I sit on the bed behind her and pull her against me so she can feel the leather and hard boning of my corset against her back, how exposed she is next to the thickness of my shell. My lips trail down her ear and neck as I pull her hands behind her, joining the cuffs with a metal clasp from my bodice. There’s a set to her shoulders that tells me she won’t resist physically, but she’s wary, not at all ready to surrender, not yet. I have something to prove. For now, though, I just keep kissing her, biting at her neck gently, rolling her nipples between my fingers. Her breathing changes; she’s leaning against me now, her head against my shoulder, her eyes drifting shut. I can feel her hips longing to thrust forward, but there’s nothing there to touch. Still too early for that, yes.
And I am behind her, so she can’t see when I reach to free the knife that’s sheathed at my back and bring it to her exposed throat. But she twitches when she feels the edge, and her eyes open, her breathing a little faster. “That’s my athame, sweet,” I purr in her ear. “Traditionally, they’re blunt, but mine is sharp. Feel?” She nods almost imperceptibly in acknowledgement, and I turn the knife, let her feel the cold flat against the artery in her neck, then drag the point slowly down her body. My left hand comes up to grasp her jaw, holding her arched against me as I reverse the knife and touch her exposed clit with its metal pommel. She shivers; her hips shift forward again, and when I bite her earlobe, she moans. In her ear, I whisper, “I would so love to make you bleed. It would be so beautiful, all that red on these white sheets,” and I rub the ridged hilt of the knife against her clit for emphasis. She makes a strangled sound, her bound hands move restlessly against me. “But there are so many other pleasures we can subject this soft white body of yours to. Why should we rush?” I ask her, and with a slow pressure I allow the hilt of the knife to slide into her cunt. Her pelvis moves to accept it, but I don’t let her have much; I keep my grip on the hilt near the blade and stroke her clit with my thumb as I carefully fuck her with the knife. Her eyes roll, but she says nothing. It’s too quiet, but I don’t really want to hear myself talk. I’d rather hear her scream.
I pull the knife from her with a final caress and she moans a little, a disappointed sound. The knife goes back in its sheath, anointed with her juices, and I lick my fingers, then give them to her to suck, turning her to the side a bit, cradling her. She lets me do it, but her eyes are guarded again as she looks at me, daring me to try harder. I love her resistance; looking at her, I have to fight the urge to rub up against her hip to satisfy my tingling cunt. How unseemly it would be, when really we’re just getting started. Instead, I lunge forward suddenly and close my mouth on her exposed throat, pricking her with my teeth. She stiffens for a moment, then relaxes again, feeling the vulnerability of the pose, and I reward her with an open-handed caress on her mound. Her body is deliciously responsive, her cunt already dripping; my excitement is growing with every shiver of her skin.
I release her, then turn her and push her down on her stomach, freeing her arms only long enough to attach them instead to the bedposts, along with her ankles. Having her thus comfortably spread-eagled, I caress her body, then leave her alone again to gather my tools and to let her nervousness rise. On another day I might take her up gently with feathers and horsehair brushes to peak with a painless flogging, but today I think that would disappoint her. She doesn’t like pain, but she wants a little fear. Returning, I rub her back, buttocks, and thighs vigorously, bringing the blood to the surface, then slap her lightly, three times. She doesn’t flinch. I feel my smile stretching my face, my teeth beginning to show. I know it’s not a pleasant expression, but she can’t see. I am so hungry. I can barely wait.
Still, I start with light blows, dragging the soft tails of the flogger across her skin between lashes. As first I’m not causing her any pain, but after a few minutes I begin to increase the speed and intensity, and I see her wincing now as I hit the same spot on her thigh over and over, the skin turning a rosy pink. I move back to her buttocks, strike her harder, and she gives a short, painful bark. Again. She’s pulling at the restraints now, thrashing a little as I beat her. Harder. “Fuck!” she says, involuntarily. Again. “Ow, goddammit, fuck!” I hit her again, pushing her, and with each blow a little more profanity escapes her with a little more force, until she’s screaming the words at me, cursing me, pulling hard against the cuffs. “Goddamn you, you fucking—ah! Bitch! You fucking whore! You—shit! Ow, ah God. Fuck!” “You’re full of flattery, my dear,” I purr in between breaths, moving my hips with the rhythm of my blows. She’s out of words now, just screaming, growling, biting at the sheets beneath her, incoherent with rage. “You want me to stop?” I ask her sweetly, but the only answer I get is a strangled roar as she again struggles with the bonds. “Then beg,” I tell her, and she screams again, curses me. “Beg,” I say again, “Beg, beg, beg,” timing the word with the blows, and after a few more enraged screams she chokes, “Please stop hitting me, please please ow fuck please lady I’ll do whatever you want please oh fuck oh God please—” and suddenly I do stop and there is silence except for our breathing, hers ragged, mine deep with exertion but steady. For a moment I struggle with the urge to turn the flogger in my hand and ram the handle into her, but I hold back; this is more for her than for me, and I don’t want to hurt her in ways she doesn’t want to be hurt. Instead, I kneel beside her, stroking back her short brown hair, and she heaves a sob, tearlessly. When I touch her face, she turns her head to kiss my fingers, and I know this was what she wanted. I lean down, murmur nonsense endearments in her ear.
There’s a bottle of aloe vera by the bed, and I take it down and stroke the gel into her skin, cooling the angry heat of the beating. I rub tension from her shoulders and knots from her thighs, telling her how lovely she is, how gorgeous, how desirable. I reach between her legs and gently touch her outer labia, feeling the heat that lingers there. A little more aloe and I’m rubbing her clit, she’s moaning softly, unresisting. And as much as I loved the fierceness of beating her, I want to do this much more. Slowly, I unhook the corset, baring my torso, and toss it to the side; I pull off my panties to let the short, thick cock I’m wearing swing free. Wiping the aloe from my hands, I replace it with a generous dab of lube, slicking her up and then my equipment, already warm with my body heat. I put my weight on her, my nipples tightening at the chill of the aloe evaporating from her back, and slip inside.
She groans and moves against me as I grind her pelvis into the bed, pushing her clit against the mattress, and my own cunt throbs with the pressure as my cock pulses into her, just enough length to push firmly against her cervix at the end of each thrust. Her moans are half sobs, and it’s the sound of her more than the pressure that gets me close. I slide a hand under her to stimulate her clit more directly and she’s screaming again, in pleasure instead of pain this time, but she sounds just the same, only with a bit less profanity—and then she’s thrashing, coming, and I let her finish before jamming my fingers under the harness and into my own throbbing wetness. It only takes a few desperate thrusts before my orgasm explodes through me and I catch myself, remember not to collapse on her, so much more exhausted than I am.
I take my time unbuckling the harness, detaching her from the bedposts one limb at a time, and then I gather her up into my arms, both of us naked now. For the first time this evening I give her a real kiss, my mouth tender on hers. As I pull back, she looks up at me, her eyes finally vague, no longer hard. But there’s still a flicker of mischief in them, and after a moment she whispers, “Bitch.”
I smile, playing the game with her. “Slut.”
“Whore.”
“Floozy.”
“Tramp.”
“Jezebel.”
“Harlot.”
...until we run out of insults, and one of us starts to giggle, and then we’re both laughing, voices raised in identical cackles, equally shameless, equally spent.
The Decision Coin
nyrdgyrl
“All roads l
ead to therapy.” After making this pronouncement, the patient settled back and folded his hands in his lap to await his therapist’s return volley.
Oh God, I need some relief. Losing the battle of keeping her posture erect and her demeanor interested, Dr. Odessa Martin slumped back into the shadow that crossed her desk. Pressing her fingertips together, she pretended to evaluate the declaration, then said, “I believe that’s all roads lead to Rome, not therapy.”
“Rome…therapy, what’s the difference? I’m here, aren’t I?”
The pencil Odessa habitually twirled suddenly snapped, scattering wood slivers across her desk and eliciting a self-satisfied smirk from her patient. She quirked an eyebrow at her least favorite client, then selected another pencil from her stockpile. He’d bested her again. Odessa’s profession required patience and neutrality, two qualities that she grappled with constantly. Over time, she’d realized that most people were reluctant, at best, to deal with reality. Without volition, her hand rose and rubbed a crescent-shaped scar that creased her hairline. It was a parting gift from a former patient who’d found another use for her summer heels.
When she was a child, her grandmother had filled her head with stories about Sojourner Truth and Martin Luther King. God knew she’d never heard his call, but making her people proud had been woven into the very fiber of her being. Every day of her youth, she’d endured lectures about the importance of service until she bristled with purpose and grabbed the shield, eager to take her turn on the field of battle. Before her conversion, the pictures of Martin Luther King that graced every wall in her gram’s house seemed benign. Afterward, she always felt like the man himself was beaming down on her with approval. Most people contented themselves with one formal portrait, but her gram collected his picture like other people did thimbles.
Service had been her calling; unfortunately, lately she’d grown tired. Nothing she said or did seemed to provide anyone any relief. Especially herself. Her normally cocoa brown skin was drawn and her soft “good hair” had dried out and become as brittle as the tumbleweeds that skittered across the highways of this godforsaken part of the country. Misguided love had lured her away from Georgia and landed her deep in the Sonoran Desert.
Killing time, she doodled in her notebook, knowing that the session was very near its end. Within seconds, her patience was rewarded when the clock struck five.
“Well, Mr. Clement, looks like our time’s up. Same time next week?” As much as she hated dealing with this man, Odessa had bills to pay and he was one of her few self-paying, private clients. All he really needed was someone to harass, and she’d filled that role nicely. No one else would have put up with his nonsense.
Heaving a huge sigh of relief, she ushered him out the door. He was her last patient of the day. Now all she had left to do was finish her notes and close up the office before heading home for another solo dinner. Afterward she’d drive to the clinic to facilitate her codependency group.
The next morning she overslept, then broke her favorite coffee mug while hurrying to keep her appointment with her friend and department head, Dr. Leslie Craven. She’d called in desperation, needing to talk to someone, so Leslie had cleared an hour out of her busy day just for her. Despite her best intentions, Odessa was late and her hastily applied makeup failed to camouflage her state of mind. Leslie met her at the door to the suite, then ushered her directly into her office.
“What’s wrong, Odessa? What’s upsetting you?” Leslie settled her onto the cushioned sofa, then drew a chair up close enough to touch Odessa’s twitching leg. “Is it Carmen?”
Odessa dropped her head into her hands and scrubbed her face, trying to dam the tears that trickled down her cheeks. She wept silently for a few moments, then gathered her composure and faced her friend. “No,” Odessa said. “Not Carmen. We’re through. I’ve told you that.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s everything, Leslie. I can’t take it anymore.” She looked around for a pencil, then ran her fingers through her carefully styled hair, a sure sign that things were not right in her world. She said, “I can’t face another patient or student. They’re sucking me dry.” Raising her tear-stained face, she whispered, “I’m going crazy. I’m distracted and disorganized and I want to…”
Leslie pursed her lips, then motioned for Odessa to continue.
“It’s everywhere. I see the tops of people’s skulls popping open like washing machine lids and I’m pouring detergent into the open hole. It’s crazy. You’ve got to help me, Leslie. I can’t stand it.”
Leslie’s eyes widened. “I have an opening for Tuesday and Thursday mornings at say…7:30? I also think you should clear your schedule and—”
“No. Not more therapy! I tell you, I can’t stand it.” Odessa’s bottom lip quivered as tears once again coursed down her cheeks. “I want…I mean I need…time. That’s all. I just need some time.”
Wrapping her arms around Odessa’s body to buffer her ultimatum, Leslie said, “Time! Girl, all you’ve had is time. You’ve been skipping your session regularly and look what’s happened. Absolutely not, Odessa. Those sessions are mandatory. I won’t settle for anything less. Not if you want to keep working, that is.”
“That’s…that’s just it, Leslie. I’m not sure I want to…that I can keep working.”
“You can’t mean that, Odessa. You’re too good and do too much for people in this community to turn your back now.”
“But what about me? What about what I need? What I want? When does that matter to anyone?” Odessa threw her soggy tissue into the wastebasket and snatched three more from the box by her side.
“You need to recharge your batteries. Why don’t you use my condo in Sedona? Take some time to reflect on where you’re going. After you come back, we’ll talk about this some more.”
Odessa nodded eagerly. Getting away might be just what she needed. Her enthusiasm waned when she asked, “But…my students and the clinic? What about them?” As an afterthought she added, “My clients, who’ll see them if I go away?”
“I’ll handle all of that, Odessa. You just go ahead and take care of yourself.”
*
Odessa steered her Lexus convertible onto exit 298 on I-17, trying to let the muted pastels that painted the desert landscape ease her worries about her car. It had been acting up for weeks, intermittently cutting out for no discernable reason. She’d been to her mechanic three times, and each time he’d returned it hinting that Odessa was mistaken because he’d never been able to duplicate her complaint. On the way up from Phoenix, the car had shuddered twice, but after a quick prayer, the engine smoothed out. It would have been just her luck to stall out on the way to a much-needed vacation.
She’d forgotten her sunglasses, so when she turned west on Highway 179, the brilliant sunset dazzled her eyes and forced her to the side of the road. When her vision cleared, she put the car in gear only to have it stutter, then stall. Her dead car brought fresh tears and she cried until her sinuses ached, grinding the ignition again and again in frustration, unconsciously mimicking her clients’ senseless repetitive behavior.
She was still crying when a loud metallic tapping made her clasp her chest in fear. She whipped her head around squinting through her tears to make out the features of the figure standing beside her car. Whoever it was backed away and was standing with her arms extended sideways, assuming a harmless stance that went a long way toward relieving Odessa’s fright. After wiping her face, she cracked the window and asked, “Can I help you?”
Stepping closer while still keeping her hands out to her sides, the stranger said, “That’s what I was going to ask you. You’re the one sitting by the side of the road.”
Bristling at the stranger’s tone, Odessa ground the engine. She pounded the wheel in frustration. “My car won’t start.”
“I see that. Pop the hood, ma’am.” The stranger sauntered to the front of the car, rapping the fender with a knuckle when Odessa was slow to comply.
“I’m going to have to give you a tow, lady. I can’t fix this here.”
“A tow?”
“Yeah, I even brought my truck along. See?” The stranger peeled blue nitrile gloves from her hands and waved them behind her at an idling tow truck. She sketched a bow. “Wendy Harper at your service.”
Odessa blinked, oddly discomforted by her timely rescue. Her luck usually wasn’t that good. She eyed the driver’s pixie face and spiked hair and said the first thing that popped into her mind. “Really,” she drawled. “Are you sure it’s not Darling?”
“Darling? Why’d you call me that? We’ve just met.” Wendy stuck her hand out, then pulled it back to stuff the gloves in a pocket. “My name’s Wendy. Wendy Harper. What’s yours?”
Blushing at her runaway mouth, Odessa extended her hand. “Oh, Odessa. Odessa Martin, but I didn’t call for a tow.”
“I know. I was just taking a ride and saw you sitting there.”
“In a tow truck?”
“How else would I tow your car?” Wendy tucked her hands into voluminous pockets and rocked back and forth on her heels.
“Of course.” Odessa eyed her rescuer warily, watching for any sudden moves. This woman had a manic gleam in her eye that many would mistake for enthusiasm. Odessa’s experience led her to believe that the tow truck driver was clinging to the edge of the sanity abyss with her steel-covered toes.
Lessons in Love Page 22