Macho Sluts (29 page)

But Chris required an exchange of words between them before the whipping could begin. Roxanne made the necessary responses— she acknowledged that it was she who had offered Chris anything, acknowledged that she had no right to appeal the matter to any other court, acknowledged that it would indeed be very hard to endure and that she had no choice but to endure it. And she asked for and was not granted permission to scream. Both of them knew she would scream anyway. This excuse to prolong the punishment was a formality, a ritual that was of value primarily to Chris, for it allowed her to gather her energy, feed her rage, and finally granted provocation to unleash that rage.

I am not here, Roxanne told herself. This will happen, but it will not happen to me. I am not here for anything to happen to.

Liar
, screamed the first lash of the whip, and she was suddenly unable to be anywhere else but here, bound to this wooden cross, a woman being beaten. The bondage that had seemed excessively confining was now insufficient. She wished there were many more ropes. They would be shelter, protection. It does not matter, she told herself. I am of no consequence, my pain is of no consequence, if I resist it will be the end of me.

The second lash brought a cry of pain from her throat, and the muscles there bore down around the next scream like a woman giving birth and forced the sound into a word. The word was “Yes.” It was the only word that would not stop her heart.

“Jesus,” someone in the pack murmured, “she's really marking her up.”

Roxanne had never been so heavily abused on the insides of her thighs. Her ass and shoulders were much less sensitive, and could consequently take a greater amount of punishment. Chris was deliberately aiming for the softest, most vulnerable part of her body, raising welts and bruises with each stroke of the whip. “Yes!” she screamed again. I consent to this beating, I give in to this beating, please please how long will it go on?

But Chris was already ahead of her.

“I know you've taken more than this, but not a hell of a lot more, was it?” Chris asked. Roxanne groaned assent. “I wish you could see all of this. You're so soft and ripe that all I've got to do is flick you and you turn black and blue. I want to be able to hit you until my arm is tired, until I can't lift it to hit you any more. Can you do that for me? Can you stay here with me? You've gotten me this far. Don't give up on me now. The rest won't be easy, but I'm so close, so close, so fucking close.”

She continued to administer the snapping strokes, but now they had been redefined as something Chris needed that Roxanne could provide. She did not want to deny Chris her climax, and went looking for a second wind. A drowning woman must, she thought, when she knows she is dying, attempt to dive yet deeper into the water, to hide herself, to take in more and more of the alien water that surrounds her. Perhaps she hopes to be able to draw oxygen from the water, if only she takes in enough of it, or become a fish and swim without harm in it. The force that surrounds me is pain, and it is alien to me, and yet I begin to crave more and more of it. I will take more and more of it in until it is part of me and loses its power over me and I cease to exist. But God, it is hard hard so very very hard.

Joy was behind the cross, her hands hooked over its arms, her feet braced on the shelf. “Roxie, you are wastin' time, trying to make it fly away. But you only got this one good life, and it'd be much better if you slowed yourself down. I'm gonna help you now, if you let me, you gonna be able to see that whip come at you like it takes ten minutes to land. And the tip of it is gonna hook you, take you outta your self again, draw you out on the shining path. God walkin' out of your body, Roxie, I mind the silver cord for you. I know who you need right now. That Alex, she is watchin' you with narrow eyes, you circle 'round behind her, girl, and kiss her neck.” Joy saw Alex jump and look over her shoulder. With a puzzled look on her face, she rubbed the nape of her neck.

Normally, a crowd would make this dangerous. But the pack was fascinated by the flogging. No one was going to cross the silver cord that would lead Roxanne back to her body. Joy called softly to the girl's spirit, and it retraced its footsteps, re-entering just as Chris let her arm fall to her side. Sweat had soaked through her leather until it was visibly damp—darker, no longer shiny. Her chest heaved. Anne-Marie looked worried, and went to the bar for some water.

Roxanne took gallons of air in with each sob, air that replenished her flagging energy and cleansed her aching flesh. The pain had not stopped with the fall of the whip. Her flesh had been so marked that it still throbbed, the heartbeat that pushed blood through the tissues causing enough pain to make her gasp and wince. “Please don't go away,” she pleaded with Chris. “Don't leave me here alone. Oh, please, don't abandon me.”

Chris was suddenly standing so close to her that they almost touched. A goddess, nude to the waist, threw a poisoned star at a demon who charged her with a bloody sword. Roxanne reeled from the image until she realized it was only a tattoo on Chris's shoulder. Her very breath fell on Roxanne's cheek; the hand that had wielded the terrible whip was inches from her tender and mottled thigh. “Oh,” Roxanne exhaled wearily, exhausted by the weight of her love, “I wish I could drop down to your feet and rest my head on your boots. You hurt me so much. I love you.”

The handle of the whip came up and caressed her cheek. She accepted the touch without flinching away. All her fear of being whipped had been burned away by what she had endured, and there was no ambivalence left in her, only longing. Chris saw the change, let approval show in her eyes, and drew the touch out into a line that ran down between Roxanne's breasts and found her navel. The handle of the whip continued to descend, seeking something even softer, something that would yield, a cavity, an oasis. Chris held the thick roll of braided leather in the palm of her hand and inserted it gently between Roxanne's thighs, held it against the spread wings of her vulva, held it there, and moved it slightly. Roxanne wanted to cry, she was in such need. Chris fed the whip butt-first into her, and then Roxanne witnessed something incredible and almost blasphemous. Chris went down on her knees. Hot breath moved like a vagina around Roxanne's engorged clitoris. It can't be, she thought, and moved to prevent it, but could not, and then Chris took her with her mouth.

She was held within that darkness and liquid and heat by a slight suction. Chris held her in place with the suction, and moved her lips in a semicircle. The whip also rotated within her. Roxanne realized she was being possessed by an expert. But this was a maîtresse, on her knees, and it was not right! It should not be this way! The service offered her was too much for her to accept, a gift too gracious, abundance she was afraid to receive. She tried to persuade Chris to release her and allow her, Roxanne, to suckle on Chris's cunt.

“No,” Chris said firmly in the cold tone that the mistress uses when she will brook no more nonsense and tolerate no more dissent. “I want this, bitch, so hand if over and disappear. Just get lost, give it up. I don't want anything to do with you, just this, your pussy. Don't interfere. Don't tell me I can't have anything I want right now. You've had it. You've lost and you're nothing. Disappear.”

The touch was so taboo it was irresistible. To allow a dominant to kneel and use her mouth upon her—to grin into her mouth and demand further attention, repetition of the most exacting and gratifying and difficult caresses. It was so sweet, so sweet, thrilling and devastating and impossible to halt.

She was only a heartbeat going miles a minute and a cunt being eaten out, whip-fucked, teased, titillated, praised, drawn out and out and out and out … The orgasm collected at the very tip of her clitoris and gushed from her into Chris's mouth. She could have sworn she ejaculated, spurted cum; could not believe that the pleasure surging from her body did not leave physical evidence behind. Chris wiped her face on Roxanne's well-marked thighs and came slowly back up to her feet. Her face was red, her cheeks glistened. “Still here?” she asked Roxanne. “Did you think we were done?”

“It won't ever be done,” Roxanne sighed. “It won't ever be done. You go away, you forget me, you get bored with me, I lose you, but you find me again and punish me and hurt me and make me scream. I fall in love and it starts all over again. I could not live without you. I am lost without you. Use me in whatever way you please, do whatever you like with me. I am nothing, I am your toy, a thing, a slave.”

“I love you,” Chris said. “Joy, let's take her down.”

The black woman shook her head. “You an' I better do this than you. Why not sit down before you fall down, and drink some of that seltzer Anne-Marie's about to pour over your head?”

Suddenly that was a very good idea. Chris sat heavily on one end of the shelf at the foot of the cross while Joy began the laborious task of undoing her human macramé project. After checking Chris's pulse and patting her on the head, Anne-Marie gave Joy a hand. “This is so much more entertaining than staying home and knitting sweaters,” she said cozily.

Chris had drunk a pint of seltzer and given Roxanne the rest of the bottle before she could be taken down from the cross. Joy and Chris linked arms behind her shoulders and under her knees, and carried her away. The three of them wound up on the same mat that Kay had taken her to. Roxanne sat in Chris's lap, her legs thrown across Joy's thighs. Chris cradled her, hid her face from the light and the future. Some of her welts were bleeding slowly, but her breathing was peaceful and untroubled. “It's a miracle,” Joy said, rubbing her feet. “Look. No holes.”

“This reminds me more of St Sebastian,” Chris said. Roxanne was a satisfying weight. She wanted to hold her until she healed completely and then do it all over again.

Alex stood above them. She was obviously not going to wait that long. Her face was a storm cloud. She squatted and went to pass a hand over Roxanne's flank. Chris tried to deflect her, and Joy hissed. Alex hesitated, then stood and turned her back on them.

Was this the way it was going to end? Tyre and Michael filtered over, their bouncer-instincts warning them that trouble was brewing. There were far too many toys that could become deadly weapons in this room to allow tempers to flare. But it was Anne-Marie who defused the situation, calling from the cross, “Oh, Joyous Day, where shall I stow all this lovely line?” Joy took the hint and slid out from under Roxanne's feet, patted her goodbye, and went to put away her ropes. Her departure seemed to wake Chris up, and she turned Roxanne's face to the light. “We have company,” she told Roxanne tenderly.

Alex made her fists unknot and approached them once again, but this time she did not go to her haunches. She wound her fist in Roxanne's hair and yanked her off the mat and onto all fours. “Get that fucking strap off your neck,” she told her, quietly furious. Roxanne was forced to let most of her upper-body weight hang from her hair while she used both hands to rip Kay's collar off her throat. Kay saved her from the dilemma of what to do with it by plucking it from her fingers. Everyone was trying to be handy and inconspicuous at the same time. The storm finally broke when Alex's palm connected with Roxanne's rump. It was a thunderclap that heralded a downpour of blows.

Chris went white as a sheet and lunged at Alex. But Tyre and Michael had her by the upper arms and jabbered in her face until she sank back down and let them distract her.

“Daddy, you're hurting me!” Roxanne screamed. Chris was furious. Anne-Marie walked in front of her, blocking her view of the spanking.

“That's right. Glad you're finally back from vacation. Seems like you give your heart away to anybody who blisters your hide. So I thought I'd better remind you that you are not a free agent.”

“I think we ought to play some music that appeals to you for a change, dear,” Anne-Marie said loudly to Joyous Day. She also came to stand between Alex and Chris, and Alex moved away to give them some room.

“I don't think Brian Eno would contribute t' the light and frivolous atmosphere of this party outta bounds,” Joy frowned. “EZ, you are slackin' off on your professional obligations. Go an' get us some help from the gods of rock ‘n' roll.”

New music freshened the atmosphere. “She don't belong to you, man,” Michael told Chris. “It was a loan. Don't be uncool.”

“Alex is not unreasonable,” Tyre chimed in. “I am sure you will get another chance to whale away on Roxanne if you don't blow it now.”

“Okay, okay,” Chris told them. Her teeth were chattering. “I think I need a jacket or something.” Kay heard her, and brought a blanket from behind the bar.

“Rather be shipwrecked here than on a desert island,” she said cheerfully. “This place has got everything. You like sugar in your coffee, Chris?”

“No—just milk.”

“Okay, I'm gonna bring you some. No wonder you got the shakes with a belly full of cold seltzer. Some nurse you are, Anne-Marie, putting your patient in shock.”

“Oh, dear, I meant to be helpful.” The kind face became terribly distressed.

Chris forgot her own confusion and grabbed Anne-Marie's hands. “Listen, if you hadn't brought me something to drink, I would have keeled over. After a workout like that everybody runs over to the bottom and says, ‘Oh, my God, how did you stand it?' and they don't even notice that the top is dying. I'm just, uh, it's a case of nerves is all. Thanks, Kay. The coffee should fix me up.”

Roxanne was blubbering and turning in circles around Alex, trying to get away from her windmilling arm. Her front had been warmed up and done to a turn, but her backside had long ago forgotten the kiss of Anne-Marie's hand. Roxanne was not looking where she was going, and bumped head first into the leather horse. Alex heaved her up by the hair over it, slapped four leather cuffs on her limbs, and stepped away. She was comfortably supported by the padded leather beam under her hips, but the thing was so high she was almost on her toes, and for some reason, the fact that Alex had quit spanking her was not very reassuring at all.