Rosalind
Everything is pink.
Barbie pink.
My head aches as a sea of consciousness washes over me, and I’m met with bright pink everywhere. Groaning, I squeeze my eyes shut as panic flutters at my insides. What I want is to sink back down into blank, black oblivion, but I know I can’t, so I force my eyes open again.
It’s hard to focus, especially when my stomach heaves and twists. My head pounds. I don’t know where I am.
Nikolai…where…?
This isn’t my room. This isn’t his place.
Nikolai. My enemy, lover, captor, tormentor: a man I should hate, but the one I crave.
Everything shifts as his devastatingly handsome face floods my brain.
He’s not here, and I don’t know where I am, or what the hell happened.
I try and breathe in, but my breath catches and twists.
Calm down, Rosalind. Think.
There’s so much fuzz in my head, like wads of cotton wool, that thinking is hard, but I try. Memories come back in sickening waves, crashing into me, threatening to drown me, suffocate me.
Calm, girl. Panicking won’t solve anything.
Last thing I remember was being in my beautiful prison of Nikolai’s home. He’d given me a sort of freedom-an unlocked door, a pitiful crumb for a pitiful and pathetic creature. What else could I do? Not fight him; he claimed he’d hurt me if I did. Not run; alarms and locks and armed guards abounded.
It was more than that. Maybe it’s the fuzziness in my brain, but while I wanted to run, I wanted to stay. I wanted to tie myself to a cruel monster of a man. A man who can make my pleasure sing.
I wanted to run, and I didn’t.
I wanted him.
I wanted the fire Nikolai set in me, a bright, seductive one I was helpless to resist. I still am because the very thought of his touch makes my body tingle and sing.
The thought of him makes me yearn, makes me… miss him.
Crap.
Where am I? That’s the million-dollar question.
I don’t remember much of that last piece of time in his place, only disjointed things, feelings.
I remember looking for him, trailing through his home, thinking…I don’t know what I was thinking. That I loved him? That maybe this whole thing with us could work? How I still don’t know, but his mouth, his fingers on me make me lose my mind, that maybe we could talk because he can be sweet and I’m an idiotic fool?
I suck in a breath. I was looking for him, and his place was empty. No, not empty because a man… I swallow hard. That man…
Fear lances through me, down to the bone, a very different feeling to anything Nikolai set off in me. Nikolai is frightening, deadly, breathtaking. That man was ugly and dangerous. Vicious. The violence in his words- blunt edged, sadistic-makes me shake, even as I lie here, even as I can barely grab hold of them. Their meaning was dark and vile, and something that tugs at subconscious.
Think, Rosalind. This is important. What did he say to me? He said…he said- Father?
The word swims in, and goosebumps rise instantly on my arms. The man with the sheet from Nikolai’s bed, from when we-I think he said something about my father?
It’s too blurred, too tangled, for me to work out. I clench my hands on the slippery material under me.
My head pounds harder. All this damned bright color hurts. I squeeze my eyes shut against the bubblegum pink paint vomit.
When I was seven, a Barbie pink dreamland bedroom would have been my dream. Back then, I’d wanted a home, a white fence, friends, a daddy for me and my mommy. Barbie pink with fuzz and glitter would have made little kid me happy.
Now? I shudder and turn, pulling my legs up to my chest. Now, it’s beyond creepy. Genius would freak.
The thought of my best friend rocks me, makes my eyes prick and burn. I miss her. I miss my uncle who wasn’t my uncle. Max, the man shot and killed by Nikolai.
My heart squeezes hard.
This isn’t my room at home, this isn’t the prison room of Nikolai’s.
This…
Oh, fuck, where am I?
Frustrated, I roll onto my back, the inky blackness of oblivion out of reach. I flop my legs down. I try and stay calm with deep breaths. Frustration won’t help. It leads to panic, and here, where I don’t know what’s going on, panic could be lethal.
Feeling a little calmer, I open my eyes. The pink noise invades my senses, but I make myself push up, hand slipping on the satin fabric. I miss freedom and… I miss Nikolai.
I shouldn’t. I should hate him, but his touch is still there, like a drug, like a poison, swimming in my veins.
Looking down at myself, I swing my legs to the ground. White. Cotton, white, girly lace, the stuff of old nightgowns. I’d been wearing Nikolai’s shirt, not this.
Slowly, I turn my head, and a sliver of unease trickles down my spine.
I’m not alone.
Someone clears their throat, and I look up along the lines of his legs to his face. A man is here, black suit, granite, lined face, graying at the temples, staring at me like he wants to bore down into my soul. Now, my heart hammers like it wants to break through my ribs, and I’m cold and hot at the same time as fear rips through me, white hot anger right next to it.
Is he another tormentor? Another player in whatever sick game is being played? Did he take me? No, he’s not the man who hit me and said those terrible things. This man reminds me of the big man who works for Nikolai.
Underling, then. Maybe I can reason with him, talk at least.
Licking my dry lips, I try to think of something to say, trying to find that balance I had with Nikolai before I sank into him, before that whole damn Stockholm Syndrome crap. Unfortunately, it’s like the well is bone dry, like I’m out of fucks to give. I’ve short circuited, apparently, because placating isn’t in my wheelhouse, and I glare, narrowing my eyes.
“Who the fuck touched me?”
The blank granite of his face doesn’t change one iota as he sweeps his gaze over me. “You need to be more specific.”
It’s one of those rough voices, hard, about as full of emotion as his face and eyes: empty and hidden.
“I wasn’t wearing…this.” I run my hand up the front of the dress. The little covered buttons all along the front must have taken ages to do up and…gross. I gag before I lift my chin. “Who undressed me? Touched me?”
“I did.” Once more, his gaze sweeps me. “Buttons look right to me. Not into girly stuff, though.”
“You’re a disgusting pig.” I’m playing with fire, taunting it, but I don’t care. “Does it get you off?”
“No. Just following orders,” he says with a shrug. “I didn’t touch you more than necessary.”