Both the driver and the young strigoi to her right were smoking and there seemed to be no ventilation in the car. She could smell the sweatandurine reek of the men, and the odor of garlic from the young one to her right seemed stronger every mile. There was no silence during the ride. The driver was talking with either Ion or the young man all the way, each of them speaking in such rapidfire Romanian that she could not understand any of it. They all laughed a lot. Frequently she caught their glances toward her just before or after a laugh. Although the words were gibberish to her, she knew the tone and arrogance very well: it was the swaggering selfassurance of the notterriblyintelligent male bully in a situation with a woman he knew, he controlled. Kate had heard these same tones of conversation, seen the same leers and glances, and suffered the same laughter as a girl in the company of older boys, as a student with sexist teachers, as a young doctor with fellow interns out to prove something, and as a divorced woman on her own. She knew these sounds well.

“You know there will be big party tonight,” said Ion, setting his huge hand on her knee. “You are invite . . . you are special guest. “ He translated for his cronies and the smelly air was filled with their laughter.

Ion's hand slid up the inside of her leg until Kate clamped her tied wrists against her thigh and stopped it. Ion said something and the men laughed again. He removed his hand and lit a cigarette.

If Kate had been sitting by one of the doors, she would have waited until the Mercedes slowedwhich it did only occasionallyand then thrown herself from the car. The road here was cracked concrete or pitted asphalt, the shoulder alongside it almost nonexistent, but jumping would to preferable to sitting here like a fat steer being driven to the slaughterhouse.

But the men crowded her on either side and she knew that she could not get the doors opened before they shoved her back in her center seat.

They passed through the city of Media, much larger than Sighisoara, but Kate had little impression of it except for factories, more factories, littered rail yards, a terrible stench that may have come from one of the many petroleum or textile plants, and the glimpse of a single church spire, very tall, rising above the industrial towers like a black ghost from the past. Then they were in the country again and following Highway 14 toward Sibiu.

She noticed a strange thing leaving Media. A factory shift must have let out and there were scores, hundreds, of workers standing along the highway leaving the ugly town. Traffic was backed up along a section of the road that was unpaved and these men, black with soot and grease, would step in front of the Dacias and other cars, wave their arms imperiously, palms down, as if they were ordering the automobiles to stop. ~ Kate realized that it was a Romanian version of the upraised hitchhiker's thumb.

The men did not try to wave down the Mercedes. Kate leaned forward and even raised her bound hands so that she could be seen, but the workers looked down and away from the black car. Some stepped back from the road almost fearfully.

They left the town behind and Kate settled back in her seat. She felt sick with hunger, thirst, and a level of fear she had never imagined.

A few mules out of town, Ion set his thick fingers on her leg again. He said something to the young strigoi to her right and this time the laughter in the smokefilled car was strained with a new tone.

“My friend,” said Ion, leaning so close that Kate could see bits of food caught between his teeth, “says he has never fucked an American woman.”

Kate said nothing. She imagined her body made of razors. Ion said something else and rubbed his hand up her leg again. When she tried to stop him, he slapped away her wrists. Ion said something to the garlicsmelling man; a moment later this one set his left hand on her right thigh.

Kate closed her eyes and tried to remember the selfdefense classes she had taken at the Boulder Rec Center years before. All she could remember was the laconic comment Tom had made when she returned home from the exercises, feeling bruised but powerful: “Kat,” he had said, “the bad news is what my daddy taught menamely, a good big guy can always beat the shit out of a good little guy. I'm afraid that even when you get good at all this kicking and gouging stuff, you'll always be a little guy. So carry Mace. Learn to use the gun I keep in the closet.” He had hugged her then. “Or just stick close to me, kid.”

Kate opened her eyes. The driver was glancing back over his shoulder. His face was flushed.

Ion pointed to a gravel road leading away from the highway to a small copse of white trees. The driver nodded and turned off the highway. A single Dacia passed them and then the road was empty. The Mercedes' suspension absorbed the ruts and bumps as they crawled their way ahundred yards to the grove of trees and an old house or barn that had once stood there. Nothing remained now but stones and the collapsed roof.

Ion's fingers slid up her thighs to her crotch. He poked at her through the thin cotton of her underpants.

When I count to three, I wall claw has eyes. I wall sank my nails in and pull his eyes from their sockets. Let it end here if it has to. She curled her fingers, feeling her unkempt nails and wishing they were longer. One . . . two . . .

As if reading her mind, Ion slapped her in the face. It had seemed a casual movement, almost languorous, but the force of the big man's hand knocked her back into the seat cushions and made her almost lose consciousness. She tasted blood in her mouth and nose. When she was fully aware of where she was and what was happening, she was stretched half across the seat, the garlicsmelling,, pockmarked man had gotten out and gone around to stand behind Ion in the open door, and Ion was shoving up her skirt and pulling off her pants. Ion was half standing, half leaning in the car. His weight was on her lower legs. She had no leverage to kick; no chance to squirm away. The driver was turned fully in his seat now, his arms hanging over the leather seatback and his fingers flexing the way she had seen men's hands do at prizefights and football games.

Ion snapped something at the other two and then smirked at her. “I tell them, we take the turns. Three times for the each of us. One time for each of your holes . . . yes?” He reached into his coat pocket, removed a pair of shears, cut through the plastic that bound her wrists and handed the shears to the driver. He said something and garlicbreath laughed eagerly.

“I tell him,” translated Ion, “if you struggle, to cut your nose off.” His wet lips curled up. “But I say, he hold you down while he is to do it so that I am not interrupted.” Ion unbuttoned his pants and lowered them with a violent tug. He spit on one hand and rubbed his halferect and uncircumcised penis vigorously while his other hand spread her thighs apart.

I am not here. This is rot me.

The strigoi called Ion leaned over and breathed in her face. “I remember . . . you try to kill me, bitch . . . now I fuck you to death.” His mouth opened wide and descended on hers. His tongue was like moist sandpaper against her closed lips. She could feel his wet member thrusting against her thighs and groin.

Kate was concentrating so hard on not being there, on feeling and sensing nothing, that the sharp sound at first seemed remote, unrelated to anything. It came again, like the crack of a branch being snapped, and Kate opened her eyes. Ion pulled his mouth away. He was not quite inside her, but his face was sagging in the slack, alarmed vacuity that some men show at the second of orgasm. There was another crack and the garlicsmelling strigoi behind Ion seemed to throw himself away from the open car door.

The driver shouted something, the branch cracked again, glass shattered and sprayed, and the shears fell to the carpet near Kate's right shoulder.