Chapter 7
Adelmo
Montez’s man lowers her then dumps her, face up onto the bed, legs half-spread, dress skewed so it reveals half her stomach and pussy but trails to mid-thigh on the other side. Her feet are bare. The red coat has vanished. Her straight black hair fans over the cherry-blossom bed cover.
This leaves me conflicted. Her presence lends a disturbing undercurrent to this operation. It’s no longer straight-forward.
Her eyes are closed, her body limp, and I gather she’s had another dose since I last saw her in his mansion, so they could transfer her to the yacht without fuss. I’ve not been told how they dodged customs, but I can guess. The man pauses, looking down at her then leans over her and pulls the arm with the bandaged hand from the dress, lets it flop back to the bed then reaches for the other. He means to undress her?
Most would just fuck her as she is.
“Stop.” I straighten from the door jamb, adjust my stance for the sway of the boat’s deck. “Leave her.”
A big man with shorn blond hair, he twists, eyes me. His gaze rakes me with suspicion. “Why?”
“Because it looks better. Her, recently fucked and a mess.” I gesture, walk over, and put a knee to the bed. I lift her upper lip, pressing it back to see her teeth, then I slowly insert my finger into her mouth. Both her nipples are bared—plump, juicy targets for a mouth, a knife, or a clamp. The shoulder strap he loosened fell across a nipple, half concealing it. I trace the pink-brown circle, leaving a shiny trail of her drool.
Her eyelids move then close again, and she groans softly. I pinch her forearm, and she flinches, mutters nonsense. She’s waking.
Truthfully, I’m salivating over her. The possibilities are making me hard.
“Fucking awesome, yes?” I say dryly.
He shrugs. “If you like them half dead and limp, sure. There’s come and blood everywhere, but sure.”
A man with a thing for cleanliness. He leaves without a second glance. The door remains latched back, the passageway visible even if no one else is nearby.
I inhale, hold it in. Her scent lingers in my nostrils. I sit on the edge of the bed. She rolls toward me a little, tempting me. I roll her away, then push her further until her rounded ass is in view. The residue of her arousal and my come still marks her there. The jizz splattered higher up on her back and neck is from Montez. I wander into the small bathroom, get a wet towel, and return to clean her upper back and hair as much as possible.
Then I put her on her back again. The blood leaking through her bandage is bright red, fresh. I dither then clean her ass and her cunt. I could put something in her, leave it there, a wine bottle, the handle of a knife, my dick. I’m hard and aching, and I need to fuck something.
Not her. Girls that don’t react are boring.
I pose her, part her legs, move the torn dress so her navel shows, cup and slide my hands over the undercurves of her breasts.
My large fingers gripping and denting her upper thigh are a perfect counterpoint to her vulnerability.
To her curves.
To her plump red lips that move the tiniest amount when she breathes.
I grit my teeth, release her, and stand.
Restraint has been my weapon and my shield ever since I started killing. Patience and restraint. One mistake could unravel me. I need to remember my story—I’m a businessman who just happened to find Montez’s favorite pest wandering the streets.
Except I let her figure out what I truly am and see the darkness in my soul. I was teasing her with it, seeding the conversation with clues. It’s fine to do that when I’m alone with someone due to die, to add some fear, but that was stupid.
She offered me power and her body. For us to unite. That she would find me the right victims? What is right when you’re executing them, leaving them in unmarked graves, on the street, or thrown into the sea? What the fuck can be right about it?
Most people would have simply begged me. No one wants to die. It’s an uninspired pitch.
She…fucking offered me a deal.
I walk out, shut the door. There is no lock, but if Montez’s men haven’t thought to tie her to the bed, that’s on them.
Another hour should be sufficient to let her wake enough.
Do I kill her?
I should smother her now. If she betrays me, we both die. They’d think it a side effect of the drug.
I keep walking. Montez is having a cocktail party on the upper deck. I can go watch his woman flaunt her breasts at me in her chic bikini and short skirt. Now she would beg if I had a gun to her head. I spend a second thinking about that before drifting back to how Izabella, Izzy—as she names herself in her posts—sprawls on that bed.
My dick hardens as I imagine her making noises.
While I do interesting things…
To her.
The sea is behaving itself. The sun glints off the green-blue waves while I souvenir a cocktail off a tray and smile at Montez and his mistress, Carmilla. She smiles back, her red hair pouring and slithering over her shoulders and back as she turns.
When we end up side-by-side, she whispers as if we are sharing a secret, “That was hot, what you did to her. I look forward to more of the same.”
I nod. “It will happen.”
“Good. Do you take requests?” Her eyes light up with hope.
“No. I don’t.”
“Oh.” She pouts. After a last lingering appraisal, she walks away. Her aquamarine skirt looks as if it’s cradling ripe fruit, as does her top.
Good, she says. Evil bitch. She would look good, bloody, and wriggling under my knife, but I would never catch her. That does make me think. Some people are too powerful. Some are like her, too connected or too public a figure.
I return to Izzy’s cabin within the hour. A man is on the bed with her, with his dick out. She’s weakly batting at him. An empty syringe lies on the small table.
“Okay, you.” The next few seconds happen in a hurry, loudly.
Shit. I shouldn’t have.
I stare at the floor where he lies on his back, gasping. He landed there after I hauled him off her and punched him into it, a few times. Once was to the throat—he wasn’t co-operating. His rasping is worrying, but he is improving.
Wiping my mouth, nursing a bruised hand, I climb off him and study the damage. “You can breathe.” I had four drinks, which isn’t enough to impair me. Or so I thought. “Sorry.”
I offer my hand. He knocks it away and staggers upright then goes to the door, spitting blood, wheezing.
“Next time don’t try to fuck her without asking.”
“Asking who? You?” he squeezes out, holding his neck. “Fuck you.” He disappears down the corridor, shoulder-crashing it a bit from the noises he’s making.
Already I’m regretting that. I should be killing her, and instead I’m acting as if I own her, or the rights to her cunt. That might alienate Montez. It might make him wonder why I have a knack for punching his bodyguards.
“Fuck.” And I’m swearing too much.
Izzy has gone back to sleep. Being around this woman is making me behave irrationally. I’m standing over her, pondering what I should do that is sensible.
Three of Montez’s men file in.
“Hey. Sorry.” I hold up my hands. “I know that was bad but?—”
The leader walks in and punches at my gut. I see it coming and try not to dodge.
The blow drives me backward, doubled over. The next three hits land near the same place or on my arms as I protect my face. I collapse to the deck and writhe and cough enough to keep them happy.
“Bring him. We’ll come back for her.” He eyes me. “Montez is annoyed. You’re to behave if you don’t want to go overboard. I’m to tell you that the deal with Kasimir Stern is sealed, and you’re almost disposable. Got it?” He leans in to stress his words, while his friends grab my arms.
“Yes.”
“Bring him.”
As they hustle me along then down some steps, I ask a dumb question, “This new cabin has a good view?”
He laughs. “Definitely. A view of shit.”
Figures. They take me through a low door into what might be the bilge area—I’m not into boats—then chain my right hand to the hull wall using a handcuff locked through a link. The walls are white and clean though stark. This isn’t a rusted cargo ship.
“Is this good enough for you?” He grins. “I liked the show you put on with her, but if the boss says to eliminate you both, you’re gone. He’s got other things to attend to. Understand, Mister Smith?” He glowers.
“I understand.”
“You will be expected to perform at the coming party, with her.” His grin widens. “Mister Flores has decided you’re to kill her then, and you’re to make it entertaining.”
I nod.
I’m demoted to porn star. Wait. Make that porn-star assassin.
They leave. Minutes later, Izzy arrives between the two men, mostly being dragged in their grasp, her feet stumbling, and sometimes they twist upside-down. She gets the same treatment as I, with her wrist locked in a manacle and chained to a point on the wall. Above us, a paltry light shines enough to illuminate a room big enough to hide a fair bit of smuggled goods, though it’s probably too easily found for that. No portholes. One door. One light.
Montez probably uses it for captives.
The floor is metal and cold, the engine noise is a constant burr. Within a few hours, I’ve gone from favored business agent to man chained in the underparts of the yacht, due to this woman and my own lack of sense.
She could throw me to the wolves if she speaks to them before I kill her.
I know this, I know this, I know this. I hesitate, still. A quick strangle, and I’d be free of her. Montez might huff, but he’d be happy she was gone.
I watch her slowly rouse. She starts to shiver.
She’s not dead, though, is she? I guess, I think, I’m plain curious? Curious enough to risk exposure.
I can mute her at the party. There is a rather nasty way to accomplish that. Not a gag or a mask, nothing so prone to failure. I’ll suture her mouth shut. The idea gives me the shivers, the good kind. I’m seeing the needle sinking in, her fear, the sutures pulling tight as they’re knotted. Maybe someone will hate me for denying them fucking her there, but it’s a great solution.
If I ask, Montez will supply needle and thread…I think.
Right now, I want to talk to her, to see where this goes. I shift closer. The chain is long enough for us to touch because they don’t expect murder. Montez probably doesn’t care about anything else that happens in here.
I lie on my side near her. We’re almost spooning. Her arms move now and then, and she’s back to mumbling while staring at the opposite bulkhead, as if a film is showing there.
Gently, I shift aside the last piece of dress that’s shielding her ass.
I’ve done this all wrong and nearly wrecked this hit due to her. She has derailed everything.
Once again, fuck this.
I shift even closer, unzip and consider nudging my cock into her. On one elbow, I lean over and put my nose to her nape, inhale her scent, while I cup her breast and fondle her. I rove my hand over her belly, breasts, moving the dress so I can touch her pussy. I run my fingers into her slit, along it, enjoying the slip and slide, the wetness gathering there.
As I work at her, she leaks more, and her lips swell but she doesn’t speak or move. I don’t penetrate her. Restraint, fucking restraint. I’m practicing what I preach.
Last of all, I part her ass cheeks.
The longer I look, the harder it gets to say no. I shouldn’t. She may as well be asleep for all the reaction I’ll get.
“Hmmm.” I sit up and undo my belt, slip it from the loops, then wrap it about her neck and thread the leather through the buckle. She makes a small choking sound then the door slams open. I let the belt fall and slip loose and sit up. I tuck myself away.
“Here! Mr. Flores says you can have this.” The leader of the three who brought us here stands in the doorway. His mildly spiky black hair makes it seem like he tried but failed at being scary. He holds up my briefcase. “You are to stay in here for the trip which is another day and a bit. Bathroom is there.” It’s a chemical toilet that’s just reachable, with a bare shower nozzle and drain beside it. “I’ve been told to say, this is to remind you the deal is still on, just don’t do anything stupid again. Mr. Flores is fucking annoyed with you. Okay?”
I nod, and my briefcase is tossed in so that it slides to my feet.
“Jesus.” He shakes his head, raising his eyebrows at my partly unzipped pants. “Her? She’s the last thing I’d fuck. Got a nasty mouth on her.”
“You think her mouth is dangerous?” I nod at her, sprawled like a drowned swimmer. Izzy has paddled into the wrong ocean. “Besides, if they bite, I bite back.”
He snorts then leaves. The door locks.
My phone is in there. My laptop. All my papers and fake ID. This is promising. I want to be there when he and Kasimir meet, and that’s unlikely to happen if I really piss off Montez.
Fucking Izzy has lost some of its attraction.
As an afterthought, I kneel and sink my teeth into her naked butt. She winces and whimpers but falls back into semiconsciousness when I let go of her skin. The teeth marks stand out nicely and I stroke them until the dents pop out and turn purplish red.
The chain gets in the way, slithers over her body, clinks.
A little hematoma appears on her where I bit—bright due to the freshness of the blood.
Bruises and teeth marks are sadistic calligraphy on a woman’s body.
I want to know what makes her tick. Montez must have a connection to the internet? It does and the boat’s Wi-Fi accepts my laptop and my phone.
I find her insta, her blog, her Facebook page, her defunct TikTok, even her X profile, and start fishing for info. The political stuff isn’t surprising. I read some of it ages ago. Then I find an old link on her blog that goes to somewhere called Archive of Our Own.
The exact link is to a profile by a writer called Izzy F. “Not the best pen name, if you want to be anonymous,” I tell her, tsking. Then I start to read.
“One Night with My Stalker.” I snort at the title. “Holy fuck, what is this?”
I’m a fast reader when I want to be. I skim. I raise both my eyebrows at the sex scenes, a few times. She fantasizes about having a stalker?
“This is filthy but not bad.” I scroll and read further then end up unzipping again. Idly, I pull at my cock.
The next story is called, “My Victim,” and it’s told from the point of view of a…cue the shark music…a serial killer.
I am, I admit to myself, glued to the page. There are mistakes, but the editing ones don’t bug me as much as the ones where she gets the murdering and abductions wrong. A Glock doesn’t load like that. A knife used like that would leave them bleeding out or badly injured internally. That one would die soon after. Pointless. Unless she’s writing hopeless dumbass killers who simply get angry.
I’m being anal about this killing, even though this is fiction.
I’m annoyed and frowning, and I have this dead-set, mind-exploding need to make notes on what she needs to fix in these. I make some notes. Then I stop typing.
She’ll be dead in two days. That’s a spanner in the mechanism.