5. The Protocol—First Dose #2
I am. I hadn't noticed. Fine tremors running through my whole body, fear and arousal and exhaustion all tangled together.
"Turn back."
I turn. Face him again. Those frozen eyes, that impassive face. If he's pleased or disappointed or hungry, I can't tell. He gives nothing away.
"This is your first lesson." He sets down his coffee.
"Your body belongs to me. Not sometimes.
Not partially. Completely. When I give a command, you obey.
When I tell you to move, you move. When I tell you to stop, you stop.
There is no negotiation. There is no resistance. There is only compliance."
The words land like blows. In my chest, in my stomach, in the place between my legs that I refuse to acknowledge.
"What about my mind?" The question escapes before I can stop it. "You said the Protocol doesn't erase my thoughts. If I can still think—if I can still choose internally?—"
"You can hate me." He shrugs. One shoulder.
Elegant and dismissive. "You can resent every moment of this.
You can spend the entire year plotting my downfall inside your head.
But your body will still obey. And eventually...
" He pauses. Something flickers in his expression. "Eventually, your mind will follow."
No. I won't let that happen. I won't let him have all of me. My body might be his, but my thoughts, my feelings, my self. Those are mine. Those will always be mine.
But even as I think it, the warmth pulses through me, the pleasure coiling in my core, my body responding to his proximity like a flower turning toward the sun.
How long before the body's surrender becomes the mind's?
"Service." I force the word out. "You said I'd be called for service. What does that mean?"
He picks up his tablet. Gestures for me to follow. "Come."
I follow. I can't not follow.
We leave the kitchen, moving through the penthouse toward a sitting room I hadn't found during my lost wandering. He settles into a leather chair, crossing his legs, the tablet balanced on his knee. The posture of a king holding court.
"Stand there." He points to a spot in front of him. "Don't move."
I stand. I don't move.
"Service means different things on different days." He swipes through something on the tablet, not looking at me. "Some mornings, you'll serve me breakfast. Prepare coffee. Make yourself useful in domestic ways."
I'm a maid. He bought me for a year and I'm a maid.
"Other mornings, you'll attend to my personal needs." He glances up. Holds my gaze. "Bathing. Dressing. Physical... maintenance."
Physical maintenance. The words slither through me.
"Some mornings, I'll use you sexually." He says it so casually. Like he's describing a schedule for deliveries. "Sometimes in the morning, sometimes at night, sometimes in the middle of the day. Your body is available to me at all times. That's what you signed."
I know what I signed. I know. But hearing it laid out like this?—
"You'll also serve me at meals. Kneel beside my chair while I eat.
Pour my drinks. Attend to whatever I require.
" He sets down the tablet. "Your days will be structured.
Exercise. Reading, if you like. My library is available to you.
Rest. Whatever activities I deem appropriate.
But when I call, you come. When I command, you obey.
Your time is mine. Your body is mine. For one year, you exist to serve me. "
I'm going to be sick. The Protocol keeps my body still, keeps my face neutral, but inside I'm screaming. A year. A year of this. Kneeling beside his chair. Pouring his drinks. Offering my body whenever he reaches for it.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes." The word comes out hollow.
"Yes, what?"
I stare at him. What does he want me to?—
"When you address me in private, you'll call me 'sir.'" His voice hardens. "In certain contexts, 'Master.' We'll discuss those contexts as they arise. For now—yes, what?"
The word tastes like ash in my mouth.
"Yes, sir."
Something shifts in his expression. Satisfaction. Pleasure. The first real emotion I've seen him show since I walked into this kitchen.
"Good girl."
The praise lands like a slap. Like a caress.
My body responds, another flush of warmth, another pulse of shameful arousal, and I hate him for it.
I hate him for turning biology against me, for making my body a traitor, for sitting there fully clothed and perfectly composed while I stand naked, shaking, and wet.
He stands.
"Come with me."
I follow him out of the sitting room, down a hallway I haven't seen before. The penthouse seems endless. Room after room, door after door, a labyrinth designed for one person and staffed by ghosts. Where are the servants? The housekeepers? I haven't seen anyone but the security guards and him.
We stop in front of a door. His bedroom. It has to be.
He opens it.
The room is massive. Dominated by a bed that could sleep six people comfortably.
Dark wood frame, gray linens, brutally expensive and perfectly made.
The walls are the same stark white as the rest of the penthouse, broken only by a single large painting I don't recognize.
Floor-to-ceiling windows look out over the city, the morning sun casting long shadows across the hardwood floor.
He crosses to another door. Opens it.
The bathroom.
If the bedroom is massive, the bathroom is obscene. Marble floors, marble walls, marble counters. A freestanding tub that looks like it was carved from a single block of stone. And dominating the far wall:
A shower.
Not a shower. A shower room. Glass walls enclosing a space bigger than my old apartment's bathroom. Multiple heads. A bench built into one wall. Steam still lingering from recent use.
Sebastian turns to face me. Pulls his t-shirt over his head.
I freeze.
His body is?—
I can't look away. The Protocol won't let me look away, but even without the Protocol I don't think I could. He's carved from marble, every muscle defined, every line deliberate. Golden skin stretched over the body of a god. A sculpture come to life.
He drops the shirt on the floor. Hooks his thumbs in the waistband of his sweatpants.
Pushes them down.
No underwear.
He steps out of the sweatpants, completely nude, completely shameless. And he's—God, he's?—
I've never seen a man like this. Not in person. Not this close. He's big everywhere, proportional, unselfconscious in his nakedness in a way I will never be. He stands there and lets me look, lets me take in every inch of him, and there's no vulnerability in it. Only power.
He steps into the shower. Turns on the water. Steam billows.
Then he turns back to me.
"Get in."