Tantalized

by Nenia Campbell

  He laves apologetic kisses over my bruising skin, and my breathing becomes hitched, both from the sensations and from the mental image of him pleasuring himself with hurried, desperate force.

  I wonder, did he make himself come in his office?

  How long did he wait until after I'd left?

  If I had stuck around, with an ear to the door, would I have heard his soft cries of pleasure.

  “My, look at you. I've never seen such a display. You are a picture. You look and sound as if you are about to come. Are you about to come?”

  I can barely manage to nod. My hips are moving faster now, in tandem with his long fingers as they slide in and out of me the way I wish his cock would. But then he stops. He stops everything, and I mewl in protest, staring at him through eyes that feel glazed.

  “Beautiful,” he says, drinking the sight of me in.

  When I squeeze my thighs together, shimmying back and forth to provide enough stimulation to my cunt to keep myself plateaued until I can free myself from my fucking jacket, Delacroix grabs me by the arms to keep me in place. “None of that.”

  “What the fuck is your problem?”

  “There is no problem, Miss Abrahams. I don't want you to come,” he says silkily.

  “Please.”

  “Now you beg for mercy? You will find none with me. I don't think you realize what exactly you've signed up for, but you will. I'll have you begging soon enough, but when you do, it won't be for mercy.”

  The silence is broken only by my ragged breathing as I come down. I curse at him, but he waits me out. “Do you enjoy rough sex, Miss Abrahams?”

  How dare he talk to me about sex.

  “You son of a bitch.”

  He brushes his lips over mine, laughing when I try to bite him. “Feisty,” he says approvingly.

  “Is that your way of wriggling out of foreplay?”

  “Oh no. I enjoy many forms of play.” He watches my breasts as my breathing hitches. “Especially when I can serve pain along with pleasure. Denial of sexual gratification is just one facet of this glittering blood ruby.” I shudder. “You must be cramping a little.”

  “Fuck you. You're a sadist, then. Like that guy. The one on the list of books you said was epinimous.”

  “Eponymous,” he corrects me. “Yes. I am fond of de Sade's work, though it is a bit rough and riddled with purple prose. He languished in his fantasies. That much was obvious. Hmm. That reminds me. I still expect you to read every book on my syllabus. Even though you are no longer in my class, as per our agreement, they will still be of use to you. They will tell you what I am about.”

  “You're assigning me homework before having sex with me?”

  “Don't mistake me. I want you. You are what they call a tease. I don't like that, and I intend to make you fully aware of my displeasure by fucking you senseless and subjecting you to all kinds of stimulation that will make your tender young body shiver and writhe for my touch, and mine alone. Sometimes it will be in pain, sometimes in pleasure, but always, always with passion.

  “I think you could satisfy me, Miss Abrahams. I want you to. But you will have to be willing to endure my readings, in addition to bearing the brunt of my wicked desires. Depending, of course.”

  “Depending on what?”

  “How badly you want to please me.”

  “What makes you think I want to please you?”

  He looks me straight in the eye. “Why else are you here? You have shown me what you have to offer, Miss Abrahams, and I have seen; and I accept.”

  His eyes are hot, promising fire that scorches and sears with a burning so sweet that it borders on ecstasy. I recall for a moment that girl in the frat house with the clamps on her nipples. I shiver a little, and like a wolf, Delacroix pounces.

  “It can be a beautiful thing, pain. Dangerous. Addictive. It's like a drug, sometimes. A rush. Yes, you understand,” he adds, when my face lights up. “The thrill that comes from toeing the line.”

  His teeth close lightly over my nipple and I shiver violently at the torment he creates with his skillful mouth and tongue. It makes me wonder what he can do with the rest of that powerful body. I'm dying to find out. “Are you going to fuck me now?”

  He pauses only long enough to say, “No.”

  I groan. “For fuck's sake, then. When?”

  “I want to take you to a club I know in the city first,” he says, the words muffled by my breast. “It has a BDSM dungeon where they practice edge play.”

  “What is edge play?”

  “Proof that the human imagination has no limits when it comes to sexual gratification and pleasure, Miss Abrahams. The pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”

  He seals an open-mouthed kiss against the nipple, leaving a ring of saliva that glitters very faintly in the lights from the street. I am acutely aware of his breath on my damp skin. My other nipple hardens, and I can feel the skin of my breast prickle with anticipation. I want him to take me into his mouth. I want him to tear off my clothes and fuck me until I can't think.

  Without lifting his head, he raises his eyes to regard the expression on my face. It seems to satisfy him because his lips curve into a sinful smile as he fastens the two middle buttons, covering my breasts but leaving my collarbones and belly bare.

  I want him.

  I want him so badly that it aches.

  “You are not to touch yourself. Not until we go to the dungeon. Once there, we will look at everything. If you are not too shaken by the evening's end we will make arrangements and I will be the one to bring you pleasure—and pain. Otherwise, you are free from any obligations and can do as you will.”

  “That isn't fair,” I rasp.

  “You should have thought of that before you wrote the rules of this game. Do you think those little outfits of yours were fair play?” He draws a circle around my navel with the tip of one finger. “Flashing your breasts at me. Flashing more. Well, now it's my turn, Miss Abrahams and I want you to see everything with clear eyes as I lead you into temptation.”

  He kisses me again, and I taste his conviction, as dark and silky as red wine. My eyes slip closed, and he lets me sink back against the seat.

  “Don't look anything up. I want you to be surprised. Not afraid. Well, perhaps a little afraid, but only as much as I choose to make you. Edge play is often portrayed in an unfavorable light. You might find yourself…intimidated.”

  “I kind of want to see what this is all about.”

  “You will,” he assures me. “When I take you to the city. Not before. Don't go tasting from the tree of knowledge prematurely, Miss Abrahams. You may find its fruit is far too bitter for your liking.”

  No good ever came from ordering a woman not to do something. Just look at Eve, or Pandora, or any female character in any fairytale ever.

  He should know better than to try that with me.

  “Okay, Alexander.” As he pulls my jacket back up to my shoulders where it belongs, I kiss him again.

  “I promise.”

  I lie.

  Edge play is a subdivision of BDSM. Normal BDSM employs consensual, safe, and sane practices (CSS). The thrill of edge play comes from putting both safety and sanity at risk, and as a result participants get high off the resulting chemicals produced by their bodies to ease the psychological trauma. Endorphins from pain, adrenaline from fear. Because of this, the article I'm reading informs me, edge play can be dangerous, even deadly, if practiced incorrectly.

  Beads of sweat dot my forehead and the skin beneath my armpits. There is a strange clenching in my belly. I'm nervous, light-headed. Adrenaline from fear, I think. Dizzied, I perform an image search next.

  Immediately, I am greeted by scenes that wouldn't be out of place in a horror movie. Clearly, these images are taken from porn or professional studios, but that makes them no less gruesome. Bruised, and bleeding flesh. Flesh bound by nylon, hemp, and leather straps. Suspension from piercings. Genitals studded with metal, and piercings with slender cha
ins. Nipples impaled by sharp needles. Hot wax the color of blood melting across naked thighs. One picture shows a man in a slave collar being fucked from behind while the faceless man behind him hooks an arm around his neck and covers his mouth with a free hand. That one I know—auto-erotic asphyxiation.

  For a moment, I wonder how you would even say the safe word if you're in the middle of being choked to death. If edge play even has a safe word. But then what if something becomes too much? I look at the pictures again and feel a chill. It's nightmarish.

  It is a lot to take in.

  I blow off my classes for the next few days with the intent of putting my mind at ease. Instead I spend all day asleep, and all night awake haunted by the imagery on my computer screen. I search beneath the loose board in the bed frame, lifting up the mattress. I hope that there's a little bit of pot left from my stash but I've been checking back for days and like all the other occasions before, I end up disappointed.

  I binge in the dining commons instead, eating six plates of food that I just end up throwing up again. Out of guilt, out of nausea, out of a general illness I can't put into words but that rises up like a monster from the deep whenever food enters the equation, and, by proxy, my belly.

  I check my email constantly. It's a total one-eighty from before, when I was only receiving messages from the school. I'd been neglecting my email for days on end, and now I'm paying the price. I curse as my laptop lags, stalling, as the 208 messages in the queue flood my in-box. None of them are from Alexander. No, they are all about courses, deadlines, events. Various memos and reminders for things I don't care about, and never will.

  FU, I think. I delete all of them and it feels good. Just press CTRL+DEL, hold them down in sync, and everything disappears like magic. I wish more things in life were like that. My life would certainly be a whole lot better if it came with a mass-delete option. Maybe I'd even be able to get some sleep at night.

  But then again, on second thought, maybe not.

  Days go by without word from Professor Delacroix. I mean—Alexander. For someone so eager, he really is taking his sweet-ass time.

  My body feels raw.

  I want to masturbate, but denying myself feels good in a way I didn't anticipate, too. I keep picturing him, watching me as I obtain my long-denied release. In these fantasies, he is using his mouth on me while touching himself, teasing me through the clothing before tearing them off with his perfect teeth.

  I consider sending Delacroix an email reminding him of our engagement. He has my address because he's contacted me before, but I'm wondering now if he deleted it from his in-box to remove the evidence. I still don't know if he's married or single, and if he's living with someone it's possible she goes through his emails. I would, if it were me.

  I don't like the idea of him living with someone else, though. I'd rather believe he sent it from the school computer and deleted it from there. Since I'm no longer in his class roster, he can't look me up. Not easily, though my email is public.

  If he were determined enough, he could find it.

  If I did drop him a line, it would serve the dual purpose of giving him my email address again, too, just in case he's lost it. But I don't want to look clingy and pathetic, especially not if he's changed his mind.

  Why would he, though? There was lust in his dark eyes when he looked at me. I try to think back to what happened in his car, to remember what we said to each other and whether anything could have possibly been misconstrued, but I'm blindsided by memories of the way his mouth felt on my body as he kissed and licked and teased me to oblivion.

  The memory makes my mouth dry and my nipples feel raw. I can feel them chafing against my bra as I prowl around my dorm room, my belly clenching, moisture between my legs.

  I search beneath the mattress again. I have no pot left. Same as the last five times I've checked. Damn. It looks like I might have to cope with reality the old-fashioned way. Waiting it the fuck out.

  By Friday, I am a wreck.

  Several parties have come and gone. I would have gone to them, if only to restock my stash and maybe get a drink or two, but I don't. Because I might hear from Professor Delacroix and I don't want to miss his invitation, and because I usually end up trading sex for drugs at these things. Technically, Delacroix only told me not to pleasure myself, but I have the feeling that sex in general falls under that whole umbrella.

  This could be difficult. Fidelity doesn't come natural to me. I don't like putting myself out on a limb for someone else. Staying faithful to a single person opens you up to getting hurt.

  Unless you're the one who makes the first move.

  Guess I'll just have to beat him to the punch, then.

  Except it looks as though he might already have.

  On Friday, just when I half-convinced myself that I am never going to see nor hear from Professor Delacroix again, I receive another one of those emails from an anonymous sender—different address, this time—instructing me to meet him at the same place before. Only, after dark.

  He actually writes, “See you after dark,” and something about the way that sentence is constructed seems positively weighted with sinister promise. It's like he's a vampire, extending his hand with the promise of leading me into twilight debauch.

  Obviously, being who I am, I accept.

  I am not sure what the dress code for a BDSM code is. Black, probably. I wear the black lace shirt that caught his interest that first day, and which I'm sure will again, with a pair of dark jeans that have leather laces up the sides. My mother hates them, thinks they're slutty, which is part of the reason I got them in the first place. Since she wouldn't buy them from me, I stole them a few days later while she was out running errands. The rush from stealing was almost as good as getting the jeans.

  I put on some lipstick, too, which I immediately wipe off because it makes me feel slutty. Then I laugh bitterly, because it's almost too sad. I suck boys off for weed and flash my tits at my teachers, but it's red lipstick that makes me feel like a whore.

  There's logic for you.

  The black Mercedes pulls up half past the hour, fashionably late. The door opens with a muted sound that nonetheless echoes the thud of my heart against my chest as I see him. Oh my God. He's wearing tight leather pants that cling to his firm thighs so closely that it's as if he's slicked them in dark, glistening oil. His shirt is white, plain, the type of thing he might wear to lecture—except it's half-unbuttoned, to show his dark body hair. He looks like a pirate from the cover of a romance novel, or maybe a sex god from the wrong side of the tracks. My brain all but melts with lust, as he slings an arm around the passenger seat, bracing himself to push open the door wider.

  His whiskery-colored eyes slide over me like syrup to coat me in lustful approval as sticky-sweet as sugar. I can feel the soft press of my nipples against the blouse, and Delacroix licks his lips as his gaze drops to my breasts. “I'm beginning to like that shirt,” he says conversationally, “now that I know that the fruits which lie beneath it are no longer out of grasp, like Tantalus and his hanging grapes.”

  “Tantalus?”

  “From Greek mythology. The patriarch of the cursed House of Atreus. He killed and cut up his son, baking him into a feast for the gods. As punishment, he was banished to the underworld to stand in a shallow pool that receded when he attempted to quench his thirst, surrounded by grapes that would elude his grasp when he tried to satisfy his hunger.”

  The hunger in his eyes slides over my skin like soft, rough velvet. I want him to touch me, and for a moment I think he's going to, but he doesn't.

  “That was his fate, for all eternity. It his from his name that the word 'tantalize' comes.” Delacroix leans in, his lips just touching mine. “And you do look tantalizing, Miss Abrahams.”

  “I look like a man who can't eat or drink?”

  “No, my dear. You look like a woman who could drive a man to such extremes. I want to see you bared before me, your body entirely at my mercy. I want to
taste every inch of your skin and see if it's as sweet as I have led myself to believe in my sleepless nights.”

  “Did I keep you up, Professor?” I ask softly.

  “In more way than one,” he says, the warmth slipping from his voice like a robe being cast off, leaving his tone so naked it's almost indecent. He slips a silk tie from his pocket, looping it around my eyes. His lips brush the hollow beneath my ear, the stubble around his mouth rasping against my skin.

  “I think you'll taste like summer.”

  I shiver when he buckles my seat belt, and the heat of his bare skin sears mine through the gaps in the lace. I'd give anything to erase the barriers between us, for that exquisite sensation of skin on skin. My thighs are tingling, and I can feel moisture trickling between my legs, soaking into the crotch of my jeans. My muscles are contracting, aching with an emptiness that only he can fill.

  “Do you want my mouth between your legs?”

  A low, pleading sound warbles through my lips.

  “Pity you're not wearing a dress. It's harder to do in jeans.” There is pressure on my fly. His fingers, exploring me through the denim. My chest hitches as they come to play over the tender spot where I've been denying myself, stroking once, idly, before removing his fingers. “I'd like to tongue your cunt.”

  “O-oh?”

  “I'd pinch you between my lips and suck, until you were drowning in an ocean of pleasure with nothing to hang onto. If you were very good—” He traces a finger beneath the strap, from shoulder to hip, brushing the side of my erect nipple. “I might even let you come.” A gasp escapes me, and he chuckles. “So responsive,” he says. “Are you ready to discover the small pieces of heaven ensconced within the inferno?”

  “Yes,” I tell him, staring into the darkness. My voice sounds breathy, faint.

  “We shall see,” he says in response.

  The drive could last seconds. It could last hours. Time ceases to have meaning in the artificial gloom of the blindfold. I think about the story he told me about the man cursed by the gods. What was the point of that? I try to ask, to understand, but Delacroix resists all attempts at conversation, clearly preferring that I sit in silence.