Her Rustanov Bully: the (possibly romantic?) tale of how I pucked around and found out
Her Rustanov Bully: Chapter 29

“Order just came in from Mr. Rustanov. He says we can let you down now.”

Stepan, who Tommy had previously thought was just some senior who’d never had the skills to come off the bench, made this announcement when he walked into the Hanson family’s dilapidated barn.

Was this another hallucination?

Tommy had been hanging from a set of heavy-duty chains used for lifting farming equipment in the barn for… Days? Weeks? Months? He couldn’t tell. Time had lost all meaning after the first few sessions of Rustanov coming into his family barn to use him and his pa as punching bags.

But Pop was dead. He hadn’t been given an IV port like Tommy had to ensure he stayed alive—if not lucid. Stepan hadn’t dutifully bandaged the older man up and tended to his wounds just enough to keep him breathing for Rustanov’s next kickboxing workout.

There hadn’t been any daily walks to pee and shit in a bucket for Pop like there’d been for Tommy.

“To keep your arms and legs from completely locking up,” Stepan had cheerfully explained. “But if you try to run, I’m gonna put two in the back of your legs. So, don’t do that.”

Tommy hadn’t done that.

But his father hadn’t been given any of these options. Sometime during the eons Tommy had been hanging from the chains, Pop had stopped breathing, then started rotting with a stench that filled Tommy’s nose until suddenly it didn’t.

At some point, Tommy heard a thunderous machine-like sound start up outside the barn.

He vaguely recognized it as the old backhoe used for digging trenches from the days before Pop, pissed off about shrinking government subsidies on his soybean crop, decided, “Know what, Tommy? Bet we could make more on meth and dog fights.”

After the machine noise stopped, Stepan unhooked his father’s body and dragged out his rotting remains.

Now, who knew how long later, Tommy was being let down from his own chains with a promise from Stepan, “Alright, no more of this hanging stuff. You’re all done with these chains.”

All done?

He wondered if it was another hallucination.

He’d had a few of those while hanging next to his father’s body, including one where Pop apologized for ever dragging him into this shit while maggots swarmed over his face.

Maybe Tommy had died, too? Maybe this was his spirit watching what happened after death?

Tommy discovered that was definitely not the case when Stepan helped him to a stand—or at least tried to help him to a stand. Stepan must have left him up there too long this time.

Tommy fell to his knees, his body collapsing under him. Shooting pains ran up his previously numb arms and legs, and intense cramps rippled through his muscles. Hurt like a sonovabitch! Tommy could only lie on the ground, spasming.

“Yeah, it’s going to take a while for you to be able to stand and walk and all that,” Stepan said with a friendly tone that didn’t match his henchman status. “Here’s this.”

Stepan lifted Tommy’s arm with the port to plunge something that immediately flooded Tommy with warmth. “It will help with the pain. Hey, you got something you wanna eat? Mr. Rustanov’s stopping by Culver’s on the way.”

The shooting pains still hadn’t quite subsided. But the opportunity to eat anything other than IV fluids cramped Tommy’s stomach with anticipation.

“Yeah,” he wheezed past the pain. “Double ButterBurger with cheese curds, and a Mountain Dew.”

“You got it!” Stepan stood up and pulled out his phone to relay the order to Rustanov, who was apparently coming here to do something other than punch Tommy until he passed out.

Then he tossed Tommy a pair of black Cal-Mart sweats to pull on over his bruised and naked body with a curt, “Put those on.”

Tommy found himself almost grateful that Rustanov had kept his punches to the upper half of his body. His arms were barely functional, but at least his legs, though weak, could still carry some weight. That decision—and the pain meds—meant he could shuffle to the little table Stepan had set up near the barn doors.

By the time Rustanov walked in, wearing the official Yolks’ game day charcoal tracksuit under his gold-and-white varsity jacket, Tommy was seated and almost felt like a human being.

Almost.

As Rustanov sat across from him, Tommy couldn’t help but notice how clean he looked. The hair he’d been growing out all season was slicked back neatly, his nails buffed and trimmed, his hands scrubbed spotless and unscarred—thanks to the gloves he always wore when he punched Tommy.

Even his jacket looked spotless, either freshly back from the dry cleaner or brand-new. Tommy had no idea where his own varsity jacket had gone. He vaguely remembered wearing it the night he came home to replace the dog that had fought like shit gone, and Lydia Carrington’s yellow mini still parked nearby.

It hadn’t taken long to piece together what had happened. That bitch had tricked him.

Did she even know who she was messing with?

He’d grabbed the crowbar he used to “collect” money for his dad and gone ape on her tiny car, imagining how he’d do the same to her next. Just as soon as he figured out where she lived⁠—

That was the last thing he remembered before waking up here, strung up in his own barn next to his father, who groaned like a cow being bled for slaughter while Rustanov pummeled him, as if he had EVERLAST stamped across his beer belly.

At some earlier point during their nightmare, a detective had stopped by to investigate—but ignored their screams for help after Rustanov nodded to Stepan, who handed over a suitcase Tommy could only assume was stuffed with dirty money.

However, standing across from him, Rustanov looked and smelled as pristine as a bar of department store soap. The expensive kind they only sold in big cities like Chicago.

Tommy, on the other hand, reeked. His ammonia-stained skin clung to the black sweats.

His stomach twisted as he watched Rustanov settle into the chair across from him, for reasons that had nothing to do with his hunger for real food.

He’d give anything to be clean right now. To be dressed in his game day suit and varsity jacket. To skate onto the ice instead of limping to this table.

“For you.” Rustanov pulled the food Tommy had ordered out of the white-and-royal-blue paper bag himself and slid it in front of his prisoner.

Dignity wasn’t a thing Tommy could access anymore—if ever, considering what got him here.

He fell on the food like a starved animal, shoving the burger and curds into his mouth.

“You will be careful, Hanson,” Rustanov advised in that flat, uncaring way of his. “Eat too fast, and you are making yourself sick.”

Didn’t seem to mind me vomiting when you was beating the shit out of me.

But Tommy forced himself to chew slower. He paused for a moment, then asked with his mouth full, “You ain’t eating, too?”

“Nyet, I have dinner plans with Lydia after I am done letting you go.”

So his suspicions had been right from the start! Tommy had to swallow the big bite of burger down hard to keep it from lodging in his throat. Rustanov did have a thing for Lydia. That was the real reason he’d tried to warn everyone off her.

“I knew this wasn’t all over some damn dogs!”

“You are correct.” Rustanov gave him a solemn nod. “It is not just about the dogs you abused. It is also about woman you are thinking you can fuck. Even though she belongs to me.”

“Why didn’t you just tell me you wanted her?” Tommy’s anger spiked. “I would have backed off.”

Rustanov shrugged. Then said, “You will finish your food so we can go soon. I have meal with Lydia. Then it is last game of the season.”

Last game of the season…

That meant it was the end of February.

He’d been in this hell hole for nearly a month.

Salty tears joined the taste of his burger. But neither he nor Rustanov acknowledged them as he finished eating in silence.

“Ready?” Rustanov asked when he was done. “Do you want Stepan to bring you bottle of water or anything else before we go?”

The Russkie almost sounded considerate.

Funny thing, food. When he was starving, Tommy couldn’t think, couldn’t reason, couldn’t keep track of time.

But once he had something solid in his stomach, his sense of logic came creeping back.

“You’re just going to let me go?”

“You are learning your lesson, nyet?”

It was technically a question, but Rustanov’s hard tone made it sound like a statement.

“Yeah, yeah.” Tears burned in Tommy’s eyes. “I learned my lesson. I’ll never talk to Lydia Carrington again, man. Won’t even look at a damn dog. And as for my dad…”

While hanging from those chains, Tommy had spent a lot of time thinking about his life and the way he was brought up. It wasn’t hard to admit anymore. “I know he was a piece of shit. So you don’t have to worry about me. I won’t ever tell anybody about what happened here.”

Rustanov regarded him for a long, hard beat.

Then he said, “I trust these things you are promising me are true. Let us go now.”

“Yeah.” Tommy sniffed back his tears. “Let’s go.”

Stepan had blacked out the barn’s windows and kept the doors closed, so it was always dark inside.

But outside, the sun was setting, and the sky made for a beautiful purple-and-orange background, with Rustanov’s black truck in the foreground.

Like an ad for the RAM 2500.

“You know, it’s funny,” Tommy observed as they walked toward Rustanov’s ride. “I’ve been wanting to see inside your truck since freshman year. Ironic, ain’t it, that this is when I finally get to⁠—”

Tommy cut off when Rustanov shoved him without warning. A tough jolt of a push that sent him stumbling sideways.

Which maybe would have been fine if not for the hole Tommy failed to notice while he was looking up at the sky for the first time in nearly a month.

He found out the tough, descending way that there was nothing beneath his feet when he fell with a shriek. That cut off when he landed so hard his right leg gave out with a sickening crack.

Pain. If not for the drugs he’d been given, still sloshing warm in his system, no doubt he would have done more than just scream. He would have passed out.

But the drugs kept him conscious as he tried to figure out what was going on. Where was he?

His heart stopped when the unmistakable feel of cold dirt under his hands answered his question.

This wasn’t just a hole in the ground.

It was a deep, dark grave.

As if to confirm his guess, warm liquid splashed down on him. Had he been worried about how he smelled? No need to concern himself about that humiliation any longer. The acrid stench of kerosene completely canceled out the scent of his own urine.

When the splashing stopped, a gasoline-soaked Tommy flipped over.

I trust these things you are promising me are true.

Rustanov’s response to his problem suddenly took on a new translation when Tommy found Rustanov standing above his grave with what looked like one of those homemade bottle fires. What did they call them?

Oh yeah, Tommy remembered with weary acceptance. Molotov cocktails.

Joke was on him. Tommy could only laugh as he watched Rustanov light the thing.

The fire cast the Russian player’s sharp face in flickering shadows.

Right before he dropped the bottle into Tommy’s grave. Without a second of hesitation.

Does Lydia Carrington know? Tommy wondered as he watched the bottle sail toward him. Does she know just how far her boyfriend will go? That he is a complete and total monster?

That was the last coherent thought he got to have before he was consumed by fire.

Then there was only pain, so much pain. Enough to make him grateful when his life was finally extinguished by a cold, black death.