The Dark Arts

by Kitty Thomas

  Saskia saw the collar painted around her throat, the heavy chains at her wrists, the pained expression on her face. But if she were a casual viewer walking by this painting in a gallery, she would have skipped all that and seen only the eyes.

  Somehow he’d painted her in such a way that all of her longing for him clashed against all her fear and the almost-dead tinge of resentment and masked defiance. It was all so stark and naked in oil. If he could get it on the canvas, he had to know. If he knew he could do anything to her, and she’d still look at him in that starved, desperate way... what was stopping him?

  7

  Saskia shielded her eyes from the glaring late afternoon sun. She was famished. Quill had lunch set up outside on the terrace, but there was only one plate of sandwiches and one goblet of tea, along with a pitcher to refill it. Next to the plate was one bowl of strawberries. Nothing had been set aside for her.

  Quill extended a hand. Would one of the servants bring something for her? Was he going to eat all of this by himself? Marcus was suddenly nowhere to be found, and she felt self-conscious in the semi-sheer gown he’d dressed her in.

  She went to Quill. His arm encircled her waist, slipping underneath the lightweight fabric.

  One of the servants stepped outside then, carrying a large cushion. She placed it next to his chair and left without a word.

  “On your knees,” Quill said, nudging her.

  Saskia knelt beside him, and he started to eat.

  “Did you wear that for me?”

  “Yes, Master.” There was no sense in bringing Marcus’s tastes into it. She wasn’t sure the information would be appreciated.

  He nodded. “I like it, but I want you to take it off and kneel with your legs spread for me.”

  He watched as she took the gown off and positioned herself on the cushion like he’d asked.

  “Back straight. Don’t slouch. It breaks up the lovely lines of your body.”

  She straightened and fought to stay still as he fondled her breast. She felt so exposed out here. Not like the studio. This space was more open, as if anyone could just wander by. Feeling watched, Saskia turned her gaze toward the house. A curtain covering a first floor window closed abruptly. Was Marcus watching her? Or one of the other servants?

  “Do you like cucumber sandwiches?”

  “Yes, Master.”

  He broke off a piece of one of them and offered it to her. She reached out to take it, but he snatched the food away. “No. You’ll eat it from my hand like a good pet.”

  All at once, any lingering bad feeling toward him evaporated. It was so hard to hold how much she’d thought she hated him in her mind when his very nearness made her feel weak and flushed. He alternated between feeding himself and feeding her. His hand lingered at her mouth after each bite he offered, so she could lick and kiss the stray bits of cream cheese from his fingers.

  The outline of an erection pushed against his pants, and she had the sudden urge... to beg him.

  “Drink?”

  Oh yes, please.

  But that wasn’t what he meant.

  “Yes, Master.”

  He held the goblet for her and tipped it back so she could drink. Then he offered her strawberries. It reminded her of Eric feeding her that strawberry that had seemed to materialize out of nowhere after the champagne at his party. But this... even if she hadn’t been kneeling naked at Quill’s feet under the open sky, the way he pressed food into her mouth, the way his fingers lingered, slipping between her lips... it was practically sex all by itself.

  She found herself disappointed when they ran out of food but not because she was hungry. Her eyes strayed to his hard on.

  Quill noticed. “Something you want?”

  She nodded, suddenly feeling herself go shy under his gaze. She shouldn’t want it. She shouldn’t want him. She knew she was falling like a row of dominoes at his feet—exactly in the pattern he’d designed. Every part of her, except for the part between her legs, wanted to resist and fight him.

  “Beg me.” He scooted the chair back and angled it toward her, opening his legs. It would only require crawling a mere few inches to be between his thighs.

  She looked back down at the cushion. “I can’t.”

  He cupped her chin and raised it so their eyes met. “I didn’t expect you to be so shy, particularly not after the captivating way you came for Marcus in the studio.” So he’d watched the video feed.

  There was a softness to the way he touched and spoke to her. She’d do nearly anything to get more of that from him.

  Saskia felt her face burn.

  The curtain on the first floor was pulled back again. Saskia could barely make out an outline of a person standing in the shadows.

  “Crawl behind me into the house.” When she hesitated, he said, “Don’t worry, I’ll bandage up your scrapes.”

  Quill rose from the chair and disappeared into the house. Saskia stared after him as if her brain had finally re-engaged to question what the hell she was doing. But after a split second of contemplation, she crawled over the terrace behind him and in through the French doors.

  He led her to the study. Of course. The room she’d tried so hard to get away from him in. The room where her skirt riding a bit too high had once been scandalous, and him slipping his hand between her legs was the most lewd act imaginable. If only.

  That room and this room were worlds apart.

  Quill sat in the leather swivel chair and undid his pants.

  “Now, you can have it, but you will worship it like it’s fucking God, do you understand little slut?”

  “Yes, Master.” The nastier he spoke to her, the more aroused she became, and from the glint in his eyes, he knew it.

  He was fully erect and seemed larger somehow than she remembered when she’d knelt in front of him. But the last time, she’d only tried to touch him from inside a cage. She could barely imagine how she would take him between her legs, let alone how she’d manage between her lips.

  He stroked her hair. “I know it’s rather frightening, but you’ll find a way.”

  Tentatively, she caressed him and began to lick his shaft in long, slow strokes, but when it came to the actual deed, she couldn’t go very far.

  “Relax your throat,” he said, as he continued to stroke her hair. She tensed and tried to pull away, afraid he’d grab the back of her head and force himself down her throat.

  “Saskia. Stop it. I’m not hurting you. I’m not going to skull fuck you. I would never do that.”

  It was hard to know what Quill would do, given the course of events so far. One could hardly blame her for any fears she might maintain.

  After a few minutes of failed attempts, he sighed. “We’ll work on it. Make me come, however you have to accomplish it.”

  “I’m sorry, Master.”

  “It’s all right. You’re a work in progress.”

  She felt like a fumbling teenager, as if she’d never done this before. She had to use her hand and mouth together to get him off.

  “You will swallow,” he said. There were limits to his compromises.

  Saskia sucked the tip into her mouth as he came down her throat and swallowed as he’d demanded.

  When she’d finished, Quill pushed an intercom button on his desk. “Lacy, please bring Miss Roth an ice pop.” He glanced down at Saskia. “Do you have a flavor preference?”

  “No, Master.”

  “Whatever’s in the freezer, Lacy.”

  “Yes, sir,” came the reply.

  Saskia slid to the floor as he zipped up and rose from the chair.

  Her face flamed when the cook came into the study several minutes later with a grape ice pop. She handed Quill the frozen treat and left the room without a word of comment.

  He unwrapped it and passed it to Saskia. “I’m sure you know what I want you to do with this.”

  “Practice?” she asked. It was far smaller than Quill’s cock so she didn’t know what they could possibly accomplish this
way beyond a pornified version of eating.

  He nodded. “I want you to practice deep throating it. The cold will numb the back of your throat so you can learn to relax it without gagging or choking. You’re going to practice at some point every day. My freezer is your freezer for this exercise. When you can take me fully, I’ll knock $100,000 off your debt. Say thank you.”

  “Thank you, Master.”

  As if her debt were anything more than a game to him. She was sure he tossed it in her face because, in a perverse way, the idea of her owing him money made him hard.

  “You can start any time.” He towered above her, his arms crossed over his chest, as she sat on the ground sliding the phallic sweet slowly in and out of her mouth, going a little deeper each time.

  Quill sat back down and watched her until there wasn’t enough left to practice with.

  “You can eat the rest,” he said, his attention shifting back to the desk. He shuffled some papers around. “Do you remember the day we discussed the plan to steal the painting, when you wore that short red skirt and I leaned you over the desk?”

  As if she’d ever forget that moment and how conflicted she felt now over it, given how mild it was by comparison to what had happened since.

  “Yes, Master.”

  “Stand where you stood that day.”

  Saskia pulled herself up off the floor and dropped the wooden stick in the trash on her way to the desk. She stood in the same spot she’d been. That day she’d felt fear and revulsion. But now? It was hard to put a label on it. It was embarrassing to think how much her inner monologue had changed where he was concerned.

  Quill moved behind her and placed his hand in the center of her back, pressing her forward until her cheek rested against the desk. The movement and touch of his hand was so similar, she could close her eyes and mentally project herself back in time. He nudged her legs apart. His hand skimmed up her thigh. Today he went further and cupped her mound. She didn’t ask him to stop this time.

  “You are so fucking wet.”

  He rubbed between her legs and picked up a thin black remote with his free hand. She thought he’d fuck her with it, but instead he pressed a button, and a screen across the room came to life with the video feed from earlier in the studio with Marcus. The picture was in shocking sharp color, the sound quality crisp. It was as far from low-end surveillance as one could get without studio lighting and a multi-million dollar production budget.

  Quill removed his hand from between her legs and gripped her throat, pulling her back against him so that she had a clear, unobstructed view of the screen. She felt her own wetness from his hand pressed against her skin.

  “Look at that filthy slut coming for the camera. I couldn’t have gotten shots this good with paid professionals.”

  He held her still, and made her watch the entire thing from the moment Marcus had knelt between her legs until she’d climaxed for him. When it was over, Quill turned it off and pushed her back against the desk.

  Minutes passed. The clock on the mantel ticked. Saskia breathed into the stillness of the room, knowing he observed her as if standing back from a painting, taking it all in. She wondered if he intended to put her on canvas like this, if he might be imagining from which angle to best compose the piece.

  In the silence, her gaze drifted to the glass dildo on the desk. The rest of the room faded out of focus as she stared at it. It was as if Quill had been waiting for her to notice it like she had the last time she’d been in this room. His fingers stroked the length of it, the girth of it. For a dildo, it was oversized—not an unrealistic fit, but...

  He nudged her legs farther apart and stroked her exposed pussy. “I think you’re wet enough to take this, don’t you?”

  She nodded as she continued to stare at it. Maybe it just seemed so big because it was inches from her face. “Yes, Master.”

  “You may not be able to swallow my cock...yet. But you can take this inside that dripping cunt. It’s about the same size.”

  A not-so-subtle brag.

  “Master, please...” Saskia squirmed against the desk, and he chuckled.

  “You just need a good, deep dicking, even if it’s made of glass, don’t you?”

  She whimpered. “Yes, Master.”

  Quill picked up the dildo and dragged the tip gently over her back, sending a chill down her spine in its wake. But he didn’t press the toy inside her. Instead he laid it back on the desk as if he’d lost all interest. Did he mean for her to beg even for a glass cock?

  He left her like that and crossed to a mini-fridge in a corner of the study and took out a large cup of water with ice in it. The look in his eyes made it clear he didn’t plan to drink it, or for her to drink it for that matter. He placed the water carefully on the desk beside the glass toy.

  He bent to her ear and whispered, “You’re getting no lube, so you’d better stay nice and wet for me. Otherwise, this might hurt.”

  Against all rational expectations, her body responded to his words as if he’d spent months training it to do so.

  Quill put the dildo in the cold water. Oh. That. She should have known. It wasn’t as if this were her first experience with such a toy. If you’d asked Saskia on any other day but this one, glass sex toys were entirely underrated. They could be sterilized easily. They could be heated or chilled. No amount or type of lube could destroy them. They were simple, they were classic, they were...

  Saskia gasped when he took the glass from the iced water and plunged it inside her. She’d braced herself against the desk, tense and waiting for something rough, but he was careful, patient, gentle. Things she never would have expected from this man, and which she drank up as if she were languishing in a desert.

  “Too cold?”

  “N-no, Master.”

  It only took moments for her body heat to warm it. Any shock of cold was already too far in the past to worry about. The toy went back into the water, and then it was inside her again.

  He kept one hand pressed against her back. A subtle restraint. A message. Don’t struggle. Don’t try to get away. Just lie there and take it like a good girl for me.

  She was only too happy to comply.

  Quill increased the tempo until she was on the edge of release. She squirmed underneath his hand as if her frantic movement could make him go harder or faster or just a little deeper and maybe to the left.

  He slowly pulled the glass out of her and pressed it against her mouth. It was warm, almost hot now.

  “Lick it.”

  She whimpered. “Master, please.”

  “I said, lick it.”

  She obediently cleaned the toy with her tongue. Quill set it down and drank down the cup of water in one long gulp.

  “You may rise off the desk,” he said finally.

  He was leaving her like this? Not finishing? What a bastard.

  “Please...”

  He put the cup back down. “In a little while. First we have business to discuss.”

  Saskia eased off the desk, the wetness dripping down her thighs. She was frustrated and angry and suddenly very self-conscious over her state of undress. She didn’t know if she was more angry at herself for letting him do this to her or at him for not completing the job.

  Quill nudged her aside and opened a drawer. He pulled out a large black ledger and laid it on the surface Saskia had just been draped across. The book fell open to reveal her name written carefully in all capital letters on the front page. He really had made a ledger just for her.

  “You have a very large debt, my dear. You’re going to have to start making a dent in it. I’ve thought of two ways you can pay me back. Your art and your body.”

  Hadn’t he already more or less expressed this? But the next words out of his mouth made her blood run cold.

  As if expecting her misunderstanding, he said, “I don’t deal in intangibles, Miss Roth. I can have you any time I want any way I want, but there’s no money in that. And Marcus isn’t paying me. But others wil
l.”

  She stiffened and shook her head as tears began to slide down her cheeks. “No, Master, please don’t...”

  Quill opened a fat lower drawer in the desk and took out a first aid kit. He led her to the sofa and sat, pulling her down with him, cuddling her in his arms as if to soothe her. “Settle down. I won’t share you with just anyone. They will pay me, but you will want them. I’ll let you choose who—only those who excite you. You can set limits with them. You won’t get limits with Marcus or with me, but you will have them with the others. And Marcus will be there to protect you if you need him. Sometimes it won’t be sex—just some kinky play. You will learn to trust me.”

  Trust. That word was mockery when it fell from Quill’s mouth.

  His hand moved between her legs again. “Just as I suspected. Even wetter. Tell me you’ll comply.”

  She searched his eyes looking for something, anything she could trust like he wanted. But all she saw were his impossible demands and no clear way to escape them.

  She couldn’t force the words he wanted past her lips. But he didn’t punish her. Instead, he opened the first aid kit and arranged her on the couch so he could take care of her knees. Crawling over the terrace and floor hadn’t drawn blood, but they were bruised and sore and scraped up pretty badly.

  Saskia hissed when he applied the antibiotic. Quill bent and blew on it before taping the gauze in place.

  She wanted to stay here with him forever in this brief shining moment where he took care of her and she felt safe.

  He closed the box and set it on a side table, then he took both of her hands in his. “Tell me you’ll comply.”

  When she’d fantasized about the Joseph Quill Experience, it wasn’t as if she’d fantasized about monogamy and romance novel sex with candles. But the fantasy was safe, while the real man felt anything but.

  “Saskia, my patience is wearing thin. I will reward obedience, but what I won’t do is negotiate with you. Let’s not forget why you’re here. After conning me out of millions, this is a better outcome for you than prison. Trust me on this.”

  But was it?

  Quill stood, a look of disappointment on his face that utterly crushed her. “Get dressed. We’re going out.”