MAFIA Romance – Owned by the Mafia

It was terrifying to have a pistol shoved in his mouth. More terrifying was the knowledge that he had no way of repaying his debt.

“How dare you,” Grigori said. “How dare you sit at my table and gamble with me when you know you don't have the funds to cover your debts.”

Grigori tightened his grip around Lenny's throat. Lenny looked up at him with saliva running from his open mouth and a great deal of fear in his eyes.

“I ought to kill you now, you asshole. But I'm a benevolent man. I'm going to give you a chance.” Grigori looked at the photo on the mantelpiece. “She's very pretty, isn't she?” he said. Lenny growled at him and tried to break free. One of Grigori's henchmen stepped forward and assisted his boss in restraining Lenny. “What time will she be home?” Grigori asked, removing the gun from Lenny's mouth to allow him to speak.

“You fucking bastard. If you so much as lay a finger on her, I'll kill you,” Lenny growled.

“From where I'm standing, you don't seem to be in much of a position to carry out your threat,” Grigori said as he forced the gun back into Lenny's mouth.

Lenny was forty-five, the son of an Irish immigrant father and a Hungarian dancer. His father had left them when he was two and his mother, struggling to find work as a dancer, had turned to prostitution. Neglected and alone, by the age of eight he was a master pickpocket, and by the age of thirteen he was one of the best lock pickers in New York. When his mother was murdered by a drunken client, he was fifteen. The authorities wanted to take him into care, but he'd already amassed enough money to look after himself, and he disappeared. When he came back to New York, it was as a heavily muscled strongman who lived from the proceeds of his criminal activities. In and out of jail, he managed to hide his ill-gotten gains and channel them into several pieces of real estate. Lenny was a rich man; he just didn't have any cash. In his opinion, he'd invested wisely, but he would have admitted to one very simple mistake: an evening of gambling with the Russians in Brighton Beach when he knew he didn't have the liquidity to pay if he incurred losses.

“Dad, I'm home,” Lucy shouted. Funny, she thought when he didn't reply. Her dad always shouted to her when she got home. He loved asking her about her day at art college, sitting in the kitchen, drinking tea, and chatting with her. She hung her coat in the hall and put her satchel down on the black and white tiled floor. “Dad, where are you?” she shouted again.

“Sit down and shut up,” Grigori shouted when she walked into the sitting room. She screamed and put her hand over her mouth.

“What the fuck are you doing?” she shouted. She didn't sit down as asked; she walked to Grigori and began to throw punches at him.

“Very spirited,” he said as he held her from him with one arm, the other still holding the pistol in Lenny's mouth. “Get her off me,” Grigori said to one of his men.

A very large, very Russian-looking man took Lucy and lifted her from the floor. She tried to kick and bite him, but he threw her onto the sofa.

“Quite a display of aggression, Lucy. I admire spirited women. In fact, it turns me on. Now, if you don't want to see your father's brains splattered all over this lovely room, sit still and fucking well listen to me,” Grigori snarled.

“What are you doing to him? What has he done?” she asked, tears beginning to escape from her blue eyes.

“He owes me money, a lot of money, and he can't pay. So, here's what we're going to do. You are going to come with me until he can pay.”

“No way. You're not taking me hostage,” Lucy shouted as she got up from the sofa and made for the sideboard, where she knew Lenny kept a handgun. Again the large man picked her up and threw her onto the sofa.

Grigori laughed. “I admire your fight, but it's useless,” he said. He took the gun from Lenny's mouth and wiped it on Lenny's shirt. “She's coming with us, Lenny, and there's not a thing you can do about it.”

“You fucking asshole, I'll see you burn in hell. When I find you, I'll rip your eyes out and piss on—” Lenny didn't get to finish the rest of his tirade; Grigori pistol-whipped him into unconsciousness. Lucy screamed again and tried to get up, but the big man had learned his lesson and was holding her. “I didn't realize what a beautiful daughter he had. How old are you, Lucy?” Grigori asked. He looked horrified when Lucy's spit landed on his well-pressed trousers. “Take the bitch and put her in the trunk. I've had enough of her.”

Lucy was thrown from side to side as the car dodged through the residential area her father lived in. She was relieved when they seemed to reach a long, straight piece of the freeway and it was a smoother ride. The tape over her mouth ripped at her skin whenever she moved her mouth, so she tried to stay as expressionless as possible. She had no idea who these men were or where she was being taken. All she knew was that her beloved father was lying unconscious in their home and she was in very grave danger.

“Take her downstairs,” she heard Grigori say as she was hauled from the trunk. Her legs scraped along the ground as she was dragged along. The man held her in one arm, opened a door, and carried her down a set of stone steps into a basement.

“Should I tie her up, boss?” he shouted upstairs.

“Tie her to the roof support,” Grigori shouted back.

The basement had four posts that supported the upper floor. Lucy found herself tied to one of them a few minutes later.

“You're so pretty,” the man said as he put the finishing touches to the knot that held her in place. “How an ugly fucker like Lenny could produce a daughter like you, I have no idea. Your mother must have been Cleopatra,” he joked. Her mouth still covered by tape, Lucy wasn't able to reply.

*****

Lucy lost track of time. She knew it had been around half past four in the afternoon when they kidnapped her, but there were no windows in the basement, and she had no way of seeing if it was dark or light. After a time, she decided to close her eyes and try to sleep, but her mind was so active that she didn't manage to drop off. All she could think about was how her father was and what these despicable men were going to do to her. She could take a beating, but she was desperately worried by the big man's comments about how pretty she looked. Was he going to help himself to her?

When the light came on she blinked uncontrollably. She heard someone coming down the stairs and held her breath, wondering what was about to happen to her.

“Here,” Grigori said as he handed her a cup of water. He tore the tape from her mouth and noticed it had caused a rash on her top lip and chin. Lucy guzzled the water, spilling some of it on her blouse.

“What time is it?” she asked. For some reason time seemed important.

“Half past ten. Do you want some food?”

“How long do you propose to keep me here?” she asked.

“For as long as it takes your father to come up with the money he owes me.”

“And how much is that?”

“Five hundred grand.” Grigori sat down on an old sofa in the corner of the room and looked at her. He too wondered how Lenny had managed to produce such a pretty daughter. He knew her mother couldn’t have been Irish, because Lucy had tanned skin and dark hair, and the Irish, he always joked, were ginger and pasty.

“But he won't be able to find that kind of money,” she said.

“How many houses does he own?”

“Five.”

“They are enormous places, each worth at least a million. All he has to do is sell one and pay me.”

“But it's not a good time to sell real estate; it could take forever,” Lucy said.

“Then you can look forward to growing old down here.”

She fixed her eyes on him in a death stare. “You're heartless. I bet your mother didn't bring you up to treat women like you are treating me.”

“What mother? I was given away when I was a baby. My mother didn't give a shit about me.”

“Untie me, please. This rope is cutting me. I won't do anything stupid,” she pleaded.

He got up, walked to her, and took out a knife. In one swift movement he cut through the rope and pulled it from her. Lucy rubbed her wrists, which were red and developing the same rash she had on her face. “Are you really going to keep me all that time?”

“Yes. You'll stay here until he pays.”

“The cops—”

“Fuck the cops. Do you think the cops will do anything? I pay them to do what I want,” he snarled.

If he hadn't been so brutal to her, she would have found him enormously attractive. He was tall and athletic looking. His dark hair was cropped and his Slavic features were fine. The most attractive thing about him were his eyes. When she looked at him, she was lost in a sea of green.

“Let me go, please. What can I possibly do to you? I'm just a young woman trying to get an art degree.”

“Where is your mother?” he asked.

“Dead,” she replied.

“How?” he asked, expressing no sympathy.

“Car crash. She was Spanish. She went to see her mother in Madrid and never came back to us.” Lucy's mind flashed back to the day the policeman had called at their house and told them what had happened. The tormented look on her father's face had stayed with her ever since.

“Too bad. I'm sorry to hear that. How long ago?”

“Three years.”

“I don't know what it's like to have parents. I was a Moscow street kid until I was fifteen, and then I came to the US.”

Lucy got up and walked a few steps. She needed to stretch, and as she bent to touch her toes, Grigori looked at her. She was wearing tight jeans, and they stretched over her body when she bent over, showing the most perfect ass he'd ever seen. He liked to think of himself as a professional criminal, the kind of man who could kidnap a beautiful woman and ignore the treasures she had to offer. But in Lucy, he found out he was, after all, fallible.

Lucy sat down on the sofa next to him and considered how quickly she could thrust her long nails into his eyes. Was it worth trying? Maybe, she thought, but she decided to see whether she was able to talk her way out of her predicament first.

“Why did you come to the US?” she asked.

“Opportunity. I wanted to get rich.”

“And you are, but aren't you ashamed of yourself?”

He looked shocked by her question. “No. Why would I be?”

“Because you haven't become rich by hard work or ingenuity. You've bludgeoned your way to wealth by threatening people, scaring them, and who knows, probably even killing a few of them. That's a dishonorable way, a way that gains no respect.”

His face darkened, and Lucy thought he was going to slap her. “What would you have done if you'd lived on the streets in Moscow, freezing to death? Nobody gave me a start in life like you have had. I had to fend for myself. Whacking people was all I knew, and it got me to where I am today.”

*****

“Where is the bitch?” Lucy heard a woman scream. The light went on, and Lucy sheltered her eyes. There was the sound of women's shoes on the stairs and then the sound of somebody following her.

“Ah, so here she is,” the woman said. She was around thirty and thin. She was rather goth-like in her appearance. Her hair was jet black, and her eye shadow matched it. Her lipstick was very dark, and she wore a ring on each finger. Lucy took an instant dislike to her. “Why the fuck isn't she tied up?” she said in her Russian-American dialect.

“Because she can't go anywhere and her wrists are hurt,” Grigori replied.

“Who are you?” Lucy asked.

The woman slapped Lucy's face, causing her to stagger backward. “Don't you dare ask me any questions. If I want you to know anything, I'll tell you. Understand?” Lucy nodded, her hand over her stinging face. “Pretty, isn't she?” she said.

“Very attractive,” Grigori said.

“Don't you go fucking her or I'll kill you.”

Lucy flew into a rage. Who the hell did she think she was? She wrapped her arms around the woman and rolled her onto the floor in a perfect wrestler’s throw. The woman was stunned when she hit the ground hard. “Don't you talk like that. You may have the advantage over me now, but when this is over, I'll find you,” Lucy hissed, her knee across the woman's throat.

“Get the bitch off me,” the woman shouted.

Grigori pulled Lucy away and put her on the sofa. The woman got up gingerly and stretched her back. Without saying anything, she walked back up the stairs and slammed the door.

“That was very brave,” Grigori said.

“Who the fuck is she?”

“That's my girlfriend, Natasha.”

“You have a girlfriend like that? Jesus, Grigori, what the hell were you thinking when you hooked up with her? She's a bitch, and she's ugly.”

Grigori remained silent, and Lucy got the impression she'd hit the nail on the head. He didn't appear to be very fond of her either. “She's dangerous,” he said.

“What do you care? You're the most dangerous man in New York.”

“No. There is one man more dangerous than me. That's her father, Iakov Sheludko.”

“You Russians are so fucked up,” she said angrily. “Listen, Grigori, stop playing games. Let me go. It'll do you no good keeping me here.”

“Not until your father has paid his debt. I told you.”

Lucy had spent the time between Grigori's visits deliberating whether to offer herself to him in exchange for her freedom. He was a very handsome man, just her type, and although not the kind of thing she wanted to do, with him she thought it would be bearable. What her father would think of her if she did that, she didn't know.

“Grigori, do you think I'm attractive?” she began. He looked at her quizzically.

“Why are you asking me?”

“Because I think you're hot. How about it? I'll let you fuck me if you set me free afterward.” She slid next to him on the sofa and put her hand on his leg. “Imagine how nice it would be to feel my firm ass and look at my pert breasts,” she said as her hand slid up toward his bulge.

He took a sharp breath, and she could feel the material in his jeans moving. “No,” he said as his hand slammed onto hers. He pulled her arm away and stood up.

“Look,” she said. She began to open the buttons on her blouse. He watched until she reached the fourth button. When her bra came into view, she noticed a considerable swelling in between his legs.

“Stop,” he said.

“You can have me all,” she added.

He turned away and walked up the stairs. When the light went out, Lucy lay on the sofa and cried. What was she doing? she asked herself. But she was now more convinced than ever that it was the only way to get out of the mess she was in.

An hour later Natasha came back downstairs. This time she was carrying a rope and a gun. “Stand against the pillar, over there,” she said, pointing the gun at Lucy. She obviously wasn't going to chance being overpowered again. Lucy did as she was asked. Natasha held the gun to Lucy's face and ripped open Lucy's blouse. “Ah, what secrets are you hiding under here?” she said as she rubbed the tip of the gun over her bra.

“Fuck off, you moron,” Lucy said.

“No need to be impolite,” Natasha said.

“Take off your pants.”

Lucy looked at her and wondered whether she was bisexual.

“Do it,” she shouted when Lucy didn't move.

Lucy reluctantly lowered her pants and stepped out of them. Natasha picked them up and took her blouse from her. She tied Lucy to the pillar and looked at her. “Now you won't be able to escape,” she said.

Upstairs, Grigori was sitting at the kitchen table, unable to get the image of Lucy's bra from his mind. She was so beautiful, soft and gentle looking, yet she stood her corner and was tough. Just the thought of her lying naked under him as he thrust into her made him hard.

“We'll kill her if her father hasn't paid before the end of the week,” Natasha said when she arrived in the kitchen.

“Are you fucking mental? As far as I know you're not a retard, are you?” Grigori said. “We can't kill her.”

“You asshole. You've thought nothing of killing people before, for much less. Just because she's beautiful, you don't want to shoot her. Well, I will.”

Grigori got up from his chair and took her by the throat. “If you touch her, I'll kick your ass so hard you won't sit down for weeks.”

“And what will my daddy say about that?” she asked as he held her against the wall.

“That's all you can do, isn't it? Run to daddy every time. Well, there will be a day when he's not here anymore.”

“And what are you saying? Are you going to kill him?”

Grigori didn't reply. “I'm gonna see what you've done to her, and if it's bad, I'll put an end to you.”

“Fuck you, Grigori. You're nothing but a two-bit gangster. You’re an asshole, and I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing with you.”

“Well fuck off then,” he shouted. He took her by the hair and pulled her from the kitchen, through the hallway, and out into the front yard. He walked back inside, took her car keys from the hook next to the door, and threw them at her. “Fuck off and don't come back, you ugly bitch.”

*****

“I'm sorry,” Grigori said as he untied Lucy. “I'll fetch a robe for you.” Before he went upstairs, he stopped and looked at her standing in just her bra and panties. He was disappointed in himself when his cock once more began to stiffen at the sight of her. “She's a bitch,” he said when he arrived back with the bathrobe. He held it out for her, and she slipped into it.

“You know my offer still stands. We could have a nice time together,” she said.

“Lucy, you are more beautiful than any woman I've ever seen, and I would like nothing more, but it's not right. When you father pays, as he will, you can go.”

She realized she actually wanted him to say yes to her proposal. She was shocked by the thoughts she was having. She was beginning to have fantasies about the man who only a day ago had put a gun into her father's mouth.

“Sleep on the sofa,” Grigori said. “You won't be tied up again.”

When he left, she lay down and wondered what it would take to get him to accept what she wanted. Maybe she should take her clothes off the next time she heard him coming downstairs.

Grigori had a shower and got into bed. When his head hit the pillow, he fell asleep, exhausted by the incident with Natasha. When he woke, it was 2 a.m. and his cock was painfully hard. That often happened in the morning when he woke, but this erection wasn't like those. This was real arousal. His cock was telling him he needed to fuck her, and he needed to fuck her now. He would fuck her and let her go.

He got out of bed and went downstairs. Naked and fully erect, he unlocked the basement door and crept down the stairs. He fumbled around in the dark until he found her. He slipped an arm under her upper body and another under the crook of her knees. When he lifted her up, she woke. She didn't scream or make any kind of protest. She knew why he was there, and she wanted to be free.

“I want to fuck you,” he said as he carried her up the stairs toward the light.

“And then you'll set me free?”

“Yes. In the morning.”

“I knew you wouldn't be able to resist me,” she said.

“You're so fucking hot, I can't. I just have to have you. It's wrong, but I can't help myself.”

Lucy let her hand fall to his groin and began to stroke his hard cock as it bounced up and down in rhythm with his steps. “You're a big boy, aren't you?” she whispered. His breathing became noticeably heavier, and his step quickened.

“Take me to the bathroom,” she said. “I've been down there for a day and a half, and I need a shower.”

He carried her into the en-suite and put her down. “I'm waiting. Don't be long,” he said.

The bathroom was like everything else in the house, luxurious. The floor was made of marble, and the shower was a double walk-in. She turned the water on and threw her robe on the floor.

Under the hot water, she began to relax. She wondered if at some point in the future she would regret giving herself to a criminal just to secure her release. It was a seedy thing to do, but what choice did she have? He was attractive, and she thought she might even enjoy it. She knew her dad would go crazy if he knew, but he never would. She would tell him Grigori had changed his mind. It even occurred to her that she might be able to get him to forgive her father's debts, or at least a large part of them. All she was doing was what thousands of women before her had done: using her beauty to overpower a man. “Pussy power,” she said under her breath. She laughed but then suddenly stopped when she realized how precarious her position still was.

When she was finished, she opened the door and walked into the bedroom, naked. He was lying on the bed with his arm's folded behind his head. His cock was still as hard as it had been when he'd picked her up.

“You really want me, don't you?” she said.

“How do you know?”

“Your cock's been hard since you came to see me. That's been about twenty minutes now.”

“Is it surprising? I mean look at you. You're perfect.”

He was perfect too, she thought. His long legs were bronzed and covered in fine dark hair. She stepped toward him and ran her hand from his ankle to his calf, feeling the coarseness of his hairs and the tightness of his trained muscles. When her hand reached his upper thigh, he groaned, and she saw his penis twitch. His cock was long and straight. Lucy had seen a lot of naked men, usually as models in art classes, but Grigori's penis was more arousing than any penis she'd seen before. It was pretty, in as far as a cock could be pretty. She ran her hand from the outside of his leg and cupped his balls.

“Jesus, that's nice,” he said.

They felt coarse and heavy. She began to massage them, gently flicking her nails across his delicate skin, teasing him, making his arousal unbearable. She gently took his shaft in her hand and rubbed up and down its length. She loved the expression on his face as she helped herself to him. She continued to rub his length as her hand left his balls and rubbed over his hard stomach, up to his bulging chest. He had no chest hair, and she enjoyed the feel of rubbing her hand freely over his skin. When her hand moved over him, she felt his muscles respond in tiny waves of excitement.

She got onto the bed and straddled him, all the time rubbing him, making him groan. “Put me inside you,” he moaned, unable to last much longer. The sight of her slender body on him and her large breasts moving in time to the actions of her hand was too much. All he could think of was taking her.

“Not so fast. I want to enjoy it,” she said.

“But I'm so close,” he moaned. “You don't know what you do to me.” She took her hand from him and lay down next to him. When she opened her legs, he knew what she wanted.

She gasped when he rolled between her legs and kissed her soft folds. She'd expected a man like him to unleash a bruising onslaught when he licked her, but he was gentle, expertly teasing her to the edge and letting her hang. “Let me come,” she said impatiently when it became unbearable. He took more of her into his mouth and worked her with his tongue. When she came, she scratched his shoulders and thrashed her legs over his back.

Without letting her recover, he slid up her, kissing her breasts as he went. When his face reached hers, he was already deep inside her. He shoved his hands under her buttocks and felt their softness as he built up his thrusts. She was soon gasping again as his body rubbed again hers. Wave after wave of pleasure left her trembling center, crashing somewhere in her head. Her body tensed, and he felt her coming once more.

“Jesus, you're so sexy,” he said as he looked at her face, tiny beads of sweat forming on her hairline.

“So are you,” she gasped, thrusting her pelvis up to meet his movements. She didn't care now what the circumstances were. She was lost in their lovemaking, and nothing else seemed to matter. That he'd kidnapped her and locked her in a basement were minor irrelevancies. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed the side of this face.

“I can't much longer. I'm gonna come,” he said.

“Come with me,” she shouted. She quickly began to pleasure herself. Her timing was perfect; as soon as she felt him twitch inside her, she came. They shook together, cried out together, and clung onto each other for minutes. When he slipped out of her, he rolled onto his back.

“Sorry,” he said.

“What for?”

“For mistreating you.”

Lucy smiled and thought about what she'd told herself in the shower. It worked every time, she thought. “Can I go now?” she asked.

“Sure. I'll have someone take you home.”

“Don't you want me to stay?” She'd hoped he would ask her to sleep with him. His sudden agreement to her release felt perversely like rejection.

“You can stay if you’d like. It would be nice if you did. Maybe we can do it again when I've recovered.”

“I'd like that,” she said. She drew closer to him and put a leg over his midriff.

“Forgive my father his debt. He's a fool sometimes. A gambling debt isn't a real debt. You're not out of pocket,” she said.

“I'll think about it,” he said just before he fell asleep.

*****

“Wake up, you stupid fuck,” 'Natasha said. She fired a bullet into the pillow between them. Grigori automatically reached under the bed. “Is this what you are looking for?” Natasha asked as she held his weapon aloft.

“You bitch. What do you want?”

“I see you couldn't wait for me to leave before you screwed this tramp,” she barked. “Get out of bed, bitch.” Her gun was now pointing at Lucy's head.

“Okay,” Lucy said. Natasha took her by the hair and pulled her from under the sheets and onto the floor. “Say goodbye to him. You're coming with me, and you'll never see each other again. Isn't that sad?” she said mockingly.

“Listen to me, Natasha. If you do anything to her, I swear...”

“Swear what, you asshole? Have you forgotten who I am? My family will eat you for breakfast.” She turned to one of the two men standing behind her. “Get something to cover her up,” she said. He walked into the bathroom and took the robe Lucy had worn before.

“Why are you doing this?” Lucy asked.

“Because she's jealous,” Grigori said. “The moment I brought you here, she began to go crazy.”

“Shut up or she gets it,” Natasha said. Lucy cowered as the barrel touched her temple.

“Okay, okay. I'm coming. Calm down,” Lucy said.

Once they left the room, Grigori jumped out of bed and took a Kalashnikov from the wardrobe. He opened the window and took aim as Natasha pulled Lucy across the driveway and toward the waiting vehicle. When he had Natasha in his sights, he pulled the trigger. One of the large bodyguards walked in front of her at just the wrong time, though. The bullet killed him instantly.

“Fuck,” he said. He took aim again, but Natasha and Lucy were now in the back of the vehicle. He managed to take out the rear windshield as the car sped up the driveway, but all to no avail.

*****

“Very pretty, Natasha. You've done very well,” Natasha's father said.

“She's quite beautiful, isn't she?” Natasha said.

Her father was short, fat, and bald. His Russian features were craggy, and his jowls wobbled as he spoke. “I haven't had a woman like her in a very long time,” he said. He ran the back of his hand over Lucy's neck and across her chest. When she spat in his face, he slapped her. “Lock her up. I want to experience the feeling of anticipation before I take her tomorrow,” he said.

“You fucking ass. Who the hell—” Lucy stopped speaking when he thrust her robe open.

“Oh my word. What treasures await me,” he hissed, his eyes devouring her breasts and the patch of dark hair between her legs.

*****

“You what?” Lenny asked.

“I forgive you your debts.”

“Grigori, this isn't the time for jokes.”

“Forget it. I apologize. I was being an ass.”

Grigori was standing in Lenny's house in the middle of the night, wearing just a pair of jeans and sneakers. Lenny hadn't slept since Lucy had been taken. He'd considered calling the police, but he knew they wouldn't believe him. What he'd decided to do was call all his dubious Irish friends and put together a small army to go and set her free.

“Okay. Now you can give me my daughter back, can't you?”

“Iakov's got her.”

“What?” Lenny shouted. “Jesus, how the fuck did that happen?”

“Natasha kidnapped her.”

“Why?”

“Because she's pathologically jealous.”

“What gave her reason to be jealous?”

“Because I've fallen for Lucy, and she felt it.”

Lenny laughed. “Give me a break. Do you think Lucy would marry a pathetic ass like you?”

“Watch what you're saying,” Grigori said. He regretted taking Lucy, but he still wasn't going to let Lenny say such things to him.

“Jesus, Grigori, Iakov's a murderer,” Lenny said. “He'll do all sorts of terrible things to her.” Lenny was suddenly close to tears.

“We're gonna set her free, okay?”

“How? He's got his own private army. His place is impenetrable.”

“You know the Irish boys, and I've got my men. We can get her back.”

“It's too dangerous. If she's in their house, they'll kill her as soon as we start attacking,” Lenny said.

“What do you suggest?” Grigori asked.

“I don't fucking know. Think of something. You’re the one who got her into this shit.”

“There is only one thing that will make him listen,” Grigori said.

“What?”

“Money. I'll have to pay for her,” Grigori said.

“And how much do you think he would want?”

“A few million, maybe.”

“Fucking hell. As if I have a few million kicking around.”

“You don't, but I do.”

“And you would pay that much to get her freed?” Lenny asked.

“Yes.”

“Then call the asshole and ask him. Just do anything to get her back safely, please.”

“Okay. It's the middle of the night now. I'll call him first thing in the morning.”

*****

It was peculiar, but Lucy hadn't felt she was in much danger when she was at Grigori's. At his house, from the very beginning, she'd felt he had a soft spot for her. It was that feeling that had made her hopeful she could sway him, which she'd eventually done. Locked away in a damp cellar in Natasha's father's house, she had an altogether different feeling. She could smell danger. This man was evil, and he would do to her what he'd said; of that she was certain. She had to escape.

Her circumstances were similar to those at Grigori's house. She was locked in a basement. The only difference was that Grigori lived in a new house, and this house was old. She wondered if at some time there had been any alterations or repairs to the basement. Perhaps there was a weak spot in the wall somewhere—a bricked up window or door, a rotten air vent. Anything would do. Her situation was desperate. She felt her way around in the dark and began to push against the walls. She worked her way from floor to ceiling every meter or so until she'd covered the whole room. Nowhere had she felt anything give. She tried to remember what the ceiling was made of. She tough it was wood, but she wasn't sure. But even if it was made of wood, what good would it do? She needed to get out of the house, not appear a floor farther up.

Lucy sat down on the brick floor and put her head in her hands. The only thing she had to cling to was the vain hope that Grigori would come for her. But that wasn't certain. She remembered he'd told her how powerful Natasha's father was. Unless a miracle occurred, she would be at the mercy of the small ugly man the next day, and the thought of that was too much to bear.

“Shit! What's that?” Lucy shrieked. She'd fallen asleep for a few minutes, and something fury had run over her face. “Please don't let it bet rats. You know how scared I am of those creatures,” she shouted. She fumbled around and found a piece of wood. She sat up and held her breath, trying to hear something. But there was nothing. “What the fuck was it?” she sobbed. “Please, let me out of here,” she screamed.

*****

“Iakov, it's Grigori.”

“What the fuck do you want? Do you know how much you've upset my daughter?”

““Fuck your daughter. She's a bitch.”

“What? You'll pay for saying that.”

“She's even uglier than you are, you fat slob.”

Lenny was listening to the conversation and wondered what Grigori was doing. Why was he antagonizing him?

“What do you want?” Iakov asked.

“I want to tell Natasha that it's over between us. After she treated Lucy so badly, I don't want her anymore. Did you know Lucy is in the hospital because of her?”

“What are you talking about? I've got her, here in my basement. And I'm really going to enjoy her; she's so pretty.”

“You know, Iakov, you've always been a liar. According to her father she's in the hospital with a severe concussion. Just tell Natasha what I said. I never want to see her again.” Grigori hung up.

“What are you doing?' Lenny asked. “Why did you antagonize him like that? And what's the bullshit story about Lucy being in the hospital?”

“Wait and see,” Grigori said.

When Grigori's phone rang again, it made Lenny jump. “Why don't you believe me?” Iakov asked.

“Because you're always full of shit. Half the things you say you have done, you haven't. You're not as tough as you think. You don't have the balls to do half the things you claim to have done.” Grigori looked at Lenny, who was beside himself with worry.

“Come and see for yourself. She's here.”

“Do you think I'm stupid? You and Natasha want to kill me.”

“Come and see for yourself whether she's here. You have my word that nothing will happen to you. But if she's here, as she is, you will watch me use her and then kill her.”

“ You're so full of shit. I'll be there at eleven.”

Grigori put his cell on the kitchen table and stared at Lenny. “You've just killed her,” Lenny said.

“No. I've just gained entry to his house.”

“But there will be so many guards there. You'll have no chance of freeing her.”

“I want him to free her in exchange for me. I can only negotiate that when I'm in the house.”

“You are willing to trade yourself for her?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because she's a good woman and doesn't deserve any of this.”

“You're in love with her,” Lenny said.

“Shut up,” Grigori said

*****

Grigori looked at the house he'd just pulled up in front of. It was one of the first mansions ever built in the New York area. It had belonged to a rich family of jewelers until Iakov had persuaded the only remaining family member to sell it to him. Iakov had paid around twenty-five million dollars for it.

He walked to the door and was greeted by one of Iakov's huge guards. All his bodyguards were Russian. Iakov hadn't ever made much of an effort to learn English—though most people knew what he meant when he was holding a gun to their head.

Grigori followed the guard through the hallway and down a long corridor toward the back of the house. Iakov was sitting in an armchair in a lounge. Natasha was sitting on the sofa. When she saw Grigori, she got up, walked over to him, and slapped him. He ignored it.

“So, you don't believe me,” Iakov began. “You think I'm a liar.”

“I don't believe the girl is here, no,” Grigori said.

“But you saw me take her,” Natasha said.

“That doesn't mean she's here. I know for a fact she's in the hospital.”

Natasha and Iakov laughed. “You're so dumb,” Natasha said.

“When I pull her from the basement, you'll look so stupid,” Iakov said. “Go and get her,” he said to Natasha. Natasha did as he asked.

“I can't wait for this,” Iakov said, rubbing his hands together. When he heard someone shouting, he got up and walked to the door.

Natasha came running up the stairs. “She's gone,” she said.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Iakov shouted. “She can't be,” he said, running down the stairs. Grigori, who was just as surprised but didn't want to show it, got up and followed Iakov. When he reached the basement he saw a small hole had been kicked in the wall. It was probably just large enough for Lucy's slender figure to get through, he thought.

“I can't see her here,” Grigori said. “I told you that you were telling me lies.”

“She was here,” Iakov said desperately. “She's escaped somehow.”

“See you later, liar,” Grigori said. He started to walk up the steps but stopped when he heard the click of a trigger behind him.

“You're going nowhere. I'm going to kill you,” Iakov said.

Grigori turned around and looked at him. “Why?”

“Because you were so rude about my daughter.”

“Come on, Iakov, you know what she's like. I only got involved with her to please you. I can't stand her anymore.”

“That doesn't excuse what you said. You insulted me, and you insulted her. Good-bye, Grigori.”

Grigori fell to the floor, rolled over, and produced a gun before Iakov had time to cock his gun and fire it. Iakov fell to the floor, dead, but it wasn't Grigori who had killed him. The shot had come from the hole in the wall. Grigori got up and looked outside. Lucy was laying on the ground with a pistol in her hand.

“So, you came to free me,” she said.

“What the hell's going on? Yes, I came to free you, but you were gone.”

“Come on, before all his men descend on you.”

“I can't get through this hole.”

Lucy put her feet to the wall and kicked a few more bricks away. “Big enough now, fatty?” she quipped.

Grigori squirmed through the hole and ran along the side of the house with Lucy. When he saw the coast was clear, they ran to his car and sped off up the driveway.

*****

“I killed him,” she said shakily. They'd just reached Grigori's mansion.

“He deserved it. He was going to kill you.”

“But what about the police?”

“They won't call the cops. They know you shot him in self-defense. Don't worry, nothing will happen to you. Would you mind telling me what he did to you?”

“He put me in that horrible damp basement. You saw it. It wasn't fit for a pig to live in. In the middle of the night, I felt something that really freaked me out. Something fury crawled over me. I thought it was a rat, but it turned out to be a cat. It hadn’t been there when I was put down there, so I wondered how it had gotten into the basement.”

“How?”

“Through a hole in the wall. I hadn't seen it the first time I looked because it was dark. The hole was quite small, but the house is old and the bricks are rotten, so I managed to make the gap big enough to get through.”

“I ran to the road, managed to get a ride, and eventually got back to my dad's house. He told me you'd gone to Iakov's. He pleaded with me not to leave, but I had to make sure you were okay.” Lucy reached for him and pulled her to him. “I need you. I never intended to fall for you, but I did, despite your brutality toward my father.”

He held her and kissed her gently on the lips. “And I need you. Is the gun your father's?”

“Yes. When I insisted on going, he gave it to me.”

“You're quite a lady. Tough as old boots,” he said. “I came to the house thinking you were still there. I was going to offer myself in exchange for you,” Grigori said.

“I saved you a job then, didn't I?” Lucy said as she put her arms around his neck.

“Yes, you did.”

They embraced, and he kissed her passionately. The thought that he might have lost her hadn't really hit home until now. Now that he held her in his arms and smelled her scent, he realized how lucky they had been.

“You'd better call you father,” he said.

He walked upstairs and left Lucy to call Lenny. When she was finished, she shouted to Grigori.

“Where are you?”

“Upstairs, waiting for you.”

When she got to the bedroom, he was lying naked on the bed.

“Grigori, you don't seriously expect me to screw you after the night I've just had? I'm tired, and I'm filthy.”

“You know where the bathroom is. Go and clean up. You can sleep after I've finished with you.”

She looked at him and began to undress. His cock seemed to grow with each piece of clothing she took off. When she was naked, he was hard and throbbing. “I love your body. It's so sexy,” he said.

“And dirty. See you soon,” she said as she headed for the bathroom.

“Don't be too long. I'm desperate to fuck you,” he commanded.

Lucy stood under the shower and thought through what had happened. She'd been lucky. Thank heaven for cats, she thought. Despite escaping, she'd killed someone, and that didn't feel good. She was also worried about being charged with murder. Listen to Grigori, she told herself. He's probably right. After all, Lord knows how many people he's killed.

When she was finished, she walked back into the bedroom and knelt on the bed next to him.

“What do you want, Grigori? What do you want with me?”

“I want to fuck you.”

“No. I mean do you want a relationship or just sex now and then?”

Grigori didn't hesitate. “I want a woman in my life who I love and who I can take care of. I want that person to be you.”

Lucy felt a lump in her throat. He'd said exactly what she'd wanted him to say. “Take me, Grigori. I'm all yours.”

He pulled her down onto the bed and entered her immediately. He didn't want foreplay; he needed to feel her body wrapped around his as he made love to her. His lovemaking drove her wild. His thrusts were so strong, she came time after time, clinging to him like a limpet to a rock.

When he took them over the edge, he shouted her name and she whispered “I love you” into his ear.

They spent the day in bed. He managed to satisfy her twice more before she was so exhausted she fell asleep for hours. When she woke up, she heard voices downstairs. She put on a robe and went down to see who it was.

“Dad,” she exclaimed.

“Thank god you're safe,” he said as he embraced her. “You have no idea how much I love you.”

“I know, Dad. Me too.”

“I only stopped by to see how you were,” Lenny said. “I'll be on my way. I know you two have something going on, so I'll leave you to it.”

“Lenny, before you go,” Grigori said, “I'm sorry about the incident the other day. It was stupid.”

“I don't think you would have cared if I hadn't had such a wonderful daughter,” Lenny said.

Grigori thought for a while. “No, you're right. If it hadn't been for Lucy, I would have blown your brains out.”

Everyone laughed, and Lenny departed.

*****

The newspapers reported the death of “A Russian Businessman,” but that was the end of it. They heard no more. Natasha was killed a few months later in a motorcycle accident.

Grigori and Lucy were married, and when their first child was born, Grigori stopped all his illegal activities and went straight. He built up a huge real estate portfolio, which he willed to his son and daughter.

Lucy spent a happy life painting and seeing to her family. She was such a good painter, she managed to sell many pieces to collectors from all over the world. But her biggest love wasn't art. It was Grigori, her children, and her father.

*****

THE END

MAFIA Romance – Bought by the Hitman

1

It was Saturday, and it was my first off day on a weekend in a really long time. I couldn’t remember having a Saturday off since I started working for Mr. Black. That wasn’t his real name, of course; I was pretty sure there wasn’t anyone in Russia with the last name of Black, and my boss was as Russian as they got. His accent was so thick it was hard to understand him sometimes.

I was Russian in the sense that my great-grandfather came over and built a life for himself. His name had been Pitor Anismov. He did pretty well for himself, the old guy. My own grandfather told me a lot of stories about him. Grandpa was Alan Anismov. Alan was as American a name old Pitor could come up with. He wanted his son to be American. He hated Russia. It was cold; it was hard living. America represented something to him: an opportunity.

Grandpa had two daughters. My mom he named Rebecca, and her sister was Rose. I never met Rose; she died when she was only five. My mom married a guy named Mike Jones, and they had me, Peter Jones. Doesn’t sound very Russian, and it took me a while to convince Mr. Black that my family came from there. Having Russians, it was important to him.

I was named after Pitor, but with the American spelling. When he came over, he made money any way he could. I’ve taken that up too. I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of, and a lot of things that could land me in jail, but hey, a job is a job. I keep my head down, steer clear of cops, and make sure the guys I rough up really have it coming to them.

Mr. Black is a fair guy, believe it or not. He’s big and round, with a bald head and a fat stomach, but he calls it like he sees it, and he plays everyone straight. There’s something honorable about that, really: a criminal who tries to do right by his own ethics and moral code. I’m the same way. I won’t knock over some mom-and-pop shop unless they’re laundering money for another guy or something like that. My boss is the same way.

But he works us a lot. I do this, I do that. I’m on call twenty-four seven. That’s why I was looking forward to that Saturday.

I slept in. I didn’t wake up until after noon. I lounged in bed for a bit until my stomach told me I needed food, and then I got up. I was halfway through my second bowl of Frosted Flakes when my cell rang. I grabbed it and sighed. It was Mr. Black.

“Peter, my boy,” the old man grumbled, “I need you.”

I knew better than to argue. “What can I do for you, Mr. Black?” I asked.

He gave me an address and told me I was working security at nine that evening. I hung up and finished my cereal. Nine wasn’t so bad. Of course, if Mr. Black told me nine, he expected me there by eight thirty. But I at least had the day. I went back to bed.

At six I climbed out of bed and slowly got ready after wolfing down a sandwich. By eight twenty I was parking across from the address I had been given. It was a place downtown, in a seedy-looking neighborhood. The building was squat and wide, just one story, with no windows that I could see. It was all gray and closed off. The door was large and metal, and a man in a suit was loitering outside it.

I locked my car and made my way across the street. I realized I knew the man standing by the heavy door, and he nodded to me as I got closer. His name was Marco, and he worked for David Zinga, a Mexican arms dealer Mr. Black was friendly with.

“Marco,” I said, stopping for a minute to chat with the guy. He was smoking, and he took a long drag on the cigarette he held between two fingers before answering.

“How goes it, Peter?” he asked, his voice low, like a tiger’s growl. He was a big guy, muscles upon muscles, with a scar running down one cheek.

“All right. It was my day off,” I complained, and Marco laughed, but his eyes were sympathetic.

“What’s a day off?” he asked, and it was my turn to laugh. I slapped him on the back and stepped inside. I expected the building to be dark, but it was well lit. There was a small hallway right at the entrance, a door propped open at the end, and beyond that was a large open room. Lights hung from the ceiling, buzzing softly as I passed underneath them. At the far end of the room was a small stage of sorts, a raised section of flooring that came up to my waist. There was a door there, built into the wall on the rear of the stage. A friend of mine stood there, another guy who worked for my boss, someone I had pulled a few jobs with. His name was Vlad, and he was about ten years older than my twenty-five. His last name was Nikitin, and he was like Mr. Black, right from the mother country. His accent wasn’t as pronounced, however. He had apparently moved to America with his family when he was only three. He was tall and angular, with a long crooked nose that had been broken more than once.

“Hey, kid,” he said to me as I found the steps to the stage and moved up to greet my friend. He always called me kid.

“Hey, Vlad,” I said. “Mr. Black coming?”

Vlad shrugged his shoulders. “Who knows,” he said. “I think a lot of big hitters will be here, though.”

“What is this?” I asked. “Arms deal?”

Vlad laughed and shook his head. “Not quite, kid,” he said. Then he nodded to the door that stood off to the side, leading from the stage. “Go check it out.”

I looked at him, wondering if he was trying to get me in trouble. I was just working security. Mr. Black, and the others like him, they didn’t like us small-timers getting our noses where they didn’t belong. I was muscle, plain and simple, with my gun in a shoulder holster under my suit jacket. Mr. Black always had us in shirts and ties.

I made my way to the door at the back of the stage and then looked over my shoulder, back at Vlad. He laughed and waved me on. “It’s fine; just us grunts here so far.”

I nodded and opened the door. It was dark in the back room, and it took my eyes a moment to adjust to the dim light. There were fewer lights here, their bulbs orange and slight instead of bright and yellow. In front of me was a cage, big enough for a man, but it was empty. I moved on.

I found another cage, but this one wasn’t empty. It was six feet high and four feet wide, and two women stood in it, holding one another and crying. They looked young, both of them no older than twenty. They had fair skin and dark hair, and their eyes were dark and hard to see in the low light. They looked at me and shrank away. It made me feel terrible. I was a bad guy—I did bad things, I knew that—but these two women, as scared as they obviously were, seeing me and reacting physically like that, it made my head swim with shame.

“I won’t hurt you,” I said as I walked by. Beyond that cage were others, each with one or two or sometimes three young women inside. I felt nauseous, and I hurriedly turned back to the door, rushing out onto the stage.

Vlad saw me and laughed. I felt a wave of anger roll through me. “First rodeo?” he asked.

“What is this?”

“What do you think, kid? Come on, you’ve done too many bad things to be naive.”

I knew what it was of course. Those women were going to be sold—sold to rich weapons dealers and drug kingpins for their beds. They were sex slaves. Young women, twenty, nineteen. God, one had looked fifteen. I shook my head. I wanted to leave then and there, just walk out the door. I would have if I hadn’t stopped and thought about what Mr. Black would do if I did. If I walked out on a job, there was a chance my legs would be broken. And broken legs was the best-case scenario. I could also wake up at the bottom of a river, cement blocks strapped to my legs.

I didn’t say anything to Vlad. I didn’t know what to say. I moved to the edge of the stage and sat for a moment. My adrenalin was pumping, my heart beating a thousand miles a minute. I had been calmer in gun fights. Something about those cages, those women, it really got me. I didn’t know what to do, so I just sat.

Half an hour passed and men started streaming in. Not grunts like me, but rich guys. Mobsters, crime lords, all in expensive suits. Old guys, fat guys, one guy with a giant scar running from eye to chin that made Vlad’s look like a scrape a kid got falling off his tricycle. These guys were big time, though I noticed none of them were good looking. They were the kind of guys who had to throw their money around to get chicks. And what was an easier way than just buying a woman outright? I tried not to think about what was about to happen around me as I stood off to the side of the stage. Vlad was at the other end, and a few guys from different crews were dotted around the room. I didn’t expect trouble. In all it would be an easy job, if not for the fact that I was about to see women sold into sexual slavery.

Mr. Black wasn’t there, and I was thankful for that. Though if I was there, I knew he had his fat fingers in the pie somewhere and was profiting off the night. I tried to push it from my mind as the first woman was brought out.

I was expecting them to pull the cages out, but they didn’t. A man walked a woman out, bound at the wrists with thick rope. She was beautiful, wearing a short dress with a plunging neckline. I guessed she was thirty or a bit older, and then the bidding started.

Men in the audience, standing in front of the stage, held up small paddles. An auctioneer was onstage, standing next to the woman. It was over in a matter of minutes. An old man with a lazy eye I didn’t recognize bought the thirty-year-old for thirty thousand dollars. It was a lot of money to me, but somehow it didn’t seem as though it was enough for someone’s life.

The night wore on; women were paraded out, one after the other. All of them were pretty, and none were older than that first woman. I tried not to look at them, and I didn’t for the most part, but as they were led through the door at the back of the stage, I would steal a glance. I couldn’t help it. I had to see them, if only for a moment.

Then she walked through. I didn’t know her, of course, but something about her struck me. She was gorgeous. She seemed a few years younger than me. She had dark olive skin and dark hair. Her eyes were the brown of coffee with too much milk in it. She wasn’t American; I could tell that just by looking at her. She was Mediterranean. She had to be from Greece or someplace similar.

The young woman was wearing a short dress, much like the first one had been. She was curvy, with well-defined hips and large breasts that pushed at the top of her dress. Her nipples were hard—natural in the chilly warehouse. She looked terrified. Her lips were plump and sensual, and they were pulled into a tight frown. I saw her, and I felt as though I had known her for years.

The bidding was fast and furious for her. It got up to fifty thousand, and the next thing I knew it was at seventy thousand. I thought quickly. I had a couple hundred thousand in the bank. Not bad for a grunt like me; I knew how to save. The bidding was up to one hundred and fifteen thousand when it started to slow. I stepped forward just before the auctioneer could award the olive-skinned woman to a fat guy with a bad comb-over.

“One hundred twenty thousand,” I said.

Silence. Every face turned toward me. I ignored them and I looked to the fat man with the bad hair to see if he would bid more. He didn’t.

“Sir,” the auctioneer started, “that’s quite a sum.”

“I’m good for it,” I growled. Vlad made his way over to me from the other side of the stage.

“What are you doing, kid?” he asked.

“What I can,” I said. I was saving that beautiful woman, saving her from that horrid fat man, from a horrible life. I had to do something. I had to do something for her. I pulled my checkbook out of my pocket. I wrote a check and handed it to the auctioneer, and then I took the woman by the hand and undid the rope at her wrists. When she was free, I took her by the hand and pulled her off the stage.

“Kid,” Vlad said to my back. He didn’t say anything else, but there was a lot of unspoken meaning. I knew what he was saying, and I didn’t care. I led the woman outside and then across to my car. I helped her in and then climbed behind the wheel. I looked over at her. She was terrified.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” I said, wishing she wasn’t afraid of me. She didn’t say anything, just stared at me with wide eyes. I turned the key in the ignition, my car roaring to life, and sped off toward my downtown apartment.

2

I knew I was in trouble. I knew I had no right to do what I had done, and I knew Mr. Black was going to come after me. I didn’t care. I welcomed it in a way. My boss was involved in sex trafficking? It was too much. It wasn’t something I was comfortable with, and it wasn’t something I was going to put up with. I would have to run or end it. As I pulled into my apartment’s parking garage, I swore to end it. I wasn’t going to run. I had saved one woman—the beautiful woman who sat beside me, who hadn’t taken her eyes off me, who looked terrified—but what about the rest of the women who had been there? The ones who had been sold before the Mediterranean beauty I had bought? Those who were sold after?

“We have to hurry,” I told the scared woman. “I want to make sure you’re safe, and then you can go. You can go home—I can help you—but you can’t yet. You’re going to have to stay with me for a bit.”

“You’re letting me go?” she asked. Her voice was low and soft; it sounded sweet like honey.

“Yes,” I said simply, and then I was out of the car and rushing around to her side. I opened her door and helped her out.

“You saved me,” she said. Then she threw her arms around me. I let her, sliding my own arms around her, and took in her scent as she buried her face in my chest. She smelled wonderful, like peppermint. She looked up at me and placed her hand on my face. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. They’ll be coming for me, and you. For both of us. We have to get to safety, and then we’ll get you home. We have to get out of Brighton Beach,” I said.

Brighton Beach was the Russian equivalent of Chinatown. It was in New York, ocean on one side, city on the other. From my bedroom window I had a view of the water. We rushed upstairs, and I took a minute to glance at it. Silver moonlight was reflecting on the slow-rolling waves. A boat slid through the dark water, churning up white behind it.

My new bride of sorts stood by the door while I packed. I took my guns, some clothes, and the fifty grand I kept in cash hidden in a safe behind a painting in my bedroom. We hurried down to my car. We had only been in the apartment for five or so minutes before we were peeling out of the parking lot.

“What’s your name?” I asked the woman. She had an accent, and I was confident that I had been right about her being from Greece.

“Chloe,” the woman said softly.

“I’m Peter,” I said. We drove through the city, the night traffic not as bad as the day-time traffic but still forcing us to go much slower than I would have preferred. We were stopped at a red light when a dark sedan pulled up behind us. I kept my eyes on my rearview mirror. It was exactly like my own car, exactly like the ones Mr. Black gave all of his grunts. I realized I was an idiot for driving my own car, but there was nothing I could do about it now. I watched the vehicle behind us, waiting for the door to open, waiting for Vlad or someone else to step out and open fire. The light turned green and I pulled through the intersection. The car behind me turned, and I realized I had been holding my breath the whole time. I let it out in a gasp and glanced over at Chloe. She was looking at me, her legs pulled up, knees to her chest, and her arms wrapped around them. She didn’t say anything, but she smiled at me, and I was reminded of why I was throwing my life away in the first place. There was something about this woman, something that made it all worth it.

We got out of the city and drove for two hours before we finally stopped at a small motel. It was situated along a lonely two-lane highway. The clock on the dash read one in the morning. An hour before I had stopped in a diner parking lot and swapped my plates with those of another dark sedan. It wouldn’t stand up to a cop running the plates, but it passed the eye test. I hoped I wouldn't get anyone hurt, but years of being the bad guy had given me a healthy sense of self-preservation.

We parked behind the motel and walked around to the front office. The clerk was a guy of only about twenty, and his eyes were glued to a small TV with some superhero movie playing. I paid for a room and took Chloe to it before getting my bag and joining her.

“I could use a shower,” she said, and I nodded. She went into the bathroom and shut the door, but she seemed to rethink that and opened the door back up halfway. From where I sat on the end of the bed I could see the bathroom mirror, and her reflection—facing away—as she undressed. She pulled the dress off, up and over her head, and tossed it onto the floor. She wore no bra and was now standing in just a pair of black silk panties that hugged the rounded curves of her ass perfectly. I felt myself harden. She bent then, sliding the panties down, and I got a glimpse of her pink slit from behind. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the mirror.

She stepped out of her panties and bent again, starting the water in the shower. I yearned to go to her, to take her there, bent over the side of the tub, but I knew I wouldn’t do that. The woman was almost sold into sexual slavery. She just wanted to go home. I wouldn’t take advantage of Chloe like that.

As she showered, I went over to the window, curling one finger around the edge of the blinds so I could pull them away from the window and peek out. I didn’t see anyone. In the bathroom, the water stopped after a while. I heard the floor creak as Chloe stepped out of the tub. I glanced into the bathroom from where I stood, but I could only see a sliver of the mirror, just her arm reflected as she dried off. I was still trying to peek when the door opened all the way to reveal her standing there, nude save for a towel wrapped around herself.

“I have no other clothes,” she said. I nodded, cursing myself on the inside. That was something I should have thought of.

“I have some gym shorts and T-shirt you can wear,” I said. “It will be big, but we can stop tomorrow.”

Chloe shrugged and then pulled the towel off her, letting it fall to the floor. She stood before me, nude, in all her glory. I couldn’t help but look her over. Her breasts were rounded and heavy, her nipples dark and hard. She had a strip of pubic hair above her cunt, and her hips were round and feminine. I grew hard again. She reached up, tying the dark hair that fell past her shoulders back into a ponytail, holding it in place with a small elastic band she’d been wearing around her wrist. I saw a scar there on her wrist, white and shiny in the dim light of the motel room. I didn’t ask her about it.

“I can sleep naked,” she said as she made her way to the bed and got in. There was only one bed, something else I hadn’t thought about. I had just asked for a room, and the clerk must have assumed we were together. Would she expect me to sleep on the floor? I wasn’t sure. “I’m hungry,” she said from under the blanket. It wasn’t a complaint, and she wasn’t whining; she was just telling me.

“I can go check out the vending machine,” I said, turning and heading for the door. I turned back to her as I opened it. “Don’t answer the door, not for anyone. I have the key.”

She nodded and I left. I was back quickly, worried about being seen. I had chips and candy bars and a couple of danishes wrapped in plastic. She sat up, the blanket falling from her magnificent breasts. I tried not to stare at them, but I was just a man, so I took a couple of looks, trying to keep it on the sly.

For her part, Chloe didn’t seem embarrassed. Maybe it was a Greek thing, but in America, no woman was so comfortable with her own breasts or nudity. We ate the junk food, both of us realizing we were famished. We laughed a lot, and at one point she bent forward and wiped a bit of chocolate from the corner of my mouth.

When the food was gone, we grew somber.

“What are we going to do?” Chloe asked me, lying down and pulling the blanket to her chin once more. I missed her breasts immediately.

“We’re going to keep you safe.”

She laughed, but there wasn’t much mirth in it. “How are we going to do that?”

“I’m going to have to go after them, the men running it. My old boss. They’ll never leave us alone.”

“Are you a bad man?” Chloe asked me. I looked at her, not sure how to answer.

“I’ve done things I’m not proud of,” I said finally. Chloe shrugged her shoulders under the blanket.

“You don’t seem like a bad man to me.”

I smiled and stood, throwing the wrappers from our junk food feast into the small wastebasket near the bed. “I’m going to shower,” I said.

“I’m going to sleep,” she replied.

I went into the bathroom. As I stood under the hot water, I had time to think about what I was doing, what I had done. I had put it all on the line for a woman I didn’t even know. And I wasn’t sorry about it. I knew it was the right thing. I had spent my whole adult life doing the opposite of the right thing, and finally I was doing something I could be proud of.

When I was clean, I turned off the shower and stepped out of the tub. I stood in front of the sink, wiping my hand across the mirror there, cleaning the fog away so I could see myself. I still looked the same, so why did I feel like a different person?

When I left the bathroom, I was clad in just boxers. The room was dark, and Chloe was just a lump under the blanket that I could hardly see. I hesitated, and then I climbed into the bed next to her. I lay on my back, hoping she wouldn’t wake up, hoping she wouldn’t kick me out of the bed.

She wasn’t even sleeping. Shortly after I lay down, I felt her move, and then her hand was on my chest underneath the covers. I turned and saw her eyes, open and reflecting the little bit of blue light that squeezed past the closed blinds and into the room.

“I was supposed to be someone’s bride,” she said softly.

“I can get you home.”

“They told me what’s expected of me. I’m supposed to do what my husband says.”

“You don’t have a husband, though. I didn’t want that for you.”

“You bought me. You paid for me. I’m yours.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “Don’t think like that.”

She slid closer to me under the blanket. One of her breasts pushed against my arm. Her nipple hardened. I felt myself growing hard, my cock pulsing against the front of my boxers.

“You are a good man,” Chloe said softly, and when I turned my head to look at her, she pressed her lips to mine.

She tasted like chocolate since we had eaten the junk food. She had brushed her teeth after her shower with a spare toothbrush I had brought, and I tasted the toothpaste too. I pressed my tongue against her bottom lip, and she parted those plump lips for me so our tongues could dance together. Her hand slid down my stomach, her fingertips running over my abs, sliding under the waistband of my boxers. Then she was at my cock, wrapping her thin, petite fingers around my rigid member.

“Chloe,” I said softly, breaking the kiss, but she shook her head and pressed her lips to mine again. I turned on my side as she tugged the front of my boxers down, fully freeing my cock. My swollen head pressed against her pelvis, and she jerked me, sliding her fingers up and down my shaft.

I placed my hand on her breast, squeezing the fatty tissue, feeling her nipple on my palm. Her grip on my cock tightened, and I groaned. She pulled away from me then, throwing the blanket off us and onto the floor. She pushed me lightly, and I rolled onto my back as she hovered over my crotch. She glanced at me sideways and then opened her mouth and lowered her face until my cock was sliding into her mouth. She sucked the head of my hard member, swirling her tongue in a circle motion around it. Her hand was still on me, jerking me slowly up and down. She was on her knees beside my hips, and I reached down and squeezed her ass before sliding two fingers along her wet slit.

“Put them inside me,” she begged, taking her mouth from my cock long enough to speak, and then she was sucking me again, going farther, this time moving her hand as her lips slid down my shaft and the bulbous head of my cock pressed against the back of her throat.

I did as she asked, sliding those two fingers into her. We lay like that for a while, me fucking her furiously with my fingers while she bobbed up and down on my cock, her mouth warm and wet, her tongue working overtime. She cupped my balls with one hand, squeezing them softly and gently pulling on them.

Then she stopped so suddenly that I thought I had done something wrong. But then she was moving quickly, throwing one leg over my head and chest and climbing atop me that way so that her sweet pussy was inches from my lips. “Make me come,” she moaned back to me before swallowing my cock once more. I obliged, lifting my head and tasting her. Her juices were warm and flowing, and I probed the depths of her with my tongue, reaching up to rub her clit with the pad of my index finger.

It didn’t take long with my tongue and lips on her to make her come. She took my cock out of her mouth, using a tight grip to jerk me furiously as she yelled and rocked backward, grinding her pussy into my face. I felt her body spasm atop me, and she screamed in pleasure again, pressing her open mouth to my thigh to muffle the sound. Her pussy was wet before, but as she came it was soaking, her juices flowing down across my lips and cheeks and chin.

When she was done, she rolled off me slowly, and I didn’t need to be told what to do. I moved as quickly as she had before, positioning myself between the beautiful woman’s spread legs. She reached down and guided me into her, and then we were fucking fast and passionately. I bent and our lips met. When I broke the kiss I moved my head lower, taking her nipples into my mouth in turn, my fingers rolling whatever one I wasn’t sucking on.

The bed was shaking with each thrust, and her arms went around me, her hands on my back, her long, cherry-red nails digging into my skin there.

“I’m going to come,” I said, confident that she wasn’t taking birth control, and she replied in kind.

“Not in me,” she said, and though I felt a flash of disappointment, I pulled out and she shifted quickly, sliding down and sideways to take me into her mouth once more. I put my hand on the back of her neck and helped her find a quick pace, her lips flying up and down my shaft.

I grunted as I came. She slowed her pace and sucked softly on the tip of my cock, swallowing every last drop. When I was finally spent, she lay down completely, smiling up at me, my dick still hard, shining with her juices and spit in the low light and throbbing right above her face. She giggled and arched up to plant a kiss on the underside of my cock.

I fell onto the bed beside her and reached over to pull the blanket from the floor and situated it over us. She lay curled up beside me, as naked as I was, one of my arms tucked under her. We fell asleep.

3

The next morning we got moving quickly. We drove a half hour with her in the same dress she had on the night before, but then we stopped at one of those big department stores and bought her a few outfits. She took me into the changing room with her and tried on each outfit, teasing me when she undressed. She came to me in her bra and panties near the end, kissed me, and then dropped to her knees and blew me. Once again she sucked me dry and swallowed it all.

Driving in the car with her, heading farther away from the city, farther away from Brighton Beach, life somehow began to feel normal. This woman, she seemed to love me, as crazy as it sounded. I had to keep reminding myself that she had been trained for that. She had been beaten probably and brainwashed into loving whatever man bought her. I was sure she knew I wanted to help her, though, and maybe that made her love me even more. But driving, listening to the radio, having her grab my hand and hold on to it, it felt real. It felt like a better life than I should know.

I’d had girlfriends, a lot of plastic bimbos drawn to the money and danger. I was a real bad boy, and it attracted some pretty girls. Beautiful even. But shallow and fake. I had never married anyone, never come close. They were just chicks I fucked, in and out of my bed, their beds, across the back of my couch.

Chloe was different somehow. I almost forgot what I had done the night before—buying her. Mr. Black was pissed; I knew it. He would want me dead. Driving with Chloe, I finally made up my mind. I would kill him first, and anyone else who stood in the way of me making sure Chloe was happy and got back home.

We stopped in a town called Barley. It was four hours upstate from New York City, small and charming. We arrived just after lunchtime. We stopped first at a small diner, both of us starving. We sat in a booth and ate hamburgers and fries and sucked down milkshakes.

There was a motel and a nicer hotel there, but we learned of cabins in some woods not far from the main road and drove there instead. I paid with cash, of course, and used a fake name. We went into the cabin together and didn’t leave for three days, save a trip on the first day to a small grocery store down the road.

We didn’t leave the bed much, day and night blending together in orgasmic bliss. Finally, as the sun fell on the third day at the cabin, I showered and came out to tell Chloe I was leaving. I had expected us to be found by then, but I had been careful not to leave a trail.

“You’re going?” Chloe asked me before I could even speak. She was lying in bed, naked, the bedsheet covering her lower half, her magnificent breasts on display.

“How did you know?” I asked her.

“I can see it in your eyes, in the way you stand.”

“If I don’t go, there are men who will never leave you alone. Never. They’ll never let you get home.”

The young woman nodded, and then she smiled sadly. She looked at me, and in the evening light that came streaming through the bedroom windows, I saw tears filling her eyes.

“There’s something I haven’t told you,” she said.

“What?” I asked.

“I’m married,” she said, and my heart sank. “Back in Greece, I’m married. Less than a year before I was taken. We were on our honeymoon. We had to go late because of his job. We were on a cruise. We stopped and I was taken. I was brought here…for this.”

I nodded. “I can get you back to your husband, but I’m going to have to do this. I have to make sure these men, the men who brought you here, can’t find you. Or us.”

She nodded. She looked as though she had more to say, and I was sure I did too, but neither of us spoke. I filled a backpack I had bought at the local grocery store with my guns and ammo. I took a bit of money and then faced her once more.

“I’ll be back in a couple of days,” I said. “Don’t answer the door.”

She stood, letting the sheet fall away, coming to me nude. She wrapped her arms around me and we kissed. “Be safe,” she said, and I nodded. “Come back to me.” I nodded again, and then it was time to leave.

I drove through the night back to the city. Mr. Black was first on my list. I knew where he would be; he owned a strip club in Brighton Beach, and he spent most nights there. I parked a block away and took time to prepare myself. I slid a handgun into the back of my waistband and pulled the backpack on. I had two larger guns in there, a shotgun fully loaded with extra shells and a submachine gun with three extra clips. I climbed out of my car and took a deep breath.

A fat bouncer named Reuben was working the door. He worked for the club but not for Mr. Black. He wasn’t a criminal, even if I was sure he was aware of what sort of man Mr. Black was. If he knew I was in trouble with my old boss, he didn’t show it.

“Peter, what’s up?” the fat man asked.

“Hey, Reuben,” I said and shook his hand as I stepped by.

“Boss man is upstairs if you need him,” he said, and I nodded.

The inside of the club was pounding music and pink and blue lights. A skinny brunette with giant tits was dancing on the main stage, a ring of horny men sitting around it, flashing green bills as she came near. I passed by the bar, where Samantha, a good-looking blonde who tended, gave me a smile and a wave. I managed to smile back.

Near the back of the club was a set of metal stairs, which led up to a second-floor office. I started up the steps and reached for the door handle. Just before I could open the door, someone pulled it open from the other side, and I found myself face to face with Vlad. His eyes widened in shock. Time seemed to slow down.

“You idiot,” the man said to me. He had a gun on the inside of his jacket; I could see the handle sticking out a bit. He didn’t go for it, though.

“Get out of here,” I said, giving him a stern warning. I liked Vlad, and he was just a lowlife grunt like me. Or at least, like I used to be. Standing on those stairs, I felt different. I wasn’t the man I had been just a week before. But my beef wasn’t with Vlad. He wasn’t the one in charge. I didn’t want to kill him, not if I didn’t have to.

“He’s going to kill you, kid,” Vlad said to me, shaking his head. He looked at me, and I saw concern in his eyes.

“I’m going to kill him,” I snarled. “Now get out. Don’t come back tonight.”

Vlad seemed to weigh his choices. Finally, he nodded and put his hand on my shoulder as he passed. I let out the breath I hadn’t been aware I was holding and opened the door.

Mr. Black’s office was large and open, with some couches and chairs at one end and his desk at the far end. I had my gun out of my pants before I stepped all the way through the door. One man stood beside the door. He was a grunt, like me, but I knew he wouldn’t hesitate to kill me, so I beat him to the punch. I pressed the barrel of my handgun to his side and pulled the trigger. The bang was deafening and the man fell. The music was so loud downstairs that I was sure no one in the club had heard anything.

Mr. Black was at his desk, his cell phone to his ear. He looked across the room and his eyes widened. Another man sat on a couch nearby, reading a magazine, an automatic rifle lying across his lap. He tossed the magazine aside and went to swing the rifle toward me, but I aimed and fired, and my bullet took him in the head. He slumped to the side, dead.

“This is not wise,” Mr. Black said as I stalked toward him, my handgun trained at his head.

“Keep your hands up,” I said. I knew he had a shotgun in a special slot constructed on the bottom part of his desk. He held his hands up.

“So you fell for a woman. No harm, no foul. Bring her back; I can make it right.”

I shook my head. “You can’t make that right. It isn’t right. I respected you. I thought you were better.”

Mr. Black laughed. “You knew exactly what I was. You are a fool if you think I wouldn’t do anything I could to make a bit more money.”

“Was it worth it?”

“Worth what?”

“Your life.”

Mr. Black laughed. “Come now, boy, we both know you won’t kill me.”

“I want to know who set it up. Who got you into it?”

Mr. Black shook his head.

“I won’t tell you a thing,” he said. I was standing next to him now, and I put my gun against his leg. “Idle threats,” he said. I pulled the trigger.

He yelled out, reaching down and covering the ragged hole I had just blown into his thigh.

“Tell me,” I said.

“David Ramos,” Mr. Black said. I knew the name. I put my gun to my old boss’s head and ended his wretched life.

I went back out to my car quickly. There was a chance no one would find Mr. Black or his two dead stooges until the end of the night when someone would go see why he hadn’t come out yet. That was if Vlad didn’t attempt to return sooner. I climbed behind the wheel and started the engine.

I knew David Ramos. He lived in New York and had his fingers in every illicit thing you could think of up and down the East Coast. He was a big man, muscular and strong with a thick neck and biceps as big as my thigh. I didn’t care. I was going to kill him.

I had to do some digging to find him, though. I hit up some old friends, guys in the business who worked for other bosses. I found out I was on everyone’s lips. Mr. Black had put it out to find me and kill me. Ramos was backing him up. Ramos was the man in charge of the slavery ring, and he’d been embarrassed in front of the other bosses. He wanted me dead as much as Mr. Black had.

It took some doing, but as the sun was rising, I had him. I had tracked him down to a high-rise building in the center of Times Square. It would be tough; I knew that much. Ramos would have ten men, twenty even, protecting him. My boss had been big time, but Ramos made him look ridiculous. I got into an elevator on the ground floor and headed for the penthouse apartment. It was a long ride, and I prepared for what I was about to do. There was a chance I wouldn’t make it. I might fail. There was a chance, but I felt good about my odds. I had rage and anger on my side. I had Chloe. The elevator stopped, the doors slid open with a ding, and I thought of her as I lifted my shotgun.

4

I had told Chloe I would be a couple of days, but I returned to her almost twenty-four hours after I had left. She was in the living room, wearing one of my T-shirts and boy shorts that hugged her ass. I came in, my shirt splattered with blood, most of it not my own. I had a busted lip and a bullet had grazed my arm, but I had given way worse than I had gotten.

The young woman came to me as soon as I unlocked and opened the door, and she wrapped her arms around me. I thought she would speak, or I thought I would, but she pressed her lips to mine and I kissed her back instead, wincing as pain shot through my busted lip but not willing to stop our kiss.

My arms went around her, and when she was sure I was in a position to support her weight, she lifted her feet from the floor and wrapped her legs around my waist. Her panty-clad crotch was pressed against my own, and immediately my dick began to pulse and grow rigid.

I thought about carrying her up the wooden stairs to the bedroom, but we never got that far. The cabin was cozy, two small floors, but it was private enough, so I just took two steps to the couch before turning and sitting so that she was on my lap. She giggled as we kissed and wriggled a bit, grinding against my manhood.

My fingers pulled her shirt up and over her head, and I buried my face in her breasts, as she was wearing no bra. My lips found a nipple, my tongue flicking it back and forth before my teeth nibbled softly. She groaned and moaned, her head tilted back.

She climbed off me and lowered herself to her knees before me. Her fingers were slow, her movements delicate as she unbuttoned my pants and pulled them off, along with my shoes and socks. She left me in my boxer briefs for a moment, my cock hard and evident. She planted kisses on my inner thigh and then switched to the other.

Finally, she gave my boy some attention, reaching a slender hand up the leg of my underwear and gripping my dick. She amused herself by sliding my cock out through the same leg of my boxer briefs, and then she took me into her mouth.

Chloe gave the best head in the world. I had already gotten to know that. She was perfect. She built to the right speed, applied the right pressure with her hand. She gripped me at the base of my cock and held me where she wanted me, her lips and tongue and mouth handling the rest. When I could take no more, I forced her to stop and moved her to the couch.

I reached up and pulled her panties off. She was nude now, and she smiled as she watched me look up and down her body. I loved every inch of it. I sent my fingertips up and down, from her toes to her forehead. Then I used my hands to part her legs and buried my face in her pussy. She smelled great and tasted better. I lapped at her pink slit, and she gave me plenty to lap up, her pussy wet and warm.

My cock was aching to be inside her, so I didn’t make him wait any longer. I got up off my knees and then positioned her so she was facing away from me, knees on the cushion of the couch, arms on the back. I slid into her tight pussy, pushing until I had nothing left to give and then pulling back.

“No one has had my ass,” she whispered, looking at me over her shoulder. I didn’t need to be told twice. I pulled my slick cock from her and then spread her ass cheeks with both hands. Her butthole was tight, and I rubbed the head of my cock against it until she opened up and I could slide in. If her pussy was tight, her asshole was like nothing I had ever felt. She groaned and bent her head forward, burying her face in the back of the couch. I knew she was in pain, but she reached between her legs and began rubbing her own clit, and I knew she was enjoying it as well.

She came right before I did, biting into the couch cushion and screaming. I had my hands on her ass cheeks, spreading them, groping them, leaving red lines on her tanned flesh. She must have known I was about to come, because she called to me once more, turning her head over her shoulder.

“Come in my pussy,” she moaned. “Please.”

Looking back, I wondered if she knew. Up to that point, I hadn’t come in her before. I had always pulled out, plastered her face, or sent stringy white strands of cum over her big tits. But now I pulled my cock out of her ass and shoved forward into her pussy just as my cock jumped and I came. I threw my head back and arched my hips, sending all I had into her. When I pulled out, she stayed like that for a minute, her back to me, on the couch, and I saw a bit of my cum leak from her gushing pussy.

We went to sleep after that. We woke up in the morning, and we knew things had changed. We kissed, but we didn’t fuck, and we didn’t make love.

“I’m safe?” she asked me over breakfast, which was simple bowls of cereal.

I nodded.

“Are you?”

“I think so,” I said with a grin.

“So I can go back?”

I sighed and nodded.

“I love you,” she said. “I do.”

“I know,” I said. “I love you too. But…you don’t belong here. You aren’t mine.”

Chloe smiled at me. It was sad and sweet and filled with longing. “I am yours. You bought me.”

Two days later I saw her off at an airport in Boston. She was headed home. I stood for a long time after she had gone, watching the planes land and take off through a large window that overlooked the tarmac. I knew I would never forget my bought bride.

*****

THE END

MAFIA Romance – Owned and Protected

“I can't do this. I really can't,” Cassy said. The house was full of floral tributes to her late father.

“You can, Cassy. Be strong for Michael. He really needs you now.”

Cassy smiled at Judy. “You're the best friend anyone could wish for. Thank you so much for supporting me today.”

“And you are the best person I have ever known. Come on, let's go.”

At St. Michael's Church, Pastor Jeffries was waiting for the funeral cortege at the church gate. He hadn't seen Cassy for a while; she didn't come to church as often as her mother and father had. Her late parents, Douglas and Wanda, had showered the church with generous financial donations, and he wondered, now that Cassy was head of the family fortune, whether she would be as generous.

When the hearse and limousines pulled up, Pastor Jeffries noticed what a fantastically beautiful woman Cassy had turned into. Tall and slender with wonderfully curved hips and a generous bosom, she was more elegant than any woman he had ever seen in his congregation.

“Cassy,” he said, shaking her hand. “I'm sorry for your loss. It must be very hard to lose your mother and father in quick succession.”

“It is, but at least they are together again,” she said through the black veil.

Cassy turned to Judy. “Look how many mourners there are. I hadn't expected this.”

“Your father was a well-known man, not only in New York but throughout the US. There isn't a single person in this country who hasn't at some time been to a ToysForAll store. How many stores are there? Six hundred?”

“Six hundred and three.”

“And you will be just as good as your father at running the business.” Judy held on to her hat as a gust of wind threatened to remove it from her head.

“I only wish he'd been around for another ten years. I'm only twenty-two. What do I know about business?”

“You have some great people working for you, people who really respected your father and who will help you.”

“Michael, are you all right?” Cassy asked. She put her arm around her fifteen-year-old brother.

“Okay. Two hundred and seventy-three,” he said.

“What?”

“People.”

“Have you counted them all?”

Michael's head tilted to one side. “Yes.”

“Wow. I really don't know how you do that,” Cassy said.

“Because he's clever, aren't you, Michael,” Judy said. Michael didn't answer; he was looking at a plane high above them.

The service was short and to the point. Cassy hadn't wanted Michael to suffer any longer than necessary.

“Men, don't like,” Michael said when they were leaving.

“Which men?” Cassy asked.

“Men under trees. I don't like.” Michael began to shift from one foot to the other and throw his head around. “Don't like. Go away.”

Judy caught up to them. She'd been delayed by Pastor Jeffries, who was keen to know whether Cassy would be donating to the fund to repair the church roof. “What's the matter with Michael?” she asked.

“He doesn't like those men over there.”

Judy looked at a line of trees that bordered the cemetery. “I agree. They are a shifty-looking bunch. You're right, Michael.”

“He gets like this when he's stressed,” Cassy whispered to Judy. “Dad was so good with him. I only hope I can be.”

“You're great with him. Autism isn't an easy thing to deal with.”

*****

“Tell me how much you want it,” Igor Ivanovich said to the blond woman he was pressing against the wall. He put his hand to the hem of her skirt and began to pull it up. “Tell me, how much do you want my cock?”

She'd never been with a man like Igor. He turned her on so much that she wasn't able to answer him. She just continued to grind her pelvis against him.

“Can't answer, huh?” he said. In a flash, he ripped her panties off and put his hand over her vulva. “I can feel how much. You don't have to speak,” he said.

She came three times when he took her against the wall, and countless times during the longest love-making session she'd ever had, and was ever likely to have.

When the gray light of morning pierced the thin curtains, Igor got up, showered, and dressed. When he was at the door, she woke.

“Can I see you again?” she asked.

“I only fuck women once,” he said.

When he was gone, she threw the hair-dryer against the mirror and broke both items.

Dima was waiting in the car outside the hotel. “And? What was she like?” he asked.

“Useless. Kept complaining she had cramps. I only screwed her for a couple of hours.”

Dima laughed. His brother was always bragging about his sexual prowess. Dima was jealous of Igor's looks and the fact that women seemed to throw themselves at him. He hardly had to speak to them before they were willing to sleep with him.

“Here,” Dima said. He passed Igor a Beretta handgun. “Let's go persuade him.”

“Let's do it,” Igor replied.

Dima drove out of town to what appeared to be a rich suburb. “Do you get it?” Igor asked.

“What?”

“Look at these big houses. Fucking politicians. How the hell do they go from being penniless upstarts to super rich in the space of a few short years?” Igor asked.

“You already know. Because they are all corrupt bastards. The US is rotten to the core. Everybody knows that.”

“We are no angels, but we, at least, try to do things honestly,” Igor concluded.

Dima laughed. “Of course we do. The only difference is, if being honest doesn't work in our favor, we very quickly turn nasty.”

Dima drove past the gate to the French-style mansion and looked at the huge iron gate. There was just one security guard sitting in a wooden hut. He drove a bit farther and parked next to the high wall that ran around the property. The brothers got out and, with the help of a rope and hook, scaled the wall.

Mr. and Mrs. Adessi looked like the perfect couple as they lay asleep in bed. The bedroom was spacious and smelled of potpourri. Igor wondered if they’d had sex the previous evening; Mrs. Adessi seemed to be naked, and her nightdress was lying on the floor.

Dima nodded, and Igor put the barrel of his Beretta into Mr. Adessi's open mouth. He snorted and opened his eyes.

“What the hell?” he muttered as best he could with the gun in his mouth. Mrs. Adessi woke up and saw Dima standing above her. She screamed and sat up in bed, forgetting that she was naked. She quickly grabbed the sheet and pulled it over her breasts.

Dima took hold of her arm and pulled her from the bed. He placed her face down on the floor and held a gun to her head.

“Mr. Adessi,” Igor began, “as you are the head of real estate at the city administration, we would like to make a complaint to you.” Adessi looked at him, terror in his eyes. “I think you know why we are here.” Adessi shook his head. “Oh yes, you do. We bid more than anyone for the old post office project. You know that and we know that. Yet you gave the contract not to the highest bidder, or even the second highest, but to some sleazy outfit from Alabama. Funny, that's where you come from.”

Dima put his foot on Mrs. Adessi's back and pressed. She squealed and tried to break free, but it was useless.

“We want your guarantee that you will cancel the contract and award it to us. As I said, we won the bidding.” Igor pulled the gun from his mouth and waited for his response.

“Go to hell. Fucking Russians. Think you own the place. Fuck off back to Moscow.”

“Not only are you corrupt, you are very rude. Have you ever seen a woman thrown from an upstairs window?” Igor said as he nodded to Dima.

Dima pulled Mrs. Adessi up by the hair and took her to the window. He held her with one hand and opened the window with the other. She screamed as he pushed her out of the window and held on to her by the ankles.

“Last chance, Adessi. She'll make a terrible mess of your driveway,” Igor said.

“Alfons, help me,” she shrieked. “Please, let them have what they want.”

Dima let go of her right leg, and she swung to and fro, attached to his strong arm by just her left ankle.

“All right! Please, pull her inside,” he said.

“No. Not until you give me the guarantee we came for,” Igor said.

“I guarantee it. You can have the contract. Just pull her back inside, please.”

“Thank you, Mr. Adessi. Just remember, we can come back anytime, so please don't change your mind.”

*****

“Michael?” Cassy shouted as she walked through the backyard of the large house she and Michael had just inherited. “Michael, where are you? Dinner's ready.” Cassy noticed how lovely the lavender smelled in the border she was walking along. Michael wasn't in the yard; she turned her attention to the house. Michael slept in a room next to Cassy's, but he wasn't there either.

“Edith, have you seen Michael?' Cassy asked the cook.

“No. Not for a while.”

“Strange.” Cassy walked down the driveway and into the street. She looked left and right but saw no sign of him.

She walked to the store where Mrs. Cheeseborough sold the best apple pie in New York State. “Have you seen Michael?” she asked.

“No, Cassy. Not today.”

Cassy walked back to the house and sat down at the dinner table. Perhaps if she relaxed and waited, he would turn up, she thought.

After two hours Cassy was frantic. It would be dark soon. She called Judy.

“Judy, Michael's gone missing. I need to speak to your dad.”

“Okay. Hold on.”

Cassy heard a rumbling sound as Judy's father picked up the phone. “Hi, Cassy. What's up?”

“Joe, Michael's gone missing. What should I do?”

“How long has he been gone?”

“About a couple of hours.”

“Well as a police officer I can tell you that the police won't do anything until he's been missing for twenty-four hours.”

“But you know what he's like. He can't look after himself for that long. Jesus, I'm worried sick.”

A day later Michael still hadn't arrived home, and the police sent an army of officers to look for him.

“Is he given to walking off on his own?” Detective Jordan asked.

“Never. He knows he should stay within the boundaries of the house,” Cassy said.

“Well, my men are looking for him. If he's around the area, we'll find him.”

*****

“What the fuck?” Igor said. “Jesus Christ. Who the fuck would do something like that to a kid?”

“What?” Dima asked.

“Look, here on TV.”

Dima listened as the reporter told his audience that the late Douglas Solomon's autistic son had been kidnapped. A ransom note had been sent to Cassy Solomon, along with a severed ear.

“Albanians,” Dima said. “They're ruthless fuckers. They don't give a shit who they hurt. How much money do they want?”

“Ten million. How do you know they are Albanians?”

“They always cut people's ears off.”

They continued to watch, and after a few minutes there was a press conference with the police and Cassy.

“Is that Cassy Solomon? Jesus, she's hot. I wouldn't mind a night in the sack with her,” Igor said.

“Stop thinking about your dick all the time. Can't you see how upset she is?” Dima said.

“She'd feel a lot better impaled by me. That's for sure.”

Dima laughed. “You're a disgrace.”

“I love women. You know that.”

“Have you ever fucked a woman more than once?” Dima asked.

Igor had to think. “Er...no. I don't think so. Motherfucker, look!” he exclaimed as the camera panned around the room full of journalists. “Murat Hyka. Did you see him?”

“No,” Dima said disappointedly.

“Right under their noses. I'm gonna make a call,” Igor said.

“Not to the cops. No way.”

“But that fat Albanian asshole was sitting among the journalists. I bet he's got something to do with it. I hate that bastard. He's a dog. Have you forgotten what he did to us?”

“No.”

“That woman, what's her name? Cassy. She's in a heap of trouble if Murat Hyka has got anything to do with this.” Igor jumped up from the sofa and stretched his considerable frame. He was well over six feet tall and a solid mass of muscle. “He's got half the police in his pocket. They'll never bring charges.”

“So why do you care?” Dima said.

“She's hot, and she looks upset. I want to help her.”

“You're fucking mad. Would you go to war with Murat Hyka just to get into her panties?”

Igor looked at his brother. “Yes, I think I would. Come on, Dima, he's a jerk, and so are all the guys who work for him. This is a good chance to eradicate him once and for all.”

*****

Cassy badly needed fresh air. She'd been sitting inside with a police liaison officer for four days, and she felt stifled by the atmosphere. Her phone calls were being monitored in case the kidnappers rang.

Outside, she walked past her parked Mercedes and noticed a piece of paper under the wiper. She picked it up.

Call me. It's about your brother. Don't involve the cops.

Te: 0178654218767

Cassy looked around nervously to make sure nobody had seen her. She walked across the lawn, stood behind a tree, and took out her cell phone.

“Cassy Solomon. What do you know about my brother?”

“I think he's being held by a group of Albanians.”

“Who are you?”

“My name is Igor Ivanovich. I'm a real estate developer.”

“And what makes you think he's being held by Albanians?”

“I saw the press conference. There was a man I know in the audience. He's an Albanian criminal. Did you know that Albania's are well-known for cutting off the ears of their victims?” Cassy felt nauseous as the image of the severed ear came to mind. “If you put those two things together, I think you're talking about an Albanian gang.”

“So what is this man's name?”

“You don't need to know. All I can tell you is that the cops will never solve this because he's got all the top cops in his pocket. They all get huge sums of money from him to turn a blind eye to his activities.”

“So what do you suggest I do?”

“Meet me. I will explain what we are going to do. Okay?”

“But I don't understand. Why you are doing this? What business is it of yours?” Cassy said.

“Because I hate the motherfucker. He's the worst person God ever made.”

“I'm not sure. How do I know you are who you say you are?”

“Tell you what, why don't we meet at Grand Central in the middle of rush hour? There will be thousands of people around. That way you'll feel safe.”

*****

Cassy waited at Chirping Chicken in Grand Central. She'd never seen Igor before, but when he walked into the restaurant, she knew it was him. On the phone he'd spoken with a Russian accent, and the man who came into the restaurant looked Russian. Not only did he look Russian, but he was also extremely good looking. Tall, well built, cropped black hair, a fine-boned Slavic face, and the deepest blue eyes.

He was even more impressed with Cassy than he had been when he'd seen her on TV. She was wonderfully beautiful, with green eyes, long dark hair, and the softest-looking skin.

“You know, I shouldn't be here. If the cops knew, they'd probably charge me with something,” she said anxiously.

“Fuck the cops. They won't help you. They haven't got the balls to fight Murat Hyka.”

“And you have?” she asked, slightly sarcastically.

“Yes. My brother and I have got a score to settle with him.”

“You told me you’re a real estate dealer.”

“Listen, we buy and sell apartment buildings in New York and London. I came to America when I was eighteen, seeking my fortune. I have done a lot of bad shit, but now we're trying to stay above the law. I'm gonna get your brother back and put an end to this asshole. Okay?”

“And what do you want in return?” Cassy said.

“I don't want money. If I bring Michael home to you, I want you. Your debt will be one night with me.”

Cassy looked at him as if he'd gone mad. “You are joking, right?”

“No, I'm not. One night for your brother. That's all.”

“Thanks, but I don't play with my virtue. Now get the hell away from me.”

When Cassy got home, she rang Judy's dad, who was a sergeant at NYPD. She asked him to do a check on Murat Hyka and Igor Ivanovich. Later, he told her Murat was an Albanian businessman with suspected links to drug trafficking and protection. His information on Igor was that he was a Russian real estate dealer with interests in New York and London. She was surprised to learn his net worth was over three billion dollars. His record was clean, although he had been taken in for questioning a few times regarding threatening behavior toward public officials and bankers.

*****

“Are you Michael?” Igor asked. Michael nodded and put his hands back over his ears. “It's okay. I've come to take you back to Cassy.” Michaels' eyes lit up at the sound of her name.

“Bad. Bad,” he said as he looked at the two men on the floor, both of them with their necks broken.

“Come on, Igor, hurry up. Untie him and let's get out of here,” Dima said. He looked up the cellar stairs to the light, waiting for more men to appear. He gripped his gun more tightly, peering to see if there were any moving shadows.

Igor pulled Michael along with him as they climbed the cellar steps and arrived in the kitchen of the seedy detached house in Queens. Dima looked at the other two men they had immobilized. One of them was lying face down in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor, the other slumped across the kitchen table, his head turned at a grotesque angle.

Dima reversed the car out of the driveway and drove away from the house where Michael had been held.

“You know we're going to have to finish what we started, don't you?” Dima said. “We're going to have to go after Hyka. When he finds out we've done this, he'll come for us.”

“Don't worry. We can handle that little prick,” Igor said.

Michael began to scream. It was high pitched and very loud. “It's okay.” Igor put his arm around Michael. “Michael, we're taking you home. To Cassy.” Michael went silent again.

Dima drove slowly across the city. The last thing he wanted to do was get pulled over by the cops for speeding with Michael in the back of the car. When they arrived at Pearlington Avenue, Michael began to recognize the houses.

“Home,” he said in the manner of a small child.

“Yes, home,” Igor said. “Pull up here. Any closer to the house and they may see us.” Dima pulled up on the quiet road three hundred yards away from the Solomon residence. “Okay, Michael, go home.” Igor opened the car door and watched as Michael began to walk as fast as he could toward the house he shared with Cassy.

When Michael reached the security guard at the gate, Igor and Dima gave a sigh of relief as the guard put his arm around Michael and took him through the gate.

Cassy was sitting at her desk in front of the window of what used to be her father's study. As she read emails expressing sympathy about Michael's kidnapping, something outside caught her eye. She glanced up and screamed. She rushed out of the room, down a corridor, and through the hallway. The front door almost came off its hinges, such was the force with which she threw it open.

“Michael,” she cried. “Oh my god, Michael.” She almost knocked him from his feet in her enthusiasm to hug him. She noticed both his ears were intact. “How did you get here?” she asked.

“Nice men,” Michael said.

The police officer who was at the house to monitor phone calls came out and scratched his head. “In all my years, I've never seen anything like this before,” he said.

That evening after the doctor had checked Michael's health and declared him well, Cassy rang the number that had been left on her car.

“Was it you?” she asked after Igor answered.

“Yes. But no cops. Just be glad you've got Michael back.”

“Thank you. I don't know what to—”

“Listen to me. We had to be heavy handed to get Michael out. In all probability, Hyka will turn violent and seek revenge. You need to take Michael to a safe place.”

“Where?”

“I have a house in London. I'll send a car at seven in the morning.”

*****

“Is this yours?” Cassy asked as she looked across the limousine to the private jet. Igor nodded.

“We'll be in London before you know it. Is Michael okay with planes?”

“He's flown before. I don't think it will be a problem.”

“Found me,” Michael said as he looked at Igor.

“Yes. We found you,” Igor said with a grin on his face.

In London, Cassy couldn't believe how large the house was. It was just outside the city in a leafy suburb. Because of the time difference, they'd arrived in the evening and it was just getting dark, but Cassy could see enough of the property to know that Igor was a very wealthy man.

“He's fast asleep,” Cassy said when she came back downstairs. “You've given Michael a lovely room.”

“The best in the house. In the morning, he'll be able to see the horses running around in the fields if he looks out of his window.”

Cassy sat on a huge sofa in the middle of the sitting room and looked at Igor. What had brought him to be so kind to them? He didn't seem to want anything, but that could change, she thought. The police had asked a thousand questions about how Michael had suddenly arrived home, but she'd told them she didn't know. Maybe the kidnappers had gotten cold feet, she'd suggested. She'd told the cops she was going to London for a few days to rest.

“Why? Why did you do this for us?”

“Do you honestly want to know?” he asked as he handed her a glass of wine.

“Yes.”

“Because I'm a sucker for a beautiful woman. I saw you on TV and saw how fucking upset you were. And I thought maybe I could get inside your panties.”

“You are really strange. Do you know that?” she said. “Why go to all that trouble just to get me into bed?”

“Well, put it this way: If I just turned up on your doorstep and demanded to fuck you, what would you have said?”

“I would have called the cops.”

“Jesus, Cassy. You're going to have to learn that the cops are assholes. They’re all on the take.”

“In Russia maybe, but not in America.”

“You are so naive. Anyway, what about you and me now? Will you fuck me or not?”

Cassy sipped her wine and looked at him. She was sorely tempted. The mix of danger and kindness that oozed from him was proving to be a powerful aphrodisiac. What harm could it do? He was hot, and it had been a long time since she'd had sex. Michael was safe, and Igor seemed to be protecting her. Maybe she owed him, she thought. What harm could it do?

“So what did you like about me when you saw me on TV?” she asked.

“All of you.”

“Come here,” she said.

He got up and walked to the sofa. When he stood in front of her, she could see the bulge of his penis through his pants. It was growing as she looked at it. She stood up and looked up into his eyes.

“Okay. Take me to bed,” she said

Igor picked her up as if she was a feather and carried her upstairs to a large bedroom. She gasped when he threw her onto the bed. Her skirt rode up her legs, and he looked at the shape of them.

“You are one fucking beautiful woman. I'm gonna really enjoy screwing you.”

“I suppose you'll have me begging for more,” Cassy said humorously.

“Yes,” Igor said seriously. “You will be begging me to fuck you more often.”

When he took off his shirt, Cassy was impressed by his hard muscles and the six-pack stomach. “I train a lot,” he said when he noticed her gaze. “Come on, get you clothes off.”

“Er...can I have a little time in the bathroom? I need to shower,” she said.

He reached down and picked her up again. The bathroom was en-suite. The walls were covered in gray granite and the floor was heated. He put her down and kissed her. His tongue probed into her, deep and demanding. She hooked her arms around his neck, stood on her tiptoes, and kissed him more passionately than she had kissed any man before. He smelled of a mix of expensive aftershave and his natural manly scent.

“Give me a few minutes and I'll come back to the bedroom,” she said.

“No. I'm gonna strip you, wash you, and take you, all here in the shower. Then I'm gonna fuck you all night in bed.”

He put his hands on the top button of her blouse and unfastened it. She put her hands on his to stop him. “Sorry. I'm a bit...”

He kissed her again. “Don't talk. Just relax. Let yourself go.”

She remained still as he unbuttoned the soft material and pushed it off her. Her bra was of the highest quality and the silk felt soft under his touch as he ran his hands over her breasts.

When he dropped to his knees, she tried to pull him up. She knew what he wanted. She wanted it too, but it was much too soon. He ignored her, pushed her skirt up, and pulled her panties down to her knees. When he put his face to her private parts, she closed her eyes and turned her head to the side. His strong hands gripped her buttocks and pulled her onto his mouth.

Cassy cried out when his tongue darted between her legs and lightly touched her clitoris. She stroked his head and opened her legs wider as his tongue probed and played, gently at first and then more firmly.

“Oh god,” she said. “That's so intimate.” He reached up and pulled her skirt and panties down. She was suddenly aware of how naked and vulnerable she was. “Take off your clothes,” she said.

He stood up, unbuttoned his pants, and slid them down over his bronzed legs. His penis sprang up; it flipped against her thigh. He took her hand and led her to the shower. The water was warm and gushed over her body, making her relax. Again he knelt and used his tongue on her. She leaned against the wall and pushed her hips forward. He held her thighs and greedily lapped at her. The water cascaded down her body, over her pubic hair and onto his face. He stroked her belly and felt the muscles, hard and tense under her soft skin. Soon she was panting and her legs were trembling. She needed his support. She pulled him up to his feet, put her arms around his neck, and whispered to him.

“Fuck me.”

He lifted her up, and she wrapped her legs around his torso. She buried her face in his shoulder. In one swift motion, he was inside her. She gasped and moaned and threw her head up as his hard thrusts shook her whole body. He was long and thick, and the feeling of him filling her was wonderful. She wondered how long his strength would last, but she was light, and he had no trouble holding her.

Eventually, he put her down, twisted her around, and entered her from behind. As he did so, he hit her G-spot. He hit it time after time as he thrust, taking her breath away, driving her forward.

“Harder,” she pleaded.

He held her hips, bent her forward until she was almost touching her toes, and rammed her as hard as he was able. Cassy turned into a shaking heap of feminine flesh as her orgasm reached her. She almost collapsed, but he held her. As her breathing returned to normal, he began to soap her body. She leaned against him, feeling his hard body against hers, exhausted by his onslaught. His touch was tender as his fingers soaped all of her. When he'd rinsed her, he led her from the shower and wrapped her in a warm bath towel. All the time he cared for her, his penis remained erect. His desire for her was great, and his body wasn't going to rest until he'd finished deep inside her.

On the bed, he opened her legs and entered her as she was lying on her back. He was gentler now, kissing her, stroking her face.

“You are quite a man,” she said.

“And you've got the hottest body I've ever seen,” he said. He bent down and bit her nipple playfully.

“Ow. Stop messing around and fuck me like you mean it,” she said.

“Be careful what you wish for,” he said.

“I don't care. Give it to me.”

A few minutes later she was beginning to regret her bravado. He took her missionary and doggy, and in at least five positions she didn't know the names of. When he stood up on the bed and fucked her wheelbarrow, he touched all the right places and she came again.

“Stop, Igor, stop. I'm exhausted,” she pleaded.

“But I'm not finished yet.”

“I have no more strength.”

He took pity on her, rolled her onto her back, and made love to her more slowly. “This better?”

She nodded, closed her eyes, and concentrated on his length as it parted her. Although gentler, it was no less sensual, and soon she felt another orgasm coming.

“Give me your sperm,” she gasped when she was almost there.

At her words, he increased the pace and took them both over the edge. She smiled as he clung to her, sweaty and spent. He was a real tough guy, but now in her arms he was soft and satisfied, and she liked it.

*****

The next day, Igor took them both to see some of the London sights. When they were just past Buckingham Palace on the way to the Houses of Parliament, Igor's phone rang.

Cassy didn't understand what he was saying in Russian, but she knew he was talking to his brother.

“Shit. Fucking asshole Albanians,” he said as he flung the car round and drove back the way they had come.

“What's the matter?” Cassy asked.

“That fucker Hyka. He knows who set Michael free. Dima has fled to the Rockies. We've got a cabin there. Shit. I fucking knew it. I'm gonna have to kill the little shit.”

“Igor, please be careful with your language in front of Michael.” She looked at him and saw that he looked like a different person. The previous evening when they'd had sex he was handsome, caring, and a fantastic lover. Now he looked distant and, though she was afraid to admit it, murderous.

“I'm going back to the States,” he said. “You stay here. It's too dangerous for you to go home. Stay here with Michael. I'll ask a couple of my friends to make sure you have all you need.”

“But what if you don't come back?” Cassy asked.

“That won't happen.”

When Igor was gone, Cassy sat up late into the night and thought about her situation.

She'd repaid her debt to Igor. She liked him—he was different—but he was involved in things that frightened her. She decided she would return to the US as soon as she could get a flight.

*****

“Where the hell were you?” Judy asked.

“In London. A few really strange things happened. We had to go away for a few days.”

“What's going on, Cassy? First Michael is kidnapped, then he's freed without paying any ransom, and then you disappear off the face of the earth. It's all a bit weird.”

“It is weird, I agree, but I can't tell you what happened. Let's just say I've had a guardian angel.”

“What are you going to do now?” Judy asked as she handed Cassy a mug of tea.

“Run my business. Eventually find a nice man and have a family. Just normal things.”

“Great, Dad's here,” Judy said. “I've been asking him to come round and fix the yard fence for weeks.”

“Cassy, just the person,” he said when he arrived in the kitchen. “You know how you were asking me about some Russian guy?”

Cassy's heart rate rose. “Yes.”

“He's in intensive care at St Margaret's. Apparently some mafia squabble.”

Cassy didn’t expect her reaction. She began to shake and felt the blood drain from her face. “Is it bad?” she asked anxiously.

“Very bad. They don't know whether he will live or not.”

“Cassy, are you okay? You look terrible?” Judy asked.

“I'm okay. What happened?” Cassy asked.

“He was found in a garbage container. He was lucky. The guy was about to tip it into his truck. I don't know any more than that.”

“Judy, can you do me an enormous favor? Can you look after Michael for a few hours?”

“Sure. No problem,” she said.

“Stay here with Judy,” Michael repeated after Cassy had told him to.

*****

Igor was wired up to so many machines that Cassy could hardly get close to him. She looked around for a nurse or a doctor. A large man in a blue uniform arrived with a packet of rubber gloves.

“Can you tell me how he is?” Cassy asked.

“Are you family?”

“Yes,” she lied.

“He's in an induced coma. His brain is swollen. The next twenty-four hours will be critical to his survival.”

“Survival?”

“Yes. He's fighting for his life.”

Cassy held on to the chair the nurse brought for her to stop herself from fainting. Why she suddenly cared so much about what happened to him, she didn't know. Okay, they'd had sex, but that wasn't enough to make her feel the way she did. He'd rescued Michael, and she'd given him sex in return. That was it. What more was there to say? Only her body was telling her something completely different. She wanted to lie next to him, cuddle him, and tell him he would be fine.

He was a mess. Both his eyes were swollen, his upper lip was swollen, and it appeared as if his nose was broken. Only God knew what was wrong with him inside, she thought. If he could rescue Michael, the least she could do was sit with him until he gave some reaction.

Cassy called Judy and asked her to look after Michael overnight. Then she sat in the chair next to Igor’s bed and closed her eyes. She catnapped through the night, and when it began to get light outside, she went to freshen up.

When she came back, a man was standing next to Igor's bed. “Who are you?” she asked.

“Dima, his brother.”

When she looked closer, she could see a resemblance.

“Are you Cassy?”

“How did you know?”

“I saw you on TV. That's the reason he wanted to help free your brother, because he took a fancy to you. Now it may have cost him his life.”

“What happened to him?”

“I fled New York after Hyka came for us, but Igor is crazy sometimes. He thinks he can take on the world. He went to Hyka's residence and tried to kill him. Needless to say, it was he who was almost killed.”

“Jesus.”

“Cassy, you are in grave danger. You should go back to London and hide out until we've finished the job.”

“What do you mean finished the job?”

Dima waited until a passing nurse was out of earshot. “Nothing will stop Hyka until we have killed him. Nothing. When he knows Igor is alive, he'll send someone. And he may well come after Michael again. You really aren't safe. Go back to London and let us finish the job.”

“But what makes you think you can? Look at you. You had to flee, and Igor's half dead.”

“We're Russians. We've got a lot of friends to call on, and that's what I'm going to do. Very soon Hyka will be floating face down in the Hudson River.”

“But what about Igor? Who will look after him?”

“Go back to London. Igor will contact you when he gets better. If he does.”

Cassy thought about what he'd just said: “If he does.” There was a chance Igor would be a vegetable, but if Michael was in danger, she would go back to London.

*****

Jesus, what was wrong with me? Cassy thought as she leaned over the flower border and threw up. She'd taken Michael for a walk in the garden of Igor's London home and had suddenly felt ill.

“Sick?” Michael asked.

“Yes, I feel a bit sick. Shall we go inside?”

Michael nodded. “Inside. Yes, inside.”

Cassy went to the bathroom and threw up again. “Shit,” she muttered. She took off her top and felt her breasts. She hadn't noticed, but they were a little sensitive to the touch. She was in a foreign country with the responsibility of an autistic brother, and she was more than likely pregnant, she thought.

“Michael, we've got to go for a walk again,” she said.

They wandered slowly down to a drug store and went inside. The old woman behind the counter gave her a tester kit and Cassy paid.

Cassy didn't know what to think when the display showed “Pregnant.” She wanted to cry. She was thousands of miles from home, and the father of her child was unconscious in a hospital. She put her hand on her belly and closed her eyes. Suddenly she was overcome with tender feelings for Igor that were so strong, she picked up her cell phone and called Dima.

“Great timing,” he said. “I'm at the hospital. They called me and told me he'd woken up. Do you want to speak to him?”

“Oh yes,” she said enthusiastically.

“Hello,” he said.

“How are you feeling?”

“Okay. The doctor says I'll be out in a few days. They were a bit worried about me, but the swelling in my brain has gone down.”

“Thank God. Igor, when are you coming to London? I need to talk to you.”

“What about?”

“I can't tell you on the phone, but I need you to come here as soon as you can.”

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes, perfectly. Michael is okay as well. It's just that I...I need you.”

Igor smiled. He was pleased she'd said that. He'd realized in the few hours he'd been awake that he needed her very much as well. When he thought of her, he knew his days of womanizing were gone. There was only one woman for him now. “Cassy, Dima and I have one last task, and then I will come to London.”

“What task?” she asked.

“We have to finish what we started.”

“No, Igor. You were almost killed. My God, you're lying in a hospital bed and talking about going out to fight. Are you insane?”

“Insane or not, Hyka is going to pay. This time we're going with our friends.”

“No, Igor. I forbid it.”

“And who are you to forbid me anything? If you remember, I helped you when I didn't have to. Without me, Michael would be dog meat. Never talk to me like that again.”

Cassy wanted to tell him about the baby. That was why she was so worried. She didn't want her child to grow up without a father. “Sorry. Do what you have to do. But come back to me in one piece, and soon. Okay?”

“All right,” he said.

When he'd hung up, Cassy called a friend of her late father's.

“Dennis, it's Cassy.”

“Cassy. How's Michael after what happened to him?”

“Okay, I think. There doesn't seem to be any bad reaction. Maybe in the future, but who knows.”

“Margery and I were so sorry to hear what happened. But at least he's home now.”

“Actually, we're in London, but it's a long story. Dennis, I need your help. I want to sell everything—the business and the house.”

“Wow. Are you sure?”

“Perfectly sure. I was never really interested in the toy business, and I don't think Dad would have minded me selling it. What do you think it's worth?”

“About fifteen billion dollars.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

“Can you start the procedure for me? I'll see that you're well remunerated.”

“Sure. Give me a couple of weeks. I'll consult the lawyers and get back to you.”

“Thanks, Dennis.”

Cassy sat down and wondered what it would be like to have that kind of money in the bank. She didn't want to be a business woman; she wanted to be a good mother. With that kind of security, she could help her children become anything they wanted. She'd never have to work again, and she could buy Michael all the care he needed.

Cassy had promised Igor she wouldn't call him for a few days. He needed time with Dima to develop a plan for the extermination of the man who had kidnapped Michael. Her sickness continued, and she often went to bed early and dreamed about how Igor would react when he found out she was expecting his child.

After a week, she started to worry. She called.

“Igor, what's happening? I'm worried.”

“Not now,” he said and hung up.

What the hell? she thought. She called back.

“Listen, I'm in the middle of something. Haven't you got any fucking patience?” Igor said.

“Sorry,” she replied.

Perhaps she'd interrupted him in the middle of the task at hand, she thought. Still, even if she had, there was no need for him to talk to her like that. When he got to London, she would inform him of her displeasure at the way he spoke to her.

*****

Michael was sitting in an armchair working out how many roses were on the wallpaper while Cassy was lying on the sofa, feeling queasy. CNN was on TV, more as background than active viewing.

Cassy started to listen when she heard the words “Albanian and Russian.”

“There has been a shootout in Brighton Beach, New York, between what is thought to be a Russian gang and an Albanian gang. It isn't clear what the motive was, but eye witnesses report a group of about twenty Russians bursting into a well-known restaurant that belongs to Murat Hyka, an Albanian businessman. The whereabouts of Mr. Hyka is unknown, but it is thought he was taken away from the scene by a group of Russian men. So far the police have made no comment, except to confirm that three Russians were killed in the shootout and five Albanians.”

“No,” Cassy said. “Oh god no. Please don't let it be him.”

“Cassy okay?” Michael asked.

“Yes, darling. I'm fine,” she sobbed.

“Don't look fine,” he observed.

“No, really, I'm fine.”

Cassy left the room and tried to call Igor. No reply. She tried Dima. Also no reply. Now she was frantic. If it was him, what would she do? No, it couldn't be. The reporter had said there had been twenty Russians and only three were dead. Chances were Igor wasn't one of them.

Throughout the evening, she kept CNN on and saw the same report time after time. It was of no comfort. The names of the dead weren't given. All she was doing was making herself more miserable, she thought.

“Bedtime Michael,” she said at half past ten.

When Cassy got ready for bed, she prayed that he was still alive. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but it was useless. An hour later she got up and wandered down to the sitting room. She turned on the TV and again waited for news.

She felt a hand on her shoulder. “Michael, go to bed,” she said.

“It isn't Michael. It's me.”

Cassy jumped up and threw herself at Igor. “How the hell did you get here so quickly?”

“It's only a five-hour flight from New York.”

“I thought you were dead. They said on CNN...”

“Never believe the press.”

He kissed her and lifted her up. “There's only one place I want to go with you,” he said.

“You'll have to be very careful with me from now on,” she said. He looked at her quizzically. “I'm pregnant.”

“What? How?”

“That's the dumbest question I've ever heard. I'm about five weeks.”

“So it's mine?”

“Jesus, Igor, what do you take me for? Of course it's yours. You're going to be a father.”

“Oh my god, really?”

“Yes.”

He took her to the bedroom and made love to her. He was a passionate lover, but this time he was gentle, tender, and loving. Cassy fell asleep more satisfied than ever before with the knowledge that he was safe.

When they woke, she rolled to him, and he put his arms around her.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Dima, me, and a few others went to his restaurant. We asked him about Michel. He told us to fuck off. He was very rude. A few of his men came out and started shooting, but we soon silenced them. Then we took the fat little asshole and threw him in the river. At the time, he was wearing a concrete sock.” He squeezed Cassy to him. “It's over, Cassy. You and Michael are safe now. We can go back to New York.”

“I don't want to. I'm selling all my assets in America. I want Michael to have a happy home here. England is much less violent than the US. He's been through a lot. I'll pocket a few billion from the sale of the toy business, and then we can live a happy life without worry.”

“Okay. What do you think about us?”

“I don't want you. You are far too violent.”

Igor sat up and looked at her face. She was laughing. “Joke, right?”

“Of course it's a joke. I love you. I was terrified you'd been killed. At that moment, I knew you were the one for me.”

“And I love you. So, let's stay here. I'll make some inquiries about a school for Michael.”

That morning at breakfast, Cassy announced to her brother, “Michael, I'm having a baby.”

“Baby,” he repeated.

“You know what I mean, don't you? We’re going to have a baby in the house.”

Michael looked at her and put his hand on her belly. “Okay. A baby,” he said.

*****

Cassy had a boy and a year later a girl. She and Igor were married when both children were old enough to walk down the aisle with them. Igor concentrated on buying and selling real estate and never again entered into dubious activities.

Michael lived with Cassy and Igor. Their children loved him and looked after him as a brother.

*****

THE END

MAFIA Romance - Kidnapped

“You bitch. You fucking whore!” Fabio screamed. “Is this how you repay my kindness? Thirty years of marriage and this is all you can do to me?”

Maria rolled over and covered her breasts with a sheet. The man lying next to her looked at Fabio and wondered how he was going to escape.

“Was she good? Was she a good screw? I hope she was fucking worth it, because you're gonna die a long, painful death,” Fabio said, his voice cracking into a higher pitch under the strain.

He'd been home to Italy to see his very old mother. He hadn't seen her since the magnificent party he'd thrown for her at his brother's home in Naples more than a year ago when she'd turned a hundred. He'd come home before Maria had expected to find her naked, on all fours, a man banging her from behind.

Not expecting to find his wife in bed with another man, Fabio hadn't bothered to carry his pistol into the bedroom. He'd left it in his jacket, which he'd hung up in the hallway. His house was the most heavily guarded home in Chicago, but he hadn’t thought he needed to defend himself inside his own residence.

He walked round to Maria's side of the bed, wound his fist into her hair, and yanked her in one movement from the bed. She landed on the floor in a crumpled heap. “Get out, you pathetic bitch,” he said, pushing her toward the door with his foot. “Get out while I see to your lover. I'm gonna cut his cock off and hand it to you as a memento of the day you crossed me, you filthy piece of trash.”

Maria continued to crawl along the floor, eventually reaching the door. Fabio closed it behind her and turned to the man lying in his marital bed. Fabio didn't need a weapon to rip a man apart; he was perfectly capable of doing it with his bare hands.

“So, you think you can cross Fabio Affini, do you?”

“It's the first time we have met, Mr. Affini. I am very surprised by your lack of good grace.”

Fabio wasn't sure whether he'd heard the man correctly. “What? Did you just say...”

“Yes.” The man pulled his arm from under the sheet and pointed a gun at Fabio. “You see, I always come prepared when I fuck someone's wife. Especially when it’s someone as dangerous as you. Now back up against the wall.” Fabio walked backward and watched as the man got out of bed and put on his shorts. “I said get back,” he repeated when he noticed Fabio creeping closer. This time Fabio backed right off and waited. Once the man had pulled his pants and shirt on, he pointed the gun at Fabio and opened the bedroom door. “Thank you for your hospitality. Your wife, as you have no doubt forgotten, is the most amazing fuck. Did you teach her all those things?”

“Get out of my house,” Fabio hissed.

When the man was gone, Fabio left the bedroom, ran down the stairs, and called Christian. “Get your ass over here now,” he shouted.

While he waited for Christian to arrive, Fabio looked for his wife. He found her hiding from him in the basement.

“Why, Maria? Why, after all these years? I've taken care of you, haven't I? You've never wanted for anything.”

She looked at him and shook her head. “You have given me all the material things I needed. But the one thing I wanted most, you have been unable to give me.”

“What are you talking about?” he asked.

She noticed how old he was beginning to look. When they'd married, he'd had a full head of black hair. Now, apart from a few strands of comb-over, he was bald. “Love and affection,” she answered. “I needed your love more than anything, and you haven't been able to give me it. I have never felt you really cared about me.”

“You crazy bitch, of course I cared about you. Even though you haven't been able to provide me with children, I still loved you. Maybe you were too self-absorbed to see it. I want you to get out of my house. Go wherever you want; I will give you money. But if you ever darken my door again with your presence, I will have you killed.”

He walked up the basement staircase and into the hallway. He lived in a mansion he'd bought thirty years ago from the proceeds of the first really successful drug deal he’d done. It had netted him five million. Thirty years ago that was a lot of money, and he was suddenly able to move with the jet set. He'd met Maria at a party on a ship in the harbor. She and her parents had arrived a few years earlier from Milan. He remembered how beautiful Maria had been that evening. She was still beautiful, but she'd crossed him in the most despicable way, and now he wanted rid of her.

“Christian, do you know what happened to me half an hour ago?” Fabio asked when a tall, dark, and very good-looking man arrived in his office.

“No, boss. Something good I hope,” he said, a cheeky grin etched across his face.

“No, Christian. While you were, in all probability, dipping yourself in some super model, I was being held at gunpoint in my own fucking bedroom.” Fabio's voice reached a deafening crescendo. To add effect, he slammed his fist onto his desk, which sent a pen flying up into the air.

Christian's expression changed. “What? How?”

“You tell me. This house is supposed to be guarded like Fort Knox. I want you to find out why it wasn't.”

“Sure, boss. Who was the man?”

“I don't know, but he was fucking my wife. She's in the basement. Go down and make her tell you who it was. Use as much force as you need.”

Christian went down to the basement and opened the door. He saw a tearful Maria sitting on top of the washing machine, smoking a cigarette from a gold holder.

“Who was he, Maria?” Christian asked.

“What are you going to do to me if I don't tell you?” she said.

Her mascara had run, and her skin looked blotchy. She'd obviously been crying for some time. “I'll have to torture you until you tell me,” he said harshly.

“That's Christian, ever faithful to my husband. You'd jump from a bridge if he asked you, wouldn't you?”

“Yes. He's been very good to me. Without him, I would have been a nobody.”

“You're the most beautiful man I've ever seen, but you're an asshole,” she said. “You're stupid for believing what he tells you. He's just using you.”

“The name please, Maria. I really don't want to have to hurt you. Spare yourself.”

She knew what he would do to her, and it would hurt. “You will never find him. He lives abroad, far from here.”

“After this, I won't ask again. What's his name?”

“Alexander Gorev.”

“And where does he live?”

“I just told you, dumbass. He lives abroad.”

Christian walked toward her and knocked the cigarette out of her hand. “Don't ever call me that again. Now, where does he live?”

“He's Russian. He lives in Moscow, and if you're stupid enough to go there, you'll never come back.”

“Thank you, Maria,” he said. “I really wasn't looking forward to dragging it out of you. You know I've always thought you were a nice-looking woman. If Fabio hadn't been my boss, I might have had a crack at you myself.”

“Don't flatter yourself,” she said.

Christian took a look at her. Who knew, it may have been the last time he saw her, he thought. He'd been working for Fabio for ten years, and he'd always fancied sleeping with her. She could have been his Mrs. Robinson. He would have like that.

“He's called Alexander Gorev, and he lives in Moscow, boss,” Christian said. Fabio looked out of the window and noticed the guards doing their rounds. “Maria says there's no way we'll be able to get him.”

“If he's fled to Moscow, we probably won't. We don't have anyone there. Find out if he has family, anything we can use in the States to persuade him to come back. And find out why my guards missed him.”

“Maria. She told them he'd come to fix the boiler,” Christian said immediately.

“Make sure she leaves as well,” Fabio said.

Half an hour later, Christian returned with a smile on his face. “He’s got a daughter named Amy, and she lives in LA. She's an American citizen.”

“How the hell did you find that out so fast?”

“Maria knew more than I thought.”

“Did she tell you where she lived?”

“I had to really persuade her to tell me that, but yes.”

*****

“Right, listen up, Alberti,” Fabio said as he looked at Christian and Alberti. “Christian has found out that the dog that fucked my wife has a daughter named Amy. We're going to kidnap her. This afternoon she's attending a friend’s wedding. Christian is going to the wedding, and he's going to charm her.” Alberti nodded and drew on his cigarillo. “Christian is going to befriend her, get her to the street under some pretense, and bundle her into the car. You are going to drive her to Oaktree Lodge and keep her locked up.”

“Okay, boss,” Alberti said.

“Remember, Christian, no fooling around with her. I know what you're like. If you put a finger on her, I'll cut your hand off.”

Christian recognized the look Fabio was giving him and knew he meant it. “Don't worry, boss. I'll behave perfectly.”

*****

When Christian walked into the wedding reception, women turned their heads. The reception was in the garden of a luxury hotel in Beverly Hills. The guests were the smart set, people from Hollywood and big business. Christian also recognized a few people from his line of work, organized crime. He laughed to himself when he noticed the chief of police talking to man Christian new had murdered someone just two days earlier.

Christian didn't have an invitation, but no one would notice; there were so many people.

“Hello. What's your name?” a woman asked.

“Christian,” he replied.

She was in her sixties. She had been good looking at one time, Christian could tell, but she was way past her sell by date now. “You're very handsome. How much do you charge?”

“What?” he said.

“Your price. What is it? Dear boy, do you think I could get a man as nice looking as you into my bed without paying him?”

“I'm not a gigolo.”

“But you do have a price, don't you?” she asked.

He flashed his white smile at her. “Yes, of course. Five million dollars. Now fuck off out of my way.” The woman looked frightened and moved away.

“That wasn't nice,” someone else said, coming up to him.

“What wasn't?” Christian asked.

“The way you spoke to her. She's old.”

“Not too old to ask me to fuck her,” he protested.

“I'm Amy,” she said.

Sometimes Christian wondered about life. Here he was trying to find Amy, and something had brought her to him without him even having to try.

“Nice to meet you, Amy,” he said. She was wearing a long silver dress that revealed her breasts and clung to her hips. She had long dark hair that curled its way to the middle of her back and the most beautiful face Christian had ever seen.

“How do you know Madison?” she asked.

He had no idea who Madison was, but he guessed she was the bride. “Oh, I'm on the groom’s side. Went to school with him,” he bluffed.

“It was a terrible shock, her getting pregnant so soon after they'd met, wasn't it?” Amy said.

“Oh yes, such a shock,” he replied, hardly able to keep a straight face.

This is one hell of a good-looking guy, Amy thought as she let her eyes flow over him. Tall, athletic, and the most wonderful eyes. Decent bulge as well, she noted.

“Come and dance with me,” he said, taking her hand. Before she had time to respond, she was in his arms, being carried effortlessly around the dance floor.

“You're very beautiful,” he said. “What do you do for a living?”

“I'm a student of music.”

“You can play my instrument all day long,” he joked.

“Vulgar,” she said.

“That's me, though. I say what I want. I don't care whether you think it's vulgar or not.” She gasped when he pulled her tighter to him and navigated them around another couple.

“You dance well,” she said, aware that her thigh was dangerously close to a place it shouldn't be.

“Self-taught. Hundreds of hours dancing with beautiful women like you.”

“You're not very modest, are you?”

“No. Why should I be?”

“How many women have you had?” She noticed she was slightly turned on by his arrogance.

“A lot. Many different kinds of women. I love women; they are so unpredictable.”

“You are Italian, so I guess it's in your genes. Italian men are continually horny.”

The music changed, but Christian still held her and danced at his own pace. He wanted a slow grind, and that was what he was going to get, just as soon as he'd warmed her up.

“Yes. We're all sex mad,” he said, laughing a bit.

“You aren't married, are you?” He shook his head. “Girlfriend?” she asked.

“No. You can have me if you want.”

She laughed. “What makes you say that?”

“Because you keep putting your thigh against my crotch and make no attempt to remove it. You know you are turning me on, and you want to.”

“I do not,” she protested.

“Oh yes, you do. You can deny it all you want, but you like me, and you want me. Look at the color of your cheeks.”

“You're crazy,” she said as she tried to pull away.

“Stop your feigned shock. I'm not one of those guys you can pussy whip into submission.” He pulled her waist back to him and turned them in another direction. He bent down and let his lips glide gently over her neck. He heard her gasp. “See. You like it, don't you? You also like it when you feel me getting hard against your leg.” He leaned into her, put his mouth to her ear, and whispered. “What turns you on?”

“What?”

“From behind, I'd say. You look like the kind of girl who enjoys being rammed from the rear,” he said.

“You're so uncouth.”

“And you're so fucking beautiful that you make me like that.”

“You've only just met me, and you dare to talk to me like that?” she asked.

“Yes, I dare. I told you before, I get what I want.”

The band announced they were taking a break. “If you think I'm easy, I'm not. You'll have to work for it if you want it,” she said. “Fetch me a drink.”

“Fetch your own drink. Who do you think I am?” he replied. “Work for it,” he scoffed. “I've never heard such shit.”

He did what he often did when faced with women who were high and mighty. He moved away and started to talk to other people. It worked every time. Soon he felt Amy staring at him. He knew exactly what she was thinking. She was pissed that he'd dared to leave her side. He'd seen her type before. She was one of those beautiful women men flocked to with their tongues hanging out like thirsty dogs. She'd been conditioned, by men's own ridiculous behavior, into thinking she could get whatever she wanted by simply fluttering her eyelids. Well, not with him.

He smiled to himself when she reappeared by his side a few minutes later. “Oh, it's you. Miss me, did you?” he said.

“You're such a cocky asshole.”

“So why don't you go and talk to your friends then?” he said nonchalantly.

“Dance with me again,” she said.

Outside in the street, Alberti kept glancing at his watch. Christian had told him he'd bring her to him around 3 p.m. It was 5 p.m. and there was no sign of him. There were a number of people sitting outside the cafe on the other side of the road, and Alberti was more than tempted to join them.

“Fuck it,” he said. He got out of the car, walked across the road, and ordered a double vodka.

“Are you ignoring me?” Madison said as she and her new husband danced by.

“No, I'm just...”

Madison winked at Amy as if to say, I know exactly what you're doing.

Amy didn't want to talk to anyone. She didn't want to stand around, chatting idly, when she could be in the arms of this handsome man, whose scent was so wonderful. He was the kind of man she'd found impossible to find so far in her life. He was a man who told her what to do, and that made her feel calm.

They danced until Amy's feet hurt, and then they sat at the bar and flirted some more. It had been dark for a couple of hours, and some of the guests were beginning to leave. As they spoke, Christian noticed Amy touching his leg from time to time. That was his signal.

“Come on,” he said, taking her hand.

“To where?”

“To my place. I want you,” he whispered.

She stood up and followed him. “I've got a driver somewhere,” he said when they reached the street. “There's the car. Where the fuck is he?”

Alberti saw them from his place in front of the café and stood up. Christian heard the crash of someone knocking glasses over and looked toward the café. “Shit,” he said when he saw Alberti sprawled on the ground. He walked over to him, picked him up, and punched him. Alberti flew across the road and landed in front of their car. Christian picked him up and once again hit him. “You were supposed to wait for me, not get drunk in some café,” he exclaimed. Alberti was too far gone to answer.

“Stop it, Christian. Everyone's looking,” Amy said.

“Fuck. Get in the car,” he said to Amy.

Christian got the keys from Alberti's pocket and left him lying in the gutter. After three-quarters of an hour, they reached the narrow road that led from the freeway to Oaktree Lodge.

“This is a bit remote, isn't it?” Amy said.

“I don't like people too much. I prefer to live out here,” he replied.

Amy wondered if anybody ever came down this road except him. It wasn't just narrow, but also bumpy, and she was beginning to feel a little car sick. She was relieved when they stopped outside what appeared, in the dark, to be a log cabin.

*****

As soon as they were inside, Christian reached for her. He pulled her to him and kissed her. She leaned against the wall just inside the door and felt him push against her. The thin material of her dress did nothing to hide how hard he was. She was flattered that such a handsome man wanted her so badly.

“You're keen, aren't you?” she said.

“I've been looking at you all night. I'm horny as hell now.”