House Rules (26 page)

Hannelore touched Gretchen with her hand, rubbing her labia and passing inside her cunt. She took her time, observing Gretchen’s reaction to the intimate touch. ‘She’s wet,’ Hannelore said, as she withdrew her fingers and wiped them on Gretchen’s thigh.

The young woman moaned softly. ‘Please, go on. I am ready.’

‘Should I go on?’ Hannelore asked Richard. ‘It is such fun to make her wait. When she is really desperate, she will beg me to strike her, punish her, do anything to her. Would you like to see that?’

The question was purely rhetorical. Hannelore could clearly see the lump Richard’s cock made as it strained against the tape and the constricting corselet. She moved closer to him and touched him with the whip. Richard gave a surprised grunt and jerked his hips at the touch.

Hannelore smiled mockingly at him. ‘It looks as if you are excited too. It will be great fun having the two of you straining at the lead.’ She turned back to Gretchen, leaving Richard to his own devices.

Two of those devices, he could see, were working well enough. The red lights on the two security cameras were lit, and they were steadily recording everything in the room. He hoped that Hannelore Bern would be too busy to notice them. If his own excitement was any indication, things should be all right.

Hannelore stroked Gretchen’s quivering thighs with the crop, pausing every now and then to give her a light smack, teasing her with a foretaste of what was to come. Gretchen’s head hung down between her outstretched arms. She was breathing heavily now, great shuddery breaths. Her eyes were tightly closed, and she was apparently concentrating all her attention on the whip drawing lazy patterns on her body. The saddle strap was pulled tightly into her crotch by her posture, and she was thrusting slowly and steadily with her hips against it. Richard knew she was rubbing her clitoris against the strap, and he wondered what that must feel like. Obviously Gretchen found it exciting. She was moaning softly as she moved.

Abruptly, Hannelore raised the crop and brought it down on her bottom with a sharp crack. Gretchen cried out, more from surprise than pain. She jumped forward, then resumed her pose as Hannelore let the whip trail lazily down the backs of her thighs and over the red weal across her bottom. Another sharp crack, another surprised yip from Gretchen. This time the crop landed across her thighs, just below her arse cheeks. Hannelore resumed the teasing. Gretchen’s face was now red as she tried to contain her excitement. She lowered herself towards the desk top, raising her bottom more invitingly to the whip.

‘You can see how our little Gretchen loves the whip. She would do this every day if I allowed her. I have to ration her strictly so that she continues to enjoy it. Neither of us would like it if she became too accustomed to pleasure.’ Hannelore spoke without breaking the rhythm of teasing and lashing Gretchen.

To Richard, this sounded very close to what Gretchen had said about Gertrude. Hannelore Bern’s sadism consisted partly in denying the two women what they wanted. But now Gretchen was getting what she craved.

Her bottom and the backs of her thighs were crisscrossed with bright red stripes. Hannelore was teasing her now only by letting the crop trail over her cunt and arsehole before resuming the lashing of the rest of her exposed rear. She was squirming and thrusting with her bottom and hips, as if seeking the lash. Her moans of pleasure were almost continuous now, broken mainly when the crop struck her, and then resumed when she had regained the breath that had been driven from her by the blow. Her head now rested on her forearms on the desk top, and her bottom was thrust high to offer the best target. Her legs were braced apart and her muscles taut under the satin of her flesh.

Hannelore broke off the whipping long enough to unlock the saddle strap. She unbuckled it and helped Gretchen to shrug out of it. It fell to the floor at her feet, and her cunt and arsehole were now fully exposed. Hannelore used the handle of the crop to tease her arsehole open. Then she pushed it inside, so that the whip stood up like the tail of a cartoon dog. Gretchen rolled her hips as it went in, and then her eyes opened in surprise as her orgasm took her. She gasped and moaned, shuddering as the waves of pleasure swept through her.

Richard remembered how Helena had responded to pain, and thought he knew how Gretchen must now be feeling as she bucked and heaved.

Hannelore grasped the whip protruding from Gretchen’s arsehole and began to move it in and out. The pink hole stretched outward and inward as it was pulled out and then thrust back in. Richard, and the cameras, watched as Gretchen cried out and came, heaving herself backward and forward in time with the movement of the plug inside her. Bent over as she was, her cunt lips were fully exposed. Her pubic hair was damp with her sweat and with her juices. The smell of her musk was strong in the room. She looked as if she would never stop coming. Hannelore reached between her outspread thighs and rubbed Gretchen’s clitoris with her free hand. The young woman cried out again as another orgasm swept through her. She thrust wildly with her hips and rubbed herself hard against Hannelore’s finger.

Suddenly Hannelore plucked the whip out.

Gretchen shrieked, ‘No, please, leave it in!’

Hannelore instead brought the whip up between her legs, striking her squarely on her exposed clitoris. Gretchen screamed, in ecstasy as far as Richard could tell, and presented her cunt again to the whip. It struck her again and again, on the insides of the thighs, on her arsehole, on her cunt, until Gretchen was once more screaming with pleasure and gasping for breath. She was covered with her own sweat and her body was shaking, but she was oblivious to everything except the eruptions in her belly and between her straining thighs. The whip rose and fell and the young woman cried out for what seemed an eternity.

Richard watched, his cock stiff with excitement. He would have gladly buried it in Gretchen’s abused cunt – or her arsehole – if they had been alone, and if his hands had been free. As it was, he knew that Hannelore would object. At least. And he wanted to stay out of camera range while she had the stage all to herself. It would be easier for him if he were not on tape.

When it was all over, Gretchen was quivering from her climaxes. Hannelore was glowing pleasantly, a thin sheen of sweat covering her face and neck. She was panting gently, her breasts rising and falling in time. Even though she was still wearing her jacket, Richard could see that her nipples were taut. He suspected that, if he could put his hand on her cunt, it would be wet. For a moment he regretted that he couldn’t. It would be interesting to see how Hannelore Bern would react when faced with a stiff cock.

Hannelore laid the crop on the desk and told Gretchen to go to the bathroom and clean herself up. Turning to Richard, she asked, ‘Did you enjoy that?’

‘Not as much as Gretchen did,’ he replied.

‘Yes, she really enjoys the whip. Do you?’

‘Not particularly,’ Richard replied. ‘It’s all right when used as an occasional variation.’

‘Well, maybe you will change your mind while you are with me.’

Richard said nothing. He hoped again that no one would notice the cameras in operation. Gretchen came back looking more composed and began putting her clothes on. While she did so, Hannelore removed Richard’s handcuffs. When Gretchen was dressed again, she ordered them back to work. Gretchen was sent out to collect some letters that needed signing.

To his relief, Richard was ordered back to the file room. He quickly shut down the cameras and removed the tape cassettes from them. These he hid in his handbag, inserting fresh blank tapes and removing all traces of the recording which, he hoped, would be the means of getting free of Hannelore Bern. Nothing else interrupted the afternoon routine, and they were driven back to Hannelore’s estate at the end of the day.

Gertrude, still wearing her leg-irons, met them at the door. She wanted to know what time Madame would like her dinner. Hannelore gave her the key and told her to remove her leg-irons and Richard’s. After he was locked in his room, Hannelore said, she would be required at the main house. She smiled languorously at Gertrude, so that it was clear what she would be required for.

Gretchen had had her pleasure at the bank that afternoon. Gertrude was looking forward to hers this evening. Only Richard would be left out, it seemed. But he had to view the tapes and make plans for their use. That would be best done undisturbed. Therefore he went to his room without protest. He undressed and took a shower before sitting down with the video tapes.

The cameras had caught most of the action. Gretchen was in almost all of the footage, but was not identifiable because her face was hidden by her posture. Hannelore’s face was readily identifiable, and there was no mistaking her excitement as she plied the whip. Richard imagined she would lose a great deal of credibility and face if these images were to be seen by any of the men of high finance in the city’s banks. The trick now would be to devise a way of letting her know what leverage he had.

Clearly it would do no good to use the tapes while he was at the country estate. He had no allies there. Hannelore would simply order the security guards to confiscate them. And what she did thereafter would be most unpleasant. Richard imagined that anyone who seriously tried to cross her will or who threatened to make real trouble would be in for a very bad time. Such a person might even be in line for something permanent in the way of silencing. He did not really know Hannelore well, but she had to have a certain ruthlessness to have achieved her present status. So, safety first.

Richard rewound the tapes and stowed them in his handbag. There was no place at the estate where he could safely leave them. They would have to accompany him everywhere.

Sometime during the night, as it were subconsciously, a course of action suggested itself to Richard. The day of action would be partly decided by circumstances, but he had to be alert for the right occasion, ready to flee when the chance came. To that end, he packed his bag and left it in the wardrobe. He would live out of his suitcase for the time being. Then he got dressed for the day, taping his cock as usual and leading the chain on his balls carefully through the holes in the corselet and tights. He was dressed once more in the uniform of a female junior assistant, and was ready to leave when Gertrude unlocked the door and summoned him to breakfast. Today there were no leg-irons. Presumably Hannelore was satisfied that lessons had been learnt.

At the bank, Gretchen was employed as usual, fetching documents from the front office and filing them. Richard was given the task of filing and tidying in Hannelore’s office. He made the coffee when needed, and retired to the file room behind closed doors whenever a client came to call. Hannelore was no more willing for him to see her callers than Margaret had been. Richard began to think that there might be a shady side to the business. The amounts of cash involved were too great to be solely the proceeds of legitimate business. That sort of transaction was usually handled by cheques or electronic transfer. Illicit cash could not be handled that way. But there was nothing he could do about the situation, even if he had had any desire to interfere.

Richard took the opportunity to duplicate the video tapes while he was sequestered in the file room. He hid the duplicates as well as he could among the rest of the cassettes. At the same time, he used the cameras to watch the meetings in Hannelore Bern’s office. It might be useful to know something of what went on in case further persuasion were needed.

Nothing like a good chance presented itself that day. Nor for the next three days, during which Richard worried about letting Helena or Ingrid know what was happening. He knew of no way except by letter, and he did manage to send a short note, of the don’t-worry variety, mixed in with the bank’s correspondence. That was on the Thursday, and on the same day he was overtaken by events and had to make his move, so that the note scarcely had time to carry its message of reassurance to Soltau.

On Thursday morning, Gretchen was ordered to stay at the estate to do the domestic accounts. ‘You will come to the bank after lunch. Call me when you are finished, and I’ll send the car to pick you up,’ Hannelore told her.

So Richard and Hannelore were driven to the city alone. Richard’s plan called for having someone bring his suitcase to the bank. He would need the clothes for travelling. Gretchen would do as she was told. All he had to do was tell Hannelore that he was leaving. And then get away as quickly as possible. He touched the tape cassettes in his handbag as if to reassure himself that they were safe, and began to think of how to break the news to Hannelore Bern.

This time it was Richard who was delegated to gather the morning’s correspondence from the front office and convey it to Hannelore as she sat in her private domain. So, for most of the morning, Richard fetched and carried. Near eleven-thirty, Hannelore left a do-not-disturb order with the secretary and ordered Richard to make fresh coffee. He was then sent to the file room and told to close the door. He guessed that she would soon be meeting an important client.

Herr Jurgen Schmidt arrived at eleven forty-five and was shown into the private office. Richard, in the file room, quietly activated the security cameras and settled down to listen to the conference. Herr Schmidt got right down to business. There was to be a large transfer of cash that very day to Margaret Wagner in Stuttgart. Could she, Madame Bern, have a courier ready within an hour?

Yes, Madame Bern said, she could manage that.

‘Good,’ said Herr Schmidt. ‘I admire the promptness with which you manage the delicate business we are engaged in.’ He placed the attaché case he had brought with him on Hannelore Bern’s desk. ‘Ten million Swiss francs and another five million Deutschmarks,’ he told her.

Hannelore nodded and accepted the keys to the case. Only then did Herr Schmidt accept her offer of coffee, over which they settled the details and exchanged commonplaces about the weather and their families. Herr Schmidt left only thirty minutes after his arrival.