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“Stop bleating,” he says irritably, reaching for something on the other side of the tub. “I’m not going to kill you. Not yet, anyway.”
The cold that goes through me as he saysnot yetchills me to the marrow of my bones. And then I see what he has in his hands.
It’s not a weapon. Not even anything dangerous. It almost makes me laugh, and I manage to hold it back only by virtue of the fact that I’m almost certain I’ll make him much angrier if I laugh now.
It’s a dye removal kit. Somehow, it almost makes me feel better to see it. At least if I’m going to die, I’ll die with my natural fucking hair color.
Since I’m back to being Natalia Obelensky, at least I’ll look like her.
The bleach burns my scalp as he rubs it in with one gloved hand, the other on the back of my neck to hold me still in the tub. I feel like a dog being given a bath, and I have half a mind to bite him, but I’m always cognizant of how far to push him. He’s angry now, and I have to be careful.
Not yet, anyway.
My life is in danger.Everythingis in danger. I have to tread more carefully now than ever. And that means not letting my own anger, and my smart mouth, run away with me.
Mikhail turns the water on, and hot water floods the tub, soaking my clothing. He pushes my hair under the faucet, and I watch black dye run down into the drain. He repeats the process over and over, until my hair feels tacky and my scalp feels raw from the bleach.
“Such a shame that you damaged your natural beauty,” he murmurs, running his fingers through my wet hair as the dye drips out of it. “With this cheap nonsense. It’s not what it used to be.”
There are a dozen things I could say in response to that. That I’d been trying to save my own life, trying to stay hidden from men like him, men who had cause to want to hurt me. That I’d been trying to give myself a chance at a new start. But none of it really matters. I don’t know why he wants to hurt me, and I know he doesn’t really care what I’d been trying to achieve by hiding under the guise of the alter ego I’d made up for myself.
He squeezes the water out of my hair as he wraps it around his fist, sliding his other hand around to tip my chin up and look into my eyes, his voice soft, almost lover-like as he speaks to me.
“I’ll see you for who you really are, now.”
Natalia
I’m shivering all over by the time Mikhail gets me out of the tub, towel-drying off my wet clothing and hair roughly, leaving me still dressed in the ballet outfit and pointe shoes as he picks me up again, carrying me out of the bathroom and towards the stairs near the front door that I’m certain lead down to the basement.
I’m not sure I’ve ever been as afraid in my entire life as I am when he takes me down the stairs into the darkness. I can’t help thinking that I’m going to die down there, that I’ll never go back up those stairs, and I can feel myself starting to shake as he flicks on a light with his elbow, flooding the basement with light.
It takes me a moment to take in what I see. It’s not the basement of a normal house, that’s for sure. The floor is smooth tile, and my stomach contracts when I see a drain towards one corner, a snakelike hose coiled up near a spigot on one wall, a table with a thin leather folio on it–and soft, pink shibari-like ropes hanging from the ceiling.
“Those are for you,” Mikhail murmurs, in that same lover-like tone. “I didn’t want to leave rope burns on those pretty wrists.”
He sets me down on my toes in the pointe shoes, capturing my hands and drawing them up over my head, stretching me upwards in a caricature of a ballerina’s pose as I stare at him, unable to hide my fear any longer. “So delicate,” he croons, his fingers rubbing over the soft inner flesh of my wrists, the sharp bones, as he reaches to begin to tie me into the ropes. He wraps them around my wrists and upper arms like the ribbons on my ballet shoes, tying me so that I have to remain just on my toes. “So perfect. And allmine.”
A surge of anger ripples through me, tangling with the fear until I hardly know what I really feel any longer, how much is terror and how much is fury. I hate him for everything he’s made me feel, everything he’s made me question, how even now, tied up in his basement with an uncertain future staring me in the face, something about his sharp, dangerous beauty appeals to me, makes me feel that knot of desire in my belly. That he makes feel aroused at the danger, the fear, the helplessness–that if somehow all of this was really just a game, and not real, I wouldwantit even more than I already do.
I rear back as he ties my hands, gathering what little moisture is left in my mouth to spit in his face, angry tears welling in my eyes. “Fine,” I hiss, narrowing them at him in bitter rage. “I’m Natalia fucking Obelensky. You’ve won. Does that make you happy?” I seethe at him, spitting again as he wipes the first glob of spittle off his cheek with his forearm, glaring at me as he finishes knotting the ropes. I’m held in place, suspended on my toes, and although I can hold this position longer than most, I know eventually it will be miserable.
“None of this makes any fucking sense,” I snap at him, my voice a heated, angry hiss through clenched teeth. “But sure, whatever. I’myours. You have me in your possession, just like you apparently wanted. Obelensky’s daughter. But you’re a fucking idiot,” I tell him, my voice flattening and hardening, a hint of bitter humor in my words. “Because my father is dead. Iknowhe’s dead, because I helped the man who killed him get to him. So whatever purpose you have for keeping me here, whether you think you’re going to get some fucking ransom from my family or his men or whatever, it’s pointless. My father is gone, and I’m on the run. You’ve committed several crimes for nothing, you stupid, fucking man.”
Mikhail listens to my entire outburst with his arms crossed over his broad chest, a small smirk playing on his lips. “Are you quite finished?” he asks finally, as I spit out the last words, sounding as if he’s bored by my speech. It makes my stomach sink, because it’s clear that I still don’t understand what it is that he wants. Why he’s gone to such lengths to capture and keep me–why he’s so obsessed with me.
“I know Konstantin Obelensky is dead,” he says, circling me slowly as his eyes rake over my body in the clinging wet leotard, heated lust clear in his gaze. “That was a disappointment, since I’d hoped to kill the man myself. But you’re still a prize,krasotka. You will still give me everything I want and more.”
He circles around to face me, and my heart stutters in my chest as he flips open the leather folio on the table, revealing several thin, sharp implements. One is a fine-bladed knife, and as he slips it free, I feel my mouth go dry with fear.
At the same time, I feel a flutter of heat deep in my belly that shocks and horrifies me.This isn’t a game!I scream at myself in my head, but it feels as if my mind and my body are divorced from each other, one reacting in a way that the other can’t understand.This isn’t a fantasy. There’s no safe word. No way out when it goes too far–and itwillgo too far. This isn’t some kinky game. This isreal.
“Why did your father want Viktor Andreyev out of power so badly?” Mikhail presses the tip of the knife to one finger, as if testing the sharpness, as he approaches me.
I look at him in stunned shock. “What?”
Mikhail narrows his eyes, crouching down to where my feet are just touching the tile. “Don’t make me repeat myself, Natalia,” he says sharply. “I don’t like that.”
“I heard you,” I manage. “I just–why in the hell would you think I would know that?”
