by Kitty Thomas
She transformed into something she didn’t recognize, but liked, even if someone from her old life would have told her she shouldn’t. When she looked in the mirror on the rare occasions she had a free moment in her room, she saw a new confidence and peace had slipped over her features. The lines that had begun to form on her face softened as everything inside her relaxed.
At first she’d feared they would start sharing her with others, especially Brian. But the fear never came to fruition, despite his complaints that she’d been there long enough. She wasn’t sure why, but Anton was
possessive of her in a way he wasn’t with the others. After awhile, the excuse that she’d been brought to the house too soon, wore thin. That couldn’t be the real reason. Not anymore.
She’d come to think of herself as perhaps special to him because he seemed to go easier on her and protect her more than others. Vivian had convinced herself this favor she’d garnered was because of how deeply and completely she’d submitted to them.
Her training was split evenly among the three men, Anton deciding that she was becoming too attached to Gabe and Lindsay. As if adding himself back into the mix would solve anything. She was attached to all of them and hated waking every morning because she knew each day took her closer to the day she’d be sold.
She’d developed a fantasy that the three leaders of this house had become so charmed with her they’d never sell her. She’d remain in the house forever with them dominating and possessing her. One morning Anton stepped into the room and burst that fantasy bubble.
Vivian knew something important was about to happen because Gabe was nowhere in sight, and he always came in for their morning shower. She wiped the sleep from her eyes as the grogginess lifted. Everything felt surreal as she left the bed and crawled over to kiss his boots.
He stroked her hair. “Did you sleep well, flower?”
She kept her head down. “Yes, Sir.”
“I have excellent news. Tomorrow morning you’re going to have a master.”
Everything in her seized up, then she started to cry. “Please, don’t sell me. I don’t want to go. I thought . . . ” She shut her mouth to stop herself from spilling out her absurd fantasies.
“You thought we’d keep you? That you’d be the house pet?”
She shrugged, still not able to meet his eyes.
“You’ve been sold for half a million just as I said you would be. What could you possibly do to be worth that price if I let you stay?”
“Nothing, Sir.” Whatever they wanted of her, they could get, free of charge.
All at once the room began to grow smaller. Her throat tightened; her breath came out in short bursts. Anton was crouched beside her an instant later, raising her chin. “Stop it.”
“I can’t help it.”
“What is wrong with you? You’ve been lovely. Better than lovely. You’ve been a dream to train, much better than I ever expected. And now you’re having a breakdown?”
She felt as if she were regressing back to the night she’d been brought to the house, suddenly needing to latch onto anything that would rescue her from this world and put her back someplace safe. “I want Michael. Please, if you don’t want me, send me back to him. He’ll pay you. Please.”
Anton laughed. “He’d pay half a million dollars to get you back? After everything you’ve done in this house? After everything you’ve enjoyed? I have hours and hours of footage of you writhing around like a bitch in heat, taking cocks and toys in every available orifice. You want to go back to your husband after that? To your safe life where you play the little woman and get your nails done? Is that what you want?” His voice came out clipped, his accent causing words to blur together.
“Yes.”
“Liar. What did we say about lying, Vivian? Do you wish to be punished on your last day with us?”
She shook her head. “No, Sir.”
There were a thousand things she wanted to say, a thousand things she wanted to accuse him of. If the banshee were still with her, screaming and crying in indignation, she would have had a laundry list of grievances to assault him with.
She could have complained about how none of it was really her fault. There had been blackmail and coercion and later kidnapping. He’d led her into this spider’s web. She’d had no choice, no hope.
But she could no longer give credence to those lies. The first day with Anton in Dome, when she’d spread her legs for him, she’d done it without much fuss or fighting because she needed to know if anyone could make her feel.
Anything.
She’d needed to remember what it felt like to surrender under the hands of another and feel pleasure. And he’d done that for her, over and over, while giving her the comforting lie that he’d tell her husband, that he was somehow forcing her to these clandestine meetings.
Maybe he would have told Michael. But her choice had always been to come back, to allow herself to slip further under Anton’s control. She’d played with the fire and still wasn’t sure if she’d gotten burned, or if the fire had reshaped her into something new like a phoenix rising from the flame.
Michael was safety, but what Anton promised her was peace. She just didn’t want to leave.
When her tears had run their course and the room was silent again, he spoke. “Tomorrow, when you are sold, you will be placed in your collar. You will address him as Master when you meet him. Annette will walk you through the protocol. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Sir.”
He left, Gabe came in, and the day went along like any other. Even on her last day she wasn’t spared the gym where Brian let out all his sadism on her in the only way he was allowed. During their session he seemed pissed off.
He must have known she’d be leaving without him ever getting to dip his wick in her. She couldn’t say she was very upset about that. She tried not to look smug as he pushed her on the treadmill.
Later Annette talked her through the events for the following day and how she was to behave and what she was to say.
That night all three of them used her. They took her into the large bathroom on the first floor with the Jacuzzi tub large enough to hold them all. They bathed her and fucked her, repeatedly. By the end of the night she was so well-used, she was a languid heap of pleasured nerve endings.
Each of them pressed a kiss to her cheek before leaving her to sleep. But she didn’t sleep. She couldn’t. She’d tried so hard that night to float away, to not experience any of it too strongly. Even though she’d come so many times she lost count, she’d tried to remain detached because the thought of never seeing any of them again, of going off to become the property of another, was too difficult.
Vivian laid awake, staring at the ceiling, tossing and turning until she finally couldn’t stand it any longer and kicked the blankets off. They’d stopped chaining her to the wall at night because she never gave them reason to think they couldn’t trust her.
She’d never explored the mansion after dark. She’d never felt the compulsion, and she’d been afraid of the consequences. Now, punishment didn’t matter as much. Please them or displease them, they’d decided to sell her.
Some rich, entitled man had watched videos of her fucking and being trained, had chosen her to belong to him and agreed to pay their price. They’d done the proper background checks, no doubt.
Anton would have gone to extra trouble to check out the buyer, ensuring he was safe, kind, and fair. As much as those things were possible in this situation. He would have made sure the buyer could give her what she needed.
The floor was cold on her feet as she slipped through the house. She crossed through the cafeteria and out to the breezeway. When Vivian got outside, she looked up at the stars and breathed in the fresh air. The pretty illusion of freedom.
The edge of the property line seemed to call to her. Lindsay had walked her out there one day, showing her where the bracelet would be set off, the point where she’d be considered a runaway. After that day she’d nev
er come near the line.
But tonight she stood here, less than a foot from the spot that would wake the whole house. She sat in the grass, staring at the boundary. She knew she couldn’t escape. That wasn’t the point.
If she did it, they’d punish her. They’d believe she wasn’t fit to be sold. How much time would that buy her?
The grass stirred and she jumped. Lindsay sat and pulled her against his chest. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“No, Sir.” She knew he heard the tears in her voice.
“Crossing that line wouldn’t allow you to stay. It would only make us disappointed in you. I know you don’t want to go. I don’t want you to go, but the sale has gone through. Money has exchanged hands. It can’t be undone, and even if it could, Anton wouldn’t undo it.”
They sat that way for a long time, until finally he stood and helped her to her feet. “Come. You can sleep in my room tonight.”
Without a word she followed him up the sloping hills back to the side entrance, then through the enormous house and up to the second floor to his room at the end of the long, silent hallway. When they were behind the door, he pushed the button on the wall to turn the water on for the plants.
She collapsed into the bed, exhausted, and closed her eyes. His arm came around her, and she drifted to sleep while the rain came down.
Vivian woke to the sounds of arguing. Gabe and Lindsay. She looked back and forth between the two as if she were watching a ping pong tournament. Gabe was angry she hadn’t been in her room. Cursing and heated words were exchanged, and then he grabbed an unresisting Vivian out of bed.
Lindsay slammed the bathroom door without a word or glance back. That was her goodbye to him. Then Gabe got her into the shower back in her room. His hands slid over her body, all cold business. She wanted to lash out at him, yell something about the fact that he’d wanted to have her in the shower, and now he wasn’t taking advantage of their last moments together.
But she didn’t. They’d trained her too well, and even now, she couldn’t bring herself to rebel enough to make one of them disappointed in her during her last hours in the house. Gabe didn’t try to have sex with her or even get a blow job out of the deal. He didn’t allow her to wash him. He just cleaned and dried her off.
He went to the dresser drawer and tossed a corset, panties, and garter belt at her, along with some fuck-me pumps. “You’re leaving with your master in this, today,” he growled.
Then he, too, was gone.
Vivian stood, stunned. She was scared enough about what was about to happen and neither Gabe nor Lindsay could be bothered to get out of their heads and their own issues. An hour later Annette brought her breakfast and asked if she was okay.
It seemed to be a rhetorical question because when Vivian tried to get into a conversation with the other woman, she looked like a doe caught in headlights and made an excuse to leave.
Soon after, when her nerves were completely frazzled, her mouth was dry, and she thought she might faint or cry or scream or all three, Anton walked into the room. He looked like he didn’t want to let her go either.
“Please, Sir . . . let me stay.”
He shook his head. “I’m afraid that’s not an option, flower. You’ll understand in time.” Then he said the words that made her blood run cold and her entire world pause.
“He’s waiting for you in the showroom.”
The showroom. Annette had told her about this. When they sold a slave, they presented her in a lovely room and paraded her around, making a grand show and ritual of changing ownership from the house to the buyer. Vivian guessed the buyer earned that much with the amount of money they forked over.
She crawled across the floor to Anton, pressed her lips against his boots, dripping tears onto them. “Please don’t do this.”
He bent and attached a collar around her neck. It wasn’t leather like the one Annette wore; it was platinum with aquamarine stones set inside the band. It was the most gorgeous piece of jewelry Vivian had ever laid eyes on. It didn’t even look like bondage-wear, at least not until a ring was attached around it, and then a leash. Anton unlocked the cuff from her wrist that kept her on the property.
She was looking down at her bare wrist and didn’t see the blindfold until it covered her eyes. Annette had said this was the way things went, and yet she still wasn’t prepared for how off-balance it made her, to not be able to steal a glance into the eyes of the man who bought her, to see if there was something human in him she could trust.
Anton jerked on her leash a little, and she knew she’d never see his face again. The trip down the hallway seemed to take forever. He let her walk until they got to the showroom because it was down one level.
When they arrived, Anton said, “down,” and she dropped to her hands and knees. He led her across the plushly carpeted floor and stopped.
“May I present your slave, Vivian.”
She groped in the darkness and bent to kiss the shoes of the stranger. “Master, this slut is yours,” she said, sure she’d pass out and thankful that was all she had to say.
“If you have any trouble, you may bring her back for further training. We’ll check in with you in a couple of weeks to make sure you’re happy with your purchase.”
Anton’s footsteps receded softly over the carpet.
There was silence for a long time. She heard a glass being filled and muffled whispers. She knew the man who’d bought her was being served a drink, perhaps something to eat.
The truth of the latter was confirmed when his hand pressed a bit of food to her mouth. A strawberry. She opened and ate it while he ran a hand over her. After several minutes, he stood and tugged on her leash.
This was really happening. If the blindfold hadn’t been over her eyes, she would have felt the edges of the room go dark anyway. Such was the level of her panic. When they got to the entryway of the mansion and the hard, marble floor, he gripped her gently by the elbows and brought her to stand. Then he led her the rest of the way outside.
The man helped her into the back of a car and joined her, then he tapped on the glass, and the driver started the engine. She felt the car lurch away, taking her to god knew where. He slipped off her panties, then his fingers were inside her.
In spite of the circumstances and her anxiety, her body fired up like the well-trained machine it was. Vivian was immediately wet and flushed, knowing she was dripping down his hand, that he would know what a horny little slut she was, even without yet seeing his face. He could look like a scruffy cave dweller, and it probably wouldn’t matter.
His thumb flicked against her clit while his fingers pumped inside her, and she began to climb toward her orgasm in earnest. “Master, please,” she gasped out. She’d had to fight to remember not to call him Sir, that this wasn’t one of her trainers, though that was what she’d been fantasizing. The fantasy had been easy to engage in with the blindfold still shutting out the world and her new reality.
“Yes, come for me, Vivi.”
She froze.
Michael. She reached to remove the scrap of black fabric from her eyes, her emotions so torn she didn’t know what to think or do. The urge was strong to start yelling at him, screeching as the banshee rose from the dead to take her indignant revenge for this betrayal. Because it must have been planned. If he’d come to rescue her, he wouldn’t have started fingering her like that in the car when she was still scared, not knowing who he was.
His free hand gripped her wrist hard before she could take off the blindfold. “I don’t believe I gave you permission to do that. Come like I asked, or there will be consequences.”
His hand was still grinding against her heat, harder, punishing the swollen nub he’d been expertly manipulating. Had he taken a class or had she really been that shut down before? Her stomach tightened in response to his words and the way he handled her. Then despite all her jumbled emotions, despite the relief of being back with him, loving him, hating him, wanting him, being repulsed by him, she came, d
ripping in the back seat of the limo.
Michael kissed her, and she opened to him. She melted against his body in post-orgasmic bliss, her mind still whirring over what he’d done. The audacity of it. The fucked-up evil of it. The fact that she was wetter than she remembered ever because of it. He ripped the blindfold off her face and they just stared at each other for a long moment.
They were on the main road now, the tinted windows blocking out the sunlight and protecting the world from their debauchery. The look he gave her was so heated, so savage, she had to look away.
Tears filled her eyes. “Michael, why . . . ”
A hand cracked hard against her thigh. “Not Michael. Never Michael again. Master. And that’s exactly why. Even with everything I’ve set in motion, you still can’t believe it. You want to see me as your tame little husband. No more.”
He held up a hand to stop her from speaking. She had a feeling if she pushed him, he’d put a gag in her mouth so he could say what he had to say. She was desperate for answers, and a little scared. What was this man capable of, and how had she never seen it? Had he just snapped one day? Even with his business tactics she never would have believed he’d take anything this far.
“We weren’t happy, Vivi. We were dying in that sanitized little world we created. I wanted more. I wanted this.”
He pulled her panties up, then pushed her onto her knees in front of him while he petted her hair. The display of power imbalance was not lost on her.
“Why didn’t you just tell me? Why bring others into it?”
“Because it wouldn’t be real. And even if it was, you wouldn’t accept it. You wouldn’t believe in it. Do you know what I’d have to do to you to make you truly understand your new place with me? I’d have to punish you so severely you’d always fear me. We’ve been so normal and vanilla our whole marriage that springing this on you now . . . you never would have accepted it.”
