Domination Inc. (6 page)

Joe's reply was cut off by a knock at the office door. ‘Shall I get that?' he asked, aware that they were not expecting visitors.

Laurel nodded. ‘If it's the bailiffs, tell them we haven't got anything worth taking.'

She looked back at the photographs on the desk, but her concentration was broken by the sound of a familiar voice asking, ‘Is this Domination Inc?'

‘Yes, it is,' Joe replied. ‘How can I help you?'

‘Actually, it's your friend I've come to see.' The Irishman strode past Joe, and came to a halt in front of Laurel's desk. He seemed to be relishing the height advantage as he looked down on her, smiling. ‘So you weren't spinning me a line, then.'

‘What are you doing here?' Laurel asked, her throat suddenly dry. She was uncomfortably aware that her nipples were peaking beneath the soft cotton of her bra.

‘You said you could put some work my way, if I was interested. Well, I'm interested.'

He must know he'd caught her off-balance, Laurel thought. She had wanted to be in control of the situation if they had met again, and yet here she was, her quim moistening even as her brain cursed him for his overbearing self-confidence.

‘Can I get you a coffee?' Joe asked.

‘Black, please,' Warren said, ‘and the stronger the better.'

‘I should introduce the two of you,' Laurel said. ‘Warren, this is my business partner, Joe Gallagher. Joe, this is Warren—' She paused. As she had said, that was all she knew about him.

‘Keating,' Warren told her.

As Joe bustled around, busying himself with mugs and coffee powder, Laurel said, ‘So tell me about yourself, Warren. What line of work are you in – if you're in work, that is?'

‘I'm an actor,' Warren replied, ‘and I'm good at what I do, but work's a little precarious at the moment. I get two lines in a soap commercial here, a walk-on part there, but nothing steady. And I thought, well, what you're offering me, it's just another sort of acting, after all. And I like sex, and most of all I like sex where I'm dominant. What I wanted to ask you was what the money was like.'

Which you could have done with a simple phone call, Laurel thought. But no, you had to come here in person and make your presence felt. ‘Well, we negotiate a rate with a client, and you take seventy-five per cent of the fee. Everything's decided up front – no extras. The women who are going to come to us will be in potentially a very vulnerable position: they're taking us on trust, and we are going to do nothing to abuse that trust. It's their scenario, and we have to stick to it.'

‘I don't have a problem with that,' Warren declared, taking the mug of coffee Joe offered him. He drank from it deeply, and signalled his approval with a nod to Joe.

‘And we'll need to do some checks on your background,' Laurel continued. ‘We need to know you haven't got a criminal record, that sort of thing.'

‘I've done nothing wrong in my life,' Warren said, ‘except maybe break a few more hearts than I should.' He grinned, registering Laurel's wince. ‘Ah, come on, Laurel, you want me to be the rogue, don't you?'

‘I just want you not to let the agency down,' Laurel said. She rose to her feet. ‘Would you mind if I had a quick word with Joe, in private?'

‘Sure, I'll just wait outside,' Warren said easily.

When he had left the room, Laurel turned to Joe. ‘What do you think?'

‘You're right. He's full of himself, but he's certainly got charisma. If his background checks out, we can't afford to turn him away. Are you going to break the good news to him, or am I?'

‘I'll do it,' Laurel said, and went to fetch Warren back into the office. With this last piece of the jigsaw in place, she could begin advertising the agency's services with impunity. She only hoped that by the time she was dealing with Warren on a daily basis she would be able to keep under better control the surge of submissive desire his presence seemed guaranteed to inspire in her.

 

 

 

 

 

The card was lying on the mat when Joanna Morrison came in from work, among a litter of flyers for her local curry house and boiler repair specialists, and her personal selection of numbers for the
Readers' Digest
prize draw.

The image caught her eye: a woman, pictured from behind but obviously topless, head bowed and hands cuffed behind her back. Intrigued, she studied the wording on the reverse. ‘Domination Inc. We know what you want.' Underneath the central London phone number, it added, ‘No need too great, no desire too dark.'

Joanna studied the card for a moment, wondering which of her friends might have mocked it up and left it with her post as a prank, then crumpled it up with the rest of the junk mail and threw it in the bin. She poured herself a glass of white wine from the fridge and flicked on the radio. It had been a rough day at work, and a blast of something loud and energetic was what she needed to help her forget the impossible deadline she was struggling to meet. But the combination of music and alcohol failed to work its usual magic; she was still aware of a nagging feeling in the back of her brain, a feeling that somehow, somewhere, she was missing out on something.

She took a sip of her wine, savouring its icy chill. If she was honest, the only thing she was missing right now was sex. It had been eight months since Pete had left her for a temp in his office typing pool; eight long months in which to be bitter about his betrayal, to declare herself defiantly celibate and, finally, to decide that what she needed, more than anything, was a good hard fuck. However, that was proving to be more than a little elusive; she had no desire to get involved in another flirtatious series of dates which would eventually lead to the bedroom, but neither did she want to hunt the singles bars and find nothing better than an instantly forgettable one-night stand. London was not an easy place to find a new lover; single available men who were intelligent, attractive, witty and not gay were incredibly thin on the ground, and they could have their pick of the city's women. Joanna's standards were high, and she was reluctant to lower them simply in an attempt to ease the void between her legs.

In the kitchen, on her way for a refill, she reached into the bin and pulled out the crumpled flyer. ‘No need too great, no desire too dark...' The words were tantalisingly full of promise. Even if it was just a joke, it was still tempting to think that someone out there might be able to reach into her psyche, discover what she really wanted, and provide it for her. No hearts-and-flowers romance, no soppy sentimentality. Just raw, straightforward sex.

Joanna curled up on the settee and glanced at the illustration on the flyer again. In her mind's eye it was she who stood, cuffed and half-naked, waiting to be punished for some unspecified misdemeanour. Absent-mindedly, her fingers moved to touch her breasts, rubbing at her nipples and hardening them. Yes, she was awaiting her master. She could almost see him now: not overly tall, but powerfully-built, his dark hair short and spikily-cut, his eyes a piercing grey that saw into her soul and had no mercy for what they found there. She would keep her head down as he approached her, only raising her eyes on his command, knowing she could not speak without his permission.

Her hands were straying lower now, raising the hem of her short, businesslike checked skirt as she imagined him easing down her knickers, leaving her utterly naked and vulnerable. With her hands restrained, she would have no way of shielding her pussy from his gaze. If he came to inspect her he would find she was already wet, her juices flowing in anticipation of the punishment she was about to receive.

His palm was broad and slightly calloused, and she tensed herself for the feel of it against her soft, unprotected backside. And when she had taken the required number of strokes, he would push her to her knees without ceremony, unzip the fly of his tight black jeans and order her to suck his thick, straining cock.

As she imagined taking that solid length deep into her mouth, Joanna touched her fingers lightly against her clitoris, and came…

 

Joanna waited until the other girls in the office had gone to the sandwich bar across the road for lunch before she picked up the phone. There was no way she could make the call if there was even the slightest chance she would be overheard. She dialled the number with trembling fingers, and waited while it rang at the other end. Half-expecting to be greeted by the laughter of a friend, she was surprised when a soft, educated female voice said, ‘Good afternoon, Domination Inc. This is Laurel. How may I help you?'

‘Well, I saw your leaflet and I... er...' She stopped, unsure of how to continue.

‘And you have a fantasy you'd like us to fulfil.' The woman on the other end of the line sounded as matter-of-fact as if she was taking an order for a takeaway pizza. ‘Why don't you tell me about it?'

Hesitantly at first, Joanna began to outline the thoughts that had crystallised when she had seen the flyer: how she wanted to be taken out of her everyday existence and made to kneel in homage to a cruel but just master. She was not about to tell her that the scenario she had created had been so powerful she had frigged herself stupid over it, but she suspected this Laurel was astute enough to realise that had been the case.

When she had finished, the woman quoted her what seemed a surprisingly reasonable price for providing such a service. Not that money was a problem, Joanna thought, as Laurel took her payment via credit card: eight months of staying in on her own and refusing dates had been considerably cheaper than eight months of going out with Pete, or whoever might have otherwise replaced him.

‘So what happens now?' she asked.

‘We'll collect you, tonight,' Laurel told her.

‘When?' she asked, amazed at the efficiency with which this mysterious outfit seemed to operate, but the woman refused to give her any further details. She simply told Joanna the code word that would be used, and wished her good day, then hung up, leaving her in a state of nervous, excited anticipation. She was still wondering whether she had done the right thing when the girls returned from lunch.

 

It was raining when Joanna left the office that evening, and she turned her coat collar up against the downpour. The city's taxis always seemed to disappear with the onset of unpleasant weather, and she began to make her way towards the nearest tube station. Perhaps the man Laurel had promised to provide was already waiting at the flat for her to arrive. Perhaps her lateness would increase the length of her punishment.

She did not notice the squat, black four-wheel drive as it came to a halt by the side of the road; the first she knew that she had company was a hand grabbing her from behind, and its twin being placed over her eyes.

‘What the…?' she began, and then a voice hissed the code word in her ear, and she knew she was being collected. There was a second man driving, Joanna realised, and the four-wheel drive was pulling away even as she was bundled onto its back seat. Any number of people had been around to witness her apparent abduction, but she knew that no one who had noticed anything would be likely to raise the alarm. It was just as well, she supposed; this was hardly a matter for the police to investigate.

She hoped the man who had hold of her would release his grip, but he clung on to her tightly as they sped through the city streets, still blocking her vision. She was trying to relax, confident that the mysterious Laurel would not have placed her in a potentially dangerous situation, but adrenaline was coursing through her body and she was finding it difficult to stay calm and quiet. The driver seemed to be taking left and right turns entirely at random, and within a couple of minutes she was completely lost and disorientated. A strange prickle of foreboding ran down her spine as she thought of what was to come.

They eventually came to a halt and she was dragged out of the vehicle. Joanna had the briefest glimpse of the façade of what appeared to be a deserted, boarded-up warehouse, and then she was ushered through the door and down a flight of steps. Her captor pushed her into a small, cold, brick-walled room, and locked the door behind him.

For the first time she got a good look at him. Average height and slender, with blond hair falling over one eye. Good-looking, admittedly, in a boyish way, but not the dark fantasy man she had described over the phone at all. She felt a deep pang of disappointment, which was immediately banished by his words.

‘You've got to prepare for him, you know.'

‘How…?' she began.

‘Strip,' he ordered her bluntly, his tone quiet and oddly polite. If he was not the cruel master she had hired, did that mean the driver would be…?

His voice cut into her thoughts, all politeness gone. ‘I told you to strip. And when I tell you to do something, I don't mean do it tomorrow. You're simply earning yourself a couple of extra strokes, you know.'

She felt a sudden, unexpected fluttering in her pussy as he mentioned her impending punishment. Shivering slightly, she shrugged off her coat and looked around for a chair, a hook, anything to hang it from. Finding nothing, she let it drop to the floor. It was swiftly followed by the charcoal-grey, box-cut jacket of her business suit, then she unzipped her smart pencil skirt, which slithered in a heap around her ankles. The blond watched her every movement, his silence indicating that he was not yet happy with her performance. Taking a deep breath, she grasped the top button on her cream blouse and unfastened it, repeating the procedure till the garment gaped open, revealing her heavy breasts in their plain white cotton bra.