“I don’t bottom anymore. Fin,” Kingsley said. “The end.”
S?ren studied Kingsley’s face as if looking at an alien specimen.
“Are you going to teach me the whip trick or not?” Kingsley demanded.
“I will, but this conversation isn’t over yet, whether you fin-ed it or not.”
“Show me the trick.”
“There’s no trick to it,” S?ren said as he scanned the rows of singletails on the wall. He took one down, pulled it taut, coiled it again and hung it back on the wall. A second singletail whip proved more to his liking. “It takes a great deal of practice. And I’m not the teacher Magdalena is. She could have you f lipping quarters in midair with a singletail in two weeks.”
“Then why isn’t she teaching me?”
“She’s in Rome. Have you used a whip before?”
“On the back—large target.”
“Then you’ll need to practice on a smaller target. Not a person.” S?ren had one of Kingsley’s business cards in his hand. He stabbed it over a hook on the wall.
“You want me to hit that?” Kingsley asked. “A business card?”
S?ren put his hand on the center of Kingsley’s chest and pushed him back…back…back until he was against the wall.
“No,” S?ren said. “I’m going to hit it. You’re going to watch. From a safe distance.”
S?ren stepped away, coiled the whip, put his right foot before his left foot and then released the whip with a quick snap. With the tip of the whip, S?ren cut the business card neatly in half.
Kingsley applauded as he walked up to the card. The cut sliced the card right down the middle between the word Edge and Enterprises.
“Such a good trick,” he said, impressed.
“Whips are multipurpose,” S?ren said. “Good for pain. Good for bondage.”
“Bondage?” Kingsley asked, reaching for the card.
S?ren lightly f lung the whip at him. It wrapped around Kingsley’s wrist. He laughed even as it tightened, and S?ren tugged on it, pulling him closer.
“Nice,” Kingsley said, his breath quickening. “What else?”
“Wrists,” S?ren said, taking Kingsley’s other wrist and wrapping the supple leather whip around his hands. “Ankles even. The neck, too, but you have to be careful. Do you want to see Magdalena’s favorite trick?”
“Show me.”
S?ren had left an eight-inch length of whip between Kingsley’s right wrist and left wrist. He spun Kingsley around quickly and pulled his back to S?ren’s chest, bringing the whip hard against Kingsley’s throat.
The world fell out from under Kingsley.
He blinked, and the walls turned to black, the temperature dropped and when he breathed in he smelled sulfur.
He dropped to his knees and yanked at the chain around his neck. If he could get his fingers between the chain and his throat he had a chance. The air went out of the room. He could hear nothing, see nothing. But he could feel, and what he felt was a wet-hole cavern in his chest, bone shattering and a lung collapsing.
No air. None. No matter how he gasped, how he gulped, how he fought, he could get no air.
Someone spoke…Slovakian? Ukrainian? He couldn’t tell. The voice was too far away…and it didn’t matter.
He was dying.
He was dying.
A bullet in his chest. A chain around his neck.
He was dead.
“Kingsley.”
He heard his name but didn’t respond. Dead men don’t scream.
“Kingsley, you’re in Manhattan. You’re home.”
He wasn’t home. He was bleeding to death on a shit-stained basement f loor in Ljubljana.
“You’re alive.”
No, he wasn’t.
“Open your eyes. Can you hear me?”
He heard something in his ears. A popping. It startled him. He jumped. His eyes f lew open. The world was a haze. But he did see something, a gray light.
“You have to breathe.”
He heard something other than the voice. A deep loud gasping wheeze. Over and over again.