Stalkers

Chapter 14

Ella

I asked for BP’s dog a few days ago, and I’m starting to lose hope of ever seeing her again. It was a big ask, and it took me a long time to work my way up to it, but if I hadn’t, then the answer would have been a definitive no.

I never got to have a pet of my own, but I remember the day I met Ethel. She was still a relatively young dog, but not a puppy. BP didn’t really like her that much, but I did. He didn’t get her trained, and he never took her for walks, because he said having the run of his many mansions was enough.

So, whenever I was around, I looked after her, and she looked after me. Both of us were too small and too weak to really assert ourselves, but we had each other.

I don’t know if Aiden is really going to bring me the dog. Most men don’t like little dogs like her. They don’t get them. And she was so small and fragile, there’s a very real possibility she got hurt…

My eyes well with tears as I think about that.

So many things have gotten fucked up lately, including me. I think about the things that have been done to me, and the things I’ve done. I worked for BP. I did what he asked. I was in the habit of doing so, but I could have tried to run away, and I didn’t. I could have…

“Ella?”

I hear my name called from downstairs. I wipe my eyes and go down fast. I am accustomed to doing as I’m told, even when the people telling me what to do are kind of sort of totally holding me prisoner.

Aiden walks in the front door holding a basket-style dog carrier that is vibrating with rage. My heart leaps.

“I don’t know if this is what you wanted,” he says. “And I don’t know that I should give it to you, because frankly it seems dangerous, but…” He sets the carrier down and opens the top.

Ethel comes out of the basket like a little tan bat out of hell, heading straight to me with her tail tucked and her ears down. I crouch down to pick her up, going onto my knees to let her wriggle against me in that way dogs do when they’re happy. It’s like she wants to burrow right under my skin.

Once she gets in my lap, everything changes. As Aiden approaches, Ethel stands bolt upright and starts screaming at the top of her lungs, teeth flashing, eyes bulging with fury.

Aiden

“What the hell is going on?”

Leo comes out to investigate the sound. He has to know what a small dog sounded like, so the question is redundant. Underneath it all, he just wants to see the puppy.

Unfortunately, the puppy is gray around the muzzle and is basically threatening to shank us all.

“I love her,” Ella says, grinning ear to ear while the creature continues to unleash that unholy cacophony. “I wish I could do this. Just bite people and scream at them and then demand a bed with a heating pad.”

“Of course you do,” Leo says, rolling his eyes. “Are we really going to live with an animal in the house? It’s probably not even trained.”

“She is trained! Sort of! Little dogs are hard to convince! They enjoy peeing recreationally.”

“Everything can be trained,” I say soothingly.

“I’m going to take her out to potty now,” Ella says. “And then we’re going to go for a walk and I am going to buy her some food and some toys and probably some sweaters.”

I pull a credit card out of my wallet and hand it to her. “Get whatever you like,” I tell her.

Another Rubicon is crossed with that gesture. I am letting her go out. I am giving her a chance at freedom. I am showing trust. After several weeks of sexual domination, treating her like she is an animal under my care, I let her experience her full humanity again.

“Really?” Her eyes widen. “Why are you being so nice?”

“It’s not the dog’s fault it was owned by a bad man,” I say. “Go on.”

Ella scoots out of the house without saying another word to me, almost as if she’s afraid I’m going to change my mind.

“So you’re spoiling her now. Sugar daddy,” Leo says, giving me a judgmental look.

“When you take someone prisoner, you have to take care of them,” I say. “And Ella deserves to have some means of getting around.”

“You’re going to follow her via her transactions, aren’t you.”

“Absolutely I am,” I say.

Leo snorts. “I thought you were getting soft, but you’re just giving her enough rope to hang herself, aren’t you.”

“I want to know what she’s going to do.”

“I can tell you what she’s going to do. She’s going to do what she was trained to do, which is make men like you and Teddy think she’s an adorable girl who just needs a chance. She’s not innocent. Not in any way. We might have killed BP, but she’s part of it. All of it.”

“What do you want to do with her, Leo?”

“I think she should be in that cage unless she’s having her pussy spanked, or fucked, or whatever we want to do to her. I think letting her walk around in the world makes us as dumb as can be. We lost Teddy. It’s time to tighten up.”

“I respect your opinion,” I say.

“I’d rather you just told me to go fuck myself,” he says. “I fucking hate it when you use your diplomat voice on me.”

He may not be happy about this turn of events, but Ella definitely is.

She comes home a few hours later, not having tried to run away with my credit card at all.

She goes upstairs with the small hound and when Leo, Luke, and I go to find her, we discover her asleep in the dog bed in her cage, cuddled up with the tiny dog who occasionally shifts and stretches, pushing its little feet against her while its tongue lolls out of its mouth.

“It’s such a silly creature,” Leo says. “What’s the point of it?”

“This,” Luke says. “This is what they’re bred for. To be companions. It’s doing more to fulfill its purpose on Earth than you are.”

Leo shoots him a venomous look.

“We did a good thing,” Leo says. “In taking her in and protecting her. She could have been like the others, destroyed in the raid.”

He’s not talking about just the dog.

“We did the right thing,” Luke agrees.

“Ella wants to be punished again,” I say. “She came and asked me today.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I told her we could forgive her. But that doesn’t mean she can forgive herself. I think we’re going to need to do one big ceremony of sorts, a punishment that will take her to the limits of what she can do mentally and physically.”

“Okay, I wasn’t behind the dog, but I am in favor of that,” Leo smirks. “Letting her walk around flipping me off has been crazy work.”

“Let her rest for now,” I say. “Let’s go talk in the kitchen.”

We go to the room in the house that is everyone’s favorite because it has the food.

Luke stands there with his arms over his chest, his muscles bulging. He looks conflicted, but he always looks that way when it comes to Ella. He doesn’t know how to come to terms with the fact that we are going to be the bad guys to one degree or another, no matter what we do.

“Luke?” I prompt him.

“I don’t know,” he says. “She needs something that most people don’t. But she’s so… messed up inside, you know? I see it. I see how she can do terrible things, even though she’s a good person.”

I can see Leo losing patience with Luke.

“She’s a little fucking monster. She laughed at me when she tied me to my bed and left me to die. She would have gotten me killed, too. She would have gotten you killed, Luke. But you lied and got to walk. You must have been really convincing.”

Luke shrugs. “She was loyal to him. But he’s fucking dead, right? So what strings are there for him to pull now? What are we punishing her for now?”

“It’s going to be punishment,” I say. “But the purpose is to let her know that she is loved and controlled. She needs to feel like someone with a firm hand is in control. And if the three of us are going to handle her, she needs that from all of us. If even one of us can be manipulated, it’s over.”

“Don’t look at me,” Luke says. “I can’t be manipulated.”

Leo snorts.

Luke throws a punch at him.

They’re squabbling, and this isn’t the energy we need.

“Enough!” I snap. “We need to present a united front. We are all different people, and we have different methods, but she needs to know there aren’t any cracks to exploit.”

Leo

“You expect me to forgive her?”

“Yes,” Aiden says. “Because what she did to you was objectively funny.”

I snort, surprised by Aiden’s response. I didn’t think he had it in him to be amused by something that could easily have killed me.

“You’re not used to anyone getting the better of you,” Aiden says. “She did that. And that’s going to keep annoying you until you realize what’s really upsetting you.”

“And what’s that?”

“She got your respect. And that means she’s an equal. And that means it’s going to be so much harder for you to do the things you usually do. She’s a real person to you now.”

“She did worse to me, and I’m not so hung up on it as you are,” Luke points out.

“That’s because you’re a…” I stop myself from insulting him, but it’s already too late.

“I’m a what? An addict? So I don’t care if I get knocked out and carried off to a death meeting?

The fuck, my guy. I fucking cared. I knew they killed Teddy.

I knew they might kill me at any time. All you had to do was wait to sober up and then get yourself out of your own restraints. Let it fucking go.”

“Let it go?” I growl. “Let the greatest disrespect of my life go?”

“She did something nobody else has ever done. She was your prey, but she bested you. You’re not angry at her. If anything, you’re pissed off at yourself. But you shouldn’t be. She’s exceptional.”

My expression tightens as I consider that perspective.

“Maybe she is,” I admit.

“Of course she is. She’s survived a hell worse than the one the three of us have known,” Luke says.

I hate it when they’re right. I hate it even more when the point they are making is obvious and yet has escaped me for reason of ego.

“I want to go and spend some time with her,” I tell the other two. “When I’ve done that, I will tell you what I think.”