Barely Legal Vol 1: Barely Legal Series Page 6

  “You seem surprised to learn that I know him. Know this, Laura; in the world of bondage, we tend to know each other a lot. And, yes, P.T. has always been my alternative plan if Michael failed to woo Serena away from Bash. I would have preferred to avoid any collusion with P.T., but sometimes things just don’t go my way.”

  I stared at her, dumbfounded, as I tried to make the connection between her and the man who’d just brought me to orgasm over the phone.

  She took a menacing step forward. “And I tend to get a little testy when I don’t get my way. Remember Gloria Thorpe? Remember how I dealt with her when she decided to play in my playground, to try to seduce one of the guys I had a crush on?” She snickered and passed an unwavering and angry gaze over me. “I think she still wears a wig to this day.” She reached out to finger the escaped blonde curl of hair. “And she had such lovely hair, didn’t she?”

  “Aren’t you a little too old to be playing such high school games?”

  “Nice attempt to put on a brave front, Laura, but I see it in your eyes… the fear, the questions, the uncertainty. But don’t worry. I have no plans to cause you irreparable harm.” She stepped closer and stood almost nose to nose with me. “I want to know what happened that night with Michael. I want to know every sordid little detail, but, more importantly, I want to know what Michael’s last words were to you. I want to know what you two talked about on his last day on this earth. What did he say, Laura?”

  “He didn’t say anything…”

  She shoved me back and grinned. “I can make you talk, Laura. You can either chose to have it easy, or have it hard, and I’ll admit, I’d have no problem at all making it hard. I have half a mind to make it as painful as possible, just for spite… just a little payback for getting in the way to begin with.”

  “What are you…?” I couldn’t even get the whole question out. I knew she had the capacity to be extremely cruel when crossed.

  But I couldn’t imagine what she had in mind.

  Chapter 8

  Willow snapped her fingers and the door to the apartment opened.

  “Jackson,” I whispered in horror.

  “Ah,” Willow said with a wicked smile. “So you do remember Jackson Harris. I thought you might have forgotten all about him.”

  Clearly, she’d counted on my remembering him very well. And, how could I ever forget him? I’d spent the last few years trying to put him out of my mind, to move on with my life and forget the trembling young girl I’d been when I’d first met him, and the sexually wound up woman I’d become while under his possessive and obsessive control.

  He looked just as good as he had back then; strong, sexy, vibrant and alluring. It’d been so easy to fall for him. Every girl wanted his attention and when he’d turned his attention to me, I gladly and willingly fell under his charm. But his charm soon turned to complete and utter control.

  “Are your panties wet already, Laura?” Willow said with a snicker.

  Now that she mentioned it, yes. I was instantly brought back to that summer; a summer of lush fields, intense heat and Southern charm in the countryside just east of Atlanta, Georgia. I’d accompanied my father that summer when he’d visited several farms in the area to find new suppliers… one of them had been Jackson’s.

  Jackson oozed charm and I’d been naïve enough to fall for it. But looking at him now, it was easy to see that he still had that charm. If anything it was even more intense, more magnetic. He still had that way of looking at a woman, looking deep into her soul, her body… deep in the cavity that harbored irrepressible lust and hunger, no matter how well brought up a young lady was. He was an animal underneath that southern gentleman polite veneer, and once he got you into his bed, you’d know he was going to ravage you. The thought of that had always made me hunger for him.

  He’d been my first, and for the longest time, I’d wanted him to be my one and only… forever.

  “It’s good to see you again, sweet thing. It’s been a long time.”

  Not long enough, I thought as a sting of want pierced through my panties and left a sharp ache between my thighs.

  With just one hot and satisfying encounter, he’d turned me into a raging sex addict, unable to get enough, unable to concentrate or think of anything other than my next sexual encounter with him.

  “Remember all those hot nights, baby? In the fields, in the barn, in the back of my truck, on my dining room table…” he smiled a slow and sexy smile that went straight to the core of me.

  And those lazy, crazy days. There wasn’t anything they hadn’t tried.

  “I’ve missed you. Sex isn’t the same without you, girl.”

  I swallowed as he took a step closer. It’d taken so long to get over him. That summer had remained branded on my soul for the remainder of the year. I’d returned to California broken and itching to be with a man every minute of every day in order to forget how he made my body feel, how he made me crave him, how he made me think I couldn’t go a day without him thrusting into me, without a man thrusting into me. I became insatiable because of him.

  “It has been a long time,” I managed to say without sounding too hungry.

  “Five years. And you haven’t changed a bit. So beautiful, so haughty. So full of restraint and control. I thought I’d broken you of that.”

  It certainly had been difficult regaining control. I decided to put on a brave face and not let him know just how hard it was to get over him. “I’m a lot stronger than I used to be. I’ve grown… matured.”

  “You were barely eighteen then. I would imagine you would indeed be strong now. Look at you. You're a pillar of strength.”

  He was mocking me. I could see it in his eyes, those deep, dark eyes that pulled me in and refused to let go. Why did he have such a hold on me? I’d met so many great men since breaking up with Jackson, including Michael, and yet he was the only one who had such an effect on me. Not even Michael had had such control over me.

  Willow stepped aside as he came up to me, strong and determined to break me once again.

  “Don’t be so quick to mock me, Jackson. You may have caught me off guard, but I’m not the submissive girl you once knew. You brainwashed me once and made a puppet of me, but your Southern charm and boyish good looks won’t work on me this time. I’ve moved on. I’m a little more worldly than the innocent little girl you took advantage of.”

  “From what I remember, you enjoyed the way I took advantage of you.”

  “The fact remains… I’m older and stronger.”

  “So I hear… a lawyer. Who would have thought?”

  “If you’d listened to a word I said back then, you would have known. I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer. It’s in my blood.”

  “No,” he said as he leaned in closer. “Being my sex slave is in your blood. I’m sure you're already eager to take my cock into that sexy mouth of yours and suck me until I come all over you. Then you’d want me to bend you over and ram you hard from behind, not stopping until you’ve orgasm.”

  He’d always been good with dirty talk; just dirty enough to get me hot, to make me want him. I didn’t even realized that Willow and Camille were no longer in the room, and I was alone with Jackson, looking me over like he could see every curve, every pore of my skin behind the sexy red dress I wore tonight. My legs tingled and standing upright became difficult, but I didn’t want to give into him.

  Surely I was better than that. Surely I’d learned a valuable lesson after that heartbreaking and difficult summer.

  I would not allow myself to get caught up in his charm, in his game.

  I would not become his slave again.

  Chapter 9

  I knew I had to stop staring at Jackson, but my eyes were riveted to him. After all this time, I just couldn’t believe he was there, in the flesh, and his eyes registered the same hunger for me that they had the last time I’d seen him.

  My stomach turned over with fear and desire. He was the kind of guy who was so boyishly good looking y
et virile. His broad shoulders, muscular arms and thick tree trunk legs filled out his black t-shirt and jeans tightly. He smelled like sex, like a man ready to hungry for sex. It was disarming how my body on a base feminine level responded with lust to him. After all this time…

  “I’ve brought a few little gifts for our reunion.” He walked to the kitchen table and pulled several items from a large leather duffle bag; heavy chains with iron cuffs, a long, narrow and very sharp looking knife and a flogger, complete with small metal spikes.

  I couldn’t imagine why he would bring such items. Yes, we had enjoyed playing such games a long, long time ago, but I’d left him and all the sordid games he came up with several years before. The items that might have aroused me while under his spell now looked like devices meant to torture.

  “I remember how you liked it rough.”

  “That was a long time ago, Jackson. I’ve grown up since.”

  “This isn’t exactly something you just grow out of, honey. This is who you are, what drives you on.”

  “Wrong. Maybe you stayed stuck in that world, but I’ve moved on.”

  He picked up the flogger and brushed it along the palm of his hand. “I don’t think it would take much to draw you back into the world you belong to.” Taking a few steps closer, he turned his palm up and flicked the spiked flogger into his hand.

  I swallowed as his deepening tone reached inside me and touched something I’d long put away; something so carnal that I instinctively reacted to it. My body’s reaction surprised me, it was so strong and determined.

  But I was determined, too; to beat him this time and I would bite back whatever arousal he managed to pull out of me.

  “You’re still as sexy as I remember you, Laura… especially in that tight dress you’re wearing.”

  Looking down at the beautiful dress I’d chosen, I frowned. I had dressed up to meet Peter Townshend, putting on my sex vixen vibe…not knowing it would be Jackson who would benefit from it.

  “All you have to do is relax, angel.” He reached out to run his fingers up my cheek and into my hair.

  My mouth watered and my eyelids fell with sudden hunger. It had happened so many times before… falling under his spell, falling into a trance, a trance that left me unable to think logically while my body thrilled at his every touch, a trance in which all I wanted, all I craved was sex. It was enough to make me lose control. But when he slapped my thigh with the flogger, I remembered. I remembered how hard it’d been breaking away from him. I remembered all the times I’d lost control.

  Damn it, but I wasn’t ready to go back to that. Despite my body’s eager and swift response, I gripped the flogger in my hand and stilled his motions. My eyes, hopefully as hardened as my heart, met his.

  I can’t waver, I thought. I have to stay strong and in control.

  “Fuck off,” I said in a tone that left no room for doubt. I did not want anything to do with him.

  “I have… many times. Now I want to fuck you.” He released the flogger from my grip and whipped it once again against my thigh.

  It stung and burned, bringing with the pain a flood of memories I’d long ago set aside.

  I was only eighteen when I became entangled in his wicked carnival of lusty games. How naïve I’d been. He made me believe having sex with him was love, that I was worthless unless I was desired by him, used in any which way to pleasure him. He twisted my naïve sheltered mind and heart into believing a woman’s worth was what was between her legs and nothing else. He took away my self-esteem, stripped away whatever dignity I had when I was with him in his world, as his submissive.

  As I stared at him, the horrors of those years as his sex slave came back to me. It stung to realize the actual acts still aroused me, still brought out something so feral and wanton in me. But I’d matured so much, mentally and emotionally. I no longer needed to have someone overpower me.

  I had Chrissy to thank for that. At twenty-two, Chrissy had already been through a lot when she’d come to volunteer at the women’s shelter. When I arrived two years later, a twenty year old wash out who was defeated and busted, she turned my life around.

  She’d been through so much for someone so young. On countless nights after leaving the shelter, her voice would still ring in my ears, encouraging me and giving me strength.

  “I went through more hell than you can imagine, Laura,” she said not long after we met; her way of encouraging me to open up to her about my tormented relationship with Jackson. “And I had so much promise, everyone was sure I’d go on to be a super model or actress.” She smiled a wistful smile that made me sad to see all she’d lost.

  “When I was five, my mom entered me in one of those child beauty pageants,” she went on. “I was thrilled. I loved the pretty dresses, the hair, the make-up. I loved the attention. And I was pretty good… you know, playing cute and hamming it up for the crowd. There were plenty of pageants that I lost and I’d cry the whole way home, but as I got older, I won more and more often. Soon my mom didn’t know where to put all the trophies.”

  “That doesn’t sound too hellish to me.”

  “It wasn’t, until I got into my teens. By then my mom had become addicted to the whole process. She loved the adoration… and money was starting to look good, too. She pushed me into one pageant after another, and when she couldn’t tag along, she put me in the hands of guardians… guardians who didn’t give a shit what happened to me. Before I knew it, I was being offered alcohol and then drugs in every color of the rainbow. Like your typical teen, I thought it was cool. I thought I was cool. I mean, here I was with all these grown-ups and they were letting me into their circle.”

  “You got in with the wrong crowd?”

  “The wrongest. And right smack in the middle of that wrongest crowd was the wrongest guy I could fall for.”

  “A good looking guy full of charm, I bet.”

  “You better believe it. He was the kind of guy who looked like a movie star. You know, the kind you’d plaster your walls with posters of. Man, he was cute, and I fell for him hook, line and sinker.” When she looked at me, her eyes were full of understanding for what I’d been though. “I know what it’s like to fall in love with a man who only wants to use you for his own pleasure. In my case, he also wanted to use me for the pleasure of others. In a moment of complete abandon, he convinced me to have our sexual exploits put on tape. He said he wanted to watch them when he missed me, when we were apart. I thought it was a cute idea, and of course, I was flattered.”

  “Oh, my God,” I said, appalled by the idea.

  “And, as you can imagine, this wasn’t straight up, simple sex. I mean, we went wild, and, at the time, the wilder it got, the hornier I became. Knowing a camera was on us turned me on even more. I loved the idea… that is until he started selling our sexual encounters on the internet.” She snorted a little sardonically and shot me a glance. “The money was pretty good. The very first month he sold for over three thousand dollars worth and within six months he was making a little over eleven thousand dollars a month. Not bad for an amateur, right?”

  “I’ll bet you didn’t see much of that money.”

  She shrugged. “To keep me going, to encourage me to continue making tapes that were increasingly racy, he spoiled me those first few months. You know… a pretty dress here, a little lingerie there; a few nice dinners… good wine… all that shit, but it was really just peanuts compared to the money he was raking in. But, despite the money, all of it started to implode when people I knew got wind of the tapes. I was mortified. I mean, it’s one thing to show my ass off in front of strangers, but when people you know start to look at you… you know. I tried to get out of it. I told him we’d made enough tapes, but he didn’t want to hear about it. On tape, he raped me… and I don’t mean just a rough and tough tumble in bed. He let me know he didn’t like my decision.”

  I felt her pain as her eyes darkened with the memory.

  “I ended up in the hospital with a fractured
collar bone, a few stitches behind my ear and more bruises than I could count. But in the end, it turned out to be a good thing.”

  Taken aback, I stared at her. “Good thing? Are you a masochist or something?”

  Her smile was suddenly serene and filled with wisdom. Twenty-four and she had her act together in a way that won my complete admiration. “It was what I needed to finally break away from him. And I never looked back. I initially came to this women’s center to get my shit together, but it didn’t take long for me to realize I was a lot stronger than most of the women in here.”

  I bit my lip as thoughts of Jackson invaded our conversation. Despite all I’d been through with him, despite the pain and humiliation, I still craved his touch. I felt stupid for wanting him, for wanting to please him. I could still taste his cock, still smell his skin, still feel his hands on my head as he pushed me repeatedly into his crotch.

  “How long has it been since you’ve seen him?” Chrissy asked.

  “A few months now.”

  “So you haven’t had sex for a while. How do you feel?”

  “It hasn’t been as long as you think. I tried to forget all about Jackson by…”

  “Sleeping with other men?”

  Filled with shame, I nodded. “I tried to break out of the cycle, but I was continually drawn back in.”

  “Like a drug.”

  “Exactly. I finally thought I’d broken free of this drug when I met up with an old friend from high school; Michael. Even though we never hung out together in school - I was kind of shy around him - his father was a client of my father, and we happened to run into each other one night at a fund raiser.” I smiled at the very thought of Michael. “You wouldn’t believe how adorable he was. I mean, women literally fell at his feet and begged to bear his children, he was that good looking.”

  “So what happened? Did you guys hit it off?”

  “Hit it off? We were inseparable - something that ticked his sister off to no end. Willow was just as possessive of her brother as she was of her beaus. In her little narcissistic mind, every man was meant only for her. But Michael didn’t really pay attention to her requests - actually more like demands - that he stop seeing me.”