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Elizabeth Keen turned her head to look at the sleek car that pulled up alongside her. She had gone out for a walk, trying to settle her feelings after the day. Another blacklister, this one a trafficker who procured and trained ‘high class’ slaves for those who could afford them. Red had suggested (read: ordered) that she stay at the Office where she would be safe, but she had waved it off as his overprotectiveness. Apparently, though, there were a number of people who were interested in owning Raymond Reddington’s new girl, the former FBI agent, despite the risks that entailed. And that wasn’t counting the ones who recognized the name Masha Rostava.
But it would figure that she wouldn’t be left alone to enjoy the relative quiet of the night. Somebody was always watching her now, FBI or Reddington’s men. The car, though, meant that it was Red himself, most likely planning a lecture.
Sure enough, the older man stepped out of the car, just looking at her a moment, eyes cool. She knew him well enough, though, to catch the tint of anger in the light gaze. He was still upset over her attempted defection, of course, on top of her near miss in the latest case.
“Get in the car, Elizabeth.”
“I’m not in the mood to listen to you say ‘I told you so’.” She answered snappily, turning away.
“Now, Lizzie, if you want your daughter back.” That caught her attention quickly.
“You found Agnes?” She quizzed, even as she moved toward him hopefully. Once, early on, she would have been nervous about being in such a confined space with the dangerous criminal, but those days had long passed. Red would never hurt her intentionally.
“I know where she is.” He answered shortly, sparing with the information, as always. She paused at the car door.
“Where? Is she all right? Can you get her out?”
“Get in the car.” He repeated. Liz frowned, opened her mouth to speak, but then just climbed into the back of the car, a Mercedes-Benz this time.
Red climbed in after her, and Liz turned toward him, intent on answers.
“Red, what-”
“Agnes is fine.” He interrupted. “I’ve got a team setting up to get her out now.”
“Where? Did you call Cooper-”
“No.” He snapped shortly, leaving the rest unsaid. She heard it, though, his insistence that he was dealing with this himself. Liz glared at him, but he had his gaze pointed out his window, and if he saw the look, he didn’t respond.
Liz sighed in irritation, looking out her own window. The bright lights and well populated streets, busy still despite the late hour, slowly gave way to old dilapidated apartment buildings and warehouses.
“Where are we going?” She asked finally, starting to feel a little nervous. It wasn’t like the crimelord to stay silent so long, usually he’d be regaling her with some pointless little story or something. Well, no, nothing Red ever said was actually pointless, he just liked to hide the real statement and make his listener try to work it out.
It didn’t soothe her any when he ignored the question.
“Dembe?” She turned her attention to the dark-skinned driver. He met her gaze for a moment in the rearview mirror, then his eyes flicked toward Reddington. The older man didn’t make any indication that he was paying attention at all, but Dembe only offered her a apologetic look in the mirror before returning his attention to the road.
“Raymond.” Liz huffed, burying her uncertainty behind anger. Yes, he had a right to be upset, but she had had good reasons for what she had done. It was her job.
“Strip.” He ordered, the command making Liz sit back, blinking in surprise.
“What?” He can’t have actually meant what she thought he did.
Finally he turned to look at her, his head tilted and lips pursed in that way he did when he was out of patience. She had been on the end of that expression enough times that it shouldn’t have had any real effect, but now it made her feel more than a little uncomfortable.
“You heard me. Unless you would rather I removed your clothing. I can promise you they wouldn’t be wearable afterwards.”
Liz just stared at him, pure shock freezing her in place. The car had stopped, she noticed, and she grabbed the door handle, intent on getting away from him. It opened from the outside just a moment sooner, though, and she stumbled out into Dembe’s arms, the bodyguard gripping her gently but firmly, obviously prepared to restrain her if necessary. He pulled her through a door after his boss, into a garage, tools lying neatly on shelves and pegs along the walls, heavier machinery pushed back to make a large clear space around them, a single table, the items on it covered by a tablecloth.
Liz moved to try to break the hold, using the self-defense skills taught to every FBI agent, but Dembe was not Reddington’s constant companion simply because he was a good friend, and she soon found herself pressed against the cold metal door, arms twisted behind her back. Again, the hold was gentle but strong, Dembe trying not to put too much pressure on her stomach, though it was well-healed after 3 months.
“What the hell are you playing at, Reddington?” She spat out. “The others are going to-”
“I already informed Agent Cooper that I would be taking you to have a little chat.” Raymond broke in, again. “He seemed quite pleased that we were clearing up our differences, even when I told him you might be gone a few days.” His expression when he looked at her now was that bland sort of half-smile, and it was that more than anything else that sent a shiver of fear through her and made her jerk against Dembe’s hold. Other people ended up dead when he looked at them that way.
“Now, I believe I told you to undress. Are you going to cooperate, or am I going to have to do this the difficult way.”
“Bite me.” She spat, stubbornness rising up. He didn’t look surprised, only resigned and perhaps a little amused.
“I thought as much. Dembe.” Red stepped away, starting to remove his jacket, and Dembe pulled her up, murmuring an apology as he tugged her bodily away from the door and over to where a pair of manacles, attached to a heavy chain, lay hanging from the ceiling.
The manacles were at waist height to begin with, but as soon as Dembe had wrestled her into them and stepped back, the chain started to retract. Liz turned to look at her captors, noticing the control Red held. It had obviously been sitting on the table, one corner of the cloth tugged back.
“Raymond.” She tried to take on a more cajoling tone now, trying to reason with him. “Let’s talk about this.”
“That’s what we’re doing, Lizzie.” He answered, letting the chain continue to retract, slowly, until she stood on her tiptoes. He set the control down on the table, picking up a length of dark material instead, moving toward her.
“If you try to kick me,” he warned, “you will regret it.”
She considered it anyway, for a moment, but she was helpless as it was, and it wouldn’t do any good to make him angrier. Part of her still believed this was some sort of trick, a ploy to scare her. But it was starting to work.
The blindfold was dropped over her eyes, and she jerked her head instinctively to try to dislodge it.
“This isn’t going to work, what-“ The words came out in a croak, and she paused to swallow, to try to clear her throat. “Whatever you’re trying to do.”
“I think it is.” He answered calmly, smoothing her hair down and tying the blindfold tight, being careful not to tangle any of the strands in it. Even now, even when he had her stretched out and frightened and planned to do who knew what to her, he was being gentle about it, making sure she wasn’t in any discomfort that he didn’t purposely give her.
“You can wait outside, Dembe.” Reddington said, moving away from her, and she turned her head to try and follow his voice, but the large space made the sound unreliable. Another set of footsteps, Dembe’s, moved away, ending in the opening and closing of the heavy door. They were alone now.
“Red, let me down, please.” She pitched her voice softer, begging now. “You’re scaring me.”
“Let me tell you about the person you almost ended up captured by today.” He answered instead. “He claims he can break any person, male or female, any one at all, without leaving a single permanent mark on them.” The criminal’s footsteps echoed around her, then there was a slight shuffle and they fell silent. The only conclusion she could come to was that he had removed his shoes, but she couldn’t see him walking around the dirty floor in sock feet. What had been under that cloth? “That he can turn them into whatever the customer desires, an obedient little sex doll, a perfectly-trained assassin, a loyal pain-loving toy for them to take their frustrations out on. I’ve even seen a few of them who were conditioned to beg to be allowed to please their master’s dogs, and the other animals on his farm.” His tone on the last sentence left no confusion as to his opinion of that. “Anything.” Another moment of silence, and then Liz’s breath hitched and she jerked slightly, as something brushed against her side. “Thus far, I have yet to hear of him failing.”
“Fear is a wonderful teacher.” Red continued, more softly. Held stretched out as she was, his voice was right next to her ear. Cold metal pressed against her shoulder, and she flinched instinctively. Red had laid the flat of the knife against her skin, though, a warning so she wouldn’t hurt herself, waiting until she stilled again to turn it to slice through the material of her shirt. “It teaches respect. The fear a child has for the punishments she gets from her parents, for instance, teaches her to respect them and their rules.”
“I don’t fear you.” She half-lied. Normally, she didn’t, anymore. He chuckled.
“Yes, I had noticed that.” He answered, her head turning towards his voice as he tore out the other shoulder, cold air making her shiver as the loose shirt slid down her body. The straps of her sports bra were sliced through as well.
“That’s probably my fault.” Red continued. His voice had lost the conversational tone, dead serious now. “I’ve spoiled you, let you believe that you can do whatever you wish, and I will be there, ready to step in and clean up the messes you leave behind.” Warm fingers slid under the waistband of her trackpants, sliding them and her panties down her legs, his hands staying along her outer thighs, though she could still feel the way the blood rushed to her cheeks at her state of undress. There was nothing overly sexual about his touch, but he wasn’t being shy about where he let his hands settle, either, lightly tracing each scar and mark that caught his attention, even a small scar at the top of her left breast, left by an old cat of Sam’s. She could feel his eyes moving over her, cataloguing the imperfections she had amassed over the years. The man even paused to remove her shoes and socks, with another warning about kicking when she jerked her foot in protest, setting her feet back down carefully on the pile of discarded clothing. With the extra padding of her shoes gone, she practically hung from the manacles. Red’s hand moved over her stomach, brushing over the scar from her incision, prodding it carefully to check for any sensitivity. She wondered if he would stop this little display, if she tried to convince him he was hurting her. Something, a shred of pride, held her back, though.
“It was amusing, at first,” he continued, after a moment, his voice a little deeper, making her blush anew. “The way you tried to act around me, all cocky FBI agent, when it was obvious you knew you were in over your head.” There was the sound of a winch, and she got a bit of slack in the chain, just a couple inches, enough that she could settle back down onto the balls of her feet, as she had been before. “It lost its novelty fast, but I still hoped you would grow out of it. And now, you have come to believe that you know better than I. You have lost your fear, and thus, your respect for me.”
He fell silent again, and she turned her head to try to listen for him, the blindfold tight enough that she couldn’t get even a glimpse of the room around her. She might as well have been left there alone, for all she knew. But he wouldn’t just leave her… Well, ten minutes before, she would have said he wouldn’t have stripped her nude and hung her from her wrists, either. Finally, the silence got to be too much.
“Red?”
Liz let out a squeal as something lashed against her back, jumping forward and swaying against the chain. The strike didn’t really hurt that much, certainly nothing compared to some of what she had gone through recently, but it was more surprise that had caused her to cry out. Even with the mood he was in, his obvious anger at her, she hadn’t thought he would actually… She couldn’t remember Sam having ever even spanked her. He must have, at some point, when she was young, she supposed, but not for a very long time.
The lash fell again, laying multiple lines of heat across her back. Some sort of multi-tailed whip.
“Red, stop. Please.” Her words were ignored, the implement falling repeatedly over her lower back and bottom, as she alternated threats and pleas, all of which were equally ignored.
“I won’t forgive you for this.” She gasped out, finally. There was a pause, there, an audible exhalation.
“This isn’t about forgiveness, Elizabeth. It is a lesson, one you would be better off to learn sooner, rather than later. But, whichever you choose, you will learn it. Your actions have gotten other people killed, have nearly gotten you killed, and I will not let it continue.”
“Mr. Kaplan…” Liz began, shivering.
“Her choices were her own, and she’s paid the price for them. But it was your choice to run, to try to put yourself out of my reach, and, thus, out of my protection, that has put you into this situation, that has put your daughter into this situation, and it is she that is paying the price now.”
“None of this would be happening if you hadn’t shown up.” She answered bitterly. The strike this time was harder, and anger lit his voice when he answered.
“If I hadn’t come into your life when I did, you would be dead.” The words were starkly matter-of-fact. “That fate was laid out for you when you were a baby, and again when you came up against the stewmaker, and countless times since then. It is only through my interference, then, and now, that you are still breathing, despite your own attempts to the contrary.”
She was crying, Liz realised, tears wetting the blindfold, soft sobs rattling in her lungs. Her back hurt from the lashing, but it was the dull throbbing of bruised skin, not the sharp pain of cuts. The weapon had probably been carefully chosen for that. Even in his anger, he was still cautious, still concerned about her wellbeing. The same man who could shoot someone in cold blood, right between the eyes, without a second thought, simply because they might become a liability to him. Or a danger to her. She sobbed harder, letting her head drop, and a moment later, strong arms wrapped around her, pulling her close. The winch whirred to life again, and the chain loosened, Red easily removing the manacles. Liz clung to him and cried, cried for the life she had wanted so badly, the one she knew she would never get. A husband, a child, a simple job. She cried for the loss of her adopted father, and the mother she could barely remember, and the baby girl she hadn’t been able to hold for more than a few hours. All the things she hadn’t let herself grieve for before were let out now, and Red just held her close, until finally she cried herself out.
***
Liz woke to the motion of a moving car, just staying still, feeling too tired and sore to bother moving. She had been redressed, in her own pants, commando beneath them and barefoot, Red’s jacket wrapped around her in place of her ruined shirt. He held her on his lap, her head on his shoulder, one arm wrapped securely around her waist, the other held loosely at the back of her neck. A slight shift of her head, and the fingers rubbed soothingly, reaching to stroke through her hair.
“Where are we going?” She repeated the question from earlier, but the tone was far different this time, quiet and resigned, where it had been demanding before.
“To get Agnes.” Red answered, his tone the same as ever, as if the little scene in the garage had never happened, or wasn’t something even worth mentioning. “She’s been safely extracted. We just need to retrieve her.”
Lizzie let out a relieved sigh, closed her eyes, and let herself fall back asleep.