by Kaye Blue
Lake
Waking up disoriented, with a pounding headache and no idea where I was, was getting really fucking old.
Yet here I was once again.
But I knew this time would be different than the last.
The last time had started poorly, but ended oh so well, with me in Aras’s arms.
I would have no such luck this time.
“Stop fucking faking it. I can tell you’re awake.”
It was his voice, Vlad’s voice, one I’d hoped to never hear again.
I didn’t say anything, didn’t move, just lay where I was, trying to fight back the bile that burned at the back of my throat, stave off the dizziness that was keeping me disoriented.
“Sit the fuck up, “Vlad said.
“You don’t want me to do that,” I responded.
To my surprise, my voice sounded almost normal.
Impressive, given that I wanted to lose the entire contents of my stomach and do something to stop the slamming pain in my head.
“You haven’t even been gone two months, and you’ve forgotten everything you learned. I’m going to have to teach you again,” he said.
I knew what he meant, knew the pain that came with Vlad’s lessons.
I wasn’t afraid.
Maybe it was the side effects of whatever drugs Roman had given me, or maybe it was a side effect of being with Aras, but Vlad didn’t scare me.
Not anymore.
“Now sit the fuck up,” Vlad repeated.
He’d been standing in the shadows but walked across the floor to stand next to me where I was lying.
This floor wasn’t concrete.
It was carpeted, thick, lush carpet. The best of the best, probably, which was all Vlad would accept.
I stared at his shiny shoes, shoes that I myself had probably polished.
Watched a shoe as Vlad lifted his foot, the threat of the kick impossible to miss.
He wanted me to sit up, so I would oblige him.
I did, and not a split second after my head left the floor, I felt the forceful push of vomit.
I didn’t try to hold it back.
Instead, I let it spew all over his shiny shoes, his pants, the thick carpet.
I retched, then retched more, kept going until I had nothing left to give.
“I told you you didn’t want me to sit up.”
I barely got the sentence out before Vlad’s shoe hit my cheek.
My jaw popped but didn’t break.
That was the one fortunate thing.
I felt like something had been knocked loose in my head, and the dizziness rushed over me again.
I flopped back, unable to keep myself up.
Didn’t even try to and instead let the darkness take me.
Lake
“Don’t move.”
I almost smiled, shocked that for once Vlad had learned something.
But then again, I had ruined a pair of his shoes, something he probably didn’t want to have happen again.
I could have told him he didn’t have anything to worry about.
I couldn’t really have moved even if I had wanted to, but I didn’t share that with him and instead stayed where I was.
“Can I have water?” I asked.
In all the years I had known him, this was the first time I had ever asked him for anything.
No, that wasn’t true.
I had asked him, begged him, to let me see my mother.
His only response had been laughter.
I expected the same in return for my request for water, but to my surprise, he approach and pressed a cool bottle into my hands.
“Sip that shit slow so you won’t throw up again. I don’t know what that asshole gave you,” he muttered.
I took his advice, but only because I didn’t want to risk getting sick again either.
The water was excellent, helped cool my insides a little, made me feel a little more awake and alert, less sluggish.
“So you paid him off?”
“Yeah. Which is some bullshit. Having to pay for some shit I already own,” Vlad said.
No doubt I was the shit in question, but I didn’t correct him. Didn’t even want to think about him.
So I lay there, the carpet rough against my face, the cool water chilling me from the inside out.
I wanted to be sad, wanted to be angry, wanted to feel something.
And I did—disappointment that I wouldn’t get to see Aras again, a little hope that he would figure out what had happened to me—but other than that, I didn’t feel anything.
Didn’t care what Vlad had in store for me, didn’t care how painful and how short the rest of my life would be.
Maybe that was progress.
“Get off the floor, Lake,” Vlad said a few minutes later.
It was still an order, but there was something almost…human about the way he spoke. I’d stayed still but now shifted my eyes to the left and saw him, barefoot, pantsless.
It was so…normal.
Funny, but I had never imagined thinking of Vlad that way. But I did now, and for some reason, that gave me the strength to sit up.
My head spun and I wobbled but gripped the floor to keep myself steady.
Vlad took a step toward me then paused, something for which I was grateful.
Him touching me was something I had no interest in, not ever again.
I stayed on the floor, letting my stomach settle, and then finally pushed myself up to stand.
I was barefoot like Vlad, wearing cotton pants and a T-shirt.
“Is this how he dresses you?” Vlad asked, his disgust clear.
“I dress myself,” I said.
He let the statement—and the disrespect that was in it—pass, then gestured toward the high-backed chair in one corner of the room.
“Have a seat,” he said.
I didn’t argue, not because I was afraid, but because I wanted to sit down.
Some of the queasiness was wearing off, but I still wasn’t a hundred percent.
I walked over to the chair and lowered myself slowly, taking a few seconds to look at the room.
It was a hotel, one I didn’t recognize immediately.
I looked at my watch, saw that it had been about four hours since I had passed out.
Enough time for Vlad to take me many, many miles away from Aras, but for some reason I felt like we were still close.
“He gave you that, huh?” Vlad said, gesturing toward the watch.
“Yeah,” I responded, suppressing the urge to cover the watch with my hand.
I didn’t touch it, didn’t want Vlad to know how important it was to me. It seemed a small thing, but the watch was mine, my only connection to Aras, and I didn’t want to let it go.
So I kept my arms on the armrests, hands flat, and waited.
Vlad stood across from me, looking vulnerable without shoes or pants.
I had never seen him like this and wasn’t sure how to react.
Decided then that I didn’t need to react.
So I waited.
He seemed fine with that, waited too, just staring at me.
He looked at me so intently that I felt like he was trying to peer into my soul, trying to understand something that was profoundly confusing.
“Did you go with him willingly?” Vlad finally asked.
“No,” I responded.
I didn’t elaborate.
“So you didn’t know that he was coming, didn’t have any part of the plan?”
“No,” I said.
I wanted to say so much more, ask him how the hell I could have been a part of the plan when he’d kept me under lock and key, but I didn’t.
“I didn’t think so. That kind of thing isn’t like you,” Vlad said.
He had no freaking idea what was like me, but I didn’t say that either.
“But something changed while you were with him. You warmed up to him,” Vlad said.
There was emotion in his voice now that hadn’
t been there before. There been a time of that kind of emotion would have been a warning sign, but not now.
“Yes,” I said.
“You care about him,” Vlad said.
I loved him.
I’d had inklings before, thought maybe I did, but I only realized how deeply, how irrevocably, I loved him in that instant.
I wouldn’t tell Vlad that, though, but I did tell him the truth.
“I do,” I said instead.
He looked wounded, an expression that was both confusing and slightly exhilarating to me.
I’d never had the power to stir anything in Vlad but anger. To hurt him, even a little, was something I relished.
“I’ll never figure women out,” Vlad said.
I so surprised by the statement that I blinked and said, “What?”
“I gave you everything a woman could want, and at the first chance, you jump ship and offer up that ass to the first dick that strolls by,” Vlad said.
I ignored his crudeness and focused on what else he actually said. “You gave me everything a woman could want?” I said.
I was so stunned that I was certain I had misunderstood his words.
“Yeah,” he said.
Apparently I hadn’t misunderstood.
“You really believe that?”
I sounded skeptical, didn’t even try to pretend to be otherwise.
“I don’t believe it. I know it. Before me, you’re going to go work some shitty job, rent a shitty house, marry some shitty dude, and pump out some shitty kids. I gave you a life of luxury, a connection to power that most people don’t get to experience,” he said.
I was quiet, staring at him for a moment, my mind slowly processing.
He really believed that. He thought that he’d been doing me a favor. Giving me a gift.
It was so shocking, I just leaned back against the chair, smiled.
“Something funny, Lake?” he asked.
“I guess not,” I said, though I didn’t wipe the smile off my face. “It’s just…”
I tried to figure out how to say the next, then shrugged. “That wasn’t my experience.”
Lame, not really descriptive, but what Vlad thought and truly believed was so far from reality, arguing with him would only frustrate me.
“I’m seeing that now,” Vlad said.
He was facing me, a huge, looming figure, one that no longer intimidated me. And for some reason, he looked as real, as authentic, as I had ever seen him.
“Do you know I love you?”
He waited, and I didn’t say anything, watched as a look that I could only call hurt crossed his face.
“I do. I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone in my entire life,” he said.
“I think you believe that,” I finally said.
“Think I believe it?”
His voice had that tone again, the one that was a warning, but I didn’t heed that warning.
“Yeah. You think it, but you have no idea what love is. Couldn’t even begin to understand it. But let me tell you, love isn’t you forcing me to be with you, raping me, beating the shit out of me, choking me whenever the urge crossed your mind, making me miss my own mother’s funeral,” I said, my voice cracking on the last.
I fought the tears back though, refused to let them fall.
“No, Vlad, that’s not love.”
“Yeah, no relationship is perfect, and I had to do some things for your own good that I didn’t like and you didn’t either. But that doesn’t change my feelings,” he said.
He seemed sincere, so sincere that my perverse curiosity made it impossible for me not to ask the question.
“So tell me, you love me, what does that mean?”
“It means that for years, my only thought has been of you. What you’re doing, where you were. What I could do to finally make you love me back,” he admitted.
He whispered the last like it was a confession, and in that moment he had never seemed more like a pathetic, lost soul than he did then.
“Vlad, that’s not love. It’s obsession. Control. But it’s not love,” I said.
“I’m sorry you can’t see it,” he said.
None of my words had made an impact on him, but I wasn’t surprised. I wouldn’t expect him to change, knew I was probably just prolonging the inevitable, wasting my breath even trying.
But still, I felt a sense of relief, almost weightlessness.
Because I had spoken the truth, for once had told him exactly what I was thinking.
It was a tiny victory, but I would take it.
Vlad stayed quiet, and so did I, until finally, after a few minutes, I broke the silence.
“So what now?” I asked.
“You in such a hurry to find out?” Vlad asked.
“There’s no reason for delay,” I said.
“Always so pragmatic. It’s one of the things I admire about you,” Vlad said.
He had been pacing but stopped in front of his soiled pants and picked them up.
I watched but didn’t speak as he pulled his thick leather belt through the loops, twisting the material in his huge hands.
My heart kicked up a notch, but I did my best not to show any outward sign of it.
Still, the reaction was automatic. Those times when Vlad had held a belt, probably that belt in his hands, were ones that I remembered all too well.
And not at all fondly.
He kept twisting the leather, maybe trying to heat it.
I wasn’t sure, and I refused to ask, refused to blink.
“If you’re trying to intimidate me, make me beg, I’m not going to,” I said.
“No, you won’t beg. You’re different now,” Vlad said.
He sounded a little bit listless, mostly resigned.
“I guess I have him to thank for that,” he said.
I didn’t respond, just kept my eyes on him as he walked toward me, moving slowly, the belt still in his hands.
When we were toe to toe, he stopped, looming over me, his eyes lasered on mine.
I didn’t look away, refused to look away.
I stilled myself, preparing for the blow.
The blow didn’t come.
Instead, Vlad turned and sat on me, his huge body pressing me into the chair.
On instinct I started to thrash, pushed against his back, but it did no good.
His weight was heavy, not exactly crushing, but the awkwardness of him sitting in my lap was disorientating.
I continued to try to buck him off, but he didn’t move.
Instead he grabbed my right arm and jammed it under his.
Then, he looped the belt around my forearm and pulled it tight.
I was so shocked I froze, trying to figure out what he was doing, dread and adrenaline racing through my veins.
I didn’t make a sound, though, at least not until he reached between the armrest seat cushion and pulled out what had to be a foot-long knife.
“What is that?” I asked, my voice quiet, the fear I felt now making it impossible for me to speak louder.
“It’s a knife, Lake,” he said.
His voice sounded distant, determined, and it terrified me.
Vlad was never this controlled, but he was now.
I had thought I was resigned to my fate, had expected this, or even something worse, but when confronting it in real life, that urge to live, even if it was just a habit, came back.
I bucked again, tried to push him off, again to no avail.
“Hold still,” he said.
“Vlad! What are you doing? You don’t have to do this,” I said.
“I do. You made no secret of where your loyalties lie. And even still, I love you. We can work on that, but you have to be punished, and he needs to get a message,” Vlad said.
He sounded like himself but also not like himself, and I doubted my ability to reach him.
“I’ll scream. I’ll scream this hotel down. You don’t want to do this!”
“Yes, you will scre
am. But no one will hear you, and if they do, they won’t help,” he said.
He had buried his elbow in the bend of my arm, then used his forearm to press mine flat against the armrest.
I twisted, struggled, but doubted I made him move even a millimeter.
“Be still, Lake,” he said.
Then he brought down the knife.
Fourteen
Aras
“We need to get out of here,” Ezekiel said.
“No,” I responded.
“Aras, we’re sitting ducks here. We need to go,” he said.
“No,” I responded.
“Why not?” Ezekiel said.
“It’s the only place that connects me to her. If I’m to get a message, it will come here. We are going to be here to receive it,” I said.
“A message?” Ezekiel said, shaking his head.
He didn’t say anything else, but I knew what he was thinking.
A message. Vlad had gotten her back, and he wouldn’t have anything else to say to me.
Oh, he might try to find me. In fact, I was banking on it. But as far as Lake was concerned, she was gone, out of the picture.
I knew that, knew that that was how I would have played it, but I couldn’t accept it.
Wouldn’t accept that she was gone, delivered back to Vlad because of my own folly.
I glanced over at Roman, who was hogtied on the kitchen floor.
When I had found the safe house empty, I got out word that I needed to see him, and it was only happenstance that had delivered him.
He’d gone to a mutual acquaintance to get a clean ride, no doubt ready to disappear and not be heard from again until I was dead.
But I’d found him, and now he would give me information.
The urge to rip him apart limb from limb was almost overwhelming, so much so that I had been tempted to ask Ezekiel to handle this.
But I wouldn’t do that.
Lake was my responsibility.
It was I who had let her down.
I who would do everything in his power to see that she came back to me.
So I swallowed down my rage, pushed it into that place deep inside of me, and then got to business.
I squatted next to Roman, stared at him.
His eyes were pleading, and I could see he wanted to speak, so I ripped the tape off his mouth.
He flinched but didn’t say anything otherwise.
