Chapter 2 #2
“None of that,” he finished, pushing my hand away. “We’re going to get very intimate, you and I.”
I groaned and half turned on my side. I watched as his gaze again fell on the scab at my hip where Victor had branded me.
The water warmed, and he closed the drain to let the tub fill up. He then picked up a washcloth and a bar of soap that sat on the edge of the tub.
I made some sound of rebellion.
“It’s clean,” he said, holding up the square of cloth. “Relatively.”
I must have made a face because he laughed outright.
“Just kidding. Christ, lighten up, princess.”
Princess. Victor had called me that a few times. He’d picked it up from Mateo. But the way he said it made my skin crawl.
“Stop,” I said, the word coming out slurred.
“Look at you, got your voice back.”
He lathered up the washcloth and started to rub me down. I had to admit the water filling the tub felt good. Warm, almost hot. It was so cold in the other room. Although it made me hiss when it reached the tender wound on my hip.
He raised each arm and scrubbed each finger, not leaving even a tiny square inch of skin untouched, paying special attention to my breasts until my nipples hardened.
“Pretty,” he said.
I tried to slap away the cloth but he took my hand and shook his head as if he were chastising a child.
“Be a good girl, and I won’t add on to the punishment you’ve already got coming for biting me.”
Goose bumps covered me at his words, and I did as he said. I lay still while he cleaned me, his touch gentler than I expected, especially around the scabby, tender spot at my hip, as if he were taking care of it. Maybe he wanted to be sure he’d be able to read whatever it was.
My captor pushed my legs apart then, and, with his eyes on mine, dragged the soapy cloth between them.
I protested by closing my legs and pushing his hand away, realizing as I did so that I was regaining mobility a little at a time.
But it wasn’t nearly enough to make any difference when all he did was “tsk” at my efforts.
This time, he held one knee wide, wider than he’d spread me before, and cleaned between my legs.
My face heated—given he’d turned on the lights in here, I could see through the mesh covering his eyes—and I swear he smiled behind his mask.
I hated him for it, hated him for his tender invasion, for the natural response of my body as he rubbed that very delicate spot over and over again, as if wanting to draw that very thing from me.
“There,” he said. “Almost done.”
And to my utter shame, he turned me on my side and cleaned me in the back too, taking his time again until he felt satisfied, before finally allowing me to lie back as he drained the tub.
“Let’s get some clean water in here, so we can wash your hair.”
He stood, his gaze sliding the length of me.
I pushed myself up a little, although I still needed the support of the tub, and cleared my throat.
He allowed me to sit up and refilled the tub, taking a seat again as he picked up a half-full bottle of some cheap shampoo.
How many girls had been here just like me?
How many had he washed like he was washing me?
How many had he—I had to swallow hard not to choke on the word—trained? Sold into slavery?
I felt my eyes welling with tears. Was I just fooling myself? I was in so deep. After James, I’d kept out of things and had warned Mateo to do so too. I warned him not to get involved with the mob. With men like Victor Scava. But he had, and he’d paid the ultimate price. Would I now pay that too?
His thumb rubbed across my cheek, and I realized I’d started to cry. I watched his eyes as he wiped away my tears, expecting some rude comment, some sick joke about my future, but all I got was silence.
I turned my head away, and the moment was gone. Poof.
“Deep breath.”
He had his hand on the top of my head as he said it. He barely gave me time to register the words though before shoving my head down under the surface. Water gurgled in my ears, and my scream turned to bubbles before fingers pulled at my hair and drew me back out.
I sucked in air, suddenly panicked, and all he did was chuckle.
“Nothing like a dunk under water to wake you up, huh?”
I spat water and coughed while he poured shampoo on my head.
“Told you to take a deep breath. Next time, you’ll know to do it.”
“Why?” I cried out.
“To shampoo your hair, silly.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Oh, that.”
He rubbed until he got lather, his fingers digging into my scalp.
“Money. Why else? Why does anyone do anything but for money?”
I looked up at him, wanting to see his face, his eyes. Needing to in order to read him.
“Let me see your face.”
He paused. Had he been expecting something else? “Going under again, deep breath.”
I barely had time to think, gulping air before he shoved me under then, moments later, pulled me back up.
“Your name, at least tell me your name.”
“Shouldn’t you be asking different questions?”
He dunked me again, three times more before the suds were gone. He pulled the plug from the drain.
He took one of the two threadbare towels from the rack—again making me think of those who had come before me—and once the water had drained, he draped it over my shoulders and lifted me up to stand.
He held on to me when he did so, maybe testing himself how much the drug had worn off.
Not nearly enough, considering my knees buckled as soon as I stood upright.
Wrapping one of the towels around me, he carried me back into the bedroom and deposited me on the bed.
“Questions like what’s going to happen to me once I’m sold?”
Leaving me there, he went back into the bathroom to return a moment later with a hairbrush. I noticed the hairs stuck in the bristles. Blonde and red and brown. I wanted to throw up.
He opened the towel as if unwrapping a candy bar and pulled it out from under me, then patted me dry before dropping it on the floor.
Goose bumps rose all over my body, both at the cold temperature in the room on my still damp skin and the thought of my future. Of the fate that awaited me.
“Or who will buy me, and what will my new owner expect of me?”
He sat leaning against the headboard and lifted me up so that he cradled me between his thighs, making me very aware of my naked back against his bare chest. At least he was warm.
After towel drying my hair with the second towel, he started to brush it, his touch not quite gentle, but also not cruel. Not purposely at least.
“Will he fuck me himself, or pass me around to a dozen friends to initiate me?”
I wondered if he used that tone—quiet and unaffected—on purpose. If it was meant to scare me. If his breath on my face was to let me know I would have no boundaries. That nothing was mine anymore, not even the air I breathed.
Could he feel the quiet tremors breaking me apart inside?
Would he be so callous if he could?
“Or maybe something as simple as will they use lube?”
He chuckled at that, but there was no joy in his tone. In fact, he grew more and more despondent with each comment he made, his tugs on my hair working out the knots, becoming slightly rougher each time as if he paid less and less attention.
He left me to ponder that last one for a while, and when he was able to pull the brush through without a snag, he lay me back down and stood.
I shifted and rolled onto my side, the sedative slowly loosening its hold on me. The tingling in my limbs told me it was almost over. I’d be free of it soon.
But not soon enough.
“Maybe something more imminent, like what punishment can I expect for my earlier transgression?”
Punishment.
He rolled me onto my belly and pulled me toward the foot of the bed until my legs hung over the edge.
I tried to push myself over or off the bed, but that proved too difficult. When he saw my attempt, he snickered.
“You want to see my face?” he asked, his voice quiet.
He came around to where I lay, my right cheek pressed against the bed.
“I guess it doesn’t matter.”
He seemed to say that more to himself than to me. He squatted down so he came to eye level.
“Will it make any difference for you?”
He brushed a wet strand of hair off my forehead, the touch of his finger making me shiver.
“For me?”
His voice, his tone—it sounded so utterly hopeless, as if truly, it made no difference at all. As if nothing mattered at all.
“No, not really, not for you. And not really for me.” He reached up to tug the mask off his head.
I watched, my eyes widening, and gasped.
Short dark-blond hair stood on end, static taking hold of it, making me think of a kid with a balloon, a boy giggling as his hair fanned out in all directions.
What had I expected? A monster. A terrible, horribly scarred monster. Maybe some deformity? What?
Whatever it was, it wasn’t this.
Certainly not this.
He was…beautiful. Beyond beautiful. His face—it belied an innocence that did not belong to him. That I knew in my gut had never belonged to him.
Blue-gray eyes the color of coldest steel softened by the thickest lashes were set in the face of an angel carved in solid, unbending stone.
Too beautiful. Too unbearably beautiful.
Thick, blond scruff darker than his hair and spotted with gray dusted his hard, square jaw.
His lips were full, as if swollen from kissing.
Kissing.
He had the face of a man who’d just stepped out of a magazine.
But it wasn’t only that—that cool, easy, deceptive beauty.
There was more. So much more. And it hid behind his eyes, in that bottomless abyss of blue-gray.
Looking at them now sent a shiver racing down my spine, making every hair on my body stand on end.
He had the eyes of a man who’d taken more and who’d lost more than any one human being should.
A man who’d learned terrible things. Who’d seen the worst mankind had to offer one another. A man who’d hurt.
No. Much more than hurt.
A man who’d done unspeakable evil.
I shuddered.
And he smiled.
He smiled a smile of pure evil, and the dimple in his right cheek disarmed me, or would have, had I not seen the darkness, the depravity, the cold, cold emptiness inside those steely, beautiful eyes, and I wished—and I knew he knew I wished it in that moment—I wished I could take it back.
I wished he had never taken the mask of death from his face.
I wished he’d never shown me this, this perfect evil, this perfect, cold beauty.
“You want to know my name?” he asked, rising, breaking into my thoughts.
I shook my head. He patted my hair as if he were a proud parent. He then unbuckled his belt and whipped it out of its loops. The sound made me gasp. He doubled it over, watching me as he set the buckle in the palm of his hand.
He moved behind me.
“I underestimated you.”
The first lash of the belt seared my ass, making me scream.