EDITOR'S NOTE: Names in the following story have been changed to protect the identities of the victims.

She was 16 when she had her hand branded with a lighter -- marked with an A to show she was Ace Crew property.

Today, in her mid 30s, she lives with one of her convicted tormentors from the night when she was kidnapped and the unspeakable done to her.

There are more questions than answers, and no shortage of heartbreaking details, at least about the earl life of Sylvain Leduc's cousin, Heather.

As a teen, she was expected to do the gang's bidding. She was given a pager, so the gang members could know where she was at all times.

She slept with at least one of them, sold drugs for them and was forced to hand over the profits.

It's just the way life evolved as the property of Ace Crew.

But at some point, Heather decided that she'd had enough.

She learned the drugs she was selling for the gang were of inferior quality to the rest of the stuff on the street. So she went into business for herself, and started selling.

She wanted out, but Ace Crew gang members had other ideas.

She changed her number and hoped she could cut all ties.

Like her other cousin, Marcia, she moved in with Leduc, his brother and their mother, Carole Maheux, hoping to hide from the gang's reach.

But in short order, the gang located her and the intimidation and threats began.

She was told if she really wanted her freedom, she would have to have her branded hand chopped off.

"At first I was kind of mad," Heather testified during the trial. "But then I figured if that's what it took, name the time and place."

Three times with the threat of a forced amputation hanging over her, she showed up to meet them.

At the first meeting, no one showed.

The second meeting was at the Concorde Motel, but they only ended up driving to a Montreal Rd. cemetery where the boy and several other gang members sat smoking pot in a car.

Then, on Oct. 25, 1995, she was told to meet at a convenience store. Again - no one showed.

Frustrated, she went back and spoke to her cousins about the problem. Sylvain told her she had two choices: Phone the cops or let him handle it.

Heather made a weak attempt at involving the police but wouldn't reveal any of the gang members' names.

The officer said without names there was nothing he could do.

"I told him if he found me in a ditch he'd know who I was," she told the court.

It was that same day the chain of events leading to Sylvain's death began.

Her cousin, Marcia, was picked up that night. After midnight she, Sylvain and his buddy, Derick, were nabbed from the house, and also brought to the Banner Rd. apartment.

She was forced onto the floor, right next to Sylvain - heard his screams, his fears - as they literally beat him to death.

She feared death, believed she would die, wondered if she was actually dying.

Her assailants took out a curling iron, with a maximum temperature of 459 degrees Farenheit.

They put it to the middle of her back.

At first she thought it was a cigarette.

Then she was flipped on her back, and the curling iron was placed on her left leg -- behind her ankle and knee.

Next it was her right thigh.

Then, for seconds, it was inside her.

She screamed and arched her back off the floor.

"I was shaking like I was having a seizure or something," she said.

"They took it out and I fell down. I was turned on my stomach and I blacked out."

Unimaginable.

Dr. John Spence told the jury that he had never seen such burns in his 30-year career.

He described the weeping, blistering and peeling wounds, and the painful medical procedures he had to use to treat them.

While in the hospital, someone tried to break into her room. Like her cousin Marcia, she was placed in the witness protection program.

"I sometimes wonder when they will come for me, who will come for me (and) how long do I have to go on," Heather wrote in a victim-impact statement.

"My life is filled with fear," she added. "I fear for my safety and my baby's safety."

During the trial for the young offenders, Heather was pregnant when she was testifying.

In an epilogue that makes no more sense than the tragedy she went through, Heather has been living with one of the convicted Ace Crew young offenders for years now -- in fact -- has a family with him.

It's something no one can understand, least of all her cousin Marcia who was also kidnapped that same night.

Attempts to reach her by the Sun were unsucessful. Reached by phone, a man identifying himself as her brother said she didn't want to talk.

"I blame her right now for what she's doing. She was young then, I don't know, she was scared, I mean, to get her arm chopped off. What the hell is she doing now?" Marcia questioned in her first interview since the horrors of 20 years ago.

"I don't know what is going through her mind ... I did run into her once, she tried to pass her number on. I wondered, 'Are you crazy?'"