Warning--A very dark chapter. Bobby in Sebastian's hands.

CHAPTER NINE

There were moments when he couldn't remember ever being without pain—terrible, awful, all consuming pain. Sebastian and Caldwell hit him with flat boards as he hung by his handcuffed wrists. They whipped him with belts and leather straps that left welts and cuts on his body. They burned and smacked the bottom of his feet. Sebastian sliced his skin, but his torturers left his face and head alone.

"We want Detective Eames to be able to recognize you," Sebastian whispered to him. "And we don't want you to suffer a blow to your head that might keep you from enjoying our work. And you do enjoy it, don't you, Detective? I believe you might think you deserve it…I know something about you from what Gage said and reading the newspapers. You abandoned your mother…your brother…Detective Eames."

Bobby refused to answer. Sebastian's comments were too close to the truth. "Dec…" Bobby thought. "I told you things…I trusted you…How could you tell anyone?"

Just when he thought he couldn't bear the pain any longer, Sebastian and Caldwell gave him powerful painkillers. Bobby wasn't sure what they were, but he suspected vicodin and codeine and some opiates. A fog would descend on Bobby. The drugs didn't completely take away the pain, but they did take him to some other places. The other places weren't always pleasant destinations. When his torturers wanted to resume their horrible games, they pumped amphetamines into Bobby. Hallucinations began to plague him, and Bobby couldn't tell what was real and what wasn't. Images of his mother, his brother, the man he thought was his father, his biological father, Nicole Wallace, his time in Tate—everything horrible and terrible in his life—swept through his mind. He desperately tried to take refuge in the only thing that offered him comfort. "Alex," he thought. He fought to keep from revealing how much she meant to him to Sebastian and Caldwell. He had to keep her away from them. He would've happily welcomed death except for Alex. "Please…Please, God…Let me tell her how much she means to me…How sorry I am for everything I ever did to her…Please."

They didn't, at least, rape him after that first time. Sebastian sneered and told Bobby he'd had better men in prison. Caldwell was bitterly disappointed that Bobby kept fighting and wasn't passive and terrified like Marian Brewster. They finally removed the gag, and Bobby was enormously grateful to be able to breathe more freely. Sebastian wanted to talk to him about Gage, but Bobby remembered that the one point of Gage's profile of Sebastian that saved Alex was that refusing to respond to the killer might keep a victim alive. Sebastian appeared puzzled by Bobby's silence, but it increasingly enraged Caldwell. Through his pain and drug filled haze, Bobby became aware of a growing division between the two men, but he couldn't take advantage of it. He was too confused and hurt. At several points, Bobby heard his cell phone ring with Alex's tone, and terror filled him that Sebastian or Caldwell would answer it and talk to Alex, or, worse, lure her to this terrible place.

"My phone…" Bobby thought. "It's over there…In the pile of my clothes…"

He clung desperately to the moments—seconds it seemed to him—of lucidity that came just as the drugs took hold or wore off and the pain eased or started. "Sebastian," he thought in these brief periods. "Usually kept his victims two to three days…He didn't use drugs…Didn't have them…Caldwell introduced that…Caldwell wants it to last longer…Marian…Oh God, poor Marian…It looked like they had her a week….My connection with Gage…My refusal to talk…It'll give me more time…But how much time has gone by already? How long before they start carving me up? Alex…Please find me…Please let me tell you…"

"You know, Detective Goren," Sebastian said as he and Caldwell hauled Bobby up for another torture session. He smiled at Bobby. "Such a formal title, don't you think? What does Declan Gage call you? Robert? Bob?"

"Maybe he calls him son," Caldwell laughed.

Bobby heard the sickly familiar sound of the leather strap smacking against the wooden table. He tried to brace for the blow, but Caldwell released the rope holding up Bobby's handcuffed wrists, and Bobby fell to his bruised knees. Before he could recover, Caldwell and Sebastian jerked Bobby up again, and the strap cut into his bloody back. A cry escaped Bobby's lips, and he struggled to keep his bruised and burned feet beneath him.

"I've often wondered about what happened between you and Gage," Sebastian continued. "He spoke very highly of you…Very highly…Upset many of the other investigators…I believe it added to the divisions among the people trying to find me. Of course, I never reached the inner circle where Gage held court. I could only observe. But I wonder if you'd been present if things might have been different."

Bobby had asked himself the same question many times. If he'd been there, he could've said no to Gage; he could've saved Gage and Gage's career; he could've saved some of Sebastian's victims; he could've saved Jo; he could've saved Marian Brewster; he could've saved Alex.

The leather strap slashed into his back again. Bobby's knees buckled, he cried out weakly in pain as his shoulders, arms and wrists took all of his weight. He struggled to regain his footing, but Caldwell and Sebastian raised him so that his body hung limply and painfully. His toes barely brushed the concrete floor.

"You know, Mark," Sebastian said thoughtfully.

Bobby shuddered. That tone of voice from Sebastian always foreshadowed some new and awful form of torture.

"I believe," Sebastian continued. "Our guest could use a good cleaning…"

Caldwell chuckled. "He does stink. And he's a mess. A good bath wouldn't hurt him…Or maybe it would…"

"Oh, God," Bobby thought. "What's their idea of "cleaning"?"

A blast of icy water froze his mind. The water hit him with such force that Bobby's body swung from the hook. He shook uncontrollably and violently from the cold and pain. He couldn't breathe, and began to desperately hope he'd pass out. The blast finally stopped, and Bobby hung limply again.

"And now," Sebastian said. "Mark has something for all of those nasty cuts…So they won't get infected…"

Bobby heard a cap being unscrewed from a bottle, and the smell of rubbing alcohol filled the air.

"No," he thought, just before the searing pain took him.

The pain finally subsided to a point where Bobby again became aware of his surroundings and realized his two torturers were arguing.

"That was too much," Sebastian said disapprovingly. "You must learn to be more subtle."

"We've been too subtle with him," Caldwell countered. "We need to start carving him up."

"I'm disappointed that we haven't had a better response from him," Sebastian said. "But think of how wonderful it'll be when he breaks…and he will break…"

Caldwell growled softly.

"Let him down a bit, Mark…So he can stand…And we can talk…"

Caldwell lowered Bobby so that Bobby could stand flatfooted on the floor. It offered some relief for his shoulders and arms and wrists, but his feet hurt terribly. He heard Sebastian and Caldwell's steps as they walked away and the door opening and shutting.

"Oh…God…So cold…So cold…" Bobby thought. "Alex…Please…Please help me…Alex…My clothes…My cell phone…Did they leave it?"

He looked up at his hands. The cuff on his right wrist dug into his skin, but the one on his left was loose. He cautiously moved his arms and winced at the pain. The blood and water on his skin provided some lubrication so that the cuff turned around his left wrist. "Maybe," he thought, but the prospect of pulling his hand through the cuff terrified him. He swallowed. "Alex…Alex did it…" He turned, and his arms screamed with pain. "Alex…Alex wasn't beaten and whipped and raped…" He swallowed again. He was horribly hungry and thirsty, and he fought the memories of his time at Tate. "Water," he thought. "There's water down there. And my clothes…And maybe the cell phone…If I can get to them…"

He turned painfully and slowly. He balanced precariously on his bare feet; the cold sent tiny, sharp needles into his skin. "Give up," part of mind told him. "You're just causing yourself more pain…They'll be back…Maybe with painkillers…If you try to get away, they'll hurt you more…Hell, you know they're going to hurt you more…Fight…Fight…You want to see Alex again…To…To tell her how sorry you are…How grateful you are." As the thoughts raced through his head, Bobby shifted and turned and pulled at the handcuffs. He concentrated on trying to free his left hand. The metal cut into his skin as he tried to force the cuff over his hand. His legs and stomach began to cramp, and he realized that his last dose of painkillers had been some time ago. "I don't know what I'm more afraid of," he thought. "Of Sebastian and Caldwell coming back…Or of they're not coming back." Blood streaked his left arm; it seemed to ease the cuff's movements.

His left arm suddenly fell by his side. The empty cuff flew up and clanged loudly against a pipe. He swayed on his feet, and his right arm, the handcuffs dangling from its wrist, fell by his side, and, his body screaming with pain, he dropped to the cold, wet floor. For several awful moments, his world was nothing but pain, the worst pain he had ever felt. He thought his body might tear itself apart, but the pain and cramps finally eased to a point where he could move. He found a large dip in the concrete where several inches of water collected. It was dirty, and he tried not to think of what was in it. It was, at least, cold and wet and soothed his parched throat, and it gave him enough relief that he could think.

"All right…My clothes…Where are they? My cell…Please…Please…Let it be there…"

He began to pull his body across the rough concrete. His right arm was nearly useless, and his legs offered little help. He pushed and pulled with his scraped and bloody left hand. His body left bloody streaks on the floor. The red mixed with the water to create tiny pink streams that swirled into the drain.

END CHAPTER NINE