On Demand

by Justine Elyot

  'I know you don't intend to make a career in taxation,' he said drily, 'but there is no need to sneer at those of us who do. Now, about these booklets.'

  He put one into her hand. 'Page five,' he said, one eyebrow witheringly raised.

  Rachael riffled through, then dropped the booklet with an appalled cry of 'Oh my God!' on finding the terrible evidence of her mistake.

  'Pick it up!' Everett had gone from ignorable nonentity to person of interest in one stentorian phrase. The tips of Rachael's every fibre stood to attention; the command entered her via her ears and seemed to stir strange untended areas within. Including her groin.

  She dropped to a crouch, seeing that the open booklet lay across the toe of Everett's lace-up brogue. He stabbed his foot towards her unexpectedly; she fell off-balance, grasping the shoe in both hands, bent over it with her lips inches above. Oh God. She had the wildest urge to kiss it! As if burnt, she leapt back and picked up the booklet, shooting to her feet again, wanting to look at anything but Everett's face. The face she had thought of as Bland British. Pale, slightly freckled, a little sun-damaged but with eyes whose sea-blueness she had not previously picked up on. Sandy hair that had once been ginger, receding now. And hands. Nice hands. Wedding ring! Stop!

  'I'm sorry,' she whispered. 'I'll do them all again.'

  Paul Everett did a strange thing. He put two fingers beneath her chin and lifted it. He kept them there long enough for her feet to start rocking and the rest of the office to blur away.

  'Your travel plans are interesting,' he said, 'even if they aren't strictly relevant to the Distraint Act of 1987.'

  Rachael laughed uncertainly.

  'I wish I could come with you.'

  'With your . . . wife . . .?'

  He took his fingers away. 'We're separated,' he said. 'Last year. She's suing for divorce. Unreasonable behaviour, she says.'

  'Oh.' Rachael blinked. There had been rumours. It was said that Everett was a much too frequent visitor to the Grapes next door as well. 'Are you? Unreasonable?'

  He sighed, gave her a searching, hooded look. 'Probably. I probably am.'

  'Oh,' she said again, feeling as if she had just been flung out of a plane with a parachute bag and no instructions. Which cord was the right one? Would she float or would she crash? 'You don't seem that bad to me . . . I mean . . . you know . . .'

  'I don't know, Rachael, and I don't think you do either. Anyway. Enough of this. Administrative duties don't seem to suit you. You're overqualified for them, and yet you still manage to mess them up. I need a new PA. Why don't you do it?'

  'What? Shouldn't you advertise?'

  'It's just temporary. She's gone to visit relatives in Canada for three months. I believe that takes us up to the start of your World Tour, doesn't it, Rachael?'

  The way he said it, and his accompanying flash of teeth, made her stomach flip-flop. It was playful and yet steely. It said, 'Don't mess with me, unless I give you permission.'

  She would not have believed it, but it took just those few minutes in Everett's office for Rachael to decide that she wanted him, but only in a very particular way. Only if he took her.

  He took his time with the taking. For the first four weeks, their working relationship was close, cordial, but professional. She performed all her duties well, even taking calls from the soon-to-be-ex Mrs Everett, who often made dark and cryptic remarks while leaving messages about solicitor's fees and decree nisis.

  'Make sure you don't get on his wrong side, dear.'

  'I bet he's got you taking dictation.'

  'Just obey orders and I'm sure he'll give you a leg over, oops, I mean up.'

  In the fifth week, there was a three-day taxation conference. Everett and Rachael had interconnecting rooms at the Luxe Noir. For Rachael, a luxury hotel was a new experience. Sitting opposite Everett at dinner, she was so self-conscious about using the right cutlery and not calling the napkin a serviette that she knocked back her first glass of wine a little too quickly.

  'This place is amazing,' she said, staring up at the ceiling, spotlit to look like a night sky. 'Do you come here every year?'

  'I spent my honeymoon here,' Everett revealed. 'Before the refurbishment, that was. There were crystal chandeliers on the ceiling back then.'

  'Oh. Wow.' Rachael very much wanted to ask him about his wife, about what sort of behaviour she considered 'unreasonable'. Did she dare? She reached for the wine bottle to pour another glass, but Everett got there first and moved it beyond her reach.

  'Slow down,' he said warningly. 'The starter hasn't even arrived yet.'

  'Is that what your wife didn't like? Did she think you were too controlling?' Rachael kicked herself violently on the ankle at the way it had come out, but it was too late to unsay it.

  'I'm surprised you'd take an interest in my marriage, Rachael, but if you must know, there was an element of that, I suppose. Just probably not in the way you mean . . .'

  'In . . . what way . . . then?'

  'I am quite controlling, but not as part of day-to-day life. Our marriage was an equal partnership in every area except one.'

  'Except . . . one . . .'

  He looked down and smiled into his wine. 'There's no reason why you'd want to know, Rachael, so perhaps we should leave it at that.'

  'I do want to know,' she said. Where were all these mad words coming from? What was she trying to do?

  'I'm not sure you'd be comfortable with it,' chided Everett.

  'I think I would,' she countered. It was happening. Eye contact. Momentous silence. His hand, twisting the stem of the glass this way and that. It was happening.

  'Two lobster bisques.'

  Two plates of soup the size of dustbin lids landed in front of them. The waiter bowed his head, picking up on the atmosphere straight away, and made himself scarce.

  Suddenly Rachael did not think she could eat her soup, or at least not in front of Everett. The idea of plunging the spoon into that velvety broth, the rich seafood smell of which might well remind him of . . . something else . . . and sipping it up between her lips seemed much too suggestive for polite company.

  Everett seemed to feel the same, for he spent far too long fussing with the napkin and the salt cellar, looking over his shoulder as if hoping for an escape route to materialise.

  It didn't. He turned back to Rachael, took a deep spoonful of the bisque and asked, 'Do you have a boyfriend?'

  Rachael shook her head. 'Not at the moment.'

  'Not worth it, I suppose. With your travels in the offing.'

  'I can't make a commitment.'

  'No, of course. You don't want to be tied down.'

  Tied down. He was trying to look casual, but his spoon hovered above the soup bowl, expectant of her reply.

  'Oh, I wouldn't say that,' she said, trying a mischievous glint. She wasn't sure if it came off or not.

  'You don't know what you're saying,' said Everett gruffly, turning away to wipe his lips with the napkin.

  'No, I suppose I don't.' Rachael gave up, threw the spoon down in the dish and stood up. 'I'm not hungry. Think I'll get an early night. See you tomorrow.'

  She heard his voice calling, 'Rachael!' rather indignantly, but decided to leave him to it. She was not going to put it on a plate for him. That was not the way her fantasy worked.

  Up in her room, she undressed grumpily, pulled on a robe, poured herself a glass of minibar wine and began flicking through the cable channels. She settled on an undemanding detective drama, lay back, ripped open a packet of peanuts in lieu of supper and tried to banish the frustrations of the evening from her head.

  They were not easy to banish though. That phrase 'tied down' kept floating in and out and she continually found that she had missed crucial plot points in the drama whilst imagining her wrists lashed to a headboard, her legs forcibly spread for the benefit of Paul Everett, who prowled at the foot of the bed, explaining exactly what he meant to do with her helpless body.

  She sighed heavily,
popped the last handful of peanuts into her mouth and muted the TV. After licking the salt from her fingertips, she pulled down the top of her robe and frowned at the state of her nipples, which were definitely ready for something. Could she tie herself up? Just to see how it felt? She unlooped her dressing gown cord and wrapped it experimentally around her wrists. The soft towelling material rubbed kindly against her skin, but how would leather or metal or tape feel? Cautiously she tied one wrist to a bedpost, tugging hard to get the necessary tension. Her blood seemed to sing, the vessels fit to burst. She moved her other hand down between her legs, finding it wet and tender there. She bunched the fingers up against her clitoris and began to stroke, pulling at the cord all the while, whispering to herself the phrases a man might use to a naked bound woman.

  'I'm going to use you every way I want . . . oh shit!' Rachael's bedside phone began to shrill. She grappled frantically with her bonds, managing to free herself just in time to snatch the receiver from its cradle.

  'Yes?'

  'Rachael? It's Paul here. I need you to take dictation.'

  Rachael held the phone away from her ear, trying to decipher the message, not sure she was understanding its import. His voice sounded brusque and businesslike enough. But what did he mean, 'take dictation'? It was night time. She was in bed, for all he knew.

  'I'm sorry?' she said.

  'I mean you are to present yourself at my door in the next sixty seconds, or there will be trouble.'

  Rachael held her breath. Unless she was wildly mistaken, this was it – Taking Time.

  'But I'm not dressed . . .'

  'Never mind that. Come as you are. Now.'

  'Yes, Sir,' she whispered.

  Hastily looping the cord back around her waist and pulling the gown tightly shut over her spilling breasts and dewy thighs, Rachael did not even think to squirt a bit of liquid soap over her fingers, such was her fluster. She bolted from her room and knocked on the one next door, thinking only of meeting her minute deadline and pleasing her boss.

  He opened the door, his mouth flickering a little when he saw what she was wearing despite his best efforts at keeping a stony face.

  'Good,' he said, putting a hand on her shoulder and steering her to the foot of the bed, where he sat down, ready to instruct her. 'Rachael, I've decided to assume that you were not teasing me at dinner, but that my interpretation of your hints was accurate. If at any time it turns out that I have misjudged the situation, just let me know and I'll release you from this . . . overtime. Clear?'

  She nodded, enthralled.

  'Right, take these.' He produced a notebook and pen from his breast pocket and handed them solemnly to her. When her hand came up to take them, he sniffed the air. 'What's that?' He took her fingers and pressed them to his nose, then smiled broadly, shaking his head.

  'Oh, Rachael,' he admonished, his sorrowful tone patently false. 'What have you been up to in there on your own?'

  Rachael's pained expression was her only reply.

  'I see you can't be left alone without falling into wicked ways. It's just as well I've called you in here. It seems you need to be kept busy.'

  Rachael had never stopped to consider the erotic potential of embarrassment, but now, caught out and laid bare, she felt utterly, wantonly vulnerable. Stripped of her everyday layers and veneers, she was goosepimply and yet not at all cold. Rather the opposite, if truth be told. She was thankful only that her robe still preserved a tiny bit of her modesty, because she would not have been at all surprised if the area between her legs was glowing neon-red, screaming 'Look at me! Touch me!'

  But Everett was looking elsewhere, at Rachael's opposite wrist, which was braceleted with redness. 'What caused that?' he asked.

  'My . . . er . . . my dressing gown. The towelling . . . chafes a bit.'

  He narrowed his eyes, pondering this, then shook his head, apparently saving the snippet of information for later.

  'Never mind. Take the pad and pen and get down on your knees, please.'

  Rachael, rather relieved to have an instruction to follow which put her out of the line of Everett's scrutiny, dropped down immediately, her knees sinking into the soft deep pile of the carpet. She wondered how easy it would be to write in this position, but Everett had further instructions.

  'Put the pad and pen on the carpet in front of you and lean forward on to your elbows. That's it.'

  Rachael complied almost unconsciously, though once she was in position, she was strongly tempted to peer over her shoulder, aware that her robe must have ridden up near the top of her thighs now.

  'Good. Now I want you to maintain that position while you copy down this contract. Are you ready?'

  Rachael clicked the pen nervously, made sure her legs were clamped tightly together, and nodded.

  'I didn't hear you, Rachael.'

  'Yes, Sir.'

  'Good. Take, as they say, a letter. ''Dear Rachael.'' '

  She coughed in surprise and craned her neck up at him, but he nodded swiftly down, returning her attention to the notepad.

  'Yes, ''Dear Rachael. In view of recent revelations regarding your personal interest in my bedroom tastes'' – are you getting this?'

  Rachael was scribbling furiously. '''Recent . . . revelations,''' she muttered.

  'Ready? ''I have decided to offer you the position of my submissive for the period of two calendar months.'' A position you are demonstrating very adequately just now.' He stood and moved behind his dedicated assistant, prodding her bare soles with the toe of his shoe.

  '''I offer the following terms and conditions. You may terminate the contract at any time without notice. Your additional duties will not prejudice your principal employment nor any future references. Although I will want to tie you up and spank you, I will not seriously hurt or harm you in any way. Any and all sexual scenarios proceeding from acceptance of this contract may be halted by the utterance of the word . . .'' Well, what do you think?'

  'A word?' asked Rachael blankly.

  'A safeword. You say it when you don't want to play any more and I stop. Any ideas?'

  Ideas were a long way back in Rachael's racing mind at this point, so intoxicated was she by the swirl of words she was painstakingly copying, and the enormous import behind the looping script.

  'Basingstoke,' she hazarded.

  He laughed. 'Why not? OK, ''. . . the utterance of the word 'Basingstoke'. On expiry of the two-month period, I undertake to never contact Miss Rachael Bates again unless she instigates such an activity.'' What do you say?'

  Everett had moved in front of the prostrate Rachael now, and when she looked up she saw a tall, slender column of navy pinstripe, stretching way up to the ceiling, topped off by a pale face that looked, in that moment, reassuringly anxious and vaguely kind. Not the stereotypical whipcracking man in leather at all, she thought, bemused. But a man she could probably trust. And, furthermore, a man she had grown to like, respect and even find attractive.

  'I accept the terms,' she said.

  He broke into a smile and dropped to his haunches in front of her.