by Mallory Rush
It was a promise of sorts, she decided. One that was hers to treasure, to climax yet again upon, and forever keep.
Chapter 19
As she walked ten paces behind Rand, Rachel was glad the veil covered her mouth. It wouldn't do to be seen in the open market wearing the euphoric smile of a woman supremely sated after two days of alternately tender and ravenous lovemaking. She was, after all, expected to play the role of a just bought bed slave getting a public lesson in submission.
A sigh of relief filtered the thin cloth. She was glad for this taste of limited freedom; even more glad that Rand had bowed to her judgment.
He'd been anxious to walk past Sarah's house en route to the market. His anxiousness didn't bode well for the cool they had to maintain. It made her nervous. One screw up was all it took and no matter how in control Rand thought he was, one chance glimpse of his long lost sister could set off some dangerously instinctive reactions. It had taken some doing, but Rachel won. Today's destination was saved for last. At dusk when the shadows would mask their faces and the hired surveillance tailing them at a discreet distance, wouldn't be as easily noticed.
That had been her reasoning, though in truth it was a gut feeling she couldn't justify that something could go wrong. The feeling was still there but Rachel shook it off, determined to enjoy this bit of sightseeing while she could. Friday would come soon enough. Today, Tuesday, she'd savor.
The descending sun slanted into the huge canvas tent as they filed down one row and then another, Rand the leader, she the chattel, and Jayna bringing up the rear as her guard. Jayna had kindly, but sternly, laid out the rules:
Slaves were not permitted to speak to their masters unless spoken to first. Slaves were not to make eye contact with any man but their master. Slaves were to keep the expected distance at all times, unless signaled to trot to his side should he want a quick fondle, then falling back the required ten paces once he was ready to move on.
To break any of these rules was to risk a public whipping.
Trinkets and fabrics and hand-carved wood, all vied for Rachel's attention. She paused to admire an ivory necklace. Jayna gave her a gentle push.
"Hurry, hurry," she urged. "The Master walks on."
"But I want to know how much this—" A high-pitched wail stopped short her protest. Rachel searched for the source.
She gasped. Close to where Rand stood, a good twenty paces ahead, was a spectacle that caused her stomach to lurch and her blood to boil. A fruit vendor grappled with a dirty urchin-like child who dropped a banana as the man shook him.
Acting on impulse, she began to run toward the child. Jayna grabbed her arm and spun her around.
"Do not be foolish, Mistress. Else you suffer a beating."
"But that man, he can't abuse the poor child! Somebody has to do something. Let me go!"
Jayna's grip tightened as Rachel struggled to intervene.
"You can do nothing. It is sad, but common to catch hungry thieves. The child will be punished. I do not wish for you to be punished also."
"Punish a starving child for stealing a banana? That's inhumane. What's his punishment, a spanking?"
"His hand will be cut off. It is the price all thieves must pay."
Such was her shock that Rachel stared dumbly at Jayna and then at the weeping boy who begged for mercy. What could she do? She had to do something, anything, to stop this atrocity.
Rachel broke free of Jayna's hold and rushed forward. When she was just shy of the fruit cart, Rand confronted the merchant. She was close enough to hear his halting speech in the Zebedique tongue which the other man replied to with a rabid snarl and another shake of the wailing child.
Just as she was ready to join the fracas, Rand held out a thick stack of local currency and gestured to the fallen banana. The merchant hesitated. Rand withdrew the bribe.
Before Rachel could yell at him to give the man however much money he wanted, the child was dumped on the hay-strewn floor and a bunch of bananas thrust into his grimy little hands by the vendor—who quickly held his own palm up.
Rand shelled out the pay-off. The child kissed his feet and, hugging the fruit to his skinny bare chest, darted from sight. His savior appeared to take no notice, but Rand had turned his gaze on her and she saw the distress, the anger and compassion she herself felt, mirrored in his eyes. She stood only a few feet away, far closer than she was allowed.
"Woman!" he bellowed, and raised his hand as if he meant to strike her. "Will you never learn your place? Get back where you belong. Ten lashings await you at home."
He was so convincing that she instinctively fell back two paces and collided with Jayna. Several passerby's shouted their hearty approval, no one needing an interpreter to know she'd just been royally admonished by a most masterful master.
She caught his playful wink as he turned and studied the vast array of exotic fruit. The rat. The stinking, naughty, marvelous, sweet rat. Rand was the only man she'd ever wanted to cover with kisses and slap senseless at once. He had a hard heart, she knew that, but it was just as big and gentle and good.
She did love him. She loved him so much that her throat constricted and her mouth trembled beneath the veil while she watched him select an assortment of cherries and figs, dark grapes and ripe persimmons. When he offered the vendor a handful of coins the other man refused payment and tumbled the fruit into a thin cotton sack.
Rachel assumed it was Rand's generosity in exchange for the child's hand that got him the freebies. Wrong, she soon realized. The man pointed at her and laughed, apparently impressed with Rand's hold over his concubine.
Rand slapped the man's back as if they shared similar philosophies on the debasement of women. She knew better. Though he smiled a tight smile, Rand's jaw was clenched and so was his fist around the sack. He looked mighty close to shoving the vendor's face into the wagon of fruit.
Fearful that he might give into the urge, Rachel stepped forward. Jayna clamped a firm hand on her shoulder.
"Do you wish for twenty lashes, Mistress, not ten?"
"For heaven's sake Jayna, Rand wouldn't—" Rachel bit her tongue. She'd slipped, like an amateur, or a woman in love taking up for her man, she'd slipped. Amateurs and women PIs falling for their clients were not mutually exclusive. Too late, from the beginning it had been too late to fight the inevitable, but she rushed on to salvage what she could. "What I mean is, the master seeks his own pleasure. He'd rather make me pay up in bed than beat me to a pulp."
"Yes. I think this too." Her soft laughter was that of a wise old woman who'd endured enough pain to recognize love no matter its form or disguises. "Do not make him shame you again when it is not his wish. Be still, child, for he comes."
Before she could utter a single, questioning word, Rachel was staring up at Rand's madder-than-hell face. He gripped her wrist and shoved the sack into her hand. If not for the soothing rub of his thumb to her pulse point or the apology she read in his eyes, even she might have bought his act.
"Carry this," he commanded harshly. "You will feed it to me later." And then to Jayna he said, "How long before the sun goes down?"
"One hour, perhaps."
"Shit."
He growled his impatience and matched it with a yank of the clasp at Rachel's temple. The veil he thrust to the side still attached and immediately took access to her mouth that was open in an "Oh!" of surprise.
His kiss was immediate, greedy and rough. It was a long kiss, so long she wondered if he meant to make-out until dusk set in. Not that anyone around here took notice of such matters, judging from the activity that bustled around them.
Staying as true to her role as possible, Rachel refrained from gripping him close though she returned his kiss with equal fervor. He was her love, her friend and only link to Western civilization. Their kiss was confirmation of all three and his lips left her with no doubt that he needed this bond as much as she did.
In this place, this horrible place that had no equal but with Hitler's G
ermany, they kissed with a madness that each clung to for their sanity. These people weren't right, not right at all, but in their midst was rightness. Call it love, call it lust, call it truth.
Whatever she called it, it was them. She and Rand, two strangers in a too strange land with his hands kneading her buttocks and her own clenching the bag between them to keep herself from returning his show of possession.
His mouth was still open as it skimmed her cheek and settled beside her ear.
"I hate this perverted country," he said so quietly that even Jayna couldn't hear. "I'm close to hating myself for being the one who got you into this. But, Rachel, there's no one else I'd rather be with."
"Me, too," she whispered. "Me, too."
"Good enough. And so was that kiss. It'll get me through sundown. How about you?"
"I'll make it, but I'm counting the minutes till we're home." While she still had the chance, she reminded him of her earlier warning. "Don't forget that if we see Sarah or her owner when we pass their house that you have to keep going. Don't stop. Don't even look their way."
"Gotcha. In the meantime, I think it's a good idea if you pretend I'm that jerk by the fruit stand who's watching us. Get uppity and give me a reason to play your master. Who knows? Maybe he'll toss me a pineapple or two."
It was almost as hard not to snicker as it was to let Rand go. Rachel thrust him away. She wiped the back of her free hand against her wet mouth and refastened the thin cloth. Indulging a grin, she cherished their moment of shared humor.
Rand's sardonic laughter echoed through the tent.
"Just a taste of what's to come, wench! Wipe your mouth again and I'll slap it."
He turned on his sandaled heel and didn't glance back. She waited until Jayna gave her a nudge.
Only Rachel heard her low chuckle. Only Rachel and the patron spirits of harmony and justice and love.
* * *
Trailing even a pretend master home should have rankled her, but it didn't. She knew they were equals, and just as importantly, so did Rand. In fact, as they approached Sarah's street, Rachel was all too aware that she was his professional superior when it came to this kind of risky business.
The niggle of apprehension she'd felt earlier came closer to an alarming unease with each step toward their destination. She told herself she was being ridiculous, that nothing could go wrong by simply passing the place Sarah was kept.
Even so, Rachel said a silent prayer that they'd make it home without incident. She shifted the assortment of packages in her arms while she kept her gaze locked on the back of Rand's head. An elegant, black car whizzed past and turned into a driveway two houses down. Mansions they were, putting she and Jayna a good half block away. Rand sped up.
She could have been the perfect concubine instead of a palm-sweating PI the way she immediately matched his accelerated pace over the red brick sidewalk.
Her heart kept time with her feet, beating faster, faster. The swish-swish sound so loud in her ears, she didn't hear Jayna panting as she rushed to pick up a fallen package.
"You carry too much, Mistress. Let me help."
"Thanks, Jayna," Rachel muttered distractedly. She thrust the bulk of her load into Jayna's arms, hardly aware that the elder woman struggled to grasp it all while she herself now carried nothing but a bag of fruit.
For a split-second, Rachel chanced a backward glance. The hired men, dressed in Zebedique garb, were making tracks behind them. They appeared to be deep in conversation but she was certain from their quickened march that they were aware of the sudden switch in what had been an innocuous walk home.
"Damn," she groaned, cursing herself for taking her gaze off Rand for even that little bit. And then she silently damned him for sprinting ahead in an aggressive saunter. He was closing in too fast, but thank heaven not fast enough to beat the wrought iron gates that swung shut behind the car.
She ran to catch up when he stopped in front of the gates. He stood there frozen, so frozen he could have been an ice sculpture. The driver got out and opened the back door.
What in the world did Rand think he was doing, calling attention to himself like that? It was exactly what she had feared. He didn't know what he was doing, wasn't capable of thinking past the need to reach for, to rescue his sister.
By the time she'd regained her ten-pace distance a man and two women had emerged from the backseat. Rand was leaning forward, his own hands empty as they reached for the bars while his mouth opened.
"You bastard!" Rachel dug into the sack and hurled a soft persimmon hard as she could. Smack! The juicy, melon colored orb splattered against his upper arm. Rand's mouth snapped shut and he whirled around. "You son of a bitch, who do you think you are expecting me to bow to you?"
Fruit began to fly. A handful of cherries hit his chest, zapping her target like buckshot from a gun. Next, she launched an attack of grapes from his face to his crotch, screaming insults at his genital endowment as she advanced. By now the car's occupants had turned to observe what appeared to be a mutinous slave turning her owner into a living work of abstract art.
Several figs landed between Rand's stunned eyes before she pounced and knocked him on his butt. Rachel punched at his chest and kicked at his shins. She wrestled in earnest until he had no choice but to flip her on her back, sprawl his body over hers and lock her in a stranglehold unless he wanted the stuffings beat out of him.
Once his face was within inches of hers, she wheezed out in a whisper, "Get a grip, Rand. Get it and fast or you'll blow the scam. Hurry up and apologize to our audience for your wayward slave and let's get the hell home while the getting's still good."
He shook his head as if to clear it. Rachel pushed him off and sprang to her feet. There had to be a God in heaven because Rand had regained enough of his senses to follow suit.
He shook her hard then thrust her away with ample momentum to send her stumbling backwards into Jayna and the two hired men who'd caught up.
While Rand made a stilted apology to the small gathering on the other side of the gates, Rachel insinuated herself between Jayna and the hired guns, hoping against hope they passed for locals enjoying a cheap thrill.
"Scram," she hissed at the two men. "Get the hell—"
They took off, laughing as if they'd just gotten their jollies for the night.
These guys that Rand had brought in were good, really good. But not as good as Jayna, gentle, wise Jayna who sized her up with a withering glare before scouring her with a string of scalding epithets, threw down the market's bounty and shoved Rachel to her knees.
Jayna's hands pressed against her charge's shoulder blades then moved to urge Rachel's face to the ground until her forehead rested by Rand's foot in humble, beggarly fashion.
Once the onlookers retreated to the house, Rachel felt Jayna's soft pat of reassurance and then Rand's tight grip as he pulled her to her feet.
The trek home was made in silence. Rand, ten slow, deliberate paces ahead as if he struggled against nature to forge each step. Jayna, just behind her, singsonging a litany that might have been a lullaby or a prayer.
And she, Rachel, thanking Jesus, God and Mary for their narrow escape while she cursed, yet understood, Rand's near fouling of their master plan.
And while she thanked heaven, she thanked Jayna in silence. Jayna deserved better than what she'd been born to and Rachel was ready to go to the mat to see that she got it.
But why stop there? Why not go for broke?
Rachel wanted it all. Freedom for Sarah and Jayna. The screws put to this country and the slavers who benefitted from its twisted mass psyche. They'd earned her enmity and she wanted their heads. And Rand, she wanted Rand. With all his secrets, his flaws and darkness and marred beauty, she wanted him. No other man would do. They all faded in his shadow. Here, there, anywhere she loved him. Would always love him.
The question was, once this nightmarish dream was over, would he still feel the magic too?
Chapter 20
Rand divided the length of Rachel's hair into three portions, rubbing the inviting texture between his fingers as he began to braid.
"Only two days left till Friday," Rachel said, snuggling her backside into his open legs on the bed. He nudged his hips forward and was rewarded with a girlish giggle.
"No thanks to me, Friday's still on. I still can't believe I almost blew it yesterday, even without Sarah being one of the concubines that got out of that car. I owe you, Rachel, I owe you really big."
"You owe me nothing but a back massage tonight."
"You're too easy on me, angel. I'd feel a lot better if you'd slug me instead of being so nice and understanding about my major league screw up."
"It's easy to go easy on you. After all, you've been hard enough on yourself to save me the trouble." She caught his hand that had strayed to her breast and brought it to her mouth. Even his knuckles responded to her gentle bite and sent an immediate message to his groin. "C'mon, Rand, give the man a break. You were human. You acted on instinct. There's no crime in that. And besides, no harm was done."
"Thanks to you. You tried to warn me, but it's like I heard and didn't really listen. If you'd been me—"
"I would have reacted exactly the same. She's your sister, not mine. And that's why, no matter what, once you drop me and Jayna off at the bath house you don't budge from the car until you see the whites of our eyes."
She kissed his palm and released it, giving him the reassurance he needed, the trust she still had in him when he'd lost it in himself. He loved her. Lord, but he did. He loved her so much the pit of his stomach took a dip with the grinding gnaw of fear for her safety. If he ever lost Rachel he'd never find himself again. And Sarah, sweet little Sarah, who'd long ceased to be little even if that's how he remembered her, she needed Rachel just as desperately as he.
In a reverse axis way and yet in total cohesion, they were bound. The three of them, single parts of the whole, spinning into a super nova...