by Box Set
By the time the clock strikes four A.M., I'm relieved the game is over. We're all leaving to go home.
At the front doors, while Rumo is bidding us all goodbye, Charlie gives me this weird look, blatantly staring at me in front of everyone.
“We still on for tomorrow then, Charlie?” Carl repeats his question because Charlie isn't paying attention. He's just...well, he's looking at me with his hands shoved in his jeans pockets.
I disregard his scrutiny and link arms with Maksim because he's out of his mind drunk. I help him stagger across the driveway and into my car. When he's slumped in the passenger seat, I slip into the driver's seat, fire up the engine, and reverse out of the driveway.
“Here you go.” He passes me a bundle of cash for fighting. He always pays me for what I do, which is sort of odd, given he doesn't pay James.
“Thank you, Cэp Maksim.” Leaning over him, I click open the glove compartment and shove the bundle inside. Then I steer out of the suburban street with the security detail on our trail.
“My friend Charlie has taken a liking to you,” Maksim says. I can feel his golden eyes on my face, scanning my reaction.
“I wouldn't know,” I lie for the second time tonight, my expression impassive. I'm not sure Charlie's reasons are genuine, but he's definitely pursuing me. I'm not an idiot.
“You would tell me if he tried anything with you, wouldn't you, My Little Pet?”
My stomach twists with disloyalty. It's almost crushing. I should tell Maksim about the things Charlie said to me. That he's curious and that I can choose my own path if I really wanted to. That he'd be on my side. But I just...I just can't. I've never kept anything from Maksim before, but this, what Charlie and I spoke about, it feels weirdly private. And, I don't want to go over it at all, if I'm truly honest. I don't want to analyze. I just want to forget. I want Charlie to piss off back to wherever he came from so my life can go back to normal.
“After I've broken his nose for touching me,” I say in response to Maksim's question, blank of emotion, “of course.”
That makes him laugh, though in a lazy manner since he's tired.
“You are a good, loyal, little pet.” He snuggles down in his coat and rests his eyes. I cannot help thinking over what he just said. Charlie has taken a liking to you.
The man is out to cause trouble. I know it. I wish I knew why.
“Do you have anything you want to ask?” Maksim says in a sleepy voice.
There's a million things I want to ask, but only one question makes sense. I brace myself for a blow as I say, “Who is Charlie exactly?”
The blow doesn't come. Maksim doesn't move in his seat.
He's quiet for a while. I train my attention on the road, so I don't look too interested.
“Remember last month?” he says in time. “Tatiana and I had you study Mexico and the Los Zetas?”
Tatiana is his boss—and more, the Russian Mafia leader. She never makes an appearance unless it’s absolutely necessary, and that’s only ever when she needs to cause bloody murder.
I nod when Maksim looks at me, then I turn right onto the highway.
“Charlie Decena is the son of the man who first deserted his army rank and created the Los Zetas.” Maksim doesn't sound too comfortable speaking about this. He pauses every so often. “They are considered the most dangerous criminal organization in the world. It is famous for their torture techniques and power throughout Southern America.”
That explains the American accent with a touch of Latin.
“Charlie in particular is known famously for his wicked torture techniques,” Maksim continues. “He likes to break women down with pleasure and pain, always ensuring their humanity remains intact—you know, sort of like how I taught you to murder women while they stare at photos of their children?” Maksim laughs like he's proud of this, his voice a bit croaky. “Women are nothing if not weak when it comes to humanity.”
I cannot relate to this, so I don't ponder over it too much.
“And the men?” I ask, swerving into the fast lane. “How does he torture men?”
Maksim stares at me with grave, golden eyes. “He will chop off their cocks inch by inch, and so slowly that time feels like it no longer exists.”
7
After a long, emotionally grueling weekend of watching Maksim's back, I return home and try for the fifteen minutes Charlie wants to shut down London.
James texts to say he's okay, informing me that he has a few broken ribs, bruised kidneys, and a bloody, messed up face. He'll be right as rain in a few weeks.
You know I'm sorry, don't you?
Though I never usually would, I text him back. I just feel so guilty about what I did. It's fucking weird. I never feel guilt for anything. I don't know what's sparking my emotions.
I know you're sorry. Don't worry about me. I'm fine. And I hope that you are too. Text or call if you need me.
That makes me smile, a little. Hopefully by the time I see him again, he'll look as good as new and this frustrating guilty feeling will leave me the hell alone.
Putting everything and everyone out of my mind, I focus on the job at hand, working my butt off in my office.
I'm exhausted by day three.
The swelling on my left eye and lip has gone down a bit, so I'm almost back to normal. Well, physically I am. Mentally, I'm fucked.
Regardless, I continue punching in codes and filling London's CCTV system with glitches so I can take over it, but by the end of the week, it's confirmed that it is impossible to grasp fifteen minutes. When the system locks me out, that's it, and it's always at eleven minutes.
I can do no more, and my time to try is up.
Two hours it takes me to work up the courage to call Maksim, two bloody hours, because I know he's going to punish me for failing.
And I'm not wrong.
He isn't happy when I lie and say that I need another week, that I only have eleven minutes—I'm just trying to spare my ass some time. He curses through the phone in Russian, telling me, “Charlie will lose it if we don't give him what he needs, Blaire. Do you understand that? Do you fucking understand what he'll do to me? To us? Pizdets!” He screams with fury. “This is the fucking end!”
I'm quiet throughout the whole ordeal, shitting bricks. Once he's finished yell-rambling, he hangs up on me. He shows up at my apartment half an hour later, as I knew he would. Punishing me in my own home is his way of letting me know that while I don't live with him, I can't escape him.
Three loud knocks echo through my personal space. My heart is racing. My palms are sweating, and my mouth is so dry.
With a trembling hand, I open the front door to him and stand there with as much innocence as I can conjure up, sinking into my shoulders and my waist length hair.
He looks the part in a sharp gray suit paired with a crisp white shirt, but that's where his customary, docile facade ends. His eyes flair with disappointment as he looks down at me, shaking his head.
This isn't good.
Though Maksim sometimes beats me to teach me a lesson, he never looks disappointed with me.
He must really be scared of Charlie.
“You don't often let me down, My Little Pet.” His lips curl against natural white teeth. “I'm very, very unhappy with you.”
I drop my eyes to the floor so my hair curtains my face, mentally blocking out what's to come. He's an unpredictable sadist. One minute he'll whip me, and the next he'll drown me—or worse, he’ll burn me.
I hope he'll just whip me today.
Reaching out, he grabs my wrist and drags me through the living area, into my bedroom. I stumble to keep up with him, my naked feet slapping against the marble floors.
By the floor to ceiling windows opposite my bed, he twirls me around to face him, knocking me off balance.
“You know what happens next,” he warns, then he orders in Russian, “On all fours with your trousers and panties down!”
When he lets go of my wrist, my thoughts g
o white. I scramble to obey, dropping to my hands and knees. Without shame—Maksim has seen my unclothed body more times than I care to remember—my sports trousers come down, then my underwear. I must leave them around my knees, I've always thought because the elastic in my trousers ties my knees together.
Cool air breezes through my thighs, blowing over my naked sex. A hand lifts up my t-shirt and bunches it around my waist, then a single finger runs over the scars on my back. I shiver quietly, holding myself up on all fours.
“Podgotovsja!” Maksim yells from behind for me to prepare, his voice resonating through the double height room.
I do. I try to relax as best as I can but it's so difficult.
The seconds tick by. I'm counting in my head. One. Two. Three. Four. I imagine he's standing there looking at my scars and at my naked ass like a hungry man starved of rage. There's nothing more in this world Maksim enjoys over inflicting pain.
He fumbles with his belt, and I can tell he's using both hands. I've seen and listened to him do this for ten years.
Though I'm relieved that he's only going to belt me, the sound of metal clanging against metal makes me cringe, sending me into some dark place in my mind.
White thoughts. Focus on your white thoughts. It's so hard. If there's ever a sound I'd love never to hear again, it's that.
He pulls his belt free with a loud, woosh. I cower to brace myself, letting my hair curtain my face, the ends dripping over the floor.
The first whip whistles through the air, then a powerful SMACK rings right through me. I jump subconsciously, a desperate scream stuck in my throat preventing my ability to breathe for a moment.
My head rushes with the lack of oxygen. He gives me a moment, and I somehow manage to suck in a lung full of air.
“Podgotovsja!” he yells again for me to prepare.
I squeeze my eyes and my teeth shut, fisting my fingers and my toes.
Wa-tch!
I jolt in my own skin.
“Podgotovsja!”
Wa-tch!
“Podgotovsja!”
Wa-tch!
My ass and the backs of my thighs are on fire, each welt throbbing. But I don't move, nor do I cry out, even while tears swim in my eyes. I just take the beating, going into a numb zone.
———
Eleven strikes in succession, Maksim groaning after each one, and then it's over.
I almost pass out with relief that it's over. My head swims with endorphins. I take deep, steady breaths now that I can, blinking away the black spots in my vision.
The belting wasn't that bad. I've suffered much, much worse. If anything, I think Maksim has been too soft on me.
“One more week, Blaire,” he says, leaning over me from behind. The buttons on his suit are cold against my naked, wounded flesh. “If you do not successfully attain fifteen minutes, this”—he rubs my ass with a rough, open palm, starting with my left cheek, and then my right, making me wince—“will be child's play compared to how I will punish you.”
The next breath I take in swells in my throat. He's been soft with me so the next hiding takes full effect. Now it makes sense.
“I want to see you at my house on Saturday at nine P.M.,” he whispers, a Russian gargle in each of his words. “My driver will collect you from here.”
Saturday is exactly one week from today. I'm petrified. I'll never have his fifteen minutes, and I know that what he says is the truth. This was child's play compared to what he's going to do to me.
“You understand, Blaire?”
“Ye-yes, Cэp Maksim.”
“Good. You can pull up your clothes, My Little Pet.”
Under his tall frame because he's still towering over me, I pull down my t-shirt, then pull up my underwear and trousers.
Maksim stands back when I'm fully clothed, ordering, “Get up.”
Pushing to my feet, I grimace, grinding my teeth because my clothes chafe against my red and sore behind. Yeah, it wasn't that harsh of a beating but it still stings.
“Here, My Little Pet.” Maksim passes me a bottle of cream from his suit jacket pocket. Hunching down, he kisses my face, pressing his lips to the sharp of my cheekbone. “So you can focus on the job and not your pain. You know the drill. Apply three times a day.”
His arms wrap around me, burying my face in his warm chest, sheathing me in the smell of burnt brut. I remain as still as a rock, empty of emotion, my hands hanging by my sides. I'm used to this for this is how Maksim comes. A beating follows disobedience and tenderness follows brutality. It's always been this way.
“You know,” he husks out, brushing down the back of my hair over the curves of my spine, “if you want to make me happy again, why don't you get on your knees, My Little Pet?”
My heart leaps into my throat, but I obey. Shutting my eyes, I slide through his embrace, down to my knees, and reach for the zipper of his trousers with one hand, squeezing the bottle of cream in my other. I will myself not to think about it while he strokes the top of my head. If I hurry, it'll be over.
“Cэp Maksim,” I hear from behind, and my heart sinks.
“Ahhh, My Pet,” Maksim purrs. “What a surprise.”
I glance over to see James standing in the doorway, dressed in his black combat gear. In a panic, I try to check out his face to see if he's okay but I'm too guilty-nervous. I know what happens next.
“I'm sorry,” he says, lifting a defensive hand. “I didn't know you were here. I just wanted to check in on Blaire because I haven't heard from her in a while.”
“Ohhh, of course you did, My Pet.” Maksim chuckles with dark desire, and I feel him stare down at me as he whispers, “Always just in time, isn't he, Blaire?”
I flinch against my given name. He shoves my head back, forcing me to fall on my sore ass. The bottle drops out of my hand with a light thud and rolls away under my bed. I consider crawling after it, but end up cuddling myself, gazing straight-faced at the floor. I'm pushing filthy images of him fucking James from my mind. He often makes me watch, but James says it's okay because at least I'm safe from Maksim's sexual attention.
It's quiet for a moment, bar the blood roaring in my ears. I expect they're exchanging knowing looks.
“Why don't you have Blaire make you some lunch, Cэp Maksim?” James comes up to us with artificial confidence. “I'll see to you.”
A Week Later
8
My eyes are heavy, and my body is lethargic. I've not slept properly in two days. I've been studying to the ends of the earth on The Dark Web for a way to gain complete control of London's CCTV system because my hacking skills have proved useless. As I feared, there's no way, so I'm here at Maksim's house in his office to collect my punishment. Hopefully, if it's brutal, he'll knock me out cold and I won't feel anything
Hopefully.
“I can do only eleven minutes, Cэp Maksim,” I confess, standing with my head down. “I'm sorry.”
“Only eleven minutes?”
“Yes,” I whisper, glancing up at him from beneath my lashes.
He's slouched back in his chair, behind his desk, hands clasped together in his lap.
“I'm really sorry, Cэp Maksim.”
“Oh, I'm sure you are, My Little Pet.”
Dropping my gaze, because I can't stand that half amused, half thwarted expression on his face, I kneel before his desk so he can hit me. I squeeze my eyes shut to brace myself. He warned me last week that this punishment would be brutal. I'm horrified to think about what he's going to do. The worse thing he's ever done was brand my skin. I passed out on the dining room table, only to be woken up in a bathtub full of freezing cold water.
The cold water hurt more than when he burned me, bizarrely so.
I can't go through that again. It was torture. I can't even explain what the recovery was like. My skin felt hot, irritated, and stretched out every time I moved my back.
“Stand up,” Maksim says.
With my eyes still on the floor, I do, but I almost lose
my balance because I'm shaking like a leaf.
“You know, My Little Pet”—his husky voice makes me shiver—“as a child, when I failed to do what was asked of me, my parents would brutally rape me to teach me a lesson.”
Is that what he's going to do, rape me?
I remember the way he looked at me when he was fucking that Albanian girl at the Asian Prince's party the other week. This has to be his next move. Nothing else makes sense.
I'm not scared if it is time for him to have me. I've always known this day would come.
“But I wouldn't do that to you,” he tells me. “Not brutally, anyway. You mean more to me than I meant to my parents.”
I pull my eyebrows together, wondering where he's going with this.
“There are other ways to teach you a lesson,” he says, and then he's quiet. The creaking sound of a chair makes me flinch, then a heavy hand lands on my shoulder. “Charlie Decena will have to make the most of eleven minutes. Look at me, My Little Pet.”
I lift my lashes to find his golden gaze.
“Is there anything you need?” he asks, a peculiar, evil expression on his face. “Or any questions you wish to ask?”
“Um...I might need a few extra computers, just if I get locked out of the CCTV system when I perform the job.”
“Of course.” He leans down and says in my ear, “I'll have them set up in your apartment for when you execute the job.” He kisses the side of my face with hard lips. “Now, you should go tell Charlie of your equal success and failure. He is out back.”
Great.
Coming down from the rush of fear that he was going to hit me, I nod, turn on my heel, and get the hell out of his office before he changes his mind and gives me a good bloody hiding. I follow the pounding music down the hallway to the kitchen. It's packed with half naked girls dancing all over the place in a drunken state, and an assortment of men whose eyes are glazed over. They're drugged up off powdery cocaine, mountains of it scattered across the white worktops and the dining table by the back doors.
