“Do not presume. To tell. Me. What. To. Do!” The woman punctuated each shouted word with further brutal strokes while he yelled and gasped and shuddered in exquisite agony until his legs buckled and he dangled sweat-soaked from the beam, chest heaving, utterly unable to speak.

She leaned in close enough for her distinctive musky perfume to tantalise his nostrils and whispered against his ear. “You think I am some slut to be ordered around, yes? You think I am like your pathetic excuse for a wife?”

“N-no,” he managed, still panting as he struggled to get his feet under him again and wincing from the fresh weals that laced across his back and buttocks.

Without warning, she stripped the blindfold from his eyes. Warwick screwed them up against the sudden light. It took a few moments before he could squint past his own eyelids.

The fantasy subsided revealing the neat bare bedroom of the top-floor rented flat in Harrow, with its stripped pine floorboards, sturdy exposed beams and conveniently empty office space beneath. The room was dominated by the huge bed with all-white linen and old-fashioned brass bedstead.

Myshka had stepped back and was watching his recovery through narrowed eyes, still fingering the suede-thonged whip longingly. It stung like a bastard but left no lasting scars and damn if she didn’t know how to use it to maximum effect. The best he’d ever had. And having taken the traditional path through the British upper-class educational system Warwick could speak from considerable personal experience.

Myshka herself was a well-endowed brunette, her hair a long gleaming collection of shades from polished oak to copper. He’d always had a weakness for Eastern European girls with their mottled English and exotic beauty. And Myshka knew how to dress to make the most of what she had.

Tonight she was wearing a tightly belted raincoat over long glossy leather boots. The little bitch did that just to tease him he was sure—not letting him see the rest until she was good and ready.

He wriggled his fingers experimentally to return the blood-flow but Myshka made no immediate move to release him. He eyed her impatiently.

“Come on darling let me down,” he said aiming one of his killer smiles. “If you don’t give me a couple of minutes’ rest you won’t be getting your reward tonight.”

Myshka pouted and for a moment he thought she was going to refuse. Then she stepped forwards and reached up to unhook his hands, rubbing her body deliberately against his as she did so.

“You promised to tell me all about Matthew’s poor dead wife,” she breathed into his mouth. “Did you see her body? What was it like? Was there lot of blood?”

Warwick pulled a face at this last question, pushing her away far enough to deal with his bonds. “Sorry to disappoint you darling but it was all over by the time I got there. Well almost all over, anyway.”

Myshka’s fingers froze on the knots. “Almost?”

“Yeah, Matt called in some specialist cleaning firm to deal with the mess. They tried to tell him it wasn’t suicide.” His eyes were on the swell of her breasts beyond the tightly wrapped raincoat. “You ask me it was just a scam to try to squeeze more money out of him.”

She finished untying his wrists and Warwick hauled her against the length of him rough enough to make her gasp. As his hands groped her backside he could feel the outline of stocking tops and suspenders under the thin material of the coat. He yanked greedily at the belt.

Maybe this is your lucky night darling and I won’t need a couple of minutes’ rest after all.

“Did it work?” Myshka asked.

“Oh yeah, I’d say so,” he muttered engrossed in his task.

“Pay attention!” She fisted a hand in his hair to drag his head back. “Did he believe them—that she did not kill herself?”

“Ow! Yes, no, I don’t know!” he protested, too surprised to be angry yet. “When I got there everything had ground to a halt while they consulted higher authority. Whoever it was must have told them to stop pratting about though. By the time I left they were hard at it. Matt says they’ve got the place nearly good as new.”

Myshka turned her grip into a caress. “Maybe I should ask them to clean up here when I am done with you, yes?” she suggested. “Who were they?”

“McSomebody-or-other, I think. McCarron—that was it. Big white vans with Specialist Cleaning Services on the side. Can’t be many of those in the phone book,” Warwick said with the beginnings of irritation in his voice. “I wasn’t paying attention. For God’s sake—Matt will have the details if you’re really so desperate to know.”

Then with a grunt of triumph he yanked the belt apart and spread the coat wide. Under it she was naked apart from a leather suspender belt and fishnet stockings, her body hair shaved to a minimum. His eyes ran hotly over her perfect pale body, hands following. He wasn’t gentle but she never seemed to want him to be.

She stood quietly accepting of his touch and smiled at him. A beautiful woman who became breathtaking when she smiled. In one hand she still held the green silk tie she’d used to bind him, now torn and distorted beyond repair.

“Your poor tie,” she said with mocking eyes. “Was it your favourite?”

“No I hated it.” He plucked the tie from her grasp and flung it across the room then shoved her backwards until they hit the bed. She went sprawling onto the mattress. He followed her down murmuring against her skin, “It was a present from my wife.”

7

Myshka sat in front of her dressing table mirror. She was alone in the flat. Steve Warwick had satisfied himself and left for some meeting he pretended was more important than it was. Later he would go home to his pathetic little mouse of a wife. Myshka was left to smear away the whore-paint and try to scrub the smell of him from her skin.

She took a long inward drag on her cigarette and blew out a thin stream of smoke towards the ceiling. Warwick did not like her to smoke in the flat—it was not allowed. Myshka gave a tight little smile. She did many things that were not allowed.

A long time ago when she was growing up in a small town ten hours’ train ride from St Petersburg Myshka’s most heartfelt ambition was not to be cold and hungry. Later, when she realised what those things meant, it was her desire not to be poor. After she started to grow in ways that men could not help but notice—and as a result acquired warm furs, a paid-for apartment, meals in the finest restaurants and a generous allowance—she realised not being poor was no longer enough. She wanted to be rich.

So she had made friendships with rich and richer men but even then it did not satisfy the empty spaces in her soul. Being given a new Mercedes-Benz for no other reason that the paintwork matched her eyes was very nice of course, but she remained as much a possession as the car itself.