“Fine,” Abigail said quickly, sensing that Chip was going to interrupt, that this was not the script he had in mind. “I’m a bad person. I’m guilty. But you didn’t need to marry me. You didn’t need to torture me and do all this.”
“If I hadn’t married you, then you’d have married some other man and made his life miserable.”
“What does that have to do with you?” Abigail said.
“So you plead guilty, Abigail Lamb,” Chip said, jumping in before Bruce could answer. It was clear that in some ways Chip was in charge. Even though he had no personal connection with either Abigail or Jill, he was running the show.
“Sure, Chip Ramsay,” Abigail said back, copying his tone of voice. “I’m guilty as charged.”
Chip reached out and gently tapped the shoulder of the pilot, who pulled his mask back over his head, then came around behind Abigail and placed his hands on her left shoulder. Eric came around to stand behind Abigail on her other side.
“And you, Jill Greenly, do you plead guilty, also, to infidelity and wantonness?”
Abigail looked over at Jill, who was quietly crying. She watched Jill slowly lift her head and nod, and then Carl was behind her, also wearing a mask that covered the top half of his face, leaving his mustache visible. The masks looked homemade, probably constructed with papier-maché, then painted green; she had a sudden surreal vision of these men crafting them. Or had they simply found them in the camp’s old theater department, some leftover from a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream? Abigail turned back to Bruce, no longer being held back by Eric, and she tried to read his expression. He was excited, his eyes gleaming and his body rocking back and forth like a little boy who needs to pee. But there was also fear in his face, his jaw clenched, his neck rigid.
Jesus, are they really going to kill us?
A flush of cold desperation surged through her body. “Bruce,”
she said. “Make this stop.”
His expression changed, his brow lowering, and for a moment she thought he might put an end to what was happening. Maybe it really was just a performance, designed to scare them, a form of theater as punishment. Then Chip raised his arms again and pronounced, “We sentence you both as whores, and assert our privileges as men to decree punishment in the form of death for both of you.”
Jill raised her head and yelled, “Alec!” over and over, her voice growing louder and more hysterical. Carl, from behind her, grabbed at her mouth and covered it. Porter charged in and helped to hold Jill. At the same time, the pilot and Eric grabbed hold of Abigail’s shoulders and arms and held her in place.
“Bruce, Alec,” Chip said, and both men turned to him. “Are you each prepared to deliver the punishment?”
CHAPTER 27
We are,” Bruce said, but Alec only nodded. His face was flushed, and Abigail realized that she hadn’t heard him say a word since they’d been out here. Chip reached into the front pockets of his vest and pulled a short knife from each. Abigail tried to wrench herself free from Eric and the pilot, but they held on to her tighter, pulling her up off the chair, each gripping an arm. Bruce took one of the knives from Chip and Alec took the other. Abigail struggled, flailing her legs, but the men were too strong. She could feel Eric’s hot breath on her neck, and the pilot was digging his fingers into the soft flesh of her upper arm.
Looking toward Jill, Abigail saw that she was being held upright by Carl and Porter now as well. But she wasn’t struggling. She looked like she was already dead, slumped between them like a rag doll.
Bruce was coming toward her and all Abigail could see was the knife in his hand. I’m about to die, she thought, and terror flooded her body again. She was cold, and felt all alone, more alone than she’d ever felt before in her life. She looked up from the knife to Bruce’s face, which was still rigid, his teeth bared. She heard Jill groan, but didn’t turn. Bruce pressed the tip of the knife against her chest, then pushed.
She felt pressure, but not much else. It doesn’t hurt, she thought. There’s that, at least.
Bruce pulled the knife out, and it made a strange, mechanical click. She still felt nothing. Just dizziness and the cold, terrible awareness that she was dying. He pushed the knife in again, laughing, and turned back to look at Chip, now standing alone, a look of triumph on his red face. Abigail looked down at her chest, and there was no blood. She still felt nothing, and then she looked at the knife, its blade bloodless as well.
Bruce was following her eyes, and he put his finger on top of the blade, pushed down, and the blade retracted into its sheath. It was a fake knife, something used in theaters. There’d been several of them at Boxgrove in the props department.