Chapter 13

Lillian focused her eyes and exhaled with relief thinking that the night had passed without incident. As she sat up a dizzy sensation overwhelmed her, she quickly closed her eyes back. When she touched her forehead there was a rancid scent and wetness. The warm sensation around her abdomen revealed a bloodstained gown, some portions of the material looked as though it had been drying for hours. Everywhere she touched left a blood print. Once she stood up there was a pain in her left heel forcing her to favor the right leg and buckle to her knees. She pulled herself across the hardwood floors, her upper body weakening as she neared closer to the bathroom. Once she reached the bathroom she threw off the gown and took inventory of her wounds. All she could think was “what happened, what happened?”

She dragged herself over to the tub, pulled up on the side and dropped the stop in while turning on the water. While the water was filling she rummaged through the cabinets and came upon a needle and thread. She lite a match and sanitized the tip of the needle. Still outside the tub, she grabbed a washcloth; put it in her mouth to mute the scream as she doused her body with alcohol and water. The burgundy stream ran down her chest, nipples and over her stomach as the blood washed away, pooling in between her legs. Lillian winced and grimaced, she could tell that there was a puncture in her side that had been slowly bleeding for a while. She turned off the water. There was no way that she would make it into the tub. She forced her finger tips inside the hole and felt around. Just as she suspected there was the poisoned silver ball. The thorns had not ejected yet, there was still time. She needed anything that could get a firm grip without pushing it further inside of her flesh. At most she had 6 hours from the time of injection before the pellet thorns would pierce causing her body to internally break down. There was no way to be certain as to how long she’d been in this condition.

“Lillian!” the voice grew closer as did the footsteps; she could tell the person was running toward her. “Lillian!” She quickly tried to hide herself behind the bathroom door. She was completely vulnerable. “Lillian, I am here, I am coming to you.”

Francois pushed open the door and saw her slumped, weakened figure. “You’re still the sharpest card in the deck; I see you tried to position yourself. I knew if she couldn’t come for you she’d send someone.” He held her closely in his arms, laying her down to examine the injuries. He couldn’t help but gaze in awe at her flawless curves, even in this compromised state she was the most beautiful woman his eyes had seen. Lillian pointed to the wounds and allowed herself to be attended to; this is the one person she felt safe with in this town.

In between her shallow breathing Lillian spoke, “it was that bitch waitress wasn’t it? I felt like the wine was beginning to get to me, I got caught up in being home, the freeness of the place, how could I let down my guards?”

Francoise moved quickly to work, trying to stop the bleeding. “Stop talking mon petite fleur, save your energy, I see you located the poisonous pellet. This must have been shot at you before you returned home.” Do you remember feeling a pinch at any point, anything?” Francois was speaking out loud, but answering his own questions. “Ah, the wine, you probably didn’t feel it because of the wine. You know that the bleeding doesn’t start immediately, it can take a couple of hours before the wound opens up to bleed you to death and usually the poison keeps secreting into your system just enough to keep you unconscious.”

“Tweezers, there,” Lillian nodding towards the opened and disheveled drawers. “I may have something in bag as well; she pointed to an area in the room beyond the bathroom door.” Francois took action and was back in seconds sanitizing the rudimentary surgical tool. He put the towel back in her mouth and counted 1-2-3, he slid the tweezers through the puncture wound and took hold of the ball. “I have got a firm grip on it, but I need you to breathe out as I pull it. I am going to count again and pull. 1-2-3,” he applied force to the carotid artery in her neck leading to the brain; she was out in an instance. He quickly injected her with a tranquilizer and the tip of the tweezers reappeared with the pellet. With his other hand he reached across to his satchel and emerged with a triple insulated cylinder device. He opened the latch, dropped the pellet into the neutralizing chemical and sealed it back tossing the entire container into the tub.

Just as he rolled his body to provide coverage for Lillian, the round shot up out of the tub and hit the ceiling, leaving a nice sized gash. When it fell back down it created a splash and sound that seemed as if the tub would break. Francois had made it in the knick of time, a moment later and Lillian would have been completely imploded and shattered from within. He kissed her forehead and went to work on sewing up the puncture. He was relieved that she was not coherent to feel the pain, she had been through enough.

In an instant Francois flashed back to a time when they were young pre-teens out on one of their explorative journeys. It usually happened when Lillian would get sent to perform one chore or another. They would always take it as an opportunity to pick a corner of the ward and make it their very own. It was also a chance to escape reality and claim back a portion of their childhood that was being diminished by what they each faced day-to-day. On one particular escapade after Lillian’s father passed away, she had lost the list of items she was supposed to purchase and terrified of the repercussions. Francois had concocted that if Lillian just returned with a bottle of moonshine, all would be forgotten by Lady LaRouche as to anything Lillian couldn’t remember from the list. Well, that was much easier than it sounded. It entailed going over to the shady parts of another ward where some of the clientele lived and crossed in, but Lillian and Francois did not venture out.

Also, what if someone spotted them and told. What was refreshing about the memory was Lillian’s innocence. Even with all that she was experiencing and exposed to at that time, there was still a girlish naivety about her. However, the house and that woman, Lady LaRouche tried to slowly squeeze it out of her….

They crept up on Pierre’s place, looking like a detective and the sidekick. Francois knocked on the back alley door, while Lillian stood watch behind a trash bin. It was obvious that she couldn’t go in; the goons in Pierre’s would have her in an instance. Francois jumped at the chance to go in and brush up on his street and impersonation skills. Plus, if he pulled this off, he’d look unstoppable in Lillian’s eyes. It seemed like forever before the door opened and Francois emerged just as cool as he had entered. He signaled to Lillian to stay put. A couple of thugs followed him and all three of them kept walking past where Lillian was and on down the street. She panicked, “what the hell is he doing” she thought, uncertain if she should she follow or stay put. What if they hurt him, how long should she wait. In an instance she calmed herself and thought about her Francois. He always knew how to get in and out of anything. She’d wait for their customary time and go on to the store to get the items she could remember. All she could do after that was hope he’d be at the house like they had done times past.

As she neared the structure the pressure increased from not knowing where Francois was, as well as nervousness of what awaited her inside the doors. The doors that were no longer her home, but that lady’s brothel, her stomach was tied up in a knot. Out of nowhere Francois whisked past her doubling back and kissing her square on the lips. “You knew I wouldn’t let you down,” he was smiling and winded at the same time.

Lillian couldn’t help but let out a grin but frowned too as she pushed him away. “This was pushing it, you really had me scared, I had no idea where those guys were taking you. I caught your signal to stay put and yes you seemed calm, but jeez, never again. I’ll take the lashing before I worry about your life over something so foolish.”

“You did exactly what I wanted you to do, stop that talk, we are connected mon petite fleur, and you cannot stop that flow of energy. Plus I got the remedy to keep her off of you.” His hands emerged with the moonshine. “Mission accomplished. Now get in there and I will be by later after they are all in a drunken stupor. Stay near the window and leave it cracked so you’ll hear me.”

Lillian’s heart skipped a beat and she replied, “Yes, I will do that if I can Francois.”

Since her father had passed, Francois never let her down; of course whenever she could she would escape over to where Nahmie and Toby were too. Grandfather always let her know they could be trusted. But during those difficult years, after Father passed and his wife inherited all his wealth, her disdain for Lillian’s beauty and the love her dad always showed her surfaced in a brutal way. She cut off Lillian’s ties to the family and quickly isolated her from any light into the darkness of her sick and twisted world. Being so young, Lillian wasn’t prepared for how to respond to the plot against her very life, but as her own heart darkened and her gifts became more in tune, she was growing into a force to be reckoned with.

Francois closed up the wound and wrapped Lillian’s body in material, leaving only a space for her to breathe. He had to move quickly, Lillian needed the blood that she had lost. There was only one place he could trust to help with her life, he had to move in the shadows, as word was definitely out that Lillian Valmont was home. Surely with all the lives she had to take during her initial escape, there were so many who still wanted to even the score. Francois was going to make sure she was safe, at least for now.