The Stairwell
written by: RC Larlham
@Mohawk742
He accosted her in the stairwell. He yanked her arm behind her and pulled her head back. She could see the July moon hanging above the trees through the window at the head of the stairs. Its pitiless white light shining through the window illuminated her defenselessness.
She filled her lungs. His free hand slid rapidly upward from roaming her breasts through the fabric of her nightgown. He pressed a finger to that spot at the base of her larynx that always made her gag.
“One sound… I’ll kill you while I rape you.” His voice was light and pleasant, and all the more threatening for it. “I’ll do what I’m here to do. Hear me?” Suddenly raspy – throaty.
She swallowed… nodded jerkily. His hand moved back down; farther. “I knew it!” Gloating. She felt his hand slide down the side of her hip, unimpeded by hidden elastic. “You sleep naked!” A crow of triumph.
Frantically, she shook her head.
“This?” Fingering the thin fabric of her gown.
She nodded quickly.
“I meant under.” He brought his hand up to her arm. “Upstairs.” Her other arm pressed tightly against her spine between her shoulder blades.
She shuddered and stepped forward, stepped up… climbed… thirteen steps. At the top, he turned her left, moved her toward her door. She turned the knob slowly. The door opened into darkness. The pressure plate was not disarmed.
For the tenth time or more she told herself her trip to retrieve the Sunday paper was a pointless habit. She stepped into the black-dark foyer and stopped. “Listen.” Her first sound.
In her mind’s eye she saw one room, the walls nearly filled by a personal multilevel aquarium. In response to the one millimeter depression of the pressure plate, water rippled over moss-covered stones … slid quicksilver flash through the industrial grade quick-dump fire killer system into a hidden, excessively oversized tank. In a tenth of a second, a switch beneath the receiving tank tripped. She dropped her head.
The small quarrel left the crossbow at rifle-bullet speed. The pleasant-voiced man made no sound.
She flexed her insulted right arm. “George,” she sang to her beloved, “come here, please.”
The huge striped man-eater rumbled in his chest as he gently butted his head against her thigh.
“Dinner, George,” pointing.
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