Carla
Carla parked her car in front of Gio's house and checked the time on her cell phone with a trembling hand.
It was exactly three minutes to eleven.
Carla had left early to make sure she arrived on time. She didn't necessarily think that Gio would pull the lever on his plan to publicly humiliate her exactly at eleven—she was fairly certain that his overconfidence and his need to possess her would make him wait a while longer, certain that she'd show up anyway.
She also knew she couldn't be sure of his behavior, which meant she couldn't afford to take that chance. She'd spent enough time with Gio to see that he had the quick temper and whims of a spoiled child, and now that he had the upper hand, it would be a mistake to provoke him.
But despite Carla's careful preparation, she still managed to hit unexpected traffic on Lake Shore thanks to a five-car accident. The police and emergency vehicles had blocked off all but two lanes of the expressway, and they were conducting cars through at a maddeningly slow pace. As Carla edged her car forward a few inches at a time, she felt her nerves being shredded with each passing minute and cursed herself for not leaving even earlier.
Now she was at Gio's place with minutes to spare, and she still had to will her hand to open the car door.
In all the months she'd spent listening to the Mancinis' taped conversations, she'd heard many rumors and wild speculations about the things Gio did with his women, but nothing solid or confirmed. Earlier that evening, she'd visited dozens of websites about S&M dungeons and practices to try to determine what she should expect, but each one seemed completely different from the others in terms of rules and fetishes and equipment.
Some had been oddly compelling, while others were downright nightmarish. Some spoke of trust and boundaries, while others seemed focused on pushing things as far as they could go short of committing actual rape and/or murder.
And for all she knew, Gio's style of “play” would conform to none of these. It could be a macabre symphony of torture and mutilation that followed no rules but his own.
She forced herself to get out of the car. When she commanded her legs to walk toward the front door, they seemed stiff and numb beneath her, as though they belonged to someone else. Each time one of her high heels came down on the driveway, the sound seemed as loud as a cannon blast, echoing and ringing in her ears.
Halfway up the driveway, her legs suddenly stopped, and she felt like she might throw up, run away, or both. She squeezed her eyes shut and pushed these feelings out of her. Then she opened them, took a deep breath, and kept walking.
When she got to the door, she rapped on it gently, almost hoping Gio wouldn't hear her. But a moment later, he opened the door, frowning at her. He wore a black silk shirt with light gray trousers, and he was in the process of tying his tie.
“You're early,” Gio observed testily. “By almost a whole minute.”
Carla's mouth fell open. That was the last thing she'd expected him to say. She stammered, “Uh, I didn't think...”
“Don't talk back to me,” Gio snapped, finishing his tie. “Get in here.”
Carla walked in and Gio stepped around her, slamming the door hard. Carla found herself wondering whether it would be one of the last sounds she'd ever hear, and a deep shiver overtook her body.
This is stupid, her frightened mind yammered. This is so stupid. I can't believe I've put myself in this position. This isn't a game. He's murdered people. He'll probably murder me when he's done cutting and electrocuting and violating me. I'm going to spend the final moments of my life begging for death and I walked myself right into it, stupid, stupid, stupid...
“And no, you did try to think, which is the problem,” Gio continued coldly. “You thought that even though I said eleven, you could get here before then and everything would be fine. But when I say eleven, I mean eleven. Not a minute before. Not a minute after. From now on, you don't get to think for yourself. You simply do what I tell you to do, when I tell you to do it, period. No hesitation, no interpretation. My word is your law. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” Carla said, looking into his brown eyes with what she hoped was an expression of submission and awe.
“Yes what?” he prompted, his body tensing.
Carla instinctively knew that he was getting ready to hit her, and she felt her gut clench. The websites she'd visited had no consistency when it came to what subs were supposed to call their Doms. Even though he'd just commanded her not to think for herself, she knew she had to come up with the right name to call him. “Sir?” No, that seemed too formal and businesslike for someone like Gio. “Daddy?” Somehow, given his issues with his father, she felt certain it would turn him off. Which only left...
“Yes, Master,” Carla said in a low voice.
Gio nodded, satisfied. “Good. Now lower your eyes, and keep them low. You're not allowed to look me in the eyes until I tell you to.”
“Yes, Master,” she said again, her eyes flicking downward.
“I like your suit,” Gio said. “You look like a birthday present just waiting to be unwrapped. Go to the stairs and walk up ahead of me.”
“Yes, Master,” she said a third time. The words had been almost comically strange to her at first, but she found that they were already starting to come to her more easily. They almost seemed like a mantra—their meaning was less important than their sound.
Carla walked up the stairs. She hurried at first, assuming he'd punish her if she dawdled. But after the first few steps, she suddenly felt the palm of his hand smack against her bottom hard, the sound ringing out like the crack of a whip.
She gasped, more from surprise than pain, though a warm ache was already starting to spread across her buttock.
“Slowly,” Gio said loudly. “And move your hips from side to side as you do it. I want to watch your tight little ass as we go up.”
Carla obeyed him, sashaying her hips back and forth with each step like the swinging pendulum of a clock. It wasn't the first time she'd been able to feel his eyes on her ass, but now his gaze was so intense that it almost seemed to burn into her.
She reached the second floor and stopped at the landing. As she did, she tried to sneak a look around her, to see if she could see into any rooms or observe any details that might give her an advantage over Gio. But all the doors were closed, except for one with another set of stairs beyond it.
Carla felt Gio's hand smack against the other side of her bottom this time, and she gasped again. Thin red lines of pain branched across her buttocks like creeping ivy.
“I didn't say you could stop,” Gio snarled. “Up those steps. Now.”
And if I had just gone for that second set of steps, he'd punish me for doing it before he told me to, Carla thought to herself grimly. He's going to find reasons to hurt me no matter what I do or how much I try to follow his rules.
She shuddered, again contemplating the possibility that she might die in this place.
“Yes, Master,” Carla said, walking up the second set of stairs.
When she got to the top and stole a glance around, she saw that she was in a dimly-lit attic. Many pieces of mysterious-looking furniture stood around her, and there were wall-mounted racks and standing glass cases filled with sex toys. She recognized a few of the implements from her research online earlier, but others were unfamiliar, and she could only imagine their sinister purposes.
What scared her the most, though, was the thick gray corrugated padding on the walls. It looked like a series of egg boxes, and with a sinking feeling, she realized the room was soundproofed.
She heard Gio approaching the top of the steps behind her and she stepped forward so he'd be able to enter the room.
“You can scream as loud as you want in here,” Gio sneered, as though he'd noticed her looking at the walls. “No one's going to hear you.”
As she listened to Gio's voice, Carla realized that ever since she'd arrived at his house, he'd been speaking in a tone that was quite different from his usual one. In the normal context of their relationship—a young mobster and his lawyer—he tended to affect a more traditional Italian-American patter like tough guys in gangster movies, littered with “gonnas,” “ain'ts,” and double-negatives. But now that he was in his own private space, his speech patterns were more clipped and precise. She wondered if this was subconscious on his part, or if he knew that he had to show different personas based on who he was around and what was expected of him.
She thought about how many versions of himself Gio felt he had to show the world, and whether any of them even came close to resembling his true self, or if he even knew what that was. If she hadn't been so immediately fearful for her own life, Carla thought she might have pitied him again in this moment.
“There are rules that have to be followed in this room,” Gio said. “First, no woman is allowed to be clothed in here, so strip down. Take everything off.”
Carla unbuttoned her jacket and took it off. As she did, she was careful to keep her movements slow and deliberate, knowing that Gio wanted to savor the show. She dropped the jacket and undid the buttons on her white silk blouse, letting it slide down her arms and onto the floor behind her. She reached behind her back, unclasped her white bra, and likewise let it slip down her arms and onto the floor in front of her feet.
She felt the embarrassment of sudden exposure breeze over her like a chill, and even though the room was warm, her nipples hardened until they hurt.
Carla stepped out of her high heels, then undid her pants. She hooked her thumbs into the sides and slid them all the way down her legs, along with her white cotton panties. Now she stood before him fully nude, her eyes on the floorboards as she listened to his slow and steady breathing behind her.
She heard Gio step forward, taking something from a peg on the wall just out of her peripheral line of vision. His hands lifted over her head and lowered something long and thin in front of her face, and for a terrible moment, she was sure he was going to strangle her to death right then.
But his hands held a black leather collar decorated with small metal studs. He put it around her neck, fastening it at the back and clipping a chain leash to it. It was snug, but Carla was still able to breathe normally.
For now.
“The second rule is that no women are allowed in here without a collar and leash.” When he spoke again, Carla could hear the smug gangster tone creeping back into his voice. “Otherwise, the dogcatcher might come by an' haul you off to the pound, heh.
“The third rule,” he continued, “is that every time we're together here, you'll have a yellow word and a red word. You will say the yellow word when you feel like you're reaching the edge of what you can take...when you want me to keep going, but you don't want me to escalate it any further. When you say the red word, it will mean you want me to stop completely.”
Carla almost couldn't believe her ears. Was he really going to treat this like an actual Dom-sub relationship, and give her a chance to control what she endured?
Or was he just fucking with her by laying out boundaries that he had no intention of respecting at all?
“I will choose your yellow and red words for you,” Gio said. “Because whenever you're with me, you'll be free from the burden of making any choices for yourself at all. Isn't that nice?”
“Yes, Master,” Carla replied.
“I knew you'd agree,” Gio said smugly. “Tonight, your yellow word will be 'earth,' and your red word will be 'fire.'
“The fourth rule,” he finished, “is that no women are allowed on two feet in this room. Whenever you're here, you get down on all fours and you crawl like a bitch. So do it. Now.”
Carla lowered herself to her hands and knees.
“That's it,” Gio smirked encouragingly. “That's a good girl. You're going to be a good little pet, I can tell. Nice and obedient. Now, do you see that post in the center of the room?”
Carla raised her eyes and saw a short, thick post made of polished black wood just a few feet away. There was a large metal ring attached to its base.
“Yes, Master,” Carla said.
“Crawl over to it,” Gio ordered.
Carla crawled forward to the post, breathing hard. Her heart was pounding like a drum and her skin prickled with hot humiliation. She'd never even thought about letting anyone treat her like this before.
“Now wait there with your head down,” Gio said. He went to one of the shelves, took something down, and returned, kneeling next to her. When Carla saw what he had, she felt the sweat on her skin turn cold.
He was holding a set of handcuffs.
Gio snapped the cuffs around one of her wrists, threaded it through the metal ring, and then snapped them onto her other wrist, binding her to the base of the post. Then he stood and positioned himself behind her again.
“Put your ass in the air,” Gio said. “Offer yourself to me like an animal in heat.”
Carla did as she was told, arching her back and exposing her labia to him. She heard a faint metallic clink, followed by a sound like leather sliding against fabric.
She felt an icy stab of terror as she realized he was removing his belt.
“Your bottom's nice and red from where I hit it,” Gio said. “Still, I think it could be a lot redder. Let's find out.”
Carla heard the whisk of the belt cutting through the air, and the deafening crack as it connected with her buttocks. A split-second later, fiery agony lit up the surface of her skin and she let out a cry of pain.
“Ask me for another,” Gio commanded.
“May I have another?” Carla asked through clenched teeth.
Instead of delivering another blow with his belt, Gio grabbed the chain leash and yanked on it hard, cutting off Carla's air. She tried to gasp, but her throat was locked shut, the blood trapped in her head.
“How are you supposed to address me?” Gio spat.
“M-Master...” Carla croaked. Her face was starting to throb, and there were lights dancing at the corners of her eyes.
“Good. Now say it right, and say please.” Gio loosened his grip on the leash and Carla sucked air into her lungs desperately.
“Please, Master, may I have another?” she wheezed.
The belt whistled through the air again and thwapped against Carla's naked ass. She let out a ragged scream, then took in more air and said, “Please, Master, may I have another?”
As the belt hit her again, she could feel the humiliation burning her down like a flame consuming candle wax, revealing and blackening the wick within. This hurt, but somehow, it didn't entirely feel bad to her, either. There was something below the physical pain, something almost eager to be freed.
She could take this. And somehow, she suspected she could take more, if needed.
Much more.
The belt came down, again and again, so quickly and viciously that she didn't even have time to ask for more between strikes. She could only breathe in and cry out, her yelps increasing in volume and pitch. In between, she simpered wordlessly, meaning to beg him for more but unable to offer anything but moans of encouragement.
Her bottom was burning intensely now, the agony broad and consuming. She could feel welts forming on her skin like searing pokers laid against her. Each smack of the belt was harder, and she started to feel dizzy and light-headed, her breath coming so hard and fast that she thought she might hyperventilate.
She felt something thin and warm trickle down her inner thigh. For a moment, she thought she was bleeding.
Then she realized it was her own moisture, and felt an odd shock of betrayal by her own body. How dare she enjoy this against her will, when she was so scared and angry and confused?
Gio threw the belt away and Carla watched it skid into a corner. She thought the pain might end then, at least temporarily—but a second later, she felt Gio's palm spank her hard with one hand as the fingers of his other hand rubbed the exposed lips of her pussy.
“I knew it,” Gio said triumphantly, his breath coming in short gasps. “I knew you'd be a slut for this stuff, whether you wanted to be or not.”
Two of his fingers pushed inside Carla and she let out a loud moan, feeling him press inside her and explore her greedily. As he did, he spanked her again, and Carla tightened around his fingers involuntarily. If he kept increasing his intensity while hitting her already-bruised flesh, she was afraid she might faint.
“Earth,” she stammered. “Earth!”
She expected Gio to keep hitting her without escalating the ferocity of the blows. Instead, she heard his pants unzip behind her, and a quiet tearing sound. A few moments later, a condom wrapped bounced to the floor to her left.
Then Gio's hands were on Carla's shoulders and he was shoving his cock inside of her roughly, plunging so deeply that she felt him slam up into her inner wall like a freight train colliding with a mountainside. It was painful, and with each thrust, his body pressed against the welts on her bottom so they lit up like glaring red neon signs. She heard his grunts of lust, and was surprised to hear her own as well, sounding savage and jagged.
The shaft of his cock was rubbing against her G-spot hard as the tip drove into her over and over, battering it mercilessly. She'd never been had like this.
She'd never known she wanted to be.
She tried desperately to regain control of her own mind in this hurricane of lust. Think of Fred, she thought, think of Don, think of Patty Kurtz, no, don't think, don't think at all, just give in, ride this wave, this ocean, let it carry you away, give in to it...just give in...
“Now,” Gio said, “look into my eyes. Do it!”
Carla looked over her shoulder. Some part of her noticed that he was still wearing his dress shirt—cuffs neatly folded up to his elbows—and tie.
Gio's eyes were blazing so hotly that looking into them was like looking directly at the sun. His face was a mixture of scorn and desire that Carla had never seen before on anyone, and as she felt him come inside of her, she came as well, screaming, with tears stinging her eyes and rolling down her cheeks.
She hated herself, she hated Gio, she'd never felt so wrong and so horribly right at the same time, and her arms and legs collapsed beneath her as he withdrew from her, so that she was reduced to nothing but a shaking, quivering, sobbing heap on the floor.