Fifty Five

Fifty Five

CLARISSA DEVOR

No one else came into the dark room for the rest of the day, and I sat there, bound to the chair and gagged. The air was dusty and the place was unbearable.

I clenched my fists, boiling with rage. How could they leave me like this? They were going to pay. Just wait till I had my hands around their necks. I was going to throttle them, one by one. And when I was done, I would make sure to order a VIP pass to hell for them.

Eventually, I fell asleep, still shaking with anger, and ended up waking up to the darkness all over again. Like, what the hell!

"Rise and shine," the door creaked open, and light flooded into the dark room, instantly illuminating it.

I squinted at the bright light, wishing I could shield my eyes. A huge figure occupied the doorway, offering some shade, and no, it wasn't even grateful or anything. For one thing, I had a more pressing urge to punch something, preferably soft and fleshy, like a face.

"What do you want?" I asked, glaring at him with a look of defiance.

"Love the attitude, girl," he clicked his tongue in annoyance.

My defiant mask flickered for a moment, as I recalled what Michael said about him. So? What if he got off on my stubbornness? I wasn't about to give him an easy time anyway. I would make sure he regretted every second of keeping me here.

He flexed his muscles as he walked, as though wanting to express his dominance and make sure I knew what he was capable of. An eyebrow crept up to his shaggy bangs, and they seemed to ask, "Do you really want to play this game, girly?"

I gritted my teeth and lowered my eyes. I was angry, but I had to save the attitude for later.

I saw it in his eyes - those serpent-green orbs told me we could play his game all day long. And I knew that was exactly what he wanted me to do. He wanted to see my defiance. It would give him so much joy for his boring life, and I wasn't about to give him that satisfaction.

"A shame, really," he stopped in front of me, noting that I was backing out.

"You're sick," I spat.

He lifted my chin up with a smirk. "And here I was thinking that little fire was gone. You obviously weren't trained to back down, hmm?"

"Is that supposed to be a compliment?"

I struggled in my bonds, wishing I could bite his fingers so that he would stop touching me.

His eyes squinted into a smirk, and he let go of me.

"Funny little girl," he chuckled. "Pick one. Give me the attitude or not. Or though your level of indecisiveness is just as endearing."

I felt another layer of burning rage with each word. How could a human be so naturally goddamn annoying? If looks could kill, then he could only pray he was a cat, because I would have killed him nine times over by now.

"Why are you here?" I asked, sounding calmer than I actually was.

"I came to check on you," he said, folding his hands. Yeah, right. I replied with a scoff. And I was just going to assume he expected me to believe that.

"Here's the thing, Clarissa," he pulled a chair over and sat down, facing me. "I'm going to untie you now, and you're going to be a good little girl and do as I say."

I gave a short laugh. I was going to be a good little girl and do as he said? And what made him think that was an idea I would even consider? I didn't even follow orders, and certainly not from some deadbeat, muscled-up guy who stole people for a living.

"Or, of course, you can prove to be a goth bitch, and then we can do it your way. I'm more than ready to show you all the ropes involved in being submissive," he added, with a dark edge to his voice that told me he was going to make good on his threat.

"Fine," I said finally, trying hard not to roll my eyes. "Fine, what?" he asked.

"I'll do what you say," I spat out this time.

A sadistic grin spread across his face, and I badly wanted to wipe it off. "The rules are simple," he began. He walked behind me, and I heard a scraping sound as he uncapped a Swiss knife.

I stiffened instinctively as the cold metal made contact with my skin.

"You can go anywhere you want to go and do anything you want to do, as long as it's all on this floor, and as long as it doesn't involve escaping," he said, chipping the first set of ropes and heading for the next ones.

"Don't do anything that would annoy me or my men either. I might love a good humor, but trust me, they're so serious all the time. They have the right to harm you in any way they want." He continued,

"You won't dare!" I seethed. I was all fine with them now because they were smart enough to see the clear boundaries and not step on them.

But the moment any of them dared to lay a finger on me, I would be sure to cut it off. And things would get really personal.

"Oh, don't tempt me," he drawled, almost sounding bored.

He snapped off the bounds on my hand, and I instantly retracted them from the chair and hugged them to myself. I flexed my wrists and then clenched my fists.

I had a pretty good idea of who to try them on first.

"Remember, the only reason we haven't gotten dirty yet is that you haven't given us a reason to yet. Feel free to change that any day." He said calmly, watching my movements with a mixture of amusement.

"You're so annoying," I rolled my eyes, standing up.

How many times did I say that?

"Show me a decent room that has a toilet and get me a change of clothing. I need to freshen up." I instructed, turning back to him.

He stood there with his knife hanging off one hand like an extension of his hand, and his eyebrows twitched violently.

"What?" I asked, placing both of my hands on my hips.

"Who do you think I am? Your little manservant?" He demanded.

Well, the post is vacant, I thought with a shrug.

"Whatever," I shook my head and stormed off, eager to get out of the godforsaken room as soon as possible. I had been taped to a chair all night long, and I didn't relish one bit of it.

"I'll just do it myself." I added.

"Wait," his voice stopped me as I turned again. What did he possibly want now?

"The client is coming soon." He said. "And, like I told you, or like you must have already figured out, we're just like middlemen, and our job is to kidnap and accommodate you till they come for you." He said.

I felt a chill run through me at the reminder. Whoever was behind this would be showing his mother fucking ass soon enough.

I clenched my fists. I didn't even know what was happening at the other part of the city.

There was no time to send out an SOS message or something similar. If I got moved around a lot, then the police might find it even harder to locate me, and that was assuming that they already knew I was missing.

"I'm guessing the first bit of information is really dang important?" Because I had already sworn not to show him any weaknesses, even though I was already very scared and shaking in my boots, the other option left was to sound indifferent and make myself as annoying as possible.

I was afraid, but all I had to do was pretend, and the only way I knew how to pretend was to wrap the fear and insecurities up in an extra layer of sarcasm and witty comebacks before dishing it to him.

I knew I succeeded because his eyes twitched again, and he seemed to be holding something back.

"It should be." He said, grinding his teeth together.

"Because then you'll have the slightest idea as to what exactly all this is about, and maybe then you won't be a total idiot all the time."

I huffed and stomped out of the room. If he thought I was a fool, then I was really sorry to prove him wrong.

For one thing, it was already obvious from the way he acted that he had orders not to harm me in any way.

Why else would he choose to hold back when I pushed him to the edge? He must have been hoping to scare me, but I was way smarter than that. And I was going to use my sweet little privilege to the fullest. That was my own way to get back at him.