Heller's Punishment (6 page)

I shook my
head. I was twenty-five and had been told after a serious car
accident that I would never have any children. At that moment,
listening to their sad tale, I didn’t feel too regretful about that
at all.

Heller spoke up
then, and we all turned to listen. People did tend to pay attention
to him. Well, it was hard not to really.

“Can I just go
over the details of this assignment, so that Matilda is aware of
exactly what she’ll be doing?” We all nodded in agreement. “Your
daughter is flying in tomorrow from down south to attend a
rehabilitation clinic located in the mountains outside the city.
Matilda will meet her off the plane and accompany her to the
clinic. She will stay with your daughter the entire week she
attends the clinic, before escorting her back to your house for
follow up rehabilitation.”

“That’s
correct,” confirmed Mr Heyne.

“I have two
questions. Why do you believe your daughter will require a security
officer? And does she know that you’re hiring Matilda?”

He sat back on
the chair and blasted the Heynes with his eyes. It was an
uncomfortable feeling to be on the pointy end of those icy blues,
as I knew from much personal experience. They fidgeted a little
under his intense scrutiny, before Mr Heyne replied.

“She will try
to run away from the clinic. At least, that’s what she’s done both
other times. I’m not sure if you know, but it takes up to seven
days to physically withdraw from heroin, so she needs to complete
the program. I’m almost certain that she’s only agreed to do this
to receive the money we offered. I don’t know if she’s at all
sincere in her desire to quit. But now that she’s finally agreed to
go again, we want to make sure that she’ll stay for the entire week
this time. And then we can consider longer-term rehabilitation for
her emotional withdrawal. And we’re prepared to do anything to make
her stay – even use force, if necessary. She did agree to have
someone with her the whole time, so Ms Chalmers will not be a shock
to her.”

“Good,” said
Heller crisply. He turned to me. “Any further questions,
Matilda?”

“Just the
details of her flight, please. And you’ve already organised our
transfer to the clinic from the airport?” I asked. Mr Heyne nodded
and handed over a printout of his daughter’s itinerary. I had a
thought. “Um, how are you sure that she’ll get on the plane in the
first place?”

He smiled
grimly. “We have someone at the other end escorting her to the
plane, making sure she boards.”

I nodded and
Heller and I shook hands with the Heynes and took our leave. Their
house was beautiful, in one of the city’s top five suburbs, with
expensively lush and well-maintained gardens. I wondered aloud to
Heller as we walked down the drive how a girl from such a
privileged background, with seemingly caring parents, could end up
as a desperately addicted sex worker on the streets.

“Perhaps she
couldn’t handle the pressure of living up to such a perfect life?
Maybe her parents expected her to be perfect as well,” he
suggested, but I could tell that he couldn’t care less about the
girl or her circumstances. As long as he was paid, he rarely took a
deeper interest in our assignments. I was the opposite, not really
caring about the money, but very curious about our clients and
their motivations. I was a pretty nosy person, I guess.

We climbed into
his black Mercedes 4WD, personalised with a black and gold licence
plate that simply read: HELLER. We headed back to the
Warehouse.

“Are you okay
with this assignment, Matilda?” he asked as we drove, shooting me a
sideways glance. I responded with a withering glare. As if it
mattered whether I was okay or not – he would make me do it anyway.
I didn’t know why he was suddenly pretending to be democratic.

“I’ve never met
a heroin addict before,” I said, instead of replying. “What do you
think she’ll be like?”

He shrugged.
“Depends on how she copes with the withdrawal. She’s going cold. I
don’t think it will be easy. For her or you. It would have been
better if she’d done a methadone program. Frankly, I don’t think
this will be successful, especially considering her previous failed
attempts. But one thing you must remember, and as her father
stressed, is that she cannot be trusted.”

We exchanged a
quick look. “Another fun adventure for me then, huh?” I asked
wryly.

“That’s the
spirit, Matilda,” he replied with his sexy, sly, half-smile that I
loved so much.

I spent that
evening hanging with Daniel and Niq again. It was something I did
most evenings now that I didn’t have a boyfriend, a situation about
which they were more than happy. They liked to have me to
themselves. The plan was for me to make them dinner and then we’d
watch one of their much-loved horror movies, my least favourite
pastime.

Heller
surprised all of us by coming to my flat and joining us for dinner
and the movie. So instead of spending ninety percent of the movie
with a cushion in front of my face, I had the distinct pleasure of
burying my face in his chest to avoid the awful bloodshed on the TV
screen. He sat on the lounge next to me, gorgeously casual in
designer jeans and t-shirt, his arm slung around my shoulders. With
his bare feet crossed on my coffee table, he watched the movie with
scarcely concealed incredulity and scorn. My Heller wasn’t much
into fiction, his business-focussed head firmly planted in reality.
Apart from the news, he didn’t watch TV or listen to the radio, he
didn’t watch movies, he didn’t read books, he didn’t listen to
music. He worked at his business, he worked on his body and he
screwed around. That was his life. And if he had any interests
outside of those three, I was yet to discover evidence of it.

I leant against
him with happy indolence, one arm thrown across his well-muscled
stomach, one leg thrown over his legs, my head on his chest. He was
quick to slide his other arm around me whenever I gave a little
screech of horror as another person met a grisly death onscreen,
even dropping a sporadic kiss on the top of my head. And yeah, sure
I played it up a bit for some extra attention from him. Nothing
wrong with that.

Daniel and Niq
were slightly resentful that Heller usurped their places next to me
on the lounge. Normally the three of us always sat bunched up, even
holding hands sometimes when the movie particularly scared me. But
Heller was undoubtedly top dog and they had to vacate their
favourite positions next to me for him. I guess I was kind of
popular in a small way, at least amongst the Warehouse occupants,
being the only female around for miles.

Niq was fastest
of the two to sit on my other side, cuddling up to me, one of his
arms hooked around my free arm, while I cuddled up to Heller. Poor
Daniel was relegated to a side chair by himself, staring at the
screen with a mutinous face. Oh dear, I’d have to make it up to him
later.

“Why can’t we
watch something nice for once?” I complained when the movie
finished, worrying about nightmares. I had an over-active
imagination and it wouldn’t be the first time that I hadn’t been
able to sleep after watching one of those ghastly movies. I
couldn’t believe how many of them there were, one entire bookcase
in the Warehouse’s sixth floor library completely devoted to horror
DVDs.

“Sorry, Tilly.
All the Disney animations were booked out tonight. I think Sid and
Clive are watching them. They’re probably having a princess
marathon,” laughed Daniel. Niq snickered behind his hand. Even
Heller smiled and he couldn’t name a Disney princess if he
tried.

“Oh, very
funny,” I said, not impressed with his wit. “I won’t be able to
sleep now and I have that new job starting tomorrow.”

“I’ll stay with
you,” said Heller, sighing hugely as if it was a great imposition
for him instead of something he’d probably planned all along.

“Well, that’s
convenient, isn’t it?” I noted tartly.

“You can thank
me later, my sweet,” he smiled, chasing the other two from my
flat.

We kept a small
stock of pyjamas, clothes and toiletries at each other’s places for
the frequent times we had ‘sleepovers’. And while I cleaned up the
lounge room and kitchen a little, he went straight to my bedroom
and bathroom to change into his usual black silk boxers and brush
his teeth. I followed, doing the same, and climbed into my bed next
to him.

He drew me to
him and flung his leg over me, kissing me gently. “I’ll miss you
being away for a week, Matilda,” he said softly.

“I’ll miss you
too, but I hope it will go quickly. Thank you for staying tonight.
I probably would have had a nightmare otherwise. I can’t get that
scene with the severed legs out of my head.”

He didn’t
answer, but stroked my back and pulled me even closer, kissing me
again harder. His hand crept under my singlet top to cup my breast,
his tongue moving exploringly into my mouth as his fingers teased
my nipple. He moved his other leg under me and trapped me in a
scissor-hold, crossing his legs together behind my back. I was
crushed against him.

“So, Matilda.
You and Elton?” His breath tickled my face.

I burst into
laughter. “Oh Heller, please. If you’re going to accuse me of
sleeping with one of the men, at least make it someone
credible.”

“He’s a tall,
good-looking man.”

“So are you and
do you see me sleeping with you?”

He laughed, so
I knew he wasn’t totally serious. I think. It was hard to tell, but
my muscles relaxed from a tension I hadn’t even realised they’d
been carrying. My sleeping with the men was such a touchy topic
between us that I couldn’t even joke about it. He kissed me again.
“I wish you would sleep with me.”

“One day.”
Maybe.

“You’ll enjoy
it.”

“I don’t doubt
that for a second.”

“So, why don’t
we? Right now.”

I tried to
wriggle away, but I was captured by his legs. “What would happen if
we did?”

“What do you
mean?”

“Would you
still sleep with other women?”

He shrugged. “I
don’t know. Probably. Now and then. If it was beneficial to me or
my business.”

“And I would
still sleep with other men, now and then?”

“No.”

I laughed, but
it wasn’t a happy laugh. “Why not?”

“I don’t want
to share you.”

“I don’t want
to share you.”

“It’s different
for me. Sex with other women doesn’t mean anything to me. Sex with
other men means everything to you.”

That angered
me. “It’s not
different
for you. That’s just an excuse you
use.” I tried to free myself again, suddenly upset, but he clamped
his legs together more tightly. It was starting to hurt.

“What’s the
matter?”

I didn’t
answer.

He sighed.
“Matilda. My sweet. What did I say now?”

Eventually, I
forced myself to speak. “Nothing. Everything’s fine. Let me go. I’m
tired.”

“Matilda,
please. I know I’m not skilled at . . . ‘relationships’, but even I
know that when a woman insists that nothing is wrong, it’s not
true.”

“You having sex
with other women might mean nothing to
you
, but it means
everything to
me
. You look at it the wrong way around. Don’t
you understand?”

He unclamped
his legs and rolled onto his back. “No, I don’t understand. Why
should it matter what I do with other women when it’s you that I
care about? Isn’t the emotional more important than the physical to
you? It doesn’t matter what I do with them. I don’t care about any
of them. It’s just sex. I don’t even remember them afterwards.”

“Well, using
your logic, I guess that I can ‘care’ about you and still keep
sleeping with as many other men as I want because
it’s just
sex
.”

Quick as the
wind, he’d pinned me to the bed. “No. It’s not the same between us.
There’s always emotion involved in sex for you. You’re an emotional
person. You can’t separate the emotional from the physical. And
it’s not okay with me for you to share any of that with another
man. I hate it when you do.”

I struggled
against him. “You’re such a hypocrite. Let me go.”

“Matilda, one
day you’ll understand me.”

“I’ll
never
understand you.”

He was silent
for so long I didn’t think he would respond. When he did speak, his
voice was quiet. “You’ll understand me one day, my sweet. I need
you to. I need you.” And he gathered me in his arms and crushed me
up against him, holding me tightly.

I didn’t know
what had just happened. It was out of my realm of experience. It
seemed significant, but I didn’t know why and that only made me
feel naive. And for the first time since I’d met him, the nine-year
gap in our ages mattered. He needed . . . I didn’t know. I wanted .
. . I didn’t know. I realised sadly that I didn’t know much at all
about either Heller or myself. That was no way to have a
relationship.

Why did it all
have to be so complicated?

Trapped in his
arms all night, listening to his steady heartbeat and breathing,
for once I didn’t sleep well.

As usual, he
was gone when my alarm woke me. He seemed to exist on less sleep
than normal people and I knew that he liked to do an early morning
workout each day. I had a big day ahead and decided I’d better get
a good workout in while I could as well. Who knew what facilities
would be available in a rehab clinic.

I went down to
the house gym on the floor below. Also on that level was Sid and
Clive’s flat. The good insulation of the old brick building meant
that the twins were never disturbed by any noise coming from the
gym.

Heller was just
finishing up his own routine and I stopped to watch him for a short
while, admiring his strength and muscularity. He met my eyes in the
mirror, but otherwise ignored me. Nothing distracted him from
keeping his body beautiful. Compared to most of the men I knew in
my personal life – my father, brothers, cousins and ex-boyfriends –
he was vain, caring greatly for his appearance, but he wasn’t
flashy about it. He was well-groomed and extremely well-dressed,
but he paid absolutely no attention to other people’s reactions to
his incredible good looks. At that moment, he was only wearing tiny
skin-tight black gym shorts, no shirt. And despite my emotional
turmoil last night, I’ll admit that I found it hard to tear my eyes
away from his glistening muscles as they tensed and relaxed. Hmm,
it had been a while since I’d had any sex. And who’d have imagined
that a sweaty, smelly man could be so alluring?