by Rue Volley
A bowl of milk was set before her, she knelt forward and just as the rigid tip of her tongue made contact a loud crack rang out behind her. She flinched as the riding crop left a welt. The pain as delicious as the milk that still lingered in her mouth.
The man grabbed her black ponytail and pulled her head up, milk ran down her chin and she parted her lips, letting her tongue lap it up.
“More,” she whispered.
“In due time,” the voice behind the mask said.
Teasing, taunting. She moaned and was forced back to the bowl of milk. Each time she tasted it, another hit rang out. I flinched with each one as I started to tense up, becoming wet, and my heart beat lowered to rest between my legs. It excited me, the thought of her submission. He jerked her head back and produced a razor and I stood up. The intensity of it making me feel as if I was going to have a panic attack right there in front of everyone. I pushed my way down the row as Avery called out to me, but I had to run. Everything in me told me that I had to.
I pushed the doors open and stumbled out into the retro-looking lobby. The attendants stopped working and turned to watch me as I tried to catch my breath. I leaned over and then looked back up at one of them.
“Bathroom?” I asked. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
The attendant pointed to the right and I ran down the long dark hall, around the corner, and stopped as I saw two gold doors, beautifully etched with roses and thorny vines. I looked to the left and saw a large, red velvet couch and walked to it. Sitting down and collecting myself, I couldn’t believe how overcome I felt as I watched them.
His control over her stirred something up in me. The hand to her hair, wrapped and jerking it upward and then leading her in to taste the sweet milk in the bowl beneath her. Her tongue rigid as it submerged, rising as the white nectar dripped from it. Told to taste, but not swallow. And the red head, whipping her from behind. It was too much. It overwhelmed me.
I leaned forward and held my face in my hands as my heart slowed and the feeling of panic started to die down in me. I felt a hand on my shoulder, it offered much needed comfort. Of course, Avery would come after me. I looked up to see Jack’s face in front of me and I scooted back as if I had seen a ghost. My body shook and the panic started to set in. Was I dreaming? Perhaps I had passed out in the theater, fabulous. That’s all I needed. As if I wasn’t acting weird enough right now.
“Abigail—are you okay?” he asked as his voice told me that this wasn’t a dream.
I bit my lip, almost hard enough to taste blood.
The confusion was completely engulfing my expression. “Jack?”
His comfort came in waves, some soothing, and some unnerving me.
“Yes, do you need anything? Can I help you?”
I wanted to say so many things. Of course, I needed things. So many that it would sound completely insane if I rattled them off.
I laughed; no other response seemed appropriate. “Unbelievable,” I muttered to myself.
He stayed on one knee in front of me like some tease to a proposal of sorts.
“I felt—sick. I’m okay now.”
He looked me over, lifting his hand to touch my cheek with the back of it. “You feel a bit warm.”
I smiled as his hand lingered against my skin. I should slap it away, but, to be honest, it is like heaven. Seeing him was all that I had dreamed about since that day. Foolish and unnecessary, but truth just the same.
“I have a cold, some flu thing, I don’t know. My appetite is gone.”
He stood up and then sat down next to me on the couch. I turned to look at him, but it made me so uncomfortable. Why he has this ability is aggravating. So aggravating that I crossed my arms on my chest and kind of closed him off the best that I could with body language. He noticed, but he didn’t let it bother him. His expression remained the same as he studied my face.
“Can I do anything—for you, to make it better, anything at all, Abigail?”
I shook my head, even though about a hundred things came to mind, including a riding crop and a bowl of milk. I blinked as the naughty thoughts flashed in my mind. I had to beat them down and away from me.
I spoke before I thought it through. “You could have called, that would have helped.”
His jaw tightened and then relaxed. I could tell that I caught him off guard, but he may enjoy it. I don’t know. His eyes lit up as he scooted toward me.
“Is that what you wanted, Abigail?”
I swallowed hard as his smell engulfed me once again. He wore some blend of vanilla and sandalwood. It was manly, but still lingered around me with some gentle after effects. I breathed him in and held it inside of me for a moment. Something I had wanted to do for the last three weeks, but didn’t get the opportunity. I scooted back as he scooted toward me. We moved as one.
“I don’t know what I wanted.”
He looked down at my hand and lifted it up to inspect the small, pale scar he had left behind on me.
“Does this remind you of me?” he asked as he gently rubbed his thumb over the scar. Each stroke sent waves of pleasure up my arm and he never took his eyes from mine. He placed the tip of my finger to his lip and then slipped it inside his mouth. His teeth grazed me at first, rough and aggressive, and then the warmth of his tongue engulfed me. I sighed without hesitation as I watched him. He moved my finger in and out of his mouth so slowly that it matched my breathing. I tried to focus, but he was once again taking away my ability to control anything about the situation.
“It does,” I whispered to him as he removed my finger from his lips and moved even closer to me.
“Tell me, Abigail, have you touched yourself since we were together?”
I shook my head ‘no’ as if the ability to lie had been stripped from me.
“So,” he said in a soft whisper as his eyes lowered to my lap, “are you wet now?”
I cleared my throat as his words felt like strokes on my clit. Each word digging deeper into me, to places no one had ever been before. He lowered my hand and pressed it to my lap as his fingers moved mine. I sucked in my breath as I stared at him. He never took his eyes from my own as he slowly started to make me stroke myself. I moaned, small at first and each time I did, so did he. He matched me, mirroring my emotions, my needs, my desperate want for this.
Suddenly he stopped as my body shook with him. He let my hand go, his wicked lips parting into a smile that could rival Lucifer’s.
“Do you have your bullet with you?” he whispered into my ear. I nodded to him and he looked down at my bag. “Get it out, now.” I complied.
I pulled it out and he stared at it and then lowered his eyes. “Put it inside of yourself.”
“Here?”
“Does it have a control?”
I nodded to him. “Give it to me.”
I pulled out the small remote and handed it to him. I leaned up onto my knees in front of him as he undid the top of my pants, he opened them and let his nails scrape along my skin and I hissed. He grinned as he looked up at me. “Put it in my mouth, Abigail.”
I placed the bullet in his teeth as he jerked my pants down and I wrapped my fingers into the back of his dark hair. He slid my panties aside and placed one of my legs on his shoulder. He pushed the bullet inside of me with his mouth, careful to not linger and let me feel him against my clit.
He lowered my leg and pulled my pants back up. Then he stood up with the remote in his hand.
“Go back into the theater, sit in the back, alone.”
I nodded to him as he walked away from me. I stood up, swaying on my feet. I couldn’t believe I had allowed him to do this to me or that I had run into him here, but none of it seemed to matter.
I walked very slowly back to the theater. I took a seat in the back just as he had instructed me to do. The last five rows were vacant, so I was alone. I watched as a woman was strapped to a giant wheel and was spun ever so slowly. The red head would stop the wheel and tighten a nipple clamp and the wom
an on the wheel would cry out. The crowd was silent as they stared on. Then I felt it, a little hum at first and then a pulsating feeling rose from between my legs. I knew that he was close enough to control it, but I could not see him. I leaned back in the chair and lowered a bit. Biting my lip as the pulse came in short bursts, it made me want to scream out in pleasure, but just as I would find a climax rising, it would stop. Over and over it continued until, finally, he allowed me to come. I slid onto the floor, gripping the chair in front of me. My chest heaving up and down as the orgasm ripped through me and nearly made me pass out. It slowly dissipated and the bullet stopped vibrating inside me. I pulled myself up, legs weak, sweaty, and utterly exhausted to see that the show had ended, and the lights were coming on. I leaned back in the chair and then ran out, shocked that I had allowed myself to come in public at the hands of a man who simply watched on from the darkness.
CHAPTER FIVE
THE GIFT
I threw the bullet away as soon as I could make my way to the theater’s bathroom. It was the only thing about him that I had shown complete control over. I wanted to keep it inside of me as long as I could to allow him to visit me from the shadows of his world at will, but I knew that wasn’t healthy. Nothing about this entire situation was.
I raced out and looked for him, but I didn’t see him anywhere. The street was full of people who had enjoyed the show. Me? Well, I enjoyed something else, entirely. I stood there rubbing my arms, white puffs of smoke escaping my lips, feeling foolish, vulnerable, almost taken advantage of to a certain degree. But could I blame him? Not really, I allowed it; I let him seduce me, yet again. His words like that of a siren to sailors out at sea.
I jumped as Avery hugged me from behind. I turned and my pale face startled her. “You look like you saw a ghost!”
“No—I think I have a fever, maybe,” I rubbed my arms again to combat the chill of the night air.
“Let’s get you home. I’m so sorry, honey, you should have told me how sick you are.”
I let her guide me down the sidewalk as my eyes lowered to the concrete below us. I may be ill, but not in the way that she is assuming that I am. My sickness is buried deep inside of me, and somehow Jack could see it all as if the veil had been lifted from my soul.
I tapped my finger son the gray kitchen counter. My pale scar on my fingertip slightly tender, but healing nicely. Jack had done an excellent job at that, much better than he had in allowing me to feel normal. Two days passed and nothing. No call, no interest shown, and instead of being as obsessive about it this time, I finally gathered up the nerve to face this train wreck head on. I knew that my actions would result in triumph or failure, but it had to be done. I even delayed my exams, took an extension—it was starting to become serious for me.
I tossed on a pair of dark jeans, white tennis shoes and tied my black hair back into a ponytail. I slid on a white t-shirt, nothing unusual, a bit see-through, but I didn’t care. It wasn’t about the clothing, it wasn’t about anything but the resolution.
I grabbed my red coat and slid it on, pulling my ponytail out and letting it lay on my shoulder. I snatched up my keys and stared back at our humble apartment. It was nothing like Jack’s world, in fact, nothing about me was like his world and I knew that. The realization that I may simply be one of his toys did cross my mind and without allowing it to be painful, I just pushed that feeling down into my now-churning stomach.
“Abi—just do it,” I whispered to myself as I headed out the door with the courage of a warrior going into battle.
I hailed a cab in the misty air. The light rain clung to the city like a fog. The rain was only a reminder of the day that I had met him. The day that everything seemed to change for me. The day that everything did change. He had taken up residency in me like some ghostly traveler in the night. No matter what I did, he was there in my mind. His blue eyes, his lips, his voice, and smell. His dominance over me was undeniable. Even his touch, which came with a tinge of pain.
I placed my fingers to my lips and let out a sharp whistle as I waved my free hand. A cab stopped in front of me and I slid into the back seat and paused. The mist was leaving a bit of a shimmer on my pale face, glossing my lips and matting my bangs to my forehead. I didn’t even care how I looked at this point. All I could think about were the words that I had to say to him. The questions, the end game.
The cabby had turned in his seat and was staring at me as I sat there in a haze.
“Miss? Where too?” he asked me as I blinked and pushed my bangs aside.
“Um—Landon, the estate,” I said as my voice cracked. I needed to remain stable and calm. Otherwise, this would be a complete disaster and I would only embarrass myself further.
The cabby turned and we sped off as I felt myself sink into the black leather seat. I stared out the window and watched the world go by, not experiencing it as I should. The world seemed to only serve as a backdrop to me now. I kept playing my questions over and over in my mind. All of the rational ones that I needed to get answers too. I mean, it had to be time, right?
I bit my lip and we hit the expressway before I knew it and headed out of the city. I turned and watched the large buildings retreat into the distance and I almost wished that I could be among them. I turned back and parted my lips, seriously considering the thought of telling the man to turn around and take me back home, but something deep in my heart stopped me.
I needed this to end or perhaps begin. But the in between would kill me. I couldn’t live here any longer. Regardless of the outcome I knew that I could at least take a step forward and stop being stuck in one place.
We arrived at the iron gate; my heart beat sped up, but I took a deep breath and steadied myself. The cabby rolled his window down and rang the buzzer. He looked at me in the mirror.
“Name, Miss?”
“Abi—I mean, Abigail Watson, to see Jack Landon,” The formality of it amused me.
The voice came through, a woman’s and I had to guess that it may be Miss. Cox.
“Yes?”
The cabby spoke as I rubbed my palms and tried to stop the tremors.
“Abigail Watson is here to see Jack Landon,” he said, sounding more dignified than I could have.
The woman paused and then the click came as if she had decided to ignore us. I stared at the mansion at the end of the lane for what seemed like forever and then I flinched as the gates buzzed and started to open on their own. I took a breath, not realizing that I had, in fact, stopped breathing for a moment.
We rolled down the lane much slower than we had sped through the city and down the expressway. I was almost grateful, but it seemed like a slow torture as the mansion became larger and larger as we approached it. I had not taken the time to study the structure yet, but it was breathtaking. Each window large, the stonework immaculate. It reminded me of something you would see in a fancy calendar of the castles in Europe. Without knowing you had simply left the city, you may think that you were in another country. Another plane altogether, and ironically it was somewhat true in my case. I was completely out of my element. But at least I had taken the initiative to show up as I am, just Abi, no red cocktail dress, no make-up, no borrowed diamonds and rubies, just me, as it probably should have been all along.
The cab stopped in front of the winding concrete stairs that led up to the large front door. I rubbed my neck and mentally slapped myself to get out of the car. The fear was something I needed to control if I had any hopes of getting what I came for.
I stepped out, and the cabby rolled his window down. “Meter on?” he asked, and I nodded to him as the large door opened up and Jack appeared, majestic and pristine, as expected. I crossed my arms over my chest and his expression remained cool and calm. He started to walk down the steps toward me, slow and steady, no rush at all. His nonchalant attitude only infuriated me more.
He stopped about five feet in front of me as I locked my eyes onto his. The light of day was showing off how blue they truly are. Stunni
ng, but I needed to concentrate and shirk off that school girl mentality. This was business.
“Jack,” I said as he nodded to me.
“Abigail,” he replied as the cabby glanced at me and popped his newspaper open.
“I would be happy to pay him for the fair. I’m sure that it was—moderately expensive.”
I shook my head. Jack’s lip curled at the edge. His eyes telling me that he was not going to fight me on it. “I can pay for my ride, thank you.”
Jack placed a hand into his nicely pressed pants as I tried to ignore how striking he was. Standing in front of this mansion, he looked like the cameras should be flashing. Who am I kidding, anywhere he stood he looked like the cameras should be going off. I swallowed and shifted from one foot to the other. He let his eyes float down my body as he checked out my attire. I looked down and then back up to him.
“What?”
“You look comfortable.”
I laughed. “Is that code word for crappy?”
He narrowed his eyes. “No—it’s a code word for comfortable.”
The cabby laughed under his breath as I let my eyes go to him for a split second. Jack took one step toward me and I backed up. He stopped, understanding that I was not as susceptible to his charms as I had been before.
“Okay, Abigail, what’s on your mind?”
I bit my lip and didn’t want to talk in front of the cabby, but I had no choice. I didn’t want him to leave, and I didn’t wish to get any closer to Jack or his house. I stood my ground and decided to try to navigate what I wanted to say. I needed to attempt to not give too much of it away. Difficult to do with the subject I was about to breach with Jack.
“My finger,” I said, as cryptically as I could.
“Is it healing well? Let me see.”
