by Vonna Harper
He gave a damn about the trainee who’d once been Marina? Wanted this to be good for her?
Sick to death of questions without answers, he positioned the recliner across from her, with some six feet between them. He sat and clicked on the remote. She shivered then slowly relaxed. Her features gentled and, judging by how she kept staring at him, she wanted him to comprehend what she was going through. Both intrusions were working her at the lowest setting. The first time he’d stimulated her, she’d remained tense throughout. The contrast between that and today was interesting, much like a once wild horse that had come to associate humans with food and gentle grooming.
He debated asking her to describe what she was experiencing but didn’t want to engage her in conversation—hell, today wasn’t going to include a dialogue. He was here to learn what he could about her while sharing nothing.
After giving her the better part of a minute to get used to the low gear, he switched to second. This time she didn’t shudder. Instead, she smiled and rested the back of her head on the chair. He hadn’t shaved her since that first time, and a faint dusting of hair drew his attention to her pubic area. From where he was sitting, he couldn’t see everything of her sex or what was being done to it, but he could imagine. The imagining fed his erection.
She was enjoying herself—of that he had no doubt. From what he could tell, she wasn’t hampered by dread that pain might accompany the pleasure. Maybe she’d found a way to lock herself in the moment. He wished he could do the same, because it seemed as if he was always looking down the road, seeking more, incapable of simply accepting that the present was good.
He gave her another minute before turning things up another notch. Her breasts started jiggling, as did her inner thighs. Her hands opened and closed, her toes curled and her lashes fluttered.
“Good,” she muttered. “Yes, good.”
“But will it remain like that?”
With an effort, she focused on him. “Don’t play games.”
“Don’t play games, please, Master.”
Judging by how her mouth twitched, she didn’t know whether to laugh or be afraid. “Thank you, Master. No matter what happens later, I need this.”
“Because?”
She tried to reach for her crotch. Her chest heaved. “Because it’s all I have.”
You bastard. You damn bastard.
“Not today it isn’t,” he said. “I’m going to give you some tasks.”
This time there was no mistaking her anxiety. At the same time, he clearly saw her effort to remain on top of her sexual responses. He came close to assuring her that he didn’t intend to punish her, but if he did, he’d have to answer to management. Better to keep them as off-balance as he was doing to her.
“Why aren’t you married? We talked about that the other day, but I didn’t get an answer.”
She again extended her fingers toward her crotch. He tried to imagine what unrelenting sexual stimulation would feel like, but he’d always gone straight to satisfaction. There was no need to engage in protracted foreplay when his sex partners fell all over themselves in their determination to please him.
“Marriage—it hasn’t been important to me. My career is.”
You career was important. “But being a jockey isn’t something you can do until you’re old enough for social security. What about a balanced life?”
Her mouth had stayed open. When she tried to shake her head, he guessed she was trying to clear it. Not touching himself was becoming damn hard. He hadn’t wanted to participate until he’d gotten her close to her sexual edge. Was she there yet?
“I know—I know my jockeying days are limited but…”
“But what?”
“I have a—plan. A dream.”
Not ‘had’ but ‘have’. Self-disgust threatened to swamp him. “What is it?”
She stared at something beyond him. “It will take money—money I hope to earn as a jockey.” She panted. “I want to teach people about horses—and provide a home for unwanted horses.”
Her plan was so damn simple on the surface, but horse rescue was a money pit and giving riding lessons far from a high ticket enterprise. Still, from what he knew of her determination, she’d succeed if anyone could.
Or rather, she’d had a shot before he’d ripped her away from her world.
“It’s a noble but selfish plan.”
“What? How can you say that?”
She was again forgetting to call him Master, but they’d deal with her lapses later. “It would take all your time. There wouldn’t be room for a husband or children.”
Her head sagged. She repeatedly tried to lift herself off the chair.
“What’s the matter, slave? Things getting rough for you?”
Instead of answering, she started tightening and relaxing her thigh muscles. He let her try to deal with unrelenting stimulation for a while, before kicking things up another gear.
“Not fair,” she whimpered. “So not fair.”
“Oh, I believe I’m being more than fair. In fact, I’m downright generous, because according to the Carnal manual you aren’t close to deserving pleasure.”
“Pleasure?” She redoubled her efforts to get away. “How long…”
How long did he intend to keep her like this? He didn’t know. Now that he’d set his plan to get her to spill her soul to him in motion, he wasn’t sure it was what he wanted. Carnal existed to produce expertly trained sex slaves. No one gave a damn about their backgrounds or what dreams and desires they’d once had.
“This can’t be a new experience,” he said as he settled back. “You have a collection of sex toys.”
Her lids kept fluttering as she struggled to focus on him. He concluded she’d split herself into two parts, with one aware of him while the more primitive half tried to deal with nonstop vibrations.
“My— They’re nothing like this.”
Of course they weren’t. Batteries were hardly on a par with something powered by electricity.
“How often do you play with yourself, slave? Maybe you’re so good at it that you have no need for a man. Is that why you sleep alone, because you have a satisfactory alternative?”
“No,” she whispered. “No.”
He couldn’t say how he knew something had changed inside her. “Would you rather have a partner, maybe even a husband?”
Her eyes closed and she stopped trying to fuck the dildo and plug. “I don’t know. I—I’m not very good at getting close to a man.”
He stood and positioned himself between her widespread legs so he could finger her breasts. Instead of abusing them as he was expected to do, he kept the contact gentle. “Is it that? Maybe you keep men at arm’s length.”
“Maybe.” She opened her eyes and locked her gaze on him.
“Why? Are you afraid of them?”
“No.” Her chest heaved. “Everything’s been different—since my father died. I don’t know…”
“What don’t you know?”
She started to take a deep breath, only to slowly exhale. Maybe she’d just now realized what he was doing to her breasts and didn’t know how to deal with it. “Maybe—oh, God—whether I can trust one.”
What the hell kind of a relationship had the two of them had? If the old man had raped his teenage daughter, it was a good thing the bastard was dead because he might have killed him. Some lines were never crossed, never.
Then what the hell about this one?
“It isn’t—isn’t what you think.” The words pushed past lips she was trying to keep closed.
“Tell me what it was.”
Chapter Twenty
She looked so close to tears he had to fight the urge to comfort her. He compromised by massaging her breasts. When goosebumps spread over them, he stepped closer so their thighs touched. She blinked and her eyes cleared. When he pressed the palm of his hand over her heart, she sighed. A second later tension seized her. Her mouth hung open and her legs shook.
“I c
an’t—I can’t come.”
Maybe it was her admission that brought him back to reality. He could keep her suspended between pleasure and hunger and experience some of the same himself, but wasn’t that counterproductive? Better to dig the truth out of her while she could still think.
Better to concentrate on his job.
“Tell me about your father.”
The story came from her, one halting sentence at a time. The whole time he lightly massaged her breasts while her heartbeats pulsed through his fingers. After her mother’s death from cancer, her father had stopped driving trucks and gone to work at a large-scale beef cattle operation. Father and daughter had moved into a mobile home on the acreage and, with Marina trotting beside him, he’d worked the long hours that were part of the ranching lifestyle. When Marina had been old enough for school, she’d had to take a nearly two-hour bus ride. Her friends had come from ranching families, but she’d spent most of her free time with her father.
Horses had become her passion. She’d ridden bareback, mothered the foals, learned how to treat many injuries, and several times sat beside dying horses with their heads on her lap. Her father had felt the same way about anything that lived. Yes, he’d taken responsibility for beef cattle destined for slaughter but he’d done everything he could to make their lives as pleasant as possible.
Father and daughter had been on the same wavelength. They hadn’t needed to talk about their relationship, they lived it. Whoever got to the trailer first started dinner. They’d shared chores, listened to the same country and western music, and had gone to rodeos and horse races together.
“One day—he was using a tractor to move some equipment.” Her eyes had become glassy and her body occasionally jerked. “It—” She shook her head but still looked mostly out of it. “I can’t think.”
“Yes, you can. You need to do this.”
“Maybe,” she muttered. “It had been raining and the ground was soft.” She sighed. “The tractor tipped over. It landed on top of him.”
Until now she’d been fighting to speak despite the vibrations wracking her body, but as she talked about the last day of her father’s life, she seemed to separate herself from her reality. Her soft words were matter-of-fact. In contrast, her expression left no doubt of her emotional pain.
“Did you see it happen?” He’d continued to stand over her while she told him his story. His hands hadn’t left her breasts, but he wasn’t sure she was still aware of his presence.
“No.” She twitched and her muscles remained tight. “He, ah, I was working with a horse. God—I—if he yelled for me I didn’t hear him.”
“You found him?”
Her eyes were both vacant and too big. “I don’t know how long—he didn’t die right away.”
She didn’t know how long her father had been under the tractor before she’d found him. Unsure whether it was better to change the subject or let her continue, he planted his hands on her thighs and leaned even closer. “I hope to hell you didn’t blame yourself.”
She blinked repeatedly, straining to get off the chair as she did. Maybe he was wrong but he wanted to believe she was trying to reach for him. At times like this a person, even a sex slave, needed to be comforted.
Her lips trembled. “I knew he was working on the side of the hill. It wasn’t the first time the tractor had tipped over. I should have—”
He started rubbing her arms. Goosebumps came to life under his touch. “Don’t. He knew the risks. You can’t blame yourself. It won’t change anything.”
She was looking everywhere but at him, making him wonder if she was trying to separate herself from his words—from him. “I mean it. It wasn’t your fault.”
When she tried to shake her head, he cupped her chin. He pressed his other hand against her chest. “Your father wouldn’t want you feeling this way. He was a good man.”
“He was,” she whispered. “Strong and kind. Gentle, so gentle. He didn’t need much, just the weather co-operating. That’s what he always said—if he was going to pay his bills and earn his keep and never get in trouble, the least the weather gods could do was reward him.”
“He also wanted his daughter to live her life.”
The moment he spoke, he knew he’d said the wrong thing, at least as far as Carnal Incorporated was concerned. Fighting the part of him that wanted to remain with her, he back-stepped to where he’d left the remote and aimed it at her. For years he’d seen the opposing team members as the enemy. That’s what this woman was, someone to be mastered and walked away from. Mostly walk away from when he was done with her.
“I don’t need anything more from you today,” he told her. “You’ve spilled enough guts for one day, revealed enough vulnerabilities.”
Watching her try to regain her composure, he stopped lying to himself. Whatever she was, she wasn’t his enemy. He thought about explaining that his intention had been to take her beyond losing her father, but he was in uncharted territory. Not only didn’t he dare forget about the ever-present cameras, he couldn’t fathom what someone went through when they spotted their beloved parent’s broken body.
“My father means nothing to you.” She stared fixedly at the remote, as if challenging him. “You don’t give a damn what happened to him. This is all part of your sick plan to break me.”
A kick in the nuts couldn’t have wounded him more. His first impulse was to push the vibrators as high as they’d go and let her deal with the consequences of her outburst, but she deserved better.
“I do care about your father,” he told her as he turned things off. Instead of hurrying into an explanation of why he’d said what he had, he watched. At first she remained tense, then she started to relax. She draped her fingers over the end of the chair arms.
“Do you want me to beg, Master? Plead with you to let me climax? Where’s your whip? Aren’t you going to—?”
“Stop it.” He dropped the remote to the floor and returned to her. Barely believing what he was doing, he knelt before her and laced his fingers with hers. “I know why you’re saying what you are. I got too close. Stripped away your layers. The only way you can put your defenses back up is by seeing me as your opponent.”
“That’s what you are.” She didn’t try to free her fingers.
Yeah, I know. “That isn’t the point. Your world revolved around your father and when he died, a part of you died with him.”
Master was right. In some regards, Marina had felt half alive ever since that horrible day. It had been the sudden loss, having her father one moment and nothing the next. She’d been so young when her mother had died that she hadn’t really mourned her. In aching contrast, she’d been a teenager when fate had robbed her of her only parent. No matter how many times people told her not to hold herself responsible for the accident, she had.
“I was wrong,” he said. “I don’t want you to stop talking after all. You said it had been raining and the ground was muddy. Was it spring?”
Her body still pulsed. If she wasn’t careful, she might tell him how desperately she still needed to climax. “Spring. A Saturday morning.”
“And you were, what, off somewhere?”
Do it. Just get it over with. “I’d slept in. As soon as I got dressed, I hurried outside and told Dad I was ready to help him. He, ah, the night before we’d talked about the garden we wanted to plant. We’d decided to devote the morning to getting the ground ready.”
“And he wasn’t happy when you overslept.”
“No, he wasn’t.” Master’s fingers were so large they spread hers wide, but without the contact, she wouldn’t have been able to go on. “I kept telling him I was sorry. He said it was all right but I knew it wasn’t.”
“Why not?”
“There’s so much that has to be done in the spring. He’d just planted hay and needed to mend some fences. The calf auction was coming up. Part-time employees were on their way to help us. Our agreement had been to— I’d promised I’d do the preliminary tra
ctor work if he’d help me set the rows for what I wanted to plant.”
“Your father let you run the tractor?”
She couldn’t remember when she’d last felt like laughing, but she did now. “I’d been doing it for years. I was supposed to be on it that morning.”
“If you’d been driving, you might have been killed.”
“No,” she whispered, “because I would have been working north of where he was. We hadn’t seen eye to eye about where to put the garden. When I didn’t show up on time, he decided to do it his way.”
“So there was tension between the two of you. Did that happen often?”
She tried to shake her head. Feeling the collar tighten brought her back to reality. She pressed her fingers against his, which was the only way she could let him know him she didn’t want this contact after all. He slipped his hand free, stood, unhooked the collar, and released the strap around her shoulders. Renewed blood flow ran through her.
“Talk now,” he said. “You and your old man were at odds that morning.”
“Don’t call him that.” Expecting punishment, she warily studied him. “He was my father.”
“You’re lucky. Not all of us feel that way.”
As far as she could remember, this was the first thing of a personal nature he’d told her. So much had changed between them today. It might not last, but she was hungry for anything that made her feel less like an object.
“I know,” she said. “Dad and I hardly ever argued. I apologized and he said it was all right, but I knew it wasn’t because he was under so much pressure.”
“Teenagers need a lot of sleep.”
“It didn’t matter. I was expected to carry my weight. I’d been making some money working with horses people didn’t have time for, so decided I’d try to make it up to Dad by gentling a gelding so I could return it to its owner and get paid. The gelding had a lot of energy. I started by letting it run. By the time I got back…”
Chapter Twenty-One
