"Josh, you said it yourself. She was going back into protection. You saw her making the call last night. She probably had the pick-up arranged. You know they have to make it convincing." Lawson reasoned sitting up slowly, somehow having managed to sleep during the night. "We can make some calls but the aim of the program is for you not to be able to find her so they're not likely to give anything up to you."
"Lawson, she hasn't gone into custody. She's in trouble. Trust me, she wouldn't have left without saying goodbye… She went outside for a pee Lawson. She'd only just got up. She's in trouble." He argued. "For God's sake Lawson we're wasting time. I know Grace OK. She hasn't changed that much. She made a promise only last night. She's still good for her word Lawson which means she's out here somewhere and we need to find her."
Lawson nodded, convinced, waking Michael quickly. "What now?" he groaned rolling over for the first time, not having stirred at the commotion of Josh rushing back into the shed.
"Grace has gone. Get up."
One hour later
"No, I don't want to get stung...keep me away from the penguin." Anna started to mumble incoherently, trying to move her arms to bat out at the air in front of her face. She let out a groan when they stayed beside her, as heavy as lead, managing at best a flick of the wrist, struggling with it for a moment before getting distracted again. "I'm gonna vomit" she realised, barely managing to turn her head to the side, feeling the burn of the mushroom sauce she'd had on her steak at the pub the night before as it rushed back up, dripping down her chin and onto the collar of Josh's jacket.
"She's waking up" Chris Emery noted, cringing at the unmistakable sound of emesis.
"She's not going anywhere" Chris's brother Brett reassured, gesturing to the restraints around her ankles. "You better tie her arms down too. She probably scratches like the pussy she is."
"Meow" she giggled from the corner of the old shed, coughing slightly on the vomit which remained in her mouth, letting out another groan.
Chris went over, grabbing some more rope and tying her arms down, kicking her firmly in the ribs as she giggled again. She stopped giggling but barely winced, the ketamine in her system combined with the strong sedative preventing her from feeling the pain associated with the force. "Don't be mean," she pouted.
"SHUT up you fucking mole!" he yelled at her, kicking her again harder, this time in the head.
This time she did shut up. Her eyes rolling back into her head as she passed out again.
"Good work" Brett laughed, taking a photo on his phone and sending the simple picture message.
"This is it Mum. We got her."
* * *
Josh had never been so frantic in his life. Despite clearly struggling to even think he was trying to make a thousand different decisions at once, trying to second guess the Emery's, where they would be, what they would be planning.
"I hate to say it Josh" Lawson started after 3 hours of driving around nearby properties. "But if this is the Emerys again…they've probably already killed her" he spoke softly, watching the long country road in front of him not wanting to face his best mate and watch him absorb the possibility that the woman he'd only just found again might be dead.
To Lawsons surprise Josh shook his head without hesitating or striking out. "No, she's not.… You've seen her Lawson. She's traumatised. She's had to relocate 2 or 3 times with this program, which means they've tracked her down that many times.. heck they even managed to track her down last night. If they just wanted to kill her Lawson they would have hired someone or just taken a shot at her while she hung out her washing or something. She hasn't said that much, she didn't want to talk about it, but it's pretty obvious they'd rather make her squirm…torture her. They'll be playing with her. They'll want to drag it out. They haven't killed her yet Lawson… We need to find her before they do."
Lawson couldn't believe the man beside him had managed to analyse this much about the targets in the state that he was in. Josh's tendency to act first and think later was notorious within the TR ranks but at this moment Lawson could see how agitated Josh was, yet he was able to profile the targets and stay calm. "I hope you're right" he replied.
This time Josh hesitated in response. "Me too…" he replied.
Four hours later
"Josh?" Anna opened her eyes, to a figure leaning over her, a weight pressing against her aching chest. "Move over, Get off me!" she protested trying to push him off her, her head spinning when she heard a laugh that didn't belong to the person she thought it was.
"She thinks I'm that other cop" Brett Emery laughed as he straddled her around the hips, leaning forward to press even more of his weight onto her already crushed chest. Anna let out a squeal of pain as she got her bearings.
"Get off me" she squealed trying to get him off her, realising very quickly that she was pinned to the ground beneath him.
"And deny myself a beautiful lady who's just begging for it?" he laughed reaching forward to stroke her cheek."
She groaned as the pressure increased on her chest, gritting her teeth as she tried not to pass out from the pain. "You touch me and Josh will kill you" she winced.
"Ahhh you see, that's the best part of it all.. your pig friends, they all think you've just disappeared again. That's the problem with all this relocating bullshit Grace… after a while your friends get so sick of you lying to them and disappearing without notice that they piss off back to Melbourne. By the time anyone realises that you're dead your friends will be retired from the pig squad. At least we know what you're up to…where you've been hiding…where you'll be buried. We always know."
Chris laughed walking over to join his brother, tightening the restraints on her arms now that she had regained consciousness, as Brett loosened her legs, spreading them further apart running a hand up Graces inner thigh letting his fingers run over the sensitive skin there, both boys laughing as they saw the panic flood Annas eyes as she began to squirm.
"Please…don't. Not again." she whimpered, her strong resolve starting to crack as the fear took over.
Chris nodded at Brett as both boys leant in closer, Brett biting down hard on her thigh at the same time as Chris who left an identical set of teeth marks on her forehead. "Just the start of things to come" Chris teased as they both stood up. "It wouldn't be right without the batteries that dickhead here forgot….need a copy for our home movie collection." He grinned again "Mum would be devastated if she missed this episode" he added grabbing his keys.
Anna let out a sob as she realised she'd been brought some time, but kept very still, trying to calm herself down and not draw any more violence from the brothers, wincing as she took a deep breath.
Anna heard the 4wd drive away moments later but stayed where she was paralysed in fear for about 15minutes, waiting for one of the boys to reappear at her slightest movement. Realising that they were planning on killing her regardless of whether she tried anything Anna decided that if she didn't take her chance now they would be back before she could, pulling against the ropes on her arms, wincing as her left arm throbbed in pain at the slightest movement. Biting down hard on her lip she tried again, frustrated as the ropes didn't budge.
It was only when she subconsciously moved her legs back together to put some pressure on the stinging bite mark that Anna realised that the ropes around her legs were still tied loosely. With a couple of good kicks she managed to pull them free from her legs and with renewed enthusiasm pulled hard with her good arm against the rope holding it down. Groaning in frustration as she felt the restraint tighten she turned her head to the left in desperation, spotting a sharp edge on the edge of the shed wall. Screaming at her first movement she moved her arm to position the rope against the edge. Gritting her teeth firmly she forced herself to be quiet and ignore the pain, slowly sawing at the rope. As soon as her arm was free she sat up, quickly picking the knot on the other side, her legs almost buckling under her as she stood up too quickly. Taking a millisecond to steady herself before the adrenaline took over, Anna Travers discovering that deep down she did still have some fight left in her as she took off.
Anna had been running for 40minutes straight without stopping or even looking behind her when she hit the main road. As the adrenaline petered out and she came to a standstill the pain started to re-register. She finally took a moment to catch her breath, the throbbing in her head and the dizziness she felt reminding her of heavy hits to the head she had taken and she groaned slightly in pain, moving her hand to her eyes to rub them, her eyes blurry, only then realising that it was blood sticking her lashes together and obscuring her vision. Licking her lips she realised just how thirsty she was, but a quick look around at her surroundings assured her that her dehydration was not going to be relieved anytime soon and that she needed to move back off the road in case the Emerys' had discovered she was gone and were out looking for her. She moved back off the road into the slight cover of the trees, not wanting to be visible but at the same time knowing she needed to stick to the road if she wanted to make it back into town.
