Evening of day ten…

I cry in the shower, hugging myself. I hope that he can’t see me cry in there, because I know it would just make him smile, and knowing that makes me want to scream.

My heart feels like a giant bruise, tender and painful.

I lean against the shower stall, exhausted. I know he wants me. I know he loves to have sex with me. Am I an idiot to try to break through the thick, hard shell he’s built around his heart? Is it selfish of me to want just a modicum of tenderness….to hope that he might actually someday come to care for me?

Disgusted with myself, I turn off the shower and get out. What do I expect from him? I ask myself. Love? Kindness? A relationship…with a monster? How could I possibly want that?

After I’ve dried myself off, I put on pajamas and go and sit outside on the patio outside my room. I’m lost in my thoughts, blinded to the beauty of my surroundings.

What would I do if Sergei really did come to care for me?

I try to tell myself that I’m just doing my best to establish a bond with my captor. But it’s not entirely true. When Sergei is harsh to me, it’s brutal. It’s devastating and hurts me worse than punches.

But that somehow makes his rare moments of tenderness a million times more meaningful to me. They’re like balm to my wounded soul. What would my life be like if he were like that all the time? If this cold, hard man warmed for me?

I close my eyes and start mentally listing all the things he’s done that might possibly be considered kind or caring.

He treats that little boy like a prince, and makes sure that he’s being raised by people who love him.

He filled up my room with books that I love to read.

He bought me beautiful clothing that suited me perfectly. It’s like he knew me. He knew my soul.

His lovemaking is breathtaking, astounding. His touch can be so sweet and soft. He makes me wet before he enters me. He makes me come first.

He found out what I went to school for, and he asked me what I wanted to do with my life. He told me I should live my life for myself. Nobody else has ever done that.

I am desperate for these little gestures to mean something. I don’t know why I need that validation, and I am angry with myself for my weakness. I have one mission here – survive the thirty days, and go home so I can save my cousins. Did I make a mistake in trying to reach him? I can’t tell.

I pray I didn’t. Helenka and Yuri’s lives may depend on it. It’s so frustrating. I am navigating uncharted territory here. All my life I was the good girl, keeping as safe as I could by following every rule. I was the perfect daughter, and then, when I lost that identity, I went to college and I was the perfect student, and when I was done with that, I was the perfect houseguest and helper.

Here, it doesn’t matter what I do. I’m nice, I’m kind, I’m obedient – and I’m still being slapped around.

It’s not even reward or recognition or thanks I’m looking for – I’ve never had that.

It’s just relief from the abuse, the insults, the mockery. The fear. If I just knew what he wanted, I’d do it.

But nothing is good enough for him. Surrender isn’t good enough. Obedience isn’t good enough. All he seems to want from me is to degrade me. He can only win if I lose. How can I work with that?

With a sigh, I stand up. It’s going to be a long, sleepless night. I won’t be able to stop thinking about him. Wanting him to be with me and feeling sick to my stomach for wanting that. Wishing he cared, even just a little.

I don’t see him at all the next day, or the next night. He’s not there to torment me, or to bring me to ecstasy.

No, scratch that. He is tormenting me – by leaving me in the dark. By leaving me craving and wanting and fearing, and never knowing when he’s coming for me. He disappeared for almost a week last time. Every single day crawled by, the seconds ticking away as loud as gunshots, and the nights dragged on for an eternity.

I burn for him when he’s not there. I dread his cruel words, but I yearn for the release he gives my flesh. I still don’t dare touch myself, so I suffer a constant pulse of erotic hunger with no control, no way to feed that hunger.

At some point, he will be back. I know that now – because I know he craves my body. How he feels about the rest of me, I’m not sure.

* * *

On day eleven, I get my answer.

Unfortunately, it’s in the form of Feodyr. Early in the evening, he walks in to my room with Karl. Feodyr is a mess, stubble growing on his chin, stinking of alcohol.

He’s holding a dress that’s literally just made of fringe with straps. There’s a black band at the top, and a couple of feet of fringe hang down from it.

“Put this on,” he growls. “We’re going to a party.”

I stare at him in shock. Then I shake my head vigorously. “No,” I say firmly. I will do this for Sergei, but not for him.

Karl grins. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

I’m wearing a cotton sundress, and he reaches out and rips it in half.

I try to run, but Karl catches my arm and spins me around.

“You can go to the party naked, or you can put on the dress,” Karl sneers. He’s gripping my arm so hard I almost cry. His rictus smile bares yellow teeth.

“I’ll put on the dress,” I say stiffly.

Karl watches me hungrily as I strip off the shreds of the dress that I was wearing. Then I step into the dress and pull it up, looping each tiny strap over my shoulder. Every time I move, the fringe slides and exposes my nipples.

Feodyr puts a collar on me. Then he connects a leash to the collar. I am mortified. Furious.

Karl grins, eyes gleaming with malice. “Should we make her take her panties off?”

Feodyr strokes his chin, looking thoughtful. “Nah, it’ll be fun watching them get ripped right off her.” His Russian accent is thicker than usual.

This is what Sergei wants. He lured me in with sweet talk, pretending to care about me and my future. It was all a lie.

I want to vomit. I want to weep.

I will not give them the satisfaction.

“Shall we go?” I say coldly, my spine straight.

Feodyr looks surprised, then laughs. There is a nasty bite to it. “Eager for some gang-bang action?”

Gang-bang. Oh my God. Let me just die now.

No. Helenka. Yuri.

This is just my body. I will float away from my body.

The hell with being nice, with being sweet, with cooperating. It doesn’t work. It doesn’t matter. Sergei will torture and insult me no matter what. “The only thing I’m eager for is to watch you choke on your own blood. But the sooner we get started with whatever you sick fucks have in store for me, the sooner we’ll get it the hell over with.”

I am led through the hallway like a dog on a leash. We pass by Jon as we’re leaving. He’s standing outside the front door. I sneak him a quick glance, out of desperation, but he ignores me.

He either can’t or won’t help me. I don’t know if he’s really working for my uncle or not. I pass him from time to time in the hallways, but I never dare ask, because the house is studded with cameras and listening devices.

How many men will there be? How badly will they abuse me?

I get into the back seat of a black Bentley, with Karl sitting next to me. Feodyr drives.

Karl doesn’t touch me; that’s a small mercy. A very small one.

Feodyr blasts Russian death metal as we drive, and he’s swerving all over the road. I pray that we’ll be pulled over, but of course, there’s not a cop in sight. We pass other cars, and I look at them through the darkened rear windows. I am a caged animal looking out at them. It’s the loneliest feeling in the world – seeing all those people out there whizzing down the road to their normal lives, with no way to cry out to them.

We drive for half an hour, heading away from the coast. When we pull to a stop, it’s in an industrial district, in the parking lot of a warehouse. There are six other cars there.

They haul me out of the car. I am forced to walk barefoot up a pebbled path, and the pebbles bite into my feet.

Feodyr stops in front of a security camera at the front door, and I hear a click. He pulls open the door. We walk down a hallway and then into a room of nightmares.

It’s harshly lit, by floodlights.

There’s an Italian guy who used to be my uncle’s business partner. His name is Carmelo. There’s a dozen other guys there. A dozen. But that’s not even the nightmare part.

There is a row of chains hanging from the ceiling. And every chain but one has a girl attached to it. Struggling. Crying out. Naked or half naked, with gross men fondling them, licking them. One girl is pinned between two men, being double-teamed. She screams in pain with every thrust, and there is a hopeless quality to her screams.

Oh my God. This is Sergei. This is his doing. I wanted to be with this man. Now I just want to kill him.

I hear a shriek from one of the women and I see that a man has just burned her breast with a cigarette. She hangs from her chains and sobs and sobs. He’s short and fat, red faced, with sweat streaming down his forehead. He laughs and laughs, and jabs at her again, and her scream splits the air and bounces off the rafters.

I am stiff with shock and rage.

These girls. They’re in agony, terrified, and the men are getting off on it. I will be one of those girls in mere seconds.

Carmelo hurries over, eager.

“The star of the show!”

With disgust, I realize that he’s accompanied by a man with a video camera, and they’re filming me.

“Fuck you, Carmelo,” I spit at him.

“See that! She can’t wait!” he brags to the camera, and grabs his crotch and gives it a tug.

I fight like mad as they drag me toward the chains, and then one of them men tazes me. Every muscle in my body is on fire and seizes up. It hurts like nothing I’ve ever felt before, and I fall to the ground, convulsing, helpless. They lift me up and carry me over to the chains. They yank my hands up and I’m cuffed.

I hear the chains creaking, and the chain lifts me until I’m dangling, my tiptoes barely touching the floor.

My legs thrash. My arms burn. Feodyr grabs me by the arm and swings me around, and I’m dizzy and sick.

Feodyr takes the collar off me and drops it on the floor.

“Who’s first?” he yells at the men. “This fine piece of ass is on the house, boys! Courtesy of Sergei!”

I’ve died and gone to hell.

I close my eyes and I don’t even know whose sloppy hands are running over my body, thrusting between my legs. Tears pour down my cheeks. I’m not just crying because of what they’re doing to me; I’m crying because Sergei wanted this. I’m a fool; I thought I could make him care about me? I might as well have tried cuddling up to Satan.

I squirm madly as fat, sweaty fingers push aside the fringe of my dress and shove between my legs. My panties are torn off.

I desperately try to press my legs together. Fingers stab into me, and I writhe, trying to dislodge them. It makes the men laugh.

“Dance for me, whore!” a drunken voice slurs.

I feel a mouth close on my nipple and bite hard, and I scream in pain.

And then I hear the gunshots. The hands fall away. My eyes fly open.

Sergei and Jon and a whole crowd of men are pouring into the room. I think there’s twenty of them.

Carmelo falls back and screams in terror. He turns and runs, but he doesn’t get far.

Sergei takes him out with one shot to the head.

Someone lowers me to the ground. Jasha uncuffs me and shields me with his body as Sergei and his men kill every man in the room, and the hideous smell of blood and excrement fills the air. They’re lowering the other women, who are sobbing and shaking. As soon as they’re free, they collapse, kneeling or curled up on the cold, hard concrete.

“Call 9-1-1,” Sergei barks at his man Maks.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. They need a doctor, and we’ll be long gone before the cops get here.” He sternly addresses a crying blonde. “We wore masks. You never saw our faces.”

She says something in another language, I think Serbian. He answers her in Serbian. She nods frantically, sobbing and hugging herself in relief. There are half a dozen cigarette burns on her chest. I want to bring the man who did this to her back to life so I can kill him myself. Over and over again.

Sergei picks up the video camera, which is lying in a pool of blood, pulls out the microchip, and snaps it in half.

Then his eyes light on Feodyr. Feodyr never tried to run, and he still doesn’t move. Sergei storms over to him and begins savagely beating him, punching him in the face again and again. Feodyr laughs, a deranged cackle, and doesn’t lift a hand to defend himself.

I can hear bones breaking as Sergei’s brutal fists hammer into him. I see a bloody tooth fly out. Feodyr’s nose crunches, his jaw shattered.

“Stop,” I cry out.

I run over and grab his arm, and he swings back, and for a second I think he’s going to punch me. He’s in some faraway place. The rage in his eyes terrifies me. He shudders all over and sucks in oxygen, barely keeping himself under control.

“Don’t kill him. Please. I’m begging you.”

“Why?” he rasps.

“He’s too close to you. He’s part of you. Killing him will be like killing a piece of yourself. I’m not saying he should go free. Let the police take him; let him spend the rest of his life rotting in prison.”

He turns away and he’s about to resume beating Feodyr, but I stagger. In an instant, he’s right next to me.

I sway, and he catches me.

“Let’s go home,” he breathes in my ear.