by Box Set
“I’ve got an even better idea,” said Hart, stepping away from the fireplace and resting his gun against the back of Matis’ skull. “How about you get on your knees.” I watched with fascination as Matis jarred to a stop, his face paling at Hart’s softly spoken words. “Beauty.” Off his lips the name held a wealth of tenderness, unlike when Matis spat it out with such disparaging care, “would you mind disarming Matis for me, love?”
There was that word again, and it did something unfamiliar to my body, making my stomach flutter and heart warm. Standing, I took the few short steps forward but hesitated to reach and take the gun I knew Matis wore in a holster under his jacket. Not because of fear, but because I wanted to savor every moment of the sweet burning anger that bled into Matis’ reddening face.
“If he tries anything, I’ll pull this trigger, and you can watch his blood decorate this ridiculous white room.” Hart’s description warmed my heart even further. He thought I was scared and was hoping to make me feel safe. It was . . . sweet. “You would like that, wouldn’t you?” he said with a grin. I tried to fight my smile, but it was as futile as Matis believing he would leave this room breathing.
Matis seethed, spittle flying from his lips as he hissed, “You fucking touch me and I’ll gut you, girl.”
He could try, he might even get a fist to my flesh, but Hart would pull the trigger, and Matis would cease to exist. Such a beautiful ending for such a vile human being. While it seemed a pretty ending to his life, it was too quick for what he truly deserved. I wanted to taunt and play a little first. Reaching forward, I peeled Matis’ jacket aside and wrapped my fingers around the gun, drawing it away. And Matis didn’t move. So disappointing.
“He’s little more than a pitiful twat when someone bigger and meaner is in the room.” Hart tauntingly chuckled, kicking Matis in the back of the legs and sending him to his knees with a grunt. Another weapon was removed from Matis’ ankle holster, then Hart backed away, keeping his gun trained on the furious man as he sunk into the sofa behind me.
“He’s all yours, Beauty. What would you like to do to him, hmmm?”
What did I want to do to him? I wanted to degrade him. I wanted to make him scream. I wanted to destroy him piece by piece until all that was left was a bloody mess of flesh and bone. Before I could do anything, though, I had unanswered questions that had burned on my tongue for the last three years.
“Why do you hate me?” I wondered aloud, my voice soft and feminine again after the monstrous growl that had slipped from my lips in the kitchen.
Matis didn’t answer. Instead, he spat at me before clamping his lips shut, the phlegm landing on my shirt. My gaze dropped to the offensive mess, and unable to stand anything of this man on any part of me for a second longer, I unbuttoned the shirt and peeled it from my skin, leaving my top bare. Nudity was something I had been unwillingly forced to find comfort in. Clothes, even though they gave me a measure of control and a feeling of being human again, almost felt constricting against my body. Before I could repeat my question, fabric was wrapped over my shoulders. The coarse texture of Hart’s long-sleeved shirt caressed my skin.
“I don’t want him to see you like that anymore.”
A new question was set ablaze. Why? Why would Hart care who saw my nakedness?
“Wear it for me, please.”
His softly whispered plea, though confusing, touched my heart. I passed him Matis’ weapon so I could pull the shirt over my head. Before I could cover my breasts and stomach, Hart stopped me with a hand over mine.
“I heard a rumor once, Matis. Something about knives and fucking.” Matis looked flustered, but still refused to speak. “Tell me, did you put these marks on Beauty’s fair skin?” With his free hand, Hart moved to touch a long, fine silver scar on my stomach. Even though I was nervous with his contact, I didn’t shy away from it, because for now, I was going to trust him. There was also something comforting in the way his finger barely whispered across my flesh. Maybe I was so ravenous for gentle affection I could perhaps ignore the fact that this man had no damn boundaries when it came to touching me. “What about this one?” he continued, one finger tracing a barely discernable line along my rib cage. My body felt peculiar, my breasts heavy as my nipples drew to hard peaks. “What about, this one?” Another of Matis’ marks was pointed out, this one following the line of my collar bone. Everywhere Hart’s calloused finger contacted my flesh, a tingling sensation was left in its wake. The feeling was unlike anything I could remember, the tenderness peeling away the thorns that surrounded my heart. Taking the fabric from my fingers, Hart tugged the shirt down over my nakedness. “Tell me, Matis, does the thought of your flesh being sliced open turn you on?”
Hart dropped his chin on my shoulder, as he had in the dungeon, and like an affection-starved cat, I leaned into him, my cheek brushing his. Snaking his arm around my front, Hart placed the weapon back in my hand, and we stood there in a loose embrace, watching Matis tremble with barely restrained anger.
“Your timing is rather inconvenient, Hart,” Matis forced out. “You see, Algimas had grown bored of his plaything. She’s getting older, her flesh bears scars, and he prefers them younger, tighter, innocent.” Matis speared me with a hateful look. “Today he was handing her over to me. Do you want to know what I had planned for you, Beauty?” I didn’t move, but my body tensed as if to protect myself from whatever rubbish he was going to throw my way. “I was going to use my favorite blade.” Matis grinned, the look on his face one with which I was intimately acquainted, pure evil. “I was going to slice open your stomach and fuck your intestines—”
Uncaring of what else he had to say, I lifted the gun and pointed it right at his head.
“Go on, you stupid cunt, pull the fucking trigger.”
Hart’s hand wrapped around mine, embracing me and the weapon simultaneously. His lips brushed my ear, and goose pimples blossomed across my flesh.
“That would be too quick and painless. I have something else in mind.” Then Hart proceeded to murmur instructions for some things he wanted me to collect from the dungeon.
Minutes later, after I’d gathered everything he’d asked for, Matis lay trussed up on the floor, naked, his arms and legs hogtied behind him, rope wrapped around his neck and attached to the knots at his back. The way in which Hart so easily subdued the large man, his deft fingers looping and tying off the rope was hypnotic.
“First things first,” Hart began, and I stood beside him, eagerly anticipating whatever he had in mind. “Music. There is nothing quite as beautiful as blood spilled to the perfect song.” With his phone in hand, Hart took his time to scroll through a selection of music, eventually making his choice. From the living room speakers a song began to play, and he watched my reaction while wearing a smile filled with expectation and excitement. I wasn’t familiar with this particular piece of music, but as a woman began to sing about running, and hiding, and a hunger inside, I decided I quite liked it. “Monsters, by Ruelle. Appropriate, don’t you think?”
Turning his attention back to Matis, who continued to curse us out in Russian, Hart shook his head with a tsk.
“We really have no use for his words. Screams, yes, but this verbal diarrhoea he’s suddenly developed is quite curable. Would you care to help me, love?”
Kneeling down alongside Matis, Hart held a scalpel in one hand and I quickly joined him, both curious and excited about what would happen next.
“Obviously our prey can be quite unwilling to have their tongues removed, so we need an extra set of hands for this. Be a doll and pinch his nose, hmmm?”
Was he kidding? Pinch his nose? Hart watched my confused gaze and nodded toward Matis. Not wanting to disappoint, I reached forward and pinched Matis’ nostrils together. He had gone abruptly quiet, all bar a few pathetic grunts, slamming his mouth shut to avoid Hart reaching his tongue. Soon enough though, his lips parted as he sucked back a long breath of air and Hart was quick to grab the man’s tongue, pull it between his li
ps, and slice with fast precision. Matis roared with pain, the shrilling sound entrancing as it bounced off the white, sterile walls.
“I thought you’d like that,” Hart purred, noticing my smile.
Then he proceeded to methodically cut Matis, the slices into his flesh deep and exact. All the while he explained how the right placed cuts can either expedite death, or in some cases, make it nice and slow. Like now.
“When a person is injured and begins losing blood, the body immediately begins working overtime in an attempt to save our prey. Their adrenaline and noradrenaline levels will rise, their blood vessels will constrict, and their heart will speed up but give a thready pulse to try to get oxygen to parts of the body that need it. ’They’ll also begin producing more blood and fluids to try to make up for the lost volume, which, of course, is futile.”
Matis was breathing hard and fast, spittle and blood oozing from his injured mouth, garbled pained sounds spilling out. It was utterly horrific and absolutely glorious.
“Soon Matis will begin to feel cold, and his kidneys will likely fail. While in agonizing pain, he will get light headed and dizzy, all the while knowing that his ending is so very near.”
Then began the sobbing, and my eyes widened in astonishment. Matis was crying.
“Everyone faces death differently, love. Some go out with dignity, though I confess, they are few. Matis here just pissed himself, very undignified, if I say so myself.”
“He is weak,” I whispered, and Hart grinned.
“That he is, love.”
Whispered flutters filled my stomach, and I recalled a distant memory of feeling this same way when the boy I danced with touched my most intimate parts. Why I would feel it with Hart was quite confusing, but I had to admit I did prefer feeling this way over the pain and rage that normally filled my body. Finally stepping away, Hart placed the scalpel down carefully on a glass top coffee table, then used a towel I had retrieved from the laundry to begin wiping his hands clean. Gazing down upon Matis, Hart appeared proud as punch, with a slight glimmer to his eye that reminded me of mischief and exhilaration.
Glancing back at the slowly dying Matis, a mess of blood and body fluid, I felt nothing but a settling kind of peace. There was no horror, no shock, or disgust. Just a quiet that I hadn’t felt in many years. The humiliation, fear, and pain he’d wrought on my body had been avenged, and the calm settling peace left in its wake was sheer perfection.
HART
The death Beauty had planned for Matis was too easy, quick, and painless. I’d shown her another way, and the fascination burning in her eyes as she watched me make each exact cut into Matis’ flesh made my cock hard and desire burn fierce. She didn’t recoil at the sight of blood pooling onto the carpet, and she didn’t flinch each time he let out a bellow of pain. In fact, the glassy look in her eyes was almost lustful. Beauty was now examining the sound system again. With obvious confusion, she glanced over her shoulder and pointed at the device.
“Can we have more music?”
Using my phone, I checked I still had a Bluetooth signal, then found Richard Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries.” It seemed appropriate, dramatic maybe, but suiting to the occasion. Beauty’s eyes lit up as soon as the music began, and she was pulled into dance, unable to stop herself. In nothing but my shirt, which fell mid-thigh, she was goddess. Matis lay bleeding out in the center of the room, red blood a stark contrast against the white carpet and furnishings. And Beauty danced around the macabre centerpiece, taking care not to step into the gore, while I sat on the sofa, more than content to watch.
***
The smell in the dungeon was pretty rank, Algimas having shit where he hung. The wounds on his ears had stopped bleeding, and his neck and chest were coated in dried blood. From the angle of his shoulders, I would say they had slipped from their sockets some time ago, probably attributing to the fact he was currently passed out. From my back pocket, my cell phone vibrated, and I pulled it free, checking the display before answering. Boss. My lips twitched, a smile threatening to crack my composure. Charlie Decena was not a patient man.
“Señor Decena,” I answered.
“Status.”
Abrupt and to the point, that was the man who ruthlessly controlled the Los Zetas. If our friendship hadn’t been formed under the circumstances it had, he might not have tolerance for my delay in the retrieval of a man he was itching to kill.
“I’ve met with him.”
“And?”
“And . . .” I stalled, walking around Algis’ putrid body, “we’ll be at the warehouse in . . .” Glancing at my watch, I quickly calculated the time I would need. “Thirty-two hours.”
“What’s the hold up?”
“I found a broken doll.”
Silence followed.
“How broken?”
“I’m in the process of fixing it.”
Charlie huffed out an impatient breath of air.
“You don’t have time to play doctor, Hart. Get on with it. Algimas is mine to kill, sooner rather than later.”
“I can probably bring that thirty-two down to twenty-eight,” I offered. It should be enough time for Beauty to do what she needed to do.
Charlie went silent again. “What the fuck are you doing, Hart?”
He sounded tired, which was completely unlike Charlie Decena.
“She’s . . . special. Trust me to take care of this.”
“If it were anyone else . . .”
He didn’t finish, and he didn’t need to. Our bond gave me a little more leeway than most, but even with that friendship, there was only so much bullshit that Charlie would put up with. The line went dead, and I slipped the phone into my back pocket.
“What the fuck do you want?”
The weary tenor brought a smile to my lips, and my head rose to take in the haggard face of Algimas. Deep bruises hung under his eyes, but they still held the fire of a powerful man whose rage was only held back by the predicament in which he found himself.
“Thirsty?” I asked, grabbing a bottled water I had procured from the fridge in the kitchen.
“You’re going to allow me water?”
“Can’t have you dying before we reach Mr. Decena.”
Angling the bottle toward his lips, I poured and watched as the wretched bastard tried to get as much of the liquid as possible. Most of it trickled down his front, but he managed a few mouthfuls before I pulled the water away. I was only giving him enough to keep him alive. I didn’t want him thriving . . . or thinking I gave a shit.
“People will be looking for me,” he spluttered.
“People like Matis?” I asked.
Algimas didn’t reply, but the confidence in his eyes told me I’d hit the nail on the head.
“He’s lying dead in your living room. Bled out from a cut . . . well, a few cuts I guess you could say. Nine to be precise. I’m not sure you’ll get that stain out of the carpet.”
“You killed him?” he hissed, affronted by my confession in a way that made me wonder if they had been more than employer and employee. Perhaps their friendship hadn’t been unlike that of mine and Charlie’s. Or maybe, just maybe, Matis’ apparent hatred of Beauty had more to do with jealousy?
“I did,” I answered truthfully. “In fact, I saved him from a quick, painless death when Beauty threatened to shoot him in the head. She watched, you know. Enraptured is the only way I could describe the look on her face.”
Fury had the man’s body move without consent, and he screamed at the pain radiating from his shoulders. Turning, I moved to the bin to discard the water bottle, enjoying every dulcet tone in his cries.
“Maybe we can come to some sort of an arrangement?”
Algimas’ voice, though quiet and through gritted teeth, echoed off the walls. It was always the same when death came knocking. Protest, resentment, bribery, and eventually begging. Whatever they could conjure in their tiny little minds to get them out of their predicament, to escape my wrath when it whispered
so closely, or in this case, Decena’s wrath. There would be no bartering, but I was more than happy to play a game with the rapist arsehole. Giving him a fleeting chance and then abruptly yanking it away would be fun. Ordinarily, I would just beat him until his teeth were spat from his mouth and his breath was rasping through broken ribs, but I was leaving all of that for Beauty. He was hers to break. Turning, I strolled forward with my hands resting behind my back, feigning interest as I came to a stop directly before his hanging body.
“What did you have in mind?”
Eyes lit with hope, Algimas lifted his head and winced when his body jostled just slightly.
“Five million American dollars and my US property portfolio.”
A rare bark of laughter left my lips. Money? If he’d heard the rumors about me, he would know it was something I was not in short supply of. Hope turned to anger, and he snarled, “I’ll throw in the girl, for free.”
Shaking my head, my smile disappeared at the mention of Beauty.
“Algimas, I want for nothing, and the girl?” My hands slipped free to hang loosely by my sides. “She’s already mine, and I didn’t have to beat her or rape her to make it so.”
The muscles in my body tensed, my fist curled, and I pulled my arm back before letting in fly forward, a hammer of a punch landing on his jaw. The crunch was highly satisfying, the tooth spat to the floor and blood oozing down his chin sublime.
“You have nothing I want,” I whispered in his ear as his head hung forward, shaking out my fist. “You disgust me, and once you are dead and buried, I will transfer every cent you own to a convent in Italy for abused women.”
“I have another.”
His words were slurred, but I heard them and stilled. Another? This sick fuck had another girl? Stepping back, I looked into his eyes, wanting and needing to see the truth in them.
“Blonde hair, blue eyes. Thirteen, young, ripe for the taking. I’ve already paid and the contract is signed. Let me go, and I’ll give her to you.”
