by Katsura
“What you want to sit an exam for? You can come work for me. You don’t need a fucking degree when you are as good as you are.” He held the young man close to his chest and smiled as Gabrys smoothed his hands down Judas’s collars to neaten them.
“Mr MacGregor.” Gabrys giggled. “You don’t think I want to do this for the rest of my life?”
They both walked out of the room together and along the corridor to where Judas would be expected to cough up for what Gabrys had choked down. “Well, naw, I guess not.” Judas kissed his cheek and took out his wallet. “I’ll miss you if you leave here, though.”
Gabrys looked touched. He rested his head on Judas’s shoulder and smiled. “Oh you would be snapped up by one of the others…or even two perhaps.”
Judas grinned. He knew that Gabrys referred to the Japanese twins, Nou and Koyubi, who also worked here and had become in such high demand as they entertained as a team. A team that liked to fuck each other as much as they liked to fuck the clients. “Well.” Judas nodded to Sacha, another courtesan and Mikhail’s apprentice, before he turned his attention back to Gabrys again. “I hope you will still be here for a long time. Good luck with your exam.”
Gabrys nodded and he blew a playful little kiss at him. He then walked back along the corridor to his room.
“You know you could learn a thing or two from him, Sacha.” Judas looked the beautiful young blond in the eye. He noticed how he had become even more of a miniature version of his boss, Mikhail, and Judas gave him a sly wink. “He knows how to be friendly.”
Sacha had always appeared standoffish to Judas and had never allowed him the pleasure of his rather elusive company.
“Oh, yes?” Sacha took the bundle of used notes from between Judas’s fingers, appearing totally unfazed by the poorly cloaked dig at his inflexibility over clients.
“Yes, I have always thought Gabrys to be most…accommodating.”
“Yeah, he is. And Mikhail has left you in charge again? That must be nice for you.”
He tucked his wallet back into his pocket, it, like his balls, now a fraction lighter.
Sacha looked up at him with a superior expression. “Yes, Mr Majewski trusts me fully. He has gone for the day and left no instruction on when he will return. He may even perhaps have gone on a little trip. He knows that the place is in safe hands with me.”
Judas patted his arm gently, amused at how Sacha stiffened to his touch. “Oh, I think anything would be in safe hands with you.” He walked to the door and waved back. “See you, Sacha.”
He was sure that Sacha muttered something under his breath in response but his mouth masked it with a saccharine little smile.
*
Darkness enveloped the cold and filthy cellar and from somewhere, Mikhail could hear a ragged sound, like someone caught in a struggle over the intake of their next breath. After a few moments of pure terror, he realised the sound was coming from himself and he had been right about the cause. He was finding every breath a painful one, as real as the ache that coursed through his injured leg.
It was impossible even to see his hand in front of him and Mikhail was forced to crawl to a corner and face the prospect of having to spend the night here. Only Hugo knew where he was and Mikhail cursed his own stupidity. Why had he trusted Hugo to be anything other than what he’d known him to be from experience and what Fergus had said about him? A devious and manipulative killer.
Did Hugo intend to keep him here? Locked up like an animal until he died and became a heap of bones in the corner? He tried to tell himself that he was being overly dramatic. Someone would come and find him. Judas maybe or dear God, dare he hope for Fergus?
Hugo implied that he waited for Mikhail to tell him all about the relationship that he had with Fergus. That was one thing that Mikhail would not do. Not even to secure his release. He would never betray Fergus. God knows what Hugo would do to Fergus if he did.
Despite the gravity of his current situation, something else Hugo had said repeated continually in Mikhail’s mind.
It would seem a trite thing perhaps to anyone else, but not to Mikhail.
Hugo said that Mikhail was not the only one Fergus had affairs with. Of course Hugo’s words had been far more crude but the gist was still the same.
Mikhail knew the reason Hugo said this was to inflict hurt and he had tried his best at the time to appear unaffected. But still, he couldn't help but wonder if it might not be true. He would like to think Fergus wasn't that kind of person but maybe it was just Mikhail’s wishful thinking, spurred on by the love he had developed for the man. He didn't know Fergus as long as Hugo did after all.
Mikhail tried to convince himself that the words were just all part of Hugo’s sick torment but this was not easy and doubt crept in with pain and fear to compound his misery.
His bladder ached, and never having been the kind of person who would urinate anywhere other than an actual toilet, Mikhail closed his eyes to the wave of shame that he felt when he pulled himself to his feet. It was quite a struggle for him to move away from the spot where he’d lain on the dirt floor but he had to. It was disgusting enough to have to relieve one’s self like this, never mind to have to remain close enough to inhale the stench afterwards. Once he had attended to this call of nature he awkwardly returned to his previous place.
Outside the wind howled fiercely and oddly Mikhail was grateful as it meant that he could no longer hear the rasp of his own breath over the roar of the trees outside.
*
With deep guilt, and not his usual irritation, Fergus ended his unanswered call to Mikhail. He deserved to be ignored. Mikhail was one of the most wonderful people he had ever known in his whole life and Fergus had treated him as shabbily as he treated everyone else.
He walked down to the sitting room and sat on the sofa. Hugo lay on the rug in front of the fire, a book opened in front of him.
“Don’t you just hate that?” Hugo glanced across at him. “When you realise you have already read something?”
“Hmm?” Fergus replied absently. His mind was too full of hate for himself to pay Hugo any attention. Hugo got to his feet. He padded across the room and sat down next to Fergus. Although the days were still warm, the evenings had turned chilly in preparation for the onset of autumn. Hugo’s clothing was far too light and Fergus felt a sudden urge to go and get him a sweater. This uncommon feeling of generosity towards Hugo startled Fergus, but he put it down to the need to make up for his earlier unwarranted cruelty to Mikhail.
“What’s wrong?” Hugo clasped Fergus’s fingers in his own. “I can tell that something has upset you. Is it still about the money? The stuff from the bank? I was there when you put it into the safe. There were five bags. I counted them. One, two, three, four, five!” He poked a finger gently against Fergus’s thigh to coincide with each of the numbers.
“Forget the fucking money. I don’t give a shit about it. I’d give them cunts the lot if my dad wouldn’t blow his fucking top about it.” Fergus sighed heavily.
“You don’t have to listen to your father, you know. He doesn’t own you. He is old and you will take over one day.” Hugo said in a bold sounding voice, with the full knowledge that he had no business to talk so out of turn. Fergus had warned him about it often enough. Did he never listen?
“Don’t, Hugo. Don’t even think about it. You know fuck all about anything.”
Fergus pulled his hand away and reached for his cigars. He lit one then leaned back more against the sofa cushions and Hugo slid closer to rest his head on his shoulder.
“I know about families, Fergus. I used to have one, remember? I had a mother and a father…a brother even. Now I have just you and I am happy about that. You are all the family that I ever wanted. A strong man to love and protect me.” Hugo sighed and closed his eyes and Fergus hoped that he would fall asleep. This was not likely however as strangely for Hugo, he was sober. Normally at this time of night he would be close to the passing out stage. “Do you want t
o tell me what is bothering you then? If it is not about the money, what is it?”
“I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t want to talk about anything. I want to sit in peace with my cigar, if that’s okay with you.” Fergus wanted to reach for his phone again and attempt to call Mikhail. But maybe this was not such a good idea. If Mikhail was furious with him, perhaps the constant calls would just exacerbate the situation.
“Of course.” Hugo raised his head a fraction and slipped his hand over Fergus’s broad chest. “You know, we could go upstairs if you wanted. It’s been a while and it would relax you.”
He kissed Fergus’s cheek gently and began to glide his hand back and forth across Fergus’s shirt until Fergus gripped his wrist tightly and stopped it. Before the recent rekindling of his affair with Mikhail, he and Hugo had fallen back into an awkward routine of having sex. Awkward because Fergus always had to imagine he was with someone else and purposefully block out Hugo’s voice throughout the whole ordeal.
Nothing about the act was ever relaxing. As he held the slim wrist in his fingers it reminded him of how he would pin Hugo down, both hands pressed tight to the sheets as he fucked him hard in the attempt to get no more than groans out of him. Groans could easily come from anyone. The voice, like that of a spoiled child, could only ever come from Hugo.
Mikhail groaned beautifully. As soft and gentle as his cultured manner of speech.
“Shall we, then?” Hugo kissed Fergus’s cheek again.
“Go upstairs and wank off if you want.” Fergus snapped at him, aware that his own voice lacked any refinement at all. “Can’t you tell I’m not in the mood?”
Hugo pulled away from him. “I see.” He raised his chin. “Then I shall take my book to bed. One can still find enjoyment going over something already familiar if one tries hard enough.”
He walked to the fireplace and lifted his book from the floor and Fergus watched him leave, a little stunned by the fact that he never took any alcohol with him.
Chapter Four
Light shone through the small, cracked glass window high above Mikhail’s head and he watched it stream across the dirt floor and illuminate a few of the tattered wooden steps of the staircase. He made an attempt to move and gritted his teeth at the pain that shot through his entire body. So fearful had he been, as he could not be sure of his surroundings, he had sat cramped and awake the whole night with only his thoughts for company.
At some point during the long hours he realised he had brought his mobile phone out with him but he searched through all of his pockets, fruitlessly. He must have either dropped it in Hugo’s car or somewhere around the lock-up and he prayed that it was in the cellar. It was possible that it fell when he tumbled down the stairs and if that was the case it would be about here somewhere. The light was his salvation. If enough of it could fill the filthy room perhaps he could find his phone and call for help.
Something caught his eye. Could it be? Could luck have finally come his way and that was actually his mobile lying beneath one of the broken wooden slats?
It was.
Mikhail gave a joyful cry and ignored the pain in his leg as he began to crawl over to staircase. His white trousers became increasingly filthy by the second but he couldn’t have cared less. Recently, he had not minded getting dirty as he was on the floor making love with Fergus. Now he was tolerating the dust and grime in the effort to save his life.
Mikhail had slim wrists. Any normal man would never have been able to reach through the gap in the wood but he could and he allowed himself a smug smile on his success. He would get out of this alive. One call to Cain, and his faithful security man, known cryptically as The Legend, would be here in a matter of minutes.
Thankfully the phone still operated but as Mikhail stared at the backlit screen he could see that not only was the battery low, the damn thing was not picking up a signal.
With the phone clasped tightly in one hand, he crawled back over to his previous spot beneath the window, with a vain hope that he would somehow be able to manage just that one call to his faithful employee.
There was a crate that had formerly contained canned fruit, pressed against the wall. How it would have ended up in such a place was a mystery to Mikhail but right now it was about the only useful thing in the room. Carefully, Mikhail stood up on it and winced as he held the phone up as close as he could get to the window.
The bar that indicated reception quality flickered, but only for a second.
“Come on, get a signal…” he mumbled painfully.
Suddenly, he heard a loud creak.
At first Mikhail thought that it was the crate about to give way beneath him. Then he wished that it had been. The door to the cellar opened and Hugo walked purposefully down the stairs. Mikhail stepped quickly down from the crate and stood with his back to the wall, the phone clutched tightly in his hand.
“I was about to say rise and shine! But I see that you already have. Although, you really are not so shiny any more are you?” Hugo voice was heavy with sarcasm. He reached out his hand and gripped Mikhail tightly by the chin. He stared intensely into Mikhail’s eyes then suddenly, his attention shifted down to the phone that was clutched between Mikhail’s trembling fingers.
“Oh, now what were you doing with this, hmm?” Hugo snatched the mobile and stepped back a little. He pressed the buttons and stared at the screen. “No saved texts, Mikhail? I am surprised. Don’t you like keeping some? As mementos perhaps?”
Mikhail was too terrified to answer. His mind raced over exactly what was in the phone’s memory but someone who ran a brothel was used to being secretive. There were no files, for instance, back at his office. Nothing that would incriminate any of his high profile clients, should his premises ever be the subject of a raid. No matter how unlikely it was that the police would stage a swoop, Mikhail took no chances.
“And you have no speed dials?” Hugo looked up, his dark eyes filled with a mischievous glint.
“I…I am…” Mikhail stammered nervously. “I am dialling my numbers by hand.
It…keeps the memory fit.”
Hugo threw his head back and laughed as though they had just shared some hilarious joke. “Ever the smart one. But I am smarter. I of course knew that you get no phone signal here. But, to be on the safe side…” He casually dropped the phone to the ground and crushed it to pieces under the heel of his boot. Mikhail stared downwards as his only hope of rescue lay scattered into a dozen useless fragments. When he managed to raise his eyes from the forlorn heap of circuits on the floor, they widened in sheer terror. Hugo had a rope held tightly between his hands. “Just in case you get any more smart ideas.”
Hugo grabbed Mikhail by the shoulders and turned him. He thrust him violently against the wall and tied his wrists tightly. He then firmly secured the rope to a pipe that ran down the full length of the wall. Mikhail had no chance or energy to struggle and he bowed his head in misery. It was hopeless. He was trapped.
Held captive by someone he knew to have murdered before.
When Hugo let him go, Mikhail turned to face him again. The rope gave him virtually no scope for movement at all, just as Hugo probably intended.
Mikhail knew from his studies of psychology at university that his only hope now as a victim was to try to force Hugo to see him as a person.
It was a thought that chilled him.
Mikhail was a victim.
Hugo’s hair had slipped to the side, no doubt during the forceful way in which he had tied Mikhail’s hands. There was a large bruise at the side of his cheek. Something Mikhail had not noticed before as the dark waves had almost certainly covered it deliberately. “What happened to your face, Hugo? That is quite some bruise.”
Hugo frowned and reached up his hand to pull his hair back over his cheek again.
“Accident…” He looked rather peeved for a moment but recovered with a frightening haste. Once more Mikhail felt completely petrified. “You should be careful, Mikhail.
Accidents happen. You don’t want one to happen to you now, do you?” He smiled and lifted a bag from the corner of the stairs, where he must have dropped it on his arrival.
“I brought you some food. I didn’t want to seem like a bad host. Are you hungry?”
“Yes.” Mikhail replied, acutely aware of the gnawing pains of hunger that had steadily grown in his stomach. “I am.”
“Shame.” Hugo tied the bag that contained the food in a tight knot and threw it some distance away. Mikhail stared ahead in horror. “Oh you should see your face!”
Hugo laughed childishly and waggled his fingers in a sinister impersonation of a playful wave. “Bye, bye! Don’t pig out now!”
*
The Seishin Casino was filled with the raucous banter of hundreds of numpties just desperate to throw their cash away and Judas sat confidently in front of the roulette wheel. He didn’t consider himself to be one of them. His eyes flitted from the little ball which clattered round in a noisy circuit to the curvaceous breasts of the hostess as she leaned to take his chips off him. “Fuck!” He turned to Vinny who sat at his side. Vinny hadn’t bothered to get any chips of his own and it seemed that he preferred to just sit and watch him play. “Vinny! Give me a decent number, man, for fuck sake!”
“Naw.” Vinny shook his head with amusement. “Only chips I am thinking about right now come with fish. And plenty of salt and vinegar.”
“I have no idea why you are not a fat bastard, Vin.” Judas placed his bet. The large heavy gold bracelet that he wore glinted under the light. The jewellery had been a gift from Vinny, and Judas was stunned as it actually looked like genuine gold. The weight and everything. If only the folk he currently acquired his fake Louis Vuitton bags from would pay such attention to detail and make them look half as legit. “If you are not thinking about food, you are actually eating. A bit like me and fucking.” Judas looked up at the hostess and grinned. “Don’t listen to me, doll. I’m a sweetheart really.”
