Pennies (Dollar #1)

by Pepper Winters

It doesn’t matter that I’ve become a master of sleeping while chained, breathing while bound, and living while beaten.

  I’ve done things I’m proud of. I’ve done things I’m not proud of. But ultimately, none of it matters.

  I felt things before, No One. I still believed in fantasies like hope and home and happiness. Now, all I believe in is numbness, the clinical assessment I manipulate my master with, and the ticking time bomb inside me that could detonate at any moment.

  Gone is the vain teenager who thought she would rule the world. My bones do their best to tiptoe from my skinny flesh. My eyes vacant and cold. The hair-cut he gave me has grown back tattered as a rag doll.

  I don’t care that he’s taken everything. There’s still one thing he’ll never have.

  Two years without a word.

  My voice is his holy grail and my ultimate fuck you. He will never earn it. Not that he’ll stop trying.

  Nine months ago, Master A broke my leg just to hear me scream. He earned that one. I couldn’t stop it. And yes, you heard that right. I stopped calling him Alrik when he…you know what? It doesn’t matter.

  All that matters is today is our anniversary.

  Two years.

  It will be our last anniversary.

  That I promise you.

  * * * * *

  “GET ON YOUR fucking knees, Pim.”

  My bruises bellowed, but I wouldn’t give him another reason to hit me. My kneecaps popped as I gingerly did as I was told.

  Living in this house with him? It was perpetual purgatory.

  I hated every damn second, but I hated waking up the most. At least asleep, I had some freedom. Free to be outside again. Laugh again. Run far, far away again.

  He was a bored asshole with nothing better to do than torment me. He didn’t go to work. He didn’t have staff apart from a cleaning crew that came once a week and a chef delivery service at six p.m. every day. His funds were unlimited. He had the power to get away with everything.

  In the beginning, I had no idea what made him tick or why he treated me so terribly. But two years was a long time, and I’d learned quickly. Every strike, every lash, every horrendous night spent beneath him gave me clues on how to survive.

  Answering back was not an option. Running, screaming, disobeying—they all earned me more pain than I could stand.

  But observation.

  That was my arsenal.

  At first, knowing his gait changed from smooth to choppy meant he’d rather whip me than fuck me didn’t help in the slightest. I couldn’t avoid whatever he had planned. It didn’t matter if his voice told me his mood or what torture recipes he plotted.

  But as time crept onward, it forewarned me. I fortified myself better, numbed my body, and won just by breathing. I began to understand who he was past the whips and chains and found him incredibly lacking. He was the epitome of a disgusting, spineless coward who kept me in line with violence.

  I’d entered his home believing I could remain strong.

  That was before the first rape.

  The first beating.

  The first kick and punch and whipping.

  My disobedience lasted longer than I thought, but it all screeched to a stop when he showed me the photos of what happened to his last girl.

  Dead.

  He killed her.

  However, as he wrapped yet another rope around my body to hold me down, he murmured that I wouldn’t end up the same as her. He’d paid quadruple for me what he’d paid for her. I truly was his most expensive toy, and even though he wanted to destroy my spirit and shackle me to his soul, he wouldn’t kill me.

  I was worth more alive than dead.

  It was a horrifying conclusion. And my defiance quickly switched from blatant to hidden. When I averted my eyes in submission, I really denied him the right to read me. When I pre-empted him by dropping to my knees, I refused him the chance to beat me.

  And while he made me do tasks completely naked, my mind wrapped itself in clothing full of retribution and revenge.

  I’d have one shot at killing him. Just one.

  And even if I did succeed, I had no guarantee I could escape without being smart. Everything in this house was on an electronic system. If I killed him without learning that code, I would die here. I refused to share a crypt with this rapist.

  “We have something to celebrate. Don’t you agree?” He stalked around me with his narrow chin held high. “Two years, my dear. I can imagine at your tender age that’s the longest relationship you’ve ever had.”

  This isn’t a relationship, you pig.

  My upper lip twitched in disgust as I dropped my gaze to the sheepskin rug.

  Unfortunately, he’d seen my facial slur.

  His fist struck the side of my head. “Don’t fucking give me attitude, Pim! Not on our anniversary.”

  I tumbled sideways, shaking away throbbing stars, forcing my body back onto my knees before he kicked me to regain my pose. Ignoring the sudden headache, I catalogued his mood. Everything spoke to me these days—not just his demeanour but his chosen wardrobe, selected watch, even the way he styled his hair. Each was a clue to his disposition.

  As he strolled around me, prattling about how his drive into the city was good and whatever business he concluded went in his favour, I looked at his shoes (black loafers meant he was carefree and confident). I glanced at his trousers (light denim indicated his visit to town wasn’t entirely work related). My eyes trailed to his wrist and the gaudy gold Rolex (he wanted to show off today and flash his superiority). Finally, I snuck a look at the baby blue long-sleeved shirt (relaxed but preppy). However, the unbuttoned linen jacket was not part of his usual repertoire (he wanted to impress but still show indifference).

  To who?

  I didn’t like things I couldn’t understand.

  Had he dressed up for our ‘anniversary,’ or did he have guests coming tonight?

  My heart curled into its shell at the thought. When he’d first given me to his friends, Darryl, Tony, and Monty, I’d thrown up not only from the horror at being used by four men, but also from the repeated blows to my belly.

  Ever since then, the sharing was often. I didn’t have a choice. But at least his arrogance and those of his friends gave me a shelter in which to shut down and hide in. They could have my body, but while I floated in a world, not quite here and not quite there, I was able to keep my soul intact, and my voice forever denied to them.

  He yanked a hand through his spiky blond hair. “Were you a good girl while I was gone?”

  You know the answer to that, you bastard.

  I glowered at the wall.

  For some reason, whenever he left on errands, he was so sure I’d never find a way out, he didn’t bind me like he did at night. The first few instances he’d left me alone, I’d commandeered the knives in the kitchen, even scurried a few blades away with hope of killing him in his sleep.

  But when he’d returned, he’d known exactly what I’d done. Fisting my hair, he’d dragged me through the house, collecting the three butcher knives I’d tucked in secret places. After rounding up my arsenal, he’d carted me to a private security room in the garage hidden behind a piece of drywall and revealed how he’d known.

  Every inch of his property was recorded.

  How had I not seen any cameras?

  Not one blind spot or unreported room.

  At the time, my heart had grabbed a spade and dug a hole so deep and cavernous inside, I feared I’d never climb back out.

  But I had. Because I had no choice.

  “Ah now, Pim, don’t be like that. I’ve been gone for three hours…surely, you must’ve missed me.”

  Like I’d miss ebola.

  I narrowed my gaze, risking a look at him.

  The moment we made eye contact, he smirked. “Still refusing to speak, I see. You can clamp your lips together, hell, you can rip out your tongue, but I hear you screaming at me. I hear your retorts even if you don’t say them aloud.”


  I hate you.

  I hate you.

  I hate you.

  I hoped he’d heard those; the decibels vibrated through my body for any deaf or blind person to feel.

  He chuckled, ducking to my level on my knees. His fingertip traced the line of my jaw, deliberately pressing the bruise he’d left there last night. “You know…if you’d just spoken to me from the beginning, I might’ve been a little nicer to you.”

  Bullshit.

  I wrenched my face away from his touch.

  He sucked in an angry breath. His hand dropped to my naked chest, pinching my nipple. “I might’ve given you clothes, at least.”

  I don’t believe you.

  He wouldn’t. He had no compassion and only lived to hurt.

  The morning of my welcome, he’d stripped me of my white dress and never given it back. Once stolen, I had nothing. No clothes existed for me in any of the wardrobes of his twelve-bedroom estate. When I’d tried to commandeer one of his t-shirts, he’d beaten me so black, I avoided all the bathroom mirrors for weeks. Feeling him abuse me was one thing. Seeing the ownership and betrayal on my skin was entirely another.

  After that first initiation, I’d gone crazy. I’d flown around his house like a psychotic bird trapped in a cage. I’d rattled every door, clawed every window—I’d searched and searched for a chink in the house’s fortress, looking for something, anything to free me.

  I’d failed.

  However, my fight hadn’t faded.

  He’d tried to make me talk. He’d become…inventive with persuasion.

  But I hadn’t faltered.

  If he spoke to me, I stared at a wall. If he took me to bed, I shut down my mind. If he threw things or beat me, I curled tight around my soulcase and held on until it was over.

  And each time, I got back up.

  One step in front of the other…until one day, I would stop.

  But that day wasn’t today.

  Or tomorrow.

  “Do you know what special thing I have planned tonight?”

  Is it your death? That’s the only gift I want from you.

  “It’s gonna be a doubly awesome night for me.” Patting my head, he grinned. “First, I have a very important visitor who I expect you to entertain if requested.”

  I froze.

  “Second, once he’s gone…we’ll have our own celebration to mark two years.” He smirked. “Oh, while I was out, I went shopping. I picked up a new gag and fresh rope. I’m so generous when it comes to you, Pim.”

  The ladder and spade and parachute my heart had tried to escape with clattered against my ribs as the damn organ grew legs to sprint far, far away.

  He could keep his barbaric generosity.

  Heading to the small fridge beside the dressing table, where he kept a stock of beer to stay hydrated while spending hours making me wish I was dead, he twisted the top off his favourite brand and drank deep. “One thing you should know about tonight, Pim, is this bastard doesn’t know how unique our love is. It’s special; do you understand?”

  It took everything I had not to roll my eyes.

  You’re deluded. Insane!

  Love? Bah!

  His ownership of me was the very definition of fucked up.

  “You’ll be on your best behaviour because I have something else to give you.”

  My shoulders rolled, protecting myself from a wallop or painful kiss from whatever new item he’d purchased. My ability to read him had scrambled as if sudden inference switched his usual agenda.

  If you can’t predict him, you’ve failed Psychology 101.

  My mother wouldn’t be proud.

  My thoughts didn’t often go to her, but when they did, I wondered if she ever mingled with the bastard who’d taken me. Smiling at him, thinking he was there for her business all while he smirked with the secret of stealing me for profit.

  How much of the one point five million did he get for me?

  What would he get for me now? Now I was skinny and beaten and blue?

  Master A turned to face me.

  My flesh prickled with foreboding.

  All I wanted to do was shoot him and walk away. I needed good news to tell No One. Even though I shared my life with my imaginary pen friend, I couldn’t write most confessions.

  He’d hurt me worse than I wanted to immortalize in graphite. He could defile me, abuse me, and even cajole me to speak, but I would never give him what he wanted most.

  My voice.

  Sometimes, he brought me to the brink of speech through throttling or cutting me, hovering me on the precipice of saying one word to make him stop. But, as if sensing that if he made me talk, I would be worthless, he pulled back at the last excruciating moment.

  After such an incident, I used my remaining strength to barricade the door with my dresser—blocking him from hurting me further.

  He’d gone berserk, grabbing an axe from the garage, hacking through the immaculate furniture.

  And what he’d done when he got through…

  I shuddered, unable to relive it. But it didn’t stop my fingers trailing to my foot where every metacarpal had been broken as he stomped and brutalised me.

  “Stand up. I have a surprise for you.”

  Surprise?

  I hated surprises.

  Surprise meant being strangled.

  Surprise meant being sold.

  My lips clamped together as I stood.

  He vanished from the room only to return a second later with a bag. “Go on. Have a look at my gift. Don’t be an ungrateful bitch.”

  If I hadn’t taken a vow of soundlessness, I would’ve cursed his rotten soul. I would’ve screamed for him to die multiple times over.

  Taking a hesitant step, I accepted the bag and peeked inside.

  Clothes.

  Why the hell is he giving me clothes now…after all this time?

  Was he somehow hoping I’d forgive him for what he’d done? Cotton and silk couldn’t do that. Nothing could. Not that he’d ever be human enough to seek forgiveness or even sane enough to realise how sick he was.

  Not waiting for me to pull the clothing free, he yanked the bag from my fingers, and tossed the white garments on the floor. They merged with the tiles and sheepskin below. “Yours. I expect you to wear them.”

  When I didn’t move, he came up behind me, rubbing his erection into the crack of my ass. “Fuck, you piss me off not talking.” He slapped my thigh. “You think you’re so strong, but you’re not that strong. You don’t want to talk to me? I don’t need you to talk.”

  Biting my earlobe hard enough to draw blood, he laughed as I flinched. “One day, you’ll break, and when you do, I’ll fucking celebrate by listening to your screams.”

  Grabbing my nape, he marched me forward until I crashed against the dressing table. “Carry on not talking to me. I don’t need your girlish voice when I know you like to write.”

  My flesh rippled with indignation as a droplet of crimson from my bitten ear landed on my shoulder.

  He rolled his hips, digging his cock into my back. “Remember those notes I stole from you when you first arrived…they were entertaining reading. I want some more. I want to know what you feel when I take you. I want to know everything you keep locked inside that mute little brain.”

  I forced myself not to look over my shoulder at my hiding place. Sheets and sheets of notes to No One hidden so damn close to where we stood. I’d have nothing left if he found them.

  I couldn’t breathe as he slammed my face against a large book resting on the edge of the table. “This is another gift because I’m feeling like Santa fucking Claus tonight.” Pressing my cheek on the ornate bound diary, he hissed, “Scribble away, my dear. Let’s see what else you have to say about me.”

  The new Mont Blanc pen beside the new pages begged me to use it as a harpoon. To stab it in his eye and dance in his blindness.

  Do it.

  Kill him.

  Now!

  My fingers crawled
to the pen, but he swiped it into his fist. “On second thoughts…this is too good for you.” Licking my ear, he smeared my blood. “I see your plans, Pim. Shame on you for thinking about using my gift for other activities.”

  Damn you.

  Screw you!

  Let me go!

  Hot, angry tears blurred my vision.

  And then nothing else mattered as he threw me to the floor and planted his foot into my stomach. “Such an ungrateful bitch. The things I do for you!”

  Kick.

  Kick.

  Kick.

  Instinct curled me tight, but discipline made me unravel and accept. I’d long since learned trying to avoid his tirade only brought another and another.

  “You think you’re better than me. You’re not!”

  Kick.

  Kick.

  My ribs screamed. My lungs suffocated. I hurt.

  I’m strong enough to obey.

  The doorbell rang with perfect punctuation of his damning abuse. The cheery chime sent blades slicing down my spine.

  Breathing hard, he reached down and almost ripped a handful of my hair as he dragged me to my wobbly feet. “Ah, he’s here. Time to play.”

  I bit back a hate-filled breath, existing in fire-searing agony.

  He let me go, straightening his shirt. “Now that you’ve seen the length of my generosity, it’s time for you to do the same by being the perfect whore for my guest tonight. Get fucking dressed. And come downstairs.”

  * * * * *

  To No One,

  I’m sitting here fingering these strange new clothes, and I don’t want to wear them. Does that make me odd? I don’t want to be confined. I don’t want whatever strands weave this creation to strangle me.

  Can you see them—the white monstrosity? No, of course, you can’t because you don’t have eyes or ears or a heart.

  He said he has a guest coming tonight. A different one from the usual animals he shares me with.

  I don’t know what that means. I don’t like not knowing.

  Can I crawl inside your soft squares and hide behind your pencil lines until it’s over?

  …

  …

  I got dressed, No One.

  I slipped into the skirt and polo neck and stared so damn long in the mirror. I’m confused why he’s making me wear this. It isn’t sexy. The material hangs off me, hiding my gaunt frame and all the bruises and scars he’s given me.