Crossing the Line (16 page)

In the end, he was the last to leave because his car had been blocked in.

“Thanks for inviting me,” he said.

“Thanks for coming and for the champagne. Well, I guess I’d better start clearing up.” She glanced around the room.

“Need help?” Ethan cursed his mother.

“That would be great.”

After a few minutes, Luisa walked up, took a pile of plates from his hands, put them down and kissed him. For a moment he didn’t respond, then her hand slipped to his groin and his cock stirred. What the hell, he thought, and kissed her back.

When they broke apart, he stared straight at her. “I’m not looking for a relationship.”

“Maybe I can change your mind.”

She unzipped him. He should have stopped her, but he didn’t.

It was past midnight before Max left the party, claiming a headache. He said goodnight to everyone, kissed his daughters and closed the door of his new suite, opening it a moment later to slip the “do not disturb” sign over the handle. He engaged the deadbolt, flipped on the lights and stood before the mirror. He was spending so much money, the hotel management had been only too pleased to switch his suite. That wasn’t the only thing he’d switched, he thought with a grin.

His heart raced. This wasn’t good for him but he didn’t care. He looked a decent, responsible man. Gray hair betrayed his age, but he was immensely grateful to still have a full head of hair. His belly, hidden under his jacket, sagged, but he was fit and followed a daily routine of a sixty length swim and a half an hour rowing to nowhere in air conditioned comfort.

He was a good husband. He didn’t forget his wife’s birthday or their wedding anniversary. He sent flowers and paid her credit card bill without flinching, but his wife had no interest in sex. The moment she’d given him two daughters, she thought her job was done. He was unsure whether her devotion to endless charitable causes was an excuse to avoid spending time with him or came from a genuine desire to do good, but either way he had a wife who grudgingly consented to let him in her bed once a fortnight—if he was lucky.

There was no experimentation, nothing kinky, no fondling, just him on top and her underneath. Soon as he’d come, she wanted him off so she could go wash. Max thought he was a saint for putting up with her. The Internet helped. His home office was out of bounds to everyone, even the cleaner, but he’d taken the precaution of never saving anything and installing a program that overwrote his deleted files just in case. It was only porn, nothing too exotic, but he didn’t want anyone prying. It was a good thing no one could read his dreams. Even better that jacking off didn’t really make you blind.

He looked every inch the businessman he was—a hardworking, successful banker. He didn’t look like a rapist, but he was one of those too. Age fifteen he’d pounced on a fourteen year old girl, covered her head and mouth, dragged her into the bushes and fucked her. He didn’t think he’d ever had such a fantastic orgasm, as if his whole body exploded. He dreamed constantly about that night, what he’d done, how he’d got away with it. She reported the rape, but couldn’t identify him. He knew the risk and never did it again, but he’d relived the event so often in his head it had become more than reality.

Max closed the drapes and undressed, carefully hanging his clothes in the closet, putting his shirt, underpants and socks in a hotel laundry bag to take home. He ruffled up the sheets on the bed so it looked like he’d slept there. He washed, then brushed and flossed his teeth and stood naked in front of the mirror. He already had a hard on. He thought his penis looked bigger than usual. He wanted it to be the first thing the bitch saw.

* * * * *

Katya sat motionless. A couple of times she’d started to panic, then struggled to breathe. She calmed herself by counting backwards in threes from a hundred. Now she sat still, sucking in air past the gag. She was furious with Aleksei. What had she done to deserve hours handcuffed in the bathroom? What an idiot she’d been to think he cared for her, that she could care for him.

She stiffened when a line of light appeared along the bottom of the door, words bubbling in her head ready to throw at him, along with her fists. But when the door opened, she saw a naked stranger.
Oh God, not a stranger. The birthday guy.

He walked toward her and she closed her eyes.
Fucking Aleksei. How could I be so stupid?
The man unfastened the tie from her mouth and she gulped air. He stroked her cheek with a wet finger, rubbing it backwards and forwards and she couldn’t figure out what he was doing until she realized it wasn’t his finger and she jerked her head back, banging it on the wall.

“What’s your name?” he snarled.

When she didn’t speak, he grabbed her jaw and squeezed, his fingers digging into her skin. “Look at me and I’ll stop hurting you.”

She opened her eyes, though she didn’t believe him.

“
Zalupa
,” she spat.
Dickhead.

“How old are you?”

“Seventy-three.”

He laughed. “Try again.”

“Fourteen.”

The way his face lit up made her shudder.

Fear skittered through her body. “Please don’t hurt me. Let me go and I won’t tell anyone.”

He unfastened the handcuffs, and kept hold of one wrist as he pulled her to her feet. Katya went wild, striking out and screaming as he struggled to hold her. She brought her knee up into his groin and as he gasped, she wrenched free and made a break for the door. Part way across the bedroom, he snagged her dress. It ripped in his hand leaving her free to scramble on, but he caught hold of her hair and dragged her back, shoving her down on the floor, tearing her dress away. She fought as hard as she could, striking any part of him within reach. He was calling her names, swearing at her, his eyes so wild she thought he’d kill her.

“Hold still, you stupid bitch. You might have got lucky with the last guy, but you won’t be able to move when I’ve finished with you. I’m going to fuck your fucking heart out.” He pinned her on the carpet with his hand on her throat and she couldn’t move, could hardly breathe.

Max was ecstatic. As soon as he’d seen the girl getting out of the pool to sit next to Aleksei, he’d wanted her. A call to Petrenko sorted that out, though Petrenko warned him Aleksei wouldn’t be happy. Of course she wasn’t fourteen. A lucky coincidence she’d picked that age. When he’d seen her in the bathroom, his breath had caught in his throat. Not just because the call had got him the girl he wanted but because the fear in her eyes drove him wild with lust. He could feel her pulse racing in her neck. He could do what he wanted, even kill her, though he wouldn’t, not when the Russians knew he was with her. The awareness that he was capable of evil was an incredible turn on. At that moment, he believed he could do anything, climb Everest, walk to both poles, conquer the fucking world.

The girl reached for his face, tried to press her thumbs into his eyes and he squeezed her neck harder.

“You fucking whore. Lie still. Touch my face and I’ll rip your eyes out.”

Even speaking like that made him think he’d spill himself over her. His cock wept in anticipation. He called her every filthy name he’d ever heard, used vulgar street talk for what he’d do to her, words he’d never spoken until then.

The breath gurgled in her throat and he took his hands away.
Christ.
He didn’t want to kill before he fucked her. He wasn’t into that. He picked her up and dropped her on the bed, then sat on her legs and pinned her down while he caught his breath. She was currently limp, struggling to breathe but she was stronger than she looked. He wanted her to fight.

As he tied her wrists to the headboard with silk scarves left for him, she launched into a croaky torrent of abuse. Well, he guessed it was abuse. The TV drowned her out.

“
Poshol nahuy, otyebis ot menya! Rogatiy kozyol. Eedee trakhay svayu mamu
.”

He wrapped a scarf around her mouth. No way could he explain screams to hotel security. He watched her thrash around, letting her exhaust herself. On the glass topped bedside table were four lines of coke and several condoms. He didn’t do drugs. He’d never even tried pot let alone cocaine, but this was his fiftieth birthday and he wanted to greet the next fifty with a bang. Waiting all these years for tonight showed the strength of his willpower. Copying what he’d seen in the movies, he blocked one nostril, put the straw against the white line and as he moved it along the powder, he sniffed hard.

The rush was instant. His heart rate soared. He felt electrified and gasped. The girl lay still now, watching wide-eyed, her chest heaving. He licked his finger and ran it along the line he’d just snorted, picking up the grains he’d missed. Catching hold of her chin, he pulled down the gag and pushed his finger into her mouth, rubbing her gums, holding her jaw so she couldn’t bite him. Then he bent his head to hers and pressed his mouth down hard. She struggled but she couldn’t stop him.

He feared he’d come the moment he got inside her but he didn’t. He was like those guys he’d watched in porn movies who kept going like frenzied rabbits. It had to be the cocaine, but he didn’t give a shit. The girl was crying and he didn’t give a shit about that either. He grabbed her breasts and squeezed hard, jerking backward and forward until he exploded with a loud cry. He collapsed on top of her, filled with the exhilarating thrill of knowing he’d fulfilled his fantasy and it had more than met his expectations.

* * * * *

Nik had gone through numerous emotions since he started recording. He was used to making hard-core porn movies, and watching the x-rated productions of others. The Internet allowed access to sex acts of every imaginable variation, often without the viewer having to submit credit card details. He’d helped at shoots where women pretending to be gang-raped were so convincing he’d almost been taken in. It was relief when filming was over to hear those same women laughing with guys who’d spat in their assholes and fucked them as they screamed.

But there were lines he wouldn’t cross. Like using kids. Ever. And no animals. Until now he’d also drawn the line at actual rape. He might have persuaded and cajoled, using charm and offering increasing amounts of money, but he’d never forced anyone to suck a guy’s cock or take it in the ass or made them lie there while a guy pissed on their face.

The sad truth was that if a guy or woman didn’t want to do something, there was always another who would. The business was easier for men who were paid when they ejaculated, whereas women were paid according to how far they’d go. So for the last sixty minutes he’d felt bad because he knew Katya hadn’t agreed to this and Aleksei hadn’t planned on this. Bruno had told him to put the equipment in Aleksei’s room while he and Katya were at the pool. Petrenko’s orders. So why had Sylvie even come with them?

When Katya begged the guy to stop, she hadn’t been pretending. When she’d struggled, it had been in desperation. A couple of times Nik had got up, frightened the man would go too far, but then he remembered how much he was being paid, that the amount he’d expected to get had been doubled. He knew what would happen to him if he interfered, and he sat down.

The sick thing was, he couldn’t stop watching. His heart had leapt into his mouth when the pervert had put his hands around her neck and again when he’d pressed her face into the pillow to muffle her screams. But somehow Nik had found his hand inside his pants while he watched the guy hump Katya and he knew in some ways he was no better than the bastard raping her.

* * * * *

When Aleksei turned the corner and saw Bruno standing outside his door, his pulse spiked. He was already in a bad temper because he was far later than the couple of hours he’d promised Katya. The phone in their room was continually engaged and he guessed she’d taken it off the hook because she was pissed off with him.

“What are you doing?” Aleksei snapped.

“Stopping you from going in.”

“Why?” But he knew.
No, no.

“Because Viktor paid me to.”

Oh fuck.
Aleksei tried to put his keycard in the slot and Bruno grabbed his arm and twisted it up behind his back.

“Get the fuck off me.”

“You’re too late.” Bruno maintained his grip and hauled a struggling Aleksei down the corridor.

Fucking Viktor. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Stop fighting. What you going to do? Call hotel security?”

“Yes.”

But as he opened his mouth to yell, Bruno thumped him in the stomach and stole his air. He dragged Aleksei into the bedroom and threw him down. Nik sat at the desk in front of a laptop and yanked his hand out of his pants. When Aleksei pushed himself up and saw what was on the screen, he flew at him.

“You fucking bastard,” Aleksei shouted.

Bruno yanked him back and manhandled him to the bed. “Calm down.”

Aleksei found himself pinned. He struggled to get out from under Bruno but the guy was too heavy.

“I’m going to fucking kill you,” Aleksei gasped.

Bruno wrenched his arm out to the side and handcuffed him to the bed.

“Let me go,” Aleksei screamed.

Bruno secured his other wrist as Aleksei writhed and yanked at the cuffs.

“I’ll pay you.” Aleksei tried to keep his voice calm.

“Whatever you offer won’t work,” Bruno said.

“Nik?” Aleksei called. “What the fuck are you doing?”

Then Bruno found something to gag him with and all Aleksei could do was struggle, knowing he had no chance of getting free.

“You’re going to rip your wrists to shreds,” Bruno said.

I’m going to fucking rip you to shreds. And after you comes Viktor.