by Mari Byrne
Stanley gave her a hurried farewell after that and told her he hoped to see her on another set soon. Stephanie waved to him and looked back down at her wilting pasta reluctantly taking a bite.
It was warm in the room, and the pasta outside of ice hadn’t held up very well. She set her fork down and settled for nibbling on the few vegetables and fruit she had picked up.
When she was done, she turned her head to where the food lay and debated if she wanted to trudge back through the bodies that were still crammed into the small area.
She finally decided she would just stop and get something on the way home, and stood up to see if she could find either of her guys.
Stanley watched Stephanie leave the table, and waited. If she turned to the right, he would have to wait.
However, if she—
The grin crossing his face, if she could have seen it, would have sent Stephanie running in the opposite direction.
Stephanie opened her link to Mitch and Kristain and found them sitting with a woman she had never seen before. They each had frowns on their faces and appeared tense.
She felt Mitch return a thought to her assuring her both he and Kristain were fine. If she wanted to continue to mingle, go ahead. If she was ready, or wanted either of them to give a holler and they would find her.
Stephanie gave a delicate snort at the holler bit and wondered just how loud a voice could sound through telepathy.
Mitch gave her an image of him cringing, ears covered, and a look of pain crossed his face. Stephanie guessed a voice could sound in one’s mind just as it could sound to one’s ears.
Kristain joined them and gave Stephanie the equivalent of a mental stroke down her spine. She shivered and felt their love coming through.
She did her best to return the feeling and hoped they knew just how much she appreciated them not hovering.
She was so intent on the conversation she was having in her head she almost ran smack into someone.
Quickly looking up, intending to apologize, she found herself face-to-face with Stanley once more.
“Are you all right, Ms. Armand?” He braced her with his hands on her arms. She made a tiny sound of laughter and shook her head from side to side.
“Just fine Stanley. I was deeper in thought than I’d realized and wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.” She gave a rueful shrug. “I get that way sometimes.”
She tried to concentrate on what he was saying after that, but Mitch and Kristain both interrupted her to ask if there was something wrong. They relaxed when she explained the mind speak could be a distraction. She was just learning how to do more than two things at once, that was all.
They sent her reassurances that she would get the hang of it soon, and she tuned them out.
She looked up once again at Stanley and he seemed more seriously focused on her than earlier.
“I’m sorry Stanley. I didn’t hear what you said.” She tried to give him a contrite look, but the look he gave her seemed to say she might not really be all right.
“Ms. Armand. I think you might need to sit down.” He began to lead her toward the room that held the food and explained she probably just needed a breath of fresh air and some food in her.
He led her out the terrace doors to tables which had been set up outside. He helped her sit in a chair and told her he would be right back with something to eat. When she tried to protest, he rolled right over her.
“I feel badly.” He began in an almost too serious voice. “I talked your ear off and you politely refrained from eating while I did.” When again she would have protested, he shook his head and held out his hand to stop her from speaking.
“My mother taught me better manners, and if I hadn’t been so distracted with meeting you, I would have used them. Your mother did a better job teaching you manners.”
Stephanie gave in and allowed him to go get her another plate. She told herself she would reassure him it was in no way his fault when he returned.
It was however the sweetest thing for him to do. She wondered if he might not have better manners than he was letting on.
She waited and found the night air did feel cool on her skin and she reminded herself to thank Stanley for the small treat.
He wasn’t long, and she saw the heaping plate immediately. There was no way she could eat even half of what was on it, but she could share it with him. It was only fair, after all.
He set the plate in front of her on her right side. “There. That should help a little.” She looked up and thanked him for his generosity. He grinned as if he had given her a great gift, then stood and waited for her to eat.
“Why don’t you sit down and join me.” She asked. “There’s plenty here, and I can’t possibly eat it all.
As she was turned back to tell him she didn’t mind sharing, Stephanie watched as his hand descended onto her upper arm.
She felt a sharp pain and shot her head up to look into his eyes.
The pleased smile he had been wearing turned into an evil, wicked, leer.
She opened her mouth to protest, and tried to open her mind to scream for Mitch or Kristain. Nothing seemed to work. All she saw was a fast approaching darkness and a feeling of floating away from herself.
Darkness descended and she felt nothing more.
* * * * *
Mitch and Kristain stood abruptly. The link with their wife had been cut suddenly, and not of her will.
They sent out sweeping probes through the throngs of people who traveled from room to room, but felt nothing. No matter how much they increased the volume, their shouts went unanswered.
Mitch looked down at Babbet and abruptly nodded and excused himself and Mitch. For the past few minutes they had been telling her in no uncertain terms they were not interested in her or her pleading to continue their previous connection. The major point of this conversation was for her to leave Stephanie out of any of her future conversations. Upon their arrival at the party several acquaintances mentioned Babbet had been spreading gossip about Stephanie.
They’d said their piece; now, they didn’t care they just wanted to find Stephanie. They each gave an absent nod to the woman and went in a separate direction to find Stephanie.
Babbet watched in slight confusion as both Mitch and Kristain had suddenly stood up. They seemed to be hearing something she couldn’t. She gazed around the room and found nothing out of the ordinary. But when she looked back at the two men, they hadn’t moved. When she would have asked them if something was wrong, they turned to look at her, gave a quick nod, and left abruptly.
Babbet watched as they went in opposite directions and began searching the crowd.
When they had been together, it had seemed as if the two men were reading her mind. Now she wondered—
Getting up, she went to find that rat Labowsky. When he was nowhere around, she quickly went to find a quiet place to make a call. Before she could reach one, her cell phone rang.
“Hello?” Her voice could have charmed the birds from the trees.
“It’s me.” came the reply.
“Did you do it? Do you have the item I wanted?” Her voice held malicious excitement.
When the reply was an affirmative, Babbet’s smile turned to malevolent glee. “Meet me at my house, and don’t dawdle. If you’ve opened the package before I arrive, you won’t like the consequences.”
With the parting threat given, Babbet closed her phone and shoved it into her clutch purse. She hurried to find the party’s host, offered her apologies for leaving early, and hurried toward her waiting limo. The driver hurried around to open the door even as she shooed him around to the driver’s side.
“Just get me home, and I don’t care how many laws you break. I have company who can’t be kept waiting.”
She climbed into the car and slammed the door behind her.
The car shot out of the driveway with a screech of tires and a plume of blue-black smoke.
Kristain and Mitch met almost where they
had started.
Together they determined Stephanie was nowhere to be found. They had asked around and been told she had been seen with an elderly gentleman who had taken her out on the terrace. When they went to check, they had found only empty tables and chairs. No Stephanie, and no older gentleman.
“Do you think we could have missed her?” Mitch suggested. “She could have been here while we were there, and—” He shook his head as Kristain looked at him.
“Never mind. It was a hope. I know she’s not here.” He gave a frustrated snarl that made Kristain pat his arm in understanding.
Mitch went on. “I can’t FEEL her.”
Kristain agreed immediately. “I know. It’s as if the link was cut but the essence is still there.”
Both men looked at each other and didn’t have the need of reading each other’s mind in this matter. They knew if the link was cut for too long they would turn on each other, and one would kill the other.
They nodded grimly at each other and left the party, no thought given to offering their regards to their host.
Chapter 16
I’m in, were the first words she heard from the voice. The weak words were barely above a whisper, yet Babbet felt the pleasure and gratitude from the voice immediately.
The diminutive voice began speaking softly, instructing Babbet in exactly what it wanted her to accomplish. She would only need to stop two men from their goal and in the meantime, she would be provided with gifts geared toward her particular tastes. When Babbet was ready to start her project, she would be sent all she required.
Chuckling softly, the thin voice spoke into Babbet’s mind, and Babbet listened closely.
The weak, yet melodic tones the conniving voice used soothed her as nothing else could. The voice always allowed her to get the most pleasure out of her games and to inflict the most pain. It would be the height of foolishness not to listen.
It had been so long since she had found anyone willing enough to appease her appetite for pain and blood she often wondered if she would ever come again. The voice assured her that if she cooperated she would never again have to worry about finding partners to give her the satisfaction she craved from her bed sport.
I will assuage every need you could dream of and some you would never have imagined. The frail voice promised riches in everything she did and Babbet would indeed claw her own eyes out for the things the voice promised.
Nodding her head in agreement with the voice, Babbet resolved to do anything and everything that was asked of her.
Babbet remembered the exact moment she became invincible. Her perverted sexual appetite had increased over the last fourteen months and gotten increasingly kinkier, not to mention more pleasant over the same period of time. Her taste for bloodletting had grown in direct proportion with the conversations within herself.
It all seemed so clear now! The glee which came with each slice, stab, or cut she inflicted during sex gave her the most delicious orgasms and had begun to thrill her more and more as the connection with the voice increased.
Babbet’s sex life had flourished after the twins had left her and she reveled in her unique appetite for blood. Giggling to herself, she had the thought she could almost be called a vampire now! She didn’t want to drink the stuff, but she so relished rolling in it, and using it for her aphrodisiacs.
It was extremely easy to manipulate the wants of the voice with her wants. The will of the voice however would not be denied and it was a pleasant coincidence both it and Babbet’s wishes had meshed so well. Babbet would have paid for the privilege of beating the woman who had dared to take what was hers. This woman, Stephanie Armand, was going to see exactly what happened to anyone who crossed Babbet Carlson.
* * * * *
The Crone’s malicious smile played across Babbet’s mouth as she listened to the thoughts flying through the human woman’s head. The Crone cackled in glee as she remembered how she had slowly incorporated her own evil plans into its weakminded consciousness. It was truly a pleasure to now have a young body and malicious mind to work with once again.
“Poor, silly, misguided Sara. That stupid woman learned nothing from me if she thought killing me would get rid of The Crone. I told her, more than once, I cannot die! I should have known she only paid attention to what she wanted to hear and not to what I actually told her.”
The Crone had indeed told her that the old body Sara saw her in wasn’t her own. The only reason she’d kept it this long was the people of Aranak trusted this wizened woman, and it would take entirely too long to build up trust in a younger one.
The plans the Crone made fit easily into the frame of Queen Sara, and the vicariousness the Crone lived had been enough for the time. If she thought she wouldn’t have as much fun as she knew she was going to, then perhaps she could go and thank that silly Queen Sara for the unintended progress of her plans.
This woman would do quite nicely.
The Crone couldn’t believe she had not instigated the Queen’s plan on her own behalf. It made things so much easier. Now all she had to do was finish breaking the simple mind already established in this body. When she did, she would be free to take it over completely and take back the throne that rightfully belonged to her.
Queen Sara and Stephanie be damned! She was the ruler, and she would show them all soon enough.
First things first. Let this puny mortal have her fun, the Crone would get her own satisfaction in the end. All she had ever needed was a new body.
* * * * *
The first thing Stephanie became aware of was a woman standing close to her. The next was physical discomfort. She tried to find words to express her situation but her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. She could feel her body, but her thoughts floated in and out of her mind. She did her best to focus her attention on the woman she had first seen, but the woman no longer stood in front of her.
“So. You’re awake.” The voice came from beside her and it took all her concentration to turn her head toward it.
There was the woman she had seen. She tried to wet her mouth, then tried to speak.
“Wha ah oo? Har a Iah?” Stephanie waited for a reply, or might have slept for a moment, but still, none was coming.
The discomfort in her wrist she felt made its presence known. She tried to ease the feeling by moving them but found they seemed to be stuck together.
Now who would have glued my wrist together? She thought to herself. But was then distracted by the woman’s voice speaking again.
“Did you hear me? Are you awake?” The voice turned in direction. “How much did you give her? It was only supposed to knock her out for less than an hour.”
Another voice joined the woman’s and it was a man’s, one Stephanie should have known.
“I gave her part of the amount you gave me. Since I didn’t know how much alcohol she might have had…I only gave her…part of…”
Stanley trailed off as he watched Stephanie twist while tied to the freestanding chin-up bar Babbet had installed in her basement gym. Her movements weren’t coordinated, but the picture she made intrigued him. He moved forward, almost as if in a trance, and came to stand beside Babbet.
Babbet watched as Stanley came to stand next to her. When he was close enough, she saw a glazed look had come into his eyes.
That look she recognized. She had witnessed the same glassy expression come over his face as she had commanded him to get down on his knees while she had circled him like a shark. She had held a whip and the sound of the crack it made every time she let it unfurl and snap made him shudder and shake and a wet spot form on his briefs.
She watched as he reached out with one hand to graze Stephanie’s right breast with his finger and could have swallowed glass. No one, but no one, was going to look at another woman while in the same room with her and want the other woman more.
The red haze shading her vision caused her to stop thinking rationally. It was the only excuse she would admit to herself as to why she
lost her cool.
She turned to Stanley and ordered him back. In her hand, she held a whip and tested her swing as she watched the woman who continued to writhe helplessly where she was shackled.
“Stanley.” Stan heard The Slut’s voice from far away. However, all his attention was focused on the woman who tried unsuccessfully to detach herself from the chin-up bar.
He knew if she hadn’t been given the drugs she would have figured out a way to unhook herself. The only thing that held her arms up were a pair leather cuffs locked together with snaps and buckles. Any person who wore them could easily unlock them. It was one of the reasons he had bought those specific cuffs.
Babbet had more interesting pairs, but these were perfect if they got caught, at anytime Stephanie could have let herself out of them.
Stanley looked up to see if it would happen anytime soon and realized until the drugs wore off, Stephanie was at their mercy.
He growled and forced himself to picture just what Babbet had in mind to do to the woman. What he saw had his eyes shutting and reaching down to adjust the bulge in his slacks. The images running through his mind now almost had him coming where he stood. He held on with everything he could and tried to picture something else.
When he finally felt under control, he opened his eyes and turned to look at Babbet.
“What? No balls?” She reached out to cup him and he hissed through his teeth. “No, that can’t be it. I feel them hanging low and very full right here under this iron rocket,” she moved her hand to cup his penis and he sucked in another breath, “which seems to be throbbing as if it will shoot straight out into space.”
Babbet felt the wetness start to flow freely in her panties and sucked in a deep breath of her own. She knew eventually he would become so aroused she could lash out with the whip, and he would beg for more until she allowed him to come.
She was torn.
On the one hand she wanted to take her lust and anger out on the woman who had presumed to steal her men. On the other, she longed to feel the lash break over the rump of the man who had brought her so low she was willing, even at this moment to hand him the whip and let him have his way with her own body.
