Keyholder Demoness Ch. 09

The list went on as Charity listened in horror. Each woman that Blue mentioned, Charity had met. Many were Blue's international friends. Each had been flirtatious perhaps, but Charity never imagined that any had wanted to buy her from Blue.

"I never told you this, but... I had a girlfriend before you... It didn't end well, and I think that she hated me in the end, so I never brought it up... I guess that I even lied to you about it... But, she was so toxic... Her name is Tam Fir... Stay away from her...

"You're going to need someone..." Blue continued. "Someone to take care of you. I'm not talking about your sister, Faith... I'm talking about someone who will truly love you... That is why I demand that you go and submit to one of these women. I demand it, Charity! You promised you would obey me forever. Do it! Fuck! Charity, you must do it! Do it as soon as possible!" Blue was obviously balling now, but she sounded angry too. "Do as I say! Do it this week! I demand it!"

Charity looked around the room she was sitting in. Would her new owner get the house too?

"Charity... After Tam, I found you. I love you. I always wanted to capture your heart..." Blue started laughing scornfully. "In the end I only succeeded in capturing your vagina..." There was a pop in the audio followed by white noise, then another pop and only silence.

Charity felt a hand on her shoulder. Hope. She swiveled her chair around and Hope sat on Charity's lap. Charity carefully wrapped her arms around Hope - one around her upper chest, one around her abdomen - and pulled her as close as possible. She cried quietly into Hope's hair, while Hope reached back and gently held Charity's head.

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"Wuhh! Ooo! Hree!" Hope laughed

Both Hope and Charity held out their right hands, palms down, flat. "Doh!"

"Wuhh! Ooo! Hree!" Hope said again. This time she held out two fingers and Charity's hand was again flat. "Wooo!" Hope laughed and she squeezed Charity's hand between her fingers. "Thithorth! I win!!"

"No!" Charity laughed. "You've just won once! You have to win two out of three!"

Hope looked confused, but she was still smiling. "I win!"

The front door opened and Faith walked into the kitchen. "Hey, baby! How are you all doing?"

Charity got up and hugged her sister. Hope held out her two fingers like she was cutting something. "Thithorth! I win!"

"The weird, naked girl has claimed victory. Is Charity cheating again?" Faith asked.

"Two out of three," Charity protested.

"Yeah," Faith said. "You're a cheater, Charity. Cheater!" Faith was pointing at Charity. "Cheater!"

Hope took Charity's hand in both of hers and raised it up. Then she did the cutting motion again across Charity's palm. "Chai-ree, chea-uh!" She continued holding Charity's hand tightly, smiling.

"Weelll," Faith said dramatically, "You all seem to be doing quite well!"

"I'm so glad you're back in town, Faith. I'm teaching Hope all the tricky intrica... the intrensi... the trickinesses of the English language," Charity said.

"Uh-huh," Faith grins. "Looks like rock, paper, scissors to me..."

Later after they had settled back into lunch (a fruit smoothie for Hope, who still preferred liquid meals), Faith asked Charity, "Have you had any luck with the cipher?"

"Cipher?" Charity asked. "The cipher?" Her look slowly transformed from confusion to horror.

"The cipher!" Faith repeated. "The code! That message with the upper and lower case letters."

"I... I couldn't remember what it was called..." Charity said. "I sort of somehow forgot about it..."

Faith's face assumed an air of concern.

"But... I've been focused on something else... something better... I have this photo of a car that was following me," Charity said quickly. "I tried to get Tumalo to track the license plate, but she just blew me off."

"Oh! Let me see!" Faith said.

Charity handed her phone to Faith who began zooming in on the various details of the picture. "No fucking way!"

"What?" Charity asked.

"I know this car! I know who owns it! Look at the bumper stickers!" Faith said.

"Who?!" Charity reached out and laid a hand on top of Hope's. Hope sometimes got a little keyed up when Charity and Faith started talking too excitedly.

"I worked with her," Faith said. "Brilliant, but odd. Maybe she's on the spectrum somewhere. Networking. Computer center operations. Her name is something really odd... She worked nights. Fedea. What is her last name? I remember trying to tell her jokes and she would just stare at me like she was trying to figure out why I was wasting air. Fedea... She took a package after our company merged last year... Whychus! Whychus! Fedea Whychus!"

"So she has tech skills?" Charity asked. "She could spoo... fake a text message?"

"Oh, hell yeah! She could totally black hat," Faith said.

"What does she look like?" Charity asked, gripping Hope's hand a little tighter.

"Frizzy. A ginger - faded," Faith said.

"That's got to be... Where does she live?" Charity asked.

"Baby, I don't know. She didn't throw parties," Faith said, thinking. "Let me call Dawn. She might have an address for her."

"Dawn?" Charity asked.

"Dawn in HR," Faith said. She pulled out her phone and walked out of the room.

Hope was staring at Charity with concern.

"Don't worry, Hope! We're going to bust that bitch!" Charity said excitedly.

Hope shook her head, clearly not understanding what was going on. "Bithh?"

"The frizzy haired bitch!" Charity said. She held her hands up by her temples, her fingers pointing out just like Hope had done in the past.

"Day ah bru bah (click)?" Hope asked, standing up. "Day ah bru bah (click)?" she asked again pointing down to the ground. "Hone?" She looked around in a panic for a second, then ran from the room.

"Hope! Wait!"

Faith walked back into the room still talking on her phone, "Thanks, Dawn. I owe you! She lives in Heceta! In the Four Sisters Mining Area."

The sounds of metal clanging echoed from down the hall.

"Where did Hope go?" Faith asked looking up.

"We have to go to Heceta," Charity said. "... but... I can't leave the city limits," she remembered. "Tumalo still thinks I'm a suspect... She'll think I'm running. It would be a... a... some kind of crime."

"Calm down, baby. I'll look into it," Faith said. "I'll do a little investigating."

"Cool," Charity said. "I'm just going to go and make sure Hope is OK. I think she locked herself in the cage under the bed again..."