The Mayor's Daughter: Draft Pony

  The Mayor’s Daughter

  by Will Versuch

  A Pink Flamingo Ebook Publication

  Copyright © 2010 by Will Versuch, All rights reserved

  For information contact:

  Pink Flamingo Publications

  www.pinkflamingo.com

  P.O. Box 632 Richland, MI 49083

  USA

  Cover Image © 2010 petandponygirls.com

  Email Comments: comments@pinkflamingo.com

  With the exception of quotes used in reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, by any means, including mechanical, electronic, photocopying recording or otherwise without prior written permission of the publishers.

  Chapter One

  The Traffic Stop

  Jessica swore and moved her sandaled foot from accelerator to brake. The telltale blue and white flashing lights made her squint as they dominated her rear view mirror. She was already running late. This was going to set her even further behind. She paused to fix her hair a little in the mirror and practice her most innocent expression as her tires rolled to a stop on the shoulder of the road. She saw the cruiser come to a halt behind her, and watched its door open as she put her car into park and turned off the engine. A tall officer, dressed in the distinctive uniform of the highway patrol, stepped from the car and approached the driver’s door. She rolled down the window as he reached her.

  “License and registration, ma’am.” He spoke brusquely, and she hastened to gather them from the glove box and her purse.

  “Here you go, sir.” She smiled up at him as she handed him the requested documents, her eyes wide and innocent as she tucked a strand of blond hair back behind her ear.

  “Do you know why I pulled you over?” the officer asked, his cold gray eyes meeting hers unblinkingly.

  “I guess I was speeding?”

  “You guess right.”

  “I’m sorry,” she pouted slightly as she spoke, trying her best to get herself out of yet another ticket that her father would not want to pay. “I’m just on my way to meet some friends for my birthday, and I was a little excited.”

  “I see. Turning nineteen today it says here.” The officer’s stony features revealed the small hint of a smile. “Any big plans?”

  “Oh, not much, really,” she smiled up at him. “My dad rented out the hall at the Sheraton for me and some friends.”

  “Oh, right,” the officer’s eyes narrowed a bit in recognition. “You’re Jessica Miller; the mayor’s daughter.”

  “Yeah, that’s me,” she responded, still smiling, and hoping that this last piece of information would get her off the hook.

  “License says you’re 5’6” and 108 pounds,” he read from the card, and then his eyes glanced down over her body as she sat in the car. “Is that accurate?”

  “Yes,” she answered, her smile fading slightly. There was something about the way that he asked the question that felt wrong, creepy. “Well, I’m actually just under 5’6”, but I’m always within a couple pounds of 110.”

  “Anyone ever tell you that you look a little like, what’s her name,” he narrowed his eyes as he spoke, “the girl from Sin City.”

  “Jessica Alba?” she offered helpfully.

  “That’s her,” he spoke with a smile, “anyone ever tell you that?”

  “A couple times,” she answered, matching his smile, “but I think that’s just because I stole her smile and her hair.”

  “Well, you wait right here, Ms. Alba, and I’ll get you on your way just as fast as I can.” He gave her a wink as he turned and walked back to his waiting cruiser.

  As she watched him go in the side mirror, Jessica gave herself about fifty-fifty odds of getting away without a ticket. She’d have preferred that he just let her go with a verbal warning, but there was still a chance that he would return with nothing more stern than a written one. Unfortunately, going back to his car probably meant that he was going to pull her driving record and see her history of tickets, which did nothing to help her chances. After a seeming eternity, the cruiser door opened again and the officer returned to her open window.

  “Ms. Miller, please step out of the car.” His voice was stern, and she saw that his hand hovered close to his holstered pistol when she looked up in surprise.

  “Wh-what?” she stammered, “why?”

  “Place your hands on the steering wheel,” he ordered, and she quickly obeyed, grabbing it at ten and two. “I am going to open your door, and you will step from the car, keeping your hands where I can see them. Do you understand?”

  “Y-yes,” she answered quickly.

  Jessica’s mind reeled at the sudden shift in the situation. What was going on? When the door opened, she swung her bare, tanned legs out of the car and rose to her feet. She kept her hands raised, resisting the urge to reach down and adjust the hem of her short, faded denim skirt. With a strong hand on her shoulder, he turned her to face the car as he closed the door.

  “Place your hands on the roof of the car, and spread your legs,” he ordered.

  She followed his commands, ‘assuming the position’ as she’d heard it called in movies and on television cop shows. It was a very different feeling to experience in person, she quickly discovered. Little pebbles of gravel slipped between the soles of her feet and the thin, flat sandals as she slid them out across the ground. Her short skirt rose, baring more of her thighs as she spread them. It was a terribly vulnerable feeling. She was being treated like a criminal without knowing why. Her heart pounded in her chest in growing fear of what was coming. Was she going to be arrested?

  “Ms. Miller, are you aware that there is an active warrant for your arrest?” the policeman asked calmly behind her.

  “A warrant?” she asked quickly, in disbelief, “for what? There must be some sort of mistake.”

  “For attempted armed robbery.”

  “What? Me?”

  “I’ll admit that it sounds a little surprising to me, too, Ms. Miller, but until I can look into it further, I have no choice but to take it seriously. Very seriously. Do you understand?”

  “Yeah, sure, I guess,” she answered quickly, finding herself grateful that the warrant wasn’t for something legitimate, like the unpaid parking tickets that cluttered up her glove box.

  “Have you ever been arrested before, Ms. Miller?”

  “No,” she replied, “but please, you don’t have to arrest me. I mean, come on, I’m not a robber. Can’t you just call my dad?”

  “Are you carrying any weapons, Ms. Miller?” he asked sternly, ignoring her question.

  “No, I’m not carrying any weapons,” she laughed, the situation taking on an absurd quality as she stood there facing the car.

  “I told you that this is serious, Ms. Miller. I’m going to pat you down now.”

  She winced as he ran his hands over her body. Her feet shifted nervously in the gravel as his palms grazed across her breasts through the thin white material of her shirt. His fingers played across her belly. She felt her cheeks blushing slightly as his hands seemed to linger on her hips before moving down across the soft denim of her skirt. She gasped as his right hand slipped up under its hem to search the bare flesh of her inner thighs. She was grateful when he finally removed his hand, and she pressed her lips together as he ran his palms down her legs. The caress of his hands to the bare skin of her legs infuriated her, and she couldn’t help but think that he was taking advantage of an opportunity to just ‘cop a feel.’ She couldn’t imagine that he sincerely thought that she was hiding a weapon underneath the sandal straps that were wrapped around her calves and tied in place. When this mess was squared away, she would d
efinitely let her father know about this.

  Finished with his ‘search,’ he stepped in close to her and reached to the roof of the car to take hold of her right wrist. She didn’t resist as he turned it, bending her arm at the elbow to place her hand behind her back. She trembled slightly as she heard a ratcheting sound and then felt the cold steel of the cuff close tightly in place around the slender flesh of her wrist.

  “Please, do you have to do this?” she asked, but did not resist as he drew her other arm back behind her and closed the second cuff tightly in place on it. “I’m not going to do anything.”

  “Sorry, Ms. Miller, but it’s procedure,” he answered grimly, taking hold of her bare upper arm and leading her back to his car. “I can’t put you in the car unless you’re restrained.”

  Jessica walked at his direction back to the patrol car. Her hands explored the cuffs behind her, and she was surprised to find them different than she had expected. Instead of a chain between them, she found a hinged bar that allowed them very little movement or flexibility. She clasped her hands together tightly behind her back, the sound of the clinking metal sending a shudder down her spine.

  Watching the road, Jessica was grateful that no one drove by to see her being taken into custody. At the waiting police car, he opened the back door and helped her to sit down inside, his hand on the back of her head to maneuver it without hitting the roofline. The seat was made of hard, formed plastic and was cool against the bare backs of her thighs. The cuffs were uncomfortable, biting into her tender wrists, and she was grateful for the cutout in the seatback behind her where they could rest without her weight pressing against them. She was surprised to see the policeman squat down next to her before closing the door, another pair of cuffs in his hands.

  “Wh-what… what are you doing?” she whimpered as she saw him reach for her left ankle, her voice seeming somehow small to her. “What are those for?”

  “I told you,” he spoke softly as he got a firm grip on her calf above the ankle and placed the open hasp of the cuff against it, “you have to be restrained.”

  “But my feet?” she whimpered as he closed the cuff in place on her, struggling to blink back tears as the situation worsened. “I’m not going to run away.”

  “You’re not now, are you?” He looked up at her as he closed the other cuff in place on her right ankle.

  With the cuffs locked on her feet, he stood up again. Reaching down, he placed his hand on her shoulder for a moment, giving it a squeeze that somehow felt anything but reassuring. And then the door closed ominously, and she was alone in the back seat. She pulled at the cuffs on her ankles, looking down in disbelief at the confining anklets and the short chain between them. Her festive sandals and toenails, painted a pale pink, seemed starkly out of place with these new additions.

  She watched him go back to her car, the view obscured some by the mesh of the cage that separated her from the front seat of the cruiser. He spent a few moments inside it before closing it up, locking it with its keyless remote. He walked back to the patrol car, carrying her purse. She pressed her thighs together as she sat impatiently in the mobile cell that was the back seat of his car. He entered the front seat of the patrol car without a word, placing her belongings on the seat next to him.

  “How long will it take to get things straightened out?” she asked, looking at the officer’s face in the rear view mirror as he put the car in gear.

  “To get what straightened out, princess?”

  “The warrant mistake,” she responded icily, “and please don’t call me that.”

  “You don’t like being called princess?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “That’s none of your business,” she snapped, twisting her wrists in the cuffs behind her back in frustration. “Now, how long is it going to take to get this warrant thing fixed, and get me out of here?”

  “There are a few complications with that, princess.”

  “I asked you not to call me that,” she hissed angrily, “and what do you mean by complications.”

  “This doesn’t seem like a very fair conversation, princess,” he spoke as his eyes met hers in the rear-view mirror for a moment.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You want me to answer questions for you, but you won’t answer them for me.”

  “What the fuck does you calling me princess have to do with anything?” she snapped angrily in response.

  He continued to drive in silence without answering her question. Looking out the window, Jessica watched them turn off the road they’d been on and onto a winding country road. The chain between her ankles rattled as she shifted her feet nervously.

  “It’s what my dad calls me,” Jessica finally spoke softly.

  “And why is that a bad thing?”

  “Because he only calls me princess when he’s not really paying attention to me,” she answered slowly, “so it just brings up bad memories.”

  “You don’t like it when people don’t pay attention to you, do you?” he asked her, once more meeting her eyes.

  “No, I don’t,” she replied flatly. “So what are the complications you were talking about?”

  “Well, for starters, there is no warrant.”

  “Wh-what? What do you mean?” a chill ran down her spine as she asked the question.

  “I’m afraid that I made that part up.”

  “Is this some kind of sick joke?” she demanded, suddenly realizing what might be going on, as hope began to surface in her mind. “Did my father set this up? Is this some kind of screwy birthday gag?”

  “Do you think your daddy would have had someone feel up his little princess as a birthday gag?” he asked cruelly, looking back into her eyes in the mirror.

  “Then what… then what…” Jessica tried to ask the question, but was finally overcome by tears, her voice breaking as they began to stream down her cheeks.

  “I’m afraid that you’re being kidnapped, princess. And I’m going to hold onto you until I can get what I want from your precious daddy.”

  “But you… you’re a policeman… they’ll know you pulled me over. They’ll question you.”

  “Nobody knows I pulled you over, princess,” he said, laughing, “I didn’t call it in, because I knew exactly who I was pulling over. I never ran your license. This traffic stop never happened, as far as the rest of the world is concerned.”

  “But… but they’ll find my car.”

  “Yes, they will. But that’s all they’ll find.”

  “Help me!” she screamed, kicking at the door of the car, tears streaming down her cheeks as she cried out hysterically, “someone please help me!”

  “A shame you picked such a lonely road to drive down, isn’t it?” he asked cruelly as her hysterics gave way to muted sobbing. “When I was dreaming up this plan, I was worried that someone might see you in the back seat and recognize you. I can’t tell you how happy I was when you turned down that old road.”

  “So what now?” she asked as she sniffed back more tears, gaining some semblance of control over herself again. “You just keep me out of the way until my father pays you?”

  “That’s pretty much it.”

  “And where are you going to keep me?” She pulled desperately at the cuffs on her wrists, trying to squeeze her hands out of them while she talked, but

  they were too tight, the effort only serving to chafe her tender flesh.

  “I’ve got a very special place in mind, princess.”

  “You can’t get away with this, you know,” she whimpered as hot new tears stung her eyes. “Kidnappers never get their money. Please, just let me go. I swear I’ll just pretend it never happened.”

  “Oh, don’t you worry your pretty little head about it,” he laughed, “I know exactly what I’m doing, and I’m going to get exactly what I want.”

  She looked away from the steely glint in his eyes, scanning the road for sign of any other travelers, but it
remained empty. After a few twists and turns, he slowed and turned off the road onto an old dirt track that was almost entirely overgrown. The car, obviously designed for smoother terrain, bounced and jostled through the deep holes in the road. She heard it bottom out a few times. She slid on the smooth seat, unable to do much to stop herself until her body thrust against the door, though she managed to turn herself enough to get a hold on the armrest.

  After what felt like an eternity on the bumpy road, they reached a clearing next to a swiftly flowing river. Built next to the river was an old gristmill. The headlights of the car glinted off the water that was still scooped up and carried by the ponderous wooden wheel as it turned in the river. The building itself looked old and worn, though still supported itself admirably.

  “My family’s owned this old mill for over a century. My dad actually worked for my grandpa in it when he was a little tyke, though it’s been decades since it’s seen any real use,” he told her, sounding almost wistful. “This mill supported our family for a long time, princess, though it’s never made the sort of money it’s going to produce through you.”

  “I bet your grandpa would be really proud of you right now,” Jessica hissed.

  “My grandpa died penniless in a nursing home,” he responded, putting the car into park and killing the engine in front of the old mill. “I intend to do no such thing.”

  When he exited the car and moved toward the door against which she rested, Jessica frantically moved away from it, pushing herself across the smooth seat to the other side. Like the other door, she found no handle for release. Pressing her back into it, she looked about frantically, feeling like a trapped animal. He opened the door across from her and began to reach into the car. She kicked out at him, sandaled feet forced to move in unison by the chain that locked them together. He laughed as he easily deflected the blow, grabbing her right ankle firmly.

  “No! Stop it! Let me go!” Jessica screamed as he yanked her from the car by her ankle.

  “We can do this the hard way, if that’s how you like it,” he chortled as she slid easily across the smooth seat to hit the dirt driveway with a thud, landing painfully on her cuffed wrists. “Because that’s definitely how I like it.”