Abduction (48 page)

Then he pulled out of her, circled around the sawhorse supporting her right leg, and
stepped in close. She was too shaken, too exhausted, too used up to resist as he
cradled her jaw in his hands an took her mouth in a soft, lingering kiss. Then he smiled,
stroked her hair, and said quietly,

"Time to sleep, now."

Before she realized what he was doing, he'd stuck her with the syringe and the
plunger was going down, down, down.

She woke up with a nasty hangover. And the weirdest memories. Fuck, what a
crazy dream.

Damn, she was sore. Just turning over in bed and getting the covers over her
shoulders again, her arms and thigh muscles screamed. What the hell had she done to
herself?

Drowsily she looked over at the night stand and contemplated the mostly empty
bottle of tequila and, a blush burning her already hot face, the dildo that had come mail
order the previous afternoon.

Had she? She could have sworn she'd given up in a wave of humiliating defeat
after a couple half-hearted, drunken attempts. But her tender bottom testified that, on
the contrary, somewhere into that fifth, she'd pillaged her own anal virginity. She wished
she could remember if she'd liked it.

Well, she thought, if it was half as good as that dream... She immediately felt
disgusted with herself for even thinking such a thing.

But for years after, when she masturbated, or when she was with someone, it
was that dream that she called to mind. It made her come, every time.

TEN: The Possessed

Devan finished reading. Sat there in the silence after, dreading to look up. Afraid to face Vaughn's expression. His eyes.

"You must admit, the girl's got a certain knack. Hasn't she, Vaughn?"

She stared desperately at the paper in her hands, knowing that when Vaughn spoke, his voice would betray his disgust. But he was silent.

"Goodness, Devan, you've struck the man speechless. But there's another way to gauge his reaction."

Devan couldn't resist following Conrad with her eyes as he rose from the hearth and circled behind Vaughn's chair, then bent over and put his hand on his groin.

"Fuck's sake, Vaughn, it's like gripping a baseball bat. Does that hard on of yours ever go away?"

She cringed and blushed at the thought of Conrad touching Vaughn like that, and exhaled with sudden relief when just a second later Conrad stood and wandered toward her, casually dropping onto the sofa beside her.

"Well, it just testifies to Devan's talent, doesn't it? What's really remarkable, though, is that she wrote that—what was it, Devan? Four years ago?" Conrad gave her a penetrating look. "She was just fifteen. Hadn't so much as touched herself. Quite an imagination, eh?"

In a sudden and swift move Conrad turned, scooped her up off the sofa, and settled her in his lap.

"What do you think, Vaughn? Does that story, written so long ago, still work for her? Do you suppose she's as aroused as you are?"

She couldn't look at him. She just took in his silence.

What was Conrad doing? With one forearm hooked under her knees he lifted her ass off his lap, and with brutal effectiveness yanked her panties down around her knees. He lowered her back down, but kept his arm locked behind her knees, holding them tight by her chest. A humiliating certainty about Vaughn's view made a salty sob rise in her throat, but she kept it there.

"Naughty, naughty, Devan…"

Just the tip of Conrad's finger lightly touched her opening, then slid, gentle, slippery, along her slit, smearing her slick wetness over her folds, finally rubbing her clit, making her squirm against all her effort to be still.

"…does my darling girl need to be fucked, hmmm? Should I string you up, just like that girl in your story, and have my way with you at last? Part your soft, creamy thighs, press myself against you, slide up into you..."

He slowly slid his finger inside her, and her desperate silence came out in an anguished groan.

"…slip around behind you…"

His finger slipped wetly from her throbbing cunt and slid down. She tensed and gasped as his finger brushed against her again.

"…slowly drive my hard cock into the tight, virgin grip of your ass…"

His finger teased her sensitive pucker as she waited, tense and fearful, to feel his finger penetrating her.

"Honestly, Vaughn, look at her. Tell me your little Devan isn't dying for you to fuck her right now."

Conrad slipped a second finger back into her cunt, pumping his finger slowly in and out of her as he went on taunting her ass, making her writhe, fearful, unsatisfied, needful.

"Just admit that you want her, Vaughn, and she's yours. I promise you, loathe though she may be to confess it, she'd love nothing more, at this moment, than for you to take her in your arms and fuck her into orgasmic oblivion. Or maybe…" his finger slipped out of her and touched down on her clit, and she gasped in her breath, sharp and audible, "…you'd rather she come to you, there in your chair, get your pants down around your ankles, climb into your lap, and lower herself, nice and slow, onto that raging hard-on of yours, and ride you until you come. Hmmm?"

Everything Conrad said filled her brain with images that mingled with his taunting touching of her sex, and she was ready to sob with want. Willing Vaughn, through all her need, to say, yes, he was dying to fuck her, so she could feel him against her, inside her. His breath on her skin, his tongue in her mouth, his arms encircling her, his hands on her.

The silence piqued her fear. He wouldn't say it. Never. He'd never take her, let Conrad give her. Unless Conrad forced him. She hated, wanted to kill the little part of her that yearned for that—for Conrad to threaten some worse punishment so Vaughn would have no choice, have to take hold of her, hold her down, force himself between her legs…

"As you wish, Vaughn."

Conrad's finger lifted from her thrumming, aching clit, and he lowered her legs onto his own, kissed her shoulder, his lips soft and lingering, and slid her panties up her thighs.

"Bum up, darling."

She felt…bereft. Empty. Or hollow. Something was very wrong, in her head.

Conrad's hands came to her hips and gently suggested a rise. Dazed, she planted her feet on the floor and raised her hips, and Conrad slipped her panties into place.

"Pardon us for a moment, Vaughn, while I get Devan off to bed."

The moment the door latched she felt the tears spilling down her cheeks.

"Devan? Darling, what's wrong?"

Fuck, Conrad had a nerve, pretending to give a shit about her. About anything except his little games. His psycho fantasy. She could hardly bear to let him touch her, but somehow didn't care enough to push him away. So she let him gently comb her hair back with his fingers, let him caress her cheek and kiss her forehead. When she finally looked at him, his expression startled her, it looked so like genuine concern.

"Tell me, Devan. What's upset you?"

"You're making him hate me." Her confession, her accusation came out a garbled sob.

"Devan," he sighed, pulling her into an embrace. "I'm not. You can't really believe that Vaughn's capable of hating you?"

"That story…"

"Devan. Darling. Trust me. You can't protect your love by hiding your real nature."

"You think you know my real nature? You're just using what I've written, what you think you know about me, to justify living out your own fucked up fantasies."

She tried to struggle free but he went on holding her until she gave in and went limp in his warm arms.

"Say what you like to me, Devan. But stop pretending to yourself. Those stories reflect something real about you. About what you need. Until he understands that, Vaughn—anyone—can only love a pale facsimile of the real you."

Conrad didn't know what the fuck he was talking about. Vaughn knew her. Knew her better than fucking Conrad ever would, no matter how many stories and diaries he'd read, however many little confessions he forced out of her, or how he tried to pry into her soul with his eyes as he pinned and touched her. Vaughn cared for her. The real her.

But as her mind rebelled against Conrad's words, she felt something inside of her dimming and shrinking.

All the fight seeped out of her. Without understanding why, she finally came undone, and let herself melt in a violent flood of tears, let Conrad hold her through it all.

She was only vaguely conscious of him putting her to bed a long while later, and slipping out of the room.

That story. Conrad was right. He didn't know her.

All this time, again and again, mentions of her stories had brought to mind…what? Bodice rippers. Beautiful women futilely defending their chastity and voluptuous charms against rogue men desperate with passion. Corsets and pirates.

But her story, her mind, she was dark. Violent. Frightening. Like him.

His cock was still hard, aching. It seemed like he'd been like that all day. In strobing flashes Vaughn recalled the image of the kidnapper sliding his fingers in and out of his victim's cunt as he fucked her ass, and half-consciously knew he'd masturbate to that mental picture once he'd been cuffed to the bed for the night and left alone. It was so like his own dark fantasies. A variation on his own theme.

Then Devan. Then Conrad. A flash, an image from her story, Devan the kidnapped woman, Conrad the rapist.

Then guilt. Then fear.

They were talking. He heard the indistinct hum of their voices seeping through the wall. Conrad wouldn't, not like that, behind a closed door, Vaughn was almost certain. But still he strained, listening for any sounds of struggle, any distressed note in her voice, any suspicious silence. His whole body, his whole being strained toward her when they were apart, when Conrad had her and he couldn't be sure what was happening to her.

At last the door opened and closed again, and Conrad appeared before him.

"Have a drink with me, Vaughn?"

"All right."

Why not. Conrad was going to chew his ear off, either way. Might as well dull the senses a little. Conrad grinned, as if Vaughn was an endless source of amusement to 439

him, then padded quietly over to the kitchen—Devan might be falling asleep, and Conrad had a funny way of being considerate of his hostage—to make the drinks.

Conrad padded back, then, set the drinks down, and undid one of Vaughn's wrist restraints. It was routine by now. Conrad carefully restoring Vaughn's use of an arm, then stepping cautiously out of range while Vaughn got himself free of any other restraints. And, of course, the tranquilizer gun always in hand or in reach.

"Shall we step out onto the porch, so we don't disturb Devan?"

Vaughn replied with a gesture toward the door.

"After you, Vaughn."

Vaughn took his drink from the table and they went outside. Following a gesture from Conrad, Vaughn took a seat in one of the big redwood deck chairs, and Conrad took the chair beside him. It was strange, how when Devan wasn't right there, Vaughn felt no fear with Conrad. He was almost at ease. Only when she was there, when Conrad might hurt or upset her, was Vaughn strung up on tenterhooks. Now, though, bombarded by a million strange impressions of the last hour, the day, the last week, for a moment Vaughn almost forgot Conrad's presence. But then he felt the man's patient stare. When Vaughn turned to him, Conrad had a weird look on his face. Maybe it was just that he wasn't smirking. No, there was something warm, almost tender in the way that man was looking at him.

"Sooner or later," Conrad said after a long silence, "when the moment is right, Vaughn, I'm going to take her. You know that."

He knew. Of course. But it was a blow to hear it. He felt sick. Weak. He gulped down a mouthful of whiskey.

"It's what she wants. You know that, too."

"She doesn't want to be hurt. That isn't what that story means."

"What the story means, Vaughn, what all her stories mean, is that Devan wants things she's ashamed of wanting."

Conrad paused, waited for Vaughn to meet his eyes.

"You can understand that, can't you?" No derision in his voice.

Vaughn remained silent.

"She wants to be, sees herself as a certain kind of person, and the desires she has don't fit. She wants to experience them, but doesn't want to be responsible. She wants them done to her, so she can experience them, and still be innocent."

Vaughn sat there, futilely searching for the answer, the words that would derail Conrad and save Devan.

"I shan't hurt her. But there's only one way to do this, Vaughn. And that's to let her believe she hasn't a choice. Because otherwise she'd feel she was betraying you.

Your mutual…affection. I won't say love since I doubt you've made such a declaration to one another."

Conrad rose, then moved in close, the way Vaughn had seen him close in on Devan a dozen times, and a moment later Vaughn felt the soft touch of Conrad's hands on his shoulders, felt his breath against his ear, and an unpleasant feeling rippled through him.

"But you wouldn't see it that way, would you? If she gave herself to me?"

Conrad accepted Vaughn's silence. Vaughn hardly twitched as Conrad pressed himself against him, whispered to him.

"I feel quiet sure about you in this, Vaughn. That you could watch as Devan realized her fantasies, that you could take part in that, and care for her just as you do now. That for you nothing would be lost. Or spoiled. But Devan, young and relatively innocent as she is, despite all she's written, isn't ready to grasp that such things are possible. She needs a little illusion of helplessness."

Vaughn would have argued. Even knowing he'd said it all before, knowing that it wouldn't make a difference, that Conrad would disregard everything anyway. He still would have tried, for her sake. But he no longer trusted himself where she was concerned. He could no longer tease apart what he believed to be her wishes, and his own. So he was silent.