Hard Candy

by Francesca Baez

  The barrel of a man grunts in the negative, and I should be relieved, but I’ve learned by now that here, things only ever get worse.

  A man a little older and shorter than Alejandro comes over, and even though he doesn’t touch me, I know I’ll be going with him. The two men have a brief exchange in an indigenous dialect I don’t understand, then Alejandro lets me go and walks away without looking back.

  “Are you a virgin?” the new guys asks unblinkingly, and I swallow hard, trying not to show my discomfort. I shake my head. El Sombrerón took care of that shortly after my arrival. They say that’s what he does to all the new girls.

  The man doesn’t acknowledge my answer at all, leading me to where the other women are huddled. Even the ones that aren’t still unconscious look like they’re barely here, glassy eyes unfocused. He gestures for me to sit on a mattress already occupied by a skinny Chicana, curled up and shivering. Her threadbare shirt has rolled up, revealing a faded butterfly tattoo on her hip, and on her lower back, the four bold lines I recognize well. I carefully lower myself onto an open corner. The mystery man crouches next to me, grabbing my arm and stretching it face-up between us. I hadn’t noticed the needle in his hand until now.

  “What are you doing?” I ask, unable to hide my fear. I instinctively try to pull my arm away as he brings the needle closer, but my starved body doesn’t stand a chance against a grown man.

  “No te preocupes,” he mutters, though I don’t find his apathetic tone reassuring. “This will make it better for you.”

  A warm hand on my waist jolts me awake. The space is flooded with bright early afternoon light, and it takes me a couple moments to blink back into reality. Andrews still has his hands on my naked waist, loose and unmoving, but they clench down when I try to thrash free.

  “Are you okay?” he asks, and the way he’s holding me forces me to meet his eyes.

  “Fuck off.” I spit out the words, trying again to pull away, even though I know it’s useless.

  “Were you having a nightmare?”

  I can’t get him in the balls with my ankles tied like this, but I try anyway, and it makes him instinctively release me and take a step back.

  “No more of a nightmare than this is,” I say, gesturing with my chin at him. I don’t care if his so-called concern is genuine or another sick game. He doesn’t get to give a shit about me.

  I blink slowly and take a deep breath, my mind settling slightly. Of course he doesn’t actually care about me. Why the fuck would he? Why would anyone?

  “What were you dreaming about?” he tries again, and I clench my jaw. He doesn’t get to know how much he’s fucked with my mind already, letting loose all the memories I’ve tried so hard to keep buried. “Was it another flashback?”

  “Shut the fuck up and get it over with,” I hiss, pushing back my shoulders as best I can when my arms are tied over my head like this. “Fucking kill me already, pussy.”

  As usual, Andrews gives me no reaction, and I let out a cry of frustration. I hate what he’s doing to me, shaking me open from the inside out. I can’t control my thoughts, my emotions, my bodily cravings. He’s fucking winning, and I can’t stand it.

  He’s circling me now, a thoughtful look on his face. He’s eying my naked body, but I don’t get the feeling that he’s enjoying the show. He’s sizing me up like I’m a problem that needs to be solved, and the answer is on the tip of his tongue.

  “Do you trust me, Miel?” he asks, meeting my gaze again. If I didn’t know better, I’d almost believe the look in his eyes.

  “Fuck no.”

  He nods in acceptance, unsurprised by my answer, but also undeterred. My marrow is vibrating with anticipation, a sickly sweet mix of fear and excitement. I never know what this man is going to do next. And sure enough, he surprises me again, but this time it’s by finally fucking hurting me. His wide palm smacks into my bare ass with a surprising amount of force, my gasp drowned out by the cracking sound echoing through the room. The pain from the first hit hasn’t even registered yet when he strikes again, and I sway in my bindings. He’s hurting me. He’s hitting me. It’s what I’ve been waiting for this whole time, and what I’d almost begun to believe he would spare me. The acceptance that he’s just like all the others sears through me, stinging more than it should, but something still feels off. There’s something about the measured way he’s spanking me, each strike calculated in both placement and force. He’s getting off on my pain, I can see it in his eyes, but I can’t help but think of what he’s said before. He’s giving me this, doing this for me. This punishment is a gift. What the fuck kind of sense does that make?

  “Tell me to stop, Miel,” he says, not quite an order, not quite a challenge. He knows I won’t, I’m too fucking stubborn, but there’s another reason I bite my tongue. Hot pain blooms across my ass cheeks, simple and straightforward, but I’m still curious. I still want to know what happens next.

  I don’t see him bend down behind me, but I feel the cool, feathery brush of his lips on the epicenters of my pain. By all accounts, kiss-it-and-make-it-better never actually works, yet I do feel better. He’s not taking the pain away, not soothing it, but his gentle touch lets a new feeling take root with the pain. Something that makes my exposed nipples pebble even in the Miami heat, and makes every hair on my body stand on end. Something that begins to wake the spot between my legs, the place where he kissed me last night.

  This is the part where I do want to ask him to stop, because it’s too much. My nerve endings are all on fire, my insides are burning white-hot. I know how to handle pain, but this new feeling threatens to overtake me, my body and mind unsure of how to control the unfamiliar sensations.

  As if reading my thoughts, Andrews pulls away, and hits me again with a loud, flat palm. Every muscle in my body jumps, and whatever his mouth just did to me exacerbates the pain tenfold, in a way that zips down my spine and grabs at my core. I gasp, and I feel my pussy clench around nothing. He hits me again, and all I can do is whimper. I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what I need. But somehow Andrews does, taking me to the brink of pain, then pulling me back to the edge of pleasure. I don’t know how long it goes on, but at some point I lose myself in the sensations. I’m outside of my body, not quite feeling anything that’s happening to me, but the separation doesn’t feel the way it usually does. When I pull myself into my safe box, locking in tight and turning the lights off, all I feel is cold nothingness. This feels warm and floaty, the emptiness feels like a comfort rather than a defense. How can this feel good? How can I be sighing in contentment as my captor beats me, how can I be desperate for the next strike instead of afraid of it?

  At some point, Andrews takes me down and carries me to the mattress. I sink into it, my bones liquefied, my limbs completely out of my control. I try to ask what he’s done to me, but my tongue twists and stumbles. I blink, and Andrews is back with a cool damp cloth, soothing my red backside, cleaning the sweat and tears off my face. I blink again, and he’s holding me in his arms, smoothing my hair back, making gentle sounds that I don’t understand but make me feel safe.

  My last thought before I fully black out is that I must finally be dead. This must be what dying feels like, because no part of living has ever tasted so sweet.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Andrews

  I’ve never felt like this before.

  Not the way I felt spanking Miel, making her cry for me, making her squirm. Everything before this, every sub and scene and strike, was all pretend. A hollow fantasy. What we just did was real, raw. Her fear was real, but so was my control. The control I had over her, anyway. Behind the mask, I’ve never felt more unhinged. Completely out of control, with no idea how far I would take things, if I could even stop myself if I tried.

  And I fucking loved it.

  I’ve never been more aroused, especially not from just giving a spanking. As my captive crashes and slips into unconsciousness in my arms, my blood pumps fast and red. All I want
to do is wake her up with my cock in that tight little pussy, but I let her rest. She won’t be having any nightmares, not after this. That beating will keep her well and truly blissed out for the rest of the day.

  I keep holding her until my blue balls threaten mutiny, then gently place her on the mattress. Curled up, naked, and with that euphoric expression on her bare face, she looks nothing like the Miel Conde I chased across state lines, the Miel Conde who handles knives the way most women handle a man’s credit card. Elegant, ruthless, with a glint in her eye. No, the girl sleeping in front of me has been scooped out, scrubbed clean, and polished. This is who Miel Conde could have been, if her childhood hadn’t been marred by darkness. If she had never met El Sombrerón.

  Then again, some people are just born bad.

  I jerk myself off without finesse, quick and to the point. I consider coming on her bare body, but there’s no joy in that, not when she’s not awake to make that little gasping sound she can’t help, to look at me like I’m both the end of her life and the very beginning.

  After I’ve cleaned up, I do the very last thing I should do. I do what the cop in me screams not to, and the man in me begs for.

  I get my phone and take a photo. Two. A dozen. A close-up of her plump lips, slightly parted. The view of her spine serpentining toward her perfect ass. I compile evidence against myself, place myself at the scene, create proof that I’m the last person to see Miel Conde alive. I can’t help myself. I need it. I don’t trust myself to memorize every minute detail, to not forget the way her wild curls fall just so. And I’ll need to remember. Now that I’ve had her, nothing and no one else will do.

  I want to keep her.

  The thought is so unexpected I almost physically startle. The whats, hows, and whens have been rethought a million times, but the end result has always been the same: Miel Conde has to die.

  I can’t let a sadist like her run loose, wreaking havoc and carving into men up and down the coast. I can’t be hiding, awaiting her retribution for my actions against her, then beginning the chase all over again. She’s a loose end, a liability. Collateral damage. We learned our lesson last time we crossed paths. This time, only one of us can walk away.

  There are a million reasons why I can’t, shouldn’t, but the thought still haunts my mind until she finally wakes.

  I want to fucking keep her.

  We drink cold soup right out of the can for dinner, and I let her finish cleaning herself up. When she’s done, I surprise us both by leading her back to the mattress instead of toward her usual spot at the center of the room. I check that the knots at her wrists and ankles are secure, then turn off the lamp.

  I don’t remember falling asleep, but I wake up gasping for breath, Miel’s toned arm around my throat.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Miel

  I feel the exact moment Andrews wakes up. Feel his breath pull harder in my grip. I close in harder, faster, but with the awkward position forced by my bound wrists, it’s no use. It’s only a matter of seconds until he’s yanked me off himself and thrown me back onto the mattress, pinning me down with a big hand across my stomach. I could keep fighting, but I already made one stupid attempt against him today. I’m not going to waste my time further embarrassing myself.

  We stare at each other for a moment, both breathing heavily. There’s not a hint of sleep left in his eyes, narrowed and drilling into me with renewed rage. A sour blend of hope and fear churns in my belly. Maybe he’ll finally kill me.

  Maybe he’ll finally kill me.

  Instead, he jerks me up by my hair, thick curls fisted in one hand. I swallow back the yelp of surprised pain, and let him lead me back toward the center of the room. Back where I belong. He ties my wrists higher and tighter, making every motion as rough as possible. I twist helplessly as he stares at me venomously, no doubt deciding how he’ll punish me.

  I almost wish he would hit me again.

  It’s an insane thought, but the dark edge in his eyes makes that spot between my legs curl back to life. He wasn’t pissed when he hit me before, and it gave me a brand-new kind of peace. What would happen if he beat me while he was this angry?

  And why the fuck am I thinking about this shit instead of worrying about my own survival, or at least shutting myself down in preparation for what’s coming?

  Because I don’t want to miss a fucking moment.

  Andrews stomps away and comes back with a smaller length of rope, which he wraps around my throat with a little less casual confidence than he usually has with bindings. He’s never done this before.

  The rope pulls taut, and I realize what’s happening, what I should have known from the start instead of anticipating some deranged pleasure. He is going to kill me.

  An eye for an eye. He’s going to finish what I started and strangle me to death.

  He doesn’t look away, lets me see it in his eyes. They’re on fire, blazing with an uncontrolled hunger that I’ve never seen on him before. I cracked him, in that basement last year, and tonight I finally broke him. There’s nothing left of the detective with a perfect record, always coloring inside the lines even when he hated it. There’s nothing left of the man worried about upsetting his mother, the man who wasn’t capable of torturing me the way I did him. I took a perfectly average man and turned him into a monster, a murderer. Like me. I should be satisfied to die knowing that my death will irrevocably make him his own worst nightmare, but something pinches in my heart. Everything I touch, I stain with blood and ash. I never asked to be this way, but neither did Andrews, and I broke him anyway.

  He was right about me all along. This is what I deserve.

  The rope pulls tight, and darkness begins to fill my eyeline, bubbling over Andrews’s perfect features. I don’t want to, but my body begins to fight anyway, uselessly thrashing and shaking. My hands ache to grab at the rope around my throat; my lungs rattle the bars of their cage.

  Then he releases, and my whole body sags, gasping for air. It hurts, almost, the sharp return to life. For a moment, I think he’s changed his mind, pussied out again, but when my eyes clear, his expression hasn’t lost an ounce of intent. Whatever he’s doing, this was his plan all along.

  Keeping his left hand at my throat, Andrews spits into his right palm, and guides it between my legs. My frayed nerves go back into overdrive. There’s no question about it; this time, he won’t be gentle. I brace myself, and for the first time, his touch hits me just the same as everyone else’s. His fingers rub against me roughly, shoving into me without restraint. I wait for the flashback, but there’s already so much adrenaline pouring through me, my body can’t produce anymore. Even my broken brain realizes it doesn’t need to remind me of former nightmares. I’m already inside one.

  His left hand tugs at the rope around my neck a little, and that seems to steady him a bit. His touch is still rough and frenetic, but it finds its rhythm, pulls back into a darker version of how he’s touched me before. He works my sensitive nub with natural talent, and where yesterday his actions produced a prolonged, slow-building pleasure, this jerks me right to the edge of a cliff I’ve never been to before. The sensation pulses like a living thing inside me, begging to be pushed forward, begging to explode. Whatever this ecstasy is, it’s a bomb, painfully ignited but not yet detonated. If Andrews doesn’t take me all the way, and soon, I’ll fucking die.

  Always knowing exactly what I need, my captor instantly denies me. He pulls his magical fingers away and everything inside me collapses. My instinct is to beg him, but I don’t know what for. I never know what this man is doing to me.

  “You want to be punished, don’t you, you filthy whore?” he growls, and I couldn’t look him in the eyes if I tried. His degrading words should humiliate me, and they do, but somehow the dirty feeling only exacerbates the combustion building inside me. I hate this man, I fucking hate him more than anyone else who’s ever hurt me. I open my mouth to tell him that, but he’s tightening the noose around my neck again. My body is a
lready operating on overdrive, all my systems fighting each other for control. It makes my brain short-circuit, or maybe that’s just the loss of oxygen. I swear I black out for a moment, and when I come back to reality, there’s not a second of reprieve. I can draw frantic breaths, but his hand is back between my legs, building all that tension back up again. He repeats this on what feels like an infinite loop, until I really, truly can’t take anymore. My body is spread thin as paper, pushed to its limits in every way, but never fully over. Somehow, that’s the worst part.

  Andrews releases me from the ceiling, and I collapse into a puddle on the floor. He warns me not to touch myself, but I can’t move so much as a finger. I’ve been used, wrung out, drained dry. There’s nothing left of me but my explosive heartbeat and the desperate throbbing between my legs.

  Andrews kneels down beside me, grabbing my chin, forcing me to look at him. I couldn’t do that on my own even if I wanted to.

  “Don’t fuck with me, woman,” he says, and though he’s sated now, back in control, he’s every bit as dangerous. “Just because I won’t kill you doesn’t mean I can’t try.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Andrews

  I should have killed Miel Conde the first day I saw her at Hard Candy. I should have taken a shot from a distance, outside of her poisonous pull. Hired a hitman to do the job for me. Left her here to starve that first night. There are so many ways I could have gotten the job done, but now it’s too late.

  There’s no way I can kill her now. Not because I hate her any less, or find her forgivable, redeemable in any way. She just tried to kill me, for fuck’s sake. I still want her to suffer. That’s the problem. I don’t ever want to stop punishing her. How the hell do I do that? I can’t just keep a captive for the rest of my life. But I also know I can’t handle losing her, not by freeing her, not by killing her. I’m addicted to her tears, her screams, her big eyes that always stubbornly beg for more. I couldn’t survive a detox.