Previous Chapter (12) - Marco | First Chapter - Camila
The darkness in the cell was a physical presence. It pressed in on Mikhail 'Wardog' Vostrikov, thick and suffocating. The only light was the dim, orange safety glow from the corridor, which did little more than paint the edges of the shadows a slightly less absolute black.
He lay on the cold concrete, face down and hogtied with a series of heavy-duty zip-ties that dug mercilessly into his wrists and ankles. His hands were a mangled ruin. His fingers were a mess of misaligned angles and swollen joints, the nails ripped out, leaving behind a raw, bloody mess. His mouth was a cavern of pain, the empty socket where his tooth used to be, throbbing with a dull, insistent agony.
His breath came in heavy, ragged bursts. Every nerve in his body was screaming, a symphony of pain from a dozen different sources.
Keystone, my friend, he thought, his own internal voice a calm island in a sea of torment. Now would be a very good time. I am beginning to find their methods… tedious.
He knew he was approaching his limit. Not his pain limit—that was a vast, unexplored country he doubted these amateurs could ever find the borders of. But his endurance limit. The body could only take so much abuse before the systems began to fail.
A small, choked sob from the corner of the cell cut through his internal monologue.
Jessica. The new girl. The little bird.
He’d almost forgotten she was there. He twisted his head, the movement sending a fresh spike of pain through his bruised neck, and looked at her. She was huddled in the corner, a small, terrified, shivering ball, the blindfold still over her eyes.
He forced his raw, bloody lips into something resembling a reassuring smile.
"Be calm, little bird," he said, his voice a low, pained rumble, the missing tooth giving him a slight lisp. "They are clumsy children playing with hammers. They do not know how to truly hurt a man."
She looked in his general vicinity, her body trembling.
"My friends," he continued, his voice a steady, confident anchor in the terrifying darkness. "They are coming. Long before these fools can find a way to make me talk, my friends will be here. They will free us both. You will be safe. I give you my word."
He said the words as much for himself as for her. It was a promise. A prayer.
A sudden, maddening itch flared on the sole of his left foot.
He grunted, trying to wiggle his toes, but the plastic toe spreader made it impossible. The doctor, Atkins, had put them on him after his last "session" in the clinic. A new chemical, a new gambit. He also encased his feet in blue plastic booties. The plastic was meant to keep the chemical sealed in, to let it marinate, to seep into his skin. Wardog didn't feel any different, just… itchy. So goddamn itchy.
He started talking again, telling Jessica a rambling, pointless story about a training exercise in the Ural Mountains, anything to take his mind off the infuriating, unreachable itch that was beginning to drive him madder than any broken finger.
The story about the half-frozen bear and the stolen vodka was cut short by the harsh, metallic clang of the cell door being thrown open.
Knuckles and Slick filled the doorway, their silhouettes blocking out the dim orange light.
"Playtime's over, Russkie," Slick sneered.
They entered the cell. Knuckles grabbed Wardog by the shoulders, Slick took his thighs, and they hauled his hogtied, brutalized body off the floor with a grunt of effort. As they carried him out to the Studio, Wardog caught a glimpse of Scout leaning against the guard station wall, a cigarette dangling from his lips.
"You know," Scout said, his voice a lazy, arrogant drawl, pushing himself off the wall. "I disappear for a few nights, and you fucking IDIOTS go ahead and lose all the broads. You stupid motherfuckers."
Knuckles was walking backward, his face tightened, his fingers dug into Wardog's bruised shoulders.
"You are NEVER around, Scout!" he snarled, his face turning a blotchy red. "You are too busy going off and getting your nuts licked to do any real fucking work!"
"Oh, fuck you, Knuckles!" Scout shot back, his voice dripping with contempt. "I brought a girl back! A fresh one! You… you LOST FIVE FUCKING GIRLS, you math illiterate mook!"
The insult hit its mark. With a roar of pure, childish rage, Knuckles stopped before the table and simply dropped his end of Wardog.
Wardog’s head and shoulders slammed onto the hard concrete floor with a sickening THUD. The impact sent a blinding, white-hot flash of pain through his skull, and for a moment, the world went grey.
He dimly heard Knuckles scream, "SUCK MY DICK, SCOUT!"
Through the ringing in his ears, Wardog heard Scout's mocking reply. "YEAH, if I could FIND IT! Hey, you boys seen that first flick with Elena? Our boy Knucks here is really carrying." Scout's voice was laced with a cruel, insinuating mirth.
"YOU FUCKIN'—"
"ENOUGH!!!"
The voice was a blade of ice. It cut through the bickering, the insults, the entire chaotic scene, and froze every man in place.
Wardog, his vision slowly clearing, twisted his head to see the source.
Frank Romano was walking towards them out of the shadows of the main factory floor. The sheer, murderous weight of his aura was enough to suck the air out of the room, silencing the bickering goons instantly.
Behind him walked a tall, anonymous thug Wardog didn't recognize, one of the new reinforcements. But it wasn't the thug that made Wardog's blood run cold. It was the woman the thug was holding. The thug had one arm wrapped around her throat in a chokehold, and the other hand held a pistol pressed firmly against her temple.
Just as Frank and his entourage came to a stop a few feet from the table, the door to the clinic hissed open. Dr. Clement Atkins stepped out. He looked like a ghost, his face so pale it was almost translucent, his eyes wide with a terror that seemed to have hollowed him out from the inside.
The young woman in the thug's grip saw him. Her muffled sob tore through the silence.
"DAD!?" she cried, her voice cracking with disbelief and terror. "Daddy, what is this?! Who are these—"
"It's okay, Sophie," Atkins said, his voice a broken, trembling thing. "It's okay. Everything is fine."
Frank Romano turned his head slowly, his cold, dead eyes fixing on the doctor. He sneered. "Yes… everything had better be fine, Clement," he purred, the words a silken threat. "Or else."
Romano's murderous gaze swept back to his enforcers. "Stop fucking around," he snarled, his voice a low, dangerous growl. "And get him on the table. NOW!"
Knuckles and Slick jumped as if they'd been tasered. They scrambled to pick Wardog up, their movements now quick and efficient under the boss's watchful eye. They cut the zip-ties around his wrists and ankles with a single, sharp snip, and began maneuvering his large, battered body onto the medical table, positioning him to fit the restraints.
Wardog didn’t struggle. He didn't fight. All the defiance, all the jokes—they evaporated in the face of this new, colder cruelty. He just lay there, a sudden, heavy exhaustion settling into his bones.
It was either one girl or five girls and the private investigator. It was no choice at all. He let his head loll to the side and let out a long, slow yawn, a final, weary act of contempt for the men strapping him down.
Once the final strap was cinched tight across Wardog's chest, locking him immovably to the table, Frank Romano walked to the foot of the table. He moved with a slow, deliberate grace, a predator savoring the final moments before the kill.
He looked down at Wardog's feet, still encased in the blue plastic booties. A small, cruel smile played on his lips.
"The good doctor tells me he's prepared a new vintage for us, Russian," Frankie murmured, his voice a low, conversational purr. "A special blend. Just for you."
He bent down so good face was level with Wardog's feet. He took hold of the opening of the bootie on the right foot.
"Aaaah, getting your rocks off now, boss-man, yes?" Wardog grunted, the defiance in his voice sounding hollow even to his own ears.
Frankie ignored him. With a slow, almost theatrical motion, he peeled the plastic away.
The sensation was immediate and bizarre. A rush of arctic, frigid air washed over Wardog's sole, a coldness so intense it felt like it was seeping into his bones. He frowned. He tried to rationalize it—his foot had probably just been warm and sweaty inside the plastic bag, and the cool air of the factory was a shock to the overheated skin.
Frankie tossed the plastic bag aside. He then lowered his nose slowly, deliberately, until it was hovering just inches from Wardog's sweaty, gleaming toes. He inhaled deeply, a connoisseur appreciating a fine aroma.
"HAHA—"
Wardog's fake, defiant laugh was cut off by a new, intense wave of fear. It felt as if a sudden, strong wind, colder than the harshest Siberian blizzard, was gusting through the gaps between his toes. He tried to curl them instinctively, to shield them from the unnatural chill, but the plastic toe spreaders Atkins had applied earlier held them open, splayed, and exposed.
His large, bushy eyebrows, which had been set in a mask of defiance, rose with a mixture of confusion and a flicker of genuine, dawning fear. He had never felt anything like this before.
Then Frankie, still kneeling, gave a wicked, knowing grin. He extended his tongue—a thick, wet muscle—and planted it, soft and warm, against the heel of Wardog's right foot.
The world exploded.
It was not a tickle. It was a neurological catastrophe. The contrast between the intense, chemical coldness of his skin and the heat of Frankie's tongue created a reaction that was blindingly painful. It was white-hot magma and stinging, high-voltage electricity rolled into one. Every nerve ending under the warm, wet pressure of the tongue ignited at once, firing a thousand times more intensely than they ever had before.
Completely unbidden, a surge of blood roared through Wardog’s veins. His cock, which had been flaccid moments before, engorged with a violent, instantaneous speed, tenting the thick fabric of his trousers like a marquee pole.
His eyes went wide with shock, humiliation, and a pain so profound it transcended anything he had ever known.
Frankie began to drag his tongue slowly, deliberately, up the arch of Wardog's foot.
The journey of Frankie's tongue up Wardog's sole was a slow, agonizing crawl through a landscape of pure, unadulterated pain.
It was a pain that defied all his training, all his experience. His time in the gulag, the broken bones, the ripped-out nails—those were nothing. They damaged the body. This… this was a surgical strike on the nervous system itself on a level he never imagined possible.
Every one of the thousands of microscopic taste buds on Frankie's tongue felt like a hyper-sharp, poisoned needle, scoring his skin, flaying it open layer by layer, pulling and twisting the raw, screaming nerves beneath.
Wardog's jaw clenched so hard he felt something pop near his ear. He squeezed his eyes shut, his entire body going rigid against the restraints, every muscle straining to contain the agony, to hold back the scream that was clawing its way up his throat.
A low, guttural groan, ripped from his chest, and the sound of his own teeth grinding together was like two massive slabs of slate scraping against each other, a horrifying, grating noise that filled the studio.
The tongue continued its merciless ascent.
It reached the base of his big toe and, with a subtle, delicate motion, lightly flicked against the toe stem.
The targeted, precise touch was a lightning strike. Wardog’s body arched violently off the table, a strangled, high-pitched noise tearing from his throat. Hot tears, squeezed from his clamped-shut eyes, traced burning tracks down his temples and into his hair.
Finally, the tongue reached the toe pad. It finished its journey with a small, almost playful swirl, a final, flourishing signature to its work of art.
Then, Frankie stood up.
He was smiling. A wide, triumphant, predatory smile.
Wardog collapsed back onto the table, his body a trembling, sweating mess. He was panting, his chest heaving, gulping in air like a drowning man. He looked down at his own body in horror. The crotch of his trousers showed a large, dark, wet stain where, in that final, blinding moment of agony, he had come hard and helpless against the rough fabric of his boxers.
He lay there, trying to find some level of composure, some shred of the unbreakable man he had been just minutes before. He looked around the table and saw every single face he had mocked—Knuckles, Nails, Slick, Scout—staring at him. Not with fear. Not with respect. But with wide, gleeful, victorious eyes. They were looking at him like Christmas had come early this year.
Frankie Romano stood over Wardog, a picture of immaculate, triumphant calm. He reached into the breast pocket of his suit jacket and, with the delicate precision of a surgeon, pulled out a single, long, white feather. He held it up by the quill, letting it catch the harsh studio lights.
"I'm afraid my employees prefer… harsher methods tickling their victims," Frankie said, his voice a low, conversational purr. "Brute force. So… uninspired. I always tell them they should use the feather. It's so elegant. So refined. So… on brand."
He moved his hand back and forth slightly. The flimsy barbs of the feather waved and trembled in the air, but it was the tip, the finely tapered end that finished in a sinister, needle-thin point, that Wardog's wide, terrified eyes tracked with hypnotic horror.
"This is your last chance, Russian," Frankie said, his voice losing all its pleasantness, becoming a blade of cold steel. "Tell me the location of my girls."
Mikhail swallowed hard, his throat clicking. His forehead was beaded with sweat. His entire right foot felt like it was on fire, a throbbing, swollen mass of pure, agonizing sensation. He looked from the gently swaying feather to the cold, dark, merciless eyes of Romano.
He thought of Keystone. He thought of the mission. He thought of the girls. He thought of Jessica, the little bird, alone, blindfolded, and terrified in a cage. He thought of every interrogation he had ever faced, every torment he had ever endured and overcome. His jaw, which felt like it was about to dislocate, set with a final, monumental effort of will.
"I'm a little… hazy, yes," he rasped, his voice a broken, trembling thing. "Jog… jog memory, please."
Romano didn't say a word. His smile just widened.
He lowered the feather.
The flat, upper portion of the feather was the first thing to touch Mikhail's foot. The instant it made contact with his chemically-sensitized skin, it felt like a thousand tiny nuclear bombs detonating at once. The sensation was so overwhelming, so far beyond tickling, that it bypassed every defense he had ever built.
He struggled against his bonds, his entire body tensing, his muscles screaming as the feather began to trace a slow, deliberate line down the top of his arch.
And then, his body betrayed him.
As the feather moved, his muscles, which had been clenched in agony and defiance, suddenly went limp. He relaxed. He threw his head back against the padded rest.
And an ungodly, horrifying scream exploded from his lungs. It was not a sound of mirth. It was the sound of his nervous system short-circuiting, of his mind completely and utterly losing control.
Romano dragged the feather down the hypersensitive sole, a master artist painting on a canvas of raw nerves. The Russian man cried, his body convulsing as each nerve ending is fired, the tears streaming down his face as the forced, agonizing laughter ripped from his throat.
When the feather reached the bottom of Mikhail's heel, Romano flicked his wrist to start the upwards sweep. The pliant feather bent, and the sharp, needle-like tip drew a single, razor-thin line down the bottom of his arch.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!"
It was a pure, unadulterated scream of agony, a pain so sharp and focused it felt like he was being flayed alive.
Romano dragged the feather back up.
When it got to the top of the ball of his foot, he lifted it, granting Mikhail a split second of reprieve. The Russian man gulped in a desperate, shuddering breath of air.
And then Romano pushed the feather deep into the gap between Mikhail's big and second toes, sliding it under the hard plastic of the toe spreader. The sharp barbs of the feather began to saw back and forth on the exposed, taut, agonizingly sensitive webbing.
That was it. The final, unbreakable lock had been picked. The iron vault of Mikhail 'Wardog' Vostrikov's will was blown wide open.
"I'LL TALK! I'LL TALK! STAAAAAAAAAAHP! I'LL TAAAAAAAAAAALK!!!"
Romano paused the sawing motion but kept the feather lodged in place, a constant, agonizing reminder of his power. He twirled the quill between his thumb and forefinger.
"I'm listening," he said calmly.
"STAAAAAAAHHHHHP!!!! NNNOOOOOOOOOOO!!! DERRINGER!!! DERRINGER!!! DEEEEEEERINGEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!" he screamed, his head thrashing from side to side.
"And the first name?" Romano asked, his voice utterly devoid of emotion, giving the quill another small, torturous twist.
"JAAAAAAAACK!!!! JACK DERRINGER!!!!"
The name echoed in the studio, a final, ragged surrender torn from the depths of Mikhail's broken will.
Romano kept twirling the feather cruelly. He looked up from his work, his expression one of calm, professional satisfaction. He glanced over at Slick, who was still leaning against the wall, watching the proceedings with a mixture of awe and terror.
"Slick," Romano said, his voice as casual as if he were ordering lunch. "Do you know this… Derringer?"
As Romano spoke, he changed tactic, sawing the feather gently, eliciting another series of high-pitched, sob-choked shrieks from the man on the table.
Slick snapped to attention. "Yeah, boss," he said quickly, eager to be useful. "I know the name. He's a two-bit hack. A failed cop who calls himself a private investigator. Works out of a shithole office in Brooklyn."
"And do you know where this office is?" Romano asked, never taking his eyes off his handiwork, watching the way Mikhail’s leg twitched and spasmed.
Slick looked at Mikhail's face, which was now a deep, mottled purple, his jaw looking like it was about to hyper-extend from the strain of his endless, agonizing screams.
"Yeah," Slick confirmed. "He's just a few blocks from here. Easy to find."
"Good." Romano stopped the torment. He pulled the feather free with a final, deliberate flourish.
Wardog slumped against his bonds, his body going limp. A low, pathetic moan escaped his lips as he felt his hyper-sensitive sole throb with a phantom pain, the nerves so overstimulated they felt like they'd grown to fifty times their actual size.
Romano turned his full attention to Slick. His voice was no longer calm. It was a whipcrack.
"Take a group of the reinforcements," he commanded, gesturing towards the entrance where the new, anonymous thugs were loitering. "Go to this Derringer's office. Take it apart. I don't care about the man. I care about my property. GET MY FUCKING PRODUCT BACK!"
"Yes, boss!" Slick said, his voice a hasty squeak. "At once!" He practically scurried out of the studio, barking orders at the new men as he went.
Romano then turned his gaze to Dr. Atkins, who was still standing by the clinic door, his eyes on his daughter.
"You really outdid yourself, Clement," Romano said, a rare note of genuine approval in his voice. "A masterpiece." He then nodded to the thug who was holding Sophie. "Let the bitch go."
The goon released his grip, and Sophie stumbled into her father's arms. Atkins held her tight, his face a mask of profound, soul-shattering relief.
Frank Romano gave the scene one last, satisfied look. He placed the feather carefully back into his breast pocket, smoothed the front of his suit jacket, and walked away from the table without a backward glance at the broken man he was leaving behind. He headed for the stairs to his office, his work here done.
The silence that descended in his wake was heavy and thick, broken only by Wardog's ragged, shuddering breaths.
The heavy thud of Frank Romano's office door closing upstairs was the signal. The formal interrogation was over. The professional part of the evening was concluded.
Now, the personal part could begin.
Nails was the first to break the silence. He let out a low, appreciative chuckle, a sound like dry leaves skittering across pavement. He looked at the whimpering, broken giant on the table, then at his own broken arm, and finally back at the man who had inflicted the injury.
"Lady-man, huh?" he purred, the insult now tasting like sweet, delicious victory.
He walked to the foot of the table, his movements slow and deliberate, a predator returning to a wounded kill. He positioned himself directly in front of the throbbing, violated right foot, the one Romano had just so masterfully abused.
At the same time, Knuckles cracked his namesakes, the sound sharp and brutal in the quiet studio. He walked to the other side of the table, planting himself in front of the still-bootied left foot. He reached into the deep pockets of his cargo pants. A metallic jingling sound accompanied his movements. He pulled his hands out, and in the harsh studio light, Wardog could see what he held: five small, wickedly curved metal banjo picks. One by one, Knuckles began to methodically fit them over the fingertips of his right hand, turning his brutish paw into a five-pronged instrument of torture.
Mikhail's head swiveled from one man to the other. He saw the gleam of sadistic anticipation in Nails' eyes. He saw the focused, methodical cruelty in the way Knuckles armed himself. The last dregs of adrenaline and defiance left him, replaced by a new, profound, and utterly hopeless terror.
"I… I told you," he stammered, his voice a pathetic, broken rasp. "I told you what you wanted to know… please…"
Nails just smiled, a thin, cruel slash in his pale face. He extended his good hand, his left hand. The long, lacquered talons flared like a claw.
"Yeah," Nails hissed, his voice a triumphant whisper. "What a shame. I guess that means there's no safeword."
He slowly, deliberately, brought his hand towards Wardog's right foot, the talons pointed directly at the raw, agonizingly sensitized webbing between his toes.
"Now," Nails purred, his eyes glittering with promised vengeance. "About that itch…"
Next Chapter (14) - Garry
The darkness in the cell was a physical presence. It pressed in on Mikhail 'Wardog' Vostrikov, thick and suffocating. The only light was the dim, orange safety glow from the corridor, which did little more than paint the edges of the shadows a slightly less absolute black.
He lay on the cold concrete, face down and hogtied with a series of heavy-duty zip-ties that dug mercilessly into his wrists and ankles. His hands were a mangled ruin. His fingers were a mess of misaligned angles and swollen joints, the nails ripped out, leaving behind a raw, bloody mess. His mouth was a cavern of pain, the empty socket where his tooth used to be, throbbing with a dull, insistent agony.
His breath came in heavy, ragged bursts. Every nerve in his body was screaming, a symphony of pain from a dozen different sources.
Keystone, my friend, he thought, his own internal voice a calm island in a sea of torment. Now would be a very good time. I am beginning to find their methods… tedious.
He knew he was approaching his limit. Not his pain limit—that was a vast, unexplored country he doubted these amateurs could ever find the borders of. But his endurance limit. The body could only take so much abuse before the systems began to fail.
A small, choked sob from the corner of the cell cut through his internal monologue.
Jessica. The new girl. The little bird.
He’d almost forgotten she was there. He twisted his head, the movement sending a fresh spike of pain through his bruised neck, and looked at her. She was huddled in the corner, a small, terrified, shivering ball, the blindfold still over her eyes.
He forced his raw, bloody lips into something resembling a reassuring smile.
"Be calm, little bird," he said, his voice a low, pained rumble, the missing tooth giving him a slight lisp. "They are clumsy children playing with hammers. They do not know how to truly hurt a man."
She looked in his general vicinity, her body trembling.
"My friends," he continued, his voice a steady, confident anchor in the terrifying darkness. "They are coming. Long before these fools can find a way to make me talk, my friends will be here. They will free us both. You will be safe. I give you my word."
He said the words as much for himself as for her. It was a promise. A prayer.
A sudden, maddening itch flared on the sole of his left foot.
He grunted, trying to wiggle his toes, but the plastic toe spreader made it impossible. The doctor, Atkins, had put them on him after his last "session" in the clinic. A new chemical, a new gambit. He also encased his feet in blue plastic booties. The plastic was meant to keep the chemical sealed in, to let it marinate, to seep into his skin. Wardog didn't feel any different, just… itchy. So goddamn itchy.
He started talking again, telling Jessica a rambling, pointless story about a training exercise in the Ural Mountains, anything to take his mind off the infuriating, unreachable itch that was beginning to drive him madder than any broken finger.
The story about the half-frozen bear and the stolen vodka was cut short by the harsh, metallic clang of the cell door being thrown open.
Knuckles and Slick filled the doorway, their silhouettes blocking out the dim orange light.
"Playtime's over, Russkie," Slick sneered.
They entered the cell. Knuckles grabbed Wardog by the shoulders, Slick took his thighs, and they hauled his hogtied, brutalized body off the floor with a grunt of effort. As they carried him out to the Studio, Wardog caught a glimpse of Scout leaning against the guard station wall, a cigarette dangling from his lips.
"You know," Scout said, his voice a lazy, arrogant drawl, pushing himself off the wall. "I disappear for a few nights, and you fucking IDIOTS go ahead and lose all the broads. You stupid motherfuckers."
Knuckles was walking backward, his face tightened, his fingers dug into Wardog's bruised shoulders.
"You are NEVER around, Scout!" he snarled, his face turning a blotchy red. "You are too busy going off and getting your nuts licked to do any real fucking work!"
"Oh, fuck you, Knuckles!" Scout shot back, his voice dripping with contempt. "I brought a girl back! A fresh one! You… you LOST FIVE FUCKING GIRLS, you math illiterate mook!"
The insult hit its mark. With a roar of pure, childish rage, Knuckles stopped before the table and simply dropped his end of Wardog.
Wardog’s head and shoulders slammed onto the hard concrete floor with a sickening THUD. The impact sent a blinding, white-hot flash of pain through his skull, and for a moment, the world went grey.
He dimly heard Knuckles scream, "SUCK MY DICK, SCOUT!"
Through the ringing in his ears, Wardog heard Scout's mocking reply. "YEAH, if I could FIND IT! Hey, you boys seen that first flick with Elena? Our boy Knucks here is really carrying." Scout's voice was laced with a cruel, insinuating mirth.
"YOU FUCKIN'—"
"ENOUGH!!!"
The voice was a blade of ice. It cut through the bickering, the insults, the entire chaotic scene, and froze every man in place.
Wardog, his vision slowly clearing, twisted his head to see the source.
Frank Romano was walking towards them out of the shadows of the main factory floor. The sheer, murderous weight of his aura was enough to suck the air out of the room, silencing the bickering goons instantly.
Behind him walked a tall, anonymous thug Wardog didn't recognize, one of the new reinforcements. But it wasn't the thug that made Wardog's blood run cold. It was the woman the thug was holding. The thug had one arm wrapped around her throat in a chokehold, and the other hand held a pistol pressed firmly against her temple.
Just as Frank and his entourage came to a stop a few feet from the table, the door to the clinic hissed open. Dr. Clement Atkins stepped out. He looked like a ghost, his face so pale it was almost translucent, his eyes wide with a terror that seemed to have hollowed him out from the inside.
The young woman in the thug's grip saw him. Her muffled sob tore through the silence.
"DAD!?" she cried, her voice cracking with disbelief and terror. "Daddy, what is this?! Who are these—"
"It's okay, Sophie," Atkins said, his voice a broken, trembling thing. "It's okay. Everything is fine."
Frank Romano turned his head slowly, his cold, dead eyes fixing on the doctor. He sneered. "Yes… everything had better be fine, Clement," he purred, the words a silken threat. "Or else."
Romano's murderous gaze swept back to his enforcers. "Stop fucking around," he snarled, his voice a low, dangerous growl. "And get him on the table. NOW!"
Knuckles and Slick jumped as if they'd been tasered. They scrambled to pick Wardog up, their movements now quick and efficient under the boss's watchful eye. They cut the zip-ties around his wrists and ankles with a single, sharp snip, and began maneuvering his large, battered body onto the medical table, positioning him to fit the restraints.
Wardog didn’t struggle. He didn't fight. All the defiance, all the jokes—they evaporated in the face of this new, colder cruelty. He just lay there, a sudden, heavy exhaustion settling into his bones.
It was either one girl or five girls and the private investigator. It was no choice at all. He let his head loll to the side and let out a long, slow yawn, a final, weary act of contempt for the men strapping him down.
Once the final strap was cinched tight across Wardog's chest, locking him immovably to the table, Frank Romano walked to the foot of the table. He moved with a slow, deliberate grace, a predator savoring the final moments before the kill.
He looked down at Wardog's feet, still encased in the blue plastic booties. A small, cruel smile played on his lips.
"The good doctor tells me he's prepared a new vintage for us, Russian," Frankie murmured, his voice a low, conversational purr. "A special blend. Just for you."
He bent down so good face was level with Wardog's feet. He took hold of the opening of the bootie on the right foot.
"Aaaah, getting your rocks off now, boss-man, yes?" Wardog grunted, the defiance in his voice sounding hollow even to his own ears.
Frankie ignored him. With a slow, almost theatrical motion, he peeled the plastic away.
The sensation was immediate and bizarre. A rush of arctic, frigid air washed over Wardog's sole, a coldness so intense it felt like it was seeping into his bones. He frowned. He tried to rationalize it—his foot had probably just been warm and sweaty inside the plastic bag, and the cool air of the factory was a shock to the overheated skin.
Frankie tossed the plastic bag aside. He then lowered his nose slowly, deliberately, until it was hovering just inches from Wardog's sweaty, gleaming toes. He inhaled deeply, a connoisseur appreciating a fine aroma.
"HAHA—"
Wardog's fake, defiant laugh was cut off by a new, intense wave of fear. It felt as if a sudden, strong wind, colder than the harshest Siberian blizzard, was gusting through the gaps between his toes. He tried to curl them instinctively, to shield them from the unnatural chill, but the plastic toe spreaders Atkins had applied earlier held them open, splayed, and exposed.
His large, bushy eyebrows, which had been set in a mask of defiance, rose with a mixture of confusion and a flicker of genuine, dawning fear. He had never felt anything like this before.
Then Frankie, still kneeling, gave a wicked, knowing grin. He extended his tongue—a thick, wet muscle—and planted it, soft and warm, against the heel of Wardog's right foot.
The world exploded.
It was not a tickle. It was a neurological catastrophe. The contrast between the intense, chemical coldness of his skin and the heat of Frankie's tongue created a reaction that was blindingly painful. It was white-hot magma and stinging, high-voltage electricity rolled into one. Every nerve ending under the warm, wet pressure of the tongue ignited at once, firing a thousand times more intensely than they ever had before.
Completely unbidden, a surge of blood roared through Wardog’s veins. His cock, which had been flaccid moments before, engorged with a violent, instantaneous speed, tenting the thick fabric of his trousers like a marquee pole.
His eyes went wide with shock, humiliation, and a pain so profound it transcended anything he had ever known.
Frankie began to drag his tongue slowly, deliberately, up the arch of Wardog's foot.
The journey of Frankie's tongue up Wardog's sole was a slow, agonizing crawl through a landscape of pure, unadulterated pain.
It was a pain that defied all his training, all his experience. His time in the gulag, the broken bones, the ripped-out nails—those were nothing. They damaged the body. This… this was a surgical strike on the nervous system itself on a level he never imagined possible.
Every one of the thousands of microscopic taste buds on Frankie's tongue felt like a hyper-sharp, poisoned needle, scoring his skin, flaying it open layer by layer, pulling and twisting the raw, screaming nerves beneath.
Wardog's jaw clenched so hard he felt something pop near his ear. He squeezed his eyes shut, his entire body going rigid against the restraints, every muscle straining to contain the agony, to hold back the scream that was clawing its way up his throat.
A low, guttural groan, ripped from his chest, and the sound of his own teeth grinding together was like two massive slabs of slate scraping against each other, a horrifying, grating noise that filled the studio.
The tongue continued its merciless ascent.
It reached the base of his big toe and, with a subtle, delicate motion, lightly flicked against the toe stem.
The targeted, precise touch was a lightning strike. Wardog’s body arched violently off the table, a strangled, high-pitched noise tearing from his throat. Hot tears, squeezed from his clamped-shut eyes, traced burning tracks down his temples and into his hair.
Finally, the tongue reached the toe pad. It finished its journey with a small, almost playful swirl, a final, flourishing signature to its work of art.
Then, Frankie stood up.
He was smiling. A wide, triumphant, predatory smile.
Wardog collapsed back onto the table, his body a trembling, sweating mess. He was panting, his chest heaving, gulping in air like a drowning man. He looked down at his own body in horror. The crotch of his trousers showed a large, dark, wet stain where, in that final, blinding moment of agony, he had come hard and helpless against the rough fabric of his boxers.
He lay there, trying to find some level of composure, some shred of the unbreakable man he had been just minutes before. He looked around the table and saw every single face he had mocked—Knuckles, Nails, Slick, Scout—staring at him. Not with fear. Not with respect. But with wide, gleeful, victorious eyes. They were looking at him like Christmas had come early this year.
Frankie Romano stood over Wardog, a picture of immaculate, triumphant calm. He reached into the breast pocket of his suit jacket and, with the delicate precision of a surgeon, pulled out a single, long, white feather. He held it up by the quill, letting it catch the harsh studio lights.
"I'm afraid my employees prefer… harsher methods tickling their victims," Frankie said, his voice a low, conversational purr. "Brute force. So… uninspired. I always tell them they should use the feather. It's so elegant. So refined. So… on brand."
He moved his hand back and forth slightly. The flimsy barbs of the feather waved and trembled in the air, but it was the tip, the finely tapered end that finished in a sinister, needle-thin point, that Wardog's wide, terrified eyes tracked with hypnotic horror.
"This is your last chance, Russian," Frankie said, his voice losing all its pleasantness, becoming a blade of cold steel. "Tell me the location of my girls."
Mikhail swallowed hard, his throat clicking. His forehead was beaded with sweat. His entire right foot felt like it was on fire, a throbbing, swollen mass of pure, agonizing sensation. He looked from the gently swaying feather to the cold, dark, merciless eyes of Romano.
He thought of Keystone. He thought of the mission. He thought of the girls. He thought of Jessica, the little bird, alone, blindfolded, and terrified in a cage. He thought of every interrogation he had ever faced, every torment he had ever endured and overcome. His jaw, which felt like it was about to dislocate, set with a final, monumental effort of will.
"I'm a little… hazy, yes," he rasped, his voice a broken, trembling thing. "Jog… jog memory, please."
Romano didn't say a word. His smile just widened.
He lowered the feather.
The flat, upper portion of the feather was the first thing to touch Mikhail's foot. The instant it made contact with his chemically-sensitized skin, it felt like a thousand tiny nuclear bombs detonating at once. The sensation was so overwhelming, so far beyond tickling, that it bypassed every defense he had ever built.
He struggled against his bonds, his entire body tensing, his muscles screaming as the feather began to trace a slow, deliberate line down the top of his arch.
And then, his body betrayed him.
As the feather moved, his muscles, which had been clenched in agony and defiance, suddenly went limp. He relaxed. He threw his head back against the padded rest.
And an ungodly, horrifying scream exploded from his lungs. It was not a sound of mirth. It was the sound of his nervous system short-circuiting, of his mind completely and utterly losing control.
Romano dragged the feather down the hypersensitive sole, a master artist painting on a canvas of raw nerves. The Russian man cried, his body convulsing as each nerve ending is fired, the tears streaming down his face as the forced, agonizing laughter ripped from his throat.
When the feather reached the bottom of Mikhail's heel, Romano flicked his wrist to start the upwards sweep. The pliant feather bent, and the sharp, needle-like tip drew a single, razor-thin line down the bottom of his arch.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!"
It was a pure, unadulterated scream of agony, a pain so sharp and focused it felt like he was being flayed alive.
Romano dragged the feather back up.
When it got to the top of the ball of his foot, he lifted it, granting Mikhail a split second of reprieve. The Russian man gulped in a desperate, shuddering breath of air.
And then Romano pushed the feather deep into the gap between Mikhail's big and second toes, sliding it under the hard plastic of the toe spreader. The sharp barbs of the feather began to saw back and forth on the exposed, taut, agonizingly sensitive webbing.
That was it. The final, unbreakable lock had been picked. The iron vault of Mikhail 'Wardog' Vostrikov's will was blown wide open.
"I'LL TALK! I'LL TALK! STAAAAAAAAAAHP! I'LL TAAAAAAAAAAALK!!!"
Romano paused the sawing motion but kept the feather lodged in place, a constant, agonizing reminder of his power. He twirled the quill between his thumb and forefinger.
"I'm listening," he said calmly.
"STAAAAAAAHHHHHP!!!! NNNOOOOOOOOOOO!!! DERRINGER!!! DERRINGER!!! DEEEEEEERINGEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!" he screamed, his head thrashing from side to side.
"And the first name?" Romano asked, his voice utterly devoid of emotion, giving the quill another small, torturous twist.
"JAAAAAAAACK!!!! JACK DERRINGER!!!!"
The name echoed in the studio, a final, ragged surrender torn from the depths of Mikhail's broken will.
Romano kept twirling the feather cruelly. He looked up from his work, his expression one of calm, professional satisfaction. He glanced over at Slick, who was still leaning against the wall, watching the proceedings with a mixture of awe and terror.
"Slick," Romano said, his voice as casual as if he were ordering lunch. "Do you know this… Derringer?"
As Romano spoke, he changed tactic, sawing the feather gently, eliciting another series of high-pitched, sob-choked shrieks from the man on the table.
Slick snapped to attention. "Yeah, boss," he said quickly, eager to be useful. "I know the name. He's a two-bit hack. A failed cop who calls himself a private investigator. Works out of a shithole office in Brooklyn."
"And do you know where this office is?" Romano asked, never taking his eyes off his handiwork, watching the way Mikhail’s leg twitched and spasmed.
Slick looked at Mikhail's face, which was now a deep, mottled purple, his jaw looking like it was about to hyper-extend from the strain of his endless, agonizing screams.
"Yeah," Slick confirmed. "He's just a few blocks from here. Easy to find."
"Good." Romano stopped the torment. He pulled the feather free with a final, deliberate flourish.
Wardog slumped against his bonds, his body going limp. A low, pathetic moan escaped his lips as he felt his hyper-sensitive sole throb with a phantom pain, the nerves so overstimulated they felt like they'd grown to fifty times their actual size.
Romano turned his full attention to Slick. His voice was no longer calm. It was a whipcrack.
"Take a group of the reinforcements," he commanded, gesturing towards the entrance where the new, anonymous thugs were loitering. "Go to this Derringer's office. Take it apart. I don't care about the man. I care about my property. GET MY FUCKING PRODUCT BACK!"
"Yes, boss!" Slick said, his voice a hasty squeak. "At once!" He practically scurried out of the studio, barking orders at the new men as he went.
Romano then turned his gaze to Dr. Atkins, who was still standing by the clinic door, his eyes on his daughter.
"You really outdid yourself, Clement," Romano said, a rare note of genuine approval in his voice. "A masterpiece." He then nodded to the thug who was holding Sophie. "Let the bitch go."
The goon released his grip, and Sophie stumbled into her father's arms. Atkins held her tight, his face a mask of profound, soul-shattering relief.
Frank Romano gave the scene one last, satisfied look. He placed the feather carefully back into his breast pocket, smoothed the front of his suit jacket, and walked away from the table without a backward glance at the broken man he was leaving behind. He headed for the stairs to his office, his work here done.
The silence that descended in his wake was heavy and thick, broken only by Wardog's ragged, shuddering breaths.
The heavy thud of Frank Romano's office door closing upstairs was the signal. The formal interrogation was over. The professional part of the evening was concluded.
Now, the personal part could begin.
Nails was the first to break the silence. He let out a low, appreciative chuckle, a sound like dry leaves skittering across pavement. He looked at the whimpering, broken giant on the table, then at his own broken arm, and finally back at the man who had inflicted the injury.
"Lady-man, huh?" he purred, the insult now tasting like sweet, delicious victory.
He walked to the foot of the table, his movements slow and deliberate, a predator returning to a wounded kill. He positioned himself directly in front of the throbbing, violated right foot, the one Romano had just so masterfully abused.
At the same time, Knuckles cracked his namesakes, the sound sharp and brutal in the quiet studio. He walked to the other side of the table, planting himself in front of the still-bootied left foot. He reached into the deep pockets of his cargo pants. A metallic jingling sound accompanied his movements. He pulled his hands out, and in the harsh studio light, Wardog could see what he held: five small, wickedly curved metal banjo picks. One by one, Knuckles began to methodically fit them over the fingertips of his right hand, turning his brutish paw into a five-pronged instrument of torture.
Mikhail's head swiveled from one man to the other. He saw the gleam of sadistic anticipation in Nails' eyes. He saw the focused, methodical cruelty in the way Knuckles armed himself. The last dregs of adrenaline and defiance left him, replaced by a new, profound, and utterly hopeless terror.
"I… I told you," he stammered, his voice a pathetic, broken rasp. "I told you what you wanted to know… please…"
Nails just smiled, a thin, cruel slash in his pale face. He extended his good hand, his left hand. The long, lacquered talons flared like a claw.
"Yeah," Nails hissed, his voice a triumphant whisper. "What a shame. I guess that means there's no safeword."
He slowly, deliberately, brought his hand towards Wardog's right foot, the talons pointed directly at the raw, agonizingly sensitized webbing between his toes.
"Now," Nails purred, his eyes glittering with promised vengeance. "About that itch…"
Next Chapter (14) - Garry
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