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Category: Erotica/Taboo Erotica
Description: A shocking and sometimes disturbing tale of lust and desire. Set in the remote countryside of East Anglia, it tells the story of a man's infatuation and mental imprisonment of and by three women. Searching the deepest dark corners of human frailty and sexuality, it holds back nothing and ends in the way of all flesh--gloriously in his defeat.
eBook Publisher: Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions,
eBookwise Release Date: April 2008

3 Reader Ratings:

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Available eBook Formats: OEBFF Format (IMP) [185 KB]
Words: 39124
Reading time: 111-156 min.

CHAPTER ONE

There are many places to hide. It's how you get to them that cause the indecision. Do you run toward the greatest distance and seek space between you and your pursuers? The longer you are out in the open the more chance you have of being captured before a bolt hole has been secured. Nearness brings quicker comfort but easier for your hunters to search and find. The thoughts of the prisoner were not as reasoned and logically defined. It must be a hunch, native instinct to decide on your escape. There was no precise calculation, only raw fear.

Lewis Jones stumbled over the recently ploughed field. Its deep furrows made his urgent strides a faltering progress and the seagulls, pecking at the newly turned earth, moved reluctantly to give him passage to a low hawthorn hedge. He didn't want to run. That would suggest panic and guilt to any observer. These wild ideas tumbled in Lewis's head. They were nonsensical. If a warder from the work party saw him, his flight would be ended whatever his speed of escape. When he reached the hedge its sparse March leaf cover gave him very little concealment, so he trudged up the lane to where the road forked.

It was late afternoon and although the sun had warmed the prison gang as they first moved, then dug in the manure from the pig stiles, the cold at this time of the year soon returned once the earth's light giver sank below the long, watery western horizon. Lewis felt trepidation and loneliness. The prison had been hell at first but he became institutionalized. After two years it exerted a strange effect. All initiative was drained from him. It was misery, but a secure one. You got used to almost everything, except the absence of warm flesh and willing lips. The memories rushed back of the dark, sensual dream-like experiences in the prison and his mind became feverish at the images recalled. What had happened and what he had done was like a burning lust, constantly replayed. He couldn't dwell on it now. Where would he be tonight? Freedom had recklessly urged him to make this dash but gave him no anchor or signpost.

He had not traveled more than a few miles up the main lane since his incarceration two years ago and that was on a work party heavily supervised by the warders. His only memory of the beyond was the journey to the prison in the police van. He could not go back. Two certainties awaited the eastern path. Firstly, he would leave the grounds of the colony. After that was the flat, open and bleak coast with its pounding seas eating away at the fabric of East Anglia, savagely and relentlessly reclaiming land and any soul caught out in the treacherous currents of an early spring day. The sea had a Jekyll and Hyde nature. It could treat you to glorious episodes then attack without warning.

The third choice was to travel south or north and follow the coast. The shifting, wind-blown landscape didn't support any large communities for many miles in either direction. Lewis pondered whether this was an advantage or not. He wasn't a local to the area. His birthplace lay as far to the west as the island of Briton could take him. His knowledge of the geography of this part of the country was based on vague recollections and conversations with other inmates at the colony. He recalled that the large container port of Frenington was to the south. Ports conjured up images of security, and that meant authority and police.

The dilemma flickered across his mind as the iridescent setting sun dipped down amongst the dust clouds. Watery yellow was turning to rich orange. As Lewis Jones momentarily took in the sunset he saw a black twitching object rear out of the fading orb. It zigzagged and hovered, then darted forward. He faintly heard the buzzing of wings. No, not wings--his senses shook him violently--blades, rotating blades. The Colony had put up a helicopter. Jones was a low-level category prisoner but they wanted him back and were going to put maximum effort into bringing him to the fold. Did he know too much?

He wildly scanned around. The lanes, although small, were too open and if there was a chopper in the air, cars would also be out searching and patrolling. Only one option could offer a possible hiding place. The Forestry Commission land fringed the northern route. It had been heavily felled but there was enough pine tree cover to afford a hope of escape. Blindly, Lewis ran for the trees. He hurdled the recently stacked logs, which were waiting to be transported to the sawmills, and gained the thickest part of the woods. Along the edge of the plantation, native birch trees had been allowed to grow. Lewis used them as a directional sign and followed their path for at least fifteen minutes. Panic blurred the exact measurement of time. All the while he could hear the eye in the sky swooping and diving, trying to spot its prey.

As the forest became denser, he felt safe from aerial detection. The incident decided Lewis to keep away from the lanes and as he was being forced to go north, that would be his destination. It must have taken almost three hours of slow hiking through the deepened gloom of evening into night to clear the forest. In the distance he could see a mall cluster of lights. It wasn't big enough for a village. Perhaps it was an isolated farm. The Colony dominated the local area. Most of the inhabitants in the district depended to some degree on the prison, either as warders in the Colony or suppliers of goods. He didn't want to walk in on some farmer whose livelihood was bound up with the Colony. There'd be no welcome mat, so he continued across the dark fields.

A few more minutes' slog through a field left to grass brought Lewis abruptly out onto another lane. He was about to cross it and enter the field on the opposite side when blaring lights pinned him like a frightened rabbit to the center of the lane. Screeching brakes and squealing rubber woke the forest creatures. Lewis was still rigid with dread as the driver got out of the vehicle. Jones was expecting a burly party of surly warders from the Colony. He got an old man. Old in features but alert and observant as he climbed down from the cab of his battered and mud encrusted four-wheel drive Land Rover.

"You trying to end it all son?" the old man gruffly asked.

"I'm lost," Lewis heard himself feebly answer.

"It's easier to do that than most folk think. Want a lift to what passes around here as civilization?"

The prisoner nodded. It seemed the only reaction possible. Lewis and the old man climbed into the weather-beaten, clapped-out vehicle. The gears clunked the car into life and two taciturn men drove through the quiet lanes. Lewis was wearing his outdoor clothes used by the working parties and not the recognizable Colony uniform, which would have immediately alerted the old man.

Lewis was not in the mood to talk and his new companion had a look suggesting loquaciousness came a long way down his order of merits. The ancient vehicle clattered over potholes as it lurched at every sharp bend. As they approached a junction, with the lane merging into a road, a bright dazzling light hit them face on. The old man slammed down on the brake pedal and the boneshaker snaked from side to side and shuddered to a halt. The blazing lights continued to blind their vision. A demanding rap on the driver's side window brought an angry oath from the old man. He furiously wound the window down and stuck his square face defiantly out to contest their interlocutors.

"What the hell you playing at?" he heatedly challenged.

"Woodgate police force, sir. We're helping the Colony search for a prisoner," the voice politely responded.

"It's a pity that place can't keep them under better control. If they will let them out to dig the fields, no wonder they lose them," the old man said, calming down slightly.

"Maybe, sir," the policeman replied then asked his question in a different way.

"Have you seen anyone?" As the policeman asked he leaned his head into the vehicle. He silently nodded to Lewis and took a look around.

"The only unusual thing I've seen..." Lewis's heart pounded ... "Is this darn fool of a police road block which near killed me with its lights," the old man threw at the young officer.

The policeman, although tender in years, gave the old man a glance as if he'd heard all the invective before. He managed a smile and pulled his prying head out of the vehicle. He waved to someone, the lights were lowered and he turned again and said with subdued sarcasm, "Thanks for your help, sir. Take care."

The old man brusquely wound the window up and drove past the roadblock. He scowled at the group of police. Lewis looked out the far window. Obviously the policeman didn't recognize him from any issued description but if there'd been a warder in the cluster of men he would have known Jones, especially one of those who were involved in the dark sexual experiences etched on the prisoners mind. Perhaps it wasn't only the prison authority that wanted Jones back. Maybe their paymasters were anxious? Or should they be pay-mistresses?

At first Lewis felt relieved that he'd eluded the police, but then started to eye the old man suspiciously. Why didn't he say anything to the policemen? The edgy stillness between old and young man persisted through miles of countryside. Lewis vaguely recalled signs for Barnthorpe, Olston, Swinton and Knolford. The journey went on for almost an hour, then the vehicle came to a halt.

"Is this where you are going?" the old man said. His crinkled face was impassive but his eyes flickered as if there was a perpetual dream being played in his head. Lewis didn't answer.

"You don't know where you are, do you?" Before Lewis could say anything the old man sniffed and shook his head in a gesture that gave the answer to his own question. He then added, "If you ain't got nowhere in particular to go, you'd better stay and work out what it is you want."

He walked from the vehicle then looked back at Lewis. "You stand there on a night like this and in the morning you'll be fair ready for the grave. Come on in." Lewis dutifully followed as the old man walked up a shingle path toward a dim light. As they approached, Lewis could see the outlines of a cottage. At this time of night it was difficult to pick out details. Before he had time to think anymore, the door was opened as if someone had been watching them advance up the path. The old man entered and muttered to someone.

Lewis cautiously went in and the door closed firmly behind him while simultaneously the bolts were drawn against intruders. Lewis froze--the sound reminded him of "lights out" in the Colony when prisoners were locked in for the long night to mental hell. Ten hours to think about freedom and your life outside, or to go slowly insane with despair.

Locked in fear

He wheeled around half expecting to see a posse of hard-nosed warders with cuffs ready to manacle him and bring his few hours of liberty to an end. Instead, the face that looked back at him was that of a woman.

"This fellow seemed lost, Jessica, so he's staying the night," the old man said, and sat down to take off his heavy, laced boots. Jessica eyed Lewis curiously then went over to the old man and helped him undo the laces. Lewis could now see that the man's fingers were twisted and knobbly as if arthritis had taken a severe hold.

As she took his boots and put them in a shoe rack by the door, Lewis watched her then glanced back at the old man. "That's my daughter, Jessica." He seemed to answer an unspoken question in Lewis's expression. She straightened up and pushed back a stray strand of hair that wasn't out of place. It was more a reflex action as she was being spoken about.

"Dinner's been ready for the past two hours," Jessica said in a slightly abrupt and annoyed manner, as if her father was late in returning.

"My bones are fair giving me jib," the old man rejoined. "I'll take a tray up to my bed. You feed yourself and this here stranger. What's your name, fellow?"

Lewis opened his mouth, gulped and replied, "Alun. Alun Griffin."

The old man rubbed his hands together to ease the obvious pain and narrowed his eyes. "Alun, eh. A fine good name for a man..." He smiled to himself ... "For a man who is lost." He chuckled and walked stiffly over to an archway that led into the kitchen. Jessica followed and Lewis, now Alun, trailed along.

The father sat silently as Jessica ladled food from a large brown dish onto a plate, arranged it on a tray and added bread and cutlery.

"Shall I carry your tray upstairs?" Jessica spoke not roughly but without gentleness to her father.

"I'll carry my own tray," he gruffly said, then winked at the woman and added, "You carry my coffin when the time comes." He chortled to himself and went up sharply rising stairs leading out of the corner of the kitchen.

"Do you want your bed or have you enough civility to eat at the table?" Jessica almost accused Alun.

"No, I'll eat here," Alun insisted defensively.

"It's a chicken casserole and sliced potatoes in garlic," she said brusquely. "You're not one of these veggie sorts, are you?"

Alun shook a "no". Lewis was still in his head and his eyes darted around the room trying to weigh up the situation. Jessica dished up two meals and put them on the scrubbed oak table with some force. She sat down and pointed at the plate on the other side of the table to signal to Alun. He joined her and watched as Jessica tore two lumps of bread off the loaf and handed one to Alun.

The food tasted good to Alun. After two years of Colony mass catering, courtesy of the Home Office via half a dozen trusted inmates who wouldn't poison their fellow prisoners, any individual and homemade meal would have been ambrosia. He ate greedily and looked up at Jessica to see if she had noticed--and disapproved--of his manners. She was contemplating her dinner and eating slowly as if not really hungry. Perhaps having made the meal and then waited many hours for her father to return had taken the edge off her appetite.

She was a woman in her early thirties with black, wavy hair. The eyes were brooding and to Alun, any woman he was near to looked beautiful. That's what being incarcerated did for you. The word would probably be striking or handsome. Before sitting down he'd noticed she walked proudly and even with a degree of haughtiness. As he went on examining her, Jessica looked up and furrowed her brow.

"What is it you want?" Jessica delivered the question in a blunt and forthright manner. It took him by surprise and he became flustered. What did she mean by it? Had she recognized the look of desire in his stare and would she so boldly allude to this physical attraction.

"Well?" she insisted. "What is it then. More food or what?"

"The dinner was good," he heard himself reply weakly.

Jessica got up, took his plate over to the stove and served another portion. Even though he'd become embarrassed that she'd caught him watching her, he couldn't help stealing glances at Jessica as she came back and sat down. She moved regally, in a flowing motion. She was a tall woman, with a lithe and ample body and he guessed she either deliberately kept fit by exercise or worked manually. Her hands were older than the face so he opted for outside physical labor. Her rough clothes didn't conceal a fine body shape that Alun was already imagining in its prime nakedness.

"Everyone else has gone to their beds and that's where we must go," Jessica said suddenly and cleared the plates away to the sink. "I'll be up long before the rest of you so I'll tidy up and wash the dishes in the morning. Now to bed."

He got up and stood like a child at his first school waiting for directions to a new class. He knew her staccato statement about going to their beds meant separate ones, but as she fussed about the kitchen he let his imagination dwell and roam on a night's romp with Jessica. When she looked at him, it was with a penetrating and unnerving stare. Could she see the thoughts of sensuality written in his eyes? He blushed and went red. Jessica shrugged her shoulders and gestured for him to follow.

They climbed the steep flight of stairs in silence. Since the house was cold, Jessica had been wearing a thick jersey and a pair of worn jeans. Alun couldn't help assessing the roll and rhythmic movement of her rear as she preceded him up the stairs. At the landing she turned left and walked the whole length of the corridor. She opened the last door.

"You sleep in there. My father is down the end and Serene is along there. I'm next to you," Jessica said. Alun looked at her and wondered why she had said that. He concluded it was his over-active imagination. She meant nothing. It was Jessica's abrupt manner of talking. He went into the room and pushed the door shut. He strolled over to the bed, stopped and heard a sound of metal on creaking metal. He went back to the door and turned the handle. It was locked from outside.

Lewis Jones didn't have the energy or will left to fight. He had only been Alun Griffin for an hour, and now man and alter ego must wait for the warders to come and collect him. With a heavy heart at the futility of his earlier breakout, Lewis curled up in a fetal position on the bed and tried to obliterate the last two years.