Why is this so deathly dull?
Mar. 31st, 2012 02:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
valarltdHelp! I'm at the "I hate this book, I hate my lie, I'm going to go be a crash-test dummy instead" stage of the edits.
Is this chapter boring?
HOW is it boring?
How can I fix it?
Is there anything that makes you stop and go "huh?"
Thanks!
BTW, so VERY not work safe.
CHAPTER 1
Sometimes his life was just one more plasti-card on the junkheap of life, Sean O’Neill decided as he waited for admittance to the arcology penthouse. From the expensive shoes up to the stylish fake blue lenses and very trendy haircut, he looked as if he belonged in a place like this. He couldn’t show his nervousness, not to the visible surveillance cameras or the unseen ones that monitored everything from his pulse to his body temperature, not to himself and most of all, not to the mark.
He waited, appearing very calm and very patient, wishing for a newsfeed inside the lenses. Of course, it would be nothing but corporate propaganda. Arcologies always blocked outside newsfeeds and other signals, preferring to give their residents exactly what the company wanted them to know.
Sean had once dreamed of the life of an arcology sarariman, with steady pay and the good life inside the enormous sealed buildings. Things outside were getting bad enough, with pollution and toxicity, that most people weren’t living past sixty and not many babies were being born anymore. The babies that were born mostly didn’t live.
The arcologies exploited this, their ads showing solarium meadows with happy families full of chubby babies and smiling grandparents, all enjoying the luxuries of arcology living as if they were ordinary. Sean craved the luxuries like filtered air, hot and cold clean running water twenty-four hours a day instead of limited hours and fluid that could be anything from drinkable to dirtier than the body it was washing. He wanted the climate control that meant no more summer heat or winter cold, the reliable security making it safe to answer the doorbell or go out at any time of the night or day, and the constant electricity from a reliable grid. The more extravagant things, safe public transportation and clean, free restrooms, swimming pools, parks with real trees and animals, spas and clinics up to world-class hospitals as well as quality-controlled real food from the hydroponic farms and protein vats instead of the endless soyamix, all made up for limited Net access and heavily-censored media.
That was not his life. His education had been minimal and his vocational training nil. There was no room for him at any level of an arcology beyond dropping a package at the gatehouse. With his criminal record, he wouldn’t even qualify for a position in an arcology’s sub-level refuse reclamation plants or in janitorial services. The arcologies were selective about who they allowed in.
Nor was the life he wore now his own. His false identity had gotten him this far. The rest was up to him, once he got into the penthouse.
To take his mind from his nerves, he inventoried the waiting room. Like everywhere, the higher he went, the posher it became. Here at the top of Broine Tower, backed by all the money of Broine Enterprises, with their mercenaries, water monopolies and food patents, life looked very sweet.
He didn’t move his head, but noticed a metal track set into the archway of the elaborate door. That would hold a metal plate to seal off access in case of hostility. All arcologies were fortresses at the upper levels. That had been their purpose during the Resource Wars, when corporations leveled their full arsenals at each other.
Sean swallowed hard and breathed deeply against his rising nerves. The ride over had been short enough that he hadn’t had a chance to start sweating. He had never let a mark see him sweat and didn’t intend to start now. He had kept his cool through the weeks of training at the posh hotel. His handlers had coached him on everything from food to the intimate personal habits of the Wheelman. Anything he might need to know, he had ready now. The exposure to luxury had been crucial to his cover, making sure he wouldn’t gawk at anything he encountered on the mission.
His backers had dropped him at the entrance to the swankiest country club in town to await a scheduled pickup. He hadn’t had a qualm, sitting in the fragrant leather chair or in the back of the limousine his host had sent for him. The pretty, underdressed brunette who presented herself as his travel entertainment had been expected as well.
He hadn’t sweated upon arrival, not through the whole fabricated story to the receptionist and security, not when security relieved him of the custom-made gun he carried as an appropriate prop. He hadn’t even sweated during an unexpected, excruciatingly thorough, double-blind check, after he had been taken through a labyrinth of corridors, when all he could do was pray that the hackers on LedaCorp’s payroll had done their work exactly and his fictional identity as “Martin Laurent,” interrogator for Ezekiel InfoTech, was as airtight as they said. Not even on the long elevator ride up with two of the Broine security goons watching him through mirrored visors, their submachine guns ready.
Now, he waited, turning the credchip in his trouser pocket over and over in his fingers. Not his credchip, by any means. He’d never have enough to put that many zeros after any number, not with courier work and small-time cons and petty grifting.
Coming up the hard way, Sean had learned the natural order of things in his world very early. Incautious little fish got eaten by the big fish, who in turn got eaten by bigger fish, who in turn got eaten by the sharks, and that all the fish in the sea—including the greatest sharks—did their best to avoid even a passing encounter with the giant octopus. Zaran Broine lurked unseen in the background of most transactions, everything from buying a vitamin soda to sending money by secure Net-transfer, his many tentacles reaching far and wide into everything.
But Sean had found himself ensnared in the tentacles of an equally powerful kraken and now he was playing far out of his league, backed by people too powerful to deny, crossing people too dangerous to face. He owed his backers far too much to say no. Too much money, a life, a functioning body that actually looked human instead of a mess of scars and too many other things.
He swallowed hard, wondering if he should ring the bell again.
His life had gone straight into the junker when his wife had vanished, stolen from their bed in the dead of night. He stopped that thought. The job. He had to think about the job, not about Kyla.
He did his best not to flinch when a nude red-haired woman answered the door. She wasn’t Kyla. She stood taller, and curvier. All her curves were on display, gold nipple rings included. Silver cuffs, with tie-down rings, circled her ankles and wrists and a fancy silver electronic collar sat on her throat, a leash dangling.
He was glad Niall was not along for this part of the job. The sight could trigger his brother and he could afford one of Niall’s PTSD freakouts and captivity flashbacks as little as he could afford sweat. Niall had volunteered to come along, but his backers had final say and denied him, for very personal reasons. Sean couldn’t dwell on that unsettling topic right now either. He’d work with Niall after he got out of this. The job. Just the job. He had to stay focused on the job.
“Welcome. Master is expecting you, Mr. Laurent.” She opened the door all the way, with a visible effort at its weight. Then she went to her knees and held up her leash. Sean stepped across the threshold, wondering if he’d ever walk out again as the door shut behind him automatically. A pair of goons, like the ones he’d left behind in the elevator, stepped into place in front of it. The rich and powerful played by their own rules at this level and there was no law that would prosecute the billionaire head of Broine Enterprises for the murder of a lowlife like him, assuming anyone besides his backers—who considered him completely expendable—even noticed.
“If you will take the leash, Mr. Laurent, I will lead you to where Master awaits you.” Sean took the leash. The girl gracefully rose, gave a respectful bow, as if apologizing for turning her back on him, and then turned and led him in. He followed her shapely rear deeper into the lair, trying not to admire the sexy sway of her hips. The stone-faced goons fell in behind him, a reminder that no matter how warm the welcome was, he was not a trusted guest, but one subject to removal, whether transport or something more lethal, at any false move.
Just a mark, he reminded himself. Zaran was just a mark, no matter how rich or powerful. He was no different than the office drones to whom Sean sold black market computer bits, which might or might not work, semi-legal energy drinks, which usually worked, and good luck charms, which worked as hard as the buyer.
Zaran’s immense penthouse apartment was tasteful, understated, all the words Sean had heard but never really believed. The rooms he saw looked big enough to encompass the whole first floor of his apartment building, with space left over. The real wood furniture didn’t overwhelm any room, and despite the antiquity of some of the pieces, they had been cared for, and not passed through at least three careless owners, like everything he’d ever owned.
The art on the walls—real paintings in frames, not projected images—was colorful, if disturbing in subject matter. Sean didn’t recognize any of the men in ancient clothing, but they all had a certain cast to their faces that made them look sinister. He drifted closer to the wall to read the small gold nameplates on the paintings. Emperor Caligula. Pope Innocent III. Niccolo Machiavelli. The Marquis De Sade. He recognized only the last from some recent required reading. He shivered. He was in very far over his head.
The same stamp appeared on the faces of the warriors in the great battlescenes, with women being carried away as plunder, in the faces of the torturers, subjecting more women to unspeakable torments, and on the faces of the demons in the myriad paintings of Hell in every religious tradition. The man had money and lived very comfortably. Sean wondered where the golden floor tiles and cut diamond doorknobs were, and then remembered that the Broines had had money long enough to develop taste to go with it. They had long ago gotten over the need to flaunt it.
As he passed from the dimly lit gallery, a splendid view of the city spread out on all sides from the enormous windows that let in light, but only reflected the sky from outside. Sean knew from his handlers that the glass would withstand anything up to a direct nuclear hit. From up here, the city was all glittery silver, shiny glass and pretty stone, without the street-level squalor and litter, without poor people. He had swum straight into the octopus’ lair, feeling like a very small fish, although he was pretending to be a shark himself.
Sean tried not to case the place as he followed the girl, but the abundance of sculpture and art made it difficult. He clutched the leash tighter and stopped his automatic reach for a golden knickknack on the hall table. Everything would be ID chipped, impossible to move on the open market, even if he could get it out. The very large security goons who had followed him from the elevator discouraged any such thoughts. Discreet black bubbles on the ceiling told him that he was still watched by others as well.
The saturnine man who lounged in the study, flanked by a pair of leather-clad retainers, his shoulders being massaged by a naked blonde, was exactly what Sean had expected. Tall, thin, dark, a bored look on his narrow face, Zaran sneered up from where he sat, toying with another blonde’s curly hair as he read on a handheld computer. The redhead dropped to her knees and crawled to kneel up beside the chair.
“Yes?” Even his voice sounded bored as if Sean had disturbed him from watching the paint dry. Sean knew him at once. He looked a lot like his sister, the indomitable Net-runner Technomancer, with the same dark hair and green eyes.
But unlike her, he was bored. He had been born to wealth and privilege, a general and explorer with no more vistas to conquer. This was not a man who had ever scrounged his dinner off other people’s plates in a dishroom, or run for his life through back alleys and over fences. Sean was willing to wager good money that Zaran’s largest task was finding a way to fill all the waking hours in a day without killing someone, probably one of the girls, for his amusement. Sean had the thought that as far above the law as Zaran was, murder was probably just as boring as every other pastime.
“I’m your thirteen-twenty appointment, Mr. Broine, here about the girl you have for sale. Gemini’s reject.”
Zaran had to think for a moment. “Oh, yes. Eighty-seven.” He turned to the redhead. “Is Eighty-seven ready?”
“Yes, Master. She's in the showroom.” She practically purred as Zaran stroked her neck. Sean wondered if the man knew her name, or if she even had one.
Sean gave a half-nod, held up the credchip, and triggered the numbers to scroll across where Zaran could see. He tried to sound cool and businesslike, calming his nerves with the act. A con always calmed him when he slipped into the role. “My boss heard she used to be Irishgirl and he has a bit of revenge in mind.” He pocketed the chip and gave a one-sided smile. “He sent me to buy her, should she meet all specifications.” Sean didn’t let Zaran seen how much the words were costing him. Kyla, his Kyla, was in this madman’s hands, trapped in his delusion of male dominance, a constructed world accessible only to the very top, and only to those who didn't mind their women kidnapped, brutalized and brainwashed. Sean had learned there were many such men in the world. His real backers, who were not Erik Ezekiel, wanted Kyla back. He needed her back.
Zaran smiled, a look that made Sean want a shower. “Erik Ezekiel has no use for women, Mr. Laurent. At least not in the ways I train them.”
A tall bald man in black leather entered, and handed Zaran a data pad with an air of urgency.
“Excuse me a moment. I was expecting this.” He tapped at it a bit, scowling as he read. “Yes, double Leda’s bid on that bit from Tatsutatchi, but keep it discreet. Use one of our smaller Asian subsidiaries. They don’t need to know who’s outbidding them. If the bidding goes any higher, let me know at once.” He signed it with his finger, added his thumbprint for verification, and handed it back. The retainer exited faster than he’d entered. “Work, work, work. No rest for the wicked and all that. And certainly none for those who dare oppose my ventures.” The shower-inducing smile was back.
Sean returned the smile and flicked out his four finger-razors. Security had debated cuffing his hands behind him when that enhancement had shown up on the full body scan. Zaran’s bodyguards clicked the safeties off of their machine guns, but the retainers never moved. That was more ominous than f they'd jumped him. He heard the sound of servomotors from the ceiling and could almost feel an unseen targeting sensor putting a large bull’s-eye on his head. He ignored all of these and took the conversation back up.
“No, of course he doesn’t, not sexually. But this is Irishgirl. Next to your loving sister, she’s the one woman in the whole world he wants to see humiliated and taken apart.” He licked the razor that jutted from his left index finger, running his tongue from syntheflesh fingertip up all four inches of chromed steel in a slow move that never failed to intimidate. “I’m his left hand. I get to have all the fun while Mr. Ezekiel watches and directs.” He shot Zaran a smile of pure insanity, just as he’d been coached. “I might even get to eat her after I’m done.” He flexed the shiny array of metal, as if in anticipation, and then made the razors go away. Security relaxed a bit, but Sean noticed that the safeties did not go back on.
Zaran looked unimpressed. Sean remembered this man had fortifications against missile attacks. Simple finger-razors were beneath his notice. Instead, Zaran stared at him, unflinching, for a full minute. Sean stood still and waited, not fidgeting or shifting around under that pale green gaze. He could not be a little fish for this. He was presenting as a shark and had to back it up.
“Wait here.” Zaran rose with a languid grace, the blonde going to her knees as he left, and went to the next room. The bodyguards followed, leaving Sean in the study with his guards and the girls. Sean edged far enough toward the other room so that he could see and hear, on the pretext of dropping the end of the redhead’s leash near Zaran’s chair. Security didn’t seem to care as long as he didn’t actually follow, but he heard the whirr of the servo again as his invisible monitor tracked his movement.
His breath caught and he tried to keep his face impassive. He had found her. Kyla, his beautiful wife, all red hair and creamy skin, knelt naked on a small rug in what looked like a showroom, with track lighting, a comfortable chair and a rack of implements. He calmed, reminding himself she had been missing for two years and he didn’t need to rush in and get himself killed in the next two minutes. The jittery nerves in his head yielded to cold clarity and he was glad the lenses hid his eyes. He knew exactly how to play his part now and he would have her back.
“Now, slave girl,” he heard Zaran say to her, his voice almost sickeningly cheerful, “you’re going to be a good girl, aren’t you? You’re going to go with your new master, if he chooses to buy you, and treat him just as you treated me.”
Kyla nodded, her head bowed, never meeting his eyes. She spread her legs, put her hands behind her head and spread her elbows wide. Present position. Sean had read about it and hated it on sight. He stared, the gold rings in her nipples catching his eye as her arched back thrust her breasts forward. More gold glinted under her neatly trimmed auburn bush. He had to accustom himself to seeing her like this. He got comfortable in the study, looking as if he hadn’t been spying when Zaran returned.
“She’s ready. I’ll understand if you want to test the merchandise first.”
Sean didn’t grind his teeth. Merchandise. The word informed him this was not the world of those who exchanged power consensually. Merchandise, that's all his beautiful virgin bride was now. The girl he had loved and taught so carefully on her first night, until she had whimpered only a little at the pain and then cried out with pleasure ten times more. Merchandise, a sex-slave to be bought and sold by anyone who had the money.
He scratched at his temple, a bad habit acquired in the hospital while the syntheskin was covering his own, new skin. A habit he’d acquired while reading Zaran’s manifesto. The book had at least given lip service to the ideals of the kink community, but even there, the real slavery was between the lines for those who cared to see it.
He followed Zaran into the showroom. The guards followed and took up positions on either side of the door. The retainers settled on either side of a comfortable-looking chair. They waited, but Zaran did not sit down. Together, Sean and his host circled the kneeling woman. Zaran picked up a riding crop from an array on the wall.
“The average person starts to have trouble in that position after half an hour. Notice the tiny shifts she makes, very small, but enough to let her keep the position for up to three hours.” He tapped her breasts one after the other, and then gave her another gentle tap on her inner thigh. “Pierced below as well as above. Lovely and decorative now, but essential during early obedience-training. She’ll always follow if you hook her leash to any of those rings. A side benefit, if anything gets torn out, the damage is not significantly disfiguring, and a replacement ring can usually be re-inserted in a matter of weeks. Only the most masochistic of slave girls ever make that mistake more than once. All of my slave girls begin with ten-gauge surgical steel rings, and then they work to earn the gold.”
Sean tried not flinch when Zaran suddenly cut Kyla across the thigh with the crop, leaving a red welt. She didn’t move or make a sound, although the blow had to hurt.
“Natural redhead. They make up less than one percent of the population these days. They’re a dying breed. Pity, they’re my favorites. All that pale skin shows every little mark.” He lifted a handful of her hair, long and slightly wavy now, and sniffed it.
Sean saw the small yearning motion she made toward him as he did.
“And so sensitive, yet scientifically shown to have a higher pain endurance level than any other hair color.” He tugged her hair and used the crop to tip her chin up. Kyla stared at the ceiling, never seeing Sean as she moved. “Pretty green eyes, so rare.”
He trailed one hand along her neck, above her collar. Kyla leaned into his touch, goose bumps rising on her skin and her nipples going hard. “She takes a fourteen inch collar, very ordinary. Seven inch wrist and twelve inch ankle. She’s beautifully fine boned.”
Sean nodded and stroked her neck as well since that seemed to be called for, making sure he did it with his left hand, the one without the razors. He had complete control of the implants, but there was no cause to alarm anyone. Kyla made the same little movements into his hand as she had into Zaran’s.
A quick double-tap of the crop on her flank made Kyla kneel up, as tall as she could manage without getting off her knees. Zaran ran a hand down the back of her left leg, then up, ending in a firm squeeze of her left buttock. Kyla arched her back and her breathing quickened.
“Absolutely no artificial implants on this slave. These are all natural—factory-originals, so to speak—although her tits are noticeably larger than usual for a woman so slender, but pleasingly so.”
Sean lowered his hand to fondle and squeeze one, still keeping out of Kyla’s line of vision. Memories flooded him, the first time he had touched her so, sleeping at night with one hand cupped around them, Kyla gasping as she rode him and he sucked her nipples hard enough to make her come over and over. Sean put the thought away.
Zaran lifted a corner of Kyla’s lip with a fingertip and ran it clear around her mouth, showing teeth and gums. “Her teeth are good, no chips, breaks, stains or missing, but I can always have them removed. Some men find it makes fellatio less risky or more pleasant. She is thoroughly trained in that matter as well, a complete change from the inexperienced girl I began with.” Kyla confirmed this by sucking the finger Zaran laid across her lips with an eagerness and enthusiasm that put a knot in Sean’s gut. “I can have her muted as well, if such should be your employer’s preference. Although I might advise leaving her with this now delightfully talented tongue we’ve trained her to use, but her vocal cords would be cut. The resulting scar is tiny, nicely hidden behind almost any collar.”
Sean, remembering the few hesitant kisses she had bestowed on his cock, the looks of sheer willpower on her face as she did, kept his face impassive, glad of the lenses that hid the murder he could feel rising in his eyes. Instead, he shrugged as if it was no concern. He ran a finger along her cheekbone as Zaran continued with words he didn’t care to listen to.
A double-tap of the crop sent Kyla’s shoulders to the floor and her hips in the air, hands going behind her back, wrists crossed. Zaran spread her cheeks.
“An unusual view of a slave, but pleasing. Both her front and back holes are well-trained, well-exercised, and very well-used, but you will find that she is still adequately tight in the front and loose in the back.”
He stroked her between the legs and then flicked her across the clit ring. Kyla tensed a little, but remained silent.
“As always, I guarantee my merchandise is drug and disease-free. Only a few others can say as much. This slave, however, came to us with the added benefit of being clean from the start.” A second double-tap between her shoulders brought Kyla back up again, wrists still behind her back. “I have, however, had her spayed, as I do all pets that come through, to spare you both the embarrassment of offspring and the inconvenience of ordinary female cycles.”
Sean was careful not to show his rage at this. He never had subscribed to the Church’s teaching that birth control was sinful, a position they had held for almost two hundred years, but he had hoped for a child or two someday. Now that option had been taken from him and from Kyla as well.
“Gemini declined to have her trained in any of the more advanced sexual arts. But she received my standard slave-training as cook, dancer, housekeeper, masseuse, and common sex-slave. For who she is though—or rather who she used to be—plus the natural red hair and green eyes, I think the price is more than fair, even if she is a reject, as you called her. You may find it interesting to know that this slave girl’s other talents as a trained sex-slave also include—”
“I’ll try her out,” Sean interrupted, more to shut up the litany of Kyla’s sexual virtues. He larded his voice with the bitterness of two years of searching, of eight months spent regrowing his skin after the accident. He had to sell the idea of revenge.
Kyla tensed and shuddered a little on the carpet at the sound of his voice. Now it was Sean’s turn to tense, but he resisted showing it with a concerted effort. He could almost feel the sweat forming on his forehead. Kyla knew him now. After two years, she still knew his voice. It pleased him, but was also a terrible liability right now. If Kyla somehow gave away the game, the whole scam could fall to pieces in a heartbeat. Sean counted on her training. If she didn’t cry out when she was hit, she was unlikely to say his name or look at him. She merely trembled. Zaran laughed, the nasty kind that was half a sneer.
“Looks like she’s scared of you already.”
Knowing what he had to do next didn’t make the action any easier. Sean set his teeth and circled around behind her and oh, how she had changed to allow him to do that. Kyla never let anyone get behind her. Like most runners, she was clinically paranoid, and like most, it was with good reason. Irishgirl was high on most corporations’ “Recruit or Kill” list.
Sean reached into his jacket pockets and pulled out a red ball-gag in one hand and a set of tweezers clamps linked by a thin chain in the other. He held them up for Zaran to see while gesturing down at the slave with the same twisted smile.
“May I?”
Zaran’s eyes flickered over the proffered toys, and he gave a little condescending smile. “You may do with her as you wish, Mr. Laurent,” came the cool response as Zaran set the crop on a nearby antique table, “after you buy her. I think it better in the meantime that you try the merchandise without any added accessories. I sincerely doubt you will be disappointed. Any properly prepared dish is truly best served and enjoyed without any extra sauce, wouldn’t you agree?”
Mildly chagrined, and hoping against hope, Sean sent a silent prayer to St. Jude that Kyla would keep to her training and not betray them both during this rescue. He added a wordless coda to St. Dymphna, patron of the insane, as he tucked the toys away and went to one knee behind her.
Sean shoved her shoulders to the floor, hating the eagerness and practiced motion with which she lifted her hips for easier access. He laid a hard swat on her upturned ass, already smelling her arousal. The scent took him back and made the rest so much easier, He wouldn’t have to coax his body much now. He knew that smell, salty and female and very, very Kyla.
“Higher, bitch.”
The words lay bitter on his tongue. He wanted to hold her and coddle her and say sweet things until she remembered him and loved him again. There would be time for that later, time to love her and pet her, to wrap up in her fiery hair, to taste all of her creamy skin, to feed her pancakes in bed and lick the syrup off of each other. Time to take her to feed the live ducks at The Enclosure and make her laugh with jokes so old they pre-dated the Net.
But for now there was dealing to be done and a part to be played. If Zaran learned who he really was, the scam would be up. Kyla would remain trapped as a slave, and he would end up dead, but only after Zaran tortured the names of his backers out of him. Right now, he could afford to be nothing more than a neutral observer representing another powerful man out for revenge.
Revenge. He could do revenge. He wanted revenge. Revenge on this smug asshole who now lounged across from him, the man who had kidnapped and kept his girl. Revenge on the He wanted his. He should have a place like this, and the woman in front of him, and be living the good life like Zaran did, just by having won the parent lottery, instead of scrambling to meet the rent and bills.
He jabbed two fingers into Kyla’s body, testing her response. She squirmed and rocked back, trying for more as her breath quickened. Sean felt the sneer on his face as he worked a thumb into her loosened ass, quite changed from how he remembered it. She arched under his touch, acting as if she wanted more, desperate to please him. They had taken his sweet girl and made her a slut. He’d have every last ounce of revenge on these people poured out for him like it was real coffee, hot and dark and bitter, and he would drink it without a grain of sugar.
His own Kyla would have curled in close at his touch and whispered how much she loved him. This animal didn’t even seem to have words, just noises. But for now, that was what he wanted. Let her make all the sounds she wanted, but never a word to betray him. He hooked his fingers forward and sawed them viciously in and out. She made more of the little animal noises, the same desperation to please clear in her movement, the sounds an invitation to take even more of her.
An animal, a toy, that was all that knelt before him, he told himself. Ignoring Zaran, who was settled into that comfortable chair and watching, Sean unzipped and plunged into Kyla, fucking her hard, with all the anger he’d built up over the two long years of her disappearance.
Rage at the ones who had taken her from their bed, leaving him concussed on the bathroom floor, boiled over and he hit her again, leaving a red handprint on her rear. The animal noises, sounding pleased, didn’t stop. He slammed her more, hating those who had made her this. She got even wetter around him.
He smacked her upturned ass, liking the bright red of his anger marked on her skin. He reached around and gripped one breast, squeezing and twisting in a way that would leave an ordinary woman whimpering. Kyla only made more of the eager sounds, and he felt her nipple go hard against his palm. He tugged at the ring and she got wetter still.
“Now I can see you’re a man who knows what to do with a girl in his possession.” Zaran’s cold smirk infuriated Sean further. “ID tracking chip and neural inducer are included. You provide your own collar.”
The sex mingled with the rage in a potent cocktail until he wasn’t sure where one ended and the next began. He hit her again and again, before he pulled out and shot over her reddened ass. Kyla moaned softly, whether pleased, hurt or just vacant, he didn’t know or care. Sean pulled away and zipped up.
At a snap from Zaran’s fingers, Kyla immediately pulled herself back up to her earlier position on her knees, with fingers laced behind her head, her body on display once more.
“Does she suit you, then?” Zaran asked, eyebrows raised. Now he looked a little interested. Of course he would care now. His reputation was on the line. If Sean said the girl wasn’t any good, it reflected badly on him. Zaran lived and died by his reputation as much as any runner, and a dissatisfied customer was not a luxury he could afford, even with all his money. “If not, I do have another appointment later this evening, plus another two tomorrow, and an African warlord looking to add some fresh meat to his harem arriving later this week who is most definitely interested. As a local, however, and as a favor to Erik Ezekiel, you got the first look.”
Sean took the credchip from his pocket and threw it at Zaran’s feet. “She’s perfect. I like her responsiveness. I’ll take her back with me now.” There had never been any doubt that he would have her. He didn’t add that he was going to kill Zaran if he ever got the chance. One didn’t threaten a shopkeeper after a satisfactory transaction, and the little fish, having snapped up a tasty morsel, knew it was time to leave.
Zaran eyed Sean without a word. His stony eyes shifted from Sean down to the credchip on the floor at his feet, then back up to Sean. Something clearly didn’t feel right, and he looked like he was internally debating what to do about it.
“Very well then, Mr. Laurent.” Zaran shifted in his chair slightly and picked up a disposable reader from a drawer. “Her ID chip code and the inducer code. You can set it for pain or pleasure. It has prison-level riot-control algetics, which your boss should enjoy. And of course, you have my contact code should you need advice. A copy of my training manual is included, so you can backtrack any bad behaviors and retrain. It shouldn't be necessary. I stand fully behind all my work.”
He clapped twice and the blonde from behind the study chair crawled in. Sean noticed her nipple rings were chained together and a small silver key dangled from the chain. She knelt at Zaran’s feet and he unfastened the chain to remove the key. He held it up for a moment and then tossed it at Sean’s feet in the same contemptuous gesture.
“For the collar.”
He snapped his fingers and the blonde scooped up the credchip and held it up to him in cupped hands. Zaran didn’t take it, but one of the retainers stepped forward and held his hand over it. Sean saw a reader the size of a marble embedded in the man’s palm. It beeped twice and he picked up the chip, stashing it in a pouch with a nod to Zaran, indicating the credchip was the real thing. He stepped back, out of the way.
“Our business here is now concluded, Mr. Laurent, unless you wish your slave cleaned up a bit before taking your leave.”
Sean stood, adjusted his tie, and tucked the reader in his jacket pocket. “My thanks for a successful transaction, Mr. Broine. My employer will be pleased to have her.” He gave a small bow and then turned his attention to Kyla.
He reached into his pockets and took out the ball-gag and clamps again, along with a collar and a pair of handcuffs. Just a little longer, he told himself.
He buckled the leather collar on her, above the metal one and yanked her hair, making her open her mouth a little. He pressed the ball-gag to her lips and she opened wider. He shoved, making sure the hard rubber ball was seated behind her teeth, so she couldn't spit it out,and buckled it tightly. The tweezer clamps went on her nipples and he locked her hands behind her back. She didn’t even whimper as he set the clamps tighter than necessary. The pain would distract her, keeping her from thinking too much or panicking.
He yanked Kyla’s head back farther by the hair and unlocked the metal collar. He left the collar and key on the floor.
Then, he drew a leash, a thinsulated cloak and slippers out of his inner jacket pocket, before he yanked Kyla to her feet. He tossed the shoes by her feet and wrapped her in the cloak. He was taking her out of here. His mind almost sang with the notion. But now was no time to get cocky. He kept the myth of Orpheus quite firmly in mind as he draped a hijab from another pocket over her face and hair to prevent looks at the collar and ball-gag from the curious. She shot one horrified glance at Zaran and he caught an abortive movement with her hands as if she were about to plead. Her wild, fearful eyes over the veil told him his Eurydice could still blow this for them both.
Zaran merely watched impassively and stroked the blonde’s hair. Kyla was a piece of sold merchandise, and whatever fate awaited her plainly no longer mattered to him. In the next hour she could be tied, basted in oil and spitted like a pig, and then slowly roasted alive over a fiery barbeque pit to suit the Wheelman’s vengeful viewing pleasure for all Zaran cared.
The simple horrid realization chilled Sean to the bone. Were he truly who he was pretending to be, this could have been the end of his wife, and he would never have known. If Kyla in any way managed to betray him before he could get her safely out of here, it still could be the ultimate fate for both of them, once Zaran had the goons put him down and then contacted the Wheelman to inquire about Mr. Laurent and this deal.
“Come, girl. We’re going home.” Sean reached out to hook the leash to her collar, but then thought the better of it and clipped it instead to her clit ring. It took a firm jerk on the lead to make her follow. A muffled yelp from behind the hijab told him there would be no more resistance.
He tried not to hear the soft sobs behind him as he led his wife away from her former master, one step at a time. He tried not to see the little brunette, dusting the floor-to-ceiling shelves of real books, who shot a furtive glance at Kyla as they left, or the overseer who cropped her in response, sending her back to her work. He tried not to notice the gun-toting goons trailing him as they left the showroom. He heard the safeties flick back on. Her sobs pained him. There was nothing happy or hopeful about the sound, as he had imagined this stage of the rescue so many times. The sobs did not even sound driven by pain from the clamps on her nipples, nor from the leash on her clit ring. They sounded more like tears of sorrow and reluctance at being taken away.
Is this chapter boring?
HOW is it boring?
How can I fix it?
Is there anything that makes you stop and go "huh?"
Thanks!
BTW, so VERY not work safe.
CHAPTER 1
Sometimes his life was just one more plasti-card on the junkheap of life, Sean O’Neill decided as he waited for admittance to the arcology penthouse. From the expensive shoes up to the stylish fake blue lenses and very trendy haircut, he looked as if he belonged in a place like this. He couldn’t show his nervousness, not to the visible surveillance cameras or the unseen ones that monitored everything from his pulse to his body temperature, not to himself and most of all, not to the mark.
He waited, appearing very calm and very patient, wishing for a newsfeed inside the lenses. Of course, it would be nothing but corporate propaganda. Arcologies always blocked outside newsfeeds and other signals, preferring to give their residents exactly what the company wanted them to know.
Sean had once dreamed of the life of an arcology sarariman, with steady pay and the good life inside the enormous sealed buildings. Things outside were getting bad enough, with pollution and toxicity, that most people weren’t living past sixty and not many babies were being born anymore. The babies that were born mostly didn’t live.
The arcologies exploited this, their ads showing solarium meadows with happy families full of chubby babies and smiling grandparents, all enjoying the luxuries of arcology living as if they were ordinary. Sean craved the luxuries like filtered air, hot and cold clean running water twenty-four hours a day instead of limited hours and fluid that could be anything from drinkable to dirtier than the body it was washing. He wanted the climate control that meant no more summer heat or winter cold, the reliable security making it safe to answer the doorbell or go out at any time of the night or day, and the constant electricity from a reliable grid. The more extravagant things, safe public transportation and clean, free restrooms, swimming pools, parks with real trees and animals, spas and clinics up to world-class hospitals as well as quality-controlled real food from the hydroponic farms and protein vats instead of the endless soyamix, all made up for limited Net access and heavily-censored media.
That was not his life. His education had been minimal and his vocational training nil. There was no room for him at any level of an arcology beyond dropping a package at the gatehouse. With his criminal record, he wouldn’t even qualify for a position in an arcology’s sub-level refuse reclamation plants or in janitorial services. The arcologies were selective about who they allowed in.
Nor was the life he wore now his own. His false identity had gotten him this far. The rest was up to him, once he got into the penthouse.
To take his mind from his nerves, he inventoried the waiting room. Like everywhere, the higher he went, the posher it became. Here at the top of Broine Tower, backed by all the money of Broine Enterprises, with their mercenaries, water monopolies and food patents, life looked very sweet.
He didn’t move his head, but noticed a metal track set into the archway of the elaborate door. That would hold a metal plate to seal off access in case of hostility. All arcologies were fortresses at the upper levels. That had been their purpose during the Resource Wars, when corporations leveled their full arsenals at each other.
Sean swallowed hard and breathed deeply against his rising nerves. The ride over had been short enough that he hadn’t had a chance to start sweating. He had never let a mark see him sweat and didn’t intend to start now. He had kept his cool through the weeks of training at the posh hotel. His handlers had coached him on everything from food to the intimate personal habits of the Wheelman. Anything he might need to know, he had ready now. The exposure to luxury had been crucial to his cover, making sure he wouldn’t gawk at anything he encountered on the mission.
His backers had dropped him at the entrance to the swankiest country club in town to await a scheduled pickup. He hadn’t had a qualm, sitting in the fragrant leather chair or in the back of the limousine his host had sent for him. The pretty, underdressed brunette who presented herself as his travel entertainment had been expected as well.
He hadn’t sweated upon arrival, not through the whole fabricated story to the receptionist and security, not when security relieved him of the custom-made gun he carried as an appropriate prop. He hadn’t even sweated during an unexpected, excruciatingly thorough, double-blind check, after he had been taken through a labyrinth of corridors, when all he could do was pray that the hackers on LedaCorp’s payroll had done their work exactly and his fictional identity as “Martin Laurent,” interrogator for Ezekiel InfoTech, was as airtight as they said. Not even on the long elevator ride up with two of the Broine security goons watching him through mirrored visors, their submachine guns ready.
Now, he waited, turning the credchip in his trouser pocket over and over in his fingers. Not his credchip, by any means. He’d never have enough to put that many zeros after any number, not with courier work and small-time cons and petty grifting.
Coming up the hard way, Sean had learned the natural order of things in his world very early. Incautious little fish got eaten by the big fish, who in turn got eaten by bigger fish, who in turn got eaten by the sharks, and that all the fish in the sea—including the greatest sharks—did their best to avoid even a passing encounter with the giant octopus. Zaran Broine lurked unseen in the background of most transactions, everything from buying a vitamin soda to sending money by secure Net-transfer, his many tentacles reaching far and wide into everything.
But Sean had found himself ensnared in the tentacles of an equally powerful kraken and now he was playing far out of his league, backed by people too powerful to deny, crossing people too dangerous to face. He owed his backers far too much to say no. Too much money, a life, a functioning body that actually looked human instead of a mess of scars and too many other things.
He swallowed hard, wondering if he should ring the bell again.
His life had gone straight into the junker when his wife had vanished, stolen from their bed in the dead of night. He stopped that thought. The job. He had to think about the job, not about Kyla.
He did his best not to flinch when a nude red-haired woman answered the door. She wasn’t Kyla. She stood taller, and curvier. All her curves were on display, gold nipple rings included. Silver cuffs, with tie-down rings, circled her ankles and wrists and a fancy silver electronic collar sat on her throat, a leash dangling.
He was glad Niall was not along for this part of the job. The sight could trigger his brother and he could afford one of Niall’s PTSD freakouts and captivity flashbacks as little as he could afford sweat. Niall had volunteered to come along, but his backers had final say and denied him, for very personal reasons. Sean couldn’t dwell on that unsettling topic right now either. He’d work with Niall after he got out of this. The job. Just the job. He had to stay focused on the job.
“Welcome. Master is expecting you, Mr. Laurent.” She opened the door all the way, with a visible effort at its weight. Then she went to her knees and held up her leash. Sean stepped across the threshold, wondering if he’d ever walk out again as the door shut behind him automatically. A pair of goons, like the ones he’d left behind in the elevator, stepped into place in front of it. The rich and powerful played by their own rules at this level and there was no law that would prosecute the billionaire head of Broine Enterprises for the murder of a lowlife like him, assuming anyone besides his backers—who considered him completely expendable—even noticed.
“If you will take the leash, Mr. Laurent, I will lead you to where Master awaits you.” Sean took the leash. The girl gracefully rose, gave a respectful bow, as if apologizing for turning her back on him, and then turned and led him in. He followed her shapely rear deeper into the lair, trying not to admire the sexy sway of her hips. The stone-faced goons fell in behind him, a reminder that no matter how warm the welcome was, he was not a trusted guest, but one subject to removal, whether transport or something more lethal, at any false move.
Just a mark, he reminded himself. Zaran was just a mark, no matter how rich or powerful. He was no different than the office drones to whom Sean sold black market computer bits, which might or might not work, semi-legal energy drinks, which usually worked, and good luck charms, which worked as hard as the buyer.
Zaran’s immense penthouse apartment was tasteful, understated, all the words Sean had heard but never really believed. The rooms he saw looked big enough to encompass the whole first floor of his apartment building, with space left over. The real wood furniture didn’t overwhelm any room, and despite the antiquity of some of the pieces, they had been cared for, and not passed through at least three careless owners, like everything he’d ever owned.
The art on the walls—real paintings in frames, not projected images—was colorful, if disturbing in subject matter. Sean didn’t recognize any of the men in ancient clothing, but they all had a certain cast to their faces that made them look sinister. He drifted closer to the wall to read the small gold nameplates on the paintings. Emperor Caligula. Pope Innocent III. Niccolo Machiavelli. The Marquis De Sade. He recognized only the last from some recent required reading. He shivered. He was in very far over his head.
The same stamp appeared on the faces of the warriors in the great battlescenes, with women being carried away as plunder, in the faces of the torturers, subjecting more women to unspeakable torments, and on the faces of the demons in the myriad paintings of Hell in every religious tradition. The man had money and lived very comfortably. Sean wondered where the golden floor tiles and cut diamond doorknobs were, and then remembered that the Broines had had money long enough to develop taste to go with it. They had long ago gotten over the need to flaunt it.
As he passed from the dimly lit gallery, a splendid view of the city spread out on all sides from the enormous windows that let in light, but only reflected the sky from outside. Sean knew from his handlers that the glass would withstand anything up to a direct nuclear hit. From up here, the city was all glittery silver, shiny glass and pretty stone, without the street-level squalor and litter, without poor people. He had swum straight into the octopus’ lair, feeling like a very small fish, although he was pretending to be a shark himself.
Sean tried not to case the place as he followed the girl, but the abundance of sculpture and art made it difficult. He clutched the leash tighter and stopped his automatic reach for a golden knickknack on the hall table. Everything would be ID chipped, impossible to move on the open market, even if he could get it out. The very large security goons who had followed him from the elevator discouraged any such thoughts. Discreet black bubbles on the ceiling told him that he was still watched by others as well.
The saturnine man who lounged in the study, flanked by a pair of leather-clad retainers, his shoulders being massaged by a naked blonde, was exactly what Sean had expected. Tall, thin, dark, a bored look on his narrow face, Zaran sneered up from where he sat, toying with another blonde’s curly hair as he read on a handheld computer. The redhead dropped to her knees and crawled to kneel up beside the chair.
“Yes?” Even his voice sounded bored as if Sean had disturbed him from watching the paint dry. Sean knew him at once. He looked a lot like his sister, the indomitable Net-runner Technomancer, with the same dark hair and green eyes.
But unlike her, he was bored. He had been born to wealth and privilege, a general and explorer with no more vistas to conquer. This was not a man who had ever scrounged his dinner off other people’s plates in a dishroom, or run for his life through back alleys and over fences. Sean was willing to wager good money that Zaran’s largest task was finding a way to fill all the waking hours in a day without killing someone, probably one of the girls, for his amusement. Sean had the thought that as far above the law as Zaran was, murder was probably just as boring as every other pastime.
“I’m your thirteen-twenty appointment, Mr. Broine, here about the girl you have for sale. Gemini’s reject.”
Zaran had to think for a moment. “Oh, yes. Eighty-seven.” He turned to the redhead. “Is Eighty-seven ready?”
“Yes, Master. She's in the showroom.” She practically purred as Zaran stroked her neck. Sean wondered if the man knew her name, or if she even had one.
Sean gave a half-nod, held up the credchip, and triggered the numbers to scroll across where Zaran could see. He tried to sound cool and businesslike, calming his nerves with the act. A con always calmed him when he slipped into the role. “My boss heard she used to be Irishgirl and he has a bit of revenge in mind.” He pocketed the chip and gave a one-sided smile. “He sent me to buy her, should she meet all specifications.” Sean didn’t let Zaran seen how much the words were costing him. Kyla, his Kyla, was in this madman’s hands, trapped in his delusion of male dominance, a constructed world accessible only to the very top, and only to those who didn't mind their women kidnapped, brutalized and brainwashed. Sean had learned there were many such men in the world. His real backers, who were not Erik Ezekiel, wanted Kyla back. He needed her back.
Zaran smiled, a look that made Sean want a shower. “Erik Ezekiel has no use for women, Mr. Laurent. At least not in the ways I train them.”
A tall bald man in black leather entered, and handed Zaran a data pad with an air of urgency.
“Excuse me a moment. I was expecting this.” He tapped at it a bit, scowling as he read. “Yes, double Leda’s bid on that bit from Tatsutatchi, but keep it discreet. Use one of our smaller Asian subsidiaries. They don’t need to know who’s outbidding them. If the bidding goes any higher, let me know at once.” He signed it with his finger, added his thumbprint for verification, and handed it back. The retainer exited faster than he’d entered. “Work, work, work. No rest for the wicked and all that. And certainly none for those who dare oppose my ventures.” The shower-inducing smile was back.
Sean returned the smile and flicked out his four finger-razors. Security had debated cuffing his hands behind him when that enhancement had shown up on the full body scan. Zaran’s bodyguards clicked the safeties off of their machine guns, but the retainers never moved. That was more ominous than f they'd jumped him. He heard the sound of servomotors from the ceiling and could almost feel an unseen targeting sensor putting a large bull’s-eye on his head. He ignored all of these and took the conversation back up.
“No, of course he doesn’t, not sexually. But this is Irishgirl. Next to your loving sister, she’s the one woman in the whole world he wants to see humiliated and taken apart.” He licked the razor that jutted from his left index finger, running his tongue from syntheflesh fingertip up all four inches of chromed steel in a slow move that never failed to intimidate. “I’m his left hand. I get to have all the fun while Mr. Ezekiel watches and directs.” He shot Zaran a smile of pure insanity, just as he’d been coached. “I might even get to eat her after I’m done.” He flexed the shiny array of metal, as if in anticipation, and then made the razors go away. Security relaxed a bit, but Sean noticed that the safeties did not go back on.
Zaran looked unimpressed. Sean remembered this man had fortifications against missile attacks. Simple finger-razors were beneath his notice. Instead, Zaran stared at him, unflinching, for a full minute. Sean stood still and waited, not fidgeting or shifting around under that pale green gaze. He could not be a little fish for this. He was presenting as a shark and had to back it up.
“Wait here.” Zaran rose with a languid grace, the blonde going to her knees as he left, and went to the next room. The bodyguards followed, leaving Sean in the study with his guards and the girls. Sean edged far enough toward the other room so that he could see and hear, on the pretext of dropping the end of the redhead’s leash near Zaran’s chair. Security didn’t seem to care as long as he didn’t actually follow, but he heard the whirr of the servo again as his invisible monitor tracked his movement.
His breath caught and he tried to keep his face impassive. He had found her. Kyla, his beautiful wife, all red hair and creamy skin, knelt naked on a small rug in what looked like a showroom, with track lighting, a comfortable chair and a rack of implements. He calmed, reminding himself she had been missing for two years and he didn’t need to rush in and get himself killed in the next two minutes. The jittery nerves in his head yielded to cold clarity and he was glad the lenses hid his eyes. He knew exactly how to play his part now and he would have her back.
“Now, slave girl,” he heard Zaran say to her, his voice almost sickeningly cheerful, “you’re going to be a good girl, aren’t you? You’re going to go with your new master, if he chooses to buy you, and treat him just as you treated me.”
Kyla nodded, her head bowed, never meeting his eyes. She spread her legs, put her hands behind her head and spread her elbows wide. Present position. Sean had read about it and hated it on sight. He stared, the gold rings in her nipples catching his eye as her arched back thrust her breasts forward. More gold glinted under her neatly trimmed auburn bush. He had to accustom himself to seeing her like this. He got comfortable in the study, looking as if he hadn’t been spying when Zaran returned.
“She’s ready. I’ll understand if you want to test the merchandise first.”
Sean didn’t grind his teeth. Merchandise. The word informed him this was not the world of those who exchanged power consensually. Merchandise, that's all his beautiful virgin bride was now. The girl he had loved and taught so carefully on her first night, until she had whimpered only a little at the pain and then cried out with pleasure ten times more. Merchandise, a sex-slave to be bought and sold by anyone who had the money.
He scratched at his temple, a bad habit acquired in the hospital while the syntheskin was covering his own, new skin. A habit he’d acquired while reading Zaran’s manifesto. The book had at least given lip service to the ideals of the kink community, but even there, the real slavery was between the lines for those who cared to see it.
He followed Zaran into the showroom. The guards followed and took up positions on either side of the door. The retainers settled on either side of a comfortable-looking chair. They waited, but Zaran did not sit down. Together, Sean and his host circled the kneeling woman. Zaran picked up a riding crop from an array on the wall.
“The average person starts to have trouble in that position after half an hour. Notice the tiny shifts she makes, very small, but enough to let her keep the position for up to three hours.” He tapped her breasts one after the other, and then gave her another gentle tap on her inner thigh. “Pierced below as well as above. Lovely and decorative now, but essential during early obedience-training. She’ll always follow if you hook her leash to any of those rings. A side benefit, if anything gets torn out, the damage is not significantly disfiguring, and a replacement ring can usually be re-inserted in a matter of weeks. Only the most masochistic of slave girls ever make that mistake more than once. All of my slave girls begin with ten-gauge surgical steel rings, and then they work to earn the gold.”
Sean tried not flinch when Zaran suddenly cut Kyla across the thigh with the crop, leaving a red welt. She didn’t move or make a sound, although the blow had to hurt.
“Natural redhead. They make up less than one percent of the population these days. They’re a dying breed. Pity, they’re my favorites. All that pale skin shows every little mark.” He lifted a handful of her hair, long and slightly wavy now, and sniffed it.
Sean saw the small yearning motion she made toward him as he did.
“And so sensitive, yet scientifically shown to have a higher pain endurance level than any other hair color.” He tugged her hair and used the crop to tip her chin up. Kyla stared at the ceiling, never seeing Sean as she moved. “Pretty green eyes, so rare.”
He trailed one hand along her neck, above her collar. Kyla leaned into his touch, goose bumps rising on her skin and her nipples going hard. “She takes a fourteen inch collar, very ordinary. Seven inch wrist and twelve inch ankle. She’s beautifully fine boned.”
Sean nodded and stroked her neck as well since that seemed to be called for, making sure he did it with his left hand, the one without the razors. He had complete control of the implants, but there was no cause to alarm anyone. Kyla made the same little movements into his hand as she had into Zaran’s.
A quick double-tap of the crop on her flank made Kyla kneel up, as tall as she could manage without getting off her knees. Zaran ran a hand down the back of her left leg, then up, ending in a firm squeeze of her left buttock. Kyla arched her back and her breathing quickened.
“Absolutely no artificial implants on this slave. These are all natural—factory-originals, so to speak—although her tits are noticeably larger than usual for a woman so slender, but pleasingly so.”
Sean lowered his hand to fondle and squeeze one, still keeping out of Kyla’s line of vision. Memories flooded him, the first time he had touched her so, sleeping at night with one hand cupped around them, Kyla gasping as she rode him and he sucked her nipples hard enough to make her come over and over. Sean put the thought away.
Zaran lifted a corner of Kyla’s lip with a fingertip and ran it clear around her mouth, showing teeth and gums. “Her teeth are good, no chips, breaks, stains or missing, but I can always have them removed. Some men find it makes fellatio less risky or more pleasant. She is thoroughly trained in that matter as well, a complete change from the inexperienced girl I began with.” Kyla confirmed this by sucking the finger Zaran laid across her lips with an eagerness and enthusiasm that put a knot in Sean’s gut. “I can have her muted as well, if such should be your employer’s preference. Although I might advise leaving her with this now delightfully talented tongue we’ve trained her to use, but her vocal cords would be cut. The resulting scar is tiny, nicely hidden behind almost any collar.”
Sean, remembering the few hesitant kisses she had bestowed on his cock, the looks of sheer willpower on her face as she did, kept his face impassive, glad of the lenses that hid the murder he could feel rising in his eyes. Instead, he shrugged as if it was no concern. He ran a finger along her cheekbone as Zaran continued with words he didn’t care to listen to.
A double-tap of the crop sent Kyla’s shoulders to the floor and her hips in the air, hands going behind her back, wrists crossed. Zaran spread her cheeks.
“An unusual view of a slave, but pleasing. Both her front and back holes are well-trained, well-exercised, and very well-used, but you will find that she is still adequately tight in the front and loose in the back.”
He stroked her between the legs and then flicked her across the clit ring. Kyla tensed a little, but remained silent.
“As always, I guarantee my merchandise is drug and disease-free. Only a few others can say as much. This slave, however, came to us with the added benefit of being clean from the start.” A second double-tap between her shoulders brought Kyla back up again, wrists still behind her back. “I have, however, had her spayed, as I do all pets that come through, to spare you both the embarrassment of offspring and the inconvenience of ordinary female cycles.”
Sean was careful not to show his rage at this. He never had subscribed to the Church’s teaching that birth control was sinful, a position they had held for almost two hundred years, but he had hoped for a child or two someday. Now that option had been taken from him and from Kyla as well.
“Gemini declined to have her trained in any of the more advanced sexual arts. But she received my standard slave-training as cook, dancer, housekeeper, masseuse, and common sex-slave. For who she is though—or rather who she used to be—plus the natural red hair and green eyes, I think the price is more than fair, even if she is a reject, as you called her. You may find it interesting to know that this slave girl’s other talents as a trained sex-slave also include—”
“I’ll try her out,” Sean interrupted, more to shut up the litany of Kyla’s sexual virtues. He larded his voice with the bitterness of two years of searching, of eight months spent regrowing his skin after the accident. He had to sell the idea of revenge.
Kyla tensed and shuddered a little on the carpet at the sound of his voice. Now it was Sean’s turn to tense, but he resisted showing it with a concerted effort. He could almost feel the sweat forming on his forehead. Kyla knew him now. After two years, she still knew his voice. It pleased him, but was also a terrible liability right now. If Kyla somehow gave away the game, the whole scam could fall to pieces in a heartbeat. Sean counted on her training. If she didn’t cry out when she was hit, she was unlikely to say his name or look at him. She merely trembled. Zaran laughed, the nasty kind that was half a sneer.
“Looks like she’s scared of you already.”
Knowing what he had to do next didn’t make the action any easier. Sean set his teeth and circled around behind her and oh, how she had changed to allow him to do that. Kyla never let anyone get behind her. Like most runners, she was clinically paranoid, and like most, it was with good reason. Irishgirl was high on most corporations’ “Recruit or Kill” list.
Sean reached into his jacket pockets and pulled out a red ball-gag in one hand and a set of tweezers clamps linked by a thin chain in the other. He held them up for Zaran to see while gesturing down at the slave with the same twisted smile.
“May I?”
Zaran’s eyes flickered over the proffered toys, and he gave a little condescending smile. “You may do with her as you wish, Mr. Laurent,” came the cool response as Zaran set the crop on a nearby antique table, “after you buy her. I think it better in the meantime that you try the merchandise without any added accessories. I sincerely doubt you will be disappointed. Any properly prepared dish is truly best served and enjoyed without any extra sauce, wouldn’t you agree?”
Mildly chagrined, and hoping against hope, Sean sent a silent prayer to St. Jude that Kyla would keep to her training and not betray them both during this rescue. He added a wordless coda to St. Dymphna, patron of the insane, as he tucked the toys away and went to one knee behind her.
Sean shoved her shoulders to the floor, hating the eagerness and practiced motion with which she lifted her hips for easier access. He laid a hard swat on her upturned ass, already smelling her arousal. The scent took him back and made the rest so much easier, He wouldn’t have to coax his body much now. He knew that smell, salty and female and very, very Kyla.
“Higher, bitch.”
The words lay bitter on his tongue. He wanted to hold her and coddle her and say sweet things until she remembered him and loved him again. There would be time for that later, time to love her and pet her, to wrap up in her fiery hair, to taste all of her creamy skin, to feed her pancakes in bed and lick the syrup off of each other. Time to take her to feed the live ducks at The Enclosure and make her laugh with jokes so old they pre-dated the Net.
But for now there was dealing to be done and a part to be played. If Zaran learned who he really was, the scam would be up. Kyla would remain trapped as a slave, and he would end up dead, but only after Zaran tortured the names of his backers out of him. Right now, he could afford to be nothing more than a neutral observer representing another powerful man out for revenge.
Revenge. He could do revenge. He wanted revenge. Revenge on this smug asshole who now lounged across from him, the man who had kidnapped and kept his girl. Revenge on the He wanted his. He should have a place like this, and the woman in front of him, and be living the good life like Zaran did, just by having won the parent lottery, instead of scrambling to meet the rent and bills.
He jabbed two fingers into Kyla’s body, testing her response. She squirmed and rocked back, trying for more as her breath quickened. Sean felt the sneer on his face as he worked a thumb into her loosened ass, quite changed from how he remembered it. She arched under his touch, acting as if she wanted more, desperate to please him. They had taken his sweet girl and made her a slut. He’d have every last ounce of revenge on these people poured out for him like it was real coffee, hot and dark and bitter, and he would drink it without a grain of sugar.
His own Kyla would have curled in close at his touch and whispered how much she loved him. This animal didn’t even seem to have words, just noises. But for now, that was what he wanted. Let her make all the sounds she wanted, but never a word to betray him. He hooked his fingers forward and sawed them viciously in and out. She made more of the little animal noises, the same desperation to please clear in her movement, the sounds an invitation to take even more of her.
An animal, a toy, that was all that knelt before him, he told himself. Ignoring Zaran, who was settled into that comfortable chair and watching, Sean unzipped and plunged into Kyla, fucking her hard, with all the anger he’d built up over the two long years of her disappearance.
Rage at the ones who had taken her from their bed, leaving him concussed on the bathroom floor, boiled over and he hit her again, leaving a red handprint on her rear. The animal noises, sounding pleased, didn’t stop. He slammed her more, hating those who had made her this. She got even wetter around him.
He smacked her upturned ass, liking the bright red of his anger marked on her skin. He reached around and gripped one breast, squeezing and twisting in a way that would leave an ordinary woman whimpering. Kyla only made more of the eager sounds, and he felt her nipple go hard against his palm. He tugged at the ring and she got wetter still.
“Now I can see you’re a man who knows what to do with a girl in his possession.” Zaran’s cold smirk infuriated Sean further. “ID tracking chip and neural inducer are included. You provide your own collar.”
The sex mingled with the rage in a potent cocktail until he wasn’t sure where one ended and the next began. He hit her again and again, before he pulled out and shot over her reddened ass. Kyla moaned softly, whether pleased, hurt or just vacant, he didn’t know or care. Sean pulled away and zipped up.
At a snap from Zaran’s fingers, Kyla immediately pulled herself back up to her earlier position on her knees, with fingers laced behind her head, her body on display once more.
“Does she suit you, then?” Zaran asked, eyebrows raised. Now he looked a little interested. Of course he would care now. His reputation was on the line. If Sean said the girl wasn’t any good, it reflected badly on him. Zaran lived and died by his reputation as much as any runner, and a dissatisfied customer was not a luxury he could afford, even with all his money. “If not, I do have another appointment later this evening, plus another two tomorrow, and an African warlord looking to add some fresh meat to his harem arriving later this week who is most definitely interested. As a local, however, and as a favor to Erik Ezekiel, you got the first look.”
Sean took the credchip from his pocket and threw it at Zaran’s feet. “She’s perfect. I like her responsiveness. I’ll take her back with me now.” There had never been any doubt that he would have her. He didn’t add that he was going to kill Zaran if he ever got the chance. One didn’t threaten a shopkeeper after a satisfactory transaction, and the little fish, having snapped up a tasty morsel, knew it was time to leave.
Zaran eyed Sean without a word. His stony eyes shifted from Sean down to the credchip on the floor at his feet, then back up to Sean. Something clearly didn’t feel right, and he looked like he was internally debating what to do about it.
“Very well then, Mr. Laurent.” Zaran shifted in his chair slightly and picked up a disposable reader from a drawer. “Her ID chip code and the inducer code. You can set it for pain or pleasure. It has prison-level riot-control algetics, which your boss should enjoy. And of course, you have my contact code should you need advice. A copy of my training manual is included, so you can backtrack any bad behaviors and retrain. It shouldn't be necessary. I stand fully behind all my work.”
He clapped twice and the blonde from behind the study chair crawled in. Sean noticed her nipple rings were chained together and a small silver key dangled from the chain. She knelt at Zaran’s feet and he unfastened the chain to remove the key. He held it up for a moment and then tossed it at Sean’s feet in the same contemptuous gesture.
“For the collar.”
He snapped his fingers and the blonde scooped up the credchip and held it up to him in cupped hands. Zaran didn’t take it, but one of the retainers stepped forward and held his hand over it. Sean saw a reader the size of a marble embedded in the man’s palm. It beeped twice and he picked up the chip, stashing it in a pouch with a nod to Zaran, indicating the credchip was the real thing. He stepped back, out of the way.
“Our business here is now concluded, Mr. Laurent, unless you wish your slave cleaned up a bit before taking your leave.”
Sean stood, adjusted his tie, and tucked the reader in his jacket pocket. “My thanks for a successful transaction, Mr. Broine. My employer will be pleased to have her.” He gave a small bow and then turned his attention to Kyla.
He reached into his pockets and took out the ball-gag and clamps again, along with a collar and a pair of handcuffs. Just a little longer, he told himself.
He buckled the leather collar on her, above the metal one and yanked her hair, making her open her mouth a little. He pressed the ball-gag to her lips and she opened wider. He shoved, making sure the hard rubber ball was seated behind her teeth, so she couldn't spit it out,and buckled it tightly. The tweezer clamps went on her nipples and he locked her hands behind her back. She didn’t even whimper as he set the clamps tighter than necessary. The pain would distract her, keeping her from thinking too much or panicking.
He yanked Kyla’s head back farther by the hair and unlocked the metal collar. He left the collar and key on the floor.
Then, he drew a leash, a thinsulated cloak and slippers out of his inner jacket pocket, before he yanked Kyla to her feet. He tossed the shoes by her feet and wrapped her in the cloak. He was taking her out of here. His mind almost sang with the notion. But now was no time to get cocky. He kept the myth of Orpheus quite firmly in mind as he draped a hijab from another pocket over her face and hair to prevent looks at the collar and ball-gag from the curious. She shot one horrified glance at Zaran and he caught an abortive movement with her hands as if she were about to plead. Her wild, fearful eyes over the veil told him his Eurydice could still blow this for them both.
Zaran merely watched impassively and stroked the blonde’s hair. Kyla was a piece of sold merchandise, and whatever fate awaited her plainly no longer mattered to him. In the next hour she could be tied, basted in oil and spitted like a pig, and then slowly roasted alive over a fiery barbeque pit to suit the Wheelman’s vengeful viewing pleasure for all Zaran cared.
The simple horrid realization chilled Sean to the bone. Were he truly who he was pretending to be, this could have been the end of his wife, and he would never have known. If Kyla in any way managed to betray him before he could get her safely out of here, it still could be the ultimate fate for both of them, once Zaran had the goons put him down and then contacted the Wheelman to inquire about Mr. Laurent and this deal.
“Come, girl. We’re going home.” Sean reached out to hook the leash to her collar, but then thought the better of it and clipped it instead to her clit ring. It took a firm jerk on the lead to make her follow. A muffled yelp from behind the hijab told him there would be no more resistance.
He tried not to hear the soft sobs behind him as he led his wife away from her former master, one step at a time. He tried not to see the little brunette, dusting the floor-to-ceiling shelves of real books, who shot a furtive glance at Kyla as they left, or the overseer who cropped her in response, sending her back to her work. He tried not to notice the gun-toting goons trailing him as they left the showroom. He heard the safeties flick back on. Her sobs pained him. There was nothing happy or hopeful about the sound, as he had imagined this stage of the rescue so many times. The sobs did not even sound driven by pain from the clamps on her nipples, nor from the leash on her clit ring. They sounded more like tears of sorrow and reluctance at being taken away.
