12. -11-
Dorian
The first thing that told me I was awake was the smell. Stale air, as if nothing had been opened in years, filled my lungs with an intensity that almost pierced my brain.
A groan escaped my mouth, and I tried to lift my heavy eyelids, but I couldn't. I wanted to move my arm and wipe the sleep from my eyes, but my fingers barely twitched. My body refused to cooperate. It felt pinned to the mattress by an invisible weight.
My breathing was ragged, and cold sweat beaded on my forehead.
My mind was blank. Nothing, like I went through a hard reset and everything was wiped out.
I didn’t feel pain, just soreness in my muscles, and my mouth was so dry I believed that I could spit dust. I swallowed thickly, but the bitter taste almost made me gag.
Fuck! What happened?
Forcing my eyes open, another grunt escaped me. The light was blinding. It speared my skull, and I immediately closed them. White and yellow dots danced in the darkness, perfectly in sync with the throbbing in my forehead and my erratic heartbeat.
Turning my head to the side, the cold sheet felt soothing against my hot skin.
It woke my nerves and will to try to open my eyes again.
The next attempt was more successful, but I saw only a mush of shadows and light.
The white above me looked like a swirl fighting with ghosts, and I couldn’t make out anything.
My shut-down brain barely functioned enough to perceive reality, keeping me somewhere between sleep and consciousness until it abruptly realized the force holding me down wasn’t imaginary. I was cuffed.
An animalistic growl split the silence as I pulled at my arms. The metal bit my skin, the pain serving as a means that kept me awake. But the more I pulled, the more it hurt. The restraints were tight and short, holding me in one position, spread on the bed like an eagle, exposed to any attack.
The reality of my situation quickly seeped into my bones. Even in my poor state, my mind quickly connected the dots: the party, the alcohol, the woman in the garage, and the unpleasant sensations that gnawed on my insides that were too similar to the mix of drug and alcohol poisoning.
“Where the hell am I?” I addressed the silence, but got no answer, only a creaky sound coming from the old, open window. The shadows of the heavy curtains and closet played tricks on my muddied mind, reminding me of scary figures from nightmares.
Blinking rapidly, I tried to clear my vision and force my brain to remember more from the previous night. It would be helpful to know who dared kidnap me from under Zyon and Malin’s noses. It’d been decades since I was the target instead of the two of them.
Publicly, I was the cleanest. Unless I counted helping with murders, disposing of bodies, and occasionally torturing people with Malin to blow off steam. My biggest crime was a parking ticket. So, who the fuck had a death wish and decided to steal me from two diagnosed psychopaths?
I didn’t want to imagine what Malin would come up with once he got his tentacles on the person behind this idiotic stunt.
Hell, I would buy a front-row ticket in his torture chambers to see a presentation of his mastery, or madness as some might call it.
My ten-minute older brother made the best therapist in New York cry at the age of eight.
Ordinary criminals shook in fear just from mentioning his name.
If someone stepped on his toe by kidnapping his favorite brother, they were either brainwashed, heavily paid, or suicidal.
Tugging at the restraints again, I noticed the strange, unmoving shadow in the corner.
It looked like a tall, curvaceous figure standing behind the curtains to mask their presence.
But outside light illuminated the shapes, revealing the hideout.
I stared at the person without blinking, unsure if my mind was playing tricks on me because I was positive that the shadow belonged to a woman.
Wait a second! A woman?
Fuck, I was slow. My mind was hazy, and the pieces connected at a snail’s pace. It was hard to recall anything from the night before, but one thing was for sure. A woman helped me into the car. Since then, I couldn’t remember anything.
Thankfully, I wasn’t one for panicking. The first natural reaction of my foggy brain dissipated, and my usual self quickly took over.
How hard could it be to charm a woman and make her forget she'd made a deadly mistake? Or maybe she wasn’t behind the abduction at all, and she would help me escape before the real criminals returned.
Either way, she had no idea what was coming for her.
Because once I discovered who dared to destroy my celebration and chain me to a bed, I would retaliate with such force that they would have no idea from which side they were hit.
Deciding the game plan, I pushed myself up a little because my arms hurt like fuck, but my body still didn’t cooperate.
Groaning, I rolled my eyes at my weak self, yet considering the intoxication, I should be happy to be alive.
With so much alcohol coursing through my system, it was surprising my organs didn’t shut down after they drugged me.
I laughed under my breath at the thought. Imagine pulling off the perfect kidnapping only to kill the target with the wrong dosage. That would be embarrassing.
Watching the unmoving shadow behind the curtain, I cleared my throat, momentarily thinking how idiotic it would sound to talk to something that might be only the product of my imagination. But what could I lose?
“You know I can see you, right?” I rasped, not recognizing my own voice. I needed water, but then it was a high risk of throwing up. Shit, I hated hangovers. “Come out so we can talk.”
She moved! Jackpot! It wasn’t only my mind playing tricks on me.
“C’mon, I won’t bite,” I said sweetly, plastering a sexy smile on my face. It always worked on women, but in my current state and position, I might look like I had a stroke.
The woman shifted her weight from one leg to another, but didn’t leave her hideout. Slowly, her arm moved to her hip, and she froze in that position, most likely realizing she had made a mistake and confirming she wasn’t only a hallucination.
“Listen,” I tried again, changing my tactics. “My arms hurt, and I’m thirsty. Help me a little, please.”
Most women reacted with their hearts before their brains caught up.
They showed compassion in the worst possible moments.
Not all of them, though. I knew some lovelies who would spit in my face or break my jaw with the back of their gun if I tried to manipulate them.
But this sweetheart reacted exactly like I expected.
She made a hesitant step from behind the curtain, then another and another until she stood at the edge of the bed.
“Hello, beautiful,” I said in a low voice, but it missed the usual sexy edge. It sounded more like a creaky door, yet I didn’t let it stop me from flirting my way out of here. “Thank you for showing up.”
She tilted her head to the side slightly, her dark eyes set on my face, but I let mine wander all over her body. And fuck me, what a body I was staring at!
If I wasn’t chained to the bed, she would already be sitting on my face, or would be bent over that old dusty table in the corner.
Despite the unenviable situation, my cock twitched when my gaze admired the curves and shapes dressed in leather pants that underlined flawless legs and a jacket that clung to a pair of nice titties like a second skin.
Bloody hell, if she turned around and showed me a full round ass, I would come in my pants like a thirteen-year-old who’d just seen a woman for the first time. Dressed woman, I might add.
What the fuck?
It had to be the remains of alcohol and drugs, because how could I explain that I couldn’t stop staring at those sexy thighs? Or maybe all my dreams came true in one moment. Tied to the bed with a leather goddess holding me prisoner and pointing a gun at me…
Wait, a gun!
I blinked back to reality, a frown forming between my brows as I figured out what was happening. My eyes snapped from the gun to the white Venetian mask covering my kidnapper’s face, but instead of being frightened, I chuckled.
“Put it down, ma vilaine. You’ll hurt yourself,” I advised, grinning, but in my head, I freaked out.
Why the fuck did you give her a pet name, idiot? The demon, who had accompanied me since I was eight, reared his groggy head. She kidnapped you!
The woman didn’t move, just pointed the gun at my chest, her arm steady but her posture tense. My vision was still slightly muddy, but the excitement of this situation woke me up fast. It gave me a chance to observe, and while I didn’t see all the details, it helped me understand some major things.
First, she wasn’t an alien to guns and probably knew how to shoot. People who had no idea how to use them were scared and nervous. She wasn’t.
Second, she trained. No one would get a body like that from God, which led to the third thing.
This wasn’t a misunderstanding. It was as real as it could be because the woman standing before me could easily be a professional who specialized in abducting people.
My cock twitched again, the blood rushing to my lower parts rapidly.
This was going to be so much fun!