The Slave

by Laura Antoniou

  Naturally, he listened, and chose to punish her with some more stripes, leaving her standing, cuffed and blindfolded, for at least two hours. Tears streaked her pretty face and filled the blindfold.

  Leon came and went, bringing food for them both and bits of advice for her. She soon came to look forward to her appearances, eager to taste his culinary delights and more than eager for his encouragement and gentle corrections. He was the real thing: he was a slave, purchased and owned and completely happy. Whispers in the kitchen informed Robin of the life he led, his daily chores, and his master’s passions. She envied him and sighed appropriately when he spoke of the love he had for his owner and for his life. She also blushed when Leon enthusiastically described his frequent sexual uses, and the state of his body when his master was in a particular mood.

  It was a very sore issue with her. Because except for the touches she received as part of her training, Chris never used her. Or, to be precise, she would remind herself, Chris has never fucked me. Never asked for as much as a blow job, despite the explicit sexuality of her position. Being gay was one thing, she supposed. But if he’s interested enough to train me, why wouldn’t he at least try me out? He had enthusiastic sex with Rachel, after all, so he apparently wasn’t all gay, despite the evidence she had gathered during their brief introduction in the leather bar. So if he could get off on screwing women, why was he keeping such a distance from her?

  The question shamed and infuriated her, and she tried her best not to think about it.

  But in the one day she had been given to go back to attending to her business, she could barely concentrate on what she had to do. Even while she visited her bank and locked up her small valuables, when she called the storage facility and made her arrangements for pick-up and storage and paid the fees for three years, and when she packed up the list of clothing that Chris had given her, all she could think of was eight o’clock that evening. When she was due back on the Upper West Side. When she could get out of these clothes and get back into what was real. Her Rolodex remained by the phone, untouched. Her answering machine had several messages on it, one a clear job offer from a major auction house. She erased them all with a casual tap and left the apartment without looking back. Tonight, it was time to tell Chris about Troy.

  Chapter Nine

  Robin’s Story: Troy’s Real Thing

  Robin was on the floor, paddle in hand, when she realized that the gentleman in the tan blazer was staring at her. She didn’t allow him to distract her from her duty; she was already far too much a professional to take such frank appraisal as unnerving. There would be time enough when her business was complete to find out what his problem was. She focused on what was in front of her, keeping her ears and eyes sharp, and raising the paddle with a swift confidence that intimidated lesser creatures around her.

  Finally, interest wavered, and one man’s hesitation got tangled in the rush to complete the transaction, and Robin heard the auctioneer call out her number, pausing only to take a breath before starting to describe the next item in the catalog.

  All in a day’s work, she thought, jotting down her final bid with satisfaction. That last fake Goya would seal up the exhibition contract she had signed last year, and all brought in under budget. It was hardly standard to purposefully seek out forgeries for exhibitions, but it had been a fun contract to fill. She got to spend a lot of time in restoration rooms, watching artists use solvents and neutralizers and all sorts of sophisticated methods to expose what some owners had truly thought were original Goya works. It was a pity, for some of them. But it had been a bonanza for her. A staff of three people had worked for almost a year, tracking them down and talking, begging, threatening, and once bribing the various owners to allow the testing. Robin had been personally to over twenty places which had offered genuine articles for sale just on the supposition that they might have sifted through known fakes in order to verify their true finds.

  It was exhilarating. Fascinating. And just the thing to show her employers how valuable she really was. Putting this exhibition together (or, she reflected, just getting the pieces in one place) was quite an accomplishment. But she hadn’t wasted her time out of the country; whenever her Goya searches came up empty, she was always purchasing assorted other pieces and lots and having them shipped to the prestigious New York auction house for their eventual arrival in the next season’s catalogs.

  The irony of the entire search was that the final two pieces she needed to fill the contract came on the block at the auction house of her chief rival. Well, she tried to get them to deal exclusively with her, but they chose to put the fakes up on the block. Now, she had them both, for just slightly less than the original offer she made them. In fact, this was such a simple transaction that she could have sent one of her assistants to finish it up, or simply called her bids in from the comfort of her office, but it gave her a sense of satisfaction to come out and handle this last little detail in person.

  “You’re good, kid, you’re good,” Taylor murmured as he handed over the paperwork. She knew him from way back; working for different employers didn’t stop art people from socializing in the same circles. And she liked him. He was always friendly and never took on the snobby air that most of their fellow workers put on to protect their egos and keep the rivalry sharp.

  “Well, this seals it for me, Taylor,” she said, signing her name and clipping the shipping instructions onto the sheets. “I’ll see you next month? At Ray’s party?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it for the world. Be good!”

  Yeah, right, Robin thought, a sudden cool wave of sadness passing through her. She turned her paddle in and went to claim her coat with a sigh of frustration. It had been a long time since someone had told her to be good and really meant it.

  Breaking up with Maria had taken a horribly long time. Robin had struggled with her discontent for months, wavering back and forth through all sorts of convoluted arguments with herself.

  She had loved Maria, and there was no doubt about that. But as their relationship slipped further and further away from mistress and slave and deeper into the state of lovers, Robin never knew what to feel. It was secure to be so loved, to have a stable partner who was interested in pleasing her and being pleased, who was supportive and nurturing and had just the right amount of personal interests and projects to keep her away from the borders of clinging over-protectiveness.

  Robin concentrated on doing things like offering submissive gestures before being asked for them, and found that Maria was generally pleased by her efforts. She also took comfort in the fact that Maria didn’t stop playing with her; she was still being tied up and she still got some beatings and some sessions with all sorts of toys. They still went to meetings and parties where Robin got to wear her collar and sit on the floor. As long as these things continued to happen, Robin decided, everything else was just great. She should be grateful and happy with what she got, and she should be glad that she had the opportunity to show off just how submissive she could be.

  It was when Maria suggested that they begin to live together that matters got too entangled for Robin to be able to neatly compartmentalize. Suddenly, conversations shifted from the world of romance and fantasy into real world things like apartment size and location and budgets and the possibility of a domestic partnership agreement.

  “Why don’t we just do this?” Robin had suggested one night, her stomach and chest full of butterflies that threatened to strangle the sounds coming out of her. “I’ll start to turn my paychecks over to you. I’ll put my savings into your accounts. You find a place you like, wherever you want it. And, and, when we do this, I’ll become your real, full-time slave. You can decide how much to spend. I’ll agree with anything you want.”

  Maria had looked at Robin as though the younger woman had taken leave of her senses. Robin sunk into her chair and felt her throat and mouth dry out.

  “What the hell are you talking about, Robin?” Maria had demanded. “What, do you th
ink you don’t have anything to say in this relationship? Do you think I’m some kind of mommy figure who’s going to take over all the responsibilities for you? We’re a partnership here! Or are you just trying to get out of my suggestion? Is it that you really don’t want to live with me?”

  It was a long night, stretching into a longer day. Before it ended, they had both cried and been comforted and shared their ambivalences over their relationship and what to do and where they were going. And they agreed to give it another try and to trust each other.

  The second time they had such a discussion, the ending wasn’t so congenial. Robin still stung at the accusations that Maria had flung at her in the heat of their most painful shouting match.

  “You’re still a child, trying to find someone to run your life for you! Well, real people who do that aren’t into SM, sweetie! They’re pimps and pushers and abusers who would love to have someone who wants someone else to run their lives for them! And you’re walking right into their arms! Because you can’t handle the responsibility of your own fucking life!” She had tears in her eyes when she tore those words from her throat, and her fists had been curled so tightly that the knuckles were white.

  Robin took her collar off and left it on the table before leaving the house, hot tears of her own streaking her face.

  Now, the collar was at home, wrapped in tissue paper and tucked away in a box. Months after that final confrontation, it had arrived at Robin’s door, with a brief note inside.

  I’m so sorry about the cruel things I said to you. You know they weren’t true. But I knew that I was going to lose you eventually and I hated knowing that I couldn’t be the person you need in your life.

  Please forgive me.

  This really belongs to you. No one else could come close to earning something like it from me, and you deserve a better remembrance of our years together than my bitter words.

  It was signed simply, with an “M.”

  And that had been almost a year ago. And since then, there had been no one else. Or rather, Robin reflected, no one else who lasted more than one date.

  Feeling uncomfortable at WISE, in desperation Robin had turned to the mixed-gender groups in town for entertainment. She found little entertainment and a lot of desperation. In one group, the men seemed so intimidating, especially those who had seen her in public submission to Maria and who spotted her uncollared throat at once. And even the male slaves seemed a little overwhelming. Several of them tried to convince her that her real destiny lay in becoming a mistress―specifically, their mistress. At least that was better than the male “slaves” who told her they would be the best possible master for her.

  The women there seemed to think of her either as a rival, or insignificant.

  In the other organization, she found the situation somewhat less oppressive, but stupefyingly dull and dominated by quasi-charismatic leaders who had their own sycophantic followers. She was eagerly welcomed and pressured to join, and prodded to all sorts of volunteer work on projects that she had no interest in. The rest of her time was taken up by meetings where whatever the ruling council wanted was done and whatever they wanted to discuss was discussed. She felt alternately patronized and used, to no specific purpose.

  Between the two organizations, Robin began to feel a genuine longing for a capacity for suicide. If this was what the future of her sexuality was dependent upon, she was heading for a destiny filled with trivia, shallow thinking, and the endless struggle between the more manipulative members of groups of people whose only real purpose in organizing was to create a space in which people could meet and get laid.

  She did her best to ignore the pettiness and the senseless power-plays, and tried to gravitate toward those individuals who seemed to at least radiate a core of responsibility, balanced with the capacity to take the whole SM “lifestyle” with a grain of seriousness and dignity. But eventually, she realized that there, too, she was lacking the crucial element to her satisfaction. It was one thing to treat SM as an enjoyable way for lovers to expand their sensual repertoire. It was something entirely different to contemplate living a life based on a dominant and submissive relationship.

  In time, she stopped going to the endless meetings and discussion groups and panels and seminars. The lives and goals of these mostly closeted men and women were nowhere beyond what she had with Maria, and, in the end, much less interesting.

  Out of her closet came her old box of personal toys, and into her life came a new collection of terribly written pornography. She even called the old phone sex line again, and picked up a few voices who seemed promising, only to discover that she couldn’t go back again. The limitations of phone sex just couldn’t recreate the majesty and the rapture of the real thing. And when she heard Bob’s familiar call for submissive ladies one night, she hung up the phone with a solid click and never called the number again.

  Thank goodness she had such a big project to oversee. It kept her traveling, it kept her occupied, and it kept her mind off of her loneliness. It didn’t stop her from visiting clubs in Europe that catered to the SM and fetish scene. But it did stop her from establishing any regular contacts with people, which probably saved her from even more heartache.

  And now, her project was done. She had almost a full month of vacation time coming due, and no doubt there were proposals and assignments being stacked on her secretary’s desk even while she waited in the line to get her coat. Maybe she could just dive into them when she got back to the office and start something else that would be time consuming and thought devouring.

  “I didn’t know there was such a market for fake pieces of art,” a strange voice said behind her. “And I wouldn’t have guessed that you were the type to collect them.”

  She turned and looked up into the face of the man in the tan jacket. A moment of recognition struck her. She had seen him somewhere before. His warm, hazel eyes were dancing in some kind of private amusement.

  “That’s an enigmatic statement,” she said finally. “Why wouldn’t you suppose that I collect art forgeries?”

  “Because I know that you’re the real thing,” he said, leaning slightly forward. “Something our mutual acquaintances at the EC would never realize.”

  The EC―the Equivocal Coalition. One of the SM organizations. Robin took another look at him. Yes, she had seen him there. A few times, not regularly. She had never spoken to him.

  “Your coat, madam,” the man behind the counter said. She turned away from her new almost acquaintance and took it, and then turned back, her heart pounding.

  “I was about to go to lunch,” she said, astounded at the casual sound of her voice. “Perhaps you would care to join me and tell me about your theories about real things?”

  “It would be my pleasure,” he said, nodding his head a little forward. “But if we’re going to lunch, we’d better be introduced. I’m Troy.”

  “I’m Robin.”

  He smiled. “I know.”

  Compared to Maria, Troy was pure lightning. Where she was exotic on the outside and warm and cozy and comforting inside, Troy looked like a slightly absent-minded mathematician whose friendly eyes and carelessly groomed hair guarded a steel-trap mind with a strong appetite for misdirection and games of torment.

  Over lunch, they laughed and talked about themselves like any two people discovering a common interest. They shared their disappointments with the scene in the city and some of their experiences at the clubs. They compared lists of mutual friends. By the time they were dawdling over the third serving of coffee and lunchtime was long over, Troy captured Robin’s gaze with his and said, “I’m strongly attracted to you. Would you like to take the rest of the afternoon off and get to know me better?”

  “Yes,” Robin answered, embarrassed by her too-quick response. “I think I’d better call in and let them know I’m going to be out.”

  “Good. And while you’re up, you can decide something.” A flash danced across his eyes. It was a look that she was to become v
ery familiar with.

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  “After you suck my cock, I’m going to beat your ass until it’s bright red and tender. What I want you to decide is whether you will then bend over and pull your own ass cheeks apart so I can fuck that tight hole, or whether I should tie you securely down and gag you before I do it. Think about it.”

  All this was said in the same slightly amused but calm and friendly voice he had chatted with all during the meal. He raised his eyebrows as she sat shock still in her seat, breath quickening, color rising into her cheeks.

  “Do you need change for the phone?” he asked, reaching into his pocket.

  Robin shook her head and almost leapt from the table. The phone banks were far away, thank God, and she strode right past them into the corridor leading to the ladies room and locked herself in a stall to think.

  She was so needy it was almost ridiculous. Her pussy was already moist with excitement, her nipples erect under the blouse and jacket. A million thoughts cascaded, and questions. How could she trust him? She didn’t even know him! No one would know where she was or who she went with!

  But wait. People did know him. He did go to these silly clubs with their oh-so-serious meetings and agendas.

  And he was so... compelling. For such a plain-looking man, with his soft eyes and broad forehead and clean-shaven cheeks, still he was one of the most charismatic men she had ever spoken to about these things. And he knew something about her; he sensed that she needed something strong and direct.

  You’re reading too much into this, she cautioned herself. You’re so damn horny you can’t think straight. You haven’t even discussed safe sex with him for crying out loud. You can’t be thinking about just going home and having sex with him on a moment’s notice!