Velvet Glove

Chains rattled on the rough stucco wall as Audrey stretched her arms. Hours must have passed since Sterling stripped her naked and cuffed her beneath the colonnade. When she rolled her head to work the kinks from her shoulders, her long dark hair tickled her waist. It was a small, sensual stimulation, one among a host. Florida's velvet night had long since swallowed the raging sun. Palms rustled in an orange-scented breeze. Insects creaked and chirped. Tiny lizards skittered across the springy grass as if it were skillet-hot. Fifty yards from where she stood, the pool cast a lurid glow across the lawn. Its surface skirled, the lanes lit but empty. Sterling had chained her here alone. He’d trusted she wouldn’t want to scream. Not that it would matter if she did. Sterling’s walled Coral Gables compound was huge. Plus, the nearest neighbours were his friends.

Sufficient time had passed to dry her tears, though now and then she refreshed them for the pleasure of feeling sorry for herself. Not too sorry, of course. At the moment, she was savouring the delicious calm that follows a good emotional storm. She could have been an invisible being: no past, no future, no responsibility except to wait for Sterling’s return. Unlike most of her peers, she was free.

She slid down the wall to rest her naked bottom on her heels. The chains caught her wrists, stretching her arms above her head and lifting her breasts. She had a strong, young body, a good offering for her latest sexual partner. Her hips and breasts were generous, her waist nicely curved. Her skin was brown from the sun and grown men had been known to blush at her teasing smile. That was before, though. Sterling never blushed. Sometimes, however, if pushed, anger would darken his face. Audrey had to admit she liked that. It was the best way she knew to get the upper hand.

Her breasts swayed as she squirmed on her heels, their peaks tightening with the motion, their piercings still tender. The tiny hurt had been completely worth it. Four smoky aquamarines dangled from the jewellery’s ends. ‘To match your eyes,’ Sterling had said. At the memory of how he’d stared in fascination, heat slithered through her. Her pulse beat softly in her sex: pom, pom, pom, like the batting of a kitten’s paw.

Unnerved by the strength of her reaction, she closed her eyes and thought of Tommy. He was the one who’d brought her to Florida in the first place. He was sweet and steady and had a face as open as the Minnesota sky under which they’d both been born. He’d been in love with her since high school, though he’d never said so, not once, because he knew she didn’t feel the same. But they were friends - best friends. Nothing could change that. They’d attended the same university, worked in the same city, and when Tommy took his first vacation, he’d invited her along. ‘We’ll halve our expenses,’ he’d said. ‘That’s what friends are for.’ Audrey knew better than to believe him. This trip was his last shot at making them more than friends. If nothing happened on the sultry golden beaches, he’d give up on her, once and for all.

Something had happened, though, and on the very first night, but not what either of them expected. Excited by their tropical jaunt, they’d decided to treat themselves to dinner at the Restaurant St. Michel. Its old world atmosphere was matched by new world prices, but why be a working stiff if you couldn’t enjoy yourself? They waited for a table at the bar, ordered silly drinks with flowers in them, and toasted absent friends. They wore their nicest clothes, grown up clothes. Tommy had gulped at the sight of her slinky red sheath. Audrey had smoothed his conservative tie. The rum made her think: why not sleep with him? Make the poor guy happy. She did love him, after all, more than any of her ex- and very-ex boyfriends.

I will, she thought, watching him stride off, bouncy and slim, for a quick trip to the men’s. She was looking forward to seducing him, melting a little as she imagined running her fingers through that carroty hair, picturing how excited he’d be to have her touch him after all these years.

But then Sterling had strolled over: Sterling in his creamy double-breasted suit; Sterling with his silver hair and smooth, tanned skin; Sterling with his eyes like chips of ice melting in a pool of absinthe. One look and everything Audrey knew about herself began to dissolve.

He was witty and urbane, charming even Tommy when he returned. He joined them for dinner, then clubbing. He seemed a friendly native showing the tourists around, an older man, avuncular, warming himself at the fires of youth. He could order drinks in three languages and paid for them with hundred dollar bills. He could dance the merengue. He could turn Audrey’s knees to jelly by blowing in her ear. She couldn’t hide her attraction, though she tried to for Tommy’s sake. Unfortunately, subterfuge was useless. One touch and her attraction swam into her eyes. Finally, with a sigh as old as the cavemen, Tommy ceded the field.

‘Be careful,’ he said as she kissed him goodbye. ‘This guy seems nice enough, but there’s something about him I don’t trust.’

That, of course, was the appeal.

On the first night, Sterling tied her to his king-size bed and spanked her with the flat of his hand. She writhed on his black satin sheets, her skin throbbing with a pleasure so intense she thought he might have drugged her. But he was the drug: the control he exerted, the sheer, fascinating force of his personality.

He flipped switches she hadn’t guessed she had.

‘How did you know?’ she asked as he rocked her in his arms, her body shaking from too many orgasms to count.

‘I saw it in your eyes,’ he said.

‘What did you see? What?’

But he didn’t answer. He only shook his finger and smiled. That was part of his pattern: withholding answers, withholding tenderness. He grew colder by the day. He wasn’t happy unless he drove her to tears, sometimes tears of fury. It didn’t matter. Her body liked what he did too much to give it up.

‘You need an iron hand,’ he said, when she asked why he couldn’t be nice like before. ‘I’ve spoilt you.’

Spoilt me! she thought, but in one dark part of her soul she knew what he meant. She needed to be forced beyond her limits, to do what she believed she could not. Then she would be - what? Something untouchable, she thought. Something hard and pure and perfect.

Something lost, Tommy would have said, but Tommy wasn’t here. Tommy was back in Washington, doing his job, living his life.

Footsteps approached, the sort made by thin-soled Italian shoes. They rounded the corner of the colonnade, crunching lightly where sandy soil had blown across the marble paving. She leapt to her feet. Sterling was back. Her heart thumped in her throat. The footfalls stopped and she strained against the chains. She could not see him clearly. He was a shadow between two pale columns.

‘Audrey?’ he said, half questioning, half stern.

She dropped to her knees and lowered her head. ‘Yes, sir.’

He walked to her with slow, deliberate strides. The dove grey linen of his trousers, barely rumpled, broke perfectly over his expensive shoes. Even his feet were elegant, their long, narrow shape hugged by the butter-soft leather. She trembled, willing him to touch her, to treat her kindly just this once.

Instead, he pulled a whip from behind his back. It had three suede tails and a polished mahogany grip, custom made to fit his hand.

‘Have you been good?’ he asked.

‘Yes, sir.’

He lifted her chin on the handle of the whip. She knew better than to raise her eyes, though she wanted badly to see his expression.

‘Has your wait humbled you?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘No impatience? No boredom?’

‘I missed you,’ she dared to say.

This made him frown. ‘I am with you always,’ he said.

She knew what he as getting at. He wanted her to love his cruelty, or at least to pretend. ‘I missed you,’ she said again, plaintive and stubborn.

He tugged her to her feet using the chains. Catching her jaw in his hand, he pulled her close. Their faces were inches apart, and the line of his mouth was white. His breath came quick and shallow. He smelled of coffee and Grand Marnier.

‘I am always with you. Wherever you go, whatever you do, whatever you think, I am the source of it. I will it and it is done in my service.’

Audrey said nothing. To her, his words seemed silly. What wasn’t silly was his anger. It was palpable, a testosterone cloud buzzing in the air, exciting her more than she could explain. She stared at the crotch of his trousers, the cloth forced outward by the fullness of his erection. She wanted him to take her, wanted to destroy him with the violence of her desire.

Maybe he could read her thoughts, that she wasn’t truly afraid. He cursed and slashed his mouth across her own, kissing her hard and wild. She reached to deepen the kiss, to make it more personal. As soon as she did, he shoved her away.

‘You know better than this,’ he said, his voice husky. ‘Turn around and take your punishment.’

‘No,’ she protested, wishing she could mean it a hundred per cent.

‘Turn around,’ he said, a low, dangerous growl.

His voice got to her, and she obeyed in spite of herself, wondering for the hundredth time why a man in charge had to push her buttons. The chains crossed to form an ‘X’ above her head as she flattened her hands on the wall. Perverse, as always, Sterling made her wait.

‘You,’ he said, ‘are a stubborn, wilful girl. My desire should be your only concern. If I wish to leave you here all night, nothing in the world should give you greater pleasure.’

Part of her wanted to laugh, if only to make him mad enough to lose control. Unfortunately, she couldn’t count on him losing control the way she wanted.

‘I do want to please you,’ she admitted, ‘but I can only be who I am.’

He didn’t seem to appreciate this departure from his script - or maybe he did. His breath rushed through his nose, a sound that could have been annoyance or excitement. He stepped back. She heard his jacket rustle as he lifted his arm, then the whoosh of descent. The first blow licked across her buttock. The second made her moan. The third drove her to her knees with arousal. The soft suede tails swished through the air, curling around her body like amorous snakes. A deep, bone-warming hum spread through her being. She began to drift on its swells as if she were stoned. He’d never struck her this energetically before. Surely she shouldn’t like this almost-hurt. Then she wondered if she truly did. Was the pleasure an illusion? Was she finally losing her grip?

‘Stop,’ she said. ‘It’s too much.’

But he didn’t stop until her backside and thighs were suffused with heat. In the soft sub-tropical air, her body seemed to expand and contract, more vapour than solid flesh.

He dropped the whip and fell to his knees behind her. His hands hit the wall next to hers, his fingers kneading the flamingo pink stucco. He did not touch her, but his long, lean body arched close enough to blend his heat with hers. Waves of it beat at her, as if from an open oven door.

‘Touch me,’ she whispered.

He swallowed back a sound, a groan perhaps, or a growl. ‘I say when I touch you, not you.’ But his lips ghosted over her shoulders, gathering up her sweat. The feathery contact trailed down her spine. He pressed his teeth to a throbbing spot. When she jerked in reaction, he shuddered uncontrollably, then laughed. His hand slid up the front of her thigh and burrowed through her sex.

‘So responsive,’ he murmured. ‘You’ll be my masterwork, Audrey, my finest creation. All the others -’ he tweaked her aching bud ‘- were only practice for you.’

She shivered at the self-absorption in his voice. He had dragged her further than she’d dreamt already. What would satisfy his quest for perfection? And where were those ‘others’ now?

I don’t trust him, she thought, and a second later: I don’t trust myself.

She moaned at the revelation. Where was the girl she’d been two months ago, the heedless, vibrant bundle of life? The girl who complained about her job, but was secretly proud to have it? The girl who thought the world was her oyster? How had she lost herself to this? She barely knew Sterling Foster, apart from the fact that he owned a bank and travelled around the world. Since that first night they hadn’t had one ordinary conversation. She didn’t know his favourite colour, much less the measure of his soul. How had she come to kneel for a man she wasn’t even sure she liked?

Tommy would be so ashamed of her.

Recalling her old friend, she had to fight a genuine sob.

‘Hush,’ said Sterling, but at last he had what he craved. His zip rasped down, a soft scream of metal teeth. She felt him fumble to free his cock. His breath rushed against her nape, his crisp, smooth shirt brushing her back. He was trying to pull himself together, to force her to wait. She knew he would fail. A moan caught in his throat, torn from him against his will.

Audrey revelled in her moment of victory.

‘You don’t love me,’ she said, goading him to do his worst. ‘You only love my misery.’

‘You are your misery,’ he said, and thrust into her forcefully.

COPYRIGHT 1999 BY EMMA HOLLY. IT IS ILLEGAL TO REPRODUCE
OR DISTRIBUTE THIS WORK IN ANY MANNER OR MEDIUM
WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR.