Twenty-One

by D. Victoria BonAnno

  “Who are you?” Demetrius murmured.

  “I am Twenty-One,” she barely heard her own voice.

  “And what are you?”

  His pants slid away and he was naked before her, coming toward her. He held himself up with one arm, pressing the length of him against her bare sex, flesh against flesh. The feeling stole Chloe’s breath.

  “I am a slave.”

  Demetrius slid himself against her sex. Chloe’s back arched. The feeling of him sliding so effortlessly against her, pressed against the apex of her sex, was too much to bear. She had lost. She was lost.

  “Look at me.”

  She obeyed.

  Demetrius slid himself inside of her.

  The bedroom prison blurred. The walls crumbled. Demetrius filled her so completely that the mere feeling of him working his way in, opening her to accommodate him, nearly brought her over the edge. She felt every muscle in his torso tremble, the smooth strength of him. The powdery scent gave way to the soft, strange fragrance of his skin, simultaneously sweet and sharp, almost like gasoline, copper, or blood. She moaned without control as he slid nearly out of her, a low growl rumbling in his throat.

  “Oh, yes,” his voice was hoarse. His low moan vibrated in his chest, against Chloe’s body. He curled his fingers around her hips and thrust as deeply as he could. Chloe gasped.

  “You must ask permission to come,” he murmured. “Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Master.”

  He slid out and back in, inch by agonizing inch, until he filled her again, and began a slow, careful rhythm. A steady pressure swelled inside of her in response, building with each thrust. Chloe’s hands were free, and somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she understood that she could strike out, but she could not escape the sweet pressure, cresting and waning as he moved inside of her. She lost herself in the ebb and flow, each wave promising to break before pulling back just enough to keep her from tumbling over the edge. She moved her hips, rising up to meet his thrusts, begging for a release from the slow, teasing waves.

  “Ah, ah, ah,” came Demetrius’ scold, a sound that threatened to bring Chloe back to herself, remind her that this man on top of her, inside of her, was her tormentor. But Demetrius seemed to sense her feelings. He hauled himself onto his knees, lifted her hips from the bed, and plunged into her. He thrust as if he meant to break her, slamming against her core again and again. Chloe gasped, arching off the bed, throwing out her hands blindly to either side of her, searching for something, anything to hold onto. She clutched the satin sheets beneath the rumpled blanket so hard her nails dug into her palms through the fabric. Demetrius altered his angle and found a spot deep within her, a spot that opened her to him completely. He ran himself over it again and again, his fingers digging into her hips, his low growl rumbling in her ears.

  The pressure swelled with each brutal stroke, blurring into one swift movement, harder and faster, until she could take it no more. Her cries grew louder. Demetrius seemed to know that she was close to the edge. He balled a fist into her hair and locked eyes with her. His skin shone with sweat, his hair thrown over his shoulder, grey eyes blazing through smudged kohl. Lust became him. In that moment he seemed almost supernatural, an elemental creature carved from the moon.

  “Oh, God,” Chloe whispered.

  Demetrius leaned into her, his mask brushing her ear.

  “Come for me,” he said.

  He thrust over that sweet spot one final time and Chloe screamed. Her body dissolved into heat and light and electricity, wave after wave breaking inside of her. Distantly she felt him withdraw, felt hot, hot fluid splatter her stomach, as the rest of her sparked and tingled like the tendrils of a bursting firework. Demetrius cried out above her, his voice vibrating in her bones. She sank into the sheet sand drifted back to her body like autumn leaves drifting down to the ground. Demetrius had half collapsed on top of her, his breath ragged against her neck.

  “Oh, Chloe, Chloe...what are you doing to me?”

  Chapter 11

  October 13, 2011

  Ms. Dia Belaire

  2717 Straeleni Street

  New Orleans, LA, 70130

  Demetrius,

  I know it’s your busy time, but I usually hear from you by now. I’m getting wedding jitters and I need you to keep me calm. You’re the only one who ever could. Don’t make me break our ‘holidays only’ pact and call you...

  The sky was spattered with faint stars by the time Demetrius pulled the truck onto the loading dock at the Oryx. He was late, and he had no one else to blame for it. It was mid-October, the Oryx’s busiest time, and he couldn’t tear himself away from that first session with Chloe. Oh, she had been a dream. She learned quickly, obeyed instinctively, yet had just enough fight in her to keep it interesting. She had even tried to manipulate him, and it had very nearly worked. He had never imagined she would pick up on his sadism and know it for the Achilles heel that it once was. Four years ago, three, even, her little show would have worked. He would have torn her apart, tormented her until she was a quivering mass of broken skin. He hadn’t been expecting such a seamless jump from false compliance to self-destruction. She had to be experiencing intense inner turmoil to leap from survival to a better dead than here mentality in the same session. Ah, but she had given herself over to pleasure so easily. In the end, the ineffable chemistry between their bodies would break her. But Demetrius wondered if it would break him, too. The way he reacted to her, the way she seemed to strip him of nearly all control…it was all very, very dangerous.

  Demetrius pulled open the back of the truck. His seven slaves were as he had left them, mummified in stiff black gauze and strapped to individual dollies. Tonight was the Oryx’s infamous Sin Night, and the slaves would be posed representing each of the seven deadly sins. The mummification was an integral part of the slaves’ training: literal objectification. The moment they were wrapped, they were regarded as lifeless dolls to be used.

  Demetrius studied the slaves as he waited for the bouncers to come to unload them. They were his best behaved slaves of the season, as they had to be to participate in public viewing. He could identify them by their figures, see their too-familiar faces through the wrappings. He passed a tall figure that could only be Two, standing on her dolly at nearly six feet tall, only a few inches shorter than Demetrius himself. She was German born, blonde beneath the wrappings with wide set blue eyes and full lips. She had just gotten her feet wet as an escort when Demetrius had taken her. She’d been stubborn at first, a substantial fighter, but she had broken easily under the whip. She was a marvelous leather slave, resilient and quick to obey, but also quick to tears. The tears were a bit of a problem in a leather slave; most buyers preferred to work the tears from them, rather than the girls giving them up so freely. But he was confident that Two’s obedience skills and her full figure would bring in a decent profit.

  Twelve, standing beside Two, had been even more dull and predictable. A tiny glass slave with Bettie Page bangs and pursed lips, she had been too easy to break. Twelve had been eager to comply from the moment he had slipped the collar on her. He always dug into slaves’ backgrounds, and Twelve’s life had been a constant string of relationships from a young age. All it took was a male authority to break her.

  Demetrius paused beside the smallest wrapped form at the back of the line. One. The slave who had begun this unsettling season. Before Chloe, Demetrius had considered his taking One to be his biggest risk of the year. It was not due to her background; she had been a prostitute with no familial ties to speak of; but because he had taken her a full month before he normally began recruiting for the season. Demetrius had been a guest DJ at a Chicago night club when he had spotted her. Her face held doll-like exaggerations of a woman’s features, with very large green eyes, full pouting lips, and high cheekbones. Small, firm breasts, a delicious apple bottom, and mocha skin made her an all-around impressive specimen.

  Despite her beauty, Demetrius probably would have
passed her by had he not noticed the two faint vertical scars near her mouth. The moment he saw them, he had been transported to Mama Dede’s parlour from years ago, where that bizarre portrait of the marred Virgin Mary hung over a shrine. The scratches on One’s face bore an eerie resemblance to the scratches on that portrait. He had felt that strange sense of foreboding then, too, just as he’d recently experienced in the suite with Chloe. He felt like the presence of the little prostitute was something purposeful, something…he despised the phrase “meant to be” and the powerlessness it insinuated. However, he could think of no more appropriate term.

  In the truck, Demetrius extended an arm and brushed the edge of One’s shoulder. He felt nothing but the scratch of bandages; no spiritual heat, no sense of foreboding. He patted the slave like a good horse. He had taken her in a moment of weakness, a momentary desire to recapture the past. Simple nostalgia, perhaps a brief longing for the passivity encouraged by the concept of fate. There was release in the belief that one’s choices are not one’s own, a sense of relief that leads to relinquishing control, which is why he used such a concept in breaking some more spiritually-inclined slaves. You were meant to be a slave. Destiny crossed our paths.

  Ah, but with Chloe, he felt it himself, didn’t he?

  The truck echoed with heavy thuds that could only be Rafe’s footsteps. Demetrius kept his hand on One’s shoulder in a casual fashion, glancing over his shoulder.

  “Rafe.”

  “Hey, Boss,” came Rafe’s baritone greeting. Demetrius turned, letting his hand drop. Rafe’s was a solid wall of flesh, his muscled arms crossed over his chest, nearly bursting through an Oryx staff shirt that looked at least one size too small. Four bouncers filed in line behind him, awaiting command.

  “Wheel them out,” said Demetrius. He exited the truck as the men unloaded the slaves on their dollies and followed them through the back to the dance floor. The platforms were already lit up with their special colours, ready to illuminate five sins on display. Lust and Envy, the remaining two, he would suspend by rope on either side of his booth just before the doors opened. He scanned the two suspension bars hanging above the booth. Both were up to his standards, and Lust and Envy would be portrayed by One and Ten, two of the season’s most delicate glass slaves. It wouldn’t take long to tie them, but he needed to take special care with the knots to keep them both safely suspended and avoid cutting off circulation to any of their limbs.

  Demetrius set to work tying rope around Ten’s tiny waist. A tight sensation in his right shoulder made him curse under his breath. He rolled his shoulder out of habit, but he knew it would do no good. A gunshot wound always left some sort of permanent damage. Demetrius was lucky he only had occasional muscle tension; the bullet could have shattered his collarbone.

  “Boss,” Rafe appeared beside him, his footsteps lost in the chatter of bouncers and bartenders preparing for the night. “Little blonde piece is askin’ for you at the front.”

  “She’ll wait ‘til we open,” said Demetrius. “We’re working.”

  Rafe tossed his massive shoulders, “Ain’t a customer, Boss. Says it’s important. Says she wants to talk to you about someone named Chloe.”

  Demetrius successfully fought an expression of shock from crossing his face. He met Rafe’s gaze with dead eyes.

  “That name means nothing to me.”

  Rafe shrugged again. “She’s being a pain in Bobby’s ass. Won’t leave ‘til she talks to you.” His mouth splintered into a smirk. “She’s a firecracker. Said she’d split Bobby’s dick if he put a hand on her.”

  Demetrius licked his lips behind his mask. That had to be Mariane, the Oryx regular with whom he had first seen Chloe. He could tell Rafe to let Bobby handle it, but Mariane would only return when they opened.

  “I’ll handle it,” he said, locking eyes with the larger man for a moment, “but if your bouncers can’t handle a pissy piece, you should look into replacing them with someone who knows how to do their job.”

  Demetrius passed Rafe, letting his last words distract the veteran bouncer from the bigger picture. Mariane stood just outside the main doors of the Oryx, smoking as always. Demetrius weighed his options as he approached her. He could have her banned from the club, but she was a well-known face in the underground, useless though she was, and her absence from the Oryx would not go unnoticed. Her ban would have his fingerprints on it, and people would start to ask questions. But as he came to her, he saw that there was little need for such drastic action. Her head turned too quickly at the sound of his approach, her body tensing despite her attempt to look casual as she leaned against the wall. If she had truly been relaxed, her feet would’ve been crossed, or her knees bent, but those lovely long legs of hers were rail-straight, her arms folded over her chest like a shield. So easy. The girl had the potential to be a threat, being the only one able to link him to Chloe. But fear had always been her poison, and more than anything, he knew she feared him.

  Demetrius advanced on her just a shade too quickly for her comfort. She flinched as he snatched her cigarette from between those heart-shaped lips and flicked it away. She was standing upright now. Her knuckles were white around her arms. He stepped into her space, his face a breath away from hers. To the Mariane’s credit, she stood her ground despite the flush of panic so easily seen in her dull blue yes. He smirked. Mariane was a pretty girl. Pretty face, pretty lips, pretty legs, pretty all over. But she wore the gothic style like a costume, an illusion to bring her run-of-the-mill attractiveness to an exotic pique. Strip her of her of her fishnet and her heavy eyeliner and she was just another skinny blonde with pretty features. Nothing exceptional. That, and her firm placement in the local subculture, saved her from Demetrius’ collar.

  “Give me one reason not to ban you for making a scene,” he growled, seeping agitation into his voice.

  A spark of resolve in her face. Oh, yes, she thought she had the upper hand, she thought she had him. She feared him, yes, but there was a certainty there, a confidence of some secret knowledge.

  “My friend Chloe went missing,” she finally forced out.

  Demetrius kept his eyes trained on her, stone still. He said nothing. Let her dig her own grave, let her reveal her little epiphany. She let a long moment go by before she summoned her nerve.

  “She went missing the night I brought her here.”

  A weak insinuation of his involvement. He could toy with her further, drag out the moment and savour her little internal struggles, but he had work to do. Bobby was keeping the growing group of clubgoers a safe distance away, but there would soon be a line to get in, and the sins had to be safely up and ready before the doors opened.

  Demetrius leaned closer to her, invading her space. “Of all the scraps of pretty flesh you’ve paraded in front of me in hopes of getting my attention, how many have I actually been interested in?”

  Mariane opened her mouth wordlessly for a moment, as if his proximity sucked the breath from her.

  “But…Chloe wasn’t for-”

  “And if I ever did take an interest in one of your offerings, what did I say?”

  Mariane’s lip trembled. “That they’re gone.” She took a small shuddering breath. “But I didn’t bring Chloe for you. I stopped doing that back-”

  Demetrius laughed, cutting her off. “You might have a little inside knowledge, Mariane, but do you really think I’m responsible for every terrible thing that happens in this town?” He wanted to let his words sink in but he didn’t have time. He had to use quick intimidation to put her in her place. He brushed her cheek with his fingers and leaned down to bring his eyes closer to hers, as if he were scolding a child. “I don’t remember any of the faces of your little friends, and your little friend last time was just as useless to me as any other you’ve tried to throw into my lap.”

  He slid his hand down her neck, barely a graze of fingertip, and the colour in her face drained away.

  “Oh, you look nervous,” he said with a low chuckle.
“You’ve never been worth one night’s fuck to me. And you’d be dead for what you know if I were a man who forgot old favours.”

  He squeezed her neck for a moment, enough to startle her into stillness.

  “Don’t make me forget the favour you did me by asking stupid questions.”

  He released her with enough force to put her off balance and went back into the Oryx without another glance. He tried to shake off the incident and lose himself in the series of intricate knots he stretched along bandaged bodies, but his blank face hid a cloud forming in his mind.

  Oh, Chloe. What did you make me do?

  Chapter 12

  October 14, 2011

  “Wake up, little girl, come open, now. I’ve got two of you to take care of today.”

  The sound of a stranger’s voice woke like a boom of thunder. A round face peered through the bars and jerked back from the cage door.

  “Whoa, easy, it’s all right,” he said, holding up a water bottle. “My name’s Gabe, and I’m your attendant. The boss wants you processed. I’m going to take you to the baths, okay?”

  Gabe unlocked the cage door and stepped back. Chloe hesitated.

  “Processed?” she dared to ask.

  Gabe nodded, folding his arms over his chest. He was large, at least a head taller than Chloe with a stocky frame, rich brown skin, and black hair. Something about him struck her as familiar immediately. Chloe was too startled to figure out what.

  “Don’t talk out of turn, sweetie,” he said. “Now come out of there and have a drink.”

  Chloe bit her lip and complied. He hadn’t answered her question, but what else could she do? Rodney had dragged her out of the cage and he was nowhere near Gabe’s size. She crawled out onto her knees. She wasn’t sure how to behave. A new face made her aware of her nudity, a detail to which she had grown accustomed. She wanted to cover herself but remembered Demetrius punishing her whenever she tried to in the past. She looked down at her body. Her breasts were still painted with tiny red streaks from her encounter the night before. But Gabe, like everyone she’d encountered in this place but Demetrius, didn’t bat an eye at her nudity.