“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” And he was gone in a flash, darting through the crowd like the linebacker he resembled, his long hair waving gently behind him.
“He seems like a nice man,” Robin said after Chris had sent Robert back to his Mistress of the evening.
“He has grown considerably in his new life.” Chris fixed one of his raised eyebrow looks upon her and she blushed. “I hope that you will not be in the habit of lying for much longer.”
“It wasn’t really a lie,” Robin protested. “I was asking him about them. He said he couldn’t talk about it because it might be considered gossip. And that he was afraid to ask because he didn’t want to intrude on their confidentiality.”
“And he was correct. I’ll punish you for lying later.” Chris scanned the room while Robin gulped some champagne to cover her embarrassment.
Most of the rest of the evening passed into a comfortable blur of faces, names, and more guessing games. Unlike the many SM-themed parties she had attended, there was no moment where the host stepped out and started some sort of erotic play, and there were no general announcements that a dungeon or bondage area had been arranged for the guests. There was just the constant stream of charmingly scantily clad slaves, bearing drinks and food and the amused but mild attentions of a very few guests.
“Who are these people?” she asked once, waving one hand. “Are they all owners?”
“No. Many of them are agents, trainers, and spotters. A few of them are professionals in other fields who provide services for the Marketplace without actually participating in the business of slave training, use, or sale.” Chris pointed out a few. There, in one corner, was an architect who took time off from developing commercial properties to design sleeping and living quarters for human chattel, and had also designed some very stylish and durable torment devices. Across from them at one point were two women who were fashion photographers. They also took the artistic and necessary photos for a slave’s personal file, and for the catalogs used in the larger international sales. One of them had achieved some attention recently for her advertising work, now featured on billboards and kiosks throughout the country.
“So many people know,” Robin marveled. “But no one tells.”
“Oh, someone always tells,” Chris answered smoothly. “But very few will believe them. The ones who do believe come and find us.”
Regrettably, Chris was no party animal. He stayed just long enough to be polite, and directed Robin away from the affair before it really started to wind down. Robin had noticed that he rarely stayed in conversation more than a few minutes, and that most of his time was spent explaining where his employers were, and introducing her. In a way, she felt bad. She would have liked to stay some more, and maybe get a chance to talk to Robert again, but it was obvious that Chris was only taking care of a chore. She sank back into the cushions of the limousine as the ride started, and then sat up again.
“Ken wasn’t there.”
“No. She is away on business. But she may be back in time for your sale.”
“Really? How do you know?”
“She told me.” Chris covered a slight yawn, and at the end of it, made a subtle gesture. The dim lights of the passing cars almost made it invisible, but Robin acted on instinct, pushing herself carefully off the seat and curling her knees under her on the carpeted floor of the car. Under her legs, she could feel the pulsating vibrations of the frame.
“Tomorrow, you go back out to finish your business.”
She nodded.
“When you come back, I will allow for no imperfections, do you understand? All this past week was a test, to see how much you knew, and how fast you learned. Now, there’s nothing else to be done but make every move and every twitch or reaction as perfect as you can. Every response to me will be exact and respectful, containing all the information requested with a minimum of hesitation and embellishment. Your most minor flaws will be punished out of you, even if it makes you into one walking bruise. And Robin... when I place you in the list of properties to be auctioned, and I sign my name as your trainer, I am in effect swearing that your behavior and appearance are guaranteed by me. If you fail me, you will have lost your best hope of attaining the status you seek.”
“Sir, Ken told me that you were the best trainer I could get. She was right.” Robin swallowed hard. “If anyone could get me perfect, you could.”
“Ken wanted me because she knew it would mean an excellent opening bid,” Chris snapped. “Any trainer could have gotten you prepped for some sort of appearance on the block. But right now, only I could make sure that you were accepted as an experienced servitor, instead of a novice. And that may make all the difference in the world for you, little girl. It may bring you exactly the life you crave. So when you’re concentrating on not disappointing me, also remember that your own happiness depends upon your being seen as an excellently schooled and driven slave.”
Robin nodded, and sighed extravagantly when Chris reached out and drew her head toward him, pushing her down onto one hip so that she could rest her cheek against his leg. And like that, they rode in silence toward the city. Fighting the urge to cry, Robin never felt more frightened. Or, when Chris’s hand strayed to smooth down her hair, so happy.
Chapter Thirteen
Robin’s Story: Bank Shot
“No, no, Jes˙, no! You’ve got to thrust your hips up, higher! Make me feel you surround me, take me into you, and now! Yes, now! Open your eyes, you stupid slut!”
Robin panted and bent her back into a bow, pulling her body back for a wild, desperate thrust, her legs spreading wider, her stomach rippling. This time, when she brought her hips up, her pussy lips splayed and soaked with her juices, she gasped at the licking of cool air that swept across her flesh. Her clit seemed giant, pounding with an agony that was too furious to be released by one orgasm. Between her legs, Ken Mandarin stood, her dark face even darker with excitement, her hair matted around her forehead. She had one hand inside Robin’s body, and the effort and strain in getting it there was paying off for them both.
Robin groaned as Ken’s hand began to naturally form into a fist. “No, no, Master, I can’t!”
“You already have! Feel it! Look at me!”
Robin forced her eyes open, looked down her body and moaned, and then whimpered. It seemed impossible that there was an entire hand in her cunt, the fingers curled and pressed against her internal walls, pressing smoothly up, and down, and back and forth. Robin felt like crying, like laughing, like pulling away in horror. One twist of the hand and she felt a desperate urge to pee, and then it was replaced by that wonderful sensation of fullness.
“Oh, oh, I don’t believe it, I don’t believe it,” she finally sobbed, allowing her head to fall back. “Oh God, yes, please, don’t stop, please...”
“I’m not going to stop, not yet. Answer me quickly: can you come like this? Will you come for me, like this, with my hand inside your wet cunt?” Ken’s voice was harsh, like it always got when she was being cruel, and Robin knew that whatever she answered, her orgasm was in Ken’s hands. Literally.
“I don’t know,” Robin gasped out. “It’s too much! Please, I don’t know!”
“But you like it? You love it!”
“Yes, oh, yes! Ahhh, please, please...”
Ken laughed, and tossed her head back, sending spikes of inky black hair flying past her ears. Her eyes glittered in possessive pleasure as she hunched forward, rocking her wrist back and forth to spread Robin open even wider, and then to press her strength against Robin’s exposed clit. Robin panted, and then moaned, and pressed back, her hips shaking, her entire body now trembling with tension and need.
“Tell me, little pet. Tell me if you can come for your Master.”
Robin bit her own lip, her head rocking almost in time with Ken’s hand. “No, no,” she gasped, “too much... It’s too much....”
“Then you won’t. Today.”
And Ken relaxed her hand a little and went
back to the rhythmic stroking movements that had enabled her to ease her way in before, twisting her hand comfortably to find the easiest ways in and out, gently now, always gently. “Can you imagine people watching this?”
“Yesss!”
“And afterward, your owner will allow them to use you. Perhaps they will scorn to use such an open hole, and fuck you only in your mouth, or they will thrust into your asshole. That is what being a slave is like.”
Robin moaned out loud and thrust her hips up again, and Ken laughed.
“You like that, too? Tell me the truth, little slut, there is nothing you would not submit to. You are truly a slave already.”
“Yes, Master, yes, yes!”
“I am going to stop soon. Do you want me to stop?”
“Please, Master, please... Do as it pleases you....”
“Ha. Then it pleases me to stop now.” With a cruel smile, Ken stopped moving her hand, relaxed the fingers, and slowly drew it out. Robin whimpered for every inch, and then collapsed back onto the table with a moan, her legs shaking. When Ken gave her permission, she drew her legs together and then pulled her knees up toward her body, slipping over onto one side. She shivered, and whimpered while Ken went to wash her hands.
Kendra Mandarin. “Ken” to her friends, “Master” to her slaves. All four of them. Real slaves. People who did not have day jobs with paychecks deposited in their own accounts and their own friends and their own activities and their own places to live. Four people who lived only to do her bidding, who used the title of Master in some magical way that Robin could not only hear, but feel, deep in her soul.
How desperately Robin wanted to be among them, serving this charmingly cruel, hauntingly beautiful, exotic woman. Foreign and familiar. Caring and sardonic. A talented and voracious lover and an implacable sadist. But it wasn’t going to happen.
“You are very nice, very natural,” Ken conceded early on. “Cute, too, and fun to play with. But I don’t need you. I have all the workers I require, and your skills are of limited use to me. But we shall be together for a while, and enjoy each other.”
It wasn’t enough. “Tell me about your slaves,” Robin begged. “Where did you get them? Can I go there?”
“No, no, it takes more than a cute bottom and an earnest smile to be what they are,” Ken scolded. “Leave them be and enjoy what you can have.”
It wasn’t hard to enjoy time with Ken Mandarin. She was fabulously wealthy. She had a large house far away from the city, and kept a duplex apartment on the Upper East Side as well. She was a genuine heiress, a child from an ancient trading family based in Singapore. Her family’s heritage was mixed, and rich with fascinating historical tales, which she only told when plied with drink and steady flattery. But she was obviously Eurasian, and had spoken Malay, Chinese, French, and Portuguese before she had learned English. She spoke her English with a faint trace of a British accent, mingled with French endearments and an occasional Chinese oath. No one, she claimed, could curse as well as the Chinese. No other language even came close. But she never actually translated what she had just muttered. She was a woman of an almost mercurial temperament, rising to extreme heat in passion and anger and cooling to a businesslike exterior that could make a person shiver from the lack of warmth.
Her slaves seemed eager to serve her. One, a slender and somewhat aged man, took care of her houses. He was also the one who applied his powerful hands and gnarled fingers to Robin’s body, drawing out every knot and every ounce of tension before Ken would deign to play with her for the first time. When he smiled, his strong, white teeth gleamed against his dark face, and his eyes flashed with pleasure. He almost never spoke, and when he did, his accent was strong. Ken addressed him only as Yaro, and Robin never found out if that was a name or a title. She did find out that he had been with Ken since her childhood, which was a daunting thought.
Two of her slaves, Andy and Cindy, looked as sweet and corn-fed as any Midwestern newlyweds, except that they were brother and sister and as sexually ravenous as two humans could be. They served various functions in Ken’s life, ranging from cleaning tasks to bookkeeping, secretarial work and errand running. They also served their Master’s desires in bed when she was in the mood, or entertained her with their own antics, or their attentions upon her guests. The weekend that Ken had them take Robin, again and again and again, was overwhelming. Robin had to call in sick on Monday, staying home to wrap herself up among her blankets and pillows, not daring to think about what it would be like to experience such repeated pain and ecstasy on a regular basis. Andy and Cindy were always friendly and cheerful, painfully so, and Cindy told Robin that they had been slaves for three years. It was their use of the title of “Master” which had taught Robin the power of the word, so much more than an endearment, so much more than it had ever seemed before. She yearned to use it as they did, with such respect and awe and pride that it became more than a word. Sometimes, she succeeded.
And then there was Celia, who was French by birth and whose English was also a late acquisition. Celia was a chef whom Ken claimed to have belonged to her older brother. The brother apparently traded Celia to Ken for a male slave whose talents were in construction work and looking good. The male slave was even now working on site at a petrochemical plant that her brother owned, leaving work to strip his clothing off, displaying the many rings her brother would have had attached to him, and then squatting to take her brother’s prick in whatever hole the man desired. “My brother,” Ken would sigh, “is so predictable. If I sent him one such slave every year, for Christmas perhaps, he would love me forever. Personally, I couldn’t tell the difference between them, especially with all their body hair off. It looks so―robotic.”
But the result of that trade was a plump, happy slave in the kitchen, who regularly turned out masterpieces for the delight of Ken’s household and her many guests.
“And she is already a luxury for me, ma petite. She is the only one of my people who does not have more than one function. No, no, you must be content with what you have!”
“But I’m not!”
“Then you must learn to live with disappointment.”
“But I love you.”
“Ah, and I love you, ma chérie! Especially when you cry. Will you cry for me tonight?”
That night, and many more.
* * * *
It took four months of regular begging to actually get Ken to consider the problem.
“Look, you know I’m good enough,” Robin insisted. “You’ve taught me almost everything I need to know, haven’t you? All I need is the way to get in.”
“You don’t even know what it is you would be getting into,” Ken scoffed.
She was dressed, as usual, in her exquisitely tailored men’s clothing, a designer pinstriped suit today, and a tightly knotted silk tie. Her hair was slicked back, spiky on the top, stylishly ragged and long down her back. Robin never knew what she would discover under Ken’s mannish dress. One day it might be a pair of boxer shorts hiding a cock of monstrous proportions. On another day, it might be little scraps of delicate lace barely covering her pubic mound. Ken’s erotic moods were as changeable as her exposed ones. It was part of what made her so magnetic.
“So tell me,” Robin demanded.
Suddenly, Ken’s eyes took on that same predatory gaze she had fixed upon Robin back at the conference. “Very well then, listen. Yes, there exists a large network of sellers of human flesh. It is called, in English, ‘the Marketplace.’ There, we engage in the trading of men and women for vast amounts of money, and for uses that are not limited by our societies and our cultures. This is not for fun. Do you understand that? It is to provide servants for those whose drives require such absolute obedience. It is not to provide boyfriends. Or girlfriends.”
“I understand that.”
“If you are allowed to enter this world, you cannot choose your masters. Nor may you deny them use of you once they purchase you. If you leave them, or rebel, you will
be rejected from the Marketplace and never allowed to return. Even I do not speak to those who have been sent away.”
Robin nodded solemnly.
“And it is not like in the novels, or in the movies!” Ken raised one finger, her eyes lightening up even as Robin got more serious. “The masters, they are not always handsome young men or dashing Asian women.”
“Ken... I know that.”
Ken leaned back and seemed to take a moment to think. But at that instant, Robin knew, she knew, deep within her, that Ken had been waiting for this. That Ken had always expected this. And rather than feeling ill-used, Robin felt relieved, flattered, and tremendously excited.
“This is the situation,” Ken said quickly, sitting up again. “There is an important sale coming up, a large one, here in the city. And I know of two people who can train you for that sale, make you presentable. It will take a month, perhaps two. You will have to give up your employment, and your apartment. But they will almost guarantee that you will be accepted and sold to a respectable bidder. Are you that ready?”
A month! Perhaps two! Robin’s mouth dropped open. She closed it again, feeling a touch of vertigo, and put a hand on the arm of her chair to steady herself.
Surely, it was not her voice that said yes.
But Ken had laughed and called across the house for Andy to call Grendel Elliot.
“What do you mean, they’re not home?”
Andy cringed slightly, the bearer of ill tidings. “Please, Master, Mr. Elliot and Ms. Selador are leaving for an extended tour of the European continent, and are not expected back until after the autumn sales. Their earliest agreeable date for the acceptance interview is late November. Shall I make the appointment?”
Ken uttered something that sounded like “duuay-ohmo” and then peppered it with a twist of one hand that looked delightfully obscene. “No, you stupid idiot! Give them my regards, the usual felicitations, wish them a bon voyage or whatever is suitable.” She waved him off and he scampered away, leaving Robin feeling like she had just missed her lottery drawing by one number. She looked up at Ken, who had started to pace, in expectation.
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