One Way or Another(52)
What the f*ck had happened to his Angie, the girl in the heels and tight skirt with the bold look in her eyes that made a promise she never intended to keep. Or rarely, anyhow, as he had personally found that night in the hotel, and subsequently, when they were in what he knew Angie had termed “a relationship.”
“Angie,” he said warmly now, “my dear, do come on in, you look so chilled standing out there in that flimsy dress. Why on earth has Mehitabel not found you something more suitable for this chilly evening?”
She made no response, stood, head hanging, not even looking at him. Refusing to look at him, he thought. So, okay, he could take care of that.
Ahmet knew how to play the gentleman even though he was not one. Now, he took off his own pale cashmere jacket, went and draped it over her shoulders. He stood in front of her, close enough to kiss, yet she did not lift her face to his, refused to acknowledge his presence in her own private world. He understood. Angie felt wounded by him, as well she might. And in fact, as she was very soon going to be wounded. He had no time for playing around anymore; he should have gotten rid of her when the opportunity presented itself, yet, thinking about it, perhaps not, because then he would have denied himself the pleasure of hurting her.
Mehitabel understood what he was about to do. She had disappeared, now she came back, carrying two long, narrow boxes. She opened the first and showed the whip to Ahmet. Opened the second, touched the rifle it contained with a soft finger, smiling at him. Their eyes met in mutual agreement.
Ahmet stood for a minute more, contemplating Angie, who from her drooped posture seemed to have removed herself to some other planet. He was about to bring her back from that place, back to him. He wanted to see her eyes, those eyes he had looked into when she was drowning, and this time he wanted to see them drowning in fear and in pain.
He took the whip from the first box, ran it through his fingers. It was an antique, of course, and from its history he knew it had been used in a turn-of-the-century gentlemen’s club where such things as whipping were part of the favored sexual delights offered. Now, Angie was about to experience that delight, as he would himself, especially when she would look up at him, her face twisted in pain, and beg him to stop, her eyes imploring … those eyes … he wanted those eyes to beg him … only then would he be able to eradicate from his mind the memory of them when she had been drowning.
Mehitabel went to remove Angie’s dress but he stopped her. “I want it this way,” he said, taking a step back, surveying the helpless woman. “Helpless” was exactly what he believed all women should be. He was the strength, the power … and if not the glory then the one she would eventually worship. That was his intention. To subdue her strong will, eradicate her personality, turn her into his kind of woman: lost, submissive, beguiling, eager only to please. And then he would be done with her.
The whip did not crack as he snapped it back, yet it whistled as he brought it down, a thin noise like a snake’s hiss, with a burning bite that notched her tender skin, left a raised red mark; as yet, no blood. Ahmet did not wish to draw blood, that was too amateur. He knew how to inflict pain in more ways than one, and pain was needed to tame Angie. Then and only then could he let her go.
She did not cry. She did not even call out, beg him to stop. She fell down and simply lay there, flat on the ground, untamed, unwilling to ask for his mercy.
After several minutes, Ahmet gave up. He nodded to Mehitabel to take care of her and stalked from the room, deeply upset. Angie had beaten him; he should be rid of her now, allow Mehitabel to take her away, never see her again. Yet he could not. He would not be beaten by any woman, and especially not this one.
Lucy came into his mind; chaste, simple, childlike Lucy. He knew he would never be beaten by her. Lucy would marry him one day, become mistress of Marshmallows, belle of the ball he would give to celebrate the house’s grand opening. Lucy was a different woman from Angie, who he now hated with all the passion he had in the beginning put into wooing her, loving her.… Was it love? Had he just wanted to f*ck Angie? He’d wanted to see that long red hair trailing across her white breasts as she lay next to him in that hotel bedroom, starry-eyed with his simple gift of the Cartier neck chain with its little panther ornament. One girl had seemed to promise sexual delight there for his taking; the other would be his virginal bride. And while he was thinking about it he thought he had better check on that, find out who Lucy was seeing, make sure nobody unlocked that chastity belt before he could. Lucy was important. Angie was expendable.
36
Martha, as well as having to get Ahmet’s huge, unfriendly house together in a mere five weeks, now also found herself in charge of organizing the “ball” with which they would celebrate its transformation. She wasn’t even sure she could get the place revamped in time, just getting workmen together in that outlandish marsh was an ordeal, to say nothing of accommodating them while they worked there. Why oh why, she asked herself after yet another fruitless phone conversation asking, demanding help. She was calling in all her markers, everyone she had ever done a favor for in business she was now telling they owed her. Fortunately, most were coming through.
She managed to find a construction company only twenty miles from Marshmallows that reluctantly agreed to help out though only when the money was doubled. She brought her own paint crew from London, grumbling all the way, suspicious of her promises that they would be put up at a very nice pub that also happened to serve hefty portions of food of the steak pie, haddock and chips variety, which suited them fine, along with free (on her) pints of lager to wash the dust down at the end of the day. She contracted private buses to get them all there and back. She laid on lunches of hot soup and sandwiches. She provided them with overalls and caps emblazoned with her newly designed Marshmallows logo: a chimney with a nest and a pair of wings on top. Try as she might, she’d been unable to come up with a “marshy” image; the bleak landscape simply did not lend itself to it.