Once Upon A (Stained Duet Book 1)

by Charlotte E Hart

  It takes me a few minutes to stare at the floor and feel sorry for myself, clamping my legs together hoping to rid myself of the memory of his hand inside me. It doesn’t work, and no matter how much I chastise my ridiculous mind, I find myself glad it doesn’t. I’ve never felt that sort of thing. My body still remembers it now. I can sense his hands still there. My clit’s still throbbing, numb with that need to be flicked and awakened again. And my stomach’s sickness is nothing to do with my own vomit filtering through the water I’m in. It’s to do with the fact that I can feel cramping inside me, clamping perhaps. Like I’m empty, unfulfilled. There’s suddenly a void in there that’s screaming to be occupied. It’s never been there before. I’ve never screamed for a fucking. Nowhere near it. But I am doing now. I’m internally screaming for him.

  Finally, I pull myself to all fours, scanning the blue marble through the water beneath me and trying to balance myself around the chains. It’s quite beautiful. Grains of darker blue etch through it, creating patterns and waves. It makes me feel almost gentile as I trace my finger along a line, following it until it brings me to the empty black bucket tipped on its side. The sight of it crushes the calm moment I was having, reminding me of my situation as I stare at its barren existence. And then actuality rapidly descends again as I reach for it, a small snort of contempt snickering out of me and the right chain restricting my movement. What the fuck do I need a bucket for anyway? It’s as empty as I am. What was once full is now nothing more than a vacuous vessel. There’s no water there to use. No disinfectant left either. The water is already spread around me. I look at it covering the blue expanse, the occasional ripple as I move highlighting its depth. It’s too thin to do anything useful with and already soiled by my own expulsion. Useless because of its ferocious discharge.

  I slump onto my knees, sensing the metaphor and fingering the wet rag by my hand. Too thinly spread to be useful. If I had my notebook I’d write that. I’d let the thought consume me and delve into the whys of that statement. Are we all too thinly spread, barely able to give full effect to any one thing because of our responsibilities and deadlines? Perhaps we are. I certainly am. For once, being here is focusing my mind on something as simple as a bucket of water and a blue floor. It’s calming, passive in some way. Annoying too, but at least fluid rather than forced.

  I pick up the rag, hoping to maybe mop the swill back into the bucket, refill it somehow. I don’t know why. It seems relevant, like it’ll make me understand what’s important here. Like this bucket is the answer to something I haven’t even asked myself yet. Why? It halts my movements as I wring the rag out into the bucket and look at the door. He’s doing this, isn’t he? How?

  “Blaine?” I say so quietly he’d never hear it. I don’t even know if I want him to anyway. I just needed to say it, had to let it through my lips so that it was real. Not that any of this isn’t.

  I mop again, swirling the water and watching as, foot by foot, the liquid gets lifted from the floor and squeezed back into its resting place. I’m almost smiling as I see the level rising, for some reason feeling accomplished. Empty vessel, and then a little more, and then more, until nearly full vessel. I find myself reaching and stretching against the chains to get to the final few feet of it. I can’t get to it, though. It’s been spread out of the range of my bonds, making me strain at the leash for finality. I become so incensed with managing my task, with making everything neat and tidy again, that I hiss at the pain that shoots though my wrist, desperate to gain another few centimetres of range. I’m so infuriated, in fact, that I end up squeezing my dress instead, wringing it out into the bucket, hoping for another few millimetres of liquid. I don’t know why, and at the moment I don’t give a fuck. I just need the bucket full. Perhaps I’m going mad, or perhaps I’m just so focused on filling this bucket that I’m delirious. Who knows? At the end of the day his hands inside me on the middle of a vomit covered floor was ludicrous, but I allowed that. He didn’t force it. I’m pretty sure I moaned for it, actually. And then there are these chains. They’re hideous, reminding me of slaves and their years of turmoil, but I’m still in them, regardless of the fact I could have made more attempts to make him take them off. Who the fuck wants chains around them, restricting them? Why would anyone do that? Ask for it even? I tug at them, annoyed with myself for allowing them there and yet oddly comforted by the way they focus me on one small area. Bucket, rag and chains. That’s all there appears to be. That, and my task.

  I eventually rock back onto my knees, surveying the outskirts of my reach. It wasn’t far enough, not by a long shot, but it’s got most of the liquid back in the bucket. It’s all I can do, and for some reason that leaves me feeling incomplete, inadequate. I scowl at the floor, trying to understand the sensations and give them some semblance of meaning. It’s just a bucket and a wet floor, nothing to be concerned about. But I am concerned.

  The door clicks, lifting me from my thoughts, and I watch as the other guy carries a large box in. A box? What the hell is in the box? I scuttle backwards as he approaches, a dull, uninterested look on his face.

  “Don’t worry, love. You’re not my type,” he says, a small laugh directed at me as I stretch my hands out to move myself further away. I’d swear at him, or tell him to go screw himself if I thought it prudent, but for some reason I’m not sure that’s going to get the best results out of any male around here. “’Sides, the boss would have me shot.” Shot? My eyes widen, my arse trying to scamper away again as I glance about, not that there’s any further I can go. “And look, you’re behaving better already.”

  I might not be opening my mouth, but that statement doesn’t sit comfortably at all. My snarl at his face as he puts the box on a table doesn’t go unnoticed. I couldn’t care less. I might behave for Blaine, but there’s a reason for that. It’s called career enhancement. Well, I think that’s all it is. Whoever this fuckwit is, though, he has no hold over me, and I don’t appreciate his tone in the slightest. I follow him with my stare, keeping my snarl perfectly formed as he chuckles and begins using a knife to slash the side of the box open.

  “Good.” Blaine’s voice shocks me, making me swing my head to the door to find him leaning against the frame and surveying my cleaning work. “Wasn’t that hard, was it?”

  I don’t reply as he just stands there, his very being annihilating the other guy in the room. I just watch as his feet eventually lift and start propelling him in the direction of the table. Some guys move just because they need to travel, their feet landing one in front of the other with no other purpose than to arrive at their destination. Blaine doesn’t move like that at all. He stalks. I’d hardly noticed it before. The only thing I’d noticed was the lack of sound coming from his shoes back at his house, something that’s not happening here, but I’d not noticed the deliberation in every move. It’s what makes his aura different to others. It’s like every single footfall or manoeuvre is prepared long before he delivers it. In fact, his hands move like that, too. Slowly. There’s no excess flamboyancy or exaggeration. I can’t even call it monotonous because it’s fascinating, really. Each and every movement is precise and calculated, still fluid, but like he moderates himself, restricting bursts of energy that want to escape.

  “You move like you’re in chains,” I say before thought catches up. Fuck. What a thing to say. He smirks, thankfully. He doesn’t make eye contact, though. He’s far too focused on his box, but he does look at the floor by my knees, widening his smile a little and then re focusing on his box as he blocks my view of it.

  “I have a gift for you,” he says as he grabs the back of the chair and turns to face me. Really, a gift? A towel would be nice. Actually, why aren’t I cold? I’m not cold. I should be freezing. It’s September for god’s sake. I look down at my sodden body, wondering why I’m so hot. “You should enjoy it.” “What?” He just moves sideways, his hand waving at the table behind him.

  Chapter 12

  Blaine

  I f only she
knew how much I restrain myself. Chains are the least of her concerns, and if she mutters one more moan or groan when I have my hand inside her, I’ll let her see just how restrained I’m being.

  To see her here, kneeling, is almost too much. It reminds me of times gone by, times I neither care to analyse nor ponder over any more than I already have done. Of all the places I could have brought her, why here? She’d been the only one to come here. The only one I’d ever relaxed with, taken stock of life with. Eloise. The thought of her makes me draw in a long breath as I watch Alana gaze quizzically at me while I think of another woman and consider her posture.

  “A typewriter?” she eventually says, her mouth hanging open in surprise. I turn from her and look upwards, scanning the hooks and then turn to Tyler.

  “The blue lengths,” I say, dragging the chair towards her and nodding at the cupboard on the right of the room. Tyler does as he’s told swiftly, like a good little boy. It makes me snort lightly, admiring the man’s newfound gait as he crosses the space. Once upon a time Tyler was nothing but a frustrated teenager, gangly and immature. Now he’s more akin to a calmed predator, hardly tamed, but learning his trade nonetheless.

  “Why a typewriter? It’s barely useable,” she continues, her eyes following me as I reach for her hand to help her stand. She frowns at it, possibly scared of what my next move will be. Good.

  “To write, Alana. That’s what you came for, isn’t it?” She looks perplexed, still avoiding my hand as she tries to push herself up. I’ve shoved her back to the floor before she has chance to make it upright, and then offered my hand again as she squirms further away from me.

  “What the…?” She falters, her mouth recalling the expletive before it leaves her lips. Good girl. Quick thinking for someone so outspoken. I smile at her, watching the way her mind ticks over the possibilities of what to do. She should just accept my hand, learn to trust it, depend on it. By the time she leaves here, she’ll understand exactly what my kind are all about. There are no insane connotations here. No adolescence. No unnecessary concerns of youth and bad upbringings. There is only acceptance and involvement—pure, unadulterated immersion.

  “I shouldn’t need to explain what I’m suggesting, Alana,” I say quietly, rubbing my fingers over the pad of my thumb and then opening my hand again for fear of doing what instinct tells me to do to her. “Take the hand.” Her brow furrows, her body fidgeting as she thinks about her options. Her thought makes me tilt my head, interested in what she thinks her options might be. She only has two. Accept my hand and continue, or ask to leave. The latter choice inexplicably saddens me, but I’ll honour it irrespective of my desires. “You came to learn, didn’t you?”

  A few more minutes pass as I watch her blinking at me, her fingers fiddling with her dress. She looks away a few times, her eyes focusing on the door behind me, and then she slowly lifts her arm. The chain glints and shimmers in the light, amusing me with its reflection in her eyes. She’s exceptional, especially in this degraded state. Her mascara runs in black streaks down her cheeks, smudging her unblemished skin. And her mouth is still devoid of lipstick, the hue of natural pink coming through and highlighting wide blue eyes. I take her hand and feel the shiver descend through my own bones again, linking with the same one that caresses her skin. So I hover her, my hand keeping hers at a certain level just to let the sensation dig in deeper. It’s an impression of fascination I’ve not forgotten since the first time I touched her, one I haven’t felt before, irrespective of Eloise’s lasting memory. This new awareness surges through me, reminding me of hopes I’ve never thought possible. There the same ones I’d given up on long ago after finally accepting my natural disposition to cause pain. And because of that very notion, every disciplined moral tells me to let her go immediately, because I’ve known this was coming since the house in Manhattan. I’d felt it between us then when I kissed her, and then again when I’d watched her smother her mouth with chloroform, offering me everything she has without realising she was doing so. I should have driven her back to her home and watched her until she woke, only to tell her I wouldn’t help after all. Instead, nature is taking over, rallying me with patience-testing resolves and unwanted sensations bellowing for escape. It’s all as profound as the touch of her fingers in my grasp now, her prints mingling with mine and hoping to join. And the spark between us, that’s as instinctual as light and dark, mesmerising me with unwarranted futures and soothing nights in the arms of acceptance. She, this, is as captivating to me as the feel of her cunt on my skin, burning my hand and rendering me incomplete without the soul attached freely.

  “You won’t hurt me?” she asks, breaking me of the exploration into my own mind as I keep staring into her eyes. Hurt her? I’ll destroy her given half a chance.

  “Of course I’ll hurt you. That’s what you came to experience, isn’t it?” I reply, still musing my other thoughts rather than what she’s asked. She gasps, a small expulsion of air parting her lips again as she stares back. I smile, perhaps enjoying the majesty of her questioning, or the way she never once removes her gaze and challenges me, the tone still questioning long after the words have left her lips. I eventually let go of her, choosing to stop my wandering thoughts before this all becomes a game of push and pull again, one that will spiral into madness the second I let it consume wisdom. Control is the only sentiment she requires for her story. Mine and hers.

  “But what about…” I turn back sharply, daring her to talk about the connection we’d both felt on that floor again, willing the conversation on. She can damn well feel what it truly means to me if she likes. Only once has something come close to that sensation, and that ended in death.

  She steps back a little, her legs crashing into the chair. Good, perhaps the impact will stop the stupidity that’s threatening her mind with images of love and contentment. There’s none of that here, not the kind she imagines anyway.

  “It needs inking. All you need is here,” I finally say, backing away from her to stop any urge continuing further than it should.

  “What? What do you mean, inking? I don’t know how to do that? It’s ancient.” She looks at the contraption then lightly fingers the keys, depressing one until it achieves a clunk. “No one types on these anymore. What do you expect me to be able to do with it?”

  How would I know? I’m not the writer, she is. I assume she doesn’t need help with that, only that she requires sensations she doesn’t understand. She fiddles again with the machine, her fingers twisting and turning levers, her eyes scanning for how it works.

  “Typing is not my field of expertise,” I say, remembering the lady in the antique shop who offered all kinds of information on how it should be put together. Which ink to buy, where to get the correct paper from, all irrelevant as far as I’d been concerned.

  “No, apparently pain and humiliation is.” It’s a mumbled reply, one she says into the table rather than facing me head on. I smirk at her, enjoying the way her mouth can’t help itself from delivering smartass comments, and knowing it won’t take long before I feel the need to broach the vile contents of her lips with the back of my hand.

  “You learn, then you write,” I say, swiping the rope from Tyler’s hand and signalling that the guy should leave. I’m infuriated enough with the fact that I’ve brought Tyler in at all, but needs must, and having another person present when I’m wound sufficiently tight is practical.

  I put a foot onto the table to push myself up to reach the hook, watching as Alana’s sense of welfare begins leaving the room and wondering why I’ve sent him away.

  “What are you doing?” she asks, backing away as she gapes up at me and tries to move further.

  “Creating tension.” In more ways than one. Albeit, there’s already enough tension in my body for all to see, no matter how much I’m holding it in. Tyler will already be concerned for Alana’s safety, perhaps pondering his own introduction to submissives and sadists, which was the very point of having him here at all. It makes me
question my own sanity as I carry on, flicking my gaze between Alana and Tyler, willing him away in one breath and hoping he’ll challenge me in another.

  The rope slides through as easily as it always does, reminding me of Eloise once more. I’ve not done this for so long. Dabbled, yes. Taught others to achieve their balance more than once, but prepare myself, feel the flex in the cord and let the ache embed itself? I’ve haven’t done that since Eloise. Not once. Why I’m doing it now for Alana is a quandary yet to be realised. I should have made Tyler do it. Or asked Delaney to be here instead, given the job to someone else.

  “Sit down,” I say, glancing at her as she loiters as far from me as the chains allowed.

  “Why?” I stop my hand working the knots and widen my stance on the table to look down at her, pondering whether the questioning will ever stop of its own accord.

  “Because you don’t understand how this works.” She screws her face up, a slight sneer directed at me. “Let me explain so a four-year-old could grasp the thread of order.” She tugs her chain, rattling it and warning me of the storm coming. I chuckle at the thought, my fingers itching with the prospect. “I say, and then you do whatever is asked of you.” Still she stays disinclined to accept the train of thought. I admire her for it some respects, remembering the first time I’d watched a woman fighting her way through independence so she could finally feel free of the unending turmoil associated with it. “The more you deny the order, the more you lose your chance of freedom.”