02 Heller's Revenge - Heller

by JD Nixon

  I sighed with utter weariness. Why was he dumping this crap on me now? I was too injured and too tired to deal with his emotions. Couldn’t he understand that? I tried though, as a good girlfriend ought to. “Will, what do you mean? You’re not competing with him. He’s my boss and you’re my boyfriend. Different roles. There’s no competition.”

  “I want to believe you, Tilly, but I keep thinking about you and him.”

  “Forget Heller and start thinking more about you and me. Do you know what I really want? I want tenderness, sweetness and love. I’ve had enough of violence and ugliness. When I can, I want to go away with you for a few days, somewhere secluded and luxurious, where you can hold my hand all day, cuddle me all night, and shag my brains out every morning and every evening! How does that sound?”

  He laughed. “That sounds wonderful. It’s a date. Now hurry up and get better so we can go.”

  Before I retired for the evening, I limped back down to my flat to check on Marcus. He was wearing his dirty clothes and was tied to the chair and gagged again.

  “Let him go! It’s not necessary to keep him tied up. He’s just a kid,” I insisted angrily of the two new men guarding him. One of them was Rumbles.

  “We will, Miss. We just had to livestream him to his parents for ten minutes. We want him to look neglected and maltreated, don’t we?” Rumbles explained patiently.

  That made sense. “I can’t believe his parents haven’t done what Heller’s asked. He’s their only child,” I exclaimed in disbelief.

  “I’m not surprised. His father’s a hard bastard. I worked for him for a while. Lots of very dodgy people work for him too, I can tell you. He used to treat his staff like shit. Him upstairs is a saint compared to that bastard.”

  Rumbles untied Marcus and let him sit on the lounge again. ‘Him upstairs’ walked into my flat.

  “Any word?” Rumbles asked him.

  “No.” Heller stood over Marcus, who shrunk back into the lounge, staring up at him with frightened eyes. “We’re going to have to up the ante.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, suddenly afraid.

  “I’d like you to leave now, Matilda.”

  “No! Not until you tell me what you mean by that.”

  “Go please. I’ll be upstairs in half an hour.”

  “I’m not going anywhere!”

  Heller regarded me coolly, not pleased with my disobedience, and nodded his head at Rumbles. That giant man advanced on me, sweeping me up in his powerful arms. I began to struggle fiercely, kicking my legs and bashing him on the chest.

  “Let me go, you big gorilla! Put me down now!”

  “Stop it, Matilda!” Heller shouted at me. “You will hurt yourself again if you carry on like that.” Then to Rumbles, “Take her upstairs to my place and stay there with her until I return. Be gentle with her, please. She’s still injured.”

  Rumbles nodded and carried me up the stairs into Heller’s flat, lowering me gently onto the lounge. I jumped up immediately and hobbled for the door. He beat me to it and stood up against it, staring me down, arms crossed.

  I paced around for a while. “What’s he going to do to Marcus?”

  Rumbles cut me a pitying glance. “Rough him up a bit. Nothing serious. Just enough to look bad, but not do any real damage.”

  “I can’t believe that Heller would beat up a kid.”

  “All’s fair in love and war, Miss. Personally, I can’t believe that someone would force a woman and a kid to crash their car at high speed on purpose.”

  I looked at him remorsefully, tears filling my eyes again. Oh boy, I was turning into a human fountain. “I’m sorry for the gorilla comment, Rumbles. I didn’t mean it.”

  His face softened at my unshed tears and he shrugged good-naturedly. “I’ve been called a lot worse.”

  I continued to pace for a while before Heller returned. He dismissed Rumbles and went to the sink to wash his hands.

  “What did you do?”

  “Nothing much. I merely wanted some blood for show.”

  “Can I go and check on him?”

  “No. We’re streaming him right now. And don’t disobey me on this, Matilda. I’m warning you. You can see him tomorrow morning. He’s all right. He took it like a man.”

  That night in bed, I slept right on the edge of his bed, as far away from Heller as possible. He didn’t seem to care, falling asleep immediately. His even breathing was annoying me as I lay there, eyes wide open in the darkness. How could he just fall asleep like that after what he’d done to that poor innocent boy? What kind of a monster was he anyway?

  It was no good; I couldn’t sleep. I got out bed and watched a late night movie in his living room, the volume turned down low. It was an extremely dull black and white war movie from the 1930s, where everyone sounded as though they had plums in their mouths and not much happened. It did its job though and I finally fell asleep, cramped uncomfortably in the corner of the lounge.

  I was roused some while later by gentle shaking.

  “Come back to bed, Matilda. You’re cold.”

  “I couldn’t sleep.”

  “Try again, my sweet.”

  I let him lead me drowsily back to his bed. He wrapped his arms around me and I nestled against him and tried to forget about everything except his regular heartbeat and the fact that Niq would be coming home in a few days. And eventually I was lulled back to sleep.

  Chapter 17

  I woke up very late again. I was alone and stretched every muscle slowly. Some were still painful, but I generally felt that I was on the road to recovery. I had a shower, a quick breakfast and went downstairs to my place.

  I opened the door with trepidation. I vaguely recognised one of the men, perhaps from Clarrie’s award ceremony, but not the other. Marcus was sprawled on the lounge, reading one of Niq’s books, dipping into a packet of peanuts. I went and sat next to him, taking his book away and turning his face towards me. His lip was busted and he had fresh bruising around his nose and right eye.

  “Are you all right, honey?” I asked unhappily.

  “Sure,” he said, and tried to take the book back. I held it away at arm’s length.

  “Were you scared?”

  He sighed impatiently. “I was reading that! It’s a good book. I’m going to buy it when I leave here.”

  “You weren’t scared?”

  “I was a bit, but Mr Heller explained everything to me last night. The more hurt I looked, the faster this would be over and I could go home. He said I had to be a man to get my father to start acting like a man, and to stop trying to run him out of business.” He looked at me unconcernedly. “I agreed with him. My father is a bully. Picking on little kids and women! And now you can’t even have your own kids. It’s not what a real man would do. I showed Mr Heller that I could be a real man. Not like Dad.”

  “What did Heller do to you?”

  He shrugged, bored with our conversation. “Stuff. A few punches. It was okay. He didn’t want to. He said he was sorry afterwards and that I took it like a man. He shook my hand. He’s pretty cool.”

  I slumped on my lounge and looked in front of me blindly. What the hell was going on in the world today? A man could beat up a kid and the kid admired him for it, while I stayed up all night worrying? What the hell? Marcus took the opportunity to seize the book from my limp hand, turning away trying to find the page he was reading again, like he didn’t have a care in the world.

  “Don’t try to figure it out, Miss. It’ll just give you a migraine,” sympathised one of the man.

  “You’re not wrong,” I rued, shaking my head and standing up.

  Heller came in then, a very satisfied expression on his face. “Marcus, good work last night. Your father has finally capitulated. I’m meeting him in an hour to negotiate your release.”

  The mood in the room lifted immediately.

  “It worked!” Marcus exclaimed excitedly. “I’m going to be free.”

  “Hopefully. If your father
can be trusted at all.” He turned to me. “Matilda, are you up to coming with me to that meeting?”

  “What about me?” demanded Marcus, “I could go with you. I know how to deal with him.” We all turned to stare at him. He looked abashed. “Oh right, I forgot. I’m the hostage.”

  “I’ll come with you, Heller.” Straight back into the fire, I thought.

  It took a while for me to dress, not because of the pain, but because I couldn’t make up my mind what to wear. What does one wear to a hostage release negotiation meeting?

  I finally decided on a very sober navy blue suit with prim cream blouse and sensible heels. I was shocked at how much weight I had lost over the last few months. My clothes were now swimming on me. When I looked at myself in the mirror, it wasn’t a comforting sight. I was too thin and too pale, and no amount of expensive clothes and skilfully applied makeup was going to make any difference to my appearance.

  Heller normally ran down the stairs with energy, but I needed to take them easy, and he was considerate enough to help me down the four flights. When we were in his Mercedes and driving out of the Warehouse, I glanced at him.

  “Marcus has a lot of respect for you, even though you hurt him. I’m struggling to understand that.”

  “You’re soft-hearted, Matilda. Not everyone is. Marcus is young, but he’s a pragmatist. Once I explained the options, he chose the most expedient one. It was a good choice.”

  “Even though it meant you had to get rough with him?”

  “As I said, he took like a man. He’s going to be a shrewd business-owner in the future. I should be luring him over to my side now, while he’s young.”

  “Heller, I get so angry with you and then I just can’t stay angry.”

  He threw me a puzzled glance. “Why would you want to?”

  I laughed, despite myself. “That’s a very good question! I don’t really. Life’s too short.”

  “It certainly is,” he replied grimly. Silence for a while.

  “Where are we meeting? Surely not anywhere that he’s suggested?”

  “Of course not. We’re meeting at my downtown office.” I’d almost forgotten about that off-site office. Daniel had told me about it when I’d first started, but I’d never had any reason to visit, not having much to do with the administrative side of Heller’s business. He pulled into the driveway of a high-rise office block and used a swipe card to access the basement carpark. We took the lift to the seventeenth floor and I experienced an inner pride to see the Heller’s logo on the floor directory.

  He pushed confidently through the glass doors and was greeted very warmly by his staff that worked in this satellite office. This was where his IT, human resources, finance and legal staff worked, all supervised by Daniel. I wasn’t sure why there was the divide in office locations, but I suspected it had something to do with his extreme need for security in his home environment and was also in case he was raided at some point. All of his important records were stored at the Warehouse or were stored completely off-site of both locations. His official business address was the downtown office, not the Warehouse. He was such a cautious man and again I wished I knew more about him. Like his real name, I thought wryly.

  He introduced me to a few of his senior staff, including his lawyer, Corby, who I’d already met briefly some months ago. While Corby filled Heller in on the arrangements for our meeting today, I looked around idly. I couldn’t fail to notice that I was the object of much covert interest among his other staff. God only knows what they’d heard about me. Probably that I was Heller’s woman, which seemed to be the general consensus among the security men. Or maybe they were just staring at my unattractive bruising. They were quite removed from the ugly side of Heller’s business.

  We were using Corby’s office for the meeting. I sat quietly on the edge of a chair, while they went over a few last details. At the appointed time, Marcus’ father, Chris Kirnin, was ushered into the office. None of us shook hands. Heller sat back in his chair, a disparaging expression on his face. My arms were crossed with unmistakable hostility. Kirnin’s eyes flickered over to me throughout the meeting, as if trying to place me.

  “How’s Marcus?” Kirnin asked gruffly. He was almost the antithesis of Heller, with black hair and eyes, a pocked face, as ugly as sin. He was older than Heller, but was bigger than him, a massive presence in the office.

  Corby spoke up smoothly. “We wouldn’t know that first hand, of course. But we’ve heard from our informants that he is fine and is looking forward to going home.”

  Kirnin smiled or snarled. It was impossible to tell which. “His mother made me meet with you, especially after that last broadcast. Gotta hand it to you, Heller. You know how to play on a woman’s weaknesses. I would have let the little shit go longer. Help him grow some balls. But she’s always been a soft pussy.” He looked over at me. I glared at him, my lip curling in utter hatred. Heller threw me a warning glance.

  “Charming,” commented Corby. “I can see why your son’s so fond of you.”

  Kirnin scowled. “I don’t care what the little shit’s been saying about me. Where are these papers you want me to sign? I’ve got another meeting soon.”

  Corby busied himself with the paperwork and stood behind him. “Now Mr Kirnin, just to make sure that you understand what you’re signing here. This is a complete acknowledgement of your illegal activities in respect to harassing and seriously injuring Heller’s staff and property over the last few years. And this paper here is your agreement to desist in any such activity in the future. If you fail to keep your word, then obviously your acknowledgement will be turned over to the proper authorities for their full investigation. Aided by your very inclusive confession, of course. And other pieces of evidence that we have chosen not to make known to you today. If this is satisfactory, then please sign here, here and here. And in return, our informants have Marcus sitting in a vehicle outside this building at this moment, waiting for you to exit.”

  He frowned, but pulled out an expensive gold pen from his pocket and signed his name and the date on all papers with a lavish flourish. He was about to stand up to leave when Corby pushed him back down in his seat with some friendly pressure.

  “Mr Kirnin, I don’t think you’ve met Tilly Chalmers, one of our employees. Tilly, this is Chris Kirnin, the man who has robbed you of your chance to have any children.”

  Kirnin had the decency to flush a little. I stood up and walked over to him, standing in front of him. He had a lovely son that he didn’t seem to love and I could now never have a son of my own because of him. It wasn’t fair. I was more than a little angry.

  “Your son is ten times the man you will ever be. I know from talking to him a few times that he would never choose to target women and children, stealing their futures,” I said to him with contempt, trying not to be emotional.

  “You ought to tell your boss to stay away from my top clients,” he returned in a cold, flat voice.

  I backhanded him as hard as I could across his ugly face. He jumped up, knocking back his chair, his fists clenched, looming over me menacingly. Heller sprang to his feet and crossed the room in an instant, pushing me behind him, his own fists clenched. Corby wasn’t far behind. Kirnin took a deep breath.

  “My people went too far that day. I apologise for that, because it was not on my instruction. It was a regretful error of judgement on their behalf. The people involved have been disciplined.”

  I honestly think I was about to launch a full-on attack on the man after that comment. Niq and I, with our horrendous injuries, were nothing more than a ‘regretful error of judgement’ to him. I felt Heller’s hand on my arm, silently urging restraint. I closed my eyes and thought about all the good things in life: Daniel’s growing confidence, Niq coming home, Dixie’s laugh, Will’s kisses, Heller’s . . . well, Heller’s everything, really.

  The situation defused and Kirnin left. I watched down from my great height at his reunion with Marcus. It was less than loving. It looked
as though there were words between them, probably Kirnin berating Marcus for being stupid enough to be kidnapped in the first place. But it was gratifying to see that Marcus wasn’t taking any rubbish from his father. The heated exchange I witnessed from far above appeared as though it was mutually antagonistic. Good luck, Marcus. Escape as soon as you can from that bastard, I wished silently.

  I gave Corby a quick peck on the cheek goodbye. Smiling, he said I could visit him anytime. I gave him a half-smile in return and Heller and I left.

  “Are you sure those papers are legal enough to keep Kirnin honest?” I asked with concern as we drove home afterwards.

  Heller regarded me with amusement. “They were drawn up by a lawyer, so I’m assuming that they’re going to be legally airtight.”

  “And that will be the end of it? Niq and I can go to the shops again without worrying?”

  “Neither of you are allowed out without me ever again. Sorry.” And I wasn’t sure if he was joking or not.

  That night I was feeling very affectionate. I should have gone to Will’s place, but Heller wouldn’t let me, so I cuddled up against him instead and forced him to kiss me. He was happy to comply.

  “Last night you weren’t speaking to me and tonight you’re kissing me?” he questioned.

  “I want to celebrate life. And love. Niq’s coming home, Marcus is returned to his mother and I’m okay. Mostly.”

  “I’m always willing to celebrate any occasion with you.”

  I kissed him intensely, pushing my body up against his, my hands roaming over his. I glided my hand over his erection. He groaned deep in his throat and grabbed my hand, pulling it away. “Matilda, stop it! I don’t want to hurt you. You’re not ready to be physical yet.”

  I freed my hand and continued my explorations. He snatched it away from his boxers again and clasped it tightly.

  “Stop it, Matilda! I’m only human.”

  “You’re not really.” I kissed him and tried to free my hand from his grasp. He wouldn’t let it go.

  “Yes, I am, trust me. Especially at times like this.”