by Jamie Knight
“You might not want to be quoting Liz Phair lyrics while making a declaration of love,” I told her. “It just doesn’t sound right. Particularly after what you did to Luna. I know she didn’t just leave me voluntarily, and you know that, too. In fact, you’re the one who caused her demise.”
“Oh, come now, lover. You know that was an accident.”
“Freud said there are no accidents.”
“Freud is a lying prick who made things up after coming to unsettling conclusions about the daughters of rich assholes,” she spat back. “The truth of the matter is, I didn’t know Luna was allergic to shellfish. Just that she didn’t like them. I was trying to annoy her and maybe make her a little sick, not kill her.”
“It doesn’t make her any less dead.”
“I know, and I think about it every day.”
Just for a moment, the facade finally dropped, and I saw Clara for how she really was. She was certainly the type to lie about an accident, but I really didn’t think she had, at first. Clara had been clingy and vindictive, and I could see her pulling a prank, making Luna feel ill.
I didn’t think she was a killer. And here she was proving me wrong once again.
“We aren’t getting back together,” I said now, firmly.
“I think you might change your mind.”
“Oh, and why is that?”
“Because if you don’t, I’ll tell everyone about the little tart who just ran out,” she threatened me. “She was an intern, right? Some bright young thing wanting to learn about the industry, open to some new experiences?”
It stung how right she was.
Not entirely, of course.
There was more to it than that.
I wanted Jonna in the carnal sense, but I also had feelings for her that I’d never experienced for anyone else. When I first proposed that we work together from my house, I thought it could be a fun fling, just to get her out of my system.
I knew I wanted her, knew I would take her and claim her body— her very essence— as I made her my pet. But I didn’t know she would claim my heart. Things had very much not gone according to plan.
“Not exactly,” is all I said to Clara.
“Well, let me give you some exactitude,” she mocked. “It is most definitely a forbidden relationship. So, forget about her and come back to me, or I’ll go to HR at your label, and then the media. Presidents have been impeached over flings with interns.”
I didn’t want to lose the label; I’d spent decades building it up and running things had become such a major part of my life.
What else could I do, without it? Launch a solo career? Not likely. There was only one path to take here.
My brain knew that.
But my heart had a mind of its own and was determined to follow a different path— the treacherous, unpredictable, but potentially more fulfilling one.
“No, Clara, fuck off,” I told her. “I could never forget about Jonna. You’re wrong that she’s just a fling. In fact, I think I’m falling for her, for real. And I don’t care if you try to mess that up, like you did with Luna. I won’t let you anywhere near Jonna.”
“Okay, have fun losing your career,” Clara snarked, heading for the door.
“I don’t think so.”
“Oh,” she asked turning on her heel, “why is that?”
“Because I know something you don’t know, that rather damages your credibility when it comes to me.”
“Oh, and what’s that?”
“Well, I know two things, actually. The first is that I have a standing restraining order against, which you have already walked right through.”
“And second?”
“Three, two, one.”
The infuriating beep filled the house, as Clara’s ankle bracelet started going off, alerting the police to her location.
“I would have heard if you lived around here. It’s quite a bit out of town, you know. Well outside any possible range of ankle bracelet.”
“But I had to come here to see you,” she protested. “I need you. I love you.”
“Well, as you can see, the feeling isn’t fucking mutual. Sit down and have a drink while we wait for the cops.”
Clara flopped onto the couch like a petulant teenager, and I got her mineral water from the kitchen.
It was all true, as much as anything could ever be said to be true. Clara was right that my relationship with Jonna was forbidden.
I was resolutely moral in what I did with Jonna, but moral and ethical were still two different things. Despite the fact we were both consenting adults, I could get in trouble with the company, even though I owned it. And I would also be in a lot of trouble in the court of public opinion, if not the court of law.
None of which mattered at all to me in terms of the greater Truth, though. Despite myself, I loved Jonna, and I couldn’t imagine my life without her.
Clara was out of the picture, forever. All that as left to do was try and convince Jonna she could trust me again.
The cops came and got Clara and thanked me for alerting them that she had violated the restraining order. She begged and screamed for me to be with her, not Jonna, but I ignored her and waved sweetly at her as I locked up my house while she was being put into the cop car.
The motorcycle rumbled under me as I drove into town. Once I arrived at the studio, it took me a while to find Jonna’s address in the employee files in HR’s office. It wasn’t the most honest thing I’d ever done, but desperate times and all of that.
It also wasn’t like I’d had to hack into her account. It was information she had freely volunteered to the company when she applied for the internship.
I could have looked her up in the phone book, but the risk of imprecision was far too high. The last thing one wanted when trying to do a romantic overture was to show up at the wrong house. So, I had been forced to get her address from her employee file.
There was still no guarantee that my plan to get her back would work, but I tried to cover all the bases I could. I was determined to do everything I could to claim her again as my own, forever, and not let her go this time.
When I arrived at the apartment complex that had been listed as Jonna’s address in her file at work, I saw that the occupants were listed by their last names first. I scanned the list until I got to “M” and once I found hers— Morris— I entered the corresponding numbers in the call box hastily.
The buzzer rang out as into the void, with only my ears there to hear it. I still wasn’t sure what I was going to say. It was something of a new situation, and I was still trying to find my footing, but that didn’t stop me from marching steadfastly ahead in my plan— or at least as much as my plan as I’d managed to come up with.
I usually planned everything, but I hadn’t planned this last part.
The part in which I say the right thing to get Jonna back.
I had to be convinced that the right words would come as soon as I heard her voice again.
Chapter Eleven
Jonna
The space had run out, even if the same could not quite be said for the time, the floor coming up to meet me like an old friend.
“Ow.”
With an assist from the coffee table, which I dearly hoped was as strong as it looked, I rose again, embraced by the dark.
“Rolled off the couch again?” Stephanie asked me.
“Yeah.”
“I keep telling you, sleep on your side, and then you’ll just roll onto your front.”
Stephanie really knew a lot about couches. She’d spent a good amount of time couch-surfing after college. Right up until an awesome job more or less fell into her lap.
Sometimes I thought she had inherited all the grace and decision-making skills she needed to get ahead easily in life. Or it could just be pure, blind luck that Stephanie ended up being such a Mycroft to my Sherlock.
“Ah, get it away,” I cried, as she threw open the curtains, letting the daylight in.
“Come o
n Vampirella, time to get you home,” she pressed.
“Can I eat first?” I asked her.
“Are you sure you just don’t like my cooking better than the food that’s at your own place?”
“Not at all.”
“Well, I suppose there’s something to be said for honesty,” she said, laughing.
As a final mercy for the sake of family ties, Stephanie did a fry up before sending me on my way. My job, or any hope of one in my beloved industry, had basically ended when I left Seth’s house. I had some skills, but the question was how to use them, in a professional capacity.
Research was an option. It was possible that someone would hire me for it if I was very creative with my resume. Seth might even help me out with a recommendation letter. He was a lot of things, but he never struck me as vindictive.
“Any plans for what you’ll do now?” Stephanie asked me.
“A few,” I said with a sigh.
“Good, though if you need some direction, I hear our second store is looking for staff,” she told me. “You would have to wait after the lockdown to start working, though.”
“I’ll let you know.”
I sighed.
“Please do.”
With breakfast eaten and the dishes done, we went out to her car.
“Are you sure you have time?” I asked her.
“Always. Besides, I have the week off of work for a ‘family emergency.’ And I’m only supposed to be working remotely, anyway.”
“Okay. Thanks again for all your help,” I told her gratefully.
“No problem. That’s what sisters are for.”
Getting our masks on, we ducked into the car and drove directly to my building, sticking to the back roads to avoid police attention.
And once we got to my building, we were greeted with a surprise that made my heart beat faster and my stomach lurch, both at the same time.
“Oh shit,” is all I could manage to get out.
“Who the hell is he?” Stephanie demanded to know.
“That would be Seth Black.”
It was like watching a lioness leap on a gazelle. Stephanie stormed up to Seth with all the rage of the Furies burning in her eyes.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing here? There’s a lockdown on, you know, or do you think that doesn’t apply to you?” she yelled. “I know, I know, I’m here, but I’m here bringing my sister home after what you did to her, so don’t you dare try and bring that up. We don’t know what you're playing at, but she doesn’t deserve to be jerked around.”
“No argument there,” Seth said, with a shrug.
“What?” Stephanie asked.
“Really?” I inquired.
“Yes. I broke lockdown because I needed to see… because well, I need to see you, Jonna, in a more general sense,” Seth explained. “I should have made things clearer before, particularly about Clara. She’s my ex. She has been since, like, the last millennium. She wants to get back together and she refuses to get the fucking message that I don’t. Especially after what happened to Luna.”
Seth got a look on his face that told me he was thinking that he shouldn’t have said that. His position in my life was precarious enough without bringing up another girlfriend.
“Who’s Luna?” Stephanie asked.
“The girl I was seeing after Clara,” Seth said. “Long after… we’re talking years. Anyway, Clara took it badly and managed to basically poison her at a dinner party we all ended up at.”
“Oh!” I gasped.
“That’s terrible,” Stephanie agreed.
“I got a restraining order and haven’t seen her for years, except for when she came walking into my house the other day. Probably because she’s been in and out of prison and house arrest, for violating the restraining order I filed against her.”
“Sounds like a real charmer,” Stephanie snarked.
“When you first meet her, sure, then the crazy comes out,” Seth admitted. “She’s back in prison now, but we managed to have a heart-to-heart before the cops showed up. I think she’ll leave me alone now. Really. She has no choice. Because she has the ankle monitor and I can alert the cops when she comes near me. But I truly think she’s done coming near me. I’ll make sure she won’t ever come near you, Jonna— near us— that’s for sure.”
I looked to Stephanie, as I had since I was a little girl. She gave one quick nod, but that was enough for me.
“Will you still be mine?” Seth asked. “Not just, you know—”
He looked towards Stephanie and I nodded, as if to let him know it was okay to talk freely in front of her, so he continued.
“Not just as my pet,” he said. “But as my love, too. I want to claim you, body and soul, because you have claimed my heart.”
“Yes,” I said, trying not to cry. “Yes, I’ll be your love in addition to being your pet.”
“Good, because I have something else to ask you,” he said.
Even Stephanie let her mouth hang open in surprise as Seth got down on one knee, right there in front of the building, and pulled a small box from his pocket.
This time it was definitely ring-sized.
And then he opened it and a huge diamond sparkled up at me.
“Jonna Morris, will you marry me?”
“Yes!” I answered, much more emphatically, the tears starting to flow.
I could hear Stephanie pull away as Seth got to his feet and kissed me tenderly, reminding me why I loved him. Not that I could ever forget.
“Shall we go up to my apartment and celebrate?” I asked, pulling my mask back into position.
“Lead the way.”
Holding his hand, fearing he might slip away— back into my dream— if I let go, we took the elevator up to my floor, leaving Seth’s motorcycle where it was parked. It wasn’t like they were checking, anyway. Everyone was inside because of the lockdown. And we would be too, in a few minutes.
Walking carefully down the hallway, so that no one would know we were out, neither of us really needing one of my nosy neighbors to place a call to the authorities about us, we made it safe and sound into my apartment.
I considered wine, even sitting on the couch and chatting more, though really, after two days of no contact, there was really one thing I was interested in doing with my recently reunited soulmate.
“Take me,” I told Seth, almost begging him.
My pussy was dripping wet and aching for his big cock to be inside it.
“Are you sure?”
He asked this as I was already topless and working on taking off my jeans.
Yeah, I was pretty fucking sure about feeling him inside me right about now.
“Yes, I’m sure,” I said, kicking my jeans, along with my panties away.
“Good,” he said. “Because I’m so hard for you. My cock wants to plunge into your tight little pussy hole again, and I want to devour it, after running my hands up and down your gorgeous curves.”
I got the collar out of my purse and, stark naked, gave it to him to put back on me properly.
“You kept it,” he remarked, sounding surprised.
“Of course I did, master, because it was a gift from you. I didn’t feel right wearing it with you gone. Please, make me yours again.”
Taking me by the shoulders, Seth turned me away from him, so that I was facing in the other direction. He then stroked his hand lovingly down the length of my arm and took one of the hair elastics from around my wrist.
With gentle hands, and surprising skill, he put my hair up into an updo, giving him full access to my neck.
With the cool vinyl pressed against the front of my neck, Seth kissing my cheek over and over as fastened the tiny, silver buckle. I was marked as his once more.
My master scooped me into his arms, as he had done so often before, and carried me to the bed, setting me down near the edge. The warmth of his gentle hands gave me a tingle as he opened my legs.
“Fuck yeah, this is what I wanted,” he gr
oaned. “This is what I didn’t want to give up.”
Seth took his time, kissing his way from my knee, all the way up my thigh, before finally ending up on my pussy. Nursing me tenderly before digging in with considerably more gusto, he started devouring my tender pussy until I was nearly screaming with pure pleasure, holding me by the wrists as I writhed. Then he slowed to a gentle lick on my vulva as I recovered after hitting my peak.
Adjusting his grip to one that was further up my arms, he pulled me down closer to the edge, until my ass was nearly hanging off of it, which was exactly where he wanted me. Meeting no resistance on my part, my master positioned my body just the way he liked.
My ankles were pressing down against his shoulders and my hands were braced over my head, giving him absolute control of the situation. He began stroking the beautiful head of his cock against my sensitive pussy lips, just to make sure I was ready to receive, my master a good and gentle one.
“Does your pussy want my cock?” he asked me.
“Yes,” I whispered. “It wants it so bad.”
He eased his way inside, my pussy adjusting as I got used to being filled up so completely. His was the only cock I ever wanted. I would be with him or no one, for the rest of my life. That was all there was to it. Fortunately, I had no intention of ever being away from him again.
With an impeccable sense of timing, my beautiful master worked me just right, fucking me slow when I needed it, and hard as soon as I could handle it. He was repaying my trust in him with wonderful sex, filling me with more joy than I’d ever imagined possible.
And he filled me with something else that was unexpected. I had been so caught up in the moment and the ecstatic sensations coursing through my being that I didn’t immediately notice when Seth’s massive load flooded into my pussy.
We hadn’t really thought to use condoms, and I wasn’t on any kind of birth control.
I looked at him, a question in my eyes, and he simply smiled.
“I want to fill you with all of me,” he said. “And I want to put a baby in you.”
“Okay, master,” I told him, surprising myself by liking the idea.
“We are going to be together forever,” he said, planting gentle kisses on my cheeks, his cock still deep inside me, for good.