A.M. Wyckid's Erotic Word-Forge

There was nothing Jack hated more than waiting. Especially if by waiting, you meant do nothing until someone else fulfilled their part of a task so that you could begin your own. It wasn’t that his partner was slow. What they liked to call Intake Theater— the abduction and transport of a client from the capture point at the Toltec Hotel to Jack’s office here — took time. It was always tempting to call for Fae or Kyo to help him with the waiting, but it would not do for him to be playing when the client arrived. She — he glanced at the dossier on his desk — Jennifer Barnet, ^[1] had paid to be the center of his attention, and so she would be. It’s not that he hadn’t been through her dossier line-by-line and word-by-word enough times that he should remember her name. It was more that her name wasn’t really among the important details in the document. Her desires were the critical elements, but those were never laid out as clearly as he would like. To get to that took a good deal of reading between the lines. Abduction, slavery, and slave-girl on slave-girl contact; that much was clear. This was to be another in a long series of abductions, and those always made him think fondly about his first time …

Bliss Carpenter was not the prettiest girl in school, but she was the most interesting. Jack had known her for years, met her on his first day at GWHS, and they’d been friends ever since. They had dated off and on, but never seriously. Nevertheless, a bond had grown between them. A bond of trust formed by several years of membership in a mutual support society of two — new loves, lost loves, accomplishments, and failures — all shared in depth and in confidence. It was as healthy a friendship as could exist between two people making the transition from teenagers to young adults during the mid-1970’s.

Jack always sensed that Bliss was holding out on him, though. “There’s something you aren’t telling me,” he asserted more than once.

“A girl has to have some secrets,” was her typical reply.

And so it went until late Spring of 74, with graduation looming on the horizon and the specter of Vietnam fading into a grim past. Jack had performed his mandatory duty of registration with Selective Service, a chore that gave every young man a small taste of his mortality. College applications had long been sent, acceptance letters received, and plans for the fall set on their immutable courses. She was going to Boston University Pre-law, and he to Akkadia University’s Electrical Engineering program.

She looks nervous, Jack thought when Bliss approached him that day on the quad after school. I wonder what gives?

She hugged him as usual, then stood back looking up at him with her blue eyes. He saw a change there, a decision that had not been made, or that had been almost made, became a decision now locked and sealed in stone. A point of no return had been reached and surpassed. She pulled a small brown-paper-wrapped paperback-book-sized package from her backpack and slipped it into his. “Don’t open this until you’re alone and have time to look it over. At bed-time tonight, maybe? After you’ve had time to read it, we’ll talk.”

“I’m not walking you home, then?” he asked.

“Not today, Jack. I …” She looked away down at her feet. Clearly she was paying the cost for a hard decision made. Something to do with the book in his pack, no doubt. “I …” she repeated. Then she steadied herself, and said calmly, “My dad is picking me up today. Things to do.”

“I’ll call you …” he began.

“No, Jack. Read it first. Read it all, before you call.”

All the way home, Jack couldn’t stop thinking about the book in his pack. It felt dangerous, like a live grenade with a twitchy pin, or a brick of hashish or maybe heroin. More than once he stopped, planning to pull it out and tear the wrappings. Just to see the title, he told himself, but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to stop at that and made himself walk faster.

He let himself into the house. He had thirty minutes before sister-Jenny would get home from school, and several hours before Mom would get home from work. He took the stairs to his room three at a time, dropped his pack on the bed, and pulled out the book. He stopped himself from ripping off the wrapping and, instead, carefully peeled away the clear tape that held it closed. He’d seen other books wrapped in brown paper; pornographic magazines with women showing everything. Exciting in a way, but mostly boring. Except … sometimes the stories wrapped around the nude pictures were worth reading. Not from a literary stand-point, but the content of the stories — S&M, bondage, and even rape — made him so hot that he doubted his sanity. Still, he’d never seen a pornographic paperback of what felt like two hundred pages before. Finally, he spread the wrapping open. Embossed on the plain white cover was the simple three word title:

   Story of O [2]

Jack opened to the first page and, a short way down, this captured his attention:

“Your bag’s in your way; let me have it.”

She gives it to him. He puts it out of her reach and adds:

“You also have on too many clothes. Unfasten your stockings and roll them down to above your knees. Here are some garters.”

By now the taxi has picked up speed, and she has some trouble managing it; she’s also afraid the driver may turn around. Finally, though, the stockings are rolled down, and she’s embarrassed to feel her legs naked and free beneath her silk slip. Besides, the loose garter-belt suspenders are slipping back and forth.

“Unfasten your garter belt,” he says, “and take off your panties.”

And that’s the first page! He bent the book, let his thumb release the pages one at a time, and watched as the pages of black text on white paper flew by. It’s all text, no pictures, he thought excitedly. I could probably read this right in front of Mom and Jenny and no one would be the wiser, he thought. Unless.… Mom knew about it. He was always surprised just how much his mother knew about things that she shouldn’t know. On a sudden inspiration he took his copy of Glory Road^[3] from the book shelf. It was so well thumbed that the pages had been falling out, and he easily dislodged the cover from the remaining leaves. When he slipped the cover around Story of O, it fit perfectly. Just a little Scotch tape made the disguise seamless, and he settled back on the bed to read with a pillow propped on his lap to cover any unsightly arousal.

“Hi-Jack,” Jenny said from the doorway with an annoying little laugh at her own double entendre. Jack had been engrossed and hadn’t heard her approach. He’d only been reading for thirty minutes, but he had about a third of the book in his left hand. The type and margins were large, so while the book had two-hundred pages, it was really less than half the length of the SciFi novels he usually read.

“Wow, Jenny. Did you make that up all by yourself?” Jack sighs and reaches out to swing the door shut in her face. The house rule was that people with closed doors are to be left in peace, so Jenny had no choice but to change tactics. A few minutes later the tortured guitar strains of Stairway To Heaven^[4] infiltrated through the thin walls. Jack pounded the wall between their rooms until his sister turned the volume down. Unnecessary, as he was so engrossed that, for once, the song wouldn’t bother him, but necessary in the sense that to not do so would look suspicious.

An hour later, Jack finished the book. Bliss had made margin notations in a number of places, and he was about to go back and look at them more carefully when he noticed a small slip of paper taped to the back cover of the book:

Dearest Jack,

It was difficult to get myself to reveal my dark desires to you, but now that I’ve decided to, I feel that you will be able to understand and help me to live them before we must go our separate ways. The Story of O doesn’t fit what I want exactly. I think O is a silly little twit to let her lover use her like that and pass her around to other men. Still the notion of being taken, bound, forced, whipped (spanked?), and so on, appeals to me in a way that I can’t shake. I’m sure that I don’t want to. You have always been an excellent friend. Please, make this happen for me. I think I can safely say that you will enjoy it too.

Yours always,
Bliss

At the bottom of the page she’d added a list of measurements:

• neck—12½″
• wrist—6¾″
• ankle—8¼″

Just below that was the notation,

I’m on the pill.

Jack had to re-read the note several times before he could convince himself that a) he really did understand what Bliss was asking him to do, and b) that she wasn’t pulling his leg in some monumental fashion. Obviously, she provided her measurements expecting that he could find or make her a collar and bracelets like in the story:

… Both collar and bracelets were made of several layers of leather (each layer being fairly thin, so that the total was no more than the thickness of a finger). They had clasps, which functioned automatically like a padlock when it closes, and they could be opened only by means of a small key. Embedded in the layers of leather, directly opposite the lock, was a snugly fitting metal ring, which allowed one to get a grip on the bracelet, if one wanted to attach it, for both collar and bracelets fit the arms and neck so snugly — although not so tight as to be the least painful — that it was impossible to slip any bond inside.

Since she’d provided her ankle measurements, she also wanted the ankle bracelets as well, like those that appeared later in the story:

… O had not noticed till now that they were all wearing, as at Roissy, a leather collar and leather bracelets on their wrists. They were also wearing similar bracelets around their ankles.

How in the hell am I supposed to manage that? Jack thought, though the idea excited him greatly. And then there was that last little notation, I’m on the pill. That was license for him to have sex with her! There was no doubt about that. He turned back to the beginning of the book and began paging through, paying special attention to Bliss’s notations and the scenes in the book they were attached to. The two, taken together, outlined her desires.

“Bliss speaking.”

“Hey, this is Jack.”

The line was silent for a moment and then, “You read it? All of it?”

“It’s a gripping story and your notes make it even more so. Are you serious about this?”

“You think I’m a freak?” Bliss whispered into the receiver. “Don’t you, Jack?”

“Not at all, Bliss, but I was worried that you were playing an enormous practical joke. You’re not, are you?”

“No. I’m serious. I want you to do this for me, Jack.”

“It’s not going to be much like the book.”

“I understand, and it’s just as well. The book was only a conversation starter. My notes should make clear what I want and don’t want.”

“I think they do. Let me think on it and we’ll talk when you get back.”

“Okay.… And Jack …”

“Hmmm?”

“You’re a great friend.”

“Thanks. Bye for now.”

Twelve weeks, Jack thought. I have twelve weeks to make this happen.

School had just ended, and Bliss would be away for the next eight weeks. It would have to happen sometime in the four weeks after she returned. Week twelve was out of the question since both of them would be busy getting ready to leave for their prospective universities, and week nine would be a poor choice since she’d have just returned from Europe and mum and dad would be trying to reconnect before she left for school, so that narrowed the window even more to a two week period in mid-August.

The problem of the leather collar and bracelets — as they’d called them in the Story of O, but which he preferred to call wrist- and ankle-cuffs — was solved. He’d gone into the Tandy Leather store and browsed until the clerk, a fortyish heavy-set man, had asked him, “What are you looking to make?”

Jack was nothing if he wasn’t a planner so he was prepared with several cover stories. He quickly settled on, “I have a suitcase, but the lock is broken. I was wondering if there was any way I could make some locking straps to secure it for air travel?”

The clerk looked at him with a placid face for a few moments and then cracked a smile. “Sure. You want a hasp, but we don’t sell them. You can pick one up at the hardware store along with a small padlock. I’m Dean, by the way.” He stuck out a meaty palm.

“Jack,” he said and pumped the older man’s hand.

“What you want to do is this,” Dean said. He pulled Jack to the counter and began sketching. Before long the whole thing was planned out, supplies taken from the shelves, and the total tallied. There was a good deal more to it than Jack expected. Aside from the pre-cut leather strap, he needed punches and pop-riveting tools. “You wouldn’t need to, but if you condition the leather before you put it together, it would be softer and last longer.”

Jack held the rather stiff leather strap in his hands. The collar and cuffs in the Story of O had been made from multiple layers of thinner leather sewn together, but he just didn’t have the skill for that. He imagined putting a collar made from the strap around Bliss’s throat. He had to admit that softer would be better. “What would it take?”

That only added a jar of leather conditioner to the pile, a short series of simple steps to the plan, and $5 to the price tag. “What about color?” Dean asked. “You could dye the leather.”

“No,” Jack said, thinking, This could go on forever and my money is not limitless. The goods on the counter represented a lot of mown lawns and other odd-jobs.

“Okay. Natural will look pretty good, too. That will be $28.73 with tax.”

Jack put a twenty and a ten on the counter and put away the change while Dean bagged the purchases and put the folded plan on top. “Thanks,” Jack said as he moved toward the exit.

He was just going out the door, when Dean said from behind him, “Sure thing. Come back and tell me how she liked it.”

The words riveted Jack on the spot. Slowly he turned and looked at Dean’s broad grin. “Seriously,” the older man said. “If you run into any problems, I’d be more than happy to help.”

“Uh.… Okay.… Thanks.”

The rest was easy. He followed Dean’s instructions for softening the leather strap until it was very supple. The process changed the color from a pale skin-tone to a lovely bronze, and he was glad that he’d decided against the dye. He cut the collar and the four cuffs, then riveted on the hasp plates with their U shaped tongues. He took great care positioning the slots in the other ends to conform exactly to Bliss’s measurements, adding a half-inch so they wouldn’t be too snug. Once the two ends were bent into a circle, the slot placed over the tongue, and a small padlock put through the U, that was it. There was no way that was coming off without the key. A chain could be put onto the shackle of the lock before closing it to make a leash or tether that could be secured elsewhere.

The leather restraints turned out to be the least of Jack’s problems. Of the remaining ones, the first was logistical. Where could this production actually take place?

The other problem was in many ways a much more difficult issue. The source of all information in those days was the public library, and that was of no help to him; the word cunnilingus just didn’t appear on any cards in the library’s card catalog. The Story of O was very little help. The book itself could hardly be considered an accurate guide to anything. The language used was flowery and obscure:

This caress, to which she never submitted without a struggle and which always filled her with shame, and from which she escaped as quickly as she could, so quickly in fact that she had scarcely had a chance to be touched, this caress which seemed a sacrilege to her, for she deemed it sacrilege for her lover to be on his knees, feeling that she should be on hers, she suddenly felt that she would not escape from it now, and she saw herself doomed. For she moaned when the alien lips, which were pressing upon the mound of flesh whence the inner corolla emanates, suddenly inflamed her, left her to allow the hot tip of the tongue to inflame her even more; she moaned even more when the lips began again: she felt the hidden point harden and rise, that point caught in a long, sucking bite between teeth and lips, which did not let go, a long soothing bite which made her gasp for breath.

It wasn’t difficult to work out what was being done, and it was easy to tell from Bliss’s notations that this was something she wanted to explore. Jack too was intrigued, but the passage didn’t say nearly enough about the act itself. Cunnilingus was just a word to Jack. One spoken in whispers and with derisive snickers in the locker room. There were all sorts of odd euphemisms for it, canyon yodeling, sip at the fuzzy cup, chew the she-fat, among others. It was something that made a man less of a man in the eyes of most guys. But if a woman could or should go down there, then why not a man?

There was a good deal of anal sex in the book, too, but Bliss’s notations indicated this was not something she wanted to explore. Some of the practices in the book seemed unhygienic and borderline dangerous. Jack was somewhat relieved that he wouldn’t have to deal with that at this point. He had enough to learn as it was. Perhaps it would be something to look forward to in the future?

Finally, there was the issue of whipping. It was clear that Bliss wanted to experience this, but the book was not much help here either:

“As a matter of fact,” the other voice went on, “if you do tie her up from time to time, or whip her just a little, and she begins to like it, that’s no good either. You have to get past the pleasure stage, until you reach the stage of tears.”

Why, Jack wondered. It was clear that Bliss just wanted him to take her to the first stage and he couldn’t see why anyone would want to take, or be taken, past the point where it felt good. Or, at least, where the over-all end result was positive even if it did hurt some on the way. There was some agenda here that he didn’t understand.

It was clear from her notations that Bliss didn’t want to be marked. He took up the leftover bit of leather strap, a piece almost two inches wide and about fifteen inches long. One side was smooth and the other grainy without being at all rough. Experimentally, he slapped the smooth side against his inner thigh rather hard. The first thing he felt was the sting, then almost like an after-thought, he remembered the heavy thud of the impact that had been masked by the sting. As the sting subsided, it left behind a warmth that was rather pleasant. Mom wasn’t much for spanking. Jack couldn’t even remember the last time she’d had to resort to that form of punishment. She was much more adept at what she called a stern talking to. Those hurt a lot more than the strap against his thigh.

He reversed the strap and slapped the grainy side into his leg in the same spot. It only felt marginally different, with less of a sting. He examined the area closely. Other than a suffuse pinkness, there was no marking. Reversing the strap again, he brought it down with all his might several times in a row. Now, that hurts, he thought, but still when he examined the area, there was nothing that looked like it would become a bruise and it certainly wouldn’t break the skin.

The book did describe the tools that were used in some detail:

… They showed her the riding crop, which was long, black, and delicate, made of thin bamboo encased in leather, the kind one sees in the windows of better riding equipment shops; the leather whip, which the first man she had seen had been carrying in his belt, was long and consisted of six lashes knotted at the end. There was a third whip of fairly thin cords, each with several knots at the end: the cords were quite stiff, as though they had been soaked in water, …

It was easy to see how whips like those would leave lasting marks. He’d stick to the strap and his open hand. With the problem of whipping somewhat resolved, and resigning himself to on-the-job-training for learning cunnilingus, Jack set his sights on the problem of where.

There were some abandon buildings where guys took girls to make-out, to mess around, or smoke a joint. That was exactly the problem with such places: people went there. Still it was the only idea he had, so he decided to scout them. In the back of his mind he had the vague idea that he could secure a door with a hasp and a lock or something. A basement would be ideal, if he could find some place that he could clean up enough that it wouldn’t be too gross. He was really scared by the idea of getting caught by some guy or guys with Bliss all helpless. It was hard to predict with certainty what might happen, but it really disturbed him.

On his way to look at the first location, he came up with a solution to this troubling possibility that bothered him almost as much as the problem itself. Mom’s got that .22 pistol in the closet, he thought. The existence of the gun made him realize a new problem that he hadn’t even considered before. He’d never really thought about the actual abduction itself. How do you take a woman off the streets and make her go where you want her to? The gun presented a solution. Just as a prop, Jack thought. It’ll be unloaded, I’ll put it in her side, like in the movies. He tried the lines on for size: Don’t make a sound, lady. Now walk! As to the first problem, the problem of getting caught by persons unknown, he’d keep the bullets in his pocket, just in case.

Two hours later he headed back home in despair. None of the places he looked at combined the privacy, security, isolation, and access that he required. It was in this funk of a mood that he met Naomi.

“You want to buy some pot?” she asked. Jack turned toward the voice and saw the older woman leaning against the brick wall. She was less than average height, and thin. She had thick brown hair that she kept in a fat braid that wound from the nape of her neck, across her shoulder, and down in front. For clothing, she wore jeans cut-off into short-shorts and a green t-shirt with a darker green three-fingered Cannabis leaf embossed across her chest, and sandals on her feet. It took several seconds for his brain to replay and process the question. Several seconds in which the woman had time to process the expression on his face. “Wow. You’ve got troubles. Come on. I live around the corner. I’ll make you a cup of tea and you can tell me all about it. My name is Naomi.”

“I’m Jack,” he said as he fell into step beside her, not at all sure why he was following her.

Naomi was a hippy; what, in the decade previous, when she was Jack’s age, might have been called a flower-child. The sort of person who would stick a daisy down the barrel of a national guardsman’s rifle. Someone who actually believed that love could change the world. She worked as a waitress and dealt pot for supplemental income, but her passion was people. She loved to listen to their stories and could make the most tight-lipped person become down right loquacious. If she’d been a more disciplined person, she could have become a good therapist. Given who she was, bartender would have been a good career choice. She lived in a one-car-garage apartment conversion near the university with a guy named Frogman.

Jack sat at the table and Naomi put the kettle on the non-UL-approved hot-plate that was getting over-ripe enough to start a catastrophic fire. She sat down across the table from him and pushed her John Lennon style round sunglasses up onto her head. “So Jack, tell me what’s stolen your cool today?”

Jack took a long breath in and sighed it out. Am I really going to bare my soul to her? he thought. Then he realized that it couldn’t hurt, he’d probably never see her again, and as long as the cops didn’t kick down the door while he was there, no harm would come of it. “Do you know about the Story of O?”

It turned out that she didn’t, but she listened without any sign of horror as he told her about the book and how it had come into his life. Mid-way through the tale, the kettle whistled and Naomi poured boiling water over tea-bags and set a cup in front of Jack. He sipped and continued. Before he could finish, the door pushed open, and Frogman came in. He was forty-something, short, thin, furry, with a wide grin and big bulging eyes. It was easy to see how he got his nickname.

“Frogman, this is Jack. Jack this is Frog,” Naomi said. “Get a cup and sit. Jack’s telling a tale that you’re going to like, but don’t ask him to start over. I’ll fill in the blanks when he’s done.”

“Cool,” Frog said, slouching into a chair with his cup steaming in front of him. “Little-brother has the floor.”

Jack felt just a little inhibited by the new arrival, but continued on after just a bit of Naomi’s patented persuasion. When he finished, Naomi answered Frog’s questions, then turned to Jack. “So your friend wants you to make her into O?”

“Not exactly,” Jack replied. “She wants parts of it: abduction, the leather, some whipping, but not like in the book, and … um … cunnilingus.”

“Hey, that’s no problem, little brother,” Frog said in a slow drawl. “I’m a pro! What’s her number?”

“Cool it, Frog. This is Jack’s gig,” Naomi said to her room-mate. “I can’t help you with the location ’cause I don’t know anywhere suitable, or with the whipping ’cause I don’t think I’m wired that way, but I can help you with the licking.” A slow grin spread across her face. “Come back tomorrow at two and bring the book, I’d like to read it.”

Jack wasn’t sure if he would come back, but he was very careful to note where the little apartment was as he left for home.

But Jack did go back. Several times. After all, what currently unattached teenage boy could turn down the chance at a unique sexual experience. Naomi turned out to be a good teacher. She stripped off her clothing and lay down on the bed and let Jack touch wherever he liked. Once the novelty of the situation had worn off, she explained the various parts of the female sexual apparatus, clitoris, labia, vagina, g-spot, and so on. Jack wasn’t a virgin, but he’d lost his virginity in an information vacuum, so for Naomi’s purposes he might as well have been one.

“It’s all sensitive, but just for the first inch or two,” she explained. “It’s especially sensitive here,” she pulled back her hood to reveal her clitoris. “But, just because it’s sensitive doesn’t mean you want to attack it like you’re storming the beaches at Normandy. You have to court it; flirt with it. Give it a stroke and then go pay attention to the rest for while before you come back for another visit. As you go on, you spend more time there until you’re there most of the time and paying the rest occasional visits.”

“How long does it take?” Jack asked.

Naomi laughed. “It takes as long as it takes, Jack. Maybe it will seem like a long time to you, maybe not. With your girl, there’s no way to know. If it’s her first time, it could take a long time, but patience is the key. Patience and just the right touch of variety. Oh, and foreplay.”

Jack knew what that was, or, at least, he thought he did, but a lot of the information he’d gleaned from locker-room talk and magazines was crap. “That’s like kissing and touching her breasts, right?” he asked to clarify.

“Yes, and no. That’s part of it, but it’s really about contact and showing her you care. It’s a little different for everyone. If the abduction, the cuffs, and the whipping really turn your girl on, then you’re not going to have a problem, but you really need to learn the basics of foreplay. Come here,” she said and opened her arms to him and the hands-on part of Jack’s education began.

Jack was frustrated when he left after spending more than an hour with Naomi. Frustrated both because he couldn’t get her to come and because she didn’t offer to do anything to help him come either. “Don’t worry, Jack. I’m pretty sure it’s because I have to focus so much on telling you what to do that I can’t relax. Next time, if you remember and think about what I’ve told you, you will probably get me there. Come back next week at the same time, and bring the leather restraints. I’d like to see them.” She opened Story of O to the first page and began reading as Jack closed the door to the little apartment.

“The book is sexist, to say the least,” Naomi said. They were sitting at the table in her tiny apartment. “I’m really glad that you aren’t taking it as your model of making love to a woman.”

“I agree,” Jack said. “It’s exciting, but it just doesn’t feel right to be so … I don’t know, one-sided maybe?”

“Exactly.” Naomi opened the shoe box that contained the collar and cuffs. She took out the collar and held it up, stroking the leather with her fingers. “It’s beautiful, Jack.”

“Here,” he said, taking it from her. He fitted it around her throat and snapped on one of the little padlocks from the box.

“That feels strange,” Naomi said. “I … I don’t quite know what to say.… I think I want it off now.” Jack unlocked it, and Naomi put it back in the box. She took the lid and while trying to put it on the box, she fumbled the box off the table. “Sorry,” she said as she hastily knelt down to retrieve the contents and restore them. Jack looked on. Something odd has just happened, he thought.

He took the box from her and helped her up. Then he hugged her close sliding his hands down her back and sides while he nuzzled her neck and throat. Jack had done a lot of thinking about foreplay. He’d concluded that a man’s seemingly natural tendency to get right to things was something that didn’t really work for women. It was very interesting that if a guy wasn’t sure if a girl would reject a his attempt to go under her blouse or otherwise take it to the next level, he would kiss and stroke instead while trying to get up the courage to try it. So before he knew how the girl would react, he’d do the right thing, and as soon as he knew it was okay, he do the wrong thing. No wonder the relations between men and women seemed so strained, he thought. Now that he had a better idea of what he was doing, he moved with confidence. He turned the older woman around, and pulled her close against him. One arm across her ribs just below her breasts and, with the other hand, he stroked her belly through her t-shirt, while he continued to kiss and nuzzle her neck.

“Mmmmm, that’s nice,” she sighed.

“You feel nice,” Jack said. It was true, but also it was a good expression of caring. He seized the material of her t-shirt and slowly pulled it out of her cut-off jeans, then slipped his hand under and stroked the bare skin of her stomach. Now, he turned her to face him again, bent down bringing his lips close to hers, and kissed her. He pulled the tail of her shirt out of the back of her cut-offs and slid both hands up her back. She misread his intent and raised her arms to help him remove her shirt. He had not intended to do that yet. Fine, he thought. That works for me. He pulled it off over her head and resumed kissing her.

A short while later he scooped her up and deposited her on the bed. He lifted one of her legs at the knee and then took her foot. He slipped off her sandal, then bent down and planted a light kiss on the top of her foot. Slowly, he worked his way up her leg kissing as he went and moved across the knee and toward the inner thigh. Naomi brought her hands to his head and stroked his hair.

Jack unbuttoned her shorts and took them and her panties down over her hips. As he slipped them off her legs, he took her other sandal as well. Now he knelt on the bed and kissed her on the lips, then the throat. Slowly, he worked his way down, spending some time kissing her small breasts and sucking her nipples. Then he kissed his way across her stomach and some way down her inner thigh before coming up to her center. He licked slowly and deliberately up the crease, spreading the lips, but it was just a promise of what would come later. It was too early for that, yet.

“Oh my god, Jack! That was incredible,” she said twenty minutes later. “I’m not sure if I’m just a good teacher, or if you are great student, but that was well done.”

“Thanks,” Jack said. It had been wonderful. Before, sex had always seemed awkward and desperate. This had been something else; playful, conscious, passionate, and like nothing he’d experienced before. Her orgasm has scared him at first. Nothing he’d read could have prepared him for her sudden increase in muscle tension, the prolonged growl that bordered on a howl, and the seizure-like shaking that followed. It was the first real orgasm he’d produced in a woman and it had felt great.

“Now, take your clothes off. I’m going to blow your mind!” she said, and then she did.

Before he left her, Naomi asked for his phone number. He had mixed feelings about giving it to her, but he couldn’t see how he could refuse.

A week later, Jenny knocked at his door and pushed it open. “There’s a woman on the phone for you Jack,” she said. “I think she’s the same one that called a couple of days ago when you were out, and maybe the day before that, too, but she didn’t want to leave a message.”

Jack went down to the kitchen, pulled the receiver across the counter by it’s long coiled cord, and held it to his ear. “This is Jack,” he said.

“I need to see you,” said the woman on the other end of the line.

He was puzzled because he had no idea who he was talking to. “Um … who is this?”

“Naomi. Sorry, I should have said. When can you come and see me?”

“Today. If that works for you.”

“Sure. And Jack,” she said.

“Yes?”

“Bring the box.”

Bring the box? Jack mused. I wonder why she wants me to do that? The question plagued him all the way to her apartment. Her reaction when she’d worn the collar had been strange. In retrospect, Jack concluded that he’d seen fear on her face. Of what, he was not sure.

At his knock, the door opened a crack and he could see a narrow strip of her face. “Jack,” she said in greeting, then opened the door wider while remaining behind it. He slipped inside and she shut it behind her.

His eyes adjusted to the dim light and he became aware that Naomi was naked. She stood with her back to the door, arms down to her sides, palms pressing into the door jambs. She looked scared. Jack, dropped his pack on the table and went to her. He took her by the shoulders and pulled her away from the door and into his arms. “What’s the matter, Naomi?”

“I’m … ah … I’m obsessed, Jack,” she said with difficulty.

The natural question would have been, With what?, but Jack didn’t ask it. He didn’t need to ask. He knew the answer to that question. He guided her back to the table and took the box out of his pack. One by one, he handed her the cuffs and told her where to put them, ankle, ankle, wrist, wrist. As each piece went on, he locked it in place, adding a length of chain to each. She stood with the weight of the chains pulling down on her arms trembling with excitement. Jack locked the wrist chains together leaving about a foot between her wrists, then took the collar from the box. “Kneel,” he said. Naomi dropped to her knees and he wrapped the collar around her throat and added yet another length of chain secured by a lock.

There wasn’t much left in the box; a handful of padlocks, a couple of short pieces of chain, and the strap. “What’s that for?” she asked, gesturing to it with her chin. Jack took the strap from the box, then stood and pulled her to the center of the room by her leash, and tugged down on the lead. She dropped to her knees once more. Jack pushed down on her head, and she assumed a position on all-fours. He stood at her side and placed his foot across the chain between her wrists and, his other foot, he placed on the chains between her ankles. Thus she was fixed, helplessly, in place.

“I feel like a slave,” Naomi began. “I’m your O, at least for a while. Don’t be afraid, Jack. You can do anything to me.”

He raised the strap and brought it down on her ass with a loud Crack!

“Yes!” she cried.

Later, with needs satisfied, they lay on the bed in each other’s arms. “Tell me about the plan, Jack,” she said. “I want to help, if I can.”

The problem of where continued to vex Jack as the weeks of summer slipped by. Naomi had offered the use of her place, but that felt wrong to Jack. The neighborhood was crime ridden and dangerous after dark. Then there was the matter of her being a drug dealer. The possibility of being there with Bliss when the police decided to raid the place was not a risk he wanted to take. Still, he held it as a last resort. Then, suddenly, just as Bliss was about to return, the problem evaporated like it had never existed.

“We’re going to visit Gram in Wisconsin in a couple of weeks,” his mother told him one day. “We’ll be there for a week. Are you going to be too busy to come with us?”

His mother seemed to have noticed that he was preoccupied. He was often away from the house and didn’t seem to want to talk about it. She knew something was going on, but he was an adult now and she didn’t pry. Her piercing gaze was almost enough to make him blush, but he controlled that impulse. “I think I will be too busy,” he replied. “How are you guys getting there?”

“We’ll be flying. I’ll need you to take us to the airport, then you can keep the car.”

I have the house, and the car, he thought after she’d left his room. “The universe must love me or something,” he said aloud to himself.

“It has to be this week,” Jack said. “You haven’t changed your mind, have you, Bliss?” Jack was going to be very disappointed if she had, but meeting Naomi and all that he’d learned from her about himself — his desires and proclivities — was worth the effort even so.

“No,” she said, “but I’m very nervous about it.”

“Don’t be. I think I can safely guarantee that this is going to be something incredible that you’ll never want to forget. Ever. All I need you to do is pick the day and arrange to be gone for one night without anybody thinking you’re missing.”

“Hmmm. That’s easy. Annette has been trying to get me to go with her and some other girls to spend a few days in Akkadia before school starts. I’ll take the bus back a day early. We’re supposed to leave tomorrow, so that will mean Tuesday night. Does that work for you?”

“Yes. Now for some details. Consider what you wear that night. It won’t survive the encounter.”

“Shoes, too?”

“No. They’ll be fine, but the rest most likely won’t.”

“If it’s going to be what you say, then I won’t mind loosing a dress and some underwear over it. What else?”

“Tuesday night, go to the Rose Cafe. Have a cup of coffee and sit where you can see the clock. Exit the cafe at nine p.m. sharp …”

There is little difference between extremely excited and terribly nervous, Jack thought. He was standing reading a newspaper just up the street from the cafe where Bliss was finishing up her coffee. In a few minutes, she would exit the cafe, turn right and begin to walk away from him. He would walk up behind her and their erotic psychodrama would begin.

A blond woman exited the cafe. Jack jumped, startled, and then began walking toward her. He glanced at his watch. Two minutes early, he thought. She stopped, fished in her purse and came out with a pack of cigarettes. It’s not her! Jack realized. What now?

He came right up to her, “Excuse me, miss, do you have the time? I think my watch maybe be wrong.” His voice didn’t convey any of the jitters he felt inside.

“No, sorry,” she said to him. “Have you got a light?” She’d continued to dig in her purse and evidently couldn’t find her lighter.

“Sorry. I don’t smoke.”

“Smart. Keep it that way,” she said and reentered the cafe.

Jack took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he walked back toward his post. He glanced at his watch again and at the same time heard the cafe door open behind him. It’s time, he thought. It’s her. He stopped walking; looking down studying his watch, all to give her time to begin walking away. Once her heels began clicking on the pavement, he turned to follow. The dress she wore was short, black, and stylish — very sexy. He appreciated that she’d worn something nice even though it was going to get shredded. He also appreciated that extra little sway she put into her hips as she walked. It said clearly that everything was a go, and yet, there was a little flutter in her hand at her side that spoke of nervousness.

The car was parked just ahead in the dark region between the bright pools cast by adjacent street lights. He narrowed the distance and came up beside her; the gun in his left hand but concealed inside the front of his jacket. His free arm came around her shoulder as the pistol poked into her side. She jumped as he touched her. “It’s a gun,” he whispered into her ear. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“No.” It was a simple statement, but full of possibilities. No, I won’t do anything stupid. Or, No, this can’t be happening. Or even, No, don’t hurt me. Probably, all of the above. Whatever it said, Jack could feel her trembling.

He steered her toward the car. “Open it,” he said when they reached the passenger-side back-seat door. She pulled it open, and Jack said, “Get in.” When she did, he followed her and prodded her toward the far side of the car with the pistol while maintaining a grip on her wrist.

“Please,” she whispered. “What do you want from me?”

“Shut up,” he growled as he checked the street to see if they’d drawn any unwanted attention. A man was walking up the street toward the car. He didn’t seem to be in any special hurry, so he was likely just passing by. “Not a sound,” Jack whispered and pushed the gun into her side until she whimpered. The man came up level to the car and stopped. He pulled a lighter from his pocket and the flare of it lit up his face as he applied the flame to the tip of his cigarette. Bliss whimpered again, and Jack realized he was pushing the gun into her side too hard and eased back. Finally, the man was satisfied with his cigarette and moved on down the street.

Jack had practiced the next move over and over with Naomi until he could do it smoothly and quickly, time-after-time. He took one of the leather wrist-cuffs from his pocket, and, one-handed, folded it around her wrist and pushed the slot down over the U-shaped tongue in the other end. The next bit was even trickier and had required even more practice. He fished the end of the chain from the seat by his leg, ran his hand down to the end where the open padlock was held in place by a bit of thread. He hooked the shackle through the U on the cuff and twisted it to line up the hole with the end of the shackle. Even with all the practice, it took several tries before he heard the snick that meant it was locked. He removed the other wrist-cuff from his pocket. “Give me your other hand,” he said.

“No.” Her denial was shaky and uneven.

“Give it!” he said prodding her with the pistol.

“Please!” she said as she surrendered her other wrist. He wrapped it and chained it like the first. Jack grabbed the woman’s hips and pulled her to the center of the seat, put the lap belt around her waist. Then he put the ankle-cuffs on and locked them in place with a short section of chain between. With his prisoner finally secure, he got into the driver’s seat and drove away.

Jack pulled into the driveway and got out of the car. He’d switched the car’s dome-light into the always-off position so that it wouldn’t illuminate his passenger when the car door opened. He slid the garage door up and open, pulled the car in, and then pulled it down behind him. He was quite relieved to be off the streets and safe at home.

The ends of the chains holding her wrists were held in place under the seats with snap bolts. He released first one side, then came around the car and released the other. He collected the free ends of the chains and gave them a tug. “Out,” he ordered, and she got out of the car, standing unsteadily on her chained feet.

“What are you going to do to me?” It was the first thing she’d said in a long while.

He smiled, looking down into her face and said, “Anything I want to.”

“Oh, god,” she sighed.

He laughed, then used the wrist chains to pinion her arms behind her back, each wrist to the opposite elbow. He wrapped the free ends of the chains across her front and locked them together with a padlock. The left over length made a leash-like affair that he used to pull his captive forward. She wasn’t resisting. Realistically speaking, how could she? But it was slow going. The chain between her ankles allowed for only small steps. When they reached the stairs, he hoisted her over his shoulder and carried her up. He didn’t bother to put her back down at the top, and carried her down the hall and into his room.

Exposed beam ceilings were fairly rare, but the fact that Jack’s house had them was a god-send. He’d removed all the furniture from the room, except the bed, which he’d pushed to the far end of the room, side against the wall. He’d wheel it back out when he needed it. For now it sat there looking like some kind of alter, draped as it was in blood-red Velour. That he’d removed the head- and foot-boards from the bed amplified it’s ritualistic aspect. The ‘alter’ was framed by two chains that descended from eye-screws that Jack had set in the ceiling beam mid-way down the room toward the bed. When Bliss saw them, she began trembling visibly. She knew that soon, her body would be crucified between them. Jack pushed her forward until she stood with one chain dangling on either side of her, facing the bed. The liquid lines of the dangling chains were marred by a pair of snap-bolts, one set in each, at head level. Jack stood behind her, and put his arms around her, then pulled her body against his. She could feel his erect cock pressing into the small of her back just below her bound arms. He nuzzled her neck while feeding the key into the padlock that secured the chains across the front of her body. It unsnapped, and he twisted it out of the links. Bliss’s arms came free and dropped to her sides, the ends of her wrist chains puddling at her feet.

“You will reach up with your right hand to the left side chain and take hold of the snap-bolt,” Jack whispered into her ear. Like some kind of automaton, she slowly began to obey. He turned her body to facilitate the maneuver, and when she had it in her hand, he said, again in a whisper, “Lift your left hand and snap the chain onto the cuff.

“No!” she barked her denial.

“You must, Bliss,” he said and nudged her left elbow up toward the waiting hook. It lifted, almost of it’s own accord, and she snapped the bolt in place. Jack took her free wrist and pulled it to the right-side chain and snapped the other bolt onto the cuff. Then he knelt down and removed her shoes. The loss of several inches of height served to increase the mild stretch in her arms, and when Jack unfastened her ankles, spread her legs, and attached each ankle to chains that were bolted into the baseboard at the sides of the room, that stretch was magnified yet again.

He stood behind her once more, his body pressed into hers and his arousal evident, then slowly ran his hands down from each fettered wrist, down the arm, stroking across her breasts lightly and down her body. “Bliss Carpenter,” he whispered in her ear. “Are you mine?” he finished as his hands slid down between her legs grazing her lips through her panties.

“No,” she groaned.

“You will change your tune, eventually,” he asserted. He brought out the collar and held it up where she could see it. Then wrapped it around her throat. After he snapped the little padlock in place, he asked again, “Are you mine?”

“No, never!”

He displayed the strap for her. It was very much like the collar except it had no metal plate with a U shaped tongue and no slot in the other end. He could see that it puzzled her; that she had no idea what it was or what he was going to do with it. When he took it behind her, she tried to follow it with her eyes, and when he wound up and slapped it hard into her ass, she cried, “No, Jack. Don’t.” But he did, again and again. Between slaps he let his hands play over her body, over and under her clothing, and he could feel the fire that he was building there. She cried out on each slap, begging and pleading for him to stop.

And eventually he did stop. He held her once again, as before, and whispered his question, “Are you mine?”

“No,” she groaned, hanging heavily on the chains.

Jack took the folding knife from his pocket. Pulling her dress away from her skin at the nape of her neck, he sliced the fabric down to the hem.

“Oh god, no,” Bliss groaned.

He sliced the dress from the neck to the end of each short-sleeve on both sides and the garment slithered down the front of her body to the floor, leaving her clothed only in her pantyhose and black bra and panties. He pulled her pantyhose down part way, and sliced from hem to hem between her legs so that what was one piece was now two. He sliced down each leg of the hose, then around the ankle just above each ankle-cuff and left her wearing little nylon booties. The bra straps were next, and when he unhooked the back, it dropped to the floor as well. Last were the panties. He made two cuts from the waistband to the bottom edge on the outside of each thigh. The front and back halves flopped down but the ruined briefs didn’t fall. There was just enough friction between her inner thighs to hold them in place. Jack took the front in one hand and the back in the other and pulled upward sharply embedding the fabric deep into her cracks, both fore and aft. He sawed it back and forth slightly, and the fabric parted her lips with a faint squelching sound and slithered into her.

“No, Jack. No,” she groaned as she shook and shivered.

Jack left the briefs wedged in place, but stooped down and retrieved the rest of the shredded clothing from between her legs. He set them aside and came around to the front of her. Her eyes were bright, and she was breathing heavily. On each inhale her chest rose and lifted her breasts with it, only to let them fall on the exhale. He placed a finger on her neck just under her left ear and then slowly, but lightly, scratched his fingernail down her throat, over the leather of the collar, across her clavicle, and down her breast to the nipple. She pulled away as much as her bonds would allow, but he followed her maintaining the pressure. He seized her nipple between his thumb and forefinger and rolled it gently. “Are you mine, Bliss?” She groaned at the contact, but said nothing. No denial, Jack thought. I must be wearing her down.

Jack had constructed a whip of sorts. Nothing so severe as those in Story of O with their knotted cords soaked in water to make them stiff. The handle of his whip was nothing more than a narrow leather strap folded in half to make a wrist thong. Between the ends of the wrist-loop, he riveted the five tails. These were foot-long strips of deer skin; soft as butter and as white as cream. He pulled it from his pocket and before Bliss could get a look at what it was, he lashed her across the breasts, taking one on the forward swing and getting the other on the backhand swing.

“No please … don’t,” Bliss groaned. Jack peeled her panties from between her legs, releasing her intoxicating scent. He reached down, parted her lips, and slipped a finger into the wetness there. Bliss moaned and ground herself down onto his hand. He let her kiss his hand for a moment more, then pulled back and quickly lashed her breasts again, making her cry out. Slowly he moved his hand back toward her lips, but stopped before reaching them. Bliss stretched toward his hand, but Jack moved away, teasing her. “Please, Jack. I need to come.”

“Are you mine, little girl?” he asked.

“Yes, Jack. I’m yours. Now … please!” she whined.

“Yes. You’re mine. So you get to come when I say you get to come and not before. Understand?” Bliss hung shivering on the chains, but didn’t answer. Jack lashed her breasts rapidly going from forehand to backhand in a side-to-side sweeping motion. The sound the girl emitted started as a low squeal that quickly ascended in volume. Abruptly, Jack stopped. “Do … you … understand?”

“Yes,” she said; the resignation thick in her voice.

“I have a surprise for you, Bliss.… Do you want me to give it to you?” he asked.

She considered for a long moment, then “Yes?”

Jack took a clothespin from his pocket. He’d seen them used in the magazines, but when he tried one on Naomi, they found that the pressure was too much for a novice. Jack solved that problem by putting an eye-screw through one side of the pin. By tightening the screw or loosening it, he could control how far the clothespin could close. He reached out and grabbed the girl around the waist and pulled her forward. He held the open jaws in front of her nipple and pulled her closer. “Tell me you want me to do it,” he ordered.

“I … I … want you to do it,” she gasped. Slowly, Jack let the jaws close onto the soft flesh. “Jack, take it off!” she hissed. He turned the screw a full-turn, opening the jaws a bit, and she settled down, still gasping for breath. He took another clothespin from his pocket. “No,” she groaned.

“Yes,” he purred, and put it on the other nipple. She yelped and he adjusted the screw. Jack sat down on the bed in front of her, leaned back propped on his elbows and watched her watching him watch her while she squirmed. He let it go on for a few minutes.

“Please,” she whimpered.

“Please, what?”

“Jack, I … I need …”

He stood up and detached the snap bolt from the chains on her ankles, but left them attached to the ankle-cuffs themselves. He helped her get her legs closed. Then he unhooked her right hand from the chain. He hugged her from behind, held the clothespin where it gripped her nipple in one hand and, with the other, he guided her fingers to the screw. “Give that a full turn to the left,” he whispered in her ear.

“No, please, Jack. Don’t make me.” she groaned.

“Do it, Bliss.” Slowly, she did so, loosing a moan as the jaws tightened on her flesh. “Now the other,” he said, guiding her fingers to the clamp. After, he released her other wrist. The heavy chains, still attached the her wrist-cuffs, dragged her arms down, but the pressure of the pins on her nipples made her want to lift her hands to her breasts to sooth them. The two impulses warred within her while he watched her shake. “One more turn, Bliss. On your own this time.”

“No, I can’t.”

“You can and you will, Bliss.” Slowly her hands moved to first one and then the other clamp. The screws were fully withdrawn now, and she was feeling the full bite of the clothespins which left her gasping. Jack took one of her wrists and applied the key to the padlock. He removed the long piece of chain that he’d used in the car and replaced it with the short section he’d used between her ankles. He removed the long chain from her other wrist and slotted the other end of the short chain onto the lock before snapping it closed. Now her wrists were secured behind her back.

Jack pulled the bed from the wall and turned it so that the short edge was at her knees and positioned between the chains. He turned her around and sat her on the foot of the bed. She looked up at him, pleading silently for release. He took one of the clothespins and gave it a tug and she groaned. She had her legs tightly closed and was rubbing them together seeking to resolve the fire burning between her thighs. He pushed her down onto her back, seized the snap bolt on one of her ankles, and lifted her leg straight up. He snapped it onto the hanging chain and then repeated the same with the other leg. He pulled the bed forward a short distance so that her legs were pulled toward her head and held wide by the chains before locking the wheels. “Do you remember what Anne-Marie did to O when she had her in this position?” Jack asked as he took the deer-skin whip from his pocket.

She looked puzzled as she searched her memory and then a look of horror spread across her face as she recalled the scene. “No, Jack. Absolutely not!” Her notations in the book at this point made it clear that this was not somewhere she was prepared to go.

“Are you sure, Bliss?” he said, dragging the soft tails across her lips sendimg a tremor through her body. “If you’re mine, then I’ll whip you and make you come. If not, then you can get dressed and I’ll take you home. It’s your choice.”

“Jack you have to … to … finish …, but …”

“Beg me to do it,” he said, continuing to stroke the tails across the hot flesh between her legs.

“Please, Jack. Anything else.”

“It’s this, or it’s nothing. Beg for it.”

Bliss continued to refuse, but Jack was adamant. Finally she said, “Whip my cunt, Jack. I’m begging you to!” He was shocked at the language and hesitated for a moment, but only a moment, before bringing the whip down on her sex with full force. Bliss screamed, more from the anticipated agony rather than the actual pain itself. Jack struck again eliciting another lesser cry. Then he dropped to his knees and ran his tongue from the bottom of her opening to the top. He circled his tongue around her clitoris without touching it, and now it was a cry of utter pleasure that he pulled from her body. He reached up and gave the pins a tug, and now there was pain mixed in with the pleasure in her cries. “Oh, Jack … oh, Jack … oh, Jack …,” she began repeating between the gasps and cries. He alternated whipping with licking and tugs on the clamps. He’d been prepared to continue for a long while, but it seemed like only a few minutes before Bliss seized, lifting herself off the mattress by her legs and clamping her thighs on the sides of Jack’s head with a cry that was half scream and half growl. As it began to subside, Jack reached up and quickly removed the clamp from one nipple. The lancing pain of the returning blood flow kicked Bliss over the edge again and she lifted and squeezed his head once more. Finally, the spasm subsided again, but Jack still had one more clamp to go, and that loosed another torrent of pain and pleasure before she lay on the bed completely spent.

Jack unhooked her ankles from the chains, then attached them together with one of the snap-bolts. He turned her on her side on the bed in a fetal position, then stripped off his own clothes and sat beside her stroking her hair. Soon she began to revive. He rolled her off the bed onto the carpet on her knees. Her arms were still fastened behind her back. He grabbed the back of her head in one hand and his aching cock in the other. “Now, it’s my turn,” he said as he steered her lips toward his member.

“Jack, I don’t know how …”

“Don’t make me teach you how with the strap, Bliss. Now, open.”

The knock at the door shattered Jack’s reverie. “Come in,” Jack said, and the door opened. “Hello, David.”

His associate entered the office, pushing the client in before him. She had a long coat over her shoulders, belted about the waist, with a hood that was pulled down over her face.

“Hello, Jack. I think you’re going to be pleased.”

“Let’s see what you’ve got for me.”