“When I told you to stop, you shoved your tongue down my throat,” Pamela told him. “I could hardly breathe. I was suffocating, but you didn’t care. You were determined to do whatever you wanted to. I begged you to stop. When I reached for my phone, you grabbed it from me and tossed it aside. Your slobbering tongue and your hands were all over me. I kicked my legs, but every time I tried to scream, you covered my mouth with yours. I almost got away.” She exhaled. “But you caught up to me, didn’t you? You threw me to the floor, ripped off my shirt, pushed up my skirt, and climbed on top of me.”
Pamela’s head fell forward, her chin nearly resting on her chest as she sobbed.
Tara wanted to go to her, but she could tell by the way her friend was trying hard to collect herself that Pamela had more to say, so she stayed where she was and remained silent.
Pamela lifted her head and said through her tears, “I’ve hardly slept since that night. I keep my bedroom door locked at all times, and I jump at every little sound. Night after night, I relive what you did to me.” She used her left forearm to wipe at the tears. “I tried to forget what happened, but I can’t. You had no right to do what you did.” She swallowed. “I brought you here because I wanted you to know what it feels like to be completely powerless to stop someone from hurting you. Do you like feeling powerless, Kyle?”
He shook his head, his bloodshot eyes rapidly blinking.
“You’ll be glad to know I was too scared to go to the police or the hospital, and I was too ashamed to tell my parents.”
Tears rolled down both sides of her face and onto the pink duvet, leaving a trail of wet spots. Her hands began to tremble. “I’ve never hated anyone like I hate you.”
Laura came up behind Tara and whispered into her ear, “She doesn’t look right. Stop her before she does something we might all regret.”
Tara didn’t know what to do. Once Pamela finished her speech, she would give her friend the sign that it was over and then shut off the camera.
“After you got off me,” Pamela told Kyle, “you looked at me as if I were a piece of trash. That’s when I knew you had done this before. I also came to realize it would be up to me to make sure you never raped anyone else.”
Pamela grabbed hold of his penis with her left hand and brought the sharp blade of the knife snug against the base.
Kyle’s eyes bulged, and sweat dripped down the sides of his face.
Laura shouted for Pamela to stop as she lunged for the bed.
Tara couldn’t tell if Pamela had purposely cut Kyle or if the movement caused by Laura pouncing on the mattress had made things spiral out of control. But either way, she knew they were in trouble when she saw blood spurting everywhere.
Rachel screamed, then collapsed to the floor like a rag doll.
Mandy shouted Rachel’s name and ran to her side.
Tara couldn’t wrap her mind around what she’d just witnessed. This couldn’t be happening. Her ears were buzzing. She felt faint. “No,” she said. “Stop!” But it was much too late for that.
Blood pooled between Kyle’s legs.
Pamela climbed off the bed. She looked like a zombie.
Laura plucked the knife from Pamela and took it to the bathroom, where Tara heard it clang against the sink. And then Tara saw two beams of light from the street below shoot through the window and sweep across the room.
Tara ran to the window and looked out.
Her parents had come home early.
CHAPTER FOUR
At work in her cubicle the next day, Sawyer read through news headlines, dismayed to see just last night a group of teenaged girls in the nearby town of Rocklin had decided to teach a boy a lesson. The scene was described as bloody and frightening, but the wound had turned out to be a nick that would heal quickly.
Thank goodness.
What was the world coming to?
First, the Black Wigs, then The Slayers, and now young girls taking matters into their own hands right inside the comfort of their home.
The Black Wigs, purposely or not, had created a monster. Revenge was not the answer.
Sawyer moved on, sorting through notes and articles she had previously saved and written about the Black Wigs. Inside an eight-by-ten envelope was a copy of the flash drive Sean Palmer had given her with instructions to have the homemade video lightened since it had been taken at night and was grainy and pixelated. Palmer’s source was unknown, but he’d said the video had been taken in West Sacramento on the same night Otto Radley had been released from prison.
Otto Radley had abducted a twenty-one-year-old woman named Christina Farro and held her captive for three years. Pulled over for a traffic violation, he was arrested when the police found evidence inside his car that led them to Christina Farro. Twenty years later, Otto Radley was released and hadn’t been seen since. Poof! Gone in the blink of an eye.
The answer to what happened to Otto Radley could be on the tiny flash drive sitting right in front of her. Although the video was dark and blurry, Otto Radley was a giant of a man. Just like the shadowed figure seen on the video. If she squinted her eyes and focused really hard, she could see the figure approach a woman sitting on a bench, a woman with short dark hair. A moment later, another figure with the same short dark hair appears from behind a tree.
Before Sawyer had a chance to do anything with the video, Palmer had been attacked and was still recuperating. She had, however, upon her return to work, copied the video and then taken the original flash drive to Detective Perez, leaving it with the person at the front desk since the detective had been too busy to see her.
Sawyer spent the next thirty minutes watching how to enhance videos on YouTube. She finally gave up and did a search for video-enhancement companies in the area. She called the one with the best reviews: Purple House Digital in Midtown.
Minutes later, her problem was solved. The owner said he would be happy to take a look at the video and see what he could do.
Sawyer played with a rubber band, rolling it around her index finger while she stared at her notes. As far as investigators could tell, Brad Vicente had been the Black Wigs’ first target. That was three months ago. According to reports, five women wearing black wigs and masks had kept Vicente trapped in his own home while subjecting him to torture. But when an anonymous call led the police to a bound and bloodied Brad Vicente, they also found a collection of rape videos Vicente had made for his own private viewing. Although the police were actively searching for the female vigilantes, Brad Vicente was found guilty of being a serial rapist, and he was locked up.
The Black Wigs’ second target could be Otto Radley. If Otto Radley did turn out to be the man on the video, then where was he? Were the Black Wigs holding him captive somewhere? Was he dead? Or had the big man simply run off?
Victim number three was Myles Davenport, a man taken from the parking lot outside the high school where his ten-year reunion had taken place. Security cameras had caught members of the Black Wigs at work. Myles Davenport was found in the woods surrounding Placerville. Autopsy reports revealed that he’d died of a heart attack.
What tied these men together was that at some point in their lives, Brad Vicente, Otto Radley, and Myles Davenport had all been accused of rape.
Sawyer tapped the tip of her pen on Nick Calderon’s name. A quick search revealed no record of any sort. No one had ever accused the man of rape. Geezer had told Sawyer that one slender person of average height was seen on the neighbor’s home security camera.