The Trainer (49 page)

“What the fuck happened here?” he asked,
stomping over to the supply cabinet for towels and wipes.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” sobbed
Salim, covering his eyes with both hands.

Yeah, you are one sorry fuck, Michael
thought savagely. But he didn’t say it. If anything, this was one
of those times Geoff called a trauma trap; the wrong things said
could put the client back weeks in their training.

He looked around briefly as he tossed the
towels down to the slave. Heather’s floggers were hung up, only one
was in reach—it had a carved wooden handle shaped like a cock, and
the handle was covered with a condom. Hm.

“What, she fucked you and you broke?” That
seemed unlikely—Salim was hardly an anal virgin!

Salim reached pathetically for the towels
and shoved one between his legs. Michael sighed and dropped another
one on top of the puddle of piss and dragged Salim away from the
spot onto a clean blanket. Impatiently, he snapped open a box of
wipes and tossed that down as well. It didn’t look like Salim was
going to answer, so Michael dragged a chair over and stroked him in
what he hoped was a soothing manner. “Come on, pull it together,
asshole, you’re not like this. What happened?” Belatedly, he asked,
“Are you hurt anywhere?”

Salim shook his head, curly locks whipping
around. They were damp, and he smelled like sweat and piss and
panic. “No, no, thank you sir. I—she—it was so hard!“

“What?” Michael wiped the slave’s face with
a bandana and handed it to him to continue the job. It took Salim a
few more minutes to compose himself.

“She... I’m so sorry, sir, I tried, I really
tried, but I was so scared! Oh, my God, I was so scared!“

“Of what?” Michael snapped, losing whatever
patience he had.

Salim looked up, dark eyes under long
lashes. “Everything! Jesus, the auction, I thought I was going to
die, I didn’t want to be sold to most of those people, I was so
afraid—and everyone said she was one of the worst, the heaviest,
she likes to hurt slaves for real! And, oh, fuck, she kept telling
me she was going to mess me up, cut my balls off, have me fucked by
ten dykes with huge straps-ons; she was going to... I just... I
know most of it was bullshit, but it was so real! And it wasn’t
going to end, I had to go home with her and no one would be there
to make sure I was okay!“

Oh God, total meltdown, Michael realized
with dismay. Salim had a fantasy and now it became too fucking real
for him?

“What did you expect, you asshole?” Michael
asked. “What do you think this is all about? This is real! I mean,
Christ, you know no one was gonna chop your balls off, but come on!
She’s an owner, not some skinny chick in rented latex you get to
hire to do exactly what you want for an hour! Isn’t that what you
want?“

Salim shook all over and nodded, but then
covered his face again. “I don’t know! I don’t know anymore!“

I guess I
didn’t know how he would react, Michael thought, absently patting
the slave’s shoulder again. And I thought he was ready? He isn’t
even ready to go away for a fucking weekend!

He wanted to take out his annoyance on the
slave, kick him and slap him around. But he was supposed to be
supplying aftercare, and who knew if the cameras were on in this
room tonight? “Okay, okay,” he said soothingly. “It’ll be okay.
Geoff will take care of it. Pull yourself together, take a shower.
Go to the quiet room, okay?“

But as Michael left the room to find someone
to go in and clean up the piss and towels and pack Heather’s toys
for her, all he could see in his mind were images of his training
house fading into the late night mist.

* * * *

The last guest went home or to one of the
rooms to sleep just before dawn. Shaking with fatigue, Michael
sprawled on a lounge by the pool, watching the thin grey line of
light edge into the darkened sky. He heard the slap of footsteps on
the damp paving and arched to see who was coming.

Geoff was barefoot in white linen drawstring
trousers and a loose shirt of the same material. He had two glasses
of orange juice and put one down on the table next to Michael.

“Long day, eh, Mike?“

“Only the usual deadly length,” Michael said
ruefully as he reached for the juice. He drained the glass in
several long gulps and collapsed back into the pillows of the
chair.

“Salim is fine,” Geoff said gently, sitting
on the edge of a nearby chair. “Thank you for taking care of
him.“

Michael nodded, thinking he didn’t do all
that much. “What happened to him?” he burst out, pushing himself up
on one elbow. “I swear, I thought he was eager for the sale,
couldn’t wait to be sold for real. Did Heather do anything
wrong?“

“Well, wrong is a harsh way of putting it.
She combined real threats with impossible ones, perhaps confused
him, and definitely scared him. She’s very good at that! I’m
thinking she needs someone with a little more strength in the core
ego, someone who enjoys the fear sensation more than Salim. She
also called him some names he found personally hurtful, so it was
good to get additional information out of him.“

Of course Geoff interviewed him right away,
Michael thought. Great. I just called him an asshole.

“Will... he stay? I mean, does he want to
really leave?“

“Oh, he’ll stay for a while,” Geoff said
reassuringly. “It was just a bad case of auction panic! We’ll work
on his confidence a little more and give him some exercises to show
him how to discern reality from role-play. I think he really wants
to serve, just as you do. We won’t discard him for a little
setback.“

“What about Heather?“

“Oh, I sent Rudy to her; she’s in the Bear
River room now probably sleeping like a baby. She was a little
upset, no one likes to see a client fall apart like that. But she
understands that Salim just needs more seasoning. Time will help
both of them! Time and the company of more experienced
partners.“

Michael nodded and sank back down into the
chair. “I thought he was ready,” he repeated.

“Well, so did I!” said Geoff, smiling. “See
what I meant when I told you that sometimes you never really know?
That’s why we use the micro contracts, why we work so hard at
finding the right slaves for the right owners. It’s not an easy job
we have, or an easy calling. But with discipline and extraordinary
patience, we can overcome so much, create such magic.” He patted
Michael firmly on one shoulder as he got up and stretched. “It’s a
new day, Michael! I’m going to spend the morning sleeping; maybe
you should think about that for yourself. I realize you didn’t have
the best time yesterday; you have my gratitude for the work you
did. In fact, I think you’re coming along wonderfully; the owners
like you. It’s time for you to meet some of the world’s finest
trainers, see what else is out there. I’ve decided to take you with
me to England for my training line annual meeting.”

“Wow! Thank you, Geoff!” Michael brightened
and grinned. “No kidding? I’ve never been to England!”

“You’ll love it. Delightful people, and my
training line is very old; you’ll find a lot to think about there,
and a chance to meet other trainees from all over the world. Don’t
dwell too much on Salim and this little incident, okay? We all make
little mistakes. You have a great future ahead of you.“

Michael nodded proudly and stared at the
brightening line of light on the horizon over the trees.

I get to go to England! he thought with
excitement. I bet only the best of his trainees get to go away like
that! And in all of his self-recriminations, he had forgotten the
neat fact that Geoff had cleared Salim for the auction.

So really, I made the same mistake that the
boss did! It’s not that bad if Geoff didn’t know either! I am
ready, I know I am—and Geoff knows, too. That’s why he’s bringing
me along to introduce to all his snooty English buddies. He
pictured himself sitting in some fancy parlor drinking tea with a
bunch of guys in fancy three-piece suits and pretty French maid
slaves all over the place. “This is my star pupil Michael,” Geoff
would say. Or maybe, “My partner, Michael,”

Or, just California’s newest trainer,
Michael Xavier LaGuardia.

Michael grabbed his empty glass and headed
back to the house for more juice. Sleep? He didn’t need to sleep.
He needed to get his cock sucked to the root by some lazy ass slave
who didn’t yet know the honor they were about to receive.

Laura Antoniou has become well known in the erotically
alternative community as the creator of the Marketplace series
(
The Marketplace, The Slave,
The Trainer, The Academy,
and
The
Reunion
), the first three
volumes of which were originally published under the name Sara
Adamson. One Marketplace character also appears in her first
book,
The Catalyst,
but she leaves the reader to figure
that out. The only independently written Marketplace short story,
“Brian on the Farm,” appears in Lawrence Schimel and Carol Queen’s
ground-breaking anthology, S
witch Hitters: Lesbians Write Gay Male Erotica, and Gay Men
Write Lesbian Erotica
(Cleis), which has been published in English and in German.
“That’s Harsh,” a new Marketplace story that appears as a bonus
story in
The Slave
(Book Two of the Marketplace) won
the 2011 John Preston Short Fiction award, presented by the
National Leather Association.

Antoniou has also had great success as an editor, creating
the
Leatherwomen
anthologies which highlighted new
erotic work,
By Her
Subdued,
a collection of
stories about dominant women, and
No Other Tribute,
which features submissive women. Her nonfiction anthologies
include
Some Women
and an homage to author John Preston
entitled
Looking for Mr.
Preston.
Antoniou’s work has
been published in the United States, Germany, Japan, Israel and
Korea, to international acclaim.

Antoniou’s short stories also appear in other
anthologies,including
SM
Classics,
edited by Susan
Wright;
Things Invisible To
See: Gay and Lesbian Tales of Magic Realism
, edited by Lawrence Schimel;
The Second Coming,
edited by Pat Califia and Robin Sweeney;
Once Upon a Time: Erotic Fairy Tales
for Women,
edited by Mike
Ford;
Ritual Sex,
edited by Tristan Taormino and David
Aaron Clark; and
Best Lesbian
Erotica 1997,
edited by
Tristan Taormino. Antoniou was also a columnist for
Girlfriends
magazine from 1995-1997, the submissions editor for
Badboy and Bi-Curious magazines from 1995-96, a regular contributor
to
The SandMUtopia
Guardian,
and a short-lived
columnist for Alt.com. Winner of the National Leather Association’s
2011 Lifetime Achievement Award, Antoniou is a highly demanded
speaker at schools, leather/SM and sexuality conferences, and has
become well known for her rants, thinly disguised as keynote
speeches.

Antoniou is currently finishing the sixth book in the
Marketplace series, entitled
The Inheritor.
She
has no intention to stop there.

Now Published by Circlet Press’s Luster
Editions

Circlet Press is proud to be returning the
entire Marketplace series by Laura Antoniou to print, as well as
launching all-new ebook editions. These books are the first in our
Luster Editions line of erotic books and books of alternative
sexuality that are not science fiction or fantasy.

The Marketplace
—available now as ebook or paperback

The Slave
—available
now as ebook or paperback

The Trainer
—available
now as ebook or paperback

The Academy
, Fall
2011

The Reunion
, Winter
2011

The Inheritor
—in the
works!

Stand-alone short stories also available as
downloads for 99 cents each!

For Want of a Nail

That’s Harsh!

California Dreamin’

BEYOND
THE SOFTNESS
OF HIS FUR

By TammyJo Eckhart, $5.99 ebook

When Emily is promoted, the bosses make it
clear that it comes with certain expectations: she is to purchase
herself a morph, a customizable animal hybrid of the future that is
both sexual pet and status symbol. Her own tastes require the
unique: an exotic and submissive male pet. All desires are exceeded
with wynn, a white fox morph. Only it is his uniqueness that is a
challenge to the morph-culture status quo and could ultimately
spell disaster for both Master and pet.

KNEEL
TO ME edited by
Lauren P. Burka

ISBN 978-1-885865-54-0

$6.99 ebook

Circlet Press brings you seven erotic stories
of dominance and submission that will return you to the moment when
a master, mistress, or slave first stepped out of a story and made
you theirs. The submissives, slaves, and bottoms you will meet in
these sci-fi and fantasy tales are tough and competent. No passive
orifices, they are beautifully-realized individuals with the spark
that makes them recognizably human.