“If you see submissiveness in that performance, then you saw more than I,” Vince said.
“I saw everything I wanted to see, but more importantly felt everything I wanted to feel.”
“And could you feel the knife blade behind her words?”
“I could feel their sting, yes. But, I trust myself, gents, even if you don’t. I’ll own her in three months. And just so you don’t worry, in three weeks, I’ll have her creaming her panties, if she wears them …”
“I did see an ass crack underneath that skirt,” Redford interjected.
“In three weeks she’ll be too confused to even remember the difference between what she read in that diary and her real life. I’ll own her.”
“You want her, you have her, Bellamy,” Thaddeus said. “But I warn you, take her slowly and make her wait, make the anticipation in her breed with her lust. And when you strike, do so with an iron fist. This one requires patience first, let her desires build and then, quick measures.”
“You doubt my methods, Thad?”
“I don’t want mistakes here, friend. You master her, be sure you master her soul, because mastering her body won’t be enough.”
“I’ll have her subdued and neutralized in three weeks. Give me my full three months, I’ll have her thoroughly trained and put her up against any of your sluts.”
“Right,” Vince retorted with a derisive sneer.
Mike shrugged.
“We trust you only because of the women you’ve trained before, Bellamy. But this one…”
“Maybe you would be advised, Thad, to worry less about Gillian Brahms and more about Kate McPherson. It is her disregard for the rules that has spawned our concern.”
Thaddeus ignored the comment, though the snarl on his face was noticed by the three others. “If there are no further comments, I do have a plane to catch,” he announced.
“With Mike going to fuck over Ms. Brahms, I’m happy enough,” Vince said.
“And I’ll be watching,” Redford added.
Mike Bellamy had only to smile—a reminder of the artfully treacherous charm that had so wittingly wooed the club’s submissive members to unparalleled obedience.
Chapter Three
The board room in Milan was quite unlike the ancient city. This one was extremely stark, with plain cream walls, a black marble floor and a sleek stylized conference table in the shape of a crescent moon.
On Kate McPherson’s arrival she smiled warmly at the seven directors that sat about that half moon. The directors were not only the men she worked for; they were all masters of the club—a rare phenomenon for any corporate board—and one that was particularly intimidating. No doubt they were pleased with her new red suit, tailored for her especially at a tiny salon not more than three blocks from Chamberlain’s art gallery. The cut of it was especially tight, and though the skirt was long, there was an adventurous slit in the side that stopped high on her left thigh. While the long jacket covered that slit when the garment was buttoned, she chose to leave it open, not only revealing her shapely legs, but letting her transparent blouse show off the fine lace bra she wore underneath. Two layers of sheer material did little to hide the form of Kate’s robust breasts. Jiggling inside the delicate lace, it was impossible for a voyeuring man not to notice her darker nipples swaying before their eyes. A soft cascade of honey-brown hair shimmered softly, framing an open, gentle face, her widely spaced eyes and her dainty mouth.
“You have your proposals ready?” Thaddeus asked her. He too noted her attire with a winsome smile, realizing that her efforts were intended primarily for him. They hadn’t been together in six weeks and this deliberate ploy might have pleased him—on another occasion.
“Yes, I do,” she said, cocking her head coyly.
“Then proceed,” he said. He sat back aloofly in his chair, joining the board as they listened to her half hour presentation for the funding of a new wing of the art gallery. She’d done her homework—and that likely meant she slept with Tracor Debbins, a former curator with the big bucks. Some say the man dealt in stolen art, the only way he could have amassed his fortunes. He preferred to tell the art world that he simply made wise purchases. And since he seemed to dictate much of what was artistically in fashion, there was little surprise that he was always on top of the latest trend. To get him to give back to the source from which he’d so richly received required a woman of some genius to pull off the sales job. Of course, he rarely parted with his money unless some beautiful woman was involved, and Kate was given indiscriminate permission to use herself in any way necessary to get what Thaddeus and his board wanted. Thad knew Kate would love the sport of such subterfuge. Tracor Debbins had aged well, and would undoubtedly spend a small fortune courting her affections. She would have bed him well and enjoyed every minute of it. McPherson was one of his best sexual assets, and an uncompromising member of the club.
“I’m impressed,” Thad remarked as soon as she was finished with the presentation. With nothing more to say, she stood awkwardly before the directors as they eyed her from behind the forbidding desk.
“Thank you,” she answered, waiting patiently for more.
Being a member of the club, a most submissive member at that, required long moments of profound patience. This time, however, the air between her and her favorite master was so curiously tense that she couldn’t hide her nervousness.
“Is something troubling you?” Thad asked after taking some minutes to peruse the report she laid in front of him. Each board member had a copy, but his was the only one open to the detailed figures she supplied for them.
“Perhaps you have questions?” she asked simply.
“Hummm.” He mused a bit, tapped the eraser end of his pencil on the table several times. “Just one.”
“Yes?”
“How many club rules have you chosen to violate in your three year tenure with us?”
“Thaddeus?” she responded haltingly, the shocking question taking her off guard.
“I suggest, McPherson, that you drop to the floor, front and center, now,” he ordered her with just a trace of sharpness in his voice, otherwise he remained incredibly calm.
Her answer was not immediate, for it had been some months since she’d been given such a command and it took time for his words to register. Yet, with all eyes focused keenly on her next move, once gaining her senses, she obeyed, falling to the floor on her knees and bending forward with her hands clasped behind her, her forehead coming to rest on the hard marble floor.
“You have no answer for me?” Thaddeus asked, his voice just slightly raised.
“I don’t know what you mean?” she replied quietly.
“You have a guest staying at your apartment in the States?”
“Yes.”
“A Gillian Brahms?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you have a bookcase in that apartment?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And in that bookcase a black diary?”
She hesitated, the realization striking both in her pounding head and her queasy gut.
“Yes, I have had a diary there,” she said.
“At least until a few days ago,” he informed her. “Does all this surprise you?”
She didn’t reply.
“No, you don’t have to answer,” he said with mocking kindness. “Of course you don’t know that your guest had a freakish problem with the flue of your fireplace, creating a cloud of soot all over your apartment, and, as she was cleaning the mess, she managed to locate your diary, not so cleverly hidden, in of all places, your bookcase.” He paused for a second for them both to catch their breath, then asked, “Have the directives of the club been made clear to you? Its rules and expectations for behavior?”
“They have.”
“And is there an indisputable law against putting anything in written form about its members and their exploits?”
“Yes, there is,” she remembered that well.
“And have
you violated that law?”
“I have,” she answered in words so small it was difficult for anyone to hear.
“Say that more distinctly, please,” Thaddeus ordered.
“I have, yes; I wrote about the club in my personal diary.”
In the following silence she could feel shock waves reverberate around the room. “Remove your clothes, McPherson. Mr. Vencinni and Mr. Bocci will you assist me?”
Kate pulled up enough to undo the buttons of her suit jacket and quickly let it fall from her shoulders to the floor.
“Everything, McPherson,” Thaddeus clarified, should she have reason to question the orders. And with that, he proceeded toward the cabinets at the far end of the room behind her back while she continued to disrobe. She removed her bra and the black high heels, and the tight red skirt and finally the sexy patterned stockings. There were no panties to remove, and so returning to her submissive posture, she remained chillingly nude against the cold marble and shivered in anticipation of Thad’s next move.
Never in her three years with the club had she so much as questioned a directive. Rarely did the look in her eyes, or a grimace on her face suggest she was displeased with her “assignments”, let alone would disobey an order. It was not in her nature to balk, and she’d been thoroughly schooled in the ways of this fraternity of masters who had brought her life amazing freedom and safety in her sexual desires. She never even thought of what punishment she’d warrant for a violation of the vows she solemnly professed. She certainly never believed the chronicle of her awkward initiation would suddenly bring about her first true chastisement, a reprimand she tried so hard to avoid.
“Lift her over the table and tie her hands above her,” Thad directed the two executives. “You can hold her feet.”
Not quite understanding what was happening, it was all transpiring so suddenly, she found two pairs of hefty hands lifting her nude body to the conference table, hoisting her on top so that the edge of the table hit where her legs meet her torso, leaving her bare ass to bob at that edge in anticipation of what was sure to be a painful paddling. Her legs were not long enough for her feet to touch the floor, so while she teetered with the sharp edge of the table painfully pushing into her groin, one man secured her arms above her and the other steadied her.
With her hands tightly fastened to some unseen bolt underneath the table, each man took a leg and held it wide, while a third man, not Thaddeus, approached the lush target of her derriere from behind. Glancing back she could see the paddle Thad handed the man—a ¾ inch thick slab of wood some five inches wide and a good eighteen inches long. There were holes drilled along the surface which seemed to add a mysterious question mark to the effect these holes would have on the pain she’d bear.
“Gag her before you start, Sabatini,” she heard Thad’s voice. Unable to see him, it was just as well, since she had no desire to look inside his rigorous eyes the way he was so focused on this punishment.
As a ballgag was suddenly thrust into her mouth she was tempted to object to this discipline. But it was too late. Even if she had time to spit out her protest, there was no way Thad would stop it. The rules were etched in stone, and from them no member of the club was advised to waver. “Why now?” she thought to herself. All this time, and the blasted diary suddenly looms as her accuser, and Gillian Brahms as well. Why would the woman betray her so, and what did that betrayal mean? Had she suddenly uncloaked their mutual secrets? Were there sleazy stories of the club’s exploits all over the tabloid newspapers? Were judges and lawyers and corporate heads being accused of crimes they never committed just by association with those mentioned in her journal? The longer she waited in anticipation of the paddle’s first blow, the more hysterical was her imagination.
At last, with that first strike, all the anticipation and the hysteria vanished. The wooden implement wielded by Vitorio Sabatini’s firm hand, backed by the well-worked muscles of his arm and shoulder, came crashing down on her vulnerable ass creating a sting she could feel to the far reaches of her body—even in places where there were no nerve endings. The vibration alone was agonizing. Sabatini struck the paddle twenty times and each time the sensation ripped new channels of pain. She cried at the top of her lungs, but that passionate response was curtailed by the confining gag, and all the sound she could produce was a muffled lament.
While she attempted to struggle against the hands that held her, these hands were fixed tightly about her ankles as secure as ropes or cuffs. Several times in her service to the masters she’d been bound and even playfully brutalized for their pleasure. Yet, those times had only produced the most profound erotic joy, as the men that owned her body and soul, only enlivened her sexual desires. What could vigorously explode with fire and bring her satisfaction one day, now became a horror that seemed to have no end in sight.
By the time the twentieth crack of the paddle was over, her body was heaving uncontrollably, and a flood of held back tears finally burst. Relief then poured through her limbs as she was set free. Though on her feet, she was forced to gaze at a forbidding board of gentlemen that stared back at the naked woman with judgmental eyes.
Thaddeus Chamberlain was noticeably absent.
“Ms. McPherson,” Vitorio Sabatini barked at her from Thad’s place at the conference table, “you have violated the club’s directive in a most alarming way. Let this punishment be a warning of what will follow if this incident becomes costly to our membership. Any future disobedience will result in disciplinary measures that will restrain your freedom. You’ll be placed under house arrest and summarily punished daily until we can be certain that you are free of any renegade thoughts and behaviors that would subvert this joint endeavor of ours. Should it be determined that you are unredeemable in the eyes of this community, you will be expelled, stripped of your position and all personal property that has been accumulated as a result of your membership in this society. There can be no crime greater than your disobedience to the rules. If this warning seems extreme, that is because it is necessary to assure the secrecy of the club. Do you understand, McPherson?” the man literally roared the question, and quaking in fright, Kate nodded while biting her lip.
“I am so sorry,” she finally said.
“Apologies are useless. Obedience is paramount, and any disobedience needs to be immediately crushed. It is unfortunate that this disregard of the rules was not found out when it was committed. Certainly your membership would have been forfeited at that time. Since you have been a member in good standing since then, some charity has been earned. But don’t ever falter again, McPherson.”
“I promise.”
“You may leave,” he ordered her directly.
Some time during the melee over the conference table, Kate’s clothes were removed from the room, so she was forced to walk stark naked out the door with her hot red ass the last thing that her masters saw.
***
Thad wasn’t often in Milan, so the apartment shouldn’t feel so dreadfully empty, but it did. Knowing that he was in town and either avoiding her, or punishing her by not sleeping with her, was agonizing.
She returned home that afternoon with a lightly bruised ass and a wounded heart. The embarrassment of being punished before a board of masters was only beginning to hit home. The whole club would know of her negligent disobedience by the end of the week, if they didn’t already, and any sexual moment would be clouded for months to come. All so thoroughly preventable … she should have burned the diary as soon as she completed the last entry … or kept it under lock and key, or tucked in her mattress, a safety deposit box … never written the damnable thing at all … her mind spun, had been spinning all day. All efforts to think of anything but the fallout from this disaster and how she was forced naked over the conference table and punished were futile. There was no thought in her mind except the way she’d compromised her good standing with the life she dearly loved. Perhaps, most importantly, she worried that the affection she shared with Thaddeus Chamberl
ain would wither as a result of this incident. Each moment she spent alone she became more desperate.
Kate went to bed at midnight, though she couldn’t sleep.
When she heard her front door open, her heart jumped to her throat, and though she wanted to hop from bed and greet Thad, she remained shivering with fear inside the sheets. She waited some minutes and then heard her bedroom door creak. Staring toward the doorway she saw Thad’s silhouette. The light about him, like a halo, burned gold, but made his body as dark as the heart beating inside his chest.
“Get up,” he said.
Pulling the covers away, she tiptoed toward him with the silk of her nightgown gently caressing her skin. Finding his arms stretched out to greet her, she let his embrace warm her, and yet, his words were not soothing.
“There was quite an argument about what to do with you.”
“There was?” she replied timidly.
“A few thought you should be strung up in the hideaway for days, fed bread and water, your nipples pierced and clamped, your clit tortured, your body made a sacrifice to any dark thing a master had in mind.”
“I see.” He was so warm. With her head pressed to his chest, she could feel a steady heart beat and the heat from him begin to soothe the aches that remained both inside and out.
“There were others who simply wanted to publicly humiliate you; find some nasty scandal to discredit your professional merits and exile you from the club forever.”
His arms seemed to hold on to her tighter as she quaked deeply over that miserable thought.
“And there were a few who thought the whole thing an amusing joke.”
“A joke?” she whispered.
He almost laughed himself.
“What did you think?” she asked, looking up at his face, though it was difficult to see his expression.
“That three years ago you were naïve, and innocently dealing with your fears, you wrote the journal believing that no eyes would ever see it. Since then, you’ve been stupidly lax placing it in a vulnerable place. Truthfully, Kate,” his look was terribly grim, “it disappointed me, made me intensely angry … I don’t know when I’ve ever been so furious with a member.” She felt that fury beginning to rise in him. We train you well to avoid such things. And to think that it was my own charge that slipped through the cracks. This comes down on me as much as it does you.”
Masters of the Club Page 2
