Looking at me carefully, he takes the chair opposite. For the past few days, he’s barely spoken to me, except when he has to. I know I shouldn’t have pulled that stunt about selling up partnership in Grade A. It wasn’t fair to him. I watch as he runs his hand across his face. His eyes look at me, searchingly.
“It’s called survivors’ guilt, Jon.” Ben’s words jolt me.
I stare at him, my eyes narrowing. I want to tell him just to go, but something in what he says touches a chord.
“Jon, you’re starting to worry me. You're a prat, but why? Think about it! What did Nijad do, Jon?” He prompts me. “You took a bullet for him.”
I shake my head. “Totally different. It was my job.”
“But you’re his friend. He felt guilty.” Ben continues to push, “What did he do, Jon?”
My hands rub my chin; the stubble is coming through and it’s rough to the touch. It’s easier to concentrate on the fact I need a shave than to consider Ben’s question; he’s well aware of the answer, he’s just forcing me to acknowledge it. Nijad had wanted to give me something for surviving unscathed when I took a bullet for him, so he’d given me my fortune. Not directly, of course, but in such a round-a-bout way I’d had to accept it. It was a way to assuage his guilt, not that he had anything to feel any blame for, and I was receiving a salary precisely for that reason, to protect him. And then that fucking judgement call that went so wrong, my acceptance of the evidence banishing him to purgatory for three years. And what did Nijad fucking do then? For my small part in proving his innocence, despite my protests Nijad had given me his treasured bike and car; shipping them over from Amahad with the excuse that as he rarely came to the Europe anymore, he didn’t need them.
I’d spent the last three years building my life; Nijad had spent the last three years in hell.
But the situation with Mia was entirely different, wasn’t it? It was totally my fault that Mia had even been put in the line of fire. I should have been on my guard. I should have protected her, should have never let her get in front of me to take that bullet. I’d fucked up. Again. If I hadn’t been asleep, if I’d been watching out for her…
“She should never have been put in danger, Ben. That was all down to me.”
“Perhaps. Possibly. Who knows what could have changed the outcome? But she’s alive, Jon.” Another searching look comes my way. “But I’m not so sure about you. She doesn’t blame you. So why do you keep blaming yourself? She needs you.”
“She needs someone who can protect her. She doesn’t need me because I always make the mistakes! Fuck it, Ben, you warned me yourself. I should never have got involved with her. It fucked up my mind. Is that what you want me to say, Ben? That you were right? Well, I’ll say it. You were right, and now I’m doing what you wanted. I’m steering clear.” As I spit out the words they seem to hang in the air. Not wanting to continue this conversation, I stand up and make a move to gather my paperwork and laptop. Glancing at the clock I see it’s already seven-thirty in the evening. We’ve all been putting in the hours trying to identify Mia’s stalker and to keep her safe. “I’m going home, Ben.”
He nods, slowly. “I may have been right at the time but things changed. You did get involved. Think about what I’ve said, Jon. Don’t make hasty decisions now. They might be the wrong ones.”
Shaking my head, I go to leave the room, but he stills me with his hand on my arm. He’s not finished, yet. “If you’d been cleared as medically fit, would you have gone back to active duty with the SAS, Jon?
Narrowing my eyes, unsure what he’s asking, my depressive mood lets the answer slip out that, on another day, I might have kept to myself. It’s a simple, “No.”
He nods, as though he’s onto something. “You thought you missed something, didn’t you?”
I don’t answer; he’s hit the nail on the head.
“You blame yourself for missing the vital evidence that would have cleared Nijad, and now you’re castigating yourself for underestimating Mia’s stalker! It’s not all on you, Jon. We all make mistakes, but only realise them in retrospect. You did the best you could at the time.”
“I was Mia’s Dom.”
He snorts, “You weren’t her Dom, Jon. To use a juvenile term for it, you were her boyfriend. You got too deeply involved.”
“I was her Dom!” I protest, “I scened with her in the dungeon.”
“I heard about that, but it wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t been pushed to do it by her behaviour. You wanted her as your woman, not just your sub.”
Running my hand through my hair, I blurt out, “Jasim’s worse than an old woman for gossip!”
Ben smiles, and then grows serious again, “If you pull your head out of your arse long enough you’ll see you can have Mia again. She doesn’t bear any grudges. And she needs you.”
Shrugging his hand off my arm, I continue towards the door without saying another word. I’ve done the right thing, the only thing I could have done. I have to stay away from Mia. Whatever anyone thinks, I failed her, both as a man and a Dom. Two strikes against me; her injury, and that she had to use her safeword. I’m not going to let there be a third.
I go home, change, and then start some further analysis of the messages sent, the phone call, the fire investigator’s report, just trying to find a thread, a pattern, something that will lead us closer to the stalker. A few hours later, my eyes are burning from squinting at the computer as I endlessly look stuff up online, and my head’s pounding. I shower and throw off my clothes, ready to go to bed. But I’m still lying wide awake when the phone rings at three am. When I hear what the voice on the other end of the line has to say, all residual tiredness slips away and I’m out of bed, dressed, and ready to go within minutes. Finally, we might have a fucking lead!
Driving through empty streets to Ben’s place, I know I’ll be lucky to avoid a speeding ticket tonight. At least one camera flashes me, but I don’t care about picking up any fines, too anxious to get to my destination. Ben answers his door at first knock and ushers me quickly inside. Sean’s sitting awkwardly on the couch, and the drink in his hand appears to be whisky. He looks done in, suffering from physical discomfort. I’m impatient to find out what’s going on, but manage to throw him a glance of sympathy.
I don’t bother with any greetings. “What happened?” Flicking my eyes between Ben and Sean, I move into the room.
Ben nods at Sean and then looks at me. “I wanted to wait until you got here. Sean won’t want to go through the details twice. He’s had a hard night.”
The man in question is watching us, and dipping his head in agreement. I know he can sense my agitation as he takes a deep swallow of his drink to prepare himself, and starts to speak. “I think I found him.”
Those five words are enough to excite me. Ben motions me to a chair, but before seating himself pours us both a drink. I take the glass automatically, my focus on Sean.
“You sure?”
“Well, I can’t be certain,” Sean shakes his head, “But if it’s not there’s some other sick bugger hanging around the clubs who needs to be dealt with.”
I wave my hand in a come hither gesture to encourage him to continue.
He sighs. “I went into the club as normal and parked myself down with the unattached subs. I got my first drink of the night.”
So far it all sounds fairly typical; I fold my arms, hardly able to contain my impatience for him to get a move on with his story. But he’s holding himself as though he’s in pain, so curbing my curiosity and impatience; I let him proceed at his own pace.
“After a while, a chap comes up to me. He was mid to late-twenties I’d say, his hair already thinning on top. Carrying a bit too much weight but his face is surprisingly lean and sharp. Obviously full of himself.” He pauses as he remembers. “One of the other subs seemed to back away; she turned to avoid his eyes. It was plain she didn’t want him to approach her, so I gave him a bit of a come on look.”
Ben gets
up to refresh Sean’s drink. After thanking him, and taking a gulp from the new glass, Sean resumes his story, “He was abrupt and rude, but it could have been his way of taking control, so I went along with it, you know how some Doms can be. He asked me if I was looking for a Dom or Domme, and I just shrugged and said I wasn’t bothered either way. He pulled himself up at that, and seemed interested, asking me if I wanted to play. When I agreed, he got hold of my hair and pulled me to my feet.” Unconsciously Sean strokes his hand down the length of his dirty blonde hair which just touches his shoulders. Then he gives an abrupt laugh, “He was a bit shorter than I am, so it wasn’t quite the grand gesture he planned, having to let go when I stood to my full height, but fuck did he pull it. I think he was left with a handful. Anyway, by his expression it was clear I’d offended him, simply by being taller than he thought I’d be. Taller than him.” He pauses, and frowns at the memory. “The game was obviously still on, though, as he led me across the main area. Once we got to the other side he quite properly asked me my hard limits—which you know with me, aren’t a lot. Then without further ado, he instructs me to kneel at his feet. Without any procrastination, he pulls out his cock and tells me to suck it. No introduction or fanfare, and it certainly wasn’t a polite request.” Sean’s face twists with disgust at the memory, “I told him I wouldn’t unless he put on a condom. He complained saying he was clean, and that he knew I had to be too, otherwise I wouldn’t have been given admission to the club. I told him, no go without covering up, and he called me a pussy.”
“Wanker,” Ben spits out.
Sean shoots him a nod of agreement. “He huffed and puffed, but eventually he gloved up. I let him face fuck me, can’t say it was the greatest experience I’ve ever had, but I was taking one for the team…”
“You’ve got our thanks.” I butt in, dryly.
“Cheers mate.” He winks at me. “Anyway, he was rough, didn’t care about his sub as long as he got his rocks off. He was choking me and tried to put his hands round my neck, but I wasn’t having any of that. But a person with less strength than me…?”
As his unfinished question hangs in the air, Ben and I exchange looks. Sean is built like a beanpole, and but is stronger than he looks.
“I told him breath play was a hard limit. He called me a fucking pansy again and then said if he’d wanted a whinging cunt tonight he’d have chosen one of the bitches. Then he finished off.”
“Nice guy,” Ben comments drily. “You get his name?”
“Master Hatcher.”
It didn’t ring any bells with me. But he could have been using a club name for anonymity.
“So,” Sean resumes, “He looks at me and confirms that flogging and light whipping are on my agenda. I wasn’t keen, I didn’t trust him, but I agreed. Something seemed very off about the man, so I wanted to hang around to see where he was going to take it. And I didn’t want him to impose himself on anyone else.” He pauses to take more of the whisky. It looks like he needs it. “He told me to take off my shirt and then fastened me to a St Andrews Cross. The bindings were pretty tight, too tight. But when I remarked on it, he told me to stop complaining, saying he’d never come across such a wimp.” He holds out his wrists allowing us to see the angry red marks. Sean looks down at the drink in his hand and then shivers. I realise what’s coming next won’t be pleasant.
“He picks up a single tail and does a couple of practice swings. Then, without any warm up, he lashes me. Hard. I tell him, ‘What the fuck, man? Take it easy!’ He just laughed. A horrible fucking laugh. And then the bastard does it again, and again!” Sean is getting riled at the memory. He lifts his eyes first to Ben, then to me, “I did something I’ve never had to do before—I safeworded out. But he ignored me.”
I look quickly at Ben. That’s unthinkable. “Sean...”
He shakes his head to stop me, so I stay quiet, allowing him to complete the story in his way. “Luckily the place had dungeon monitors, and one heard me. He came over and stopped it.” Sean shifts uncomfortably, and then looks over at me, guiltily, “While the DM was getting me down, Hatcher slipped away. I couldn’t follow him, Jon. He’d disappeared by the time I was free. The club wanted to get me medical attention, but I wanted to try to find where he’d gone. But I lost him, I’m sorry.”
“Jasim’s on his way over,” Ben informs me, Sean apparently already knew. As if on cue the doorbell rings, and Sheikh Jasim al Kassis enters looking tousled suggesting he’d come straight from his bed. He’s carrying a black briefcase. Luckily for us, he had been a paramedic in the military back in his homeland, and we weren’t above using our friend’s skills when we didn’t want, or feel the need, to involve the authorities.
Sean shrugs out of his jacket, but has difficulty with his T-shirt as it’s stuck to his back, so Jasim takes him off into Ben’s bathroom to try to help him out of it. As I hear water running, I turn to Ben. “Sounds like our man?”
Ben’s eyes open wide, “A definite wannabe Dom with a sadistic streak a mile wide? Could very well be.”
I think for a second. “Could Hatcher be a surname, and Miller the first name? Does the club keep records?”
“Sean had to sign up as a member, so this Hatcher chap should have done too. I’ll get Vanessa to do some research. Hopefully, we haven’t lucked out with a fake name.”
“We’ll find him, Ben. We’ll follow the paper trails, and we should be able to pick him up again soon. People would surely remember someone that sadistic. He might have been kicked out of other clubs. Somewhere there’ll be a clue as to whom and where he is.”
We drop the conversation as Sean; now minus shirt comes back into the room. He is naked from the waist up.
“I thought you’d want to see this,” Jasim says, heatedly. He’s furious. As Sean turns around showing his back to us, I jump to my feet. Before the DM had managed to stop Hatcher, he’d got half a dozen hard licks in. Sean’s back is criss-crossed with angry welts, several oozing blood. He’ll have scars from tonight. But something catches my attention, and I lean forwards to have a closer look, gently turning Sean, so the light falls on his wounds.
“It’s him.” My voice is grim. “See the pattern here?” Ben and Jasim move closer and look where I’m pointing. “He’s got vertical strokes and then has crossed them. And then gone over the top to define them. See what’s been carved out?”
Ben examines the marred skin. “An ‘H’?”
I nod, my hands tensing at my side as I explain, “Mia’s got the same scars on her back. It hadn’t clicked the lines formed a pattern before, but seeing this, it’s clear. It has to be his trademark.”
Jasim fiddles in his bag and brings out a couple of tubes. He flashes them at Sean, telling him one is an antibiotic, and the other a local anaesthetic. Then he applies the salves and bandages him up. By this time Sean looks done in, the expression in his eyes bleak. Ben tells him he’ll be staying in his spare room tonight, and the fact Sean agrees without argument says a lot. Sean is an active, robust man, no stranger to fighting and violence. Like the rest of us, he’d done his time in one branch or other of the armed forces. But tonight would have been shocking, even for a man like him. In a D/s situation, the sub gives his trust over to a Dom, but retains overall control of the situation by being able to use his safeword. Sean had been robbed of that control tonight, had been put in a position where he was completely powerless. If it had been somewhere without vigilant DMs, who knows how far that bastard would have gone? Something like that is harrowing for anybody. But knowing the man as well as I do he’ll regroup and bounce back in the morning. But to start his recovery he needs a good night’s rest.
I turned to see Jasim looking at me with narrowed eyes, and I lift my eyebrow in question.
“This is the bastard after your girl?”
“She’s not my girl.” Emphatically, I deny any relationship. “But it looks like he’s the one after Mia Fable. Yes.”
He nods, slowly, as if considering. Then he scowls. “Ki
ll him slowly, Jon.” Picking up his bag and waves away Ben’s thanks as he returns to the lounge, Jasim heads out of the door. I get up to refill my glass, put my arms on the top of the sideboard and lean forwards, my eyes closed, totally exhausted. What a fucking nightmare.
Chapter 25
Mia
Seven years ago
Mum locked me in. She actually locked the door. Which gave me no option, other than to stay hidden away in my room. I had no phone, and she’d taken my laptop, removed any chance of communication with the outside world. I couldn’t even escape out of the window; my room wasn’t on the ground floor, and in any event, I was too sore to attempt to shimmy down a drain pipe, even if there happened to be one handy. She didn’t actually neglect me; bringing me sufficient food and drink along with painkillers, and later, that first day, a tablet which she told me was the morning after pill. I took it without argument, wanting no permanent reminder of my ordeal.
In shock and pain, I listened when she told me she’d contacted my school, informing the headteacher I’d been in an accident and needed time off to recover. It was an excuse she thought would hold until the bruises faded and I was fit to be seen in public again. Appearance was everything.
Refusing to call a doctor, she saw to my injuries as best she could cleaning, applying salve and bandages, but there was no tenderness in her administrations. As she dressed each wound, she reiterated that I’d deserved everything I’d got, that it was my fault and mine alone. She was ashamed of me and stressed over and over again how I must never speak of what I let happen. To anyone. I’d brought it all on myself.
For over a fortnight I was confined to my room, subjected to her daily mantra. I was only seventeen. I came to believe her.
Present day
Fed up and bored, I pace around the small living room, not sure what to do with myself. It’s now been a week that I’ve been held a voluntary captive in the safe house and during those seven long days, I’ve not taken one step outdoors, except to go into the securely fenced back garden just to satisfy my desire to breathe in fresh air. Even then I had to have the company of one of my burly guards. I’m desperate to escape from these four walls.
Close Protection (Blood Brothers #2) Page 31
