Escape From Paradise (12 page)

He paused, watching me, so I said, “Yes, Master.” Although his idea of “taking care of me” was far from my idea.

“Bueno. Now. My rules for you are this: Never tell a patron no. Allow him to do whatever he wishes. If they are breaking a rule my people will swiftly intervene. Try to enjoy yourself, and if you don’t, pretend you do.” His fingers brushed over my nipples in the gauzy material, making them pucker and my breath quicken. My nerves were on high alert. “Eventually you will learn to enjoy the ease of your life here, Angel. My patrons will see you as a goddess. They will worship you with their touches and you will grow to find pleasure as they do.”

Bullshit.

I gritted my teeth and stared straight up at the ceiling. Marco pulled something out of his pocket. A blindfold.

“This will help relax you for your first time with a patron, yes?”

I nodded. I definitely liked the idea of not having to look at this man. I lifted my head and Marco slipped the velvety covering over my eyes. Then he kissed my forehead, which was oddly comforting. As soon as I thought that, a revolting sensation slid through me. I didn’t want to feel anything positive toward Marco. He was fucking with my head, and I needed to be strong.

A plastic click sounded, like something opening, and a moment later Marco was urging my legs apart, pushing aside my panties. What was he doing? I felt a cool slickness at the entrance and he swirled lube around, pushing some inside me. He then fixed my underwear and straightened my negligee.

I heard both Luis and Marco leave. Then I waited.

That bastard made me wait forever. I was high strung, pissed off, and scared to death when the door opened and slow footsteps approached the bed. He was silent. I could hear my breath coming too fast. In and out. My knees pressed together. My muscles tensed.

A belt buckle clinked as it was being undone and I whimpered, remembering that sound only hours ago. Was he allowed to whip me?

Don’t cry, Angela,
I begged myself.

Something touched the side of my calf and ran up my leg. He
thwapped
it against my thigh and I realized it was the end of his belt. I stayed still, practically panting, as he gently whipped the piece of leather across my legs. Then he pulled my thigh to spread my legs. I whimpered again and he chuckled, giving me the chills. He pushed the lacy material of my thong aside and gave my clit a smack with the belt. I let out a small holler of surprise. It hadn’t hurt, necessarily. But it made me throb down there. He did it again and I clenched my thigh muscles, gasping.

No, no no. I would
not
be turned on by him. Hell-fucking-no.

With no fanfare or warning he shoved two fingers inside me, curling them upward and rocking his hand back and forth. Hard. I bit my lip and pulled on my chains. Nobody had ever fingered me so roughly. I gritted my teeth and tried not to think about abrasions. As he manhandled me, a wet, sloshing sound began and he moaned. The sound was coming from me. I could feel a fullness building deep inside me. I realized with horror he was working my g-spot, which wouldn’t make me come, but it would definitely make me sopping wet.

“Ah, sí, putita,” he moaned.
Little whore.

He pulled his fingers out and I heard clothing being yanked off. Moments later he was against my arm by my head. He whapped my mouth with his fucking cock and chuckled.

Yuck! I wanted to scream at him to get it away from my face.

“Suck me,” he commanded.

He yanked me by the hair to face him and prodded open my mouth. My wrists burned in their cuffs above me as he pulled me closer. He shoved himself in, all the way to the back of my throat. Thankfully his penis wasn’t long enough to gag me. I kept my lips tight around him, letting him control the speed, hoping he’d come fast and get it over with. But he didn’t. After a while of grunting into my face he flipped me, twisting my wrists, and climbed onto the bed behind me. He grabbed my hips and pulled them up, shoving my head face down.

Over. I just wanted this to be over.

His hands roamed across my whelp marks and his breathing went raspy. He open-palm smacked my ass cheek and my head flew back from the stinging pain, holler wrenching from my throat.

He smacked again, a growling laughter bubbling up when I yelled again. He seemed to love when I vocally responded to the pain, so I gave the sadistic bastard what he wanted. Five times he smacked my already-sensitive bottom and hips. Then he bit my ass cheek and I screamed. It wasn’t a skin-breaking bite, but his sharp teeth hurt. He did it on the other side and then buried his face in my ass crack. I squirmed, wanting more than anything to scream for him to get his face off me, but it wasn’t necessary. He was finally so worked up that he went up to his knees and pushed his dick into me.

“Ah, apretado!” He called me tight and began to thrust faster, smacking my hip every few seconds like he was riding a horse. I made a lot of noise for him, praying it would end soon. He reached down and grabbed a handful of my hair, wrenching my head back. Freaking-A, that hurt! He was fucking me super-fast now and with a hard yank of my head his deep voice went up a few octaves and I felt him coming inside me.

I breathed, relieved it was over.

That hadn’t lasted long. Maybe fifteen minutes. Fifteen
unpleasant
minutes.

I thought about the soft little mattress waiting for me in the slave quarters.

He pulled out of me slowly, and turned me to my back.

“Now for dessert,” he said in Spanish.

My heart sunk. Why couldn’t he just be happy with his orgasm and leave me the hell alone? My head spun—I was feeling loopy now and I wondered if it was from the drug or the day’s experiences crashing down on me.

He pushed my thighs apart, holding them up with his hands and squeezing so hard I’d probably have fingertip bruises. I yelped when his face went to my crotch and he began lapping at my hole, at his own come. And then he latched on to the sensitive nub of my clit and sucked with abandon, flicking the tip of his tongue. Every nerve ending came to life and blood rushed between my thighs. I panted.

No.
No!

I orgasmed violently, my hips bucking from the unexpectedness of it. It didn’t last long, brief and intense, but my scream and obvious pleasure were enough to make him hard again. He raised my ankles to his shoulders and slid into me, pushing my legs toward my chest so he was close enough to grab my nipples and pinch them, twisting.

Hot shame and regret filled me. That orgasm had come out of nowhere—I rarely ever came, even during good sex. Maybe the drug had relaxed me too much. Whatever the reason, I was mad at myself for making him think this was all okay. I hated my stupid body for reacting. It hadn’t been enjoyable in the ways that counted to me. In that moment I swore to myself I’d never come again for one of Marco’s patrons. I might not be able to keep anything else from them, but that would be mine.

Round two lasted longer than round one, but by the end he was tired out and I was sore all over. Luis came to get me, shedding my blindfold as we exited the room. I crawled back to the slave quarters with remnants of my first patron seeping down my thighs. The crawl of shame.

I felt like I’d died and gone to hell.

This is not my life,
I chanted in my head.
This will all be over soon.

I had to keep saying it or I’d lose myself. The moment this all became my “norm” would be the end. I’d truly be Angel instead of Angela, and I could never let that happen. I couldn’t fight the people here, couldn’t control them, but I could fight my own mind and control it.

I had to.

Something was going on the next morning. Something big.

Luis got me out of bed early, wrapping a bandana around my mouth to gag me and slipping a blindfold over my eyes. He didn’t even make me put my collar on. I still wore the see-through negligee from the night before, seeing as how this place had no pajamas, but I wished I’d had time to put on underwear. Luis pulled me through the house, speed-walking. My heart pounded. Did I do something wrong? Had Marco’s friend been unhappy with me? I ran through the night, trying to remember any “rules” I may have broken.

But then I realized it wasn’t just me. The whole house had a nervous ring to it. The workers were all quieter than normal. I heard someone whisper in Spanish about policía and news reporters. At the sound of those words, I dug my bare heels against the floor, a rush of exalted longing to escape rushing through me.
Someone is here! They’re here for me!
A scream ripped from me, its glory muffled by the cloth in my mouth. Luis grasped me harder and another man grabbed me from the other side. I went into full freakout mode.

The men lifted me by the arms and rushed forward despite my kicking and thrashing. I didn’t care if I was punished; all I knew was this was my chance.

I heard some sort of latch creak open and then smelled dank damp air as we descended. I fought with renewed passion, knowing they were taking me back into the confinement room I’d been in with Josef. Underground. Probably soundproof. My fighting earned me a ringing slap on the side of the head. They threw me on the dirt floor and the door slammed. I ripped off my blindfold and gag.

In that moment I felt like a deranged animal. I attacked the door, yanking on the handle and yelling as loudly as I could. I kicked the door with my bare feet, punched it, clawed at it, beat it with everything I had, all the while screaming like a banshee. When my whole body was thrumming with self-inflicted injuries and my throat was hoarse, I dropped to the ground and cried deep, heaving sobs. Screw Marco and his no crying rule. I didn’t care about belts or cuffs or anything except
who
was at the villa looking for me and what, if anything, they’d find.

Please, God
… I prayed. I begged, pleaded, and tried to make deals with that invisible entity I’d never given much thought to before.
If you get me out of here I swear I’ll be good. I won’t even question why You let this happen. I’ll do anything You want.

I crawled to the door and pressed my ear to it. Nothing. Not a single sound.

“Hello?” I banged my open palm against it. “I’m down here!”

Silence. I sat down with my back against the door and closed my eyes.

It didn’t take long for me to start to feel crazy in the compact room with no stimulation. With no way to mark the passage of time I just sat there and listened, my auditory sense becoming so acute in the silence I could hear my own heart beating and the movement of air into and out of my lungs, but nothing else.

Twice that day the door was opened. Each time I would scream and try to fight my way out, but all that got me were painfully ringing ears from smacks to the head, bruised appendages, and plates of spilled food at my feet.

“
Fuuuck!
” I screamed in frustration the second time and kicked my plate of grilled chicken and steamed vegetables. It splattered against the wall and I didn’t care because I couldn’t even think of eating. Nobody was going to find me down here. A bleak feeling of despair settled over me like nettles.

“Why?” I cried. “Why are you doing this to me?” I didn’t even know who I was talking to. Marco. God. That bitch, Karma. All of them. Why?

Hours later I lay curled against the door and sheer exhaustion took me.

The next day they brought me nothing. In my hunger I thought about eating the dirty food that I’d thrown, but angry pride kept me from it. And just to ensure I wouldn’t give in and eat it, I picked up each piece and threw it in the crap bucket.

Okay, so I was cutting off my own nose to spite my face, as my mom used to say, but my mind had gone to a dark and cloudy place. The kind of place where, for the first time ever, death began to hold some appeal. I spent the day dreaming about the least painful ways I could go—begging Marco to drug me or gas me. I wasn’t above using his guilt about Fernando as leverage.

But, no. In the end, I knew I wouldn’t do it. Because even in that scary, shadowy place of my mind, a feather of hope floated along, stark white and bright.