Chapter 5
5
TOMASZ
“I ’ll survive,” I tell the doctor as he leaves.
Stopping by the doorway, he shakes his head at me. “Take it easy, Tomasz. You lost enough blood.”
Emin is practically part of the family. He and my father are childhood friends. His father was a surgeon, and his son is a surgeon. The Petrovs have served our family for generations, and they’re our first port of call when shit like this happens.
Another shake of his head, and he sighs. “You need to keep her watered at least. The girl won’t last another three weeks like this.”
“Emin,” I laugh at his statement. “ Emin …I don’t want her to last. The girl needs to break. My father wants to send a message. Well, this is it. The girl is it. When they get what’s left of her back, they’ll realise that they’re not untouchable. They’re not gods. The world… our world is not at their mercy.”
Looking out of the window, I watch the huskies pace closer. Their howls are becoming louder as they run around the grounds freely. Nero, the larger of the pack, finds her first. Siberian huskies are as close as you can get to a domesticated wolf. Loyal and smart, you can train them into whatever you need.
“Careful, Tomasz. Lesser things have spurred wars,” he scoffs as he leaves, closing the door behind him.
His words don’t sit right, even though they sound like nothing more than a ramble from an old man. Putting them out of my mind, I get in the shower. The heat of the spray does nothing to mute the whirlwind in my head.
I should’ve killed her today.
Her delicate neck should be snapped, and those probing eyes of hers should be blinded.
Fuck, I should’ve made her bleed.
The dogs should be lapping up her draining blood out there.
“Shit!” My hands slap to the marble wall, and pain throbs through my side as my stitches pull tighter at my skin. Anger deafens all my thoughts as it bellows in my ears.
I’ve never wanted to hurt anything as much as I crave her pain. Although I know better, I wash myself as quickly as I can. This thing inside me wants to watch her fall apart. It’s desperate to witness fear consume her as the dogs taunt her.
The girl is fascinating. Her fire is addictive, and the more I think about it, the harder it becomes to contain it in my veins. She’s poisonous, and every thought of her makes it harder to resist the urge to taste her. To use her. To tear her apart in every way.
“Fuck.” The hiss escapes as I stroke over my cock, imagining the glisten of tears in her eyes.
Red would be breathtaking with tear-bruised eyes, pleading for my mercy while her hands grapple at me, those red claws of hers scratching as she struggles for breath.
My hand squeezes as her scent envelops me, and my mouth waters for more. To taste. To take…and take until there’s nothing left of her. My already pounding heart races as I stroke harder, and my dick throbs as the skin on my neck tingles with the recollection of her breath.
Hot and so fucking tempting. Trembling with her rage. Every time I think that she’s about to snap, she surprises me with more defiance. More strength. And I fucking want it all. I want to own it. Her.
Especially that fucking grit she possesses. It’s maddening, and God, my cock pulses at the thought of fucking it out of her. Of fucking that mouth of hers so hard that she’ll never defy me again.
The buzz of my heated blood rushes down my body, making my muscles quiver with an undeniable ache. A crazed need.
“God,” I bite out as my other hand fists against the cold stone.
The ghost of her hair cutting into my flesh, incensing my already frayed control, and for this one moment, all I can see is the curve of her throat, stretching as I yank at her hair tauter and tauter as her tits threaten to spill from the deep V of her dress.
Sweeping my thumb over the head of my dick, I pick up the pace. The feel of her body haunts mine. The warmth and the lithe curves. And her supple flesh that fills me with the urge to bite and maim. To control and dominate.
The erratic pulse of my heart hammers in my veins, harder and harder the faster I fuck my fist. It’s wrong. Wrong to want her. Dangerous to crave her. Still, I can’t stop. Thrust for thrust, I chase my tight, unyielding grip, and I imagine it’s her I’m fucking. That it’s her muffled cries and hoarse gags filling the air and not my frustrated and uncontrolled grunts.
It’s so fucking wrong.
Yet, with my muscles coiling tight around my bones, it’s her fucking eyes I see. Boring into mine. Wild and torrid.
“Fuck… fuck …” The curses echo around me as her tongue sweeps over her lips, and her throat clenches while her eyes weep for me.
Collapsing into the wall, I come hard and fast, my cock pulsing as my release coats my stomach and inescapable heat scorches me from the inside out.
“Shit.” I’m fucked.
Beyond fucked. The girl needs to go. It’s time to end the game.
The only problem is that ending the game means backing down, and I’ve never backed down. Not once in my whole thirty-two years. I don’t stop until I win.
Getting out of the shower, I pause in front of the balcony doors and watch. Her wracking body as Red uses its weight to pull on her restraints, still putting up a fight. I like that. Admire it, even. She’s more like us than she thinks. Maybe when she realises that, she’ll break for me. When it finally dawns on her that no one is coming for her. Because I know that’s what’s keeping her going.
Hope. It’s there in her eyes. All. The. Fucking. Time.
The cacophony of the dogs’ howling doesn’t die down while I get dressed. I need to get out of here. Forget about her and the fucking mistake in the shower. It won’t happen again. It can’t. When it comes to her, the only thing that needs to get fucked is her willpower.
Pausing in the shadow, I watch her shake the dogs down with every kick of her legs and twist of her body. The torturous burn must be agonising right now because her ferocity is dulling. It’s obvious even from a distance. Red is growing weary.
The girl won’t last…
Emin’s words come back to taunt me, and I remind myself like I reminded him—I want her weak. I need her to snap. To fall apart at my feet.
“Break,” I grit under my breath as Nero jumps at her from behind.
He’s always liked a toy.
The sight of him pretending to maul her makes my gut twist.
Red is my toy. My pet.
Before I can stop myself, I’m walking out of my room. The house is quiet and dark as I take the stairs down quickly, skipping two at time as though I’m on a countdown. And maybe my insanity is. Because this is crazy.
“Tomasz,” my father calls from the doorway of the drawing room. The flicker of the flames licks the walls behind him. “We need to talk.”
“I’m busy.” Before he can get another word in, I head outside.
It’s a starless night, with the moon hidden behind thick clouds and the fresh incoming bite of winter lingering in the air. The smaller of the dogs spins to look at me. Gaius growls as though he’s protecting the girl from me, and if I didn’t know that he was afraid that I’m taking the new toy from him, I might actually teach him a lesson in loyalty too.
“You don’t have to be like him.” I pause at the voice coming from the shadows of the gazebo beside me.
“What do you want, Vanya?”
“Let her go, Tomasz. She’s just a girl. A young, helpless girl.”
“Helpless?” I scoff, stepping inside the small structure that overlooks the vast lake. “Isn’t it past your bedtime?”
“What are you going to do when you have daughters and your enemies come for them? What mercy will you pray for when they take them away and savage them like this?”
Grabbing her by the arm, I guide her down the steps, towards the house. I won’t humour her suppositions of the future. If that day ever comes, it is my enemies that will beg for mercy. It is those that come against me that will pray on their hands and knees for salvation.
“Ignore me all you like, but we both know that hurting her will not strengthen you. It’s another sin you will have to atone for. Another curse you put on your soul.”
“Let me tell you something we both know,” I snap at her as she yanks herself free of my hold. “Little girls like you that stick their noses into grown men’s business…always end up getting hurt.”
“Grown men like you that hurt little girls like us?—”
“Shut up!” Slapping my hand to her mouth, I silence her sanctimonious bullshit.
“It’s you! It’s all of this…you, him, and this wicked world!” In the dark, her tears aren’t visible, but they are audible. Considering this is the world she was born into and the only one she knows, Vanya is soft. All the time she spent at the convent school has made her far too pious for her own good. “You’re the reason she’s sick.”
The twist of my gut has me clenching my fists at my side. If it wouldn’t crush our mother, I would crucify her like the martyr she thinks she is. Instead, I force myself to take a step back.
“Go back to Tolstoy and all the other useless shit you fill your head with. Better yet, go pray a little harder so that maybe God will hear you this time.”
“Durak,” she spits back as she walks up the few steps to the patio at the back of the house.
Vanya may think I’m a fool, but she’s the one on the fine line. Family princess or not, if she doesn’t start bucking her ideas up and showing some loyalty to her flesh and blood, her life is going to become a lot more difficult. All the prayers in the world won’t save her.
Nero’s long whine followed by the sudden silence has me focusing back on the reason I’m out here in the first place— Red.
It’s an apt name for her. It’s what she does to me. Everything is red with her near me. The girl makes me feel hate and lust unlike I’ve ever felt before. She makes me see anger and crave blood. Her blood and that of anyone that touches her without my consent.
Turning, I draw in a deep breath that quickly congeals in my lungs, clogging my throat. Nero nudges at her limp legs with his nose, coaxing her fight.
It’s gone.
In the bleakness of night, she swings lifelessly, pale skin and white dress ghostly in the moonlight and cool gust.
The girl won’t last.
“Fuck,” the growl vibrates from deep in my gut as my legs carry me to her.
Fast. Faster than I’ve ever moved so that my body protests with every shift. My chest squeezes so tight that the pain throbbing at my side fades to nothing. Using my shoulder to prop her up, I untie the knot I made earlier and unwind the rope from the branch.
A part of me is wary of her tricks and is on high alert as I carry her back to the house, waiting for Red to strike. Deep down, though, I know she won’t. I’ve been here before. I’ve carried her enough times to know that her listless form isn’t another ruse.
The girl won’t last.
“The fuck you won’t,” I bite out as I manoeuvre her in my arms so that I can see her face and she’s not draped over my shoulder. “I’m not done with you yet.”
Kicking the door open, I wait for the loud crash to wake her. Still, she sleeps. Dark circles shadow her eyes, and the usually soft pink of her lips is darkening while her skin lightens to a translucent veil over her veins and flesh. The freckles on her face all but disappear.
“You’re not meant to be weak,” I tell her as the lights in the hall come to life and my father comes bounding out of the drawing room, gun at the ready with Emin and Vanya behind him.
Pushing past them, I put her down on the sofa closest to the fire before I check her pulse. It may be weak, but it’s there, and this isn’t over.
“Bring her back,” I snap at Emin as I grab the steak knife on the dinner plate that’s on the coffee table and cut through the rope still binding her wrists. “Now!”
“What?” Vanya blurts at me at the same time as Emin shakes his head. “No, you can’t!”
“Enough of this.” My father pushes me away, eyes narrowing on me with fury as I push back, “I’m not done. You think this will send a message? This is a mercy…”
The cock of his brow and the sneer on his lips show his obvious revulsion at my statement.
“Papa…” Vanya looks between the two of us, eyes widening on our father in that innocent and beseeching way of hers that he can’t ever seem to fucking ignore.
“We don’t do mercy, do we, Father ?” I remind him of one of his most precious rules.
“Bring her back,” he tells Emin, nodding down at Lucy before turning to me and stepping closer. I’m taller and broader, but he holds my stare like it could be enough to make me submit to him. “This time, finish the job you start, or I’ll finish it for you. We don’t do weakness either, son . Ponimat’?”
“Sure.” I understand him, but this isn’t his game anymore. We both know that he’s the boss in title and age, not much else.
Taking Vanya with him, he walks out of the room, allowing me to focus back on Emin.
“The girl needs to go to the hospital.”
“No.”
“How do you want me to save her?”
“You’re the doctor, aren’t you?”
With a shake of his head, he curses. Dialling his son, he gives Niko a list of what he needs him to bring to the house. In the muted light, the girl looks cold. Frozen, even. Draping a blanket over her, I can’t stop my grimace at her pallor.
“Niko is on his way,” he tells me as he goes through his bag and goes about treating her with the bare essentials he has with him.
All I do is watch every move he makes. I take in the way he touches her. Meanwhile, I wait for her to come back to life. I wait for the fight that she’ll come back with because if there’s one certainty between us, it’s that mercy isn’t a weakness either of us knows.