In Crimson

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

Two Miles Up

A crowd of journalists was held at arm’s length as the Crocs waited for the transport to arrive. Random flashes from the cameras, shouted questions that begged stereotypical answers. Carrie, usually eager to flaunt herself watched as the two huge busses slid into position up to the sidewalk and were loaded with all of the gear that would accompany the Crocs to their training camp.

Towering over her like giants were the men from the Crocs team. Between them, all of the others who were privileged to accompany them. Wives and girlfriends, physios and trainers, flunkies and assistants, gofers and the one or two press spokespersons who smirked at the opportunity to accompany this up-and-coming team.

She kept a jealous eye on Mike as he bantered with the line-backs as she waited impatiently for the boarding to begin. Amongst all of the banter and shouting of the press, she heard the team Physical Therapist speaking behind her. A few words caught by Carrie almost made her step backwards to hear more clearly, but she held herself and merely tilted her head a little to focus on the discussion and separate it from all of the other clamor.

“I f****d her good… the slut squealed like a sow every time!”

Jerry’s words were uttered with a low chuckle.

“You serious?”

“Of course I’m f*****g serious. It’ll make me a f*****g mint!”

“How’s that?”

“For me to know and all of the rest to guess,” laughed Jerry. “When the time’s right it’ll be front page news…”

Carrie wanted to snort in derision, but controlled the impulse, She did not want them to realize she had overheard their private conversation and she wondered which of the wives and girlfriends the ass-hole was talking about, but it seemed that the conversation had taken another turn.

“Perez’ll win, obviously!”

Politics endless f*****g politics! thought Carrie. Politics was on everybody’s lips at the moment…

She exhaled in frustration as the line started to resolve and those at the head of the line mounted into the first bus.

“I reckon so too,” said the other voice. “The polls say that she’ll sweep the board.”

“First and last b***h in the White House,” sneered Jerry’s voice. “Give it a month and she’ll be swallowed up by the scandal!”

“What you were saying?”

“It’s ready, all I need is a contract…”

“You really gonna do it?”

The line shuffled forward and Carrie missed the next comment as her boyfriend turned to her and put his hand on her hips.

“One for the cameras, let’s give them something,” he laughed as he picked her up and placed her into the open door of the bus.

The assembled press lapped up the moment and Carrie knew that she would be on every sports page next morning. A little smile, a wave and the photo opportunity was over. She took a window seat as the bus filled and waved again to the clustered press, careful to display her hand-bag clearly.

By the time that they were underway, Carrie smiled to herself… her latest branded designer-handbag would soon be a sell-out, one on every arm when it was released for sale tomorrow!

A broad, well-made road that wound through hairpins and curves carried the team buses away from Lima and up into the Andes.

Every twist, every turn taking the two busses higher into the mountains that soared into the clouds. The two busses crawled up the gradient slowly, each turn allowing the passengers glimpses down the almost sheer mountainsides. In just a couple of hours they would arrive at the drill-camp where they would spend the next two weeks training for the coming season. Away from the adoring crowds, focusing on strength and tactics isolated from the scouts and sports reporters, building team spirit, stamina and cohesion and that special Team élan.

Carrie could not get Veronica completely out of her thoughts. The last sight of her at the gates at the airport, disappearing into the milling passengers and well wishers and fans of the Crocs somehow an anti-climax, unfinished business somehow and a sentence left hanging …

Stupid cow! How dare she? Just an aging skank… b***h!

The cluster of the paparazzi at the exit-gate had initially purged the thought of Veronica from her mind as the hustle and bustle of attention took over and she posed with her muscular boyfriend and answered the fawning questions put to her by the press. Carrie managed a mention of the new line of fragrances and then it was over. Minders and team officials bustled them onto the two coaches and they were whisked away into the mountains.

Two miles up…

The winding road taking them ever higher.

She looked down from her bus-window and shivered. If the coach were just to make a single mis-turn, it would tumble into the depths, roll and be destroyed on the mountainside in a few slow-motion moments. Every year, the team made an extraordinary training trip, this being the first that she had been present. Last year it had been the cold high pastures of the Swiss Alps, the year before in Aruba, this time, Peru.

Carrie could feel Mike next to her, his sheer muscular bulk forcing her to the side as he filled his seat and more. He was laughing and joking with the coach who sat on his other side and Carrie felt cut out. He would spend the next two weeks fully occupied with team training and this was his chance to spend some quality time with her and she deserved it…

After all, he was as famous for being with her as much as for his efforts on the pitch. She wondered how she would manage to cope with being in this god-forsaken place for two weeks, away from the clubs and shops, and the posing, it sure looked as if there was nothing of that sort here. She glanced again at her phone to see that there was still no signal.

Surely the camp would have some sort of satellite internet connection and allow her to get on f*******:?

Mike continued listening to Jerry as he pontificated.

Carrie could not help herself sneering at the man who was always so full of himself. Hints of all his affairs slipping from his lips, boasting mentions, suggestive asides about the women that he had f****d.

Fake news, she decided. He could talk the talk, but has he actually ever walked the walk? Carrie doubted it.

“All the signals and codes,” Jerry was saying. “Until they are totally f*****g habit. We have a few new great plays to test, well away from the snoopers, as usual, you are the lynch pin… You make it happen Mike, the best of the best…”

Carrie turned her attention from the sports-talk. It bored her with its macho-speak and obsession with the one thing that Carrie could never be part of. Football! It made millions for Mike but the rules the strategy and motivation were something that she just could not bother to understand. Her new fragrances and the diet-fitness regime just came naturally to her. Mike’s celebrity was a thing of interest to Carrie as long as the spotlight caught her in its glare.

Two weeks!

It would seem like an age…

The coach groaned as it turned another hairpin, this time Carrie could only see a wall of rock passing by almost in touching distance. She sat back in her seat, the coach was almost at a standstill and then it rounded the corner and came to a halt. The engine revved and then the bus lurched into motion again, now juddering over a rough surface as it hugged the rock wall and moved away from the edge. Chattering and a suppressed short female scream came from the front and Carrie lifted in her seat to see what the problem was just as the bus finally came to a juddering halt.

There seemed to be a commotion at the front, though Carrie could not see what exactly what was happening. Another scream and there came a rasping mechanical chattering sound Smashing glass, more sounds and then cries and then there was a bearded figure in fatigues standing at the front by the driver, an automatic weapon pointing up at the skylight of the bus. His face was half covered by a green bandana, the gun waved ominously.

“Sit down…” he yelled as he waved the gun in his hand.

Carrie slumped to her seat as a short burst of automatic fire shattered the skylight as the man with the gun fired again. Now all Carrie could hear was a whining-singing in her ears as she burrowed into the footwell.

“All out… now! Now, get a move on...”

With the seat hiding her, Carrie cowered down as another burst of fire ripped into the glass roof of the bus. All around was confusion. The bus rolled back a couple of yards and then there was a hiss as the brakes locked and it came to a sudden halt. Mike and the team-coach stood as Carrie cowered and there were more orders shouted and all around her, the occupants of the bus shuffled towards the front.

Mike’s powerful hand reached for Carrie, but she evaded his grip and crouched down as another burst of fire blew out a window and caused a hailstorm of glass to spray inside the bus.

There were screams from the front and from the window Carrie could see more armed men like the one standing at the front of the bus as they corralled the occupants of the second bus on the gravel lay-by. They filed past her window, mouths open, some of the women screaming thinly, the massive men of the team herded from their transport under the guns of their captors.

Then she was alone, all the seats that she could see were empty.

Carrie was the only occupant, the only one hiding, peeping to watch the frightening scenes outside. The entire team, the coaches and trainers, the girlfriends and wives stumbling in the dust as they were lined up roughly. Carrie felt herself descend into a panic, senselessly watching as the jumble of people outside resolved itself into a parade of cowering women, players and drivers while it seemed that the armed men were sorting through their prisoners. She ducked briefly as a man walked by her window, looking in, but it seemed that she had evaded notice.

Carrie waited several minutes before she dared peep out again. Now she could see the person in charge of the kidnap. A tall figure, a woman with a bandana-covered face who strutted past the captives and pointed individuals out to be taken to one side. Of the fifty or so victims, it seemed that twenty were to one side in a group, while the others were herded out of Carrie’s sight.

Then calm.

Some shouts and answers, some laughing and another burst of automatic gun-fire. Carrie found herself shaking and weeping in terror and then the bus moved a little as someone entered it. She heard the footsteps and curled up as tight as possible in the foot well of her seat. There was no place to hide but nevertheless, Carrie wrapped herself up as small as could be, as if to be small might bring invisibility.

Perhaps she would yet be overlooked?

The steps came closer and then there was a feminine laugh.

“This is not a good place to be,” said the woman’s voice.

Carrie uncurled a little and looked up to see the unmistakable figure of Veronica standing looking down at her. The bandana covering her face almost completely, but there was no mistaking the cheap leather jacket and plain jeans, or the smiling eyes that looked down at her.

“Veronica!” blurted Carrie.

“Out you come, dear. You are selected… You will be perfect!”

Carrie shifted and uncurled onto all fours before climbing to her feet.

“Out, Miss Rudd!” laughed Veronica. “This bus is going over the cliff, so if you don’t want to go with it, you’d better come with me!”

Scarcely able to see for the tears that filled her eyes, Carrie staggered the length of the bus with Veronica close behind. There was a blow in her back to urge her on as she almost tripped. Now she could see the kidnappers were now ushering some of their captives into the second bus and she exited to be grabbed by a man in fatigues. Her arms were twisted behind her and a cable-tie rasped as her wrists were bound.

“Who are you?” she cried thinly as she was led to the smaller group of players and women by the kidnappers. “What do you want?”

The question earned her another sharp slap. She was pushed into the small group as both busses were reloaded with the remainder of the team and their hangers-on. Carrie shook the tears from her eyes and turned to watch the unfolding drama. There were no bodies, it seemed that the kidnappers had not shot anyone except for one of the drivers who was nursing a wound on his arm where he had been winged.

Shell cases littered the dust at her feet.

Now it was clear that Veronica was in charge. She was directing the whole show, walking around the two half full busses and looking at each of the faces at the windows. It seemed as if she was searching for someone in particular. She stopped and made a small motion with her hand. Carrie recognized Valentina Rossi, the young wife of the team’s owner, who was then taken from the bus again to join the group of twenty. She was weeping and staggering, as Veronica grabbed her hair, forcing her to stand whilst her hands were bound behind her.

Veronica turned to the group.

“You are all selected, and are going on a little trip. Be glad, girls and boys,” and then she turned to the leader of the armed men. “Pedro and Juan… if you please! We only have a few minutes before rendezvous…”

Two of the men moved, one to the front of each bus. They climbed through the open doors, released the parking brakes and jumped free as the busses started to roll backwards. Carrie cried out as the doors closed automatically and the two huge luxury coaches rolled from the graveled area onto the road under their own weight. With no drivers in the seats, each of the vast coaches turned slightly, the rasp of tires on the gravel the only sound as they rolled with the curves of the gradient and the passengers suddenly realized what was happening.

They stood in their seats, screamed, one of the windows shattered and a player tried to exit just as the bus teetered on the edge of the road and then… the long bus teetered and disappeared over the edge with a grating sound of metal as it lurched over the cliff to be followed by the other bus that was given an affectionate pat on the rear by one of the kidnappers as it too wavered and swayed a moment and then vanished.

For a long second there was no sound.

Utter silence!

Just the gasps of the bound prisoners and then a distant shattering crunching and the sound of a few falling rocks. Busses and occupants, all disappeared off the edge of the cliff into yawning void.

Carrie staggered and cried out with the others as an indistinct sound of rending metal and rock was heard from far below and Veronica walked to the cliff edge to look down with hands on hips. She stood looking down at the c*****e far below and then turned back to view her captives and then cast a glance upward to the clear skies.

“Boys and girls,” she called. “You all have a long journey ahead of you. I would suggest that complete cooperation would be the best course for you as I have zero tolerance of the slightest disobedience. Our ride will be along in a few moments…”

Her hands pulled the bandana from her face and smiled before walking slowly to the cowering group of victims who were guarded by a circle of armed men. Carrie tried to move back from the front of the group, but the tall woman who had kidnapped them all was now advancing towards her and she found that she was frozen in terror.

Several of the ten men with guns walked over the ground and picked up the spent cartridges, laughing and chattering as they stooped while Veronica moved closer.

She stood right in front of Carrie and smiled.

“You see, I can buy and sell all of you now, Miss Carrie Rudd,” she laughed. “Though you will not be sold on, that’s for sure!”

Her hand reached out and she slid her fingers into Carrie’s designer T shirt at the neck and ripped it from her with a sharp tug. She stood for a moment admiring her victim’s pert breasts and her n*****s as they stiffened and became erect in the cool mountain breeze before turning, surveying the scene with clear satisfaction

A sound of laboring engines came from the curve of the road and three black vans pulled in.

“You know? Perhaps I shall buy some of your new fragrance after all,” she said to Carrie.