Lost Property (9 page)

And that was that.

Kath had to admit that Mostyn hadn’t mentioned Proteus, and it could mean that he just wanted a dirty weekend on his own terms, but somehow she was sure it didn’t. He had seemed pre-occupied and the touch to her bottom had been almost an afterthought. But in any case there was absolutely nothing more she could do. If she misbehaved any more, he might lose patience and sack her. She just had to wait and see if, by Friday night, she had a Mistress any more. And it really was all down to Proteus now, Angie had the technical staff at the hotel stand down and Kath was ordered to the spare bedroom even before bed time.

Thursday was a nightmare, she could hardly concentrate on work at all and the minutes dragged by interminably. The atmosphere at home continued to be cold and hostile so that by Friday morning, Kath was a nervous wreck.

She traipsed into work, listless and depressed and hardly bothered to react when one of the temporary staff stuck her head round her door.

“Kath Knowles?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Delivery at the main entrance for you.”

Puzzled but still far too worried about Angie to bother with much else, Kath made her way down to the main hall, vaguely wondering who the delivery was actually for – it had to be some kind of mistake.

When she stepped out of the lift she saw Charlie the doorman talking to a smartly dressed pair of men who immediately came across to her. They were large men – and it wasn’t fat.

“Miss Knowles?”

“Yes.” Kath’s voice was uncertain all of a sudden.

“Could you sign for something please, just out there.” He pointed through the glass doors to where a minibus stood in the car park. “It won’t take a moment, Miss.” He leaned close. “You’ve been selected for Proteus, haven’t you?”

Kath nodded, excited, relieved and scared all at the same time.

She followed the men outside and they ushered her to the sliding door on the side of the bus. She peered in and saw six or seven other young women.

“Don’t worry, Miss. It’s all very hush, hush. All your nearest and dearest will get letters telling them you’re on a residential course.”

Giving him a nervous smile she stepped up and into the bus, buckling herself in to a seat that was the nearest unoccupied one. The door slid shut and the driver, whose seat was partitioned off, steered the bus out into the London traffic. Suddenly, Kath realised that she was off at last. This was Proteus and she had no clothes other than those she stood up in and no bag, no money, no cards, no nothing. Frantically she slapped her skirt pocket and felt the thin shape of her mobile there. She pulled it out, desperate to tell Angie the good news but a girl sitting in one of the seats ahead turned round.

“Don’t bother, hun. We think there’s a signal suppresser on board, we all got diddly squat when we tried to call.”

“Oh,” Kath tried to hide her disappointment at not being able to restore herself to her Mistress’ good books. “Well I expect it’ll all be made clear eventually,” she said and tried a bright smile.

“Yeah,” the other girl sounded unconvinced but no one seemed inclined to talk and the bus wound its way out of London while its passengers tried to see the signs outside – or to see anything outside. The smoked glass was just as dark from the inside as from the outside. She tried to open a window at one point and found they were all sealed shut.

Someone wanted the girls taken onto the Proteus course to enjoy very high levels of privacy.

Kath fretted about not being able to let Angie know where she was and there was a core of unease that wouldn’t go away. The journey went on for a long time and when someone tried to strike up a conversation an LED message scrolled across above the windscreen telling them that the course mentors at Proteus would immediately mark down anyone who talked. With no idea what advantage or damage Proteus could do to their future prospects, the girls held their peace as the journey wore on and more passengers were added until Kath counted ten of them.

Sharon was definitely of the opinion that that final vodka and whatever it was, had been one too many. Even for her. And besides it had taken the last of her cab fare home.

That was why she had decided to put out for those lads – to earn the cash for a taxi. And that was where she had been, in an alley just around the corner from the club when the police had found her with her skirt up round her waist, one lad going in from behind while she took another in her mouth.

There had been the usual scuffle as they were loaded into the wagon but with tazers it was one sided these days – especially when those on the receiving end were as paralytic as they had all been to start with.

Of course she had offered to do the same for the officers – it was a tactic that had got her out of some scrapes in the past – but there were no takers this time from Manchester’s finest and now she languished in a cell awaiting the inevitable charge and remand. It’d be Community Service again, she was dead sure but it might just be a chat about changing her ways, for once she hadn’t actually nicked anything or fought anyone. She’d just been shagging a bit too publicly.

Still they seemed to be taking a lot more time about things this than usual. She was sure she’d been there at least for a day, her stomach was rumbling and her hangover was fading fast. But at last she heard the hatch in the door slide open and saw a man peering in. Then a key turned and the door opened.

Two men entered. One was in the uniform of a prison officer, the other was in jeans and a plain shirt. He was lean and sun tanned and he looked directly at her in a way no one else ever had. He was assessing her and whatever it was for, she reckoned she was failing. He wasn’t sneering exactly, he didn’t appear to think he even needed to do that. It was as if he knew he was superior to her in ways she couldn’t even begin to understand. She felt the familiar heat of rage stir inside her. The rage that had won her so many fights, but which had also had her in and out of the nick for the last four of her nineteen years.

“Sharon Wilkins, Mr Lang. Got form as long as your arm.”

Sharon was proud of that fact and decided to try it on a bit with this guy who was probably some kind of poncey social worker. She was still wearing just the short black skirt and pale blue shirt she had worn the night before. She let her left leg slide off the narrow cot she was sitting on, giving the stranger a direct view up to her knickerless crotch.

The man’s eyes took in the view but not a flicker of expression registered on his face.

“Done last night for gross indecency. Shagging some guys in the city centre. She said she needed the taxi fare home, but had enough in her bag to buy a bloody taxi!”

That was news to Sharon. Christ! She must’ve been more hammered than she had known.

“The lads’ve been sent to a quarry for a year’s hard labour. You want her?”

Sharon sat up straighter. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. She’d heard some rumours about a crackdown but it wouldn’t apply to her. Not to her. They wouldn’t dare! But there was something about this guy she didn’t like.

“She’s a slut alright,” the man said with a posh, southern drawl, his eyes never leaving her for a second. “But is she the brainless scumbag she seems to be, I wonder?”

The rage that always seethed just below the surface inside her, erupted and Sharon was up off the bed and charging, hands outstretched, fingers clawed, ready to scratch and tear. It was a tactic that made her feared by all the other girls on her estate. She could punch above her weight with them and a lot of the guys too. Those she couldn’t fight she could shag, and there were always plenty of guys who wanted to do that. It was why she had her own gang.

But on this occasion it went badly wrong. The man simply wasn’t there. Instead she crashed heavily into the opposite wall. She spun round and found him standing in the middle of the floor with hands nonchalantly on hips.

She rushed him again, this time staying lower, aiming to get him around the waist and bear him down with the ferocity of her charge. But once again he wasn’t there. What was there however was an arm that took one of hers and lifted it high above her back as she charged past, and a foot that took hers out from under her.

She somersaulted helplessly back onto the cot, landing flat on her back, winding herself and smashing both chains that held it horizontal from the wall, against which it could be folded.

The small room echoed with the crash and Sharon lay whooping and gasping for breath in the middle of the ruin. The man made no move towards her and as her wind returned, she found one of the chains that had held the cot and with a wordless snarl she rose again and charged. Pain exploded in her arm as she swung it at him, the chain swinging lethally behind it. Without seeing how he did it, Sharon found he had her hand twisted back under forearm in such a way that it had to drop the chain, she had been spun round and something that felt like a red hot poker was pressed against the side of her neck. She tried to kick back and free herself. Effortlessly, he lifted her off the ground and kept her there. All the time the pressure on her neck was growing and it didn’t help to realise that all he was using was his fingers. The pain became such that she knew she had to make it stop. The only way was to go limp. She slumped and he let her down, pushing her away from him. She took a shuddering gasp of air and massaged the side of her neck where he had applied the grip.

“She’s scum,” the man said. “She’ll do nicely. I’ll take her.”

The men turned and left. Sharon tried to scream imprecations at them but found that he had robbed her of her voice temporarily. And by the time it returned, she was on a truck, chained by her ankles in the dark, heading for somewhere she thought sounded like Preston, which was not far from Manchester. But then again she might have misheard and all of a sudden she was not certain of anything any more.

Chapter Seven

On the second night of a three day show, Carlo Suarez always took things easy, especially if the outcome was as precariously balanced as this one was. Therefore he was sipping at a soft drink only as he walked along the walls of the great fortress that looked out across the Mediterranean. It was the base for the home team, the team that had hired in CSL livestock to strengthen its own squad against a stable from East Asia that fielded many diminutive but surprisingly tough slaves. Beside him paced the elegantly dressed owner, Johnson N’Benga; a man whose fortune had been made in commodity dealing and who was now dealing in slightly less legal commodities, which nevertheless afforded him much more pleasure than fruit and beans, as he happily admitted with an infectious grin whenever he was asked.

In the courtyard below them some of the spectators of the games had paid for the use of the slaves in the evening and were ensuring they got good value for money. It was standard procedure at games and whereas the squad members could be hired quite cheaply as there were at least a hundred in each stable these days, these punters had paid for the solo fighters; Carlo’s hired-in ones amongst them and in the privacy of this closed area were sampling the delights of Blondie herself, Ox, Trouble, Purdy and El Tigre from CSL plus several more of Johnson’s.

The two men paused in their promenade and looked down as Ox roared her way to another orgasm, nipples and labia pierced, her backside caned and now being energetically fucked. Carlo’s eyes sought out Blondie, as they always did. She was the widely acknowledged ‘Queen of the Arenas’, capable of winning at everything from pony racing to chariot racing, pursuit running and studded whip duelling. She was Mistress of all trades within the arenas and currently there was a queue of men and women waiting to use her so they could have their photos taken with the spectacular blonde’s body playing host to them at one end or the other, or both at the same time. Purdy was undergoing her usual breast torments – they were uncommonly big for an arena slave and she always attracted those who loved to ply the whips, pegs, needles and clamps the stables thoughtfully supplied for such purposes. As he watched, she threw her head back and joined Ox in wherever it was slaves went to when they orgasmed under punishment. Beside her, Trouble, the indefatigable lover of Ox and fellow whip specialist was taking yet more lashes and soaking them up stoically. Tigre was suspended by her ankles with her legs wide open and was clearly lost to this world as she sucked hard on one cock while another priapic man belaboured her back with a single tail whip.

All was as it should be, but Carlo would only be happy when they were all bedded down safely.

“Have you submitted the list of entrants for tomorrow’s events?” Carlo asked Johnson.

“Yes, as agreed I’ve put Blondie in for the pony racing, but put Purdy in for the chariots with Tigre. That way we can field Blondie for the finale. I think we’ll come through ok but they’ve been tough competitors,” Johnson said.

“It’s a long time since I saw Ox and Trouble have to work so hard for points in the log pulls,” Carlo agreed.

“And even Blondie only tied for first place in the pursuit running. Mind you the girl who matched her was way ahead of the rest of her stable too.”

“Yes.”

Carlo looked thoughtfully as Blondie’s exhausted body was hauled up off the table it had been tied down to and she was turned around and laid face down. Someone wanted to have their photo taken up to the hilt in the famous blonde’s arse. A few years ago he would have happily put her in for the studded whip duelling and the pursuit running on the same day but this time he had held back and let Purdy take on the duelling. She had done well too, winning all three of her bouts, but whereas Blondie would normally have been a foregone conclusion for the pursuit running – where a naked girl was released ahead of a rider in the arena and had to make as many circuits before being caught as possible – she had been equalled this time by a delicate but superbly athletic Chinese girl. And only a few months ago in Asia she had barely won a studded whip duel and struggled in the pursuit running. Carlo knew everyone was watching him, waiting to see when he would call time on the girl who had almost invented the mystique of the female gladiator, who had suffered more and achieved more in the arenas than any other.

Johnson seemed to read his mind.

“You’ll know when it’s time, my friend. You and she know each other more closely than any two people I ever met.”

“Thanks,” Carlo said and they moved on.

Later that evening, Carlo considered having her brought to his room for a while but dismissed the thought. It was better that she get a full night’s sleep after a day competing and then being used in the evening. He made do with one of Johnson’s household girls, a demure looking African girl who nevertheless took him in her back passage with all the knowledge and competence he could have wanted. He allowed her to stay once she had cleaned him up and he woke refreshed and ready for the final day.

The N’Benga arena, like all the new ones that were springing up, had abandoned the original practice of naming themselves under colours – as the Roman teams had. There were simply not enough colours to go around and although The Girl Squad fought under yellow and black colours, it was simply referred to by everyone as The Girl Squad. Johnson’s stable competed under a sort of deep maroon coloured flag but was known as the N’Benga stable. It sprawled along the North African coast and was kept reasonably cool by the breezes off the Mediterranean, so after a light breakfast, Carlo and the other drivers strolled under clear blue skies and with a salt wind in their faces along from the old fort that housed the majority of the N’Benga household, past the hotels and restaurants that catered for the guests and towards the pony racing course.

On their right as they walked was the actual arena, it was partly built from stones recovered from ruins that had been unearthed when Johnson had first started to develop the site. Around it were ranged the cages, surrounded by banks of terracing where the individual boxing and wrestling contests would take place quite shortly. Then just past them was the circus where the chariots would race before everyone returned to the arena proper for the climactic finale. The pony racing course was laid out around the dressage ground, starting and finishing within the stadium but leaving that arena and going across country for most of its length. Video screens would keep the crowds apprised of the rigs’ progress as they went. It was a good course, Carlo had walked it carefully and he was looking forward to the day as he and the others walked into the tack room.

Blondie was standing against the rear wall of the long room, tethered by a lead running from her heavy tongue ring to a hook over the pegs that held her tack. Carlo greeted her fondly with a pat on the rump and was nuzzled in return, then he set about giving her a quick examination, running his hands up and down her legs and arms, seeing if there were any strains or any bruising. The vets would have done it anyway but old habits died hard. He parted her buttocks and peered at the whorled pit of her anus, checking that the previous night’s usage hadn’t left it reddened and sore. He would coat her butt plug with his usual secret brew and it would certainly be sore by the day’s end, so he wanted to ensure it was in good condition to take what was coming its way.

As he straightened up from his examination the two vets entered accompanied by the Owners’ Council Referee, one of a group of men who were now a common sight at events. After their lawless and piratical start, the arenas’ owners had formed a body which now legislated for such things as the length and weight of whips to be given to slaves to fight with, the sort of tack that they should wear for racing and dressage. And in the arenas themselves they decided when a girl was down and out and oversaw the awarding of points. The owners had had the sense to see that as the scale of the investment they were making grew, so the need to ensure that that investment was protected by rules and regulations also grew. The introduction of vets to oversee the well being of the slaves had been grudgingly accepted by trainers and now the earning potential of the slaves was being considerably extended by more cautious treatment outside the arenas themselves, and even Carlo couldn’t argue with that.

He stood back as the two women in white coats gave each girl a quick going over, each vet examining the opposition’s slaves in their respective tack rooms, watched over by the stable’s own vet, to ensure there was no fixing going on from either side. Pupil dilation and pulse were checked and later on a urine sample test would be run. Then the referee stepped forwards and scrupulously examined the sets of tack to make sure that the length of the tines on the inside of the leather strapping was within regulation and that the plugs’ dimensions conformed to Council Rule No.1706 ii (c) and finally he checked that the whips all conformed too.

“Thank you, gentlemen, ladies,” he said when the formalities were concluded. “See you in the paddock in twenty minutes please.”

As soon as the door had closed behind him the day’s work began. Carlo took out his trusty spirit stove, just as Johnson’s drivers did and the air filled with the odours of the various spices the men employed to get the best out of their ponies. The materials had all been submitted in advance and examined by the Council, now the ingredients had been left on the central table in the room, in sealed plastic bags which only now were opened.

While the mixture was heated and the smell of ginger pervaded the room, Carlo began tacking Blondie up, settling the bridle over her head, passing the bit through her tongue ring and clipping the reins to its ends, then tightening the buckle at the back of the bridle that allowed a thick pony tail of blonde hair to escape and bounce at the nape of her neck, where she, like all arena slaves, bore her chip that contained her record. Lastly he settled the blinkers and made the final adjustments to the buckles that held the cheek and chin strap snug against her face. Then he turned back to the stove.

He gave the evil looking brew a quick stir, turned down the heat and went back to Blondie. He took down the tack and began to fit it, starting with the crupper and girth. As soon as she saw him take it down she spread her legs apart and he was able to buckle the girth on then leave the crupper hanging free for a moment. He returned to the stove, stirred and sniffed the pungent brew once more, turned off the heat and moved the small pan to cool down for a few moments. He returned to Blondie and, whistling happily between his teeth, buckled her tit straps in place. She stamped a couple of times as the tines on the insides bit into her, holding the straps firmly and thus ensuring her tits didn’t bounce too much as she ran. He moved behind her to buckle the thin strap that helped brace the front ones. It was kept thin so as not to interfere with however much whip her driver felt it was necessary to apply during a race. He gave her nipples a couple of lighthearted twists as he passed back in front of her, returned to the pan and tested the brew for heat. Around him the room began to echo to the snorts and whinnies of the other ponies as they were plugged and began to register the effects of their drivers’ concoctions.

Taking the pan over to Blondie, he dunked her butt plug deeply into the green brew, then he set the pan down and began to tighten the crupper, locating its dildo at her vaginal entrance and checking that the tines would lie nicely in between her labia then, once that had been achieved and the dildo easily inserted into her moist vagina, the butt plug was located at her anus. Despite her experience at anal penetration, her training kept her fairly tight and he had to screw and push the prong at first until it was accepted and sank into her. Then he wrenched the crupper up between her buttocks just as she began to stamp and cavil at the stinging that was beginning deep in her entrails.

“Whoa, there girl!” he chided. “Nothing you haven’t had before. Now, let’s get you buckled up nice and snug, then show you off to the punters!”

He tugged hard at the straps which came off the base of the plug and buckled each of them to the girth on either side of where it was buckled to itself.

There was none of the decorative detail of the dressage tack, no plumes atop the bridle, no flowing tail, no nipple piercing decorations and no decoration on the leather itself. This was simple working tack.

Hooking a finger through a cheek strap, Carlo led his pony out to where the rigs waited. He backed her between the shafts and unclipped her wrists from behind her before clipping them to rings on the shafts. Then he mounted the lightweight trap, stepping over the shaft carefully and lifted the carriage whip out of its holster once he had gathered the reins.

Between the shafts ahead of him he saw the most famous figure in the arenas, her shoulders were broad but her waist was trim and her hips swelled out enticingly to long, flawless thighs. And to his mind, the criss crossing welts and flares she bore from two days of competing and serving only made her more beautiful. Beside him the other N’Benga rigs pulled out towards the paddock and Carlo dragged his mind back to the job in hand.

There were to be two heats run between six rigs in each. The first two plus the two fastest losers from each heat went through to the final. He had tried to persuade Johnson to hire in Jet or Legs to strengthen the stable at this event but the owner had felt his side were strong enough. Carlo was not at all sure. In the first heat, the N’Benga stable were running a tall, beautiful girl whose skin was so dark it was almost true black but whose features were uncommonly delicate, and a Middle Eastern girl who was the colour of honey and who was hardly marked, having been held back for this event and the chariots. The tall black girl had fought in several melées and boxed in the pens as well but it was difficult to tell how marked she was. She moved very gracefully and Carlo knew a lot of punters would bet on her but he wasn’t sure about her stamina.

Their drivers were wiry Africans who carried no excess weight. Carlo had been impressed with their expertise in practice runs, they didn’t throw the lash unnecessarily but showed sound judgement in urging their mounts to perform rather than thrashing them into exhaustion.