by Lana Hartley
"Thank you," I whispered.
Carlotta nodded.
I gave a half smile and closed my eyes.
She returned to working on my hair. I started to think about the list. Not to stress myself about whether or not I wanted Jacob to be able to develop the architecture of my life, but because the reality is that I would probably be doing those things regardless of how I felt about him facilitating them. Now, I didn't have to worry about affording college. My father told me, the one time I asked to be able to go school, that if someone worth selling me to wanted me to go to college, they'd pay. The irony of this situation was not lost on me. I was going to have a job...I had real options. I knew what I wanted to major in. It was fantastic that I could choose that major and not worry about money if I chose it. Because wanting to study literature and be an English major wasn't exactly a valid career choice...but I could bide my time at Renaud's place, in his world, until I could afford the school I was going to and find my job.
But I resigned myself to the fact that it was a hopeless fantasy. No, if I were going to get away from Jacob Renaud, I would have to hide. And I would have to hide damn well from a man who stole whatever he wanted. If there was any trace of me in this life that remained.
Leah
"Aww, princess," Jacob said, his mouth covering over my skin where he'd spanked me. I could feel the heat of his breath, and it made me whimper, my eyes scanning nowhere and making my toes pinch together inside the heels. "Don't be like that. You don't want it fast." He ran the back of his fingers down the seam of my ass, and I shivered against him. Instantly, his other hand stilled me, capturing my hip and gripping me into place. My heart was pelting through my stomach now. How could even the simplest moves reveal just how dangerous he was, how much I stood to...transform under his touch?
Fuck.
I'd lost this game before it even started. I wanted him. I was desperate for whatever came next. I didn't know if he would spank me, if he would fuck me, if he would talk to me more and do so with his breath so close to me. All of it drove me wild with desire for him. For some reason, that didn't make me want to break down in tears. Not right away. No, it made something feel like fluttering wings in my chest. I sucked in the strength I hoped to gain in a breath, and his hand released my hip, stroking slowly down my thigh, my calf, and then both his hands removed my heels. His palms went flat against my feet. It was odd, something about it was so intimate. It was as if I had no fucking clue what Jacob was up to. If he was just going to fuck me, he wouldn't go through all this, put me through all of this. Goddamn, he was claiming my virginity like it was a quest to be completed. That's what I was. Some perverse conquest.
I whimpered a little. I wanted him. I wanted to hate him.
Jacob ran his hands back up my legs and rose up until his stomach was grazing my back. "Are you okay, Leah?" His voice was quiet, a solemn sound.
It pulled me out of everything tumultuous in my mind and was like a homing missile to my truth.
"I'm scared," I said. I didn't want to say that out loud, but there I was, telling him the thing I didn't want to admit to myself.
"You have to let go," Jacob said, and he moved until our faces were touching, his hand cupping my face and our foreheads pressing together. "Let every sensation mean nothing more than the physical to you. Delve into everything, and let it wash over you. Don't let it all sink in until you're ready, and then completely let go. Give yourself to it."
I opened my mouth as if to speak, but I didn't know what to say. It was incomprehensible madness, and it was the truest thing he could have said to me.
"Why would you spank me?" I asked. I had to get to the concrete heart of something because when Jacob talked to me like that, it made me wonder what was truly going on his mind. He was a complex man. I didn't want to yearn to uncover his mysteries.
"Because sometimes pain is more pleasurable than anything else," Jacob said, his voice sounding like for a moment he was far away in thought. "And because it is a very useful tool for both distraction and arousal. It can help you focus."
"Hitting me can do that?" I was incredulous, even though I'd felt how even a few hard swats warmed my pussy.
"Oh, princess," Jacob said with a laugh. "I know you enjoy this," he said through gritted teeth, landing several swats on my ass in quick succession that made me yelp.
The evidence of how good it felt was pooling under me on the bed. "Yes," I said finally.
"Yes?" He asked.
I knew what he was asking for. Now, I remembered his question. And before I could consider whether or not I wanted to answer him, I was. "I have thought about how if you're going to fuck me that it better be the best goddamn orgasm of my life. I thought the person I gave my virginity to would love me."
I felt strong for a moment when the first half of the statement came out of my mouth.
So why the fuck did I have to say the second part?
He said nothing. Jacob swatted my ass. When he switched to the other cheek, he used one hand to rub the previously abused skin. When he was done and rubbing both of my ass cheeks with his palms, I had sticky thighs and hazy thoughts. Would it be so bad if I did love Jacob Renaud? He had everything.
Including me.
I couldn't help the first line of those thoughts any more than the last, and when he pressed his fingers inside me and curled them, I was already spasming around him, my pussy squeezing his fingers and my body tremoring with the orgasm he'd already brought me to. It felt so good, and the instant he'd contacted my sensitive inner walls, I let all my worries fall away and melted into every sensation he brought me. It all felt so damn good. I wanted to be high on pleasure rather than tugged around by my own inner turmoil.
"Yes, Leah, we all have such hopes," Jacob said. His other hand stroked my back, pushed some of my hair out of the way, and he placed a palm on my back. He removed his fingers from my pussy and lined up his cock at my entrance.
Oh.
Oh, fuck, he was going to do it. There was no more lead-up right now. I didn't need it. My wet pussy was fluttering from the orgasm that he'd just given me and I was sweating all over and desperate for more. For the very thing that had been in every inch of my thoughts, waiting for it to come.
"But you know you could never love a man like me," Jacob said.
I didn't get to ponder that thought or why he'd say that because he slammed the full length of his massive cock into my pussy and I was screaming. It didn't hurt, it didn't even overwhelm me. It did something more than that. It erased every doubt in my body and made me desperate for him to fill me. His hands captured both of mine, and he pumped hard into me, pulling me by my wrists and teasing my nipples with the way my breasts slid over the fabric of the bed sheets.
My mind was a cavern of stars, and somewhere in the immense pleasure of him stretching and hitting every part of my soul with the pleasure his cock unlocked, filling me, I heard his words in my mind and the question my own brain demanded I answer.
What kind of man could I love?
I didn't know if I could love anyone. I was barely able to love myself, still learning.
Jacob...why had he said what he did? I was hyper aware of his every touch, but I zeroed in on the way his hands punishingly held mine. His fingers were bruising me. His grip was so tight. I wasn't struggling. It was almost as if he was. There was no avoiding it now. I was caught up in whatever mystery Jacob Renaud housed in his dangerous soul. I just hoped that it would capture me as well because I needed to escape. For my own soul. For my own sanity.
His deep thrusts were bringing me to another orgasm, and when my pleasure swelled, the fear was consumed by a possibility. Some sick ray of hope that made me think I would never feel this way with anyone else, and maybe I could love Jacob Renaud.
When I had finished coming, he released my hands and pulled out of my pussy with a wet sound and a feeling that made me whimper.
Jacob turned me over to my back and looked me square in the eyes. I wanted to loo
k away, but I couldn't bring myself to. There was a wild look in his eyes. He never broke eye contact with those soulful portals to his internal enigma peering into my own open soul. His cock slid back into me, slowly this time, and with slow, deliberately tender movements that were just as claiming, he stroked inside me, his face never leaving mine, until he was close to the crescendo of his own pleasure. When he was about to come, then he dropped his face to my breasts and buried his face next to my heart. It must have thundered in his ears as the intimate movement made me cling to him, squeezing him with my inner walls and my arms, I came too.
Leah
"I mean, why steal art?" We'd been trading orgasms and sighs every waking hour, and some incredible twilight hours in the moments before wakefulness and sleep, but our conversations had ended completely. I knew that when I told him I wasn't ready for school or work yet, that I'd disappointed him. I wasn't embracing the life he was trying to give me, but it was a countercurrent to how I was trying to save myself, and I just wasn't ready. I went shopping with Tatiana, went to the gym and trained in self-defense. I fucked Jacob when he wasn't gone on business. I was his kept little woman, yet something about it wasn't right for him. I couldn't pull myself out of the cycle my brain was in to start up a fake life on his dime. This was all I could manage. And I wasn't sure why. I did want those things. Despite what scared me and made me want to hold back, I was still desperate to know more about Renaud. His touch only served to make me more interested. Somewhere between trying to resist him and trying to figure him out, he'd become the only thing I thought about.
The irony. He'd swore to me that I wasn't trading one cage for another, yet I was bound to my curiosity and confined to thoughts primarily of him. "J-Jacob?" I wondered if he heard me, and I stumbled because I'd almost called him Renaud aloud instead of Jacob as he preferred. It was odd. That's not how I thought of him, but I wasn't in any position to decide. He owned me...
"I heard you, baby girl, I just didn't know how to answer that," Renaud said with a laugh. "I mean, I know what a shrink would say. I know what my pat answer could be. But the truth? I like to own beautiful things...and I find money is frequently the most beautiful thing. I steal canvasses from some of the most powerful people in the world, and I'm walking in so many worlds. There's nothing in this world I can't have." I regard how he is answering so plainly, yet the power in his voice seems to fill the room. The strength he has, coming from every inch of him. It is part of what makes him dangerous. I'm certain that Renaud has never feared anything. Has never taken no for an answer. I shiver. I remember what he asked me. Could I have said no?
I don't want to think about it.
Just like I don't want to think about what I'm doing today. I might be digging my own grave. Jacob Renaud, who bought me, insists that I'm not in a cage. But I'm the last person in the world without a phone. I'm never truly alone. If he isn't there, one of his men is nearby. So it makes the fact that I'm trying to contact Interpol that much harder. I could contact the police here in the US, but I think that with everything that I know Mr. Renaud is up to, I have a much better chance at aiming higher. I'm not a thing to be owned. Fucking him is wrong. I enjoy it, but I hate myself for it. I didn't know any better, I tell myself. It feels good, but that's just my body. The man bought me.
My father sold me.
I just have to get away from all of this. I'll put him away, and he'll never do this again.
No one will own me and hide me away from the world ever again.
Today, I'm going to find a way to make a phone call. I figure I may be the only person in my life without a phone. That means if I am around anyone else, then I can use their phone. I just need to do it where Jacob's people won't follow me. One girl in the bathroom is sure to let me use her phone. I can just say that my phone died. Seems plausible. Reasonable.
"I want to go shopping today," I announce. Is my voice shaky and nervous? It probably is. It feels like it is. I need to work up the nerve and figure out how I'm going to contact Interpol and tell them who I am and what I need to do.
What was I going to say? It overwhelmed me completely even thinking about it.
"Sure, baby girl, what for?" Jacob asks.
I jump about a mile in the air. At least, that's what it feels like.
"Umm, I want to get a journal. Maybe a novel. I think I'd like to go a bookstore." Fuck, I sound insane. It was the first thing that came to mind. Jacob does something on his phone and then looks up at me. “Davidson will drive you, no problem." Jacob reaches into his wallet and pulls out something that knocks the wind out of me.
He pulls out a black credit card with my name on it.
When did he even do this?
Why would he give me money? Access to his money, or something of my own? I'm shocked. But he's told me this whole time I wasn't his prisoner. I swallow and take the card nervously, my hand shaking as my fingers close over it. I look into his eyes, trying to read what he makes of my reaction. Should I say thanks? I guess I should, but my stomach turns. This whole surreal situation makes my head hurt, and I don't know what to do. Am I supposed to fake thinking this is all normal? Be gracious? Be a greedy bitch happy to have a billionaire's funds at my disposal? I thought fucking him every day was confusing.
"You buy whatever you want. I'm going to be home late tonight, so take yourself somewhere nice for dinner. Davidson will take you anywhere you like." Jacob says this, his eyes back on his phone.
"Should I have dinner with Davidson?" I know it is a dumb question, but it falls out of my mouth before I think about it.
"Well, he can eat at his own table if you prefer to be alone, but the man does eat," Jacob laughs and looks up at me.
"Oh," I say, my face heating. I feel bad about my question now like I was making Davidson sound like the problem. Jacob Renaud is the damn problem. "No, of course, I'll eat dinner with him." The stupid explanation that I have eaten dinner with Jacob almost every night since he bought me, almost comes out, but I hold back my words this time.
"Well, I'm not thrilled to give you up to Davidson for the day, but it is just as well that you wanted to go out because I have some things to attend to tonight. We'll have a nightcap if you're still awake when I make it back home." Jacob kisses me on the forehead, his lips lingering on my skin and his fingers entwined in my hair for a moment longer than expected. Like we are a normal couple or something. I shiver in reaction, and I'm not sure how he'll read it. My attraction to him is undeniable at this point, and maybe he'll take that shiver as just that. I don't know. Right now I want to pull my knees to my chest and think about how my life can't revolve around the man who bought me.
Leah
Jacob Renaud is going to fuck me. The way that he fucks me isn't quick. It isn't simple, or vanilla. He's a kinky fuck with all sorts of idiosyncrasies that I see play out on my body. Feel under my skin. And when we're done, I feel them through every inch of my body and covering me like the sheet of sweat I get from just how hard he makes me come.
"Baby girl," he purrs in my direction. I stare at the way his lips move when he says those words, his name for me. When it is isn't princess or kitten. I shouldn't like being called anything but my name. Especially not by the man who is using me, who bought me to fuck me. He valued that I was a virgin. That he's the only man who gets to fuck me. I should hate him.
Part of me really does. In fact, largely I hate him because when he touches me, it is almost impossible to remember I hate him and at the same time any thoughts I have are tinged with those truths. He bought me. He owns me. But when he touches me, I come alive in a way I never have before. If I'm honest, I fear that no one will ever make me feel what I feel when he touches me. I didn't know it could feel like that. Orgasms I'd have from my own masturbation were like pale whispers in a winter wind compared to the storm he summoned inside me. The man was a god of sex, and he fucking knew it. I could see it now in the self-assured look he was giving me.
Jacob looked at me while he loosened h
is tie. Removed it. Unbuttoned his cuffs, his shirt buttons, and pulled that off. There was something achingly sexy in how his shoulders rolled as he took off his collared shirt. His undershirt removal was sexy too. He grabbed the shirt with one hand, in between his shoulder blades, and pulled up, revealing every chiseled, defined inch of his abs. My mouth was watering, and I felt like my whole body was sweating already. He hadn't even touched me. Jacob wasn't even naked yet. The part where I hated him for owning me was burning right along with the fire he stoked in my belly knowing how he would touch me. I fucking needed what he was going to give me. I hated myself for feeling safe in it. I wanted to be able to resist. I didn't want to resist, though. I struggled with how I felt when he fucked me. But I never said no. I might scream in my mind that I wished I were anywhere else, but my torturous body silenced my mouth. I would say no such thing. I wanted no such thing. I was a prisoner because the way he made me feel erased my resistance when I might have offered.
I was going to get away. Far away. Somehow, I'd erase every feeling he created in me, and I'd stoke instead the flames of hate I had for him touching me, owning me, knowing what my body wanted and giving it to me even though I wanted to be on my own.
He slowly unzips his slacks, and he's wearing silky boxer briefs that outline every inch of that bastard's perfect cock. Fuck, it feels like heaven inside me, and I'm in hell with how much I want him. I swallow several times, unable to keep myself from getting nervous. Anxious. Fuck, who am I kidding? I'm desperate. I'm frozen in space, in time. I'm lingering on the thought that I'm not going to take my own clothes off. I can't help but be disappointed when he leaves just his boxer briefs on. I want him naked. I want him naked, and I want him to take off my clothes. I don't want to do a goddamn thing to make this happen. If he wants me, he'll have to take me. Not that I don't want Jacob to fuck me. I've never wanted anything more.