“Good morning, Chloe.”
Darko is standing behind the bars. He must have slept in the nearby bed, but I was asleep before he got there. I wonder if he slept naked. He’s half naked now. He’s put pants on, but nothing more. I stare at him, trying desperately to understand who this man is. That’s the key to all of this strangeness, I just know it.
The upper reaches of his muscular body are trammeled with scars. One notable one runs right down the center of his chest. The others look like knife marks, but that one looks surgical and old.
“What happened to you?”
“Hm? What happened to me?”
I point at the scar. “When did you get ripped open? That’s heart surgery, right?”
He glances down at himself, then back at me. “Don’t you have better things to worry about right now?”
I don’t. He is all I have to worry about. He is the entirety of my problems, and right now, the whole of my world. And I want to know what happened to him.
* * *
Darko
She’s looking at me with curious eyes and that strange lack of fear that I am beginning to find irritating. The aim of this exercise is to teach her a lesson about power. Her lack of it. My abundance of it. We’re not here so she can ask me questions and get to know me. We’re here so I can teach her the lesson her father never did.
She still thinks she’s untouchable. Even now, even after all the touching. Even after a night in a cage. She’s not taking this seriously. It is almost as if she thinks this is some kind of dark vacation jaunt. I hate to admit it to myself, but I am both surprised and running out of ideas—at least, the ones that seemed thinkable to do to her.
I’ve taken her roughly. I’ve made the sex as intense as it can be without being outright criminal. I’ve taken her to the very limits of consent.
The only thing left is to ramp up the pain. I didn’t want that, but somehow, I’ve managed to be too soft on her. I’m not sure how that is possible given I broke into her home, spanked her, fucked her, and abducted her, but one person’s hell is another’s hot weekend. Maybe she’s expecting to wake up and find this was all some kind of dream, or a prank, or something.
It’s time to make this real.
“Get out here.” I swing the door open and point to the floor.
She starts to step out. I put my hand up to her chest and gently push her back. “Not walking. I want you to crawl for me.”
“Crawl? Why?”
She asks the question innocently. She doesn’t understand what I’m trying to do. She doesn’t get it at all. I’m going to have to spell this out for her explicitly.
“I want you on your hands and knees because that is how animals move, and I’m making you my little animal. I’m taming you like a wild thing.”
She shrugs and drops to her hands and knees. “Okay, so this is what you want?”
* * *
Chloe
He taps his foot and I smirk to myself. I know this must be driving him crazy. I perfected this technique a long time ago. Not kneeling naked, per se, but this borderline malicious compliance where you can give someone what they’re demanding without giving them anything they want. He doesn’t really want me to kneel and crawl like a dog. He wants me to blush with humiliation. Not gonna happen, buddy. I can take more than he thinks I can.
That foot taps three more times, then a big hand descends and grabs me by the back of my hair, pulling my head up, and the rest of me with it.
I’m still on my knees, but my face is turned up to meet his. His grip makes me arch my back, holds me in an exposed, vulnerable position.
“This isn’t going to work,” he purrs softly. “You can’t resist me, Chloe.”
“I’m not resisting you,” I say as sweetly as possible.
He won’t hurt me. Not seriously. I have to believe that. Nobody has ever hurt me, except one man, and he only hurt me the day he died.
Darko leans down toward me. His eyes sear into mine. His lips are nearly brushing my mouth.
“Chloe…”
“Yes?”
“Your father…”
The mention of him brings anger rushing through my veins.
“His death was not from natural causes. He was murdered.”
His words send me into shock. I expected some sexy threat. I thought this was a prequel to more of his kinky little games that end in orgasm. I did not expect him to tell me my beloved father was purposefully killed.
“What?”
“You heard me,” he says, letting go of my hair.
I drop to the floor, all spine gone from me as I pool at his feet.