Paul Anderson and Gabe Miller arrived back at the Compound shortly after midday.  Gabe had wanted to spend the night at the hospital so he could be there when Raul Alvaro came out of recovery.  Raul's surgery had gone well and Gabe was in good spirits.  The bar that pierced his chest, while damaging, had been a clean injury.  Tubel, the surgeon, said that Raul could be taken back to the Compound in a few days.  Gabe came back to the Compound to arrange for a couple of the Alvaro clan to go to town while Raul was hospitalized.  He also was looking forward to spending a little time with Shawna; the woman had been on his mind a lot while he was gone.

Paul hadn't told him about his discovery.  In fact he had been rather closed mouthed the entire trip, although Paul wasn't much of a talker anyway.  He had been glad that Gabe needed the extra time; pumping his friend Sheriff Kinkade for information without him knowing about it was a delicate process.  As it was, there was little more to be known about the robbery.  Kinkade wasn't exactly in the information loop.  All he had was what was in the All Points Bulletin and what he had heard from other departments he had talked to.  All in all, it wasn't much help to Paul.

But Paul DID get a chance to be in on something else, a visit to the home of one of the kids that Rhianna had fought with at the lake.

Armed with a search and seizure warrant, Kinkade and a couple of his men went to see what they could find, and Paul was invited along.

It happened to be Kale's home, the big kid that had started talking with Rhianna.  One of the other guys had spilled his guts and told Kinkade about Kale's stash.  Kale's parents objected strongly to the search, but Kinkade just kept waving the warrant in their faces and smiled.

Kale had been dumb.  A smart kid would have at least tried to destroy the evidence of his misdeeds, but Kale wasn't that bright.  They came for and found his computer and a brief perusal of its contents showed close to two hundred megs of still pictures captured off video, most featuring women and children of the Compound.  There were also digital videos, and the deputy who was handling the computer was proud to announce the discovery of a website.  Apparently, Kale and his friends had put the Compound on the web, disguising its location (which Paul was very happy to hear about), but otherwise showing all that could be seen from the land around it.

Funnily enough, the website featured just the adult and teenage women, and was split into bound and unbound, as the community didn't keep it's playful or punishment bondage just indoors.  Yet almost half of Kale's collection featured the younger children playing outside the Compound, and both Paul and Kinkade had a sinking feeling in the pit of their stomachs.

Kale was still young, and at the moment content to just be a voyeur; but the men wondered if they had a potential pedophile on their hands.  Kinkade didn't want to think about the implications.

The Sheriff confiscated the computer, and everything computer related he could find.  The warrant also allowed him to take any pictures or tapes he found, too, but there were none to be seen.

His next stop would be to find Kale himself; the boy had left the house early that morning.  Kinkade was not looking forward to this.  So after talking with his deputy about getting the website taken down, the men left.

"I'm sorry, Paul," Kinkade said as they were leaving.

Paul Anderson didn't understand much about computers and wasn't sure what the web was, but he knew enough to be angry.  "I want him punished," he said.

"He will be, I'll guarantee it!"

Paul grunted.  He made a note to talk to Rhianna about all this; she would be able to put it in better perspective for him.

That had been how he spent his morning, and now he and Gabe were riding into camp.

Gabe looked around and saw his friends and family, all in a good mood and anxious to hear how Raul was doing.  It gave Gabe a lot of pleasure to spread the good news, and he walked away with a crowd of children around him.

Paul tied his horse and looked at the same people with different eyes.  He saw a people violated, their dignity stripped from them by a few boys.  While he wasn't sure of the extent of the damage that had been done to them, he knew that if word spread about the pictures, relationships with the townsfolk would be even more strained.

One of his goals when he first became Guardian was to improve communication with the town and foster new friendships.  But prejudice on both sides made that a lot more difficult than he had imagined, and the only friendship formed was between him and the latest Sheriff.

Paul sighed.  The pictures were out of his hands right now, the damage done, what he had to focus on now was another problem entirely.

Shawna Michaels.

---***---

They came for her late in the afternoon.

Shawna was with Grady in the stables, watching him work.  She had to watch, for he had tied her up again, laying her on some bales of hay out of the way.  His excuse was that she needed the rest, but Shawna felt he did it just because he wanted to.

To her surprise, she didn't protest much about it, thinking that if she had to be tied up, it was better to be bound for fun than out of malice.  So she lay on her front, her arms bound behind her in the usual way, and her feet tied together, and watched as Grady helped Patch sweep and clean the horse stalls.

There were twenty stalls in this barn, and most of them were occupied, although the current residents were all out in a paddock nearby or being used.

After doing just a few, Grady began to tire, not yet fully recovered from his illness, and at Patch's urging, he took frequent breaks to rest and drink.  He would come sit by Shawna, and spend a few wordless minutes with her.  It felt good to both of them.

They were resting when Paul Anderson showed up with one of his deputies.

"Shawna," he said to her, noting her bondage, "You need to come with us."

"What's up?" Grady asked before Shawna could speak.

Paul didn't want to look at Grady; for some reason he was feeling bad about what was going on.  "The elders want to see her," he said.

"Why?" Shawna asked.

Paul looked her in the eye.  "I think you know."

Paul saw Shawna look at him with a puzzled expression for a moment, then he saw realization dawn, for her face paled and a look of fear appeared.

"Oh," was all she said.

Paul gestured for his deputy to untie her feet.

"Wait a minute," Grady said.  "I don't understand; what's going on?"

"She's seeing the elders," Paul replied, "the rest...I'll tell you later."

"Don't give me that, Paul!  Shawna, what is it?"

Shawna was scared, very scared.  One look from Paul and she knew her secret had been discovered.

They found the plane; they found Dirk.  Maybe they even found the money!  Could they know about the robbery?  Was that why Paul was so long in town?  Were there police waiting for her right now, to take her away?

Shawna shivered in her bondage and pulled at the bindings.  She felt alone, vulnerable, and had a very strong urge to run.  But she knew it would be hopeless.

"Shawna," whispered Grady, seeing the fear in her eyes, "what is it?"

Shawna evaded his eyes, shaking her head.  She didn't want to tell him, it would shatter the fragile friendship that was just beginning to form.

Her legs untied, Paul helped her off the hay bales, and Grady came down with them.

"Stay here, Grady," he said.

"No.  Look, I'm going with you.  Shawna's my responsibility, and if she's in trouble then I have a right to know about it!"

"Not right now."

"Yes, right now!  I'm her Head of House.  That's what the elders made me, and until they take that away from me, it means I can't be kept in the dark!"

Now Paul looked at him.  "I thought you had given up that right," he said accusingly.

"That was...just a misunderstanding."

Both Paul and Grady were big men, but Grady had Paul in both youth and bulk strength.  Yet Shawna suddenly felt that she was looking at two big predators, eyeing each other for rights to the pack.  Grady had the energy, but Paul the experience and the know-how.  It was there for just a fleeting minute, but Shawna wondered if they were going to come to blows over her.

"Please," she said, "Grady.  Please stay.  It's better that you don't come."

"It's my right!  I have to be there, if only to protect you.  They can't punish you for something without going through me!"

Shawna would have held him if she could, but Paul hadn't untied her.  "Please, for me," she whispered.

Grady looked angrily at Paul for a moment.  "Bring her home when you're done.  Then I want to see the elders after."

"We'll see," said Paul, and he took Shawna's arm and led her away.

Patch came up to his friend and watched as they left.  "You okay?" he whispered.

"No, I'm not!" Grady said loudly, thinking it was a stupid thing to ask.

"Good," said Patch with a smile, and he went back to the stall they were cleaning.

Surprised and offended, Grady stared at Patch, and at Ruthy, who had watched all this from the loft where she had been working.  He had thought that Patch was his friend, someone who understood pain.  Yet the man just said he was glad that Grady wasn't okay!  Then it dawned on him; the true meaning of Patch's words.  Grady realized that for the last five minutes he hadn't been thinking of Cheryl his dead wife, but of Shawna.  His anger was for her, and it had pushed Cheryl from the forefront of his mind where she lived for him now.  For the first time in a long time, he truly let go of his grief to feel for someone else.  Patch hadn't been happy about Grady feeling bad, but he was happy that Grady was feeling anything at all!

"Thanks friend," he said.

Patch smiled, and pointed at a rake.

---***---

It was a smaller group than last time, Shawna noted.  Only the five elders around their table, plus Paul and Rhianna at theirs, and a dog lying by its Master's feet.  That was it.  There was no police, and no Sheriff to take her away.

No one looked happy, but no one looked angry either, which confused her.

Shawna's fear that they had discovered the plane was confirmed when she saw the three bags of money sitting on the table in front of Paul.  Shawna wondered if they had connected her to the plane, or if they were just bringing her in on suspicion alone.  For a moment, she considered a few bold-faced lies; an attempt to deny that she knew anything about the plane.  But Paul picked up a sheet of paper and brought it over to her, showing her the artist's rendition of her face as described by witnesses.

Shawna's heart sank, and she followed it to her knees.

"I take it it's true then," said Paul.  His voice was low, and full of strain, but it was enough to carry throughout the room.

Shawna nodded, not looking at anyone, tears welling up in her eyes.

Paul glanced around the room.  Robert Klink had told him that he would do all the talking, unless he got into trouble.  Robert would only interrupt if he felt the need was there.  This was Paul's show, one of the more unpleasant aspects of a Guardian's duties.

He, Rhianna, and the elders had spent most of the afternoon talking about what they were going to do with Shawna.  All knew that it wasn't a simple situation anymore.  The rules said that a felony crime, which bank robbery certainly was, meant expulsion from the Compound.  Outsider or citizen, it didn't matter.  But all felt that there was more to the story than they had been told, and after endless debating, they agreed to hold off their decision until they found out more.

So Paul was elected point man, with Rhianna to advise him on technical matters, while Robert and the rest were the jury.

This meeting was also unique in the fact that it was a closed door one.  Not much was held from the community as far as Compound business went.  It was just too small a place for things to hide from gossip.  Also, keeping secrets was against the feeling of community spirit that held the place together.  But in this case, only the people in this room were going to know anything.

Paul sighed and looked down at the woman on her knees before him.  Grady had let her dress in one of the simpler dresses Cheryl had owned, so at least she didn't have to contend with being naked as well as helpless to determine her own fate.  But Paul still thought she looked very vulnerable, shaking with fear.  He realized that she wasn't much older than his own daughter, maybe just a couple of years older than his son was.  Just a child really.

"Who was he?" he said softly, pointing at the picture of the man on the APB, even though with her head bowed, Shawna couldn't have seen him do it.

"Dirk, Dirk Tesco," said Shawna, her voice trembling.

"Can you tell me about him?"

"He was...he looked after me.  He rescued me from my father and...we became...lovers."

"Rescued you?" Paul asked gently.

Shawna nodded again, and spent a few minutes telling everyone about her family, and how abusive her childhood was.

Everyone could feel her pain, but they steeled themselves against it.  Rhianna felt it more than the rest, although her own childhood in Maine was nothing like Shawna's.  She instead felt Shawna's humiliations through her OWN experiences.  No one truly knew the extent to which those episodes had affected her.  Counseling with Father Logan, who was a world-class therapist even though he didn't have the credentials, had allowed Rhianna to adjust to her past.  But the demons would never go away.  Rhianna knew that about herself, and knew that would be true for Shawna as well.

When Shawna stopped talking, Paul remained quiet while everybody absorbed what he or she had heard.  He considered calling in the priest to continue questioning Shawna, but shook that idea out of his head.  Interrogations, no matter how gentle, were not something he was used to doing.  Rhianna probably had a lot more experience, but he couldn't trust her not to be heavy handed about it.

He did look over at the ex-FBI agent, wondering what his next question should be.  He was surprised to see her with tears in her eyes.

"So," Paul said to Shawna, "Dirk got you away from a horrible situation.  You must have loved him very much."

Surprisingly, Paul got no response from Shawna.  Not the one that he expected anyway.

"What are you going to do to me?" she asked, looking not at Paul, but at the elders.

"We're probably going to send you back," said Paul before he could think.

"No," Shawna said, "please.  I can't...I can't go back."

"You DID rob the bank, didn't you?" Paul said.

Startled, Shawna nodded.

"You hid the money, and didn't tell anyone, any of us here, about your dead boyfriend.  What were you planning; to run away with the money after we got you well?"

"I..." said Shawna, looking at him wide eyed.  She couldn't deny what he said; yet, in all honesty, she didn't know what she had planned.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Paul asked slowly.  For a moment his temper had flared, but he gathered himself back together.

"You would...send me away."

Paul opened his mouth to speak, but Rhianna interrupted him.

"Shawna, how did you get hooked on drugs?" she asked.

Paul turned to glare at Rhianna, but she was focused on Shawna and ignored him.

Shawna looked away.  "If you're sending me away, I don't see why I have to tell you anything more."

"YOU STUPID GIRL!" Rhianna shouted, getting up from her pillow.  "CAN'T YOU SEE THAT WE'RE GIVING YOU A CHANCE TO DEFEND YOURSELF?"

"RHIANNA!" Paul yelled.  "Enough!"

Shawna once more looked stunned, and she stared at the woman until both of them were on their knees again.

Paul stood glaring at Rhianna for a moment, then with a glance at the elders who sat nervously at their table, he approached Shawna.

"I think since..." he began, but this time it was Shawna who interrupted.

"It was Dirk who got me high," she said.  "Dirk who gave me my first joint, who got me drunk first, who made me shove stuff up my nose to get high until I couldn't stop shoving it myself.  For him I shot up, toked up, and drank up, eager for his approval and support, because I needed him.

"Yes, he rescued me from my father, but with Dirk that rescue had a price.  My dignity and my freedom!"

The room went quiet at her outburst, except for the big dog, which sat up panting.  "Hush now, Sidney," said Bill Anderson as he stroked behind the animal's ears.

Shawna focused on the happy face of the dog.

Paul thought carefully for a moment, there was something he needed to know.  "Why did you rob the bank?"

Shawna saw a way out, and what boosted her spirits was that all she had to do was tell the truth.  All the lying she had done to these people had never settled right with her, and now she had a chance to fix it.  If only they believed her.

"I had to," she said.  "I had to help him.  If I didn't do what he wanted, he would hold back my...he wouldn't give me my next...fix."  Shawna went on to tell how living with Dirk became another sort of hell, for which the drugs and booze had become a welcome escape.

Rhianna listened to all this, and thought extenuating circumstances.  She had been right and wrong.  Right in thinking that Shawna was going to be a problem, yet wrong in assigning blame.  But she knew the hard decision that had been made would no doubt be debated again after hearing all of this.

Some of the elders had heard enough, and they waved Paul over for a whispered consultation.

Paul got up and went to the door, bringing back in his deputy.

"Where are you taking me?" Shawna asked, as Paul helped her to her feet.

"We need to talk," he replied.  "In the morning we'll let you know what we decide.  In the meantime, Gerry here will take you someplace where he'll look after you."

"What?  I want to go home!"

"That's what we have to decide," said Paul.

"No, home, Grady's home!"

Paul looked back at Robert and the elders, a questioning look in his eyes.

Robert slowly shook his head.

"Please?" begged Shawna.

"I'm sorry," Paul said, meaning it.

Shawna kept her mouth shut until she got to the door.  "Don't I even get to say goodbye to him?" she said.

No one said anything until the door closed behind her, then the debate raged on.

---***---

Shawna was taken to an empty apartment where the deputy's wife waited for them. The deputy led Shawna over to the bed and bound her feet.

"You'll have to stay here until they make their decision," he told her, regret in his own voice. "My wife will stay with you tonight and will see that you don't want for anything.  Just ask her if you need anything."

Shawna didn't say a word, her depression full on her now.

The deputy watched her for a moment, then with a tired nod to his wife, left the women alone.
 

---***---
 

Matthew and Rhianna lay naked together in bed.  It was early in the morning, and neither had slept much since Rhianna had come home the evening before.

The elders managed to surprise her when they asked her to stay for the debate that followed Shawna's departure.  Rhianna had been determined to stay anyway, but actually being invited caught her off guard.

Paul had been surprised too, but when it became apparent that Rhianna's contribution to the debate was only to be about the law and what the outsiders might do, then he relaxed.

Rhianna was anything but relaxed, and tried to discuss everything.  She managed to last an hour before they finally invited her to leave, so she came home.

Matthew, who had just gotten back himself from the carpentry shop where he spent his days, took one look at her and took her to the baths.  He washed her and gave her a long sensuous rub down, before asking her anything about what had gotten her so tense.  She would only talk in private though, so after grabbing a quick supper from the Great Hall, they went back to their apartment, and Rhianna told all.

Matthew listened to her frustrations and her silences, and helped her mostly by being quiet and letting her vent.  At one point, they made slow, quiet love in their bed, before dozing lightly in each other's arms.

While she slept, Matthew thought about Shawna, and the road ahead of her.

Now they both lay awake, and watched the sky lighten through the skylight in their ceiling.

"Matt," Rhianna said quietly.

"Yes, Pet?"

"Why did you do it?"

"Do what, Pet?"

Rhianna turned slightly in his arms and rested her head on his chest.  Matthew could smell her hair and feel her heartbeat against his side.  It was a warm, comfortable feeling, one he treasured a lot.

"Turn to crime.  Why did you do it?  You know you've never really said anything about it."

"Why did you become a cop?" Matthew asked back.

"You know why.  I told you about my mother!"

"Yes, you're living out the career she couldn't have, the one she gave up to have you and your bothers and sisters.  At least, you used to live it out."

"Be nice," she said, a little hurt.

"I'm always nice.  But was that the real reason?  I doubt it."

Rhianna said nothing.

"You want to know how it started for me," he said after a while.  "Well, it all started because I had never seen the ocean."

"You became a smuggler because you'd never seen the ocean?" Rhianna said, disbelief dripping from her voice.

Under the covers, Matthew spanked her butt.  "Hush, Wife, I'm talking here!"

"Sorry."

Matthew looked down at her.  He was trying to keep it light in an effort to break Rhianna's tension and help her relax.  She had come down a certain amount, but Matthew was striking out at getting her to come down all the way.  He knew the only thing that would end it was when she heard what the elders decided to do.

What Matthew wondered about most was what result Rhianna wanted to hear.  Up until yesterday, he knew Rhianna wanted Shawna gone; but something had changed, and he now had no idea what she wanted.

He decided to continue his story.

"Yes, I had never seen the ocean.  So, there I was, eighteen, with barely anything to my name, working my way toward what I thought of as my Holy Grail.  The coast.

"I ended up in South Florida, and lied my way into getting a job on one of those barefoot cruises.  They wanted a young, experienced sailor, but all they got out of me was the young part.  But I was willing to learn, and convinced the captain that if I wasn't up to his standards after a week, he could make me walk the plank."

"How does this fit in with smuggling...Ow!"

"I said hush.  With all due modesty, I learned the trade well, and began to make money at it.  I saved every penny, and soon bought my own little sail boat, which I used to sail the Keys.  A wonderful place to sail."

"I know, I was stationed there when I was in the Coast Guard.  But I didn't know you knew how to sail!"

"You never asked.  But one day, I met some fellas out there who liked my little boat and came aboard to have a few beers.  In the middle of our conversation, one of them asked if I was going up to Miami, which I was, and asked if I minded taking something up for him.  It was a box of cigars, Cuban cigars.

"I said sure, and found a neat place to hide them because he told me they were a little illegal.  I wasn't going to do it after he told me that, but they convinced me that it was just a hassle getting them through customs, and that there really wasn't anything wrong with it.  After all, what was so bad about a box of cigars?  He also handed me a twenty, so off I went.  Not long after, I just happened to be stopped by a Coast Guard boat for a safety inspection.  It was pure coincidence, but I was sure they knew about that box, and I waited and waited for them to find it.  But they didn't, and when they left, I came down from the biggest rush I'd ever had!

"I delivered that box, and many more after that, and soon made enough money to quit my cruise line job.  Boxes of cigars changed to bigger and more expensive items, and as they grew so did my operation and of course my rush when ever we were close to being caught.

"In the end I was hooked."

Matthew swallowed, his mind replaying those times in his head.

Rhianna shifted so she could look up at him.  "So you did it because you're an excitement junkie?"

"At first, yes," he replied, his eyes looking into the distant past.  "After that, it was just pride, that and the money.  I had built up a good reputation..."

Matthew was suddenly interrupted by the door to their apartment slamming open.  Rhianna let out a short scream and instinctively grabbed for the blankets, pulling them up to cover her chest.

Matthew sat up, startled by the sight of Grady standing in their doorway.

"WHERE IS SHE?" he yelled.  "RHIANNA, WHERE THE HELL DID THEY TAKE HER!"
 
 

End of Part 15.