Break Her Page 2

  She’d left herself wide open for this. No. She couldn’t think about that now either. She’d always known their line of work was dangerous. And while there’d been something worth protecting, they had taken great care to do so. But she’d let the security go lax after what happened, especially here, at her solitary, bayside getaway. It just hadn’t seemed to matter. Well, as it turned out, it did. But there was no time for self-recrimination now. She just needed to keep her head when appropriate, appear to lose it when appropriate, and find out what she could about him. And she might just keep herself alive.

  But at what cost?

  Well, that didn’t matter, did it? It wasn’t about her life really, was it? It was about winning and not letting the other guy win. Because she could tell right away, this guy really needed to lose. She’d be doing the world a favor, and, unlike usual, not even charging for it.

  And she knew, knew with a completely non-rational certainty, knew the moment she felt him inside her, that she was one of the few people who might possibly be able to do this.

  He knew it too, she could tell. Not that she could undo him. But that there was something. Something different about her. Maybe even a level on which they could connect. These things were chemical. They were palpable, if you knew how to face facts. He only had an inkling right now, that she was something special. She’d have to really work to prove him right.

  The next challenge presented itself almost immediately. And she reacted the way any woman would. It was a purely physical response anyway. The first attack had been the introduction, devilish and, in its own way, subtle. The assault on her rear was about pure domination. She was his, and he would do what he liked with her. And what he liked would hurt. Cry, she told herself, cry hard. It was what he would want. It was against all her, for lack of a better word, instincts. In her current state of mind, that is, the state of mind she’d been in up until a few moments ago, the most natural thing would be for her to shut down, turn inward, feel nothing. The way she had done for years. But he had to think she had feelings. He needed to see them; that’s what his sort fed on.

  She couldn’t help thinking of a line from an old British movie with Peter O’Toole: “I stand outside myself, watching myself watching myself. I smile. I smile. I smile.” If you just substituted scream for smile, it was dead on.

  She lived too much in her head, she thought. That’s how she could get to this point, able to react and think about her reaction at the same time. She’d always been made to feel a little guilty because she could do that. Why couldn’t she be more authentic, more in-the-moment? More like everybody else? Only her husband had understood. Only he had been capable of making her feel safe enough to suspend the incessant protective activity of her brain, and allow herself to feel. And she had felt. Boy, had she felt. With him and, always, with –. No. Stop there. Stop there.

  And how had that worked for her?

  She was better off being what she had previously been, what she was once again. “Cold bitch.” That’s what they’d called her. What a laugh. Part of her was still burning, still smoldering from the conflagration that had turned her life into a sea of ash seven years ago. Well, fuck them all, and fuck him. She would out-think him and out-emote him. She would use everything. Everything that was left. And she would beat him. And he would be the one to die.

  Because whatever he said, she knew the truth. One of them had to.

  “So tell me about yourself,” he said comfortably, after a light doze. Somehow, the sharpness of his presence made the blue and yellow flowers on the sheets and pillowcase beneath him seem even more faded than they already were. And yet for the first time in a long while, she noticed them. “Why am I here?” he asked.

  “You’re asking me?” she replied.

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t you ask that when you get the job? Don’t you wonder? Don’t you have any natural curiosity?”

  “No, no, and no. I was just making conversation.”

  “What are you?”

  “Not human.”

  “You’re human. ‘You. You’re barely human.’” She said the line in a dead tone. “That’s from a movie.”

  “And it’s true.”

  He’d freed her legs, but her arms were still cuffed to the bed. She wouldn’t ask him to let her go.

  “I have to say,” he added. “I am quite impressed with you.”

  “You said that before.”

  “No one is going to come help you. You’re completely at my mercy, as the villains say.”

  “You are the villain.”

  “Don’t interrupt. I’m admiring your nerve.”

  “You’re the one with the nerve.”

  “You can probably imagine by now that I’m going to fuck you in a variety of degrading ways, but you’re holding your own.”

  “Is this all you do?”

  “I have hobbies.”

  “Professional rape?”

  “Oh, no. In fact, it’s rarely specifically called for. My services include rape, beating, torture, and killing. Rape is the one I get asked to do the least. It’s for special. And again, I can’t help pointing out. Usually, all it takes is once. Women really take it hard. My low-key, conversational style also tends to confuse them. They’re wrecks afterward.”

  “You don’t know how I’ll be if I get through this.”

  He unhooked her from the bed, but kept the cuffs on her, pulling her to him by them and holding her.

  “Well, it’s obviously going to take more than once. Or twice.”

  “And usually you just kill or beat.”

  “Or torture. Yes. But I have to say, I love rape. I really love it.”

  Dawn was beginning to peep through the sheer curtains. They were a pale, pale green. It’s funny, she thought, how she was noticing that as if for the first time. So pretty. She remembered picking them out.

  “They say rape is about power not sex,” he said.

  “Yes, they do, don’t they?”

  “But it’s about sex and power. The best of both worlds. I can do whatever I want to you. And what I want to do feels better than almost anything else. I mean, I don’t mind beating the shit out of someone. Yes. Like you’d like to do right now. Or killing them. With my bare hands –.” He made a fist in front of her face, flexed the fingers open and closed in front of her eyes. “Or with a weapon,” he continued smoothly. “That’s fine. But nothing is like the, the, intimacy of rape. And it’s even better when it’s an extremely attractive woman, which is rare. I can even make it good for you, which will likely drive you even crazier. It’s always win-win.”

  “For you.”

  “Right.”

  “So that’s just ‘win.’”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “Were you abused as a child?”

  “Yes,” he said, pleasantly. And that’s all he said. It was chilling.

  She sighed. “Well, you’re very good natured, it seems. Very comfortable in your own skin.”

  “I can be. I have, as I’ve said, my own particular style.”

  “I have to go to the bathroom.”

  “I imagine you do.”

  “Is the idea to make me pee in my bed? You’ll get wet, too.”

  “You have a point.” He jumped out of the bed and pulled her up and out as well. Removing her cuffs, he pushed her, naked, toward the door. Rubbing her wrists, she made her way down the hall a few steps to the bathroom.

  “Are you going to watch?” she asked, hesitating.

  “Um-hm.” He leaned against the door jamb. She rolled her eyes, and he raised his eyebrows. “Relax. I’m not squeamish,” he offered.

  She sat down and peed. It went on for a while.

  “It’s always one of those record-setting ones when you don’t want it to be,” she said, forcing a false lightness into her tone. She wiped herself, stood up and was about to flush, when he casually moved her further inside the room. “Let’s conserve,” he said.

  He stood in front of the toilet a
nd urinated. She watched him.

  He looked at her.

  “I almost never see that anymore. It still fascinates me. As a female.”

  He smiled and flushed the toilet. His hand was on his penis, which was rapidly hardening.

  “Get down on your knees and bend over the tub,” he ordered. The tub was built-in, fairly low to the floor. It was a light shade of blue. The whole bathroom was blue, the walls a darker shade with a border at the top of red, white, and blue sailboats bobbing on the ocean. The sink and toilet were the same color as the tub. Three small, squeezable duckies faced her from a shelf built into the tiled wall.

  “Oh, come on.”

  “Here’s how it works. I’ll let you talk pretty much all you want, mostly because I’m curious to know what you’re going to say next, but never question my orders. And never hesitate.”

  “But you’ll wear me out.”

  “That’s the idea.”

  “Well,” she said, as she knelt slowly down. “At the very least, I’m gonna have a hell of a case of cystitis after this.”

  He shook his head a little, in wonder, pushed her head down until she was staring into the blank eyes of those ducks, and entered her from behind, also on his knees and holding her hips for leverage. She sighed again and grunted repeatedly throughout the process. He didn’t come this time. He just stopped after a while. Keeping a hand on her back, he swatted her on the ass several times, hard. Her shouts echoed in the tiled room, and when he stopped, she remained slumped over the tub.

  He pulled her up by the hair, led her back to the bedroom and threw her onto the bed. He leaned against the wall by the door, looking at her.

  “So. Every room in the house?” she asked, still a little breathless, but clearly determined, he thought, to be cool.

  “At least,” he said, smiling. For a moment, her face looked drawn and tired. Then she appeared to pull herself together. She put on a neutral expression. He just kept looking at her.

  “You’re ... what is the word...valiant, I think, and surprisingly level-headed,” he said. “You may just be ruining me for all the rest.”

  “Gee, I’d hate to do that.”

  “You know,” he went on, imperturbably. “I’m a little peckish. What have you got to eat?”

  “Well, where are my manners?” She said it without moving.

  “Up. Now. Kitchen.” He waited until she rose from the bed. She seemed to be looking for something. He shook his head.

  “No clothes. Like that.”

  “That’s dangerous in the kitchen,” she said.

  “We’ll take special care.”

  She frowned and, at his indication, walked by his side to the kitchen.

  “In the movie version, they’ll put underwear on us.”

  “You are funny.”

  “I just want to make you happy, lover.” Her tone was sharp.

  “You do. You do.”

  She looked at him with hate, as she passed his powerfully built, naked body and led the way to the kitchen. He let his hand caress her behind as she did so. She tried to wiggle it off, so he slapped her twice there quickly and she stopped trying.

  He kept a close eye on her as she opened and closed various of the butter-yellow cabinet doors and drawers, gathering the necessary elements and setting them on the white-and-yellow speckled Formica countertops.

  “It eats like a human,” she noted a little while later, as he bit into the ham and cheese sandwich she’d made him.

  “Isn’t that amazing?” he agreed.

  The sun was rising. The windows in her dining room faced east. They could see the sun hit the water of the bay. It would soon begin to heat up the room.

  “You sure picked a nice, secluded location,” he said.

  “Should I call you anything?”

  “I thought you’d decided on motherfucker.”

  “Like a name?”

  “I don’t care about that.”

  “Well, you know, for me to call out in the throes of passion.”

  “How about ‘master’?”

  “Never mind.” She looked out the window again. There were four small fishing boats in the middle of the bay. They might as well have been on the moon.

  “I’m going to have to send you a card afterwards,” he said, interrupting her thoughts, “thanking you for making this my most entertaining rape, probably ever.”

  “Why do you keep talking about an afterwards? I know you’re going to kill me.”

  He put down his sandwich. “I see I have to explain something. If I were going to kill you, I would tell you. Why would I bother to lie? The point of telling you that I’m not is twofold. One, so you aren’t tempted to do anything really stupid out of desperation, and force me to kill you. And two, because the idea here is that they want you to live through this and through the aftermath. They want you emotionally and permanently scarred, not dead. For whatever reason, that’s what they want.”

  “But you’d say that anyway. To keep me from trying something desperate before you’re finished having your fun.”

  “So bitter. And so logical. I can’t argue with your reasoning. I guess you’ll have to figure it both ways. But remember, there are fates worse than death. Although just between you and me.” He paused. “I think they made a mistake in this case. But I’ll give it my best shot.”

  She just scowled at him. When he frowned back in mockery of her, she turned her frown upside down and gave him a big, fake smile, with lots of teeth. He bit into his second sandwich.

  “Hmm. Nothing like a good rape to give you a hearty appetite.”

  She couldn’t help it. She actually chuckled, a tart, acidic sound.

  “Ah, you see, deep down, you too have a sick sense of humor. We’re not so different after all, you and I. ‘I am but a shadowy reflection of you.’”

  “‘Now you’re getting nasty.’”

  He smiled. “Raiders. You recognized it. One of my favorites. It’s so good to meet someone on my level.”

  “‘Try the local sewer,’” she said, continuing to channel Harrison Ford.

  “Exactly. Speaking of, anything good on TV? You have cable, right?”

  “Make yourself at home.”

  “I am.”

  She started to rise.

  “Leave the dishes. Let’s see what’s on.” The living room opened off of the dining room. He directed her in and looked around to see how he wanted to arrange them. Turning suddenly, she aimed a quick kick at his balls, but he moved too fast in response and knocked her to the ground. Placing his foot, lightly but threateningly, on her abdomen, he shook his head and spoke.

  “I understand why you had to try that, if only for your own self-respect. But that’s the point of this. You don’t get to have any self-respect. You’re supposed to feel like you went along with this, and maybe you could have done something but you didn’t. A moment of weakness, I suppose, because I know you’re a logical person.”

  She didn’t look like that at the moment. Her face was feral, her lips drawn back over her teeth. Her breathing was fast and heavy. For a moment, it was as if he had a wild animal under his foot. He smiled.

  “I know that you’re aware that you can’t do anything without putting yourself and your beloved cats at risk. I should take one of them out right now for that.”

  Her demeanor changed immediately, the fierceness gone in a flash. “No, please don’t,” she begged from the floor. “You’re right. You’re right. I won’t have any self-respect, and I’ll hate myself forever, I already do, but please don’t. I forgot for a second. Please. I’m begging you.”

  “I’m aware of that. Do you begin to understand now? This is about making you feel worse than you’ve ever felt.”

  “Yes, yes.” She was sobbing a little. “Please. I’ll do anything.”

  “I know that.”

  She sniffed.

  “Lick my feet.”

  “Seriously?” She couldn’t help herself.

  He reached down and
slapped her quickly across the face. “Now. Or I’ll change my mind.”

  He put his foot in front of her face, and after one quick look up into his eyes, she stuck out her tongue and began licking. He sat down on a nearby chair, and he motioned to her to crawl over to continue. He held his other foot out, sole up. “The bottom,” he said. And she did it.

  He sat back and wiggled his toes. “Umm. That feels terrific. And I hadn’t even thought of it until now.”

  She said nothing and kept licking. Her eyes were closed.

  “Open your eyes.”

  She did as he said.

  “Suck my toes.”

  She obeyed.

  “Now you’re not going to do anything else to try to salvage your ego, right, sweetie?”

  She nodded, a toe in her mouth.

  “Good.”

  He leaned back again. “God, I could let you do that for hours.”

  Her eyebrows betrayed her consternation, but she said not a word.

  “Now my ass,” he said. She opened her mouth, then closed it.

  “Good. You’re learning.”

  He stood above her and spread his legs. He could see the calculation in her eyes. He was ready, if she tried anything. She sucked her lips in, then took a deep breath and raised herself up to a kneeling position behind him. She began to lick the outer curve of his ass.

  “And you know that’s not where I meant.”

  She grimaced again, closed her eyes, put her hands on his ass cheeks and pulled them slightly apart. She stuck her tongue out and began to lick his anus. This act ranked pretty high, although not at the top, on the list of the hardest things she’d ever had to make herself do in her life. And, metaphorically speaking, the night was still young, she knew.

  He told her she could stop after about five solid, endless minutes. She rubbed her tongue with her hands and made small retching sounds. He ignored her. He went over to a satchel on one of the tables nearby and took out a pack of cigarettes.