“You do not get to say his name. You do not know him, though you did once.” He was crouching in front of me now, his hand stroking my matted hair back from my face, which was bleeding from the impact of the studded whip. It is only because of my master’s diligent care I do not have a permanent scar, for only that I am grateful. “You are him, dog, do you see? You are Yuri…or you were. Now you are nothing more than bitch and plaything to any and all. On my command. All because of me.”
He stood and I reached a hand out to a picture of this young man who was supposed to have been me, a picture of me and our papa. Before my hand could touch it, he put his heavy booted foot down on it hard, so that I felt the bones cracking. Then, on that hard and stony ground, he stood on my hand, effectively, crushing it beneath his weight. The rest of that night passed in a haze of pain and terror. Never before had I taken such a beating, but I would take several from him after. Military denied his promotion? He would blame me, at least in part. Some disagreement with you Ivan, or with papa, he would blame me. Sometimes I think he just did it because he enjoyed it, because he liked the feeling of power. Because it secretly excited him in a way he would never admit.
When the sun was coming up the next morning, my master returned and was shocked by what he saw, as I’m sure I would have been. There wasn’t an inch of skin that wasn’t bloody or bruised, not on my body or my face.
“Sir…I…he has fight in two days…let me call it off, sir.” I heard my master say, though I was exhausted and only barely conscious. I felt the hands of the attendants on me, but I could not even manage to growl at them when they caused me more pain, though they were trying to help me rise, help me to move to my enclosure.
“Stop.” I heard my owner say, and the men’s hands immediately fell away. “There will be no more of this coddling you show him. No attendants, no warm baths, no hot mash after fights or matings. No more matings unless I sanction them, but also no more relief given by any male. Only females should be allowed to relieve him, if I allow it at all. Do not worry, he can still be sold out, but buyers should be cautioned they are not to give him any pleasure in matter.”
“But…sir…he will go mad…I will not be able to control him…” I heard my master argue, as I lay in my own bloody mud on the hard ground, not daring to even breathe more than just enough to stay conscious and alert. “What of his face, sir? I need to at least do some doctoring on it…and what of fight in two days?”
“He will fight, as scheduled. There is nothing wrong with him to prevent it.” My owner, who we now know was Dmitri, said tonelessly. “I will be present. I will expect victory. If he fails to win, it will be you who wears collar next.”
“Da, sir.” My master said, and then I heard my owner leaving, his heavy boots, a sound I had come to fear and recognize, but then, he stopped and returned.
“And another thing, get him out of that cushy cell you keep him in. Old cistern will suit him, just chain him to wall and give him something to crawl under when rain or snow comes.” That order, I thought, would be the death of me. Now he was departing, though I could not see him, my face had swollen so that I was effectively blind, and my master stood by me until a vehicle passed by, speeding out of the camp. Once he was gone, the attendants immediately helped me move back to my cell, but it was only a brief move, just long enough for my master to secure a place I might be tied out in the old cistern you found me in.
And that is the story of what happened the night I learned the depths of the hatred Dmitri felt for me, and as I lay in the cold in my cistern, my wounds and bruises and broken bones throbbing with each beat of my heart, something in me died. I may have lived on, after that night, but it was not me. I let the animal in me come to the forefront and, to be honest, I have little memory of the rest of my time there until you came, Ivan.
While I do remember Dmitri being there, mainly because his visits brought extended periods of extreme cruelty, I remember very little about his words after that initial visit. I had given myself up to death, I knew I was destined to die in that place, and had you not come for me, I don’t believe it would have been much longer. I had lost so much weight I was losing the ability to fight effectively in the pits, so much so I had nearly died in a fight just days before you arrived. My next fight was to have been the following afternoon; and that probably would have been the end of me. I welcomed it, death, as would any of you, including you, Ivan, had you been through what I had.
Chapter 23
The four sat quietly on the bed, but both Yuri and Rosa could feel Ivan quivering, and Yuri, who was more in touch with his own feral side, could smell the rage emanating from his very pores. “I…am going to kill him.” He managed to snarl out, between clenched teeth. Crimson was showing through the bandage on his badly-bitten hand, where he had most likely torn the stitches as his hand was clenched into a tight fist.
“No, you’re going to stay here until…” Rosa started but Ivan cut her off.
“Nyet!” He bellowed, making all of them jump, Rosa fell off the bed but bounded up on her feet at once, backing away from him as he rose, not caring that he was barely dressed. “I have had enough of running, enough of lies, enough of…everything. I am going to finish this. I will call him, I will summon him somewhere away from people and I will finish this thing between us. That is only way any of us will ever be safe.”
“Ivan…” Yuri started, hesitantly, recoiling slightly against the comforting warmth of Aleksei, who was now sitting behind him when Ivan turned to him, almost angrily. “I know your thirst for revenge—if any of us does, I do. But Ivan…you are not well yet. Let your wound heal and then let us go and find him together. I want to end this by your side, I don’t want to send you alone to fight my battles.”
“But, you do not know…I have not told you,” Ivan said, sitting back down and permitting Rosa to look at his hand. “He is not after you, for moment, he is after me. He is angry because I keep pulling one over on him at every turn and then teasing him about it. I had not realized, of course, how deep this went or I would have killed him when I had chance.”
Chapter 24
Crystal hurried up the stairs of her reasonably upscale apartment building, her mind on the evening’s activities with friends and then her goodnight call to Daniel. That’s all she tried to think about these days, since Daniel had moved, she had been told, to California. She hoped to visit him one day, and he said it might be possible when they were more settled in, but for now there were still renovations to do on their new home and the like. Never once did she ever imagine his story to be untrue, but of course, it was as untrue as a story could be, no matter how much he had disliked telling the untruth, it had been necessary both for them and for Crystal.
She knew something was wrong the moment she opened the door and stepped into the small entryway. The light was out, a light she never turned off, not even during daylight hours. At first, she thought, one of her friends might have done it when they left during the day, but then shook that thought at once. If they’d never done it before, they weren’t likely to start. Tossing her keys down on the table by the door, visible from the lights in the hallway, she sighed. After she closed the door she slid her hand across the smooth, painted surface of the wall, feeling for the light switch she knew was there. When she found it, she froze, because there was another hand, an enormous, rough hand, on it, and for an instant paused, shocked. Giving a frightened squeak, she withdrew her hand and reached again for the door, but a second hand caught her around the throat and lifted her, pinning her against the very means of her escape, blocking it.
“You are person who was dating my brother?” He asked, in the complete darkness, his voice was deep and his accent familiar from all the time she had spent talking to Daniel’s giant of a brother. She’d been fascinated with him, as she was fascinated with all Russian culture, but this somehow didn’t fit into her view of the blonde haired man she’d known.
“Kirill?! What the hell are you doing? Put me d
own!” She manage to choke out, despite the pressure on her throat. He only squeezed tighter, silencing her other than the raspy sound of her attempting to draw breaths around his hand.
“Ha, that is his middle name, real name is Ivan. Or rather, name he goes by. You just answered my question, spassibo.” He said and then released her neck and allowed her to drop back to her feet only to scoop her up over his shoulder. “Let us go have talk about my brothers, shall we?”
“No, I’d rather not. Just…put me down. I don’t even know who you are.” Crystal tried to struggle but he brought his hand painfully down on her thigh which was, other than the nylons she wore for work, bare, thanks to the skirt she had also worn having ridden up slightly. He did not place her on the couch, rather, he sat her heavily on a wooden chair. Just how he could see it she had no clue because the lights were out and since the sun had gone down now, it was completely dark in her den-slash-dining room. When her butt hit the chair she knew it was one of the chairs from the dining room set, but that was all she could discern. That and the positive reek of alcohol on him, and body odor. He smelled as if he’d not seen a shower in a very long time.
“Has been two weeks, in fact.” He commented and she cocked her head to one side. “Since I had shower. You were sniffing me. And if I am little bit drunk, well, I am Russian. What do you expect?”
He was working behind her with something and she was shivering, “Did…did you turn my heat off?”
“Nyet, I had to break bedroom window to get in; this building is quite secure. Do not worry, will not matter soon. I am going to keep you plenty warm.” He said and she felt something close around her left wrist. If only she could see she’d run! But in the dark, she couldn’t tell one direction from the other, she wasn’t even sure which way she was facing at this point. When her hands were bound, he covered her nose roughly with his hand, forcing her to breathe through her mouth. Though she resisted, it was inevitable that she took a gasp, and he slipped a gag between her perfect teeth.
This was not the kind of gag a kidnapper used in the movies, no, he had the real thing, a bit-gag with leather straps he buckled so tightly behind her head it made her mouth ache. Crystal whimpered. If only he would at least have let her have a pee, something, anything so she could text Daniel and warn him that some madman claiming to be his brother had her captive. “Now, pretty one, if you will excuse me, I am going to see about shower. Just…hang out here.” Chuckling at his sick jest, she heard his heavy feet thumping up the stairs to her bedroom loft and private bathroom.
He’d been so smooth at tying her up, she hadn’t felt the cuffs close around her ankles, but when she tried to stand up she quickly became aware of them and sat back down, dismally. In her purse, she heard her cell-phone ringing and recognized the ringtone as the one she had set for one of her friends at the Warehouse, as they now called their private hang out. She hoped and prayed no one came over, because this man seemed as likely to hurt any of Daniel’s friends as he was to hurt her. She also knew he would end up raping her, that was almost a foregone conclusion, but she was willing to endure it if it meant he would leave her, and Daniel, alone.
Upstairs, she could hear him rummaging about, probably going through her things, and the sound of the shower running. Music, louder than the building code allowed, cranked up and she knew the reason behind it. To block out her screaming. Suddenly, she had to do a lot more than pee, she wanted to vomit. Closing her eyes, she tried to send her thoughts in Daniel’s direction, then a better thought occurred and the switched to Kirill’s direction. He was the biggest man she’d ever seen, what were the chances he was in Chicago at this very moment? Slim, she knew, but it helped her stay calm and focused on anything but her assailant and the torment she was about to endure.
The shower turned off and the bathroom light went out, plunging the room back into darkness, and her eyes jerked open, swiveling about in fear. When he touched her, she jumped, she hadn’t even heard him come back down the stairs; apparently he moved very softly when he wasn’t wearing his boots. This made her wonder just how big he was, and she was about to find out because the lamp by her sofa clicked on and she found herself face to face with a one-eyed giant with long salt-and-peppered dark red hair. She could see only a slight resemblance, though this man looked old enough to be Daniel’s father, so clearly there was either some separation in age or the man had lived a hard life.
“Now, since you are unable to speak, I think we will agree you can blink once for ‘nyet’ and twice for ‘da’. Nod if you are understanding.” He said, and then reclined, revealing a riding crop with metal studs on it that was hanging from his belt. Not even wanting to imagine what that thing felt like, Crystal nodded, and he smiled slightly. “You know what? I am thirsty. Do you have any thing I might drink?” Two blinks. “With alcohol?” Two blinks. “Spassibo.” He went into the kitchen and she heard him, once again, rummaging around.
When he returned she saw that he had found her liquor cabinet. Not much of a drinker herself, she knew that some of her friends were and so, she kept it fully stocked. In particular, what she noticed, was the bottle of illegally imported vodka Daniel had given her. Winter-wheat, she believed it was, and she knew it was very expensive. He cracked the top and drank straight from the bottle. “That is good vodka. Where did woman like you come across such good quality drink? Did, perhaps, boyfriend give this to you?” Two blinks. “Da, I thought as much; I expect they kept one in fridge for no real reason, da?” Again, she blinked twice. “Now, to get down to meat and potatoes. I want to know if you are really woman.”
Crystal stared at him in utter disbelief for so long, he fidgeted and stroked the whip on his belt almost lovingly. She considered saying no, but then if he checked and found out different it was likely he’d make her suffer more. Unwillingly, she blinked twice. “I cannot understand this, because brother is gay. He has mated women in past, but he was forced to do it for purposes of getting good fighting stock to train and sell, though unfortunately he is unable, same as Ivan. Does he fuck you willingly?” Crystal blinked, then felt her cheeks reddening with embarrassment.
He slid off the couch on his knees in front of her and she tensed as his hand went right up her skirt, not just checking to see if she was lying, but actually slipping into her. Since she was terrified out of her wits, she was anything but aroused, so even the tip of his large index finger made her wince with pain. He withdrew it, looked pleased and sat back down, taking care to suck the finger, just to humiliate her more, as he kept his bloodshot brown eye locked on her emerald green eyes.
An inadvertent downward glance told her two things she didn’t really want to know. The first was that he was enjoying this way too much and the second was that he was far, far superior in size to Daniel, who had been her only lover. Ever. So this, she knew, was going to be extremely unpleasant. Taking a deep breath, she looked back up and saw the knowing grin on his face, then wished she could slap it off of him. Smug bastard!
Chapter 25
In Italy, Ivan was sitting with Aleksei, discussing their next move. Rosa was out doing some sightseeing with Yuri who hadn’t wanted to go, really, but she had kowtowed him into it on Ivan’s orders. He needed to have this discussion with Aleksei without either of them present, not just Yuri, but he wasn’t about to tell her that. “There is nowhere here we can hide, I saw news story about dog attack late last night.”
Aleksei groaned and sat his teacup on its saucer, gently. “Where are you thinking this time?”
“Cape Town.”
“You mean as in Cape Town, South Africa?”
“That would be it.” Ivan smiled slightly, then sobered and continued. “I have friends there, from back in my…not so savory days. We can even head out into grasslands with some tribe-people if it becomes necessary; I rescued man from diamond-slave camp and we have stayed in touch over years since. He will give us sanctuary.”
“Sometimes, Ivan, I think I would like to write a book about your life, bu
t then I realize there is too much there for just one book. I could be even wealthier selling a series of books about you. Just you.”
Ivan chuckled genuinely at this, “Nyet, statute of limitations is not up. Cannot have written record of my crimes. Perhaps when I am dead and gone I will leave it all behind somewhere, you know, confess on my deathbed.” He shook his head then and stood. “Nyet, I will not die old man in my bed, Aleksei, you can be assured of that. Sooner or later, things I have done in past will find me and no one will be able to save me. Not even me.”
“So,” Aleksei changed the subject; he was never comfortable discussing Ivan’s death. He had a feeling whatever came for Ivan would take down anyone close to him, too. “Are you going to break the news to them or am I?” He asked as he heard Yuri and Rosa come in, laughing about something. Ivan moved in their direction, then glanced back.
“Tonight, at dinner. We will bring it up.” He whispered, then let out a soft ‘oof’ as Rosa threw herself into him, laughing all the harder for having actually collided with him accidentally. She passed it off rather unsuccessfully as a hug, then stood on her toes as he bent and kissed her, his strong arms around her middle, lifting her feet off the floor slightly before setting her back down. “I take it you and Yuri had fun?”
Yuri was standing behind Aleksei, clearly either biting or kissing the other side of his neck, but when he realized Ivan had asked a question, he stopped immediately. “Had fun? She’s more of a troublemaker than you are! She…I’ve never…she actually embarrassed me!”
“Nothing illegal!” She blurted out at Ivan’s stern glance. “I promise! Just a little fun is all, not even really in public, but it was so funny…I’ll have to tell you when I’ve had a shower and a change. It’s really hot out today.”
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