The door of the boat opened and footsteps neared. Every step creaked and the boat rocked dully on murky rolls of water beneath it's wooden belly.

The footsteps stopped and Connie turned her head, just slightly, just enough to see down through the sitting room, and into the kitchen.

One of the men was nearing her, casting an eye over everything as he passed as though he was looking for something. He stopped just behind Eliot's limp body and looked down at him, a sneer cut a jaggered loose line across his face and with the toe of his boot he nudged him, once, twice, three times before growing bored, and with one final satisfying kick to the dying mans back he stepped over him, neatly avoiding the pool of blood at Eliot's lips and coming to a stand still in the door frame like a grotesque picture of a man in life size.

He sighed as he looked at her watching him. He was still smiling, and when he looked at her he narrowed his eyes.

"Looks like we're about to receive our first delivery."

He pronounced the last word carefully, drawing it out and curling his lip.

"Clinical nurse manager Rita Freeman was very, very helpful..."

He bit his lip against a laugh and Connie struggled to draw in a breath, she felt the sudden weightless flutter of her heart beneath her ribs.

Rita...

All she could think of was that there were two of them. Two men, and she had one knife, one chance. If somehow she injured one, surely the other would come running?

She turned away from him and closed her eyes, she wanted to cry and let the hot tears burn her cheeks. She wanted to curl up in a ball and cry forever. Somehow she had ruined everything good in her life, with one drunken night. Surely Rita knew what had happened by now? That she'd been unfaithful...

The very thought made her choke in a strangled breath and she drew her lips into a pinched line, refusing to make another sound.

She felt him nearing her, she heard the groan of the floorboards as he knelt down next to her and the heat of his breath against her cheek.

"Don't cry..."

There was laughter in his voice, drifting and swelling, mocking her.

She drew in a steadying breath through her nose and turned her head to face him, unprepared for how close he was to her as she opened her eyes. He was so close that she could see the hazel within his blue-green eyes, the coarse dark hair stubbling his jaw, could smell the alcohol on his breath.

"You know, I never got to truly appreciate how fucking gorgeous you are, when we first met."

He whispered, his eyes glittering dangerously.

She almost laughed, instead she exhaled abruptly, unable to look away.

"When we first met?! When you raped me?!"

She whispered, her lips trembling despite the fierce burn of fire within her belly.

He raised his eyebrows and sucked in a breath, seemingly unphased.

"It was too dark."

He said with a shrug.

"Too dark to really appreciate..."

He was touching her. His fingers were running over her cheek, her jaw, lingering on the rise of her throat as though contemplating her life force and it's worth, the tips of his fingers pausing over the pulse that beat like a bird that struggled for every breath.

"Don't touch her..."

A watery rasp of a voice made them both start, the man's touch fell from her face and he twisted to look behind himself. Connie craned her neck back to see around him, to where Eliot was lying, as still as a dead man, with one eye open, the other invisible, his face crushed and bloody against the floor.

"I don't think you're really in any position to do anything to stop me, are you now pretty boy?"

He laughed as he spoke and then turned back to look at Connie, his head cocked to one side, catching her eye.

"Not so pretty anymore, is he..."

He murmured, gazing at her mouth, how her lips were parted showing only the glinting white edge of her two front teeth, how pink her lips were, how they rose into a perfect cupids bow.

"You know..."

He knelt down closer to her, lowering his voice to a whisper. She could smell the repulsively thick sweet smell of stale alcohol on his breath. She tried to turn away from him but her neck was stiff and he placed his palm against her throat. He stroked the skin of her neck, back and forth, back and forth, his eyes watching the path played by his hand, and then he paused, and looked pointedly back to her mouth.

"Those lips look like they were made for sucking cock..."

He reached down out of site with his other hand, and she heard the gentle stutter of the zip of his fly being lowered. All the while he was smiling, grinning, with laughing eyes that made the bile rise in the back of her throat so that she felt that at any moment she might choke to death.

She felt herself shaking her head, only ever so slightly, but his fingers twitched against her throat and his grasp tightened so that she had to open her mouth to gasp for breath.

"And don't think of using those perfect teeth of yours, because if you do-"

He tightened his grasp further.

"I'll knock. Them out. Of your. Fucking. Head."

Her vision was blurring. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to swallow.

"Please..."

Her voice came out as a stranged rasp and she coughed, wincing as the muscles in the back of her neck contracted.

He hoisted himself up so that his waist was level with her face, and she couldn't help the hopeless sob that caught in her throat, or the tears that burned at the back of her eyes as she watched him unbuckle his belt.

-.-

More soon. Please review and let me know what you think, as always...xxx