Chapter 2
Scarletta
I'm naked again.
New place, same strangers. Same humiliating vulnerability.
My three attendants guide me toward the tub and I try not to panic because Jesus Christ, it looks like something from a medieval torture museum.
Black stone. Cold and massive. Deep enough to drown in.
And at the far end—stirrups.
Stirrups.
Like the exam table. A moment from Christmas Eve flashes through my mind.
The way my masked man guided my heels into the stirrups after he caught me.
After he learned that I couldn't be trusted to be still so he had to strap me in.
The look in his eyes behind that mask—god, it made me want him to do very sick, strange things to me.
But this gyno-tub… what the hell is it?
I'm trying to reconcile where I even am right now.
The Caribbean, obviously. Tropical heat, palm trees, that thick humidity that makes my hair frizz instantly.
But I don't actually know. It's an island.
I saw it from the window of the plane. Two of them, actually.
Very close together. One with a lot of infrastructure, one without.
But I could be anywhere. Mexico. Belize. Who knows.
The trip here was awful.
I waited almost an hour for the limo. Standing in the lobby of my apartment building, checking my phone every thirty seconds, convinced the masked man changed his mind. Convinced the whole invitation was a joke. You really thought someone would pay fifty thousand dollars for you?
When the car finally arrived, I almost didn't get in.
That's not true.
I was always going to get in.
The plane was delayed—mechanical issues, they said. I sat in that private terminal for another two hours, spiraling, convincing myself this was a sign. A cosmic intervention telling me to go home.
I didn't.
The flight itself was turbulent as hell. I felt sick the entire time. Gripping the armrests, stomach churning, convinced we'd crash into the ocean and no one would ever find me because I hadn't told anyone where I was going.
Who would I have told? My mother didn't even call me on Christmas this year.
When I called her later in the afternoon on Christmas day,—still shaking, and excited, and confused, and happy, and bewildered, and relieved that my bank account held more digits than I'd ever thought possible in a single account balance—she made excuses for not calling me.
Claimed she was traveling and didn't have service. As she was talking to me on the phone.
I didn't even push back. She's not worth the fight.
But my hesitations for this experience were real, even if I had no one to bounce them off of. The whole flight here I kept thinking I should tell the pilot to turn around. Demand it.
Didn't.
I kept thinking I was insane for coming. That this is proof I'm damaged beyond belief.
It is, too. I am insane. Absolutely unable to make a good decision if my fucking life depended on it, because I left the cameras up in my apartment.
All sixteen of them are still running. Still recording everything I do. I know exactly where they are now. The masked man told me how to disable them and I… just… didn't.
I didn't change my passwords, didn't remove the keystroke logger.
I want him watching me.
I want him reading every filthy word I type into The Watcher, the novel I'm writing about him. About us. About everything he did to me.
I want him to see that I kept his Harvard shirt.
That I touch myself thinking about him.
That I accepted this invitation the second I saw it because forty-eight hours with him is worth any amount of money, any amount of fear, any amount of—
"Easy," one of them murmurs, steadying my elbow as I step into the tub. The water's steaming. Lavender. Eucalyptus.
And then—hands. Everywhere.
One cups my breast immediately, soaping it with deliberate pressure that makes my nipples harden. Another slides down my stomach. The third is working shampoo into my hair, tilting my head back, exposing my throat.
Oh god.
I try to stay still. Try to breathe. Try to remember this is just preparation, just like before.
Except it's not like before.
Before, they were gentle. Clinical. Professional.
This time they're... aggressive.
The one at my breast pinches my nipple between soapy fingers, rolling it, watching my face for reaction. The one washing my stomach lets his hand drift lower. Lower.
Between my legs.
I gasp.
His fingers slide through my folds, not accidental, not incidental—deliberate. Circling my clit with expert precision while his other hand grips my hip to hold me steady.
He's watching.
The thought slams into me with absolute certainty.
My masked man is watching right now. Probably on a dozen screens. Probably stroking that massive cock of his while three strangers touch me in a bathtub built like a gynecological nightmare.
This is his fetish.
Voyeurism.
I've written about it in—god, how many stories? Twelve? Fifteen? The protagonist watched through hidden cameras, touched by strangers while her captor observes from somewhere else, getting off on her humiliation, her helplessness, her—
"Fuck," I whimper.
The attendant between my legs increases pressure. His thumb works my clit in tight circles while his fingers tease my entrance. Not penetrating. Just... threatening to.
The one at my breast leans in and whispers, "You're so wet, beautiful. We can feel it."
I am. God, I'm dripping. The water around my thighs probably has my arousal floating in it like some kind of sick evidence of exactly what I am.
A slut who gets wet when strangers touch her.
A broken girl who craves this.
I could come right now. Right this second. His thumb is in exactly the right spot, the right pressure, the right rhythm. My pussy is clenching around nothing, desperate, begging to be filled.
But I hold it.
Because I don't know what he wants.
Does he want me to come? To lose control in front of these men while he watches from wherever he is?
Or does he want me to be strong? To deny myself? To prove I'm saving myself for him?
I don't know.
The attendant washing my hair rinses it, his fingers massaging my scalp with firm, possessive strokes. The one at my breast soaps down my ribs, my stomach, my hips. The one between my legs—
His finger slides inside me.
Just one. Just to the first knuckle. But enough to make me gasp, and arch, and nearly come on the spot.
Then he withdraws.
The water starts draining. It quickly lowers to knee level, then stops with a weird glug sound. "What's happening?" I ask, trying to sit up and look around.
One of the men shushes me, pushing me so my back is resting against the stone tub.
A mechanical noise—then my hips begin to lift out of the tub. Again, I try and sit up. Trying to figure out what the hell is happening.
And again, the attendant gently—but firmly—pushes me back.
I'm lifted.
Not by hands—by the tub itself.
My hips rise out of the water with a mechanical whirr that sounds like something from a sci-fi horror movie. The stone beneath my lower back tilts up, up, up, raising my pelvis while the rest of me stays submerged to my ribs.
Then the stirrups swing wide.
Metallic clicks. One after another. Click-click-click-click—like some medieval gynecological Transformer unfolding for battle.
Oh my god.
What the actual fuck is this thing?
The blond attendant picks up my right foot with gentle hands. His thumb strokes my ankle as he guides my heel into the stirrup. The metal is cold. Padded, but cold.
"Wait—" I try to pull back.
"Shh," he murmurs. "Just relax."
He closes something around my ankle. A cuff. Leather-lined but unmistakably a restraint. It locks with a soft snick.
My left foot goes next.
The dark-haired one guides it into position while I'm still processing what's happening. Another cuff. Another lock.
My legs are spread.
Wide.
Oh god.
The stirrups hold me open at an angle that makes my pussy completely exposed, raised above the waterline like I'm being presented for inspection. My thighs are trembling. I can feel cool air against my throbbing pussy, can feel how wet I am, how swollen.
I try to close my legs.
Can't.
The stirrups don't budge.
"Please—" I whisper.
The tall one with the long hair moves to my head, kneeling beside the tub. His hand cups my cheek. "You're okay, beautiful. Just breathe."
I'm breathing too fast. Panicking. Because I can't see what's happening down there. My head is low in the tub, water lapping at my shoulders, and my hips are raised up like—
Like an offering.
Like a sacrifice on some kind of stone altar.
The blond one moves between my spread legs, and that's when I see it.
The tray.
Shaving cream. Razor. Oil. Towels.
Oh no.
"We're going to make you perfect for him," the blond says, his voice so gentle it makes my stomach clench. "Just relax and let us work."
I want to protest. Want to tell them—
The shaving cream is warm.
The blond one spreads it along my bikini line with his bare fingers, working it into my skin with slow, deliberate strokes. His thumb brushes my clit—accidental or intentional, I don't know—and I gasp.
"Easy," the tall one murmurs from behind my head. His hands are in my hair now, massaging my scalp, tilting my head back. "Just feel it. Don't fight."
The third attendant—the dark-haired one—moves to my breast. His soapy hand cups it, thumb circling my nipple until it's hard and aching.
I close my eyes.
Because I can't watch this. Can't process it. Can't reconcile what's happening with who I'm supposed to be.
Good girls don't get wet when strangers shave their pussy.
Good girls don't arch into the touch when fingers pinch their nipples.
Good girls don't—
"He's watching you right now, beautiful."
My eyes snap open.
The tall one is looking down at me, his fingers still working through my wet hair. "Your masked man. He's watching. Put on a good show for him."
Oh god.