Vae Victus [Volume 1] [WOE TO THE VANQUISHED]

Chapter 9

"Tell me all the salacious details," she said.

"Excuse me?" I said.

"You know, all the sexy, juicy details," she said.

"I know what salacious means, lady," I said. "Who are you again?"

She laughed. "Anastasia Karpov at your service, madam," she said. 

She curtsied and offered the back of her palm. I am not going to kiss your hand. I shook her hand awkwardly.

"and you must be John's new friend," she said. "Kefi, isn't it?"

"Kefira Levi," I said. So this is the female voice on John's phone.

"Ms. Levi," she said. "What brought you to Ben-Gurion Foundation today?"

She had this smooth voice, not unlike John's. But to my ears, it sounded like a slithering serpent instead of John's smooth silk. Damn it. I am turning into one of those overly possessive housewives.

Anastasia Karpov was a beautiful woman in her late thirties, or maybe early forties. I could see traces of plastic surgery on the edge of her chin. Nip tuck here, botox injection there. My jealousy aside, she was a stunning woman by any standard. She had this finesse that you could not buy. The confidence that could only come from raised by old money. A noblesse oblige.

She reminded me of Sarah Ben-Gurion (nee. Walker), John's deceased wife. Not in her gentleness or kindness, but in the ease that she carried herself. The way she could walk into any room and expected to be the center of the attention. 

I envied that kind of effortless grace. I could never walk ten feet on a high heel without screaming for mercy, and I had high pain tolerance.

"Yes?" she asked. She waited for my answer, and I had been daydreaming about how to flay this beautiful reptile.

"Nothing in particular," I said. "I wanted to see how John spends most of his time. Do you work here?"

She sat on her chair behind a large wooden desk, in a luxurious office. John only hired the best interior decorators for his organizations. I sat on one of the chairs on the other side.

She laughed. "Yes," she said. "I am the CEO of Ben-Gurion foundation."

I frowned. She was laughing at my ignorance, and I could not blame her for it. I wanted to stay far away from Jane and Robert for the day. I ended up being stuck in the traffic for three hours and left with Anastasia in her office.

The old me would have researched every single thing I could find about my targets before I even met them. I was being an amateur and appropriately mocked for it.

"So what do you do here, Ms. Karpov?" I asked. I raised my pitch an octave higher. If she thought that I was an idiot, I might as well played to it with gusto. "John is always so busy with these and that, all I want is for him to shop with me more. Ya know?"

It helped that I was wearing one of the clothes that John bought me. A fancy high-end dress from a shop I did not bother remembering. It made me look like a cotton candy wrapped in a plastic bubble. Fashion. What the heck do I know about it?

I milked my airhead blonde-bimbo persona for all its worth. By the end of the half an hour 'interrogation' session, I had disclosed to Anastasia every single BDSM kinky actions that John 'loved' to do. The hardest part of the charade was keeping myself from laughing. 

I started with all the bondages and the blindfold, tame stuff. I finished with the kind of spankings, whips and hot candles he liked to pour on my naked, tortured body.