by SR Jones
K asked her what car she wanted when we arrived here, and she shrugged and said something old and good on rough terrain as she wanted to use it to go to the beach with Gulliver and swim. K bought her an old Land Rover.
At the time, I asked him if he didn’t want to get her something a bit more expensive. He’d grinned at me and said no, Cassie wouldn’t like that.
I climb in the back and Andrius hands me something. It’s a cloth, which I press to my nose. I pull it away, and it’s soaked in blood. Fucking hell.
Cassie pulls out of the drive smoothly. I glance at K up front and notice him open the glove compartment and take out a gun. Cassie shoots him an annoyed glance.
“I hate having that thing in my car.”
“Baby, it might be needed one day.”
She sighs. “It’s not as if I’m allowed anywhere on my own at the moment, is it? So, why do I need it?”
“In case, okay? Humor me.”
“I always humor you,” she shoots back.
He leans over and kisses her cheek as if she’s just said something nice instead of arguing with him. “Yes, you do.”
She purses her lips as she glances at him again, but there’s a smile there, playing over her full mouth.
For a blinding moment, I imagine Dasha smiling at me that way. Her features are different thana Cassie’s. Dasha is delicate. Tiny nose, big blue eyes, small mouth. She is petite, but graceful. Pale skin and red hair give her an ethereal appearance. She might have looked delicate, but she was tough, deep down where it matters.
Life in Russia, in the endless slums outside of St. Petersburg, made you that way. You either got tough, or you went under.
Andrius takes hold of my chin and angles my face, looking at my nose. I jerk my head out of his hands. “What? You want to kiss me?” I speak in English because K hates it if we talk in Russian around Cassie. Says it’s rude. The girl is learning our language, though. She listens to a tape every night and tries to say the words. Often, she mangles the pronunciation, but if she keeps it up, she might be able to follow what we’re saying.
“Well, you’re pretty enough,” he replies in English with a smirk. He makes a mock sad face and adds. “Now, though, K has made you ugly like us. You will look like a man now, not the pretty boy.”
“Maybe my nose will mend the way yours did, and I’ll be lucky.” I shrug.
“My nose was broken, yes, but yours is splat.”
“Fuck off,” I grouse. “Stop saying splat.”
We pull up outside the private hospital in Corfu Town, and I’m grateful as fuck. My nose is throbbing with a tenacity that makes me want to cut the damn appendage off.
We enter the clinic, and a nurse swoops down on us immediately.
“I seem to spend a disproportionate amount of time in hospitals,” K grumbles.
“Because you spend a disproportionate amount of time doing dangerous things,” Cassie replies smartly.
“We were playing a casual game of sport.” Andrius shakes his head at her as if she’s talking total nonsense.
“No, you were playing rugby, which is a dangerous sport. You’re adrenaline junkies, the lot of you.”
“I’m not,” I say. “I would love a quiet life. A plot of land, maybe olive trees, some chickens.”
“Did you hurt your head?” Andrius taps my head with his fist.
I jerk out of his way. “It’s true. One day I would like the quiet life.”
“Good for you, Bohdan,” Cassie says sincerely as K smiles at her.
A lady at reception with a friendly face asks me for my details and hands Cassie a clipboard, which she passes over to me.
“Do you have insurance?” the lady asks.
I nod.
“I’ll be covering this,” K says and gets out a credit card made of actual palladium and gold. I know this fact because he told me one night when he was drunk. Flashed it in front of my face. Now, he’s using it to pay for my nose.
“You don’t have to do that,” I protest.
“I fucking broke it,” he growls. “I’ll pay for it.”
A doctor has appeared at our table as we talk, and she smiles at me and winces. “Looks like you need some painkillers, an x-ray, and probably a scan to be safe.”
“Just be sure to make him as pretty as he was before,” K jokes. “I don’t want to be responsible for ruining his beauty.”
The doctor gives K another smile, and motions for me to follow her.
After a whole ton of tests and a consultation, the doctor tells me I can either have surgery now or at a later date. I won’t have trouble breathing once the swelling goes down, so the surgery is purely for cosmetic reasons. I tell her I’ll think about it and let her know in the morning whether to book me in immediately. She told me the sooner I have it done, the better the cosmetic results can be. Thankfully, my nose is not a splat like Andrius said, that fucker. It is, however, going to look slightly bumpy if I don’t have surgery.
We head home a few hours later, me doped up on the good stuff. I’m staying in the spare house with K and Cassie. Reece is staying with Andrius and Violet, although he’s in the UK right now. When we arrive, Violet comes to greet us and looks at my face, her eyes filled with concern.
“Does it hurt?” she asks.
“Yeah, it hurts. An elephantine lump of muscle plowed into me and took me to the floor.” I shoot K an annoyed glare.
“Poor baby,” Justina comes out of the living room and smiles at me. “You need a drink.”
“Yes, I do.”
“You’re on drugs,” Cassie says.
I laugh at that and then wince as the pain hits me hard. “I’ve mixed a lot worse than alcohol and whatever this shit is.”
Justina pours a large glass of brandy and hands it to me.
“If you lovely folk don’t mind, I’m going to bed. I’m tired.”
I bid them all good night and hike up the stairs to the spare room I’m staying in.
Despite the mild chill in the air, I open the windows. I like to hear the birds, wildlife and ocean down below. The sounds out here are beautiful, unlike those in the city.
Sipping at my brandy, I open my laptop and turn it on. Time to check on Dasha.
My little ballerina is being spied on. By me.
Thanks to Damen, I’ve had top-notch spy equipment installed in the house she shares with her husband, the disgusting Jasper.
The man is weird as fuck. I knew the instant I saw him backstage with Dasha after the opera that something was wrong. Then I dug into their lives, or rather Damen did and gave me the information. It seems Jasper is a Svengali-type figure to singers and dancers in the Parisian arts scene. He’s molded many of their careers, but one dancer under his guidance died, which caused a scandal. It seemed to go away, though, the way so many of these things do.
Damen’s men fitted cameras and bugs when Dasha and Jasper were out, and I’ve been listening to their life and watching since.
I was shocked as shit when I witnessed Jasper drag Dasha over hard, cold stone by her hair and have been waiting to see if he does anything else, but so far, it’s been mundane these past few days. I’ve asked Damen to hurry along getting me out there, and he says he’s working on it. I imagine her face when she sees me. When she realizes that I’m going to be deep in her life. I smile, and it holds a vicious edge of satisfaction.
Leaving the laptop, I head into the bathroom to check my face.
My nose now has a slight bend to it. It’s also much thicker in the middle with swelling. If I don’t get it fixed, it will mar my appearance for good.
I lean in closer and look at myself. Blue eyes, wavy blond hair, lighter around my face from being in the sun, and full lips. My nose used to recede into the background, the least prominent feature on my face. Now, it is more prominent. I’m still handsome, but I look more masculine. I’m not so pretty. I ought to cut my hair too, take the lighter notes out and wear it shorter. It will fit the role I’ll be playing for Jasper and D
asha more than the wavy mess I have now.
I pull my hair from face and stare. That’s better. My face matches my insides more this way. I smile, a slow, satisfied smile.
Fuck it, I might leave my nose the way it is.
I’m still good looking, but now I’ve lost that angelic innocence my face held, which I always hated. Now I don’t look like the boy who had men grabbing at him. Instead, I look like a man who would fight anyone who dared to threaten him … which is exactly who I am.
I like the new me, I decide.
Maybe that clumsy oaf K did me a favor.
Chapter Two
Dasha
“So, you see, this endorsement will mean millions for you in the long run.” The man sitting opposite me is short, rotund, and sweating profusely. It’s hot today, and he clearly doesn’t handle the heat well.
We have air conditioning, but Jasper being the person he is, always turns it off for business meetings. He says it pays to make people sweat.
“I don’t want it to damage my image, though,” I reply.
Jasper shoots me an annoyed glance. He wants me to do this. Of course, he does. It’s more money for him.
“Darling, I don’t see how endorsing running shoes will harm your image.” He shakes his head at our guest as if I’m a silly little thing.
“Most people who endorse running shoes are star athletes or singers. They don’t come from the classical world.” I shrug. “It might be too fashion forward, don’t you think? A bit too street style for a supposed doyenne of the arts scene.”
“Oh no,” Monsieur Bernard, our guest, says. He leans forward with a sparkle in his faded blue gaze. “The campaign we have planned will be all about you as a dancer. It won’t only be the running shoes you’ll endorse, but our bags too. They’re practical but stylish. Comfortable, but fashionable. The running shoes we are going to advertise as like clouds for your feet. Who better to wear them than a ballerina? Your feet are your livelihood; damage them and you lose it all. You are entrusting your precious assets to our shoes; it’s a great endorsement.”
His words make me flinch.
A memory floods back, unbidden and unwelcome.
Last year, on the hopes of getting out of this hellish marriage, I’d dared to defy Jasper. He tied me up in the kitchen and took a hammer to the pinkie on my left hand. Told me if I dared do the same thing ever again, it would be my feet he’d smash to bits. I believed him. I still do. My bent finger serves as a constant reminder.
“The campaign will feature you wearing our shoes en pointe and then in other poses with the shoes and bags. It’s saying, they’re so comfortable and stylish even a ballerina can wear them to dance in.”
I hate it. I hate the idea of me posing with bags hanging off my arm like a coat stand, but I can see Jasper loves it, and if he loves it, I’m doing it.
“It sounds wonderful,” I lie. “Gentlemen, would you excuse me? I have a headache and need to lie down. Jasper sorts my financial affairs out anyway; don’t you, darling?” I send him a sugary sweet smile and wish it was poisoned darts instead.
He smiles back at me, all sincere and warm. If he wasn’t my manager, my husband, and my abuser, he’d have made a great actor.
Leaving the men talking, I head upstairs. I hate him, I think to myself. Hate. Hate. Hate.
I spend hours wishing him dead. I’ve even thought about killing him with poisoned mushrooms or something else as farfetched. Of course, I could simply leave with only the clothes on my back. Steal away like a thief in the night. I tried that once though too, and when he found me, he made me pay twice over. Plus, Mother lives a few doors down, and what would happen to her?
All I live for now is dance. It’s my life. Dancing on the stage, with the music coursing through me, I feel free. I couldn’t bear to lose that. It’s all I’ve cared about for years.
I used to care for a boy. A boy with blue eyes, full lips, and a face that made me want to cry because it was so sad and so beautiful at the same time. I saw that boy again. Only weeks ago, and ever since my equilibrium has been shattered. It’s funny what we can deal with. What we can grow used to.
My abuse is something I put up with these days like most people weather the normal trials of life. Seeing Bohdan, though, threw me for a loop. I’ve been anxious and jittery ever since.
What was he doing there? And the look he gave me as he stared at me, mere feet away in the narrow backstage corridor. That look said a lot. Trouble is, I don’t know what it said.
I don’t speak Bohdan anymore.
I used to know all his looks, all his expressions and nuances.
No more. He tore all that apart when he betrayed me. The day I saw him at a party, some older woman sucking his cock like her life depended on it, destroyed me. I’d loved him so much. So purely. And he went and dirtied it all up.
He’d lied to me. Told me he wanted us to wait until I was eighteen, and he was happy to do so, but he’d been sleeping around behind my back.
Worse, he’d made a laughingstock of me. I never had the chance to talk to him about it because two days later I was sent away when my mother heard the gossip about the whole affair and realized I was “sleeping with a Bratva thug” as she put it.
In some ways I ought to thank Bohdan because my mother sent me to family in London and followed herself mere days later. They were wonderful, and they let me go to ballet classes, which is how I ended up realizing my lifelong dream of being a ballerina.
Sighing, I cuddle up to one of my cats. They are my babies. My joy. My Dachshund too, Mr. Bojangles. He’s such a character and goes everywhere with me. The cats always stay here, and if we travel then my mother feeds them. She lives in a home paid for by my husband officially, but actually paid for by my blood, sweat, and tears. Literal blood, as my feet have bled and broken to achieve the comfort we now live in. Comfort Jasper lives in too, like the parasite he is. I’m the host, and one day there’ll be nothing of me left for him to feed off.
Later that night, Jasper comes to search me out. We have separate rooms and have for years now. I’m not Jasper’s type. I’m the type he likes to pretend to the world he desires, but Jasper’s taste in women isn’t petite ballerinas. Jasper likes his women curvaceous. He also likes them blonde and blue eyed. Tan. Everything that I’m not.
“What have you been doing with yourself all day?” he asks. He sounds interested, kind. The thing is, Jasper doesn’t only act for the outside world. He acts for me too. So long as I behave. So long as I don’t fuck up or make a mistake, this is the Jasper I get. Do something wrong, though, and the monster shows its teeth.
“I’ve been reading,” I reply with a smile. It’s as false as his friendly demeanor. The hatred I feel for him is always there, but it’s a bland hatred. I want him dead and gone from my life. The hatred I felt when I saw Bohdan was different. That was the hatred of broken dreams and long-lost youth. Full of fire and passion and hurt.
Jasper doesn’t hurt me anymore. Not emotionally at least. I’m immune to him. I think I’m immune to everyone and everything now. Except him. The fire I felt with my first glance at Bohdan was more electrifying than any applause from an enchanted audience. More charged than the first melancholy echoes of a violin as I prepare for a solo.
Jasper sits on the bed, and I stiffen a little. It’s a natural response. A learned reaction to a clear and present threat.
“Where did we go so wrong?” he muses as if we’re some ordinary couple hitting a rough patch.
I don’t know what makes me do it. I can’t believe what my mouth is saying even as the words form. Instead of smiling and sighing and saying I don’t know, darling, which would send him to bed, I dig my grave.
“I think it was when you decided to take everything I earned for yourself and treat me like your possession. Nothing more than a thing to earn you money and prestige.”
His face transforms. It’s like getting a glimpse of the real Dorian Gray. The portrait slips through the façade for a momen
t as evil shines through his generally easy-going demeanor. He narrows his eyes and sighs. “Get up.”
I don’t move.
He moves swiftly, grabbing my hair and pulling me off the bed as I scream at the pain in my scalp.
I’m only wearing my robe, and he yanks it from me so I’m naked. He drags me downstairs by my hair and into the kitchen. This is nothing new. He’s put me on the kitchen floor like a dog and made me stay before.
He throws me on the floor, then he gets the trashcan by the door, lifts out the plastic liner full of foul-smelling food, and throws it all over me. Okay, so this is new.
Ugh, it’s disgusting. I try to swipe it from me, but he grabs my foot and pulls me through it, laughing. The hard, stone tiles are uneven and cold, and they hurt as my too thin body bumps over them.
“You’re the one who made the money and developed the prestige?” He laughs. “Don’t make me laugh. You’re nothing but a stinking Russian whore, who would have been working in a factory back in St. Petersburg if not for me. Don’t you ever fucking forget it.”
He kicks my backside, and it hurts. “Don’t you dare move for at least half an hour. I will check on you, and if you’ve moved, I’ll go fetch the hammer. Don’t make me.”
With a disgusted sneer, he turns and leaves me curled in on myself, on the kitchen floor, naked and covered in trash.
I soothe myself as I lie there by listing all the ways Jasper could die. He might get hit by a car. He could eat a rotten mussel. This is one of my favorites. I love to imagine him vomiting himself to death. What a way for him to go.
As much as thinking about my husband dying soothes me, my mind decides it wants other thoughts, and once more a boy with blue eyes and handsome features fills my mind.
Bohdan.
I remember when we first met. I was only eight and he was eleven, and we became friends. We hung out in the stairwell of our block of flats, with the other kids, and Bohdan somehow became my protector against the older children who teased and taunted us younger ones. Once the gang of kids knew he was watching over me, no one hurt me. No one stole my lunch or played tricks on me. Having Bohdan in my corner was like owning a magical cloak of protection.