handcuffs. Again there was sharp pain in her wrists. She screamed, but anyone in the adjoining rooms would have had to have their ears pressed to the wall to hear the muffled cry, and at this late hour that was highly improbable.

The young blonde backed slowly away as the intruder began walking calmly toward her. She recognized him. He had gotten into the elevator with her just minutes ago—in fact, she had held the elevator door open for him as it was about to close. He had smiled politely and tipped his baseball cap at her as the elevator doors shut. She had smiled back at him, thinking it odd that someone was wearing sunglasses at that hour of the night, but then turned her full attention back to the messages on her smart phone as the elevator ascended. She had not been aware that he had gotten off on the same floor as she. Or that he had followed her….

Their eyes locked now. The man was no longer wearing sunglasses, and his eyes fairly shown with lust as he regarded the young woman backing away from him, her own eyes fearful and as wide as saucers. With her chest heaving from panicked breathing, she tried to talk to him, but her words were hopelessly suppressed by the thick rag in her mouth. Soon, she bumped into the curtains of the hotel room’s window, and could back up no further. The man, however, continued stepping carefully toward her. Again she let fly with a flurry of words that were rendered completely unintelligible by her gag.

The man paused at arm’s length from the young woman. She was wearing a delicate, tight fitting white blouse with buttons in the front, the type of blouse which, with the help of a very expensive bra beneath, uplifted and showcased her breasts in a way that weakens a man’s legs. That was especially the case here, where the top two buttons were undone, providing more than a little hint of tantalizing cleavage. It was a bare midriff blouse that also showed off a slender waist and the beginning swell of hips above a pair of low riding, tight fitting, coral colored denim slacks. She stood awkwardly on one medium heeled shoe and one bare foot.

They watched each other intently for a long moment, the young woman breathing heavily and with difficulty given the rag in her mouth, and the man, it seemed, hardly breathing at all. As they stared at each other, it was as if each was waiting to see what the other did.

It was the man who acted first. He turned and walked away from her. There was a moment of disbelief, and then a sigh of relief that caused the young woman’s tense body to sag. Of course, this was just a mistake! Some sort of a game this man was playing, but he had the wrong room! He was leaving now. Of course, that was it! Oh, my god yes! This was just a terrible case of mistaken identity!

But why isn’t he taking my handcuffs off? The young blonde continued watching the man’s movements with the wariness of a cornered animal, and her sense of relief faltered when she saw him stoop to pick up from the floor a medium sized black bag that he had apparently brought with him. She watched in confusion as he pulled some articles out of the bag. She couldn’t tell at first what they were. There was not a great deal of light in the room. She was still in doubt as she watched the man hold up a metal device with three short tubes coming from its core and saw him begin to pull on the tubes, extending them outward four or five feet. But she didn’t recognize what the contraption was until she next saw the man pull a video camera from the bag and attach it to the device. A tripod! And when set on the floor, it positioned the camera a good six feet in the air. The young woman watched in mounting confusion as she saw the man point the camera to the bed. It was only after she saw the camera’s red recording light come on, and then saw the man look back to her and give her his non-humorous smile, that she realized that her attacker was not only not leaving, but he was going to record whatever…whatever was going to happen! The realization of this caused her legs to nearly buckle. A warm flow of urine slowly soaked the crotch of her coral colored jeans.

The man now walked back to where the young woman cowered by the window of the hotel room. This time he moved quickly, decisively. As he grasped her by the biceps of her right arm, she cried into her gag and twisted her body away from him. He shoved her against the drapes and gave her face quick, hard slaps, first across one cheek, then the other. The blows made her head snap. Stunned, she sagged against the curtains. Her assailant then doubled her over his shoulder and carried her kicking and squirming to the bed where in dumped her roughly onto the mattress, in full view of the dull red light of the video camera.

The young woman rolled onto her back—her forearms beneath her—and lifted her legs, cocking them into a martial arts pose, ready to kick out at the intruder. Her head shook hurriedly back and forth. The strap of the gag around her head kept most of her long, blonde hair in place, but several strands of it tossed wildly in the air. Incoherent words continued to jam into her gag.

The man watched her carefully, an expression of amusement on his face. Then, he moved closer still and paced a knee on the edge of the bed. The young woman kicked at him as viciously as she could. The blow with her heel struck him in the thigh, but did not faze him. To the contrary, his hand moved quickly and caught her ankle before she could pull back. She attempted to kick him with her other leg but missed wide, and in that instant her attacker was between her legs. Squirming madly on the bed, the young woman continued to thrash her legs, but her target was too close, and the considerable energy that she was expending was entirely in vain. Her cries continued to die in her gag, heard by her assailant and nobody else.

The man moved atop the young woman’s legs and sat on her thighs, his knees on either side of her as she thrashed and twisted beneath him. It was when her assailant reached for his bag that he had left on the bed and withdrew a black handled knife with a six inch blade that the young woman froze. Her saucer-sized eyes widened yet further as she saw the lethal weapon. It’s sleek, steel blade fairly glistened before her, despite the fact that the hotel room was only dimly lit by lamp light, and she began to sob hysterically. The sounds she made, however, muffled as they were by the rag stuffed in her mouth, could not have been heard by anyone even had they happened to have been passing by in the hallway at that late hour. Another stream of warm urine besotted the crotch of her tight fitting pants, very close to where the man sat atop her.