CHAPTER 20
Two weeks, maybe two months, pass in this self-deprecating, empty pit. Time has become irrelevant. I don’t even try to keep track of it anymore. There’s no point. I’ve stopped hoping for a day when all this ends because I can’t imagine it. I’m not sure I want to. The end will surely involve a black void in one sense or the other, and it seems I’m headed straight for it.
Everything is meaningless. When I’m at the check-out counter, mumbling my Hungarian phrases and glancing at the woman with the dead gaze, it’s like looking in a mirror.
I used to be a good-looking woman—not exuberant, but there was always a spark in my green eyes. Maybe even some kind of innocence that carried a certain charm. But now my eyes are empty. The radiant color is matted, like a photo with a gray filter. If, for once, there’s more to find in them, it’s exhaustion and hopelessness.
The fight is gone, and when two suit-clad men pay me a visit for the fifth night in a row, I step into the middle of the room like a mannequin to let the scrawny man tear off my clothes.
He throws me onto the bed with unnecessary force and pins me in place with a leg on my back. With my lungs compressed under his weight, I can barely breathe, and when he presses a hand to my head, my nose and mouth become trapped in the mattress.
I can’t breathe.
My lungs work to pull in air, but I remain still, making no effort to aid my struggling organs. Part of me hopes the hand will keep up the pressure when my reflexes set in and reveal my lack of air. But I know he’s not supposed to smother me, so when the need for air becomes urgent, I try to subdue my reflexes so he won’t notice.
But that’s not how reflexes work. As the rest of my body catches up, figuring out something is very wrong, I start twitching and grappling at the sheets.
My mind blurs. In a moment or two, I’ll pass out. If he just keeps the pressure a bit longer, I won’t wake up to live through another devastating night.
The twitching turns into jolts, but my body is so disconnected that the reflexes never fully manifest. No flailing arms or kicking legs.
Hastened strides break through the silence as someone moves through the room. Then there’s a thud, maybe a fist hitting a face, and the pressure disappears. My face slips up from the mattress, just enough for air to pass through the corners of my mouth. My lungs heave dryly, thirsty for the air they’ve been deprived, but I don’t move to aid them. Black dots dance in my already blinded vision, and I welcome the darkness.
But luck is never on my side. A new set of hands, this time strong and big, pull me onto my side, up against a pair of solid thighs. The same hands pull my mouth wide open. Air floods my lungs with a painful gasp, and I’m as disappointed as relieved.
The hands start moving over my body like they don’t know what to do. Palms splay gently on my stomach, fingers dig into my skin, then onward to squeeze my arm and up to stroke my head. The restlessness seeps into my veins like an infectious disease. I can’t take it. It wants to stir up something dormant inside me—the fight to live, maybe. Or any emotion at all. Sadness, relief, longing, betrayal. I don’t know. I should probably scream, cry, or beg, but I’m too paralyzed. I just lie there, numb on the outside, desperate on the inside. The only movement is my heaving lungs.
Finally, the hands cease their nervous search and make swift work of placing me in the recovery position. Then they disappear, and no one touches me for a long time.
***
A foreboding sound intrudes upon my senses. I think it’s the sound of a door, maybe steps.
Then hands are on me again. This time, they’re long and smooth, stroking my body with the softness of a lover’s touch. If it weren’t for the ominous crackle in the air, it would be nice. But even though I’m capable of fooling myself into all kinds of things these days, I can’t dismiss the threat these hands pose.
They turn me onto my back, and my listless arms fall awkwardly over my chest and face. The new man shoves them aside to explore my breasts. He starts with featherlight strokes, which turn into broad movements before they become hard squeezes. I don’t react to any of it.
Finally, these hands leave too, and I’m alone again, staring blankly at the ceiling.
“I’m in the mood to watch,” Gabor announces, a broad, soulless smile palpable behind his words. “Would you like to have a go at her, Janos?” The question hangs unanswered in the air until the same voice adds, “Maybe in the ass?”
A primal grunt is accompanied by a “No.”
“Come on,” Gabor entices. “You usually love a good ass fuck.”
Silence hangs thick in the room. Then someone moves across the floor, and the sound of a long zipper fills the air. The crackle of latex gloves rouses a mix of pleasure-filled anticipation and trembling fear, and my mind doesn’t know which one to latch onto.
A latex-clad hand shoves me onto my stomach and pulls my legs apart. I shut my eyes to the world as the mattress dips and someone jumps up between my legs. I know it’s him—the man I’ve been yearning for with all my desperate heart. But now that he’s finally here, I don’t feel a thing. I just want to get this degradation over with.
Another latex-covered hand tells me I’m right not to be relieved. Janos always leaves one hand uncovered, letting me feel his skin on mine. His two gloved hands speak volumes, and his touch is cold and clinical as he smears lube between my ass cheeks. I barely perceive it. I’m so paralyzed it hardly matters how he proceeds.
But when the first finger slides in, something awakens inside me. It’s only a spark, but it’s something. I don’t want it, and I try to force it down. But when Janos adds a second finger and presses against the tight rim of muscle, my nerves start prickling, my skin humming. And as he presses on, stretching and massaging, my lower body awakens. I squirm as a dull energy builds within me. The sensation is restless and frustrating, but more vibrant than anything I’ve felt for a long time.
A huge palm presses down between my shoulder blades. First, I think it’s to hold me still, but then I feel the thumb moving. It seems soothing, but the latex blocks the comfort from seeping into my skin. The barrier is a testament to my worthlessness—I don’t deserve the touch of a bare hand. My mind reels from the mixed signals, and I let out a despairing moan.
Slowly, the fingers pull out of my ass, and Janos releases my back to drip more lube between my cheeks.
Pressing three fingers against my tight opening, he slams a palm onto my back. Suddenly, everything explodes. Panic rips through my foggy mind, sending shock waves through my unfeeling body. A shrill scream rips up my throat, and I kick at everything within my reach as the fingers press on.
I can’t take it. In a moment, they’ll tear at my tissues and spread fire through my skin—rip me apart physically and mentally. This time, there’ll be no going back. My mind is too feeble to recover. So I make one final attempt at preserving the remaining scraps of myself. I twist and turn to pull free, throw my hands back to bite my nails into whatever flesh I can reach, yell and scream with unrelenting fury. I do it all in blind panic, knowing it’s pointless. But I can’t hold back. I refuse to give up without a fight.
Janos simply gathers my legs between his knees and presses harder on my back. His fingers remain, prodding at my opening. I can barely move, but still I keep fighting.
“Relax.” Suddenly, his enormous body is right above me, his breath warm against my ear. Heat radiates into my skin as he hovers an inch from my back. It hurts. Terribly so. I’ve dreamt about this for so long, and now that it’s here, it’s a cruel overload to my tired senses. “Let me in,” he whispers in front of my face, and the gentle rumble hits straight into the very essence of my soul. I want his words, his proximity. Him.
I steel myself with a deep breath and open my eyes. It’s like seeing the sun for the first time. Everything stops—my breath, time, the spinning world. It’s only him and me. Me and those gray eyes that have refused to see me for so long. Now they’re staring straight at me. There’s no way to resist. No way to protect myself. I relax my tense muscles, and the fingers continue on, slowly gaining entrance.
“Good girl,” Janos croons as all three fingers slide into place.
Tears trickle down my cheeks and onto the sheets. I keep staring at him. It’s like a dream, seeing those eyes fixating on me. They breathe life into mine, lighting the spark I thought I’d lost for good. I can almost feel the color return, the dull green becoming vibrant and hopeful again.
I push out my tongue to wet my lips, and as he watches the movement, a fierce hunger lights up his monochrome orbs. In one fluid motion, he pushes up. “Fuck,” he growls, tearing off both gloves and throwing them to the floor.
Warm, bare hands touch my skin. It’s a relief unlike any other. I arch into them as they slide up my back, then back down to lift my ass into the air. His fingers dig into my skin, but it’s not the same painful bite as Gabor’s. No, this is something powerful and vibrant that shoots bolts of lust through my entire body. And when the tip of his wet cock presses between my cheeks, a long, fervent moan breaks free from the mind-numbing nothingness that paled the colors of my world.
He adjusts his rock-hard length against my opening, and I eagerly lift my hips, wanting nothing more than to feel him inside me. It doesn’t matter that he’s bigger than both Gabor and the biggest butt plug he’s put inside me. I just need him. My muscles ache around him as he pushes into me, but the pain morphs into pleasure—the pleasure into pain. The two seem to merge into something inseparable, and I welcome them both.
He roams his hands along my back, and the deeper he goes, the faster his hands move. Soft strokes turn into furious sweeps, and when he sinks in to the hilt, his nails are raking across my skin.
A hand shoots up to fist my hair as the other clamps down on my hip, and a long, almost pained groan fills the air behind me as he slowly pulls out and pushes back in.
I tremble and spasm around him, clawing at the sheet as I try to process the intense need wreaking havoc on my mind. “Please,” I moan, needing more.
Gabor’s sadistic laughter rings out in the distance, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing can take me away from this raw moment of reckless desire.
“Please, Janos,” I beg, and his name on my lips is his undoing.
With a feral groan, he thrusts into me, so hard the bed moves. I reel from the force, but he doesn’t let me recover before he repeats. Over and over. My moans become screams as I buck beneath him. But my movement is miniscule. Between his grip on my hair and his impaling cock, I’m immobilized. When he finally releases my hair, I’m so deep under his control that I go slack beneath him, letting him have his way.
He fucks me hard and fast, and I jerk back and forth on the mattress, feeling completely empty and very much alive all at once. He’s taken all I have, yet I feel more like myself than ever before.
It doesn’t make sense, and it doesn’t have to. When Janos shoots his cum inside me, I crash into an orgasm so violent it hurts from the inside out. In that short moment, I feel an island of happiness amidst all the gruesomeness that has wiped out the rest of my world.
I collapse on the mattress with Janos on top of me. A wave of emotion crashes into me as I come down from the orgasm, hearing his labored breaths against my ear. I want to cry and get everything out, but it’s all stuck somewhere in my throat, and I start shaking instead.
“Such a good little anal whore,” Janos croons against my ear as he skims his fingers across my hairline. His words hold a startling tenderness that set my tears running. “Such a good girl,” he whispers, wiping the pad of his thumb across my cheek to gather the small beads.
Those four words send me into full-fledged sobs. But it’s neither pain nor terror that draws out my tears. It’s pure, overwhelming relief.
I mean something to him.