“So, what does that mean?”
“I don’t know, but I do know that you’re going to have to prove to me you’re over her and you can’t do that now.”
“I am over her.”
“But you came running back here the first chance you got?”
“An offer I couldn’t refuse. It is my company as much as it is hers. And it was going down the tubes.”
“Right. Yeah. I know the price Randall Tyler’s paying you for your work; it has to be Dana, that’s the hook. The man’s no fool. He reeled you in with tall tales of the company’s demise. He could have hired an accountant to take care of most of the problems, left you out of it. But just one word from him and here you are.”
“You won’t believe me if I say it’s not Dana?”
“No, I won’t believe you, Ben.”
“So, why did you come then?”
She shrugs. “To see for myself what I expected all along. It gets worse, you get more distant every time we talk, every time I see you. It’s been a month and I can see where we’re headed.”
“And here I drift…” he sighs.
“Go after her… do what you will with her; that’s what she wants.” Colleen says this as if she means it. She’s not only perceptive, she’s wise.
“Don’t you understand, I’m in love with you!”
She laughs, melodious and sweet. How can a man be so obtuse? she thinks. Even the very good ones, the Benjamin Hunters of the world can’t see what any woman clearly can—he’s in love with Dana Ransom.
“Listen,” she moves on his body, snaking her leg between his, “how about you have your fill of her? Do everything you want to, what you couldn’t before, but can now. And if it’s really over, I mean really over, and you have no feeling for her anymore, and your heart beats so boldly for me that you’re missing me every minute of your day… well then, come back to me in Seattle.” She gauges his reaction knowing exactly what he’ll do. “Not that I’m going to wait for you, but I may still be available.”
She offers him her best coquettish smile, perhaps this will make her hurt less real. But then, how could she be hurting if the man wasn’t right for her? Just like Darlene said.
“You can’t do this!” he quickly objects. “You’re supposed to be a sweet, loving sub.”
“Honey, I am, when I want to be. I’m really good at it too, but… I’m a pragmatic woman and I’m not about to share the man I love with a witch whose spell still spins his mind and tears apart his heart.”
He laughs. He knows she’s right.
At least she can walk away thinking she’ll still have him when the time is right; it just isn’t yet time for them. After Dana. She’ll wait until after Dana, if that time ever comes.He doesn’t look as if he agrees at all, so she finally tells him, “You just think about it. Think long and hard. Do what you need to do, Ben.” He’s still deep in thought as Colleen pulls away and moves off the bed. “So, how about that tour of the city? I want to eat some really great San Francisco food. Let’s go to the wharf, some place with lots of seafood. I’m in the mood for crab.”
He watches her as she fluffs her red curls, spreads lip-gloss over her lips and turns to find her clothes. She’s too damn perfect! he thinks silently. How come he can’t adore what is so beautifully flawless and his desire embraces instead an inconstant, imperfect woman like Dana?
Chapter Ten
“Don’t you ever deliberately fuck up to get me mad, Dana,” Ben tells her with his eyes flaming mad.
“What was that?” she stares at him shocked.
“The printer called. Good thing they have a proofreader. There were a dozen mistakes in this copy. I can’t believe you’d screw up after…”
She rips the pages from his hand and reads through them quickly. “Oh, my God, this isn’t the final draft,” she looks up dumbfounded. “I mean the images are right. It was late, I mean 5:00 in the morning. I was so tired. I’m sorry. I’m sure the right copy is somewhere on my desk.”
“Like anyone could find it.”
Her desk is covered in papers and she’s about to dive in and find what they need. But before she can get even a half step in that direction, he’s pushing her himself into the office with a hand firmly holding her upper arm. Out of nowhere there’s a leather spanking paddle in his other hand and she’s sprawled over the side of the desk. He raises her skirt. Oh, how he loves the short skirts for the easy access they provide. With just a thong panty, her cheeks are suitably bared.
The paddle strikes with a nasty smack… She howls and kicks under his steely grasp.
“You’re already going to get the cane, Dana, so I’d suggest you stall your fit for that.”
The blistering blows shoot fire though her crotch and belly; immediately stirring her sexual juices. And yet, there’s nothing sexual about his anger; it’s all righteous rage.
“I swear I did not do it deliberately!” she tries to tell him.
“I really don’t care!” he comes right back. “You deserve this and a whole lot more.”
“Please, Benjamin, I’m sorry. I am. Please!”
He starts in again and it’s harder now. But she has adjusted to the sensation and her body takes it in as any good spanked submissive does.
“Oh, my God…” she’s almost begging for more, lewdly swaying her reddened behind as if she’s taunting him.
But this is not what he wants. He wants her begging him to stop, not begging him to cum.
He ups the heat, criss-crossing her bottom, setting it ablaze. The color turns from pink to red, to streaked with a purple rash from blows where the paddle hits along its edge and it cuts into her skin. She’s flailing harder, in pain, just short of an all out revolt. She could run, she could wriggle from his grasp, but she stays and takes it all until she is sobbing, crying, and, finally, begging for him to stop.
When he puts down the paddle, he backs off quickly. No hand at her crotch to get her off. This isn’t the same as the Friday before; there’ll be no sweet sexual end.
THWACK!
The cane suddenly lands solidly against her punished bottom. It cuts the air in shreds before it does the same to her behind.
The brutal sting tears through her body but she only grunts and lurches forward, grabbing for the far side of the desk. She grits her teeth and hangs on, preparing for whatever absurd number the man will dish up today.
THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! The cuts come so fast that she can hardly catch her breath. Her sobs begin and she twists in a tortured dance. The pause just makes the next one cut worse.
THWACK!
“Oh, please,” she finally moans, sounding helpless and forlorn.
THWACK!
She waits for the next mean thwack, gearing up for the last half dozen, but to her surprise, he’s finished.
“Let’s just say that sitting on your bare ass for the rest of the day would be a very good idea, especially if you don’t want the six I decided not to give you. You got that?”
“Yes, sir.” That term of respect sets them both back.
He knows he should correct her now. He’s not her sir. But he lets it slide. Old form. A memory, even if it’s not an entirely pleasant one, it does have a meaning they both understand. Who knows what’s going to happen in the relationship now, although it appears the possibilities are starting to emerge with some clarity.
***
I can feel it within him. I think he’s torn. I’m not. I know very well what I want. I know what I need and it is Benjamin Hunter.
In the afternoon, I march into his office. Well, maybe not march, that’s what I think about doing. I’m actually meek as a lamb when I knock on his door, and then, as is our custom, turn the knob and peek inside without waiting for a response.
“What is it?” he looks up and asks.
“Could we talk a moment?”
“I guess.”
I move inside where I feel less safe and less courageous. But I’m going through with it, I tell myself. I have to.
“I think we should start over,” I say, as I reach his desk. “I mean really start over, with things the way they should be, sort of how they used to be, but better. You on top and me your lowly, groveling sub. You can’t deny I need it.”
He considers my speech for some seconds, leaving me sweating this out and feeling so nervous I think I’m going to wretch. When he finally speaks, my heart is thumping so hard I can hardly hear. “No, Dana, I can’t deny you need it,” he says. “But you’re forgetting something, I already have a relationship I love.”
“But you’re back here with me now. Why else would you return? Be honest.”
“To protect my investment.”
I shake my head, feeling a little more bold. I know I’m right. “You’re not being honest enough, Benjamin. You know there’s more.”
He just stares.
“I’ve got you, Benjamin Hunter, you know I do. I didn’t ask you to return; you just showed up.” My body is visibly shaking now. “It’s about time you took care of the whole package.”
“You think it would be just that easy? You seem to forget how it ended between us. It got ugly, really ugly. I’m not going down that road again.”
“It got ugly because it was an ugly time in your life. It brought you down, you brought me down,” I’m even surprising myself with how sane this sounds. “But you’ve changed. You changed the day you left and I wasn’t smart enough to see that. I don’t mean you changed altogether, but you have, well, a certain maturity about you. I know it would work between us now. And for me… well, if Locksley did nothing else, he pointed out the fact that I am submissive. I need the hard hand, the grimace, the nasty fucks, the pain, all that. I can’t deny it anymore than you can deny who you are.” I stop and take a breath. There’s a strange look in his eyes I don’t like. I think I got to him but the look says more than that.
“Dana,” he say my name so softly, I love the sound, “You need to understand that I’m in love with Colleen.”
Oh, shit. There’s a huge pain in my chest, my heart sinks out of sight. Of course, Colleen. Damn Colleen! Dammit, dammit, dammit. But my mind is still moving ninety miles an hour… “Yes, I understand Colleen, but I’ll bet she won’t want you if you’re in love with another woman, with me.”
He shakes his head. “But I’m not in love with you.”
Not in love with you…
The words grab me hard… not in love? Like I never expected him to say that.
“You honestly mean that?”
“Yes, I do,” he says evenly. I can tell he’s trying to be kind.
“Nothing left from what we had before?”
“Oh, I remember what we had before—very well, in fact. The love, the being in love is gone.”
It’s starting to sink in.
“Oh.” I take a breath and I stare at him, gulping down tears and finally say before my voice cracks painfully, “Okay,” I start to back away. “I got it. It’s a bad idea…” I’m halfway to the door, “but, you know, maybe if you fall out of love…with her…” There I stop. I don’t want to shame myself further. “I just know that I can’t live with this, this way,” I blurt out.
“How’s that?”
“You have every right to spank me, and I get nothing. I guess it’s supposed to be the discipline I need.” I laugh instead of cry. “But what do I do with everything else I’m feeling?”
“I can’t Dom you, Dana, like you want. If I need to stop the discipline, if you can discipline yourself, then maybe that would be better.”
Of course, this is not the answer I’m looking for. Although I can’t think of anything else to say.
***
She’s always had a thing for hats, quirky colorful hats that she pulled down low to cover her ears and mask her face. There are three felt ones, a bright pink, a red and a black Derby that’s very sexy. Every time Ben sees her wearing the black Derby, he thinks of the night they fucked in the park and the Derby was all she was wearing. He had ordered her to strip down to nothing as they drove into Golden Gate park.
As soon as he stopped the car, she flew out the door and ran into the woods giggling, looking a bit like a fairy and certainly crazy. No one was there to see them or stop them at four in the morning. He finally tackled her to the ground out in the open, although he dragged her back into the woods and pushed her against a tree. She laughed the whole way through until she was cumming on his hand that invaded her cunt with ruthless zeal. She wasn’t silent at all, as if she wanted to attract a crowd. Thankfully, there were no crowds at that time of night.
She was wearing the black felt Derby and nothing else.
“Yes, yes, gawd baby yes!” she screamed until he clamped his hand over her mouth.
“One more word, I’ll gag you, you hear?”
She got the message and nodded. When he took his hand away, she continued to giggle as he pushed her down on all fours and rammed his dick in her cunt from behind. She didn’t scream again.
Her hats reflect her mood, but he’s never quite deciphered the code.
He sees her every day and knows what he wants. He thinks it’s impossible for them to have a relationship; he knows by previous experience that they can’t make it work. But he thinks again and starts creating ways to make it happen. A hundred scenarios run through his mind. There’s even a doable possibility at the forefront of his thoughts, but he dismisses the idea every time it comes to mind. They can’t go down that road again, he constantly reminds himself.
She is gorgeous. Her body is slim but not skinny, and very graceful. It moves with such ease; which she has in common with Colleen, although they wear their grace very differently. Colleen is more athletic, energized and grounded. Sometimes Dana looks as if she’ll float right off the earth, as if her physical substance will disappear like a summer fog burned away. She submerges her being in things, in outfits and behaviors, her work, her thoughts, her moods. She disappears inside personas so no one will recognize the real Dana Ransom.
But Ben notices her all the time. She’s hardly out of his mind for a minute. He easily replaced Colleen in his thoughts once his girlfriend was on the plane and flying back to Seattle. He feels guilty for being so fickle.
He tried to hurt Dana with that talk about Colleen and how he loved her. He’s sure it made a dent. He hates that but he had to do it. Self defense. He knew that he could have Dana again in heartbeat; Colleen practically pushed him toward the woman. Why does he resist? he asks himself. Then he remembers how their relationship ended three years before. Yes, he tells himself, I’m doing the right thing.
Sally left at five o’clock. It’s nearly six now and Ben’s about to leave too, but he hears sounds coming from Dana’s office.
The door is closed.
He listens a minute as the sound becomes more distinct, although he’s still not sure. Is she crying, or is it something else?
He knocks. No answer.
He cracks the door and peers inside. Then he suddenly stands up straight and opens the door so wide that it bangs back on its hinges. His heart thumps, his cock engages.
On the desk, the desk still strewn with papers, wearing a black corset that binds her midriff but leaves her breasts bare, Dana’s lies half reclining. She wears short black high-heeled boots and her black derby, nothing more. One leg is bent, allowing him to see the soft curls of pubic hair trimmed to a neat Vee. Her flesh glistens with dew. While leaning back against the desk on one arm, she has a hand in her crotch masturbating, looking now as if she’s reached the point of ecstasy and is on the verge of bliss. Her fingers work with effortless precision moving around the soaked flesh, circling her clit, rubbing to the side of it and sporadically jabbing the slit between her sex lips like a small cock.
Ben stands watching, waiting for her to notice that he is there. But she is not going to stop until she’s finished, until her raspy moans are rising in the steamy air, and her cunt clenches, and her sex juice pours out over her fingers. The sight of her is so am
azing, so daringly outrageous that he is speechless. Her scent collects in the air around him and stings his nostrils with the memory of the hundred times he made her body dance with heat. He imagines her getting off to an inner music. The picture of her masturbating is so overpowering that it short-circuits any thought of interrupting the scene. Perhaps he should be angry—but then this is after hours and she has every right…
He sees her gasp, her head falls further back—that damned Derby dropping to the floor—and her body goes rigidly taut for several seconds. Times seems to stop; she doesn’t breathe anew, but her chest reaches upward, nipples hard and firm, as if she’s engaged in some new form of prayer. Is it just his imagination, or can he actually feel her inner muscles as if they are contracting around his rising organ. He gulps the experience down like a parched castaway gulping rain.
When she finally finishes, her body relaxes and a few moments later, she opens her eyes and sees him. She sits up, swivels on the axis of her two ass cheeks and dangles her legs over the edge of the desk.
She giggles. “Oops! I lost my Derby.” She coyly covers her mouth with her hand.
“What’s this about?” he asks—though as soon as he says that, he knows it’s a stupid question.
“How better can I beg?” she says. Her eyes telegraph to him the inner desires that she has stoked.
“Beg?”
“I knew you’d find me.”
“What if I hadn’t?”
“But you did.” Her sly grin could seduce a thousand men.
“So what’s the point, Dana?”
“I need you to take me, Benjamin. I need to serve you. I think you’re lying when you say you’re in love with Colleen.” She delivers the message with a post-coital softness; not a ripple of hard emotion. “I know you love her, but you’re not in love. Please, love, don’t deny me this. It must have been what you came back for; I know it, I can feel it in my gut, my bones, everywhere. It’s obvious…please, don’t make this so hard, please.”
She sees him in the glow of the afternoon sun, as he thinks long and loudly. She can hear the cranks and turns, then the machinery of his brain finally grinding to a halt.
A Master For A Desperate Slave Page 10