Unearthed (3 page)

“What about ‘cunts,’ Anthony?” She looked so cool, so … joyful, as she pressed harder. “Do you call women cunts?” It was like a dagger just under his breastbone, like someone pushed a letter opener up under there, ready to crack him open. “Do you, Anthony? Don’t fucking lie to me. You have, haven’t you?” Waited for him to nod. “Of course you have. You’re a misogynist prick, Anthony.” She smelled so fucking gawdawful sweet, it was just drowning him. He squeezed his eyes shut tight.

“You ever rape a girl, Anthony?” His eyes snapped open, found hers looking at him. She still had the gun in her hand, just playing with it. Her skin looked … sallow in the light, almost yellow, against the red background of the room. The veins up and down her legs were almost pulsating in the red light.

“It’s okay,” she said, playful again. “You can tell me.” He clenched his teeth together tight, willed his jaw to stay shut. “You
will
tell me, Anthony. You will fucking tell me, you should know that.” There was a clatter as she tossed the gun, and dropped to her knees astride his abdomen, a weight across his belly as her ass hit him in the gut with the force of ten punches. He almost vomited, coughed up bile and whatever dinner he’d had hours ago. It fucking hurt.

She put her face right up in his, like she was going to kiss him, but there was nothing sexy about this. Her breath stunk, stale, like she’d had a gallon of coffee on an empty stomach and started burping it up immediately. She breathed, and he felt like he was going to wretch, the pressure of her body weighing him down. “Anthony.” She snapped fingers next to his cheek, a crack of thunder in his ear. “Have you ever raped a woman, Anthony?” He watched her run a hand down her back, behind her, and felt her grab hold of his crotch like a fucking robot claw had him. “Tell me. Tell me, or you lose your balls and dick, right now.” She squeezed like it was pliers on his piece, and he threw up right in her face.

“Oh, that’s some kinky shit right there,” she said, staring at him. She had not a drop on her, even though she’d been right there in his face when he’d blown. The strong taste of acid, the smell of bile was all over him, dripping down his cheeks where she held him to the ground. His hair was sticky where it had caught his vomit, where it trailed down his face. He’d felt her move, subtly, and she’d gotten away in time? Fast. In the blink of an eye, the time it took his gullet empty in a fountain into the air above him. She snapped a finger in his ear again. “Have you ever raped a girl, Anthony? Your balls are awaiting your answer.” She squeezed again, but more gently this time. He didn’t throw up, but goddamn did he want to.

“Yes,” he said, breathing in gasps, like he’d gone for a sprint. Anthony hadn’t sprinted in years, but he felt like he’d been on one now. His mouth was full of the taste of his own sick, all he could see was her cold eyes, yellowed, smooth skin, that mismatch clash of tan bra with purple cotton panties a shade lighter than the veins in her legs, and the red of the walls around him.

“Yes, you have?” She asked, looking at him seriously. He nodded, unable to get another word out. “Mmm. See.” She slapped him gently, playfully, along the bile-soaked cheek, and it snapped his head aside. “Tell me about it.” He felt the pressure loosen on his crotch.

Anthony flinched. He could see her staring at him, eager, interested. She was totally focused on him, peering into him, and all he could feel was the residual sense of nausea and a sudden sense of shame about confessing to something he’d bragged about many times to Mike, Early, and others. His face burned, his tongue moved inside his mouth, trying to wet a mouth gone dry and sticky. “I … uh …”

Her veneer broke and he recognized it for what it was, nothing but a show. She cackled, right in his face, with that horrible breath wafting down on him like fog drifting out of one of those machines that makes it. “I’m totally fucking with you,” she said. “I don’t care what you’ve done. All I care about now …” she stared into his eyes, and he felt a chill, “is what you’re going to do for me.

“This is how we’re going to do things. I ask for something, you do it. I ask a question, you answer. Simple, right?” She ran a hand across his forehead. “No need for threats, or yelling or … vomiting.” She looked at him with disdain, smacking her lips together. “You think you can handle that, Anthony?”

She was so strong. He couldn’t even move her. The squeeze of her thighs against his ribs was like being caught in coils of thick wire as they extracted the breath from him. “Anthony, are we having a meeting of the minds here?” she asked. “A concordance? You on my wavelength?” She slapped him against an already burning cheek, and he felt a tooth fall out in the back of his mouth. “You with me here, fucker?”

“I—yes.” Anthony nodded, back of his head scraping against the tile. It felt slick back there, like his head was bleeding. “I … yes, I am … with you.”

Her whole manner changed in an instant. Her legs loosened from where they’d squeezed in his sides, and he could draw breath more easily. “Good,” she said, and hauled him to his feet. “Let’s start with something easy. Who told you about my place?”

He stood there for a moment, dazed. Bitch was strong. Holy shit, strong. He looked at her again, saw her eyes studying him, watching him for his next move. She did that for all of a second and then she clamped a hand around his wrist and jerked him forward toward the center of the room. “Jake,” he said, without even a thought. “The night doorman. He’s my … cousin.”

“Excellent,” she said, nodding at him with approval. “You’ve done well, Anthony.” He shook his head, like that would clear it. Had he really just sold out Jake, that quick? If it had been the cops, he never would have rolled.

This lady wasn’t the cops, though. She was … man, there was something about her that was … different.

Dangerous.

“All right, Anthony,” she said and yanked him toward her. “Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s move on to more important things.” She paused, and he wobbled, legs unsteady. “You know what? It’s easier if I just do this,” she said, turning him around as she pushed him down, slamming his chest into a metal platform, knocking the wind out of him. His chin hit the top of it. It ran down his front to his waist, a little oblong rectangle a foot wide and maybe two feet long. It kept him propped up like he was a dog, on all fours.

“What the f—?” He didn’t get to finish before he felt something cutting the leg of his jeans all the way up the side. He tried to sit up, and she shoved him back down like he was a weakling, like he didn’t work out, didn’t press. He tried again and she slammed a sharp punch into his ribs that buckled his legs.

“Don’t fucking push me, Anthony,” she said, voice quiet and low. “You told me you were with me. If I find out now that you’re not, I will cut your dick and balls off and fry them in a pan in front of you.” She slid down so that she was looking him in the eyes. “Then I’m going to eat them while you watch, and if you’re really unlucky, I’ll feed a couple bites to you.” He felt her grip like steel on his neck, pushing his chest into the corners of the metal platform. “Do you believe me?”

He stared at her. He didn’t believe it. Not for a second. This bitch was just some spoiled c—

She hit him so hard the lights went out for a minute, and when he started to stir again, her voice tinkled lightly over him. “I saw it in your eyes. You were mentally calling me a cunt, weren’t you?” She only paused for a second. “Don’t answer. I fucking know you were, and that is such a bad idea for your continued ability to draw breath, Tony. Do you mind if I call you Tony? Anthony is just so … formal. Considering I’ve stripped you naked and now I’m strapping you down.”

He felt movement beneath his knee. She was doing something there, something that made a sound like a seatbelt snapping back into place. He tried to move the leg she was working on and couldn’t. He tried to turn his head and she cuffed him in the back hard enough to drive the air from his lungs again. “Don’t move,” she said pleasantly. He felt another tightness as a strap locked his upper thigh into place. “It’ll go easier on you if you don’t move.”

She did the same for his other leg, then his right arm, then the left. He didn’t dare look up, not again. She pulled the straps tighter and he felt metal on his crotch, too, his cock and balls strained through something cold and steel. “Stupid clothes get in the way,” she said from behind him, and he felt her lay two more straps under his armpits that belted him tight to the plate, then he heard her stand up. And felt it.

It was like she’d tied a chain around his junk, a small chain like the kind you put on a necklace, and yanked it as she stood. It set him groaning until he felt the pressure loosen. He looked up toward her face as she stood there, right in front of the doctor’s chair-thing with the stirrups, and he got a real bad feeling about where this was going.

“I’m leaving tomorrow for Tennessee,” she said in a conversational tone. “Bright and early. I should have been there tonight, but my flight got canceled. Probably making sure there’s still an airport down there.” She laughed to herself as though this were really funny. “I was so sad, because I sent my butler down already, and I didn’t have any plans, so I was just sitting here without anything to do, no reservations—not that I’d go out alone, anyway—no one to eat me,” she slid the panties down nonchalantly, no big deal, and they puddled on the floor like they were ready to be picked up and thrown in a laundry basket, “and then you boys show up and solve my problems for me.”

She sat back in the padded chair, letting her feet dangle right in the middle. “Have you ever gone down on a woman, Tony? You can nod your head, you know, my little toy’s made so you can—” He nodded, and she paused. “Oh, good. Did you go down on the girl you raped, Tony?” He felt a rush of agonized discomfort, and she laughed again, a squawking, hissing noise. “I am slapping you on the balls with that one, Tony, I fucking know you didn’t. You’re the kind of guy that thinks foreplay is the number of quarters in a football game, am I right? You wouldn’t eat pussy for more than five minutes if it was a Tootsie Pop with a gold center and you had to lick your way down, would you?”

He just stared, not sure what to say, eyes wide.

“Don’t fucking answer that, Tony!” She slapped him on the shoulder and it was like someone had hit him with a baseball bat. She laughed again. “You’re going to be a lively one, I can tell. I started with your boys over there, but they were … mmm … boring. See, I had a feeling about you after I heard you pissing in my bed.” She tugged on the chain in her hand and something sharp ran against the top of his dick. “By the way, that’s like a guillotine for your danglies, so … anyway, where was I?” Anthony shut his eyes tight.

“Oh, yes. I’ve got you by the dick and balls. Got ’em on the chopping block. So what you’re going to do for me … is go down, Tony. You’re going to go down like you’ve never gone down before. You’re going to eat my pussy like it’s your last meal, you’re going to lick my clit like it’s got the secret of life hidden somewhere inside, you’re going to do that until I tell you that I cannot possibly have one more single orgasm.” He felt something poke him on the crown of the head and opened his eyes to see her clutching an ornamental dagger with a golden handle. “You’re going to do this,” she said, “or … have you ever heard the phrase, ‘bleeding like a stuck pig,’ Tony? Because I will fucking bleed you like that. I will poke a hole in your carotid artery and jill off in front of you as you spurt blood on my taint while you die, okay?” She jabbed him with the knife and then tugged on the chain in her other hand. “And then I’ll haul your little boyfriends over here one at a time and see if their tongues are loosened up and ready to perform by then.”

She twirled the dagger so that the hilt was down, and she clubbed him across the forehead hard enough to draw blood. “And so help me, if you so much as dip the tip of your pinky inside me, I will take your dick and balls a quarter inch at a time, cut them like I’m slicing a loaf of bread.” Her eyes were dark now, furious. “You simply do not fucking do that to me, got it?” She clubbed him again. “Indicate that you understand me, Anthony, or I’ll rape your anus with the sharp end of this dagger until you pass out from blood loss—thrice.”

“I …” Anthony felt his voice quaver, “… I … understand.” He didn’t even sound like himself.

“Okay, good,” she said, back to business, and he felt the splash of water hitting him in the face like a fire hydrant had been turned loose on his mouth and cheeks. She had an empty cup in her hand. He shut his lips, gagging, and it stopped after a moment, leaving him sputtering, spitting. “I don’t need any of your nasty puke on me,” she said as he coughed. He opened his eyes and heard the whirl of a motor as she slipped her feet into the stirrups and the chair scooted closer to his face. He could see her now, the split in between her legs, her—he swallowed hard.

Her.

“Now, if you do a very good job,” she said as the ratchet and clank of gears moved him closer, inexorably closer to her genitals, “I may get loud. And I may … accidentally stab you a few times—”

“Wha—” He felt a sharp stabbing pain in his forehead as the dagger landed in a poke, drawing blood.

“Shut the fuck up, Tony,” she said crossly, “you’re ruining the mood for me. As I was saying, I may
accidentally
stab you a few times. That just means you’re doing a good job and you should keep doing it, or the stabbing will get a lot—
a lot
—a whole lot worse. I can’t emphasize this enough. It will get so much worse, because I’ll start tugging on the chain that will amputate your manhood if you fuck up. And I will make sure you live long enough to deep throat your own cock at least a hundred times before I let you cross over, okay? Don’t fuck up. Seriously. Unless you want to die giving your amputated dick a blowjob … Don’t. Fuck up.”

The machinery whirred, slow, and that flowery smell of perfume started to give way to another aroma. Deep, heavy, like … sulfur?

“Hold your breath if you have to, Tony,” she said, “but not too long. You’ve got work to do … bitch.” She laughed out loud, sending a subtle vibration through her whole body, her thighs touching his cheeks. “I’m sorry, I just can’t get down with tossing that word. I love it too much. Same with cock, and dick, and cunt. I just … love them all. Fuck, I love them all, all these gender-specific insults. And I know calling a big, strong guy like you a cunt would just send you into a rage-spiral if you weren’t completely cowed right now.” She rattled the chain. “I mean, I might as well have already yanked this and cut them off, because they belong to me at this point, right? I own you. You are a fucking item I possess. Your ass is a commodity I could trade to a Gungeneera for a pack of cigarettes if I wanted a smoke, and they’d just turn you inside out having fun with you.”