The Trophy Wife by Diana Diamond Read Free Book Online

watched him writhe in agony, sick from the taste of his own blood, his strength ebbing away. But as she began to feel her own consciousness, she realized that she was the one who felt sick to her stomach and whose strength had deserted her. She couldn’t move herarms or even raise her head. When she opened her eyes, she was blinded by a white glow. Only by squinting could she make out the pattern of perfect squares coming through the white background.
    She was on her back, looking up at a ceiling of sound-deadening tiles. There was a ceiling just like it in the finished basement of the first house she and Walter had owned. She struggled to raise her head and was able to see the tops of the walls, light fake wood panels, framed out with rough furring strips. When she tried to sit up, she found out why her arms felt so heavy. Her wrists were handcuffed around the wooden crossbar of the headboard. She was chained onto a bed. She glanced down and saw that she was on a plain mattress with no bedding and was wearing a heavy, plaid nightgown that she had never seen before.
    â€œOh, you’re awake.” It was a woman’s voice, neither rude nor pleasant but simply stating a fact. Emily turned her head trying to locate the sound, but she was suddenly engulfed in a wave of nausea.
    â€œI’m going to be sick.”
    â€œNo, you won’t. That’s just the drug. It takes a while to wear off.” The woman stepped into view, leaning over the bed. She had a long, thin face with narrow eyes and a prominent Roman nose. Her hair was jet black and cut off abruptly just below her ears. The part, which showed traces of gray, was as straight as a laser beam, and the narrow lips were colored to a dark maroon that was nearly black. She was in her forties, fitted out to look twenty and achieving midthirties. She seemed very competent, projecting all the authority of a top executive’s private secretary.
    She took Emily’s face in her hand and turned it slowly from side to side. “They probably used Demerol. That shit can give you a nasty hangover. Sodium pentathol is faster, and there aren’t any aftereffects.”
    â€œWhere am I?” Emily managed.
    â€œThat’s not important,” the woman answered. “What’s important is that you’re alive and well. And you’ll stay that way as long as you do as you’re told.”
    Emily lifted her head a bit higher. “A basement? Am I in a basement?”
    â€œIt’s a cellar in a house. An old dump in the middle of nowhere. There’s no way out except those stairs …” she nodded to Emily’s left “… and there’s a gentleman up there you really don’t want to meet.”
    Emily followed the direction of the gesture. There was a flight of steps, covered with a faded carpet, that led to a closed door. “How did I get here?”
    The woman laughed. “In a shower curtain. You’ve been shipped around like a sack of mail.”
    â€œYou drugged me … you kidnapped me.”
    â€œHell, no. Kidnapping is a little out of my line. All I’m getting paid for is keeping you off the streets and that’s all I’m doing. This is someone else’s scam. Someone told me you were coming and the same person is going to tell me when you’re going. In the meantime, you and I have to do our best not to get on each other’s nerves.”
    Emily wiggled on the bed, trying to find a comfortable position. “Please. Can you free my hands. My arms are hurting.”
    â€œSure! If you promise not to try anything silly.”
    Emily nodded. The woman immediately went around behind the bed and snapped the shackles off one wrist, then the other. Slowly, Emily was able to drag her hands down and begin massaging her wrists. “God,” she sighed blissfully.
    â€œThere’s a toilet over there,” the woman said, pointing to the stall formed by a framed-out wall. Emily