The Strip (2 page)

She gasped, coming to a sudden stop as he wrapped the other end of the belt taut around his hand and pulled it up short, yanking her against him. Her eyes were shut tight, her fingers clawing at the leather material that that dug into her throat.

Her back once more against his chest, he held her there with his makeshift leash and grasped her chin tightly in his other hand. He placed his lips to her ear. “We’re moving to the bed now,” he told her, his tone resolute. He lessened the grip on the belt slightly, making certain she had adequate air to breathe. At the same time, he used the belt to guide her slowly back toward the bed, and she felt threatened enough to follow him without further resistance.

When her legs bumped against the mattress, Jessie moved his body to stand before her, tilting her head up with his fingers beneath her chin. “Open your eyes, Charlie,” he whispered across her lips, using her nickname that only her closest friends used. “Look at me.”

His grip increased on the belt, a warning. But his tone was gentle, as were the knuckles he tenderly brushed against her cheek bone. He needed to see her eyes. He needed to look into those ice-blue windows and know that she wasn’t actually afraid. Not really. He would never truly hurt her, but he had to be certain that she understood this before he went on.

Claire opened her eyes and gazed up at him. He stared down into those unnaturally beautiful orbs and suppressed a groan of need. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever met.

“I’m going to tie you to my bed Charlie,” he told her, brooking no room for argument. There was no fear in her eyes. Instead, there was so much glittering, heavy-lidded lust that his own need had become downright painful. “If you fight me, I’ll pull the belt tighter.” He demonstrated for her and her hands flew to his chest as she closed her eyes, her oxygen supply suddenly shut off. He released it again and she gasped for air, her fingernails finding purchase in the muscles of his chest. He wondered if she was getting dizzy yet. He strained to keep his calm while his crotch ached.

“If you want to breathe, then lay down in the middle of the bed and raise your arms toward the head board. Do you understand?”

She nodded, this time readily.

“Good.” He bent with her as she sat down on the king-sized bed and then scooted slowly to the middle to raise her arms over her head. He considered her clothes for a moment, realizing that he would have to cut them away from her if he tied her first. But there was still a cold fire in her blue eyes. She had some fight left in her. If he gave her the chance, she would make things more difficult for the both of them.

He decided that cutting her clothes off was the way to go. With a speed and efficiency that surprised even him, he had the other belts wrapped securely around her slim wrists and was fastening them to the steel frame of his head board.

Her legs came next. He could tell that she wanted to fight him on this one, but his grip on the belt around her neck changed her mind and she settled down.

“Spread them, Charlie.”

Still, she hesitated, obviously not liking the direct order one bit.

He laughed a low, malicious laugh and lowered himself over her until his lips were a breath away from hers. “I’ll have them open anyway, baby girl. If you do it yourself, you get to stay conscious when it happens.”

She gritted her teeth in frustration and then, as she glared at him in unconditional defiance, she spread her legs open.

“More,” he ordered, needing them to line up with the steel posts at the end of the bed. She almost growled at that one, but again obeyed. “Good girl.” He knew he was driving her crazy, patronizing her with his words. But he also knew that she needed this. She was a control freak in her every day life and she desperately needed to give up control for a while. Whatever it was that was eating her up inside tonight, she wouldn’t be able to let it go until she had a chance to work it out, both physically and mentally.

He was her best friend. He was here for both.

He laughed to himself when he had both of her ankles tightly secured.
Friends with benefits, indeed.

* * * *

Claire was running. She could hear her ragged breathing, feel her heart hammering in her chest. The brambles and weeds ahead of her seemed to come faster and faster, and she couldn’t duck in time, couldn’t swipe them away before they clawed at her face and neck and ripped her clothing.

But she could hear him behind her. She could hear
it
. Fear thrummed through her until she tasted metal in her mouth. She couldn’t let it catch her. When it did….
Something bad
, her mind insisted.
Something bad will happen!

She couldn’t run any faster.
God!
Her legs were already growing weak, her lungs felt as if they would explode.

And then it was on her and she was knocked to the ground. Dirt and vines rose up to meet her with dizzying speed. The impact knocked the wind from her body, stunning her into immobilization. She heard a snarl and felt herself being turned over. Strangely, she could have sworn that the hands moving her were human. Not claws.

Still, she closed her eyes and willed herself to fight, to lash out and save her life. She willed herself to keep those sharp, white teeth from sinking into her flesh.

Charlie!

The beast knew her name. He was shaking her now. Why hadn’t he ripped out her throat? Eaten her?

Charlie, wake up!

A growl wrapped around her, low and long. It was a warning, a sound of anger and frustration. She felt as if it were a physical thing, tying her to the spot, not letting her up.

She screamed when she felt its breath on her neck, and she opened her eyes. There was a wrenching sensation, hard and horrible.

“Charlie, baby, clam down!”

Jessie was above her and was struggling to keep her pinned to the bed, her wrists in his hands. “Shh… baby girl, it’s okay. I’ve got you”

She could feel that she’d been fighting. Her muscles felt strained from the exertion. Her heart was still a rapid-fire drum beat behind her ribcage. She stared up at Jessie, knowing her own eyes were wide with a fear she couldn’t yet shake.

Jessie let go of her wrists and pulled her against him, wrapping his strong arms around her as she tucked her head into his chest. She was shaking. She could feel her body trembling against his.

She said nothing, but held onto him as he gently rocked her back and forth, running his hands through her hair. His low voice whispered that she would be all right. That she was safe. She breathed in his scent, felt the warmth of his skin beneath her fingertips, and grounded herself with him until the cloying vestiges of her dream finally began to slip away.

After several long minutes had passed, Jessie pulled back just enough to look down at her. Charlie knew what was coming. He would want an explanation.

“You wanna tell me about it?” he asked softly.

She shook her head and dove for his chest again. She pressed herself hard against him; she could hear his heartbeat. It brought her comfort. But she knew he wouldn’t let it drop. She knew that he could tell something had been bothering her lately, and this dream was a catalyst. There was only so long she could avoid the inevitable.

Eventually, as she knew he would, he pulled her away from him again and gazed down at her. “You need to let me in, Charlie. What’s going on up here?” He gently touched his fingertips to her temple.

She took a deep breath and let it out with a whoosh. “I’ve been having these dreams… every night. They don’t let me sleep. Not very much, anyway.” She chewed on her lip, a nervous habit. “I’m getting tired, I can tell. Sometimes I miss beats and I never used to do that before.” She took a shaky breath and let it out again. “And Reese keeps getting the upper hand. It’s like he knows I’m tired and he….” She trailed off. She hadn’t meant to bring her trainer into the conversation already – it had just slipped out. And now it was too late.

Jessie pulled back from her and gently held her by her upper arms. His amber eyes burned into hers. “He’s the reason for all of these bruises, isn’t he?” he asked. She could hear the suppressed rage in his tone. She trusted Jessie with her life, but she knew he wasn’t a man to cross. He had connections and she was worried about him interfering somehow, about him trying to do something to David Reese.

“Jessie, it’s my own fault. He’s only trying to teach me-”

“
Bullshit
, Charlie. The man is a sadist.” He yanked the covers out from between them, exposing both of their bodies. His stark gaze raked across her flesh, stopping on the dark marks on her hip bones and upper thighs. He pointed to the splay of small bruises at the bottom of her rib cage. “These were not accidental,” he told her, his tone harsh. “He’s marking you up while you’re too exhausted to fight him off, and he’s
enjoying
it.” He almost growled that last bit. “Can’t you see that?”

Claire pulled away from him, suddenly angry. Her gaze narrowed. “He’s the only one who can teach me what I need to know, Jess. So far, it’s saved my life several times over.”

Jessie didn’t seem to have a reply for that. He opened his mouth as if to say something and then closed it again. She knew that
he
knew that she was right.

There was something about her that attracted a bad element. Men were magnetized to her; always had been. She exerted some sort of pull on members of the opposite sex. The good ones managed to keep their distance, out of respect maybe or at least a sense of what was right and what was wrong. But the others lost out against their more base instincts and she’d had to defend herself against them too many times.

Her parents had warned her about this. Well, sort of.

Before they’d been killed, they had pulled her aside and sat her down. She had been twelve at the time. Her mother had taken her hands and held them in her own. She told her that she was special and that it might cause some problems.

Problems?
she remembered thinking.
What sorts of problems? Like… strange periods? Zits? Delayed learning abilities?
She remembered the horror that had crossed her mind as she thought,
Oh God, do I have some sort of deadly disease?

Charlie had been utterly confused by her mother’s statement and had wanted to ask what her mother meant, but her father cut in before she could voice her question. He told her that she would need to learn to defend herself, and that she would always need to play it safe. She would need to learn to keep herself out of harm’s reach.

When Charlie had finally asked
why
, her parents had fallen silent.

“It’s complicated, Claire,” her mother had said. “A little too complicated for you to understand just now. But we’ll explain in time. When you’re ready.”

And they’d left it at that. It was the most bizarre conversation she’d ever had in her life and, as a twelve year old, she’d been quick to file it away in some cabinet in the back of her mind where all of the shadows and spider webs of adolescence lurked. She got on with her life.

Two months later, her parents were killed in a car accident on the Fort Pitt Bridge. Witnesses said that the SUV seemed to appear out of nowhere and then veer horribly out of control. It went straight through the barrier and off of the bridge, into the Monongahela below. When they pulled it out of the river, the vehicle had been ripped into metal shreds. They hadn’t said as much, but Charlie knew deep down that the same sort of thing had happened to her parents’ bodies.

The closed caskets all but confirmed it.

Charlie spent the remainder of her under-age days with her god-mother, and seeing as how the two of them got along relatively well, the courts hadn’t pursued it any further.

High school was touch and go. Claire grew up. And while everyone around her noticed that she’d bloomed into an extraordinarily beautiful young woman, all she wanted to do was bury herself in her work.

The combination was like catnip to her male peers. They began to take ardent notice in her. So did their girlfriends, though not in the same way. It wasn’t long before she found herself seeking out large friends for the relative protection their friendship offered. One such friend was a giant of a boy who loved Metallica. He let her play his drum set one afternoon and was stunned at how well she pulled off a flam paradiddle and buzz roll without ever having touched a drum kit before in her life. She was a quick study.

Claire also learned not to go anywhere alone. She learned to break eye contact with boys right away, so as not to send the wrong messages.

It all helped a little. But nothing was fool proof.

It was a nearly supernatural phenomenon, but she seemed to be a magnet for would-be rapists. After one too many narrow escapes that chilled her to the core, her parents’ warning came back to her. She wondered what it was that they’d never had a chance to tell her. At the same time, she resigned herself to never knowing.

Instead, she tried to deal with the problem she inexplicably faced.

She was a natural drummer; her hands seemed to fly on their own, always knowing where to go and when. So it was easy to join a band, surrounding herself once more with people who were not afraid to fight on her behalf. And she sought out trainers who could help her learn to defend herself.

One day, a woman in a Judo class suggested that Charlie try a man by the name of David Reese. She swore that there was no one better. She told Charlie that she could tell he was the kind of trainer she really needed.

David Reese was not listed in the phone book and he didn’t advertise anywhere. If the woman hadn’t given her his business card, Charlie may never have been able to find his private studio.

The man readily took her under his wing and she had been training with him for three years.

She had to agree that he was good.
Very
good. The best, maybe. But Reese didn’t mess around. He attacked full-out and, short of back-handing her into unconsciousness or shoving a needle in her vein, he used the exact techniques that rapists or attackers would use. Charlie had found herself in many a painful position, trapped in his arms and at his mercy as he told her, in vivid detail, what it was that a rapist would most likely do next. He seemed to enjoy whispering the threats into her ears. His hands would often wander. Just as a rapist’s would.