by Logan Fox
“You should never have come,” Seth murmured, the words mangled behind his hand. “Why did you come? Why? Everything was fine until you got here.”
He drew away from her, turned, and strode from the room.
Pearl lay for a few seconds, her mind replaying his words, until Gia’s face appeared in her field of view. The girl’s blue eyes were crystal clear — had she imagined those earlier tears? — and her mouth was a thin, straight line.
“He’s right, you know,” Gia whispered. “Everything was fine until you came along.”
“Fuck you, Gia.” Pearl sat up, and the girl took a hurried step back, her eyes turning into wary slits. “I’ve never done anything to you.”
“You’re rocking the boat.” The girl crossed her arms over her chest. “And it’s making me seasick.”
“Why do you care?” Pearl rose to her feet, tugging her sweater straight. “You’re getting off this ride in a few days, anyway. Make sure to puke off the side and you’ll be just fine.”
Pearl pushed past her, heading for the bathroom. There had to be somewhere she could hide—
Gia’s hand snaked out. Pearl was still drawing breath for a gasp when the girl’s hand darted back, black keycard caught in her slim fingers. Pearl turned on stiff legs, her mouth open but failing to speak.
“Wouldn’t want Tanner to find this, would we? Howsabout I hold onto it for now, hmm?” Gia deftly evaded Pearl’s wild grab.
She wriggled the card.
“Give it back!” Pearl lurched forward, her legs tangling under her as they caught in the trailing end of her bed sheets.
Gia made the card disappear in her pajamas, a feat she’d never thought possible in a girl wearing a nightie. That keycard was definitely seeing an inordinate amount of crotch tonight.
“Gia—”
“Clean up,” the girl said, turning on her heel and beginning to straighten her side of the room. “Seth doesn’t need to come back here and deal with your shit.”
Pearl’s shoulders slumped. She didn’t have the energy to try to tackle Gia to the ground and steal back her card. Not now, anyway. But the girl had to sleep. She had to close those sly, blue eyes and then…
When Seth came back inside, reeking of cigarettes and spearmint gum, their room was almost back to its pristine condition. He helped Gia tug her mattress straight without more than a glance in Pearl’s direction.
When Gia had settled back into bed, with murmured words for Seth, the man bent over her and kissed her forehead. He smoothed hair from her face, giving her a faint, doting smile before turning to Pearl.
She was in bed, rod-stiff under her sheets. Seth stood for a moment, as if considering whether he should tuck her in too.
But he left, switching off the lights behind him.
In the darkness, Pearl’s stomach coiled into a tight, cold ball. Her hand tightened around the bed sheets as she drew them to her throat.
She should never have come.
Would she last the three weeks she had left before she could leave? Or would someone come for her in the middle of the night? Someone who thought she was more trouble than she was worth?
Someone who would, unwittingly, set her free.
When she woke and went into the den the next morning, Seth was on the couch. He glanced over at her, swiped fingers over his eyes, and sat forward.
Pearl froze, thinking he was going to say something, but instead he just watched her until she went into the bathroom. He was still outside when she’d showered, changed, and brushed her teeth.
“Coffee?” she asked quietly.
Seth shook his head. His black eyes followed her as she moved around, making herself coffee and dishing up cereal. She hesitated, breakfast in hand, but heading back to her room seemed as worse a fate as eating out here with silent, gloomy Seth.
So she sat on the couch and tried not to let the quietness of the man get to her while she crunched cereal and swallowed down her coffee.
Her bowl was almost empty when Seth rose. Pearl stiffened, her eyes fixing on the carpet by her feet, waiting. But the man moved around the couch and went to knock on Morgan and Ivy’s door.
“Morgan? Up and at ‘em, kitten.”
There was a faint response from behind the door, but Seth ignored it, heading back to the couch. His eyes roved over Pearl, his face setting into a grim expression.
“You’re long overdue,” he said, making no sense.
Long overdue? Pearl drained the last of her coffee, getting ready to fight, flee, scream, whatever. Instead, Seth disappeared into the bathroom, leaving her wide eyed and quivering internally.
He came out with a cosmetic bag in his hand, that same sullen expression on his face.
Sinking onto the couch beside her, Seth used his pinkie finger to turn her face toward him. He took out a pair of tweezers and a tube of gel from the bag, studying her eyebrows with the solemnity of an artist gazing at an empty canvas.
Pearl sat as still as she could while Seth smeared the cooling gel over her brows and used a tiny, hard-bristled brush to comb out her brows before shaping them with the tweezers. Whether it was the gel or his steady hand, the process took less than ten minutes and hardly hurt at all.
But she had more than enough time to take in his stony face, lifeless eyes, and stiff posture.
God, was he really that pissed off with her? Seth, who seemed incapable of holding a grudge? The guy who’d almost beat Henry the driver to death after finding them outside, her bloodied and frantic?
Tears began collecting on her lids. She blinked them away, forcing her eyes away from Seth’s, hoping it would stem that trickle of pain worming its way into her heart.
“Am I hurting you?” Seth asked, but his voice held not a trace of the concern it usually did.
“No.” Her voice warbled. She looked down, the movement freeing a single tear. Her hand shot up to wipe it away, but Seth’s thumb reached her cheek first.
He blotted away the tear, but didn’t say anything as he began packing away his utensils.
Pearl wanted to reach for him, wanted to feel those massive, strong arms around her. But it would be like pressing herself against a stone wall and hoping it would embrace her. Seth ran a hand over his face and sat forward as if getting up, then stopped. He took a breath that expanded his chest, dragged his fingers through his beard, and straightened his leg. After digging in his pocket for a few second, he drew out a slip of satin.
Roses filled the air.
She shrank back from him, her eyes widening.
Seth stared down at the strip of ribbon and then held it out to her. Pearl stuck out her hand, turning her palm up, her fingers curling to the ceiling.
“He’ll be here in three hours. He wants you shaved, but not everything. Leave a strip, about half an inch wide.” Seth lifted his eyes.
Pearl felt heat in her cheeks, her fingers closing reflexively over the strip of fabric as Seth drew away.
“Got it?”
Pearl gave a small nod.
“I need to hear you say it, ki—Pearl. It’s important. The guests expect—”
“I’ll shave,” Pearl said woodenly. “Everything except a strip. I’ll wear this—” she held up the satin choker “—because I’m guessing that’s why you gave it to me. And I’ll…”
She exhaled, forced her eyes up, and tried to smile. It was a weak quivering thing, but it was there.
“And I’ll be a good little kitten, Seth. You’ll see.”
When Seth came to fetch her a few hours later, Pearl had resigned herself to the fact that this was her new existence, at least for the next three weeks.
There would be no escaping, not if she couldn’t even hold onto a keycard long enough for it to do any good.
Hey, maybe she’d be one of the lucky ones. Maybe she’d leave and get taken home, instead of offed in the woods.
Did they do it in the woods?
It would make sense. The borders of the Fox Pit property ended at the tree line of
a massive, all-encompassing forest that stretched all the way to the base — and partially up — its collar of mountains.
Seth was silent as he took her to the dungeon’s bathroom and prepared her for her scene. She already wore the collar the wolf had given her the last time she’d seen him — the scent of roses suffocated each breath. Seth didn’t look at that band of gold around her throat. In fact, he studiously ignored it to the point that it was blatant how much he disliked seeing it on her neck.
“Have you seen Tanner again?” Pearl asked, desperate to diffuse the thick, stifling atmosphere inside the small bathroom.
Seth made a noise, but what it meant she couldn’t decipher. His black eyes were fixed on his work as he painted on a nose for her.
“Did they find what they were looking for?”
Another question Seth ignored. Pearl shifted her weight, rolling her eyes to the ceiling and staring at the sparkling lights set in the creamy clay.
“Why did—” Pearl began, just as Seth started saying, “It was—”
She clamped her lips closed, waiting, hoping, Seth would finish his sentence.
After a sigh, he did. “It was Ethan. Fuck knows why Tanner tossed our den. That idiot lost his fucking keycard. For some reason, Tanner thought you had something to do with it.”
“He lost his keycard?”
Seth’s eyes flew to hers. She wanted to look away, wanted to blink, but would any of those actions make her look guilty? She held his gaze, desperately needing to lick her suddenly dry lips, but forcing her tongue to lie like a dead thing at the bottom of her cotton-dry mouth.
“Yeah,” Seth eventually said. His eyes moved back to her nose, the paintbrush in his fingers swiping over its tip. “Don’t know the whole story, but that’s the gist of it.”
Pearl gave a small nod, but stilled instantly when Seth’s eyes narrowed.
“Hold still, kitten.”
“Sorry,” she mumbled. “So has Tanner cooled down?”
Seth snorted softly. “He cooled down before he left the den. He’s bipolar or some shit.” Seth sighed and dropped his hands, studying her face for a few seconds before turning to the basin to collect her ears.
“It sucks being the newbie,” Pearl said. “Ethan must feel like shit.”
“Not anymore,” Seth said, twisting back to her. “Tanner canned him this morning.”
Pearl’s eyes widened before she could catch herself. Seth paused in the act of sliding her ears onto her head, frowning down at her.
“They fired him?” she managed, trying to sound less shocked than she was. She failed.
Seth slid her ears onto her head and began arranging her hair around the band.
“Don’t worry. It’ll take more than this for them to kick you out. It’s rare enough they can find a girl who’s still stable enough to attend scenes after the first week. They won’t fuck that up because of something like this.”
He’d completely misread her panic, of course. She couldn’t give a shit about whether her job was safe. Although, getting fired would have solved all her problems.
Ethan was gone.
The cop who’d been investigating the Fox Pit murders was gone.
And she was responsible for that.
She’d just fucked herself. Royally.
6
Pearl’s Punishment
Pearl fidgeted with the ribbon around her neck. It felt too tight today. Had it shrunk after being dunked in the pool water?
Or did it have something to do with the quivering nervousness spreading through her muscles. She tried to push away all the thoughts bombarding her mind. Thoughts about Ethan. Thoughts about Tanner. Thoughts about Gia.
Had they spoken with Tina? Was that why Tanner had come barging into their den, looking for something he had every reason to believe she had on her?
It would be too obvious for her to ask Seth about the girl. She’d have to wait until she happened past their den — because that was something that happened real regular like — and hope that Tina was there.
Gia was right. She’d fucked up bad.
Ethan had been a safety net. If she’d felt threatened, she could have gone to him and told him that she knew. That her life was in danger. But everything had happened too soon. When had there been a moment to find him, to try to speak to him? To admit that she’d heard everything. That she could be an asset, not a liability?
Now she’d have to suck it up and hope—
Something brushed the sole of her foot. She was on her knees on the dungeon’s altar, naked, her only decoration those ears, her strapped on tail, and the wolf’s collar.
Pearl’s head shot around, her eyes widening on their own at the proximity of her wolf. She hadn’t heard him approach. She hadn’t had time to prepare herself.
A tremor raced through her at the sight of those pale brown eyes. Was he wearing the same mask as before? This one looked different; sleek black and as understated as his charcoal-colored suit. But the ears were more pronounced, those fangs long and sharp.
She could see his hair — a chestnut brown, thick and carefully styled — and most of the lower half of his face.
As such, it wasn’t a very good disguise. Would she even recognize him if she saw him outside of the Fox Pit?
The thought made her stomach tighten.
“You seem preoccupied, princess,” the wolf murmured.
His fingertips caressed the side of her hip, bringing out goose flesh on her skin.
“No, Master,” Pearl whispered.
She could feel other eyes on her. Seth’s… maybe his wife again. Maybe more; it was impossible to tell. She’d have to lose herself in this scene. She’d have to be the perfect pet again, so no one watching would have any reason to suspect her of anything. Not now… not ever.
The wolf flattened his hand, running his palm up her waist and cupping a breast. Pearl quivered at the touch, keeping her eyes downcast so she wouldn’t have to watch the wolf watching her.
“I understand this is the first time you’ve had an owner, princess,” the wolf said.
His hand trailed up and slid around the front of her throat, gripping her softly but insistently.
She nodded, forcing her eyes to stay fixed to the edge of the altar.
“Then let me be the one to explain how this works.” His thumb brushed the bottom of her chin. “When I visit, you will be facing the door so you know when I arrive.” He used a light pressure on his thumb to turn her head.
Pearl’s eyes slid past that panel of dark mirrors — too fast to untangle the shapes and shadows that lay beyond — and fixed on the dungeon’s distant door.
“And when that door opens and I step inside, you will spread your legs for me, understand?”
She managed a slight nod, trapped as her head was by that solitary thumb.
“Good,” the wolf murmured.
He ran the pad of his thumb along the lower curve of her mouth, leaning in until his lips were an inch from her ear. Her muscles tightened, her sex throbbing once and beginning to tingle at his proximity, at the sudden smell that filled her nose. His smell. A smell she’d forgotten, but one that immediately brought with it a flood of ecstatic memories. Sharp, fresh, oaky. She made a noise in the back of her throat, her eyes sliding shut as she drew deeply on the air, trying to taste the scent of him.
“I expect my pets to be honest with me. And I expect them to be well behaved. Have you been well behaved today, princess?”
Her mind scrambled, unbidden. “Yes, Master.” Her voice was low, possibly too low to be heard by the shadows behind the mirror. “I shaved, like you asked me to.”
The wolf’s other hand brushed the inside of her thigh. It was the only warning she had before his fingertips drew lines of electricity over the smooth mound above her sex. Well, shaved except for a thin strip… just like he’d asked.
“Good girl,” he said. Then he laughed. “But it wasn’t a request, princess. It was an order. Another thing it’s imperative you re
member: what I say is law. You will do what I want without hesitation, without quarter. There is no backtalk, no negotiations, with me. Do you understand?”
She nodded.
“Look at me.”
Her eyes flashed up to his. When their gaze met, another flash of voltage speared through her.
The wolf smiled. “You will address me only as Master, and yourself as ‘this pet’. Do you understand, princess?”
“Yes, Master.”
Those fingers paused, burning four holes into her flesh despite the lightness of his touch. The wolf cocked his head at her, those new-grass eyes narrowing. His lips tightened infinitesimally.
“This pet understands, Master,” Pearl said, her voice hoarse.
“You will not touch me without permission. And you will beg for permission—” he gripped her wrists, bringing her palms together as if in prayer “—like so.”
“This pet understands, Master,” Pearl whispered through numb lips.
Her body was starting to feel heavy. The air grew thick around her, presenting a strange, oily resistance against her skin. She blinked back a brief, insistent wave of tears.
Why the hell was this happening to her? It wasn’t as if he really owned her. This was all just a game — an elaborate, twisted game. And all she had to do was keep playing her part, collect her cheque, and hope they would let her leave when her time was up. But her mind was slipping into some strange, trance-like state. She became disembodied, watching everything from a foot away while her nerves were still directly routed to her brain.
“Now… I have a gift for you,” the wolf said. His sonorous voice was light now, sounding amused and pleased.
He tugged a black, leather-bound journal from the pocket of his suit. A slim pen followed, its golden surface engraved with dozens of interlocking roses. He held the book and pen in his hand — it was small enough to almost fit his palm — and smiled at her again. “Hold out your hands, pet.”
Pearl lifted her hands, turning them palm-upward. She bowed her head at a sudden, inexplicable, wave of embarrassment. A gift? For her? When was the last time someone had given her something as beautiful and unexpected as this?
