Unbearable Pain

He shook his head disapprovingly, his mouth pressed into a hard, unimpressed line, the way a scolding father would.
"I see that I'm confusing you. Your father is responsible for my partner's arrest. Ah, I didn't tell you I was once a cop, did I? Well... sorry darling. Your father worked together with a cop that busted my partner's drug operation. He was sentenced to life in prison. Jim died two years later. Then I had killed your father in vengeance, a month before you were born.
My stomach twisted with unease. The blow of his words shooting raw edges to the fresh grief of my father's death. That meant I'd never met the real Carmine Lynn. It took me a second to compose myself.
"It was quite easy to find a man, pale in complexion who had your father's build and height." his eyes stared far away, dazed. "What was hard was finding a man that would be willing to go under the knife to reconstruct the nose and mouth your father had, a man who had no problem living your father's pathetic life at all."
Jennie struggled violently against her restraints, muffled voices struggled against the gag.
This amused Nikolai. He watched her with curious eyes.
He walked behind me towards Jennie. I turned automatically to follow his movement, to watch him. He crouched over Jennie anxiously and removed the gag.
"Did you want to say something?"
Jennie spat at him.
He wiped his eye with the back of his hand, disgusted.
"Your daughter will pay handsomely for that."
"I'm going to kill you," Jennie vowed.
Nikolai shrugged and pulled the gag back in place.
"How rude Jennie is," he said nonchalantly. "As I was saying. I did eventually find someone, Roberto, the man your mother eventually killed. It was easy really... he would come live with your mother, be her husband, and your father... at the same time gain valuable intelligence from the CIA. It was working out perfectly until your drunk ass mother started questioning him, started to suspect his sudden amnesia was all a lie."
I was sick to my stomach. I'd been wrong about Jennie, I'd judged her too harshly, gave her a verdict when I was the one who wrongly accused her. Wouldn't I have done the same thing if I suspected someone had done to Roman's memory what Roberto did to my father's? He hadn't just pretended to be my father but Jennie had invited him to her bed. I flinched. That would make any woman sick.
Nikolai took a threatening step forward, towards me and stopped a few inches away and then he smiled. “You don’t know how long I’ve waited for you.”
A smile of satisfaction spread across his face as he met my frightened stare. He leaned back, his eyes wide and thrilled as he scrutinized my face. I could see it in his eyes — the pain they promised. My knees were weak, not the way they usually were when Roman touched me. No. This was different. They were weak with fear.
"Undress for me," he said, the excitement fresh in his eyes.
I shook my head in horrified disbelief and took a step back. This irritated him. Made him angry. He was suddenly Bill again. The man I'd always feared. He was my personal hell again. I turned back to the door and hurried towards it. I nearly ran. I was anxiously desperate to get the hell out of there.
"Now..." he roared behind me.
I didn't see him come at me. I hadn't heard his usually heavy footprints behind me.
I heard a sudden sound, sharp, piercing break through the room as he broke my pinkie finger and moved on to my index finger and then my thumb. My whole hand was numb with adrenaline. The pain didn't hit yet.
"Undress for me," he said again, the calm gone from his voice.
I staggered back another step, my hand still numb.
"Undress?" I squeaked. I pointed a finger at myself. "Me?"
His weight shifted slightly, I didn't have time to react before he punched me so hard that I literally flew in the air and landed in a crushing blow on the floor.
And then I felt the pain.
Hard.
Fierce.
Hot.
Blinding.
Blood trailed down my nose and I bit my bottom lip to stop from screaming, the nausea bubbled with a sudden jolt.
He was walking towards me, his eyes wide with excitement.
I stared at him in horror, crawling backwards. Nikolai followed, patient, graceful in his walk. Almost dancing.
"You like it rough, huh?" He grinned. "You're my kind of woman."
With a predatory glare, his eyes roamed over me, revelling in the delight of his good fortune. My fear thrilled him and he picked me up by my washing and hurled me across the room, into the opposite wall.
I had no time to be surprised by his strength as my back connected with the hard brick wall and my backbone broke through my skin. As soon as a scream of agony tore through my lungs a rumble of thunder cracked as though directly in the house.
There would be no chance of anyone hearing us. The thunder blocked the screams of terror so that it didn't reach any of the neighbours.
The blood floored around me in an instant and soaked my clothes and hair. The pain crippled me and I spilled my lunch on the dirty floor.
He laughed. "This is so much fun... brilliant!" he was so excited.
I whimpered in pain.
Nikolai crossed the room, he was looking Jennie in the eye, smiling at her. Her fury sent a rush of adrenaline pulsing in his veins. He lowered himself into a squat in front of me, and grabbed my chin between his his thumb and forefinger, lifting my face to his.
A cold surge of agony pierced through me.
"This is fairly entertaining don't you think?" He was smiling. "Wanna see something more exciting?" He leaped to his feet at once.
He walked, no danced, across the room. His salsa moves were clumsy with excitement, he was whistling, excited. He towered over my shaking, pain-struck body and threw his head back in laughter. He lowered himself enough for his fingers to touch my blooded face. He was still humming a song as he withdrew his fingers and licked the blood off.
It was so sudden, the heel of his boot shattering onto the side of my head, forcing my head back into the wall, that I passed out from sheer pain and surprise.
The iron grip of his hand around my throat forced me back to consciousness. It was so tight that air couldn't pass to my lungs, finally he let go and I desperately fought the acidic flames licking my lungs as I urgently sucked air in.
It felt like I was dying. And yet my sharp gaze was still on Jennie, horrified and panicked, watching me in utter despair, it felt like she didn't know what to do. How to help. I closed my eyes. I couldn't bare to watch my mother like that.
"Open your eyes, Nuru!" he ordered in a growl. "Look at the hopelessness in your mother's eyes. Hmm... she does care after all. Which makes this all the more exciting."
Anxiously urging waves of air back into my lungs, tears clouded my vision and I wished for an end. Wished that he would soon get bored and find something else to play with.
This was just a game to him. He was a sick twisted man.
I was unprepared when his stone strong fist smashed against my stomach, knocking the very breath I had been struggling for out of my lungs. I screamed so loud that it hurt my own ears. The thunder was rumbling still overhead.
I was in hell, the flames licking at my skin in ferocious force. I felt like a useless firefighter, unable to stop the flames, the intensity of the heat. All my bones were breaking, hurting, it seemed like a feeling I knew all too well, the same feeling I got when the steam of the kettle full of boiling water made contact with my skin.
“I can’t let you leave your own party just yet, can I?” Nikolai growled at me. “This is my definition of fun, really.”
Nikolai punched my stomach again and I launched into a coughing fit, bile rose up my throat and I emptied my stomach. My good hand, trembling, was bloodied when I pulled it back from wiping my mouth.
“You're ungrateful, Nuru, I gave you a good life. All you had to do was stay away from Roman, now you see what you made me do, huh? I loved you. I was prepared to wait until you were ready to leave with me but you chose your own destiny… and if I can't have you, I'd rather you die than watch another man take what's mine.” His lips curled up derisorily with sickened amusement. “I can’t begin to imagine how forlorn your boyfriend will be when he finally joins the party, um?” He chuckled.
His fist lifted, positioned narrowly with mouth. I closed my eyes in terror, and stilled, anticipating the pain, but several minutes passed. I opened my eyes and blinked away the tears. Nikolai was smiling wickedly at me.
“Do you want me to stop?” he asked.
I was having a hard time trying to distinguish where the excruciating pain was coming from, the breaking of my jaw, the flattening of my stomach, my gums making way for bitter, salty blood. The pain was maddening. It was shocking.
"Please," I groaned, pain shot through me as I spoke.
His chest rumbled with laughter, mimicking the roar of the thunder outside.
“I was hoping you’d say this,” he mused. “As pathetic a creature you are, you certainly are an amusement. I’m going to enjoy breaking you, it’s my speciality.”
Bullets of pain shot into me from everywhere, yet his words left a gaping hole in my heart and that hurt... a lot.
The self-satisfaction was plastered all over his face as he continued complacently, “I’m going to enjoy myself tremendously and even more thrilling is the fact that Jennie is going to watch, just like I watched her husband destroy Jim's life.”
Wasn’t this agony enough for him? What else could he do to me? Why me?
He was smiling now, his eyes malicious — I had no doubt in my mind that there was still more pain, that he’d kill me today.
I couldn't possibly begin to imagine how frightening I must've looked right now. Naturally, I felt bad for whoever was unfortunate enough to find my body. I just hoped it wouldn't be Roman.
I adopted precise stillness, my back cringed in agony as I heard a sickening sound that echoed around the room; his zipper. I numbly watched Nikolai's eyes gleam smugly as he yanked my damp t-shirt off my body and ripped my jeans with his bare hands.
Exposed, defenceless, I was entirely at his mercy, yet I had a numbing suspicion that he wouldn't show any of that to me.