Chapter 28

Hundreds of man-hours had been spent examining CCTV footage, and by Friday, the police had pieced together a clearer view of Sophie’s fateful last journey. She was seen at Liverpool Street Station in her school uniform, moving in and out of places with few cameras, and then going in and out of the women’s toilets, where she changed into a One Direction T-shirt and trousers.

Officers tracked her movements as she headed to the train, listening to music or something on her phone. From the grainy footage and eyewitness accounts, she seemed normal, not stressed or upset.

The footage showed her leaving the train at Rosevale-On-Sea, but that was the last sighting of Sophie Yildiz. Despite exhaustive searches, police couldn’t find any footage of her with anyone suspicious on the train or at Liverpool Street Station.

The media had descended on the quaint village of Rosevale, disrupting the police’s efforts to interview witnesses. One woman was adamant she had seen a girl with flaming red hair on a clifftop on Friday morning. Another witness, a man named Rodney Jackson, claimed he had driven past Sophie and offered her a lift.

The officers were piqued by Jackson and took a statement. “Yes, it was ... on the road to the cliffs I think, or it could have been the road to the main dual carriageway, past the Blue Lotus, God I’m not sure. I think it was up to the Blue...”

“But that isn’t the road to the sea is it?” asked the police officer.

Jackson swallowed, no it wasn’t. He had it in his head he had driven past her as she walked to her doom on the clifftops, it was what he had told his wife last night. But now he thought of it, it might have been the other road, now he had confused himself.

“Actually, no sorry yeah it was the road to the cliffs” he said doubtfully.

The police took more CCTV footage away from the Blue Lotus which would cover its main entrance. The sheer volume of footage meant long delays. Elsewhere the interview of further people proved fruitless, quite a few remembered the redhead but gave contradictory accounts where she had been walking to.

It was getting late when the senior officer was called in by his colleague.

“I’m afraid we may have found the One Direction T-shirt.”

“What? Where?”

“Well, we know about it. Two separate witnesses—an entire family and a beachcomber—both reported seeing it near the cliffs. The family saw it on Saturday, and the beachcomber on Sunday. He was cleaning up rubbish and threw it away. But they both swear it’s the same one we see in the footage of Sophie.”

The senior officer gave a sad smile. The revenge porn leads indicated that Sophie had been under significant stress, and it seemed she might have jumped before, or just as, it became public.

“It’s not looking good, is it?”

His assistant looked close to tears. They really wanted to find Sophie, but after a week of fruitless searching, things were not looking good at all.

Meanwhile, Pembroke was enjoying the sense of control over a prisoner. “Sophie, you must remember you have to give me pleasure. Now, let’s play a little game shall we!”

Sophie steeled herself for whatever would come. Pembroke was in his dressing gown, and flashes underneath showed he was in a simple black thong. His sense of confidence over her was entirely predicated on her having no choice and no freedom. He had nothing to justify it—his body was fat and ugly, with a bald head, double chin, crooked teeth, and unattractive features. Sophie had not seen another male for over a week, but had not developed even a scintilla of attraction toward Pembroke. Indeed, her fear of him was the same as always.

Pembroke’s ‘game’ was designed to break her in further. She was still in her green hipster shorts and vest and stood outside her cell waiting for instructions.

“Adopt the naru position and face the screen, please.”

Sophie did as she was told. Pembroke sat at his table, like a teacher commanding his only pupil, and set the video running.

It was a bondage video, where a dominant woman was “training” a pony girl, making her run in circles with her hands behind her head, and her knees being raised with each step to well above her waist. She was being gently whipped by the dominatrix.

“Now, I think you can guess which role you’ll be playing here!” Pembroke came over and placed the collar around her neck. “This is just to keep you in check. Down to level two for shock power, so please don’t take advantage of my kind nature.”

Pembroke also brought out a thin bamboo cane. He swished it through the air and gazed at it like a seven-year-old with a new Christmas toy. Sophie’s expression shifted from bored and sullen to scared and panicked. “Please, sir, please, I’ll be good. Don’t hit me with that; please, just use the collar...”

“Now Sophie, don’t forget your place. This thing could break your skin if I hit you with it, raise really ugly welts on that cute ass of yours. So don’t worry I don’t intend to hit you very hard with it. It’s just for show for now, I just want to ... sting you a little with it, that’s all and if you do what I say you might not even feel much!”

Sophie whimpered. She had never gotten used to the pain she suffered down here; she realized how sheltered she had been from violence before, and that now she was utterly at its mercy. Above all else, she strove to avoid it.

“Now you see these little cones? Start moving like that pony around this way. Hands behind your head, back straight looking straight ahead. Not at me, straight ahead, now with each step, I want it to be jaunty, I want your knee to come up just above 90 degrees. Now, go!”

Sophie started off, finding it strange to trot in this manner, lifting her slim legs high with each step. She felt her small breasts move up and down within her vest as she moved. She completed one lap and could see Pembroke out of the corner of her eye. In the middle of the lap, he turned around to keep facing her, his remote control in one hand and the cane in the other. He had a maniacal grin on his face, his tongue hanging out to the side, as if he were desperate to see her slip up.

She felt the buzz at the same time as the tap on her buttocks from the cane. “Aaaa...” She stumbled and nearly fell over. “Your knees were dropping! Come on, Sophie, no slacking—back to it!”

She continued, her breathing becoming more labored, and she grew slower. Another buzz, and this time the sting from the cane smarted more.

“Ten second break then we continue. Come on Sophie you can do it!”

Sophie restarted, but was almost crying as she moved. She was tired, and it was only a matter of time before the shock and the cane tap would come. “Noooo!” she wailed as she slowed down, then felt the shock and the cane whack harder into her buttocks. “You gave up! Come on, Sophie, this is good for you! It will shape those thighs and ass!”

This time Sophie stayed on the ground. “Please sir, I can’t I cannot...”

“Don’t tell me you cannot!” Pembroke’s voice cut through the air with seething anger as he pressed the button on his remote control. The electric buzz shot through Sophie’s body, causing her to writhe on the floor clutching her neck. As she raised her leg to shield herself, Pembroke’s cane came down with a sharp crack, leaving a red welt on her shin.

His eyes were ablaze with a malicious glint, and his rage echoed in his voice. He loomed over her with palpable fury, his posture threatening. Sophie scrambled to sit up, her heart pounding in her chest. Her eyes were wide with fear, tears streaming down her cheeks. She joined her hands in prayer, pleading with him without words.

Pembroke checked himself again, he was being cruel, Sophie could not have kept going. “I’m sorry Sophie, you should have just kept going until you collapsed, then I would decide when to shock you, not you. You have to remember it’s my decision not yours.”

He ran his fingers on her shin. “Oops, I don’t know my own strength, that will leave a mark for a day or two. At least it’s not on your ass, I don’t want to ruin your pretty cheeks.”

Sophie sniffled and sobbed. “Now get up again; this time, we’ll do something less strenuous.”

Pembroke instructed Sophie to crawl on all fours in a circle. This time, she had to talk continuously about whatever subjects he asked her about. If she hesitated or stopped talking, she’d get the buzz from the remote and a tap on her bottom from the cane. He kept the taps light this time, careful not to mar the pristine whiteness of her ass.

The room was filled with a tense silence, broken only by Sophie’s stuttering voice as she struggled to keep the conversation going.

“Now tell me about your sister, Jenny, tell me about her sex life, and what she is like to live with”

Sophie went on and on. Recounting episodes from school she had previously told ‘Luke’ about. After half an hour he changed tack and asked her to describe the morning of her kidnapping. How she felt, what she did and her opinion on how she had performed as a victim.

It was humiliating and hurtful for Sophie, but it also served a purpose for Pembroke. He gathered from it that she had not devised any decent plan to avoid him. There was no secret phone, no emails sent to others. He taunted her back.

“Good. Good for me that is. You were so naive Sophie, you didn’t do anything to protect yourself.”

He then switched back to questions about boys, her friends, and sexual experiences. She confirmed she had none. He quizzed her about how she felt when threatened with the exposure of photos and videos. Her description of her sense of loneliness and despair, of feeling that there was no way out, brought back the reality of her own past stupidity—the cruel irony that she’d been in a far better position then compared to her current situation.

She grew conscious that Pembroke had dropped the bamboo cane by his feet. He was still in the middle of the circle made by the cones, holding the remote, turning with her as she crawled in laps and watching her keenly. But as she stared ahead, she grew more aware of the silence as the questions stopped. She heard and sensed him masturbating. She kept crawling, even faster, as if doing so was making her escape from his clutches. She was sweating hard, panting and her knees were sore and red. But it was a loud exhalation from Pembroke that signalled that the game was over. “Fuck” he sighed, and she dared look at him. Again, she saw an erect penis at his crotch through the dressing gown, he had cum. “Fuck, stop Sophie. Stop! God. OK, crawl back into your cell, I will let you in...”

Pembroke seemed more tired than Sophie as he opened her cell door and let her in. She thought he might have a heart attack. If he did, she might die of starvation down here. But maybe if he went missing, people would search this place, wherever it was?

Pembroke went back upstairs and showered. He didn’t go back down, he just checked on the monitor that Sophie was safely locked up. He didn’t owe her any explanation or to tell her when he would return. Fuck her, she would get a change of clothes tomorrow morning. He just wanted to relax and watch TV and go to bed.

That night, the police paid a visit to Teresa and Jenny at their flat. The chief inspector, a stern-looking man, was accompanied by his deputy, a kindly woman with a soft voice. After they shared some tea, the officers updated the Yildiz women on the status of the search for Sophie. They were cautiously hopeful; their leads had pointed to Rosevale-on-Sea on Friday morning.