Mercy

My body ached as I scaled the seemingly infinite flights of stairs leading to my fifth floor apartment, and the agonizing reminder of the previous night’s horror I was forced to endure was enough to compel a change of heart regarding my refusal of Billie’s offer. I could feel my throat burning as if Elliot’s hands were still clenched around it, bruising and maiming the delicate skin beneath. I could feel the muscles in my arms and legs screaming in overexertion brought about by my futile struggles to escape Elliot’s deadly grasp. And, most discomforting and mortifying of all, my ass was fucking throbbing. Of all the abuse Elliot enjoyed to inflict upon me, I hoped to whatever higher power that he wouldn’t choose to rape me again. If there was anything remotely human left in that wretched man, he would wait a day or two before allowing his sick libido to wreak havoc on my tender flesh.

Considering he never seemed merciful enough while I was dating him to give two shits whether or not I could handle more than one round a day, I wasn’t counting on him giving me a break. Why the fuck did I turn Billie Joe down?

With a trembling hand, I unlocked the door to my apartment and turned the knob, praying it was still early enough for Elliot to be passed out in my bed. I felt a revolted chill scuttle down my spine at the image of that foul man sprawled on my bed, drooling all over my pillow, and jacking off into my bed sheets to the mental images of my wide-eyed, earsplitting pleas of Don’t do this! No, stop! It hurts, oh Jesus fuck, just kill me instead! I couldn’t possibly fathom what transformed this supposedly upstanding member of society into a soulless rapist, a cretin who was incapable of anything other than controlling every damn thing that fell into his grubby paws. Elliot utterly disgusted me, but if enduring his abuse meant that Jakob Armstrong could potentially get his life back in order, then it was certainly worth it.

…right?

“Mikey! Holy shit, you weren’t kidding,” Elliot chuckled the moment the door of the apartment was closed and locked behind me. At first, I didn’t understand why. It wasn’t until I saw his eyes giving my entire body a lustful once-over that realization cruelly bitch-slapped me in the face. In my haste to get the fuck out of the hospital and away from the old bastard, I had forgotten to change back into my street clothes. I was standing before a sickeningly excitable man, and I was still in my fucking scrubs.

“Oh…you didn’t actually think I was a nurse?” I questioned, attempting to tread lightly around the dangerous waters I found myself drowning in.

“Nah, I honestly didn’t think anyone would hire a whore,” he sneered, giving me his twisted version of a playful wink. I forced a smile as to not give him any cause for an angry outburst, but it wasn’t much more than a quick twitch in the corners of my mouth. In fact, the grin was more comparable to a grimace than a smirk.

“Whore wasn’t exactly written on my résumé, so I don’t see how the fuck it would limit my job options,” I snapped, immediately regretting the snide tone my voice had instinctively adopted in response to derision.

“Watch it, Slut, that’s not what I meant. I meant they don’t usually hire people with records,” Elliot spat, rising from where he’d been perched to round on me. The broken, rusted out springs of the armchair groaned as his weight was vacated from its ominous existence. As his steps drew nearer, the sound persisted, creaking softer and softer until finally coming to a rest and giving way to silence. It was a sound I used to associate with my daughter, but at that moment all I could relate the sound to was terror, thick and staggering.

“My record was expunged when I agreed to testify against you,” I stated coldly, gazing in mounting fear at the furious glow radiating from Elliot despite how desperately it appeared that he was attempting to keep his cool.

“Well aren’t you a pathetic little nark. I fucking failed the first time with you, otherwise you wouldn’t’ve gone pansy and cried to the cops about me. This time…I’m not gonna fail,” Elliot hissed, his lips inches from my ear. His body towered over me, and any confidence I may have had prior to his bullying stance was abruptly shattered once his lips migrated to my neck and gently suckled. I whimpered, but certainly not out of pleasure. All I wanted was to wriggle away from him, curl up into a ball on the floor, and sleep. Sleep forever.

“And h-how’re you a-any different n-n-now than you were b-before?” I stammered, insides crawling the minute Elliot placed his hands on my hips.

“Because I actually have a plan this time. I know what I’m fucking doing. Now, come with me. I made you lunch,” he cooed, planting a delicate kiss so very much unlike the savagery I normally faced on my lips as he surreptitiously led me away from the door, away from safety. I felt his tongue brush against my lower lip, but it did not beg for entrance. Instead, Elliot pulled away from me with an alarmingly wary expression plastered across his mug. I didn’t like it much.

“Bullshit, you don’t cook,” I responded, frowning not only in disbelief, but also in apprehension. He was actually trying to be sweet before, but upon witnessing the look on his face after he kissed me, all bets were off. His grip on my body became unbearably tight, and his breathing grew raggedly labored.

“I still don’t, but it doesn’t take a fucking genius to make a sandwich,” he sneered, but when I peeked into my meager excuse of a kitchen I saw no evidence of food anywhere in sight. The control freak was bullshitting me.

“If it doesn’t take a genius, then where the hell is it?” I shot back, struggling desperately to squirm out of Elliot’s arms.

“Stop fighting me, Slut. What I’ve got for you isn’t in the goddamn kitchen,” he growled, taking hold of my arms and dragging me into my bedroom. I thought I knew what was going to happen, what he planned on taking from me once again, and immediately I commenced with pleas and sobs for him to let me go, to stop, you don’t have to do this. I wasn’t even a minute into my tearful protesting before Elliot rounded on me, forcefully shoving my back against the wall and eyeing me with a rage that stopped my heart and rendered me incapable of drawing breath.

“What’s his name, hm?” he snarled, face inches from mine.

“What’re you talking about. Whose name?” I squeaked, eyes wide.

“The guy you sucked off this morning. What’s his name?”

I was momentarily stunned by the accusation, despite how entirely accurate it was. How the hell was he able to figure it out so quickly? Did he have a highly defined sixth sense for infidelity, or had I acted guilty enough to be charged with such an allegation?

“I…I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was only with my patients this morning,” I retorted, hopelessly failing to retain some sort of composure.

“Oh really? And do you offer any special services to those patients or just the one you sucked off this morning?”

“I’m just a nurse, Elliot! I’m not a whore anymore!” I squealed, hating myself more and more as the accusations progressed. A segmented flashback from the few hours I spent with Billie replayed in my mind, and under different circumstances, it would have terrified me.

“Fairy, you don’t have to do this.”

“Do what? I’m just doing my job, Old Man.”

“Which job would that be?”

“I can fucking smell him on you, Slut. I can taste him. Don’t you go trying to tell me you’re not still whoring around!” he bellowed, releasing one of my arms long enough to strike me on the cheek. For a moment, I felt nothing but a vacant numbness on the left side of my face, but then the pain began to crawl, unforgiving and excruciating, across the rouged flesh. Soon enough, the entire imprint of his hand was aflame on the side of my face.

“I’m sorry!” was all I could bring myself to cry out in fear of being pummeled again.

“Damn right you are! Here I thought I was going to be all sweet and apologize about last night, but now I’m thinking you deserved it…and you sure as hell deserve this.”

Elliot elaborated on just what he had in store for me by proceeding to claw at my clothing in what I thought were his efforts to defile me once more. His hands effortlessly pulled the loose fabric of my scrub pants down around my ankles and commanded me to step out of them. I did as I was told, managing to trip over myself as my vision blurred with tears that refused to fall. Elliot laughed coldly at my ungraceful blunder and continued to strip the boxers from my waist as well. At that point, I was babbling incoherently, begging him not to do it. I was imploring his forgiveness, despite the fact that I’d technically done nothing wrong. I asserted over and over that never again would I be intimate with Billie, but Elliot appeared to be ignoring me completely. Once my boxers were haphazardly abandoned on the floor, he swiftly lifted the remaining clothing up over my head, leaving me as bare and as exposed as Billie had been before me mere hours prior. Much like the old bastard had done, I stood glaring at my abandoned mass of clothing on the floor and longed to crawl right back into them. Instead, my body was left to be carefully scrutinized by a man who would, most likely, rape me again before the day was over.

Naturally, I flinched when Elliot drew closer to me, keeping my eyes firmly glued to the heap of clothes. I didn’t notice the object in his hand, nor was I able to refrain him from wrapping said object around my neck and tightening it as much as it would allow without completely restricting my windpipe. I was outright clueless as to what he’d put around my neck up until he held up a very small, black item in his other hand with a button on it. It looked like a mini remote, and the second Elliot pressed his thumb to that button with a sickening grin, I knew exactly what both the object around my throat and the menacing black rectangle were.

I had a dog’s shock collar clasped around my neck, and Elliot was in control of the voltage.

The pain that flared from that fucking collar was so far beyond agonizing I thought I would go wholly insane before his thumb released the button. Thankfully, he did so just as rapidly as he had pressed it.

“Make one fucking sound, Slut, and I’ll do it again,” Elliot cautioned, his voice emotionless and arctic. I promptly kept my mouth shut in response. “Good boy! Now follow me.”

With my arm in his grasp, Elliot led me to the very back of my bedroom and stopped to contemplatively stare at the closet door across from my bed. With yet another hideous smirk, he opened the closet, threw me inside, and laughed mirthlessly as I screamed when he slammed the door. With the voltage turned up higher than before, I felt a second shockwave emanating from the collar immediately following my startled cry. I was forced to grit my teeth and deeply burrow my fingers into the carpeting of the closet floor to keep myself from shrieking once more. It was as if the electric shock was frying my brain, rendering me completely paralyzed and unable to experience anything but blinding pain.

Then it was over.

“Like I said, Slut…one fucking sound…” Elliot reiterated through the closet door. I could faintly hear him whistling merrily to himself as he locked me inside, bursting with pride at his new approach at breaking me into total submission.

Apparently, he hadn’t been kidding when he claimed to have an actual plan of controlling me this time around.

For a few moments, I was surrounded with nothing but darkness. It frightened me, not being able to visualize so much as my own hand waving frantically in front of my face, but my eyes adjusted to my currently dim environment before long, permitting me to catch a glimpse of something that appeared to be white and circular in the corner with something square on top of it. Reaching out to the mysterious thing with a shaking hand, I brought it closer for investigation. I noiselessly sobbed when I realized what it was.

Sitting on a paper plate in the far corner of the closet was the sandwich Elliot had promised me.