The Novice Prey & the Daring Prey (45 page)

She saved washing between her legs for last, partly because she needed to work up her nerve for it. Unlike the previous time she'd showered for the benefit of an audience, she felt a real need to be thorough, given the gang-banging she'd gotten from the Andersons, and it made her a little shy.

It was starting to get dark by the time she was done. She wrung out the washcloth and dropped it on the pallet alongside the brush. Then she picked up the bucket. There wasn't much water left in it, so she upended it over her head. As if he'd been waiting for that signal, Mike turned the nozzle on the hose he held to a fine spray and began to rinse her off. The water was cold, and Alexa let herself shriek girlishly at the chill and dance around – carefully – on the pallet. Mike gradually adjusted the spray as he went, and she turned in place so that he could reach every part of her. She let out a few more squeals and shrieks before he was done. When he shut off the nozzle, she just stood there, shivering, wondering what came next. One of the slave barn employees, a man who looked to be in his late hundreds, came out and handed her a huge, thick towel. The glint in his eye as he looked her over suggested that he was still young at heart. Alexa accepted it with a smile and began to dry herself off, starting with her hair. Here she had a clear advantage over Martina. Hers was so short that it took hardly any time at all to dry, while the blonde's thick mane would never get dry through the use of a towel alone. No, Will would probably have to spend a lot of time with a hair dryer and brush. He might like that, though.

Once dried, Alexa, still shivering a little, handed the towel over to Mike and once again waited to see what came next. If she had to crawl back to her stall, a lot of her shower-tease would be wasted, since the ground around the pallet was wet and more than a little muddy. And if she was allowed to walk back, instead, her feet would get dirty. The old retainer provided a solution to that problem, bringing out a pair of flip-flops for her to wear. He still had that glint in his eye. Alexa slipped the cheap sandals onto her feet and let Mike lead her back to her stall. She felt almost completely refreshed, if still a little chilly, and was happy to see that her old, stained blanket had been replaced by a thin quilt. At the door to her stall, Mike halted her and took the chain from around her neck. There was a wide and thick black leather collar slung over the low door, and he held it up for her to see. It was soft, supple and shiny black, with heavy silvery D-rings set in the front and on both sides. The buckle was just as heavy. It was a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. When Mike began to put it around her neck, Alexa held her head up to make it easier for him. She wondered where he had gotten it. Last year Will hadn't collared her with anything nearly as beautiful. As Mike buckled the collar snugly around her neck, Alexa felt a first little thrill of anticipation. He would want to fuck her. After the display she'd put on just outside, he'd have to be a walking corpse not to want that. And he'd want to keep her. He wouldn't have put such a collar on her if he meant to sell her off. She could easily be his slave for the rest of her time here, and she didn't think he'd be anywhere near as rough with her as the Andersons had been.

“Sit, female.” Mike ordered after he had finished buckling the collar. It felt snug, but not uncomfortably so. Alexa obeyed, sitting down on the edge of the quilt. Mike just stood there, looking down at her, so she just sat there, looking up at him.

“Are you hungry?” Mike asked after a long, wordless moment.

“Yes, I am,” Alexa replied.

“Let's try this again,” Mike said with a sigh. “Are you hungry, female?”

“Oh! Yes, Master,” Alexa said demurely as she turned her head away from him. There was a lot to the whole Master-slave thing, and even then most of those relationships were customized to suit the people in them. She wasn't looking for a permanent Master, and she didn't think that Mike was looking for a full-time slave, but while they were here in Gordburg she could enjoy the role-playing. And the sex.

“All right,” Mike said. “Wait here for me. I'll be back shortly.” With that he turned and left, not just Alexa's stall but the barn. She couldn't see where he had gone, but then Will came in, leading Martina by her chain leash. At first glance, the blonde appeared to be sleepy. As the pair came closer, though, Alexa realized that instead she was powerfully aroused. Her hair looked to be dry, and well-brushed, and Alexa wondered if having her hair brushed had some kind of erotically stimulating effect on Martina. Maybe it did, or maybe it did only under very special circumstances. Will led Martina into her stall, shut the low door – it was more of a gate, actually – and shortly afterwards the two of them sank from Alexa's sight behind the solid plank partition wall that separated the stalls.

Mike came back. He had a styrofoam food carry-out container in one hand and a bottle of wine, with one glass, in the other. He put it all down on the quilt in front of Alexa and opened the container. The smell of a freshly-cooked cheeseburger with a side of fries made Alexa's mouth water. Her first instinct was to grab for it, but waited to see what Mike's rules were. He didn't say anything, but he used a plastic knife to cut a bite-sized piece out of the cheeseburger, which he then offered to Alexa. She leaned forward and opened her mouth for it, even though her initial impulse was to snap it up like a starving tiger, possibly taking one or more of Mike's fingers with it. He gently put the morsel into her mouth and watched as she ate it.

Having her hair brushed might have done it for Martina, but Alexa thought she had never, ever, experienced anything as pleasurable as the taste of that cheeseburger. There was no ketchup or mustard or mayonnaise on it, but as the juices from the meat hit her tongue she closed her eyes and let out a tiny moan of sheer pleasure. After so long eating processed, preserved or scrounged food out in the woods, the taste of the fresh beef, melted cheese, and toasted bun was heavenly. She ate that bite, and every succeeding bite that Mike carefully cut and handed to her. He interspersed the bits of cheeseburger with fries, and those were as perfect as the cheeseburger in their own way.

In a very little while, the food was gone and Alexa was feeling very, very contented. Mike set the takeout container aside and uncorked the wine. It was a red wine, and they shared half of the bottle between them, Mike holding the glass to Alexa's lips from time to time so that she could take a sip. She thought that it was all very romantic in a truly strange way, and by the time he recorked the wine bottle and set it aside along with the glass she was ready to do anything – almost anything – that Mike wanted. When he pulled a pair of handcuffs from a pants pocket and held them up for her to see, she twisted around and put her hands behind her back so that he could cuff her. She was confused at first when he then stretched out on his back on the quilt and unzipped his pants.

He pulled his cock out. At first Alexa thought that he wanted her to ride him again as she had in that creaking bed in that little upstairs room so many days ago. But he didn't seem to be completely erect, and the unspoken rules of this little game they were playing required her to wait for an instruction or an order from him.

“Suck it,” he ordered. Alexa knee-walked into a better position next to him, bent over, leaned forward, and took him into her mouth with a tiny moan. She could smell a faint trace of male musk, but otherwise he smelled as if he'd recently showered himself. She took him in as deeply as she could, then pulled back slowly, feeling his cock sliding out between her lips. Then she took him in again, just as deeply. She could feel him getting harder and longer as she sucked. She didn't know if he wanted to come in her mouth, but if he did she would accept it, and even swallow it all. It was the least she could do to show her thanks to him for rescuing her from further use and abuse at the six hard, rough hands of the Andersons. And for the shower. And for the wine. And especially for that cheeseburger.

Alexa stirred. She didn't feel the solid warmth of Mike's body against hers, and, still half asleep, she reached out for him. Her groping hand touched nothing but air, and she opened her eyes to look for him.

He wasn't there. She was alone in her stall. The doors at both ends of the barn were open. A slight breeze was blowing through the building, and it felt like early morning. She saw some people wander past her stall, slowing a bit as they looked in at her. Aside from a lone older woman, they were casually-dressed young couples, probably taking a tour of End for tips on how to spice up their sex lives.

Alexa sat up and stretched. For the first time in a while, she felt well-rested and well-fed, though not so well-fed that she would turn down breakfast if it was offered to her. Her beautiful new collar was still there around her neck, and as she began to move she saw that there was a heavy chain padlocked to it. The other end of the chain was also padlocked, to a bracket set in the back wall of her stall. It was just a bit too short to let her reach the front of her stall, but she hadn't planned on going anywhere anyway.

On a whim, she crawled over to the low wall separating her from Martina and peered over it. Martina was still asleep, curled up on her side with her back towards Alexa. Her long blonde hair had been gathered into a ponytail. There was no sign of Will, but there seemed to be a couple of new red marks across Martina's ass. Alexa smirked and went back to her comfortable quilt. She didn't know if Martina had done something to warrant a whipping or Will had just done it because he felt like it, and she didn't really care.

There wasn't a lot for her to do here in her stall. For a while it was enough for her to just lie there and not wonder or worry about anything, but that didn't suit her for very long. She got up and began running through the daily exercise routine she kept to back at home. Some of the gawkers who came into the barn stopped to watch her. She didn't mind that at all, but there were some parts of her routine that she just wasn't going to try without some sort of support for her breasts. Time and gravity would have their way with them soon enough. She wanted to keep them just as perky and firm as they were now for as long as she could. Once she was done, she laid back down on her quilt. Her audience gradually lost interest and wandered away, but new people kept wandering through.

She heard noises coming from Martina's stall, so she roused herself to peek over the low wall again. Martina was awake now, pulling at the chain that connected her collar to the back wall of her stall. She didn't notice Alexa watching her until she gave up on it and happened to look in Alexa's direction. She just looked at Alexa without saying anything, so Alexa smiled at her and didn't say anything. Martina turned away without smiling back, and Alexa returned to her quilt with a tiny chuckle. There was no love lost between her and Martina.

After a while, a proctor came by and entered Alexa's stall. She was somewhere in her mid-thirties, kind of plain, but with beautiful big dark eyes and mouse-brown hair done up in the usual severe bun. Alexa didn't recognize her.

“Hello,” the woman said with a smile. “I'm Natalie. You're Alexa Marx, aren't you?”

“Yes, I am,” Alexa nodded. She smiled back.

“I'd heard about you,” Natalie said as she crouched down. “There were a lot of men after you, you know, and since this was the last place you'd been seen they all started hunting for you from here. Are you all right?”

Alexa looked down at the heavy chain dangling from her collar and then back up at Natalie. “Well, yes,” she said. “I'm just another female now, but I did break the old record, didn't I?”

Natalie laughed. She had a nice laugh, full and throaty. “I'd heard that that's what you were trying to do,” she said. “And yes, you did set a new record. I'm afraid that we don't award any prizes for that, though.”

“That's okay,” Alexa waved a hand. “I did it for myself. I didn't even know there was a record to break until I came here last year. Then after I got caught someone told me that I'd beaten the previous 'unofficial' record, but hadn't quite beaten the official one. It gave me an excuse to come back.”

“Did you need an excuse?”

“Let's just say it helped me to make up my mind,” Alexa said. “And now, here I am, just another naked female.”

“You're hardly that,” Natalie smiled. She stood back up, straightening her long black dress. “I have to go now. I just wanted to meet you and wish you luck with the rest of your stay.”

“Thanks,” Alexa nodded. Luck? She thought to herself as Natalie exited her stall and went over to Martina's. What could luck possibly have to do with the rest of her stay? She thought about trying to overhear whatever conversation Natalie might have with Martina and decided not to.

Sometime later, after Natalie had left the barn, Mike arrived with another one of those styrofoam take-out boxes. Alexa scrambled up onto her knees eagerly. He probably wasn't bringing her another cheeseburger, but she was suddenly hungry and eager to see what he had brought.

Mike entered her stall. He put the container down on the floor, took out a pair of handcuffs and held them up so that she could see them. Alexa promptly straightened up and put her hands behind her. She held still as he ratcheted the cuffs around her wrists. They felt heavy, cold and heavy, and that gave her a little thrill. All the same, when he picked up the takeout container and opened it, she forgot all about them. She raised herself up on her knees to see what was in it that could be giving off such a delicious aroma. It looked like scrambled eggs, link sausages cooked crisp, and toast.

“I'm going to feed you,” Mike said as he settled down beside her. “I was thinking of making you say 'please' and 'thank you' before and after each bite, but if I did that your breakfast would be cold long before we're done.” He took out the white plastic spoon that had been sitting in the container and shoveled up a bit of the scrambled eggs. Alexa opened her mouth eagerly for it. When she first tasted it, she realized that there was some kind of cheese mixed in with the eggs.