times in total. He’d even brushed his teeth twice and flossed and gargled mouthwash while soaping his genitals. He wanted to expunge the feeling of being defiled by filth, a result of the way he had been treated that day.
At last he felt clean.
But he didn’t feel alone.
He had lived alone in his home for years, and comfort was always the name of the game for the Reverend Rupert Shaw. He liked his own space, being alone, away from his daily life of constant meetings with throngs of parishioners, fellow church folk and others. He always felt wary around people, he had been born a bit of a loner, had never trusted other people totally. He could usually tell if something was wrong in his world, call it gut instinct.
He had that feeling, right now, in his own home.
And it wasn’t a good feeling.
Wrapping a white towel around his waist, Rupert moved through the archway to his bedroom from the en suite bathroom and headed towards his bed. Ducking down, he knelt and scrabbled around under it. His hand fell on the handle of his baseball bat. Gripping it firmly, he picked it up and stood.
Placing the bat on his bed, he tightened the towel around his waist, all too aware of how naked he felt. He wanted to put on some clothes, but he wasn’t dry yet. He wanted to be sure he was alone before he started drying himself. That was the only way he’d be able to settle his nerves.
He stepped out onto the landing and peered down the stairs. The front door was closed, and locked as he had remembered leaving it. The furniture was not disturbed. The air smelt normal, no aftershave or sweat that was alien or unusual.
Had he locked the back door ? He wondered.
Terror gripped him for a second.
“You locked the front door,” he said to himself, “but did you check the back door, you idiot?”
Then, to his relief, he remembered that he always kept it locked.
Yes , he reflected, but you felt comfortable about the security just before you were kidnapped.
Rupert took firm hold of his baseball bat and held it out in front of him. He felt his penis dangling in thin air, and this unsettled him.
Let’s get this over with, he thought.
Then he was at the foot of the stairs. He looked into his kitchen. Nothing was disturbed from what he could see. He looked at the cupboards and the furniture. Nothing wrong.
Backing up beyond the stairs he headed for the utility rooms and the office at the rear of the house. The doors were just as he had left them. Nothing wrong here. His spaghetti-ruined tee shirt was still sitting on top of the dryer. Peering into his office, he noted that it was unoccupied, and in darkness.
He walked back to the lounge, holding the bat at his side. He ran a towel through his wet hair and breathed out with relief.
Then Rupert saw the chair in the centre of the floor. He looked back at the dining room, and saw from this different angle that a chair had been moved. Not by him. And now it had been placed sitting in the centre of his lounge with a variety of knives on the floor beside it. There was rope bundled on top of it too.
He walked towards the chair.
Then everything went black.
***
OUCH!
Home run!
To the observer sitting at his desk, that last episode was like watching a wrestling move, something that was over-choreographed and rehearsed. The second the bat had hit his Choice in the face, the impact made the guy somersault onto his lounge carpet in a heap. His genitals flapped in the air. His towel had whipped off to the left and he had landed spread-eagled on his front. He could have sworn he heard the crunch of his nose splattering across his face.
The figure that had attacked him had picked him up effortlessly and sat him down in the chair, tied him down and made sure he couldn’t move. Then he had kicked the towel away and sat opposite the Choice on the man’s sofa. He waited for the guy to regain consciousness.
The man at the desk found that his manhood was now fully erect.
It was only a
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