The Delicious Torment

by Alison Tyler

  “You heard what he wants,” she said, and I realized that the room had changed in my absence, and not merely in the fact that Alex had arrived and Jack had departed. The cage, previously hanging from the ceiling, was on the floor, and the door was open—and I knew that Jack wanted me inside of it.

  I backed away, into Juliette’s waiting arms, but rather than hiss at me, or demand that I obey, she stroked my hair, breathed her warmth on the back of my neck, and brought her arms around me.

  “Don’t fight,” she said. “It will be so much worse if you fight.”

  I understood the intelligence in her words, but the advice still didn’t make me want to obey. I’d been in a puppy cage one time at Jack’s, and the thing scared me more than any of Jack’s other toys.

  “You know you’ll end up in it,” she said, her voice low, intended for my ears alone. “But if you fight, you’ll have to go through so much punishment first. Why not behave? Why not get into the cage like a good little mousy?”

  Her words flowed over me but didn’t sink in. I pushed back against her, my mind reeling for solutions. Where was Jack? If he entered the room, I could talk to him, tell him to bind me to the spanking horse instead. Or down on the table. Or to chains I’d noticed suspended on one wall. He didn’t have to put me in that cage.

  But “telling” Jack—that wouldn’t work. I couldn’t “tell” Jack anything. Not in this sort of situation. My lack of clothes made me hesitant. I didn’t want to sprint through the club like a streaker. Yes, the partiers were in various states of undress, but a naked woman fleeing through their numbers would definitely cause a stir. And I could imagine what would happen to me. I’d be caught—undoubtedly, and probably easily—and I’d be put on display, used as one of the models for how to properly cane your sub.

  I still hadn’t taken a step forward, and the men hadn’t moved toward me either. But we weren’t at a true impasse. They could force me into the box with no problem—we all knew that. Clearly, Jack hadn’t asked that I be put in the cage, but had wanted me to climb into the thing of my own accord.

  “Alex didn’t fight,” Juliette whispered in my ear.

  And that was all I needed to hear.

  Chapter Fourteen:

  All Alone

  Closing my eyes now, I try to recall how I managed to make myself get into that frightening metal puppy cage. Maybe it was what Juliette had said: Alex didn’t fight. Perhaps it was the fact that Alex was right there, his eyes on me, silently watching my every move, willing me to fail. I sensed that he wished I would cause a scene. My disobedience would make him look more superiorly submissive, wouldn’t it? Alex, I could tell, always wanted to be the top boy. He needed the gold star on his forehead, the A+ on his chest.

  Feeling his eyes on me, feeling the heat of the hulking men waiting to use force, I made a decision. They wouldn’t have to tell Jack I’d failed yet again. They’d be able to offer a report of model behavior.

  Still, looking at the cage, I had doubts. It seemed smaller than the one at Jack’s house, and that had been small enough to cause a wave of claustrophobia to douse me in its embrace.

  Somehow, I climbed inside, feeling the bite of the metal against my naked skin, a shiver running through me, both from that cold steel and from the sound of the cage door being shut. I wasn’t bound. I was free—yet boxed.

  Juliette gave me a smile, and I wondered whether she had thought I would fight. Whether I had behaved unpredictably in my obedience, or like a lamb led to slaughter. Docile and meek. Nothing I was doing this evening felt entirely right. Inside myself, I believed I should never have left Jack and Alex. I should have pulled a tantrum in that first room, forced Jack to deal with me, yanked his attention away from his assistant.

  The two burly men came forward at Juliette’s nod, and they lifted the cage easily and hung it from the suspension system in the ceiling. So now I was up. I was in. I was captured. What was going to happen next?

  The two men left the room in silence, and I gazed down at the space. Why did Jack want me out of reach? Why did he want Alex bound in place?

  Jack entered the room moments later, shutting the door firmly behind him. His hair was wet, so he must have showered, too, and he appeared relaxed and ready to answer those questions—if not with words, then with actions. My eyes were focused on him as he took in the view with a sweeping gesture: one slave bound in place, the other overhead. He smiled his pleasure at Juliette and then stood back from her and watched as she slowly undressed. And now the shivers grew more pronounced, running up and down my spine. I had a feeling what was going to happen, and I didn’t want to be right.

  I met Alex’s eyes for a second, and he looked as horror-struck as I felt.

  Juliette slowly removed her black-satin attire, stripping down to a fancy corset, dark-blue lace that hugged her form. She was curvy, her lush breasts pushed up by the device, her slim waist held in tight. Beneath, she had on a matching cobalt garter belt, inky black stockings, and spiked heels. She wasn’t wearing panties. Jack ran one hand over her bare shoulder, and I felt as if he were touching me. Felt burned by the familiarity of the stroke.

  What the fuck, Jack? I wanted to cry out. Why do I have to watch this?

  Yes, Jack had watched another man punish me—but that had been fuel for Jack’s own private fantasies. I’d never craved the reverse, hadn’t spent my nights longing to see him dominate another female. I wanted to be Jack’s one and only. I’d accepted Alex—somewhat grudgingly—but I didn’t want a girl in the mix.

  I realized that we’d never discussed the true rules of our relationship—other than us both accepting that Jack ran the show, and I was allowed my freedom to write. I knew that if I fucked around, it would be the end. But we’d never talked about what Jack did in his spare time. What he might be doing. What he had done before we met.

  He knew my whole history—from my first date in junior high through my last fuck on Nate’s bed. And I didn’t know anything. Had he been married? Had he always been a rock-hard Dom? Watching him with Juliette brought all sorts of questions thrashing to the surface. And yet I couldn’t spend time thinking about them, because he was busy now, binding her down to that maroon-leather table, fixing her wrists over her head, spreading her ankles. When he touched her between her legs, I moaned, and Jack looked up at me, for the first time. He didn’t smile. He didn’t wink. He seemed curious as to my reaction.

  How was I dealing with his kindness to another female?

  Not too fucking well.

  I hated the fact that he’d whipped Alex. But I hated this even more, despised seeing him touch her. Worse still, of course, was the fact that I was wet. Who wouldn’t be aroused at the sight of a stunning ice-blonde princess, her ass in the air now, her body prepared for what I could only guess?

  “You tell me,” Jack said, loud enough for his voice to carry, but sweetly somehow, softly.

  “A crop.” She turned her head away when he went rummaging through the antique wardrobe, like a kid avoiding the view of the doctor preparing a shot.

  Jack was in fine form tonight, wasn’t he? First he’d taken care of Alex. Now, he was preparing to punish this pretty minx. What did he plan for an encore?

  My heart raced as Jack ran his fingertips over the various weapons. He hefted one, then another, then returned to the table, his choice made. “I should have forced you to pick for yourself,” he told Juliette.

  “Send me out to cut my own switch?” she was teasing, her voice rising up at the end, but I caught the undercurrent of fear there.

  “Exactly,” Jack said. “You of all people know which one of these inflicts the most pain.”

  “It’s not the tool, Jack,” she responded, and she was smiling, although weakly. “It’s the power behind.”

  She was right. I knew that. A whipping from Alex was entirely different than one from Jack, even if the same paddle, crop, or cane was used. The Dom was what mattered. Not the device.

  I knew Jack had whipped Ale
x for the situation with me. For failing somehow, being unable to provide Jack with the information he craved. Basically for a job not well done. But I had no idea what the relationship was between Jack and Juliette. They seemed to be friends. I squeezed my eyes shut at the thought. I didn’t want Jack to have female friends. I wanted him to be all mine.

  I hadn’t thought Jack was paying me any attention. He’d only looked my way twice. Now, he said in a voice that carried to me, “Open your eyes, kid.”

  Was he talking to her, or me?

  I looked down, and we made instant eye contact. Powerful. Burning. He was talking to me.

  “You watch,” he said next. “You see how it’s done.”

  Had I thought I was at the lowest I could get? Being forced to witness Jack’s banter with this blonde? Being held captive overhead, like some exotic bird on display? Now I felt as if he’d put me underground, my heart in my stomach. He was going to demonstrate how one properly accepted punishment. And this…this…oh, whore, for want of a better word, was going to be his model.

  Did that mean I had failed him as Alex had? Did that mean that when he whipped me, or cropped me, when he used a paddle or his belt, he was unhappy with my response? The thought made me sick to my stomach. I was being taken to school.

  Juliette had on no panties, only the garters and the corset top. Her ass was a blank canvas for Jack, and he went to work. An artist if nothing else.

  He didn’t tell her how many. He didn’t make her say why. He simply started, the crop cutting into her tender flesh, and she immediately barked out, “One. Thank you, Master.”

  At least she didn’t call him Sir. “Master” had the same effect on me as the word had back in the New York club. It signaled a false interaction, a make-believe scene. Jack wasn’t her Master. Not truly. This was some paid-for advertisement, created solely for Alex and me. Punishment for Alex in some privately excruciating way. A lesson for me on how to behave.

  I listened to Juliette count for him. I watched the stripes line up on her skin. I saw the change come over her when the pain grew intense. When she had to force herself to keep up the model behavior, shaking the hair out of her face, quivering in that instant before crop met skin, knowing how much it would hurt and working to prepare herself to accept that pain. I had the feeling she would be wet now; if I were to run my fingertips between her legs they’d be drenched in her sweetness. I had the image of doing exactly that, of soothing her somehow, and the concept floored me.

  Not because she was a woman. I’d been with Ava, after all, a similarly cool ice blonde who invited me into her bed with her roommate and indoctrinated me into the exotic world of a girl-girl-boy ménage. No, I didn’t have a problem with Juliette because of her sex, but because of her easy relationship with Jack. I wanted to hate her. I wanted to ridicule her in my head for her dyed platinum mane and her faux-emerald eyes. Yet, as I heard the sound of impending tears in her voice, I felt pity.

  And, yeah, I also felt turned on.

  So much so that the metal of the cage didn’t bother me anymore. I spread my thighs apart and pushed down, gaining contact with the cold steel against my clit. I wondered how long Jack would keep me up here. If he didn’t let me down soon, would my sex juices begin dripping to the floor?

  Chapter Fifteen:

  Vicious

  If he fucks her, I’m going to rock this thing out of the ceiling.

  That was my sole thought.

  I can watch him crop her. I can watch him inflict the pain that she seems to crave. But I will not be able to watch him take her.

  When Jack was done, he dropped the crop and undid Juliette’s bindings. I stared, hands tight on the metal of the cage, not even feeling the chill of the steel any longer. I watched because I couldn’t look away. Not like Alex, who was bound with his head faced forward, with no choice at all but to witness the unfolding scene. No, I watched because not knowing would be worse than seeing the drama with my own eyes. Juliette stood, shaky and laughing at herself for being off balance. Jack leaned back, waiting for her to speak. I saw him in my mind with a cigarette dangling from his lips, insolent in that James Dean pose. I saw him regarding her under half-shut eyes, waiting for her response.

  “Not fucking bad,” she said, and I knew that if I had said the words, he would have slapped me. Hard. Jack must have been thinking the same thing.

  “You let your subs talk to you like that?”

  “I’m not your sub, Jack.”

  He grinned at her, his expression softening. “I know.”

  I understood the sensations working through her. She’d gotten the pain. Her nerves were strung tight. Now, she needed the pleasure. I hated the fact that I was watching all this like a member of a silent audience. Yet there was no way for me to interact.

  Juliette disappeared for a moment through the door to the boudoir, and when she was gone, Jack focused his attention on Alex, undoing the bindings, setting the boy free. Alex was stiff from having sat in a forced upright position for so long, and he stretched slowly, his eyes on Jack. He appeared wary, as if wondering what Jack might have in store for him next, and he didn’t seem to be prepared when Juliette reemerged, fully dressed in all-black once more, silky pants and a long-sleeved sweater.

  “You don’t mind, do you, Jack?” she asked, gripping on to Alex’s wrist.

  Jack shook his head.

  “I’m so hungry after a tune-up like that.”

  And now Jack nodded, and I could see Alex’s face lose a bit of the worry. Had he been here before, with Juliette? Did he know what future pleasures awaited him? She opened the door to the room and pulled him after her down the hall. Jack shut the door behind them.

  I watched, still feeling breathless, gripping the cage, scared beyond measure. Jack surprised me. He climbed onto the leather table and stared up at me. Regarding me now with the same look he’d given Juliette.

  “What are you thinking?” he asked.

  I swallowed hard. It felt like years since I’d last spoken.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Not good enough, doll.”

  I couldn’t say it. I hated him right now. That’s what I was thinking. This whole encounter had been planned for days. It had nothing to do with the fact that I’d acted the brat this afternoon, and everything to do with the fact that I’d staged my faux runaway scenario with Elizabeth. Jack was paying me back. Not from my script this time, but from his. And he’d known somehow that watching him give pain to someone else would be far more gut-wrenching than having to submit myself. It wouldn’t have been punishment if he’d cropped me. Not true punishment. The pain would have been real, but Jack knew all about what pain did to me by now.

  “I’m waiting, Sam.”

  “I can’t, Jack.” There were tears in my eyes, tears coursing down my face. “I can’t watch you do that again.”

  He’d broken me without lifting a hand in my direction.

  “I’ve seen you whipped. What’s the difference?” There was hardness in his voice.

  My dismay was caused by the way he’d touched her, the casual banter between them. The history I sensed they had, something I’d never be able to share.

  “I can’t—” I said again, and I turned around and put my head down. I wouldn’t look at him. My whole body shook, which made the cage shake, but I didn’t care. I could fall at this point, but I didn’t think I would be able to feel any lower.

  “Tell me what you want, Samantha.”

  I wouldn’t look at him. I wouldn’t talk to him. It would take some doing for him to get me down, right? I could misbehave all I wanted up here in the air. Maybe I was hung from the ceiling in a birdcage, but I was momentarily out of Jack’s reach.

  “Two seconds,” he said. “That’s all it will take for the guys to be in here, for them to lower that cage to the floor. And then you’ll find yourself in the same position that Juliette was in. Only you won’t be asked to choose your weapon. I’ll be doing the choosing for you.”

&
nbsp; Here was a threat, one that made me tighten up my thighs, squeeze them together at the vision of what he was describing. But still I refused to look at him. He could stare at the line of my back, at the curves of my ass. He could think what he would.

  “Don’t test me, kid.”

  I would not hear. I would not see. I would not speak.

  “What do you want?”

  What did I want?

  Jack stood and walked around the cage, leaning on the wall now, staring up at me. I thought of moving once more, of facing the other way, but I couldn’t make myself do it.

  “Don’t mess with other women,” I said hoarsely. “Don’t hurt them. Don’t fuck them. Don’t touch them.”

  “But men, I can torment men?”

  “I don’t know what you do with Alex—”

  “You saw,” he said.

  I nodded. So this wasn’t the first time they’d acted like that. I was coming in so late to this little drama. I took a deep breath. “I don’t care about that.” It was true, I realized as I said the words. Alex was a tool to me—I didn’t know what he was to Jack. But it was the girl who had bothered me. The girl who mattered.

  “Tell me what you want.”

  “Just you,” I said, and the tears were in my words now, my voice thick. “Just you. That’s all. I’ll do whatever you need, Jack. But I don’t want to see you play with someone else. Not like that.” I wiped my eyes on my arm, feeling so brutally exposed. Nowhere to hide. I wished the cage were made of solid steel rather than bars, so Jack wouldn’t be able to see me.

  Jack walked away, and I heard the door open, heard him leave the room. I wondered whether I’d said the wrong thing. If I had, then it was over, wasn’t it? I’d learned enough tonight to realize that I couldn’t stand to watch him engage in our sort of dance with another woman. I’d rather be alone than feel this sort of pain… this shattering type of pain that had nothing to do with marks on the surface of the skin, and everything to do with marks within.

  When the door opened again, I heard the heavy steps of Juliette’s two hulking assistants, and in moments the cage was on the floor. Jack thanked the guys, and they left, quickly, leaving Jack to open the cage. Was he setting me free or letting me go?