The Dark Collector

by Vanessa North

  “Tell me,” he orders.

  “I want to be fucked, Sir. I want you to own me, make me come.”

  “Shhhh, there’ll be time for all of that.” He strokes my back with one hand, then he unfastens the cuffs and frees my arms. He massages them slowly, working the kinks out, meanwhile my poor cock is hard and achy and my balls feel like they’ll just burst if he doesn’t…

  “Oh, come on. It’s such a pretty hard-on, pet. It would be a shame to get rid of it.” He drops a playful hand to my cock and squeezes gently. “I think I’ll keep it awhile.”

  I didn’t see the cock ring in his hand when he came back from the bathroom, but I sure feel it wrapping around me, and that’s okay, because with his ring snug on the base of my cock, I won’t come, and I can stay hard and beautiful the way he likes me.

  “Good,” he praises as he fastens the ring.

  “Thank you, Sir.”

  “Why are you thanking me?”

  “Thank you, Sir, for putting your ring on my cock, for making me keep my hard-on for you. Thank you for making me beautiful for you.”

  I shudder. It’s the kind of thing Jeffrey would have done, and I’d always done this for him, withheld my orgasms. Being told I have to wait makes my body thrum in excitement.

  He pulls me upright and then wraps his arms around me in a gentle hug. He rubs my shoulders and smiles. “I have big plans for you, pet. But I need to get some work done. Will you keep me company while I work?”

  “But, it’s Saturday!” I blurt out.

  “Yes, it is.” He frowns. “I often have to work on Saturdays, but I promise I won’t be long. Simple correspondence is all.”

  “Why don’t you have a secretary?” The words feel sullen coming out of my mouth. Clearly the guy is fantastically wealthy. Why wouldn’t a secretary take care of correspondence for him? Then he could take care of this raging hard-on he’s got wrapped up in a cock ring.

  “You’re prying.” He smiles. “I like to write thank you notes myself. Having my assistant write them for me would be rude.”

  “I see. You’re right, Sir. That wouldn’t be appropriate at all.”

  So I kneel at his feet, erect, while he writes out his thank you notes. Every so often, he ruffles my hair or strokes my cheek. I arch into his touch, welcoming it, waiting for the next when it disappears. I keep my eyes lowered so every touch is a surprise. Over the course of the morning, my knees begin to ache and my back stiffens. I try to hold as still as possible, but eventually, a muscle twitches. Then another. Then I shift slightly in place. The discomfort actually makes me hornier, and the pressure of the cock ring reminds me I’m at his mercy. I’ve always loved being vulnerable like this, on my knees, or tied up. It was Jeffrey who taught me it was okay to want these things.

  “Everything all right, pet?” His voice is so loud after the uninterrupted scratch-scratch of his pen.

  “Yes, Sir.” I shift slightly as I say it.

  “No, you’ve been on your knees too long. I can finish these later. Come on.” He pulls me to my feet and tilts my chin up so I’m looking in his eyes. They’re a dark, warm brown, filled with compassion. “I’m not a sadist. I don’t get off on hurting you. I might from time to time because you like it, but I don’t want you to suffer in a completely non-sexual way because I get lost in my work. Let me call out for lunch and then we can play.”

  He grasps my cock in one hand and leans close as if he’s going to kiss me. His lips are beautiful, framed as they are by black stubble, and I want to feel them, want to taste them. Just as suddenly, however, he drops my cock and looks away. Instead of his kiss, I taste bitter disappointment. I should have known this isn’t that kind of arrangement. This is about lust and power and that damned painting.

  Affection has no place in that arrangement. Kisses are for lovers, and we aren’t that, are we?

  ****

  The lunch, when it arrives, is exquisite. I know you can get almost anything delivered in New York, but I’m still surprised to be served a fancy restaurant lunch from the dark collector’s hands instead of something more mundane like pizza. And I don’t know why I’m still thinking of him as “the dark collector” when he’s clearly so much more than an art collector.

  “What are you thinking about?” he asks me. “You have the strangest expression on your face.” He slips a piece of asparagus between my lips, and I nip at his thumb, just a little. He laughs and pats my head. I think about his question as I chew, and then I answer with a question of my own.

  “What do you do, Sir? For a living? That you need to spend over an hour writing thank you notes on a Saturday morning?”

  He sighs heavily, as if my question actually hurts. When he speaks, it’s in a carefully measured tone.

  “I own things. Companies. Galleries. Properties. I own lots and lots of things. When you own lots of things, people give you more things. Or they do nice things. Or they say nice things. Or they invite you to things. And so I thank them for things.”

  Oh. And I think about the paintings and photographs in his gallery, the Kuypers and the Mapplethorpe, and the other artists whose work was neither important to me nor relevant to me, and how those were just more things to him, things he owned. And how the painting which was so important it compelled me to kneel at his feet and be fed scraps like a dog, it was another thing. A thing he could trade for my company, and how on earth could I be so important I was worth that?

  “I guess I didn’t really answer your question, but owning things is the easiest way to describe what I do.” He presses his thumb against my lower lip, using enough pressure to make it sting against my teeth. Such an odd caress: oddly rough, oddly dominant, just odd, but it feels good, makes me feel like he’s maybe owning me. I raise my eyes to meet his gaze and his thumb presses harder, hard enough to force its way between my lips so his thumbnail taps my teeth. “Come with me.”

  I follow him back to his bedroom, wondering what that was about even as I feel my lip plumping and swelling where his caress bruised me. He might not be a sadist, but I am at least a little bit a masochist. I liked that rough touch, and it made me hum with the craving for more. When we get to the bedroom, I kneel for him again, hands behind my back.

  “No, pet, on the bed. On your back, please.” He gestures toward the bed, and I lie across it, watching him, but trying to make it look like I’m not. I don’t think he’s fooled, because he’s smiling when he lies down beside me, as nude as I am. “You were very patient while I wrote my thank you notes. I think you deserve a reward.”

  He slides a hand down my chest, pinching at my nipples. I arch into his hand, closing my eyes and letting myself feel that hum of energy I associate with submission. When his teeth come down on my shoulder, more a suck than a bite, I arch into those too.

  “You like to be marked,” he observes after a moment.

  I nod, and he rewards me with a harder bite, this time just above my left nipple. I can’t help the groan that escapes, and he bites just a little harder.

  “He did that, didn’t he? Kuyper?”

  I nod again. “Yes, Sir. He liked to see his marks on me. He liked to paint me that way, and photograph me that way. And I liked it too because it meant he was proud of me. Proud enough to mark me.”

  “You’re beautiful, pet. Any man would be proud to mark you.”

  No. I shake my head.

  “You don’t believe me? Do you think I’m lying?” There’s a harsh note to his voice now.

  “No, Sir. I think you don’t know me. You don’t see me, not the way I am every day.” You will though, when you get those negatives. You’ll see all of me. At my best, at my worst, you’ll see me stripped to the soul, and you’ll add me to your collection.

  “I see you, pet. I think maybe you don’t see yourself.”

  “I know who I am!” I’m surprised at my own voice, surprised at the tears in my eyes.

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m Jeffrey Kuyper’s muse. And his boy. His belov
ed. I’m his.”

  “But he’s gone. And who are you, just you, just Ol—”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Please, Sir, don’t use my name, it’s not…” I don’t even know why, but I can’t have my name be part of this weekend, not when I don’t know his. It makes this transaction too real, too personal. It makes me more than the currency in the sale of a painting, and I can’t be.

  Something hardens in his face.

  “Get up. Go into the bathroom and place your hands on the mirror—not the one over the sink, the full-length one.”

  I don’t hesitate. This I can do. This is the transaction, this is me giving him my body—not myself.

  The mirror is cold against my hands, and my palms leave sweaty prints when I place them just below shoulder height.

  “Step back farther, but leave your hands there,” he calls from the other room.

  The position makes my ass thrust out. God, please let him just fuck me. Get away from awkward conversation about existential shit that doesn’t matter. I was the conduit to the art, the muse. And now I can be the currency to purchase the painting, but please don’t make me have to confront being alone.

  He comes and stands behind me. In the mirror, I can see he’s already wearing a condom, and his hand is slick with lube. Without warning, he plunges two fingers inside me. I slam my eyes shut because it hurts, but the pain is right because it’s not for me, it’s for the art—it’s currency. But it doesn’t feel like currency when he nuzzles my ear as he touches me. It feels like intimacy. He knows what he’s doing, stroking me soft, easing me open. A shiver down my spine as he massages me in just the right way. I push back against him, begging without words for more.

  “Look in the mirror, pet.” His breath is warm and I shudder at the tenderness in his voice. He pegs my prostate with those two fingers and I groan at the sharp spike of pleasure. So fucking good.

  “Look in the mirror,” he demands again. “Look in the mirror, or I’ll fuck you with that cock ring on and not let you come.”

  I drag my eyes open, see the wild, fey thing in the mirror staring back with heavy-lidded eyes, blown pupils eating most of the blue. Jeffrey’s boy. The muse.

  “Look how beautiful you are.” His fingers slip out of me and his cock is poised at my hole. “Look at yourself, pet. Look at that beautiful man, with the ring around his cock and his eyes black from desire. Look at him.”

  I see him—me, a flush riding high on my chest as I grind my ass back, trying to take that thick cock.

  He slides inside me, a quick, sharp sting that makes me gasp, then he sucks on the back of my neck and I relax into him, take his cock gratefully. I let my eyes drift closed.

  “Open your eyes,” he orders, reaching around my body to stroke my cock with his lube-slick hand. His other hand slides up my body to pinch and pluck at my nipples and drag across them in a hard rub.

  I watch. I watch him fuck me, and I try to detach, to not see that wild creature whining and groaning as he fucks and ruts but it’s me, and I’m whining and groaning because the things he’s doing feel so good, the hand on my chest, the other on my cock, and his cock driving into me from behind. Pleasure builds and builds, swelling inside me, but it can’t release because I’m still wearing the ring.

  A whimper escapes me, then “Please, Sir.”

  “You’re so fucking perfect, pet. Look at yourself; see who you are. See that wild, beautiful man in the mirror. That’s how I see you. That’s who you are to me.”

  I groan, because I see myself now, and I see the longing, the need to be held, to be claimed. The hand on my cock fumbles, and he releases the cock ring. The rush of sensation makes my hands slide several inches down the mirror as he’s milking me again, fucking me and stroking me, and all the while keeping up a litany of praise for the beautiful man in the mirror who is somehow me.

  “Please, Sir…” I whisper.

  “What do you need?” His voice is thick with some emotion.

  “Own me.”

  His lips find the back of my neck and suck, hard. He’s marking me, and that’s it, that’s enough. I can’t keep my eyes open as my orgasm slams into me. My arms shake, and I collapse against the mirror, coming and crying, again. His arms hold me up and he’s still fucking, fucking, driving into me, until with a shout, he comes too, shuddering against me and inside me.

  We lean against the mirror for a long, harried moment. Neither of us speaks as he eases himself out of me. He throws the condom away, then he turns me with gentle hands and pulls me into an embrace.

  “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?” He tilts my chin, forces me to meet his gaze.

  I shake my head. “No, Sir.”

  “Good. Clean up your mess and join me in bed.”

  I groan, knowing full well what he means. My cock wants to get hard again at the very idea. He disappears into the other room, and I drop to my knees. I lick my come from the mirror, knowing my own taste and knowing he is giving me this task to bring me back to myself, to ground me. He knows he rattled me, and he’s giving me time to make my peace.

  Is that what I’m doing? Making peace? I watch myself in the mirror as I lick the last few drops away. How long has it been since I’ve cared at all about the person I see in the mirror? Lick. Can the muse exist when the artist does not? Lick. How can this stranger, whose name I don’t even know, see me if I can’t? There’s no peace in this mirror, no answers, just my flushed face and my spunk. My shame and my pleasure. Once it’s cleaned of the evidence of both, I return to the bedroom. He told me to join him in bed, so I crawl in beside him when he lifts the covers for me.

  “Are you tired?” he murmurs, drawing my back to his chest.

  I nod.

  “Nap with me.” He spoons me against him, but he doesn’t speak anymore. I take his suggestion, and I close my eyes and listen to his quiet breathing until I fall asleep.

  ****

  I wake some hours later, alone in his big bed. I stretch under the luxurious sheets and I groan when I realize how sore I am. Sore from kneeling, sore from fucking, sore from crying. The good sore is the bite mark on my pec, and the hickey on the back of my neck. Those feel great. But I’m wary now, because the man who put them there didn’t do it to claim me. More like the opposite, and that scares the holy fuck out of me. He’s stuck his hands deep into parts of me I didn’t want free—they belonged to Jeffrey—and he’s shaking them loose, one by one, and giving them back to me.

  I make my way out to the kitchen and find him there, putting away groceries. I move to help him.

  “Hey, I didn’t want to wake you. Did you sleep well?” He hands me a trio of oranges and nods toward a fruit bowl on the table.

  I put the oranges in the bowl and turn back to him. “Yes, Sir. Thank you.”

  “Good. The food delivery came while you were gone. I told you we’d cook together tonight.” His smile seems almost shy, as if he isn’t the same man who fucked me to tears and then ordered me to lick my come off the mirror. But he is that man, and this soft, sated man too. Something about him looks different, and it takes me a moment to realize he’s shaved away the stubble. He looks much younger now. Softer. And his lips, God, they’re even sexier than they were before.

  I really want to kiss him. He’s not your lover. This is a transaction. I look down at the floor.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No, Sir.”

  “Good. Can you get some carrots out of the bottom drawer of the fridge and peel them? Two or three should be enough, I think. The peeler is in the first drawer to the right of the sink.”

  No orders, just a request. I gather the carrots and start peeling.

  “Sir?”

  “Mmm?” He reaches into a drawer and pulls out a cutting board. He sets up on the counter next to me, grabbing some herbs off the plants hanging in the window. As he begins chopping, the scent wafts around the two of us working side by side.

  “Why are
n’t you ordering me to peel these?” I hold up a carrot.

  “Because cooking isn’t part of our arrangement. It’s just…” He shrugs. “Fun.”

  Oh.

  “Okay. But eating…I mean, you’ve been feeding me.” I blush. I like being fed from his hands. It feels good, playful.

  “That’s different. That’s me taking care of you. You need that, don’t you?” His expression is so earnest, I can’t help but smile.

  “I like that. I just…this is different.” I gesture between us and a carrot peel goes flying and lands on his shirt. Embarrassed, I reach for it, but he just shrugs and flicks it into the sink.

  “I wanted you to spend the weekend here. I didn’t want to keep you chained to my bed all weekend. And topping you constantly, while it’s a hell of a lot of fun, isn’t really practical when we aren’t in bed, you know?” He stops chopping. “I will if you want me to. I just, I don’t know. You seem like your life might be short on camaraderie lately. If you’d rather I say ‘Pet, peel those carrots,’ in my biggest, baddest Dom voice, I will.”

  I grin over at him. “Okay, no topping me in the kitchen. I can live with that.” Oh, shit. That sounds like I’m making plans. “I mean, I just meant…”

  “I know what you meant. Peel those carrots.” But he says it in a cheesy fake-deep voice that makes us both laugh. And then I guess there isn’t really anything else to say because we both fall silent, peeling and chopping.

  That night, he doesn’t fuck me again. Instead, he drags me up against his body and holds me close, his hands rubbing soothing circles on my back and belly. At first the caresses seem too familiar, too much like a lover, but after the last twenty-four hours, I’m too exhausted to protest this intimacy. I let myself be lulled to sleep.

  ****

  Sunday morning I wake up to a hand on my cock and a heavy erection riding the crease of my ass. It feels good so I roll with it, thrusting my hips and squeezing my ass cheeks to give him some friction.