Make Me: Twelve Tales of Dark Desire

by Aleatha Romig

  I squinted as a blast of wind came up off the beach and rattled the umbrella shading our table. At least Klaus had a suggestion of handsomeness about him with his short, dirty-blonde hair that could tug at your fingers like bristles on a brush, and the no-nonsense Germanic bone structure of his face. I imagined few women dreamed of being captured by a brute with a pot gut and bad teeth. Klaus would look good on film. We could edit if his acting was awful. Or mine. Only I wasn’t sure how much I’d be acting.

  No matter how much preparation and thinking we’d done, this whole exercise was foreign territory.

  I took another swallow of my coffee frappe and set it on the little round glass-topped table. My fingers were cold. So were my lips and a spot in the center of my chest.

  “You’re insane. You know that don’t you?” Klaus regarded me without bothering to move from his casual position in the wicker chair. Only the mild narrowing of his eyes betrayed…something. He was probably totaling up expenses, though I knew my idea disturbed him.

  “Of course.” I mimicked his coolness and smiled. Inside I was going sign, sign, sign. To do this, I didn’t really need him to sign, because I trusted him, but he needed this. He’d only do this with everything under control, and with t’s crossed and i’s dotted.

  The day I’d raised this idea came to me in vivid detail. I’d been so nervous my chest had seemed wrapped in steel. Breathing was hard to do simultaneously with wondering how he’d react, or what he’d say.

  It had been tax time. Klaus always did my taxes. He’d probably cornered doing the taxes of many of the residents of Magnetic Island. This wasn’t a small place, either. Though close to the mainland of Australia, it had the aura of a faraway fantasy holiday destination even after you’d lived here for years. Tropical climate, palm trees, secluded white-sand beaches, and enough hills and valleys and little roads everywhere to make it ever so quaint. Tourists were the only drawback, but even they were assets if you liked ogling them and bumping elbows with tanned cheerful people in skimpy swimwear.

  Klaus’s office was on the main street in Nelly Bay. If you crossed the unsealed road you’d be only a few meters from where the grass sloped down to the beach.

  A breeze had riffled in through the slats of his window louvers. The roofing iron above pinged in the heat and a fan swished lazily overhead.

  “Done.” He reached over and dropped the final document onto the desk in front of me. “I’ll see you again next year, Jodie. You’ve got to get more engagements, you know.” He raised his eyebrows. “Or you’re going to go under.”

  Understatement of the year. Being a comedienne and low-budget documentary maker was close to auditioning to become a street bum.

  “I try.” I stared back while assembling my best imitation of nonchalance. Be businesslike and this will seem less…stupid. But truly I was like one of those crazy mice on a wheel. Always, that was me. Today wasn’t that different from my average day. Inside my head, I was running fast in circles, like an insane hamster, while on the outside I acted like a hip sunglasses wearing chick who’d just stepped out of the Ice Age. I’d even gotten a tattoo above my butt this year. I was pretty sure that made me badass.

  “Was there something else you wanted?”

  I let out that breath. Go. “I have an idea. Performance art of a sort. I want do a film based on me going through the experience of a capture fantasy.” That blank look I’d expected. Men didn’t read truckloads of erotic stories like women did. Or like I did, anyway.

  “Capture fantasy?”

  ’Nother deep breath, let it out. I rattled out the words like I’d memorized them for a test, which I kind-of had. “It’s a fantasy of a lot of women—where the protagonist of a story is captured and basically made to serve a man sexually and sometimes in other ways. So she becomes his slave or at least under his control. Sometimes it’s permanent, sometimes they end up married.”

  Silence. The wind blew. The fan swished. And I was sure I must have distant genetic traces of mouse in my family history. I’d have scurried under the desk given half a chance.

  “Sounds like rape.” He picked up a pen and rotated it like a propeller through his fingers while giving me a dead-set black look. Nerves? Had I unsettled him? “How is that performance art? What exactly do you plan to do?”

  “Ah. Yes. Crucial point. I plan to have myself mock-captured, but in as real a way as possible. No sex, of course, but I want to show the changes that might occur in a captive subjected to this sort of situation.” I swallowed and imagined shooting all the butterflies in my chest with a dart gun loaded with valium. “I’m aiming to allow a bit of the reality to leak into the situation, but not too much. Women buy stories like this by the millions, so there has to be a mar—”

  “No. You are not doing this.” He stamped the words out like a man squashing cockroaches under his boot.

  I leaned away until the chair hit my back and I could go no farther, then I stiffened and leaned forward again to show he hadn’t scared me. “Sorry?”

  “There is no way you are allowing a man to do this.”

  “Ah. Ah-huh. Mmm.” Quailing, but trying not to show it, and to give myself a break from the confronting wrinkles on his forehead which pretty much said, you’re one crazy muthafucka, I reached into the canvas bag on my lap, pulled out my old eReader and tossed it at him. It spun to a halt hanging partly over the edge of the desk just where his lap would be.

  His mouth turned down and those sandy-colored eyebrows went a tad higher.

  “There. I left a few on there for you to…” I sucked my cheek onto my teeth for a second, “…to study.”

  Just imagining Klaus reading those stories, some of which I had merrily masturbated to while reading, made my cheeks heat up. Gah, woman. Get this over with.

  He tapped the surface of the eReader with his forefinger, like it maybe contained something suspicious. Which it did if you counted the fading traces of hundreds of explicit erotic romances and BDSM stories and…yeah, um, those. The bondage and fucking and humiliating scenes I’d read had probably scarred my brain. It was a wonder I hadn’t worn out my clitoris.

  “Why should I study this?”

  “Because you’re the man I had in mind.”

  Yes. That had gone down so well.

  Those stories had made me wonder about the difference between fiction and reality. I’d imagined scenarios, with me in them. Most times the man in my imagination was anonymous but once or twice, he’d been Klaus.

  Yes, that day in his office had been so wonderful. I focused back on the present. Klaus was still being stubborn and hadn’t signed—nothing new for him. We both had a streak of stubborn, I guess. It had made for some fiery arguments.

  Seagulls cruised on the winds, kids ran about laughing on the beach below, but at our table the tension was making my head throb.

  “If I sign this you are giving me carte blanche—” He frowned. “—to make you a captive in your home up there on the hill. No neighbors. No contact but me for four weeks.” The corner of his mouth twisted. Oh noes—I was in for one of his bursts of silliness. He leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “I will have you washing my dishes naked in a week.”

  “God.” I groaned. The fucking dishes. That had driven me crazy when we were together. “Klaus, the nakedness is a no-no. You are the one who made me put it in the contract. But no dishes either.” No sex, of course, even though I hoped otherwise. No nakedness. No physical damage. His face was to be blurred out. A copy of what we were doing was in a deposit box at the bank. Neither of us wanted Klaus arrested if something weird happened—like the cops showing up.

  But needing money was one thing. Washing the dishes was another.

  “No dishes, Jodie?” He shrugged. “A bad bargain. Slaves should do dishes.”

  I raised my eyes to the underside of the mango-colored beach umbrella and prayed for deliverance. Of all my friends and acquaintances, Klaus was the only one I could ask to do this. The only one I trusted to do
this. Still, he was being a bastard. While he waited for me to reply, with one finger he slowly turned his shiny stainless steel pen around and around on the table.

  I’d never ever done dishes for him. I detested housework to the core. A dishwasher I could load, sure. Hand washing, carrying meals out to a man at a BBQ—all those womanly chores made me shudder. I liked my equality. Women weren’t slaves. My fantasies only went so far.

  I pursed my lips and sipped more frappe. The bastard abandoned his pen and sat back, watching me with those green-gray eyes. This was ridiculous. After all the mucking around, after days of bargaining, it came down to dishes? He’d helped me with some of the house alterations even. Would he give in if I stood my ground?

  “Klaus…”

  “Mmm?”

  Fuck. As my accountant, he knew I needed money, yet he’d just about sent me to a psychologist when I suggested this. He’d told me that of all my performance art, this was the most extreme. Maybe he was right. No, he was right. But his protests and the precautions he’d demanded, the contract with six million sections…before all that I’d been wary myself of going ahead. After I’d had to drag the man to the bargaining table, despite me offering him a share in any profits from the film, drag, drag, drrraaaag to the bargaining table, then, and only then, I knew I could trust him.

  If filming a woman enacting a capture fantasy and exploring the psychological changes didn’t win me a world-wide media contract, I’d eat the damn beach umbrella, with a bucket of beach sand to wash it down. And if I was wrong, I’d have no money for food, and sand would look tasty.

  That Klaus had agreed though—that gave me more hope than I’d had for a while. The man only ever bet on near certainties. If he thought this could make money, it would.

  He hadn’t budged. While I’d run through the encyclopedia of my worries, filed them alphabetically, and then set them alight, he’d barely shifted an inch. His hands lay loosely on his trouser-clad upper thighs. From the corners of my eyes, I dwelled on one of his best aspects. The heaviness of his thighs was all muscle. Being a black belt in judo since his twenties meant Klaus had the musculature of a very fit man despite being almost forty. They’d felt good between my legs when we’d made love.

  Thoughts out of the gutter. “Fine.” I closed my eyes and shook my head in mock despair. “But I’m not guaranteeing I will. If you can get me to do the dishes it’ll be a mind-fuck of Olympic proportions.

  “I haf my ways, fraulein.”

  I groaned. That mock German accent drove me nuts too. Almost as much as the dishes idea. Then he signed the contract, finally.

  Relief swept me like a cool breeze, only it sank farther and chilled my bones just a little. Done it. But…yeah, there were limits and rules, but still this was the weirdest thing I’d ever done. And the strange little look he’d given me after I’d agreed to do the dishes had jarred me.

  Jeez. The dishes?

  Really, if he’d unwrapped an array of knives I should worry. Maybe it was just that he’d gotten me to say yes to something I’d hated so. But I needed a man with some dominance or this whole exercise would have wilted. This needed to have some realness.

  As Klaus went to pay for our meal, I brushed aside some strands of hair from my forehead and took a deep breath of the salty air.

  In a minute, I was going to climb into his car and drive home, and give him the key to my house. Yes, I must be insane. But if it made me money I didn’t care. There was also that niggling other reason. Klaus was hot, like hot in the I-still-dream-of-you-and-want-to-fuck-you way, and that was going to make this even more interesting than it would have been with any other man. Some of his rules…I prayed they’d get broken.

  Chapter Two

  Klaus

  ‡

  I didn’t speak on the drive up to Jodie’s house. After a few light-hearted jokes that we both laughed at, she went quiet too. The road was dirt and rough, and the gravel sounded like a small war under the tires of my jeep.

  I guess we both were preoccupied. Considering what we were doing, I wasn’t surprised. The canopy of over-arching gums cut much of the sun as it slanted in over the sea. A glance across at Jodie revealed dappled light slipping over the curves of her face. Her auburn hair streamed backward and bared her neck. She was a beautiful woman. Desirable, but too complicated for me.

  Every time I’d seen her up on stage, in the days when I used to go watch her, I’d cringed at the things she’d revealed. It had been like seeing someone trot out their soul on a plate and hold it up for the audience to laugh at. Once, and once only, she’d made a joke of something we’d shared. She’d stopped when I’d made us off limits, but it was too late for me; it had soured things. I couldn’t understand her. Willing to do that for strangers and yet she had this thing about holding back with me. Not doing dishes? What was that?

  To me, giving of yourself should be more for those you loved, not less.

  Was she a good comedienne? From the laughter, she succeeded most of the time, but I knew she’d never make it big. Something about her left her timing a flinch, a half-step, a gesture just shy of perfect.

  I slotted the jeep into the space beside her yellow Suzuki Swift and we walked to the front door. As always, her smallness made my manners struggle to break out. I wanted to put my hand on her back and guide her, but didn’t. After all, I was to be her captor. This was so odd.

  At the door, I held out my hand for the key.

  “This is it, huh?” She quirked an eyebrow but tossed her keys in an arc so I had to catch them out of mid-air. “Don’t forget the caviar on toast every morning and the champagne on Sundays.”

  “More like bread and water and cornflakes,” I drawled as I pushed open the door.

  “Cornflakes?” She chuckled. “Guess I’m in heaven then.”

  This was a nice little beach house, white with Mediterranean blue trim, a prim delusion of grandeur, a surface coating of prettiness, and buried in the basement, a prison cell. Damn, we were both crazy.

  “Down to the bowels of the house, we merrily go,” she sang, skipping down the hallway ahead of me.

  I smiled and watched her ass. Of the two of us, she was a little crazier.

  At least her, I understood—money needs and sexual fantasies.

  Me? I didn’t need the money. I could do with more, don’t mistake me, but I didn’t need it. Sexual fantasies too? There was no sex involved though, just the odd feeling that doing this would be…intriguing. Plain and simple, I was curious. At nearly forty, I had an inkling there must be more to life. I felt stagnant and this certainly confirmed that Jodie had a knack of finding things I’d never dream up on my own to do.

  And yeah, admit it, man, Jodie still had this thing going. Attraction. I couldn’t pass up a chance to be around her. It wasn’t purely sexual either. Pheromones? Some special sort of catnip that zeroed in on me? Who the hell knew? I never wanted to see her hurt, even when she was the one hurting herself. Or if I was the one she roped in to do the hurting by proxy? So what was I doing? A psychologist would have a field day with me.

  When I got to the downstairs room, she was slowly turning in a circle with her arms out like this was some ballet show, and smirking. “Here it is.”

  “Yep.”

  “Here” was a room she’d used for storage, with a toilet and shower attached. The small window up near the ceiling already had burglar-proof bars but we’d put a shutter on also and padlocked it. By the time I’d fished the wrist cuffs from the box on the single wooden chair, Jodie had calmed. I wrapped the cuffs on her wrists, checking out her widened eyes as I did so. There were little padlocks for the buckles and I clicked them into place. New leather smells good, and I took my time, running my fingertip along the raw cut edge before I released her wrists. The look of the black on her white skin said…screamed, vulnerability.

  “Scared?” I murmured. I stepped back and waited while she lifted her hands and gave the cuffs a small puzzled look—as if she’d never seen them befo
re.

  “Of you? Ha.” She bit her lip and audibly sucked in air. “Nooo. Excited, maybe. There’s butterflies in here.” She laid her palm on her stomach. “I can’t believe we are going through with this.”

  “Me neither. But, if we’re doing this, we do it as planned. Even the Fire Department would be upset over this arrangement.” I waved at the blocked window. “Let alone the cops. There’s no point in going halfway. This film has to be good or we’re wasting our time.”

  “Yes.”

  I sat in the chair and took the laminated list from the box. I held it up as if checking the words but instead sneaked looks over the top. Her little denim shorts showed a hint of butt cheek when she knelt to sit on the mattress. Damn, what was with me? Peeking at a woman…a thought hit me…a woman who, in a few minutes, I was going to lock inside this room.

  For a second or two, I couldn’t have blinked if my life depended on it. I stared at nothing.

  What was wrong with me?

  Was that frisson sexual? I didn’t dream of locking up women. I certainly wasn’t planning on raping her. I could have sex with Jodie if I wanted to. She’d given enough hints since I broke up with her. But here I was, dissecting her every move.

  I snapped my gaze back to the list. The words blurred.

  Yeah, the mattress on the floor, cuffs, blocked window, and video camera aimed through the hole in the wall all spoke of normal. If someone walked in right now, maybe we could just say we were being kinky, and maybe the contract would get me out of trouble. Sobering, though. I knew I should not be doing this, but if I was then it would be done right.

  “You ready?” I asked.

  She raised her shoulders in a hesitant shrug and grimaced. “Sure.”

  “Okay.”