Chapter 13

Ranger left the apartment after a brief tutorial on how to transfer the video to digital. I was both happy and sad to see him leave. If he'd stayed, I knew I'd be more motivated to get through the tapes. At the same time, the thought of him being present while I watched myself cavort with Rafael was more than I could handle. He sensed this.

Once I was well and truly alone in the space, I reached for my messenger bag and pulled out my stash. Tastykake butterscotch krimpets, red licorice, two Payday candy bars and a box of Milk Duds. Nobody goes to the movies without candy, right?

I put the first tape in the player and hit play. The image came up immediately on the computer screen. It was grainy, probably because the room was dark, but I realized at once the couple on the screen was Rafael and someone who was not me. I watched the entire video, all twenty-two minutes of it. It was horrible. Not erotic, but I hadn't thought it would be. I felt as though I was a peeping Tom looking at an unsuspecting couple. Only it wasn't an unsuspecting couple because Rafael knew his performance was being recorded.

The little hairs on my arms stood on end, when at one point during the video he smiled up at the camera. I noticed he positioned his partner momentarily, so the camera had a good view of her face. He was making sure the intended view could clearly identify the woman. It was something I saw repeated in each video I watched. Rafael had a routine to his sick video making.

I watched the second tape and was relieved to find that once again the woman was not me. Still, I watched the tape to the end. This one was only eighteen minutes. The third time wasn't a charm either. I continued to randomly pull videos from the backpack and push them into the player.

I'd watched four videos in their entirety. There was sound on all of them, and although the quality wasn't good, it was good enough to hear that he seemed to always satisfy his partner. I looked with surprise at my stash of treats and realized I hadn't bothered to open a package.

As I put the fifth tape in, I opened the butterscotch krimpet and took a healthy bite. The tape was staticky. No images. Nice to know there was at least one woman who'd escaped the recording. I ejected the tape and popped the next one in as I stuffed the rest of the krimpet into my mouth. Bad timing. This one was me.

I hit the pause button and got up to get a glass of water and let the krimpet digest. I knew I was putting off the inevitable, but I was good at that. I thought about going down to the gym for a run on the treadmill. Maybe that would put me in a better frame of mind to watch, but then Ranger would know I wasn't viewing the tapes. Well, screw Ranger—at least figuratively. He'd made it clear there wouldn't be any literal screwing. I could do what I needed to on my own time frame. He wasn't the boss of me!

Sighing at the ridiculousness of my own internal dialogue, I set the glass of water on the counter and turned to go back to the den. I had my tape. I could pull it from the player and do what Lula said, stomp it into oblivion. The hold Rafael had on me would be gone. I needed to see it, though. I needed to know exactly what was on the tape before I destroyed it. I would watch, but I'd watch with the mute button on. I'd be damned if I was going to listen to my own sounds of pleasure. And I wouldn't look at the timer. I didn't want to know how I compared to the others.

It was good that it had taken me a while to find my video. Watching the others, knowing that I was only one of several foolish women lessened the blow to my self-esteem slightly. After I had finished the entire video, I realized the overwhelming sense of relief I'd thought I'd feel was missing. Theoretically, I should be feeling very relieved. I had the tape. There could be other copies, but I doubted it. Rafael was pond scum who got off on screwing women who could be of use to him and then recording the event to make sure he could make them bend to his will. I thought I'd been an idiot, but there were others like me, it seemed.

I couldn't forget the haunted far-away look in Ella's eyes that morning when she asked me if I'd ever had so many bad days that I forgot there could be good ones. Suddenly I understood what had made me watch the tapes to the end, and I knew I would watch the rest of the tapes in their entirety. It was doubtful, but if I could find even a shred of evidence that would help prove Rafael's guilt then I would.

With each succeeding tape I watched I munched my way through the pile of junk food. Ranger had mentioned I might recognize some of the other victims. We were victims. It's true that we may have been too trusting, but that hadn't given Rafael the right to record us. So far, I hadn't recognized any of them. Maybe later I would have Ranger review the tapes to see if he could recognize them. I had taken Rafael's threat to them away by stealing the tapes. It would be good to let them know.

Watching the videos to the end had produced no clues. I didn't think there was anything that would link Rafael to the murder of David Guzman hidden in Disney Princess movie cases. I'd been through eight of the tapes and I thought maybe I was getting immune to the sight of Rafael ruining the lives of unsuspecting women. I'd been in the room for nearly three hours and I probably had another hour to go to get through the last tapes. I really wanted to quit, but I persisted. One more hour and it would be over.

I put the next tape in the player and was relieved to see the static indicating a blank tape. I was about to eject it when the screen turned black, and a time stamp flashed briefly on the bottom left corner. Dang, I guess I was going to have to watch after all, but then the video returned to static mode. I decided to take another brief break. I scooped up the wrappers and other detritus from my junk food extravaganza and went into the kitchen to hide them in the bottom of the trash compactor. I didn't care if Ella saw, but I'd rather Ranger didn't see the evidence of my nonnutritive snacking.

When I sat in front of the computer again there were images on the screen. Crap! It wasn't a blank tape after all. I hit rewind and watched backwards until the images stopped. Even backwards I knew I was seeing something unlike what I had previously watched. I started from the beginning.

Two men were talking and moving in and out of the camera range. I recognized the language enough to know they were speaking Spanish. I noticed the time stamp on the video again and my heart gave a start. It was the same date as the last time I'd been with Rafael. I wondered if the man was David Guzman. That would mean Ranger was right. If the man I'd overheard Rafael arguing with was David Guzman, then I could be in danger.

I picked up my phone and called Ranger as I watched.

"Yo," he answered.

What was happening on the screen temporarily rendered me incapable of speech.

"Babe?" His voice was soft but questioning. I quickly hit the pause button on the video.

"I found my tape," I said.

"Are you okay?"

"I am," I said softly. "I didn't get through all the tapes. There are still two I haven't watched, but…I found something. Something that you need to see."

"On your tape?"

"No," I said quickly. "I know it's possible another copy exists but, in case it doesn't, my video is done being viewed. I don't want anyone else seeing it, especially you."

"I have no desire to see it," Ranger said. "I need to keep the sorry bastard alive long enough to get proof of his guilt. He needs to be publicly acknowledged as the murderer of David. That's what Louis asked of me, and I'm trying to fulfill that request. I don't want to see him with you. It could substantially shorten his lifespan." He wasn't joking. I knew from experience Ranger didn't make idle threats.

"Can you come up?" I asked. "I really think you're going to want to see this."

"I'm waiting for Tank to bring me a contract I need to sign. It shouldn't be long and then I can call it quits for the day," he said. "Did you destroy your tape?"

"No, but I didn't save it to the computer. I was serious about it not being viewed again," I said. "I think it's from the second time we were together. The last time at his home. I watched the others, beginning to end, and maybe I was a little numb to them, because when my face appeared, it was easier than I thought to watch it. I was just like all the others. Nothing special, just women he'd had to his place, wined and dined, and then taken to bed. Videos of casual sexual encounters."

I paused because what I'd just said made me wonder. Did all those women get invited to Rafael's private lair? I didn't think so, but if there was something special about me, I hadn't seen it.

"All the tapes have timestamps on them," I continued. "They are all from a short period of time. All within a couple of months of one another."

"That's not surprising," Ranger said. "He'd been out on his own for less than a year when he left Trenton. He was selecting his women carefully and I think his plan was to use them as insurance policies."

"You said that before," I told him. "It's not true in my case. I found him; he didn't find me. I went to him for help with my divorce, and despite what you said about him being able to use me to influence Dickie, I question why he'd ever need Dickie for anything."

"Dickie was with the DA's office at that time," Ranger said. "He would have had all kinds of uses."

That was true, but if Rafael had taken a tape of me to Dickie and threatened to expose me if Dickie didn't help him, Dickie would have helped him distribute the tape. I didn't tell this to Ranger because I couldn't quite verbalize why I thought Rafael had used me in the way he did and trying to make sense of Rafael's motivation was terrifying.

"Tank's here," Ranger said. "I'll be up shortly."

I met him in the living room. "There's a tape ready to view in the player," I told him. "I only watched a little before I called you. It's Rafael and another man, and they are speaking in Spanish, and I think the other man is David. I watched it to the point where they, uh, they started kissing and taking each other's clothes off. Then I called you."

"Let's go look," Ranger said. I let him have the chair in front of the computer. I pulled the armchair around where I had a good view of the screen and we watched.

"It's David," Ranger confirmed, "and the date stamp indicates this video was made on the night he died."

We watched in silence. I had never seen men having sex before, so I wasn't sure if I was prepared for what I was going to see. When Rafael reached down beside the bed and grabbed something from the floor, I realized I was indeed not prepared for what I was going to see, but I knew the routine. This was not a casual romp between the sheets like the other videos had been. This was a reenactment of the things Rafael had subjected me to in the room off his office.

His hands were cuffed, arms outstretched to the posts on the headboard. "He'll tie his legs to the footboard posts next," I murmured.

Ranger turned and looked at me. "Babe, you don't need to watch this."

"Oh, I do," I said. What came next were the not so playful slaps to sensitive areas, but unlike me, it was apparent David enjoyed the stimulation. Rafael would continue, eventually changing to a leather whip, I knew. And the pain would keep coming.

I remembered the tight pinching grip he'd had on my nipples, the whip marks across my breasts before he moved lower, and I remembered the ever-present fear that it would get worse. And it did get worse until I cried out and begged him to stop. And when I begged him to stop, he did. He let me loose of my bonds and then he covered my body with his and…

The guttural cry brought my attention back to what was happening on the screen. I didn't speak Spanish, but it was clear, David was begging him to stop. Rafael didn't stop. He picked up the other whip, the truly horrible one. He began to whip David mercilessly. And David kept screaming.

I stood from the chair and ran from the room, through the bedroom and into the bathroom where I puked up my guts, the Tastykakes and all the other junk food I'd eaten. I collapsed on the cool tile floor. This was getting to be a terrible habit. Ranger squatted by my side and leaned down to push the hair out of my face and help me back to my feet.

"Take a shower," he said. "You're done watching video for the day."

"Are you going to finish it?"

"I am."

I was glad to do as Ranger said. I didn't need to relive any more of what I'd been through. I had my video tape. Rafael had no more power over me, and now with the video Ranger was continuing to watch, we had power over him.

I spent a long time in the shower. I stood there with multiple jets spraying water over my body and inhaled the cloud of steam that resulted. I reexamined every aspect of my time with Rafael as the spray of the water insulated me from what was happening in Ranger's office. The video brought back memories I'd buried deeply. I'd relived some of the most terrible moments of my life, but this time I viewed them from a different perspective.

I didn't take much time with my hair or makeup after the shower. I wrapped a thick towel around myself and peeked into the bedroom. The pocket door between the bedroom and the office was closed and there was no sound emanating from behind the door. I quickly made my way into the dressing room and pulled on an old t-shirt and pair of sweats. After that I flopped on the bed.

It was another ten minutes before the pocket door slid back and Ranger entered the bedroom. He came and laid on the bed next to me and stared at the ceiling. I glanced over at him. He was processing, so I didn't speak but just continued to lay on my side and do some processing of my own.

I was surprisingly calm, given everything I'd seen that day. The long shower I'd just taken had provided me with time to clear my thoughts and now I was retrospective. It was time to make sense of everything I'd been through.

I'd gone to college straight from high school because that's what was done. There had never been any discussion about it. Valerie was in school and doing well and my parents assumed I'd follow in her footsteps, so I did. I hadn't had any burning desire to become something, so I earned a general education degree. I certainly hadn't had a burning desire to become a lingerie buyer, but I stuck with it and did a decent job until I'd been laid off.

The bonds office hadn't been the expected thing to do, but I'd been desperate, and after a few years, I'd become an almost adequate skip tracer. Still the burning desire to be an apprehension agent had been missing.

For the first time in my life, I had a burning desire. I knew what had to be done and not only was I willing to do it, I felt the need to do it. Finally, I had a sense of purpose. I was going to take the fear and shame I'd felt over Rafael's treatment of me and turn it into power. I was going to help Ranger prove Rafael's guilt and get an arrest that would satisfy Ella and Louis and hopefully give them some closure.

Their grief would be never ending, but they deserved to see justice done. It would come at some personal cost to me, but I was going to tackle the thing I'd been most frightened of and conquer it. My big girl panties were snug around my hips, and I was ready to move forward.