The Trainer (34 page)

“Not the owners who patronize Anderson,”
Chris answered evenly. “She holds her clients to a higher standard
because the sloppy, haphazard training cultivated by gentlemen like
your former employer have ruined the market.”

“What?”

“You’re getting tiresome, Mike. I think
that’s enough for today. We’ll work together tomorrow morning.
She’s going to be practicing some basic flower arrangements, and I
don’t think you have any experience there.” Chris nodded a
dismissal and waited for Michael to leave.

Michael had no such intention. “Not until
you explain that last crack, Parker. Geoff wasn’t Anderson, but he
turned out great slaves. To happy owners! His methods were
different, that’s all. I didn’t much approve of some of his stuff,
but he’s a good man, and a good trainer. No one’s ever complained
about one of his slaves!”

“That’s not true, Mike, and I’m surprised
that you believe it. If you like, I will be glad to pull up the
files and show them to you. It’s trainers like him who have flooded
the Marketplace with inferior, rapidly trained novices whose
dedication to the craft of service—to the lifestyle, if you like—is
at best questionable.” Chris folded his arms casually, but his
voice was sharp. “Year after year, I see more stories of contracts
broken, leaks of information to the press, discussions among the
dabblers—the word is getting out, Mike, and it’s because of
trainers like Negel and the flotsam he gathers and shapes into
slaves. Not to mention the dilettantes he selects as his junior
trainers.”

“You shut your mouth,” Michael growled. “I
don’t need to hear this shit from you.”

“Yes, you do. You need to hear it from
someone, before you end up right back where you came from.”

Michael gritted his teeth and folded his
arms. “Okay, go ahead. Tell me what a waste of time I am. It’ll be
nothing new.”

“I don’t suppose it will be,” Chris snapped.
“Here’s truth, Michael Xavier. You were trained in a ‘tradition’
not even a decade old. A philosophy that takes the entire drive for
honorable service and turns it into kinky sex. I would hazard a bet
right now that when I pulled up the files on slaves sold through
Geoff Negel, 100% of them would be beautiful. Muscular men, shapely
women. Would I be correct?”

Michael nodded. “Owners want their slaves to
look good. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.”

“Would he have taken Tara?”

“Sure, she was okay.”

“Even at the age of forty-six?”

Michael set his jaw and felt a deep twinge
of shame. No, Geoff wouldn’t have taken her at forty-six. There was
a belief that the younger a person was trained, the better they’d
behave. Also, owners preferred younger slaves—

Unless they were bookkeepers and
researchers, maybe. He felt that familiar old sinking sensation,
and tried not to think of the thousands of tasks and skills which
age and experience would lend value to.

Chris nodded, as though following Michael’s
train of thought. “All right, let’s assume that he would take Tara.
We know he’d take Lorens.”

Michael dropped his arms and began to
nod.

“Yeah, I know,” he said. “But no way would
he take Joan. I mean, not the way she is. He’d want her to lose the
weight. Take up aerobics, go on some diet.”

“And why?”

“Because people like skinny people! Come on,
it’s not unrealistic! There are lots of houses that only take
beautiful slaves! You go with what gets bought.”

“The owners will buy quality, Mike. Years
ago, Marketplace slaves were not always assumed to be sexually
available, let alone skilled. In some areas, it is still considered
tacky and uncouth to take your slave to bed—one does not make love
with a social inferior.” His tone changed to slightly mocking.
“Now, thanks to the trainers who serve up the idea that a slave is
nothing more than a kinkier than average plaything, there is this
sudden proliferation of slaves who are quite agreeable to look at
but hardly talented or dedicated to their service. Slaves who
expect to be matched with similarly attractive owners who will
require nothing more than sexual availability and willingness.
Slaves who think nothing of jeopardizing their master’s reputation,
or the safety of another slave. Slaves who are actually in it for
the money, Michael. Or because they were failures at everything
else.”

Michael took a step back; there was a lot
more here than just a lecture. “Hey, chill out, Chris. This seems
to be getting out of hand.”

“I’ll tell you what’s getting out of hand,
Michael LaGuardia. Trainers like yours, who believe that you can
take a selfish little failure off the streets and Pygmalion him
into being an acceptable slave!”

Shit—this was about whatever happened in
California. Michael held one hand up. “Listen, I don’t even know
what went on there, Chris—but I sure as hell know that Geoff wasn’t
involved.”

“No? Think again. The man who supposedly
spotted and trained the slave who caused this entire situation was
certified as a trainer by your own teacher, Mr. Geoff Negel. And
who knows what tragedy would have followed you if your scheme to
turn a weekend ‘sub’ into a slave had actually gone beyond the
spotting stage?” Chris grinned in his nasty way and cocked his head
to one side. “Perhaps I’d have to go clean that up, too.”

“You son of a bitch!”

“Watch your language, Mike. I’ll see you in
the morning. You may leave.”

Michael trembled with anger, but there was
nothing else to do. The only other option would be to hit the
short, taunting man, and that would surely ruin everything once and
for all. He nodded and turned stiffly, feeling the heat of the
controlled rage. He didn’t even know where he was going, and was
surprised when he found himself back in his room. He locked the
door, feeling slightly foolish, but knowing that the slightest
interruption would set him off. The bed creaked as he sat down and
buried his face in his hands.

He had gone back to Geoff’s with a heavy
heart but with some measure of confidence. He would just have to
pay more attention to the techniques of spotters. There was a whole
library of slave narratives describing their experiences in
entering the Marketplace—he would have to read them or watch the
tapes and take some notes. Maybe he just approached it the wrong
way. It was obviously Karen’s fault—she had misled him into
believing that she had real potential.

At first, there was no clue that anything
terrible had happened. Work continued, and Geoff was encouraging
and sympathetic about the “breakup” that Michael haltingly
described for him. Michael was very careful to leave out any hint
that he and Karen had been doing anything more than sleeping
together and doing pretty standard “date things” like going to
movies and to the beach. He fell back into the ongoing training
with ease, marveling at the difference between the obedient, docile
slaves at the ranch as opposed to the curious and demanding Karen.
He began to wonder how he had ever been hoodwinked. Weeks went by
without incident, and he believed that Karen was all behind
him.

One evening, he was called to Geoff’s
office, where he met someone he had never been introduced to
before. The house lawyer.

Geoff looked more sad than anything else. He
was sitting at his desk, framed by the twinkling lights of the
patio shining through the huge window behind him. His shoulders
were pressed back—he was not relaxing in his chair the way he
usually did. The desk lamp was shining on a pile of what looked
like reports of some kind. His kind eyes were just a little sharper
than usual; there was something terribly wrong.

“Mike, this is Nani Okawa, our lawyer. I’ve
asked her to sit in on this meeting because of some disturbing
things we’ve found out about the woman you say was your
girlfriend.”

Michael paled and felt his knees buckle. He
found a chair and sat on the edge. His mind was blank.

“She wasn’t really your girlfriend, was she,
Mike?” Geoff asked. His manner was still calm, his voice
reassuring.

“No,” Michael managed to say. The shame
mingled with relief as he got that out. “She—I thought—she told me
she... “ His voice trailed off as he tried to organize his
thoughts. He looked at the lawyer, so prim in her designer silk
suit, her legs demurely crossed at the ankle.

She raised one eyebrow and picked up a piece
of paper from the desk. “This woman has been attempting to have you
investigated and charged, Mr. LaGuardia.”

“Charged? With what?” Michael shouted,
shocked and panicked. “I never did a thing to her that she didn’t
want!”

“She claims, in her report to the police,
that you offered to make her a prostitute. That you had identified
a large organization which handled these matters, and tried to harm
her when she resisted.” Her voice was matter-of-fact, but he could
hear a faint trace of disapproval.

“That’s a lie! Goddamn lies, all of that!”
Michael turned to Geoff, his eyes wide. “I never told her anything
about the Marketplace—nothing that could be traced! I never said
anything about prostitution, I was always very clear—I mean, there
was only one time, and when she didn’t go for it, I dropped it and
left! I never laid a fucking hand on the bitch!”

“Now, Mike, there’s no need to fly off the
handle. Let’s listen to the whole story and get it straightened
out,” Geoff said. “As it turns out, there isn’t a real case. The
police will come to interview you, but we don’t believe it will go
further than that.”

“Thank God,” Michael said weakly. “How did
you do that?”

“It wasn’t Mr. Negel,” Okawa said. “Lucky
for you, your friend doesn’t have any evidence. The police who took
her report noted quite clearly that she owned almost every object
she claimed you used on her, and that she freely admitted to being,
as she put it, a ‘sexual submissive.’ They have to come and
interview you, but thanks to your keeping that one secret, they’ve
had trouble finding you.”

“How did they find me?”

“Oh, we told them.”

“What?!”

“Mr. LaGuardia, despite the non-standard
ways our organization does business, we do recognize that we
operate within the United States of America, and we must cooperate
with authorities in any way we can.” She pulled another paper out
of the pile and scanned it. “Also, your doings had already exposed
us to potential annoyances. I suggest you look at this.”

Michael took the orange sheet of paper and
read. It was a flyer for a Los Angeles SM group called Gates of
Pleasure. They were apparently promoting a line-up of guest
speakers and special events for the year. The list was esoteric—a
seminar on basic bondage, a speaker discussing age-regression play,
a piercing workshop—pretty standard stuff. His eyes scanned the
list once, trying to see what the lawyer was pointing out to him,
and then he caught it.

It was called “Secret Societies,” and the
featured speakers included “Slave Karen.”

“Oh my God,” he whispered. “But she knew
nothing.”

“We sent someone to tape the event,” Okawa
said. “The transcript is here. Apparently, after she told her
story, audience members encouraged her to press charges, which is
what she has done.”

“But I never did anything to her!”

“Mr. LaGuardia—I suggest you look at this.”
She pulled a multipage document out of the pile and opened it to a
folded over page. “Start at line six.”

It read:

MOD: Have any of you heard anything about a
hidden slave market active right now?

SK: Hell, I was recruited for it.

MOD: When did that happen?

SK: Just a few months ago, at Leather
Forever.

(AUD: Much amazement.)

SK: No, it’s true. He looked just like
anyone else—showed me a good time. But he figured he could make me
his slave and then sell me off to this organization he kept talking
about. He was a great master—handsome, skilled, brutal,
creative—everything a beginner could want. He seemed more real than
anyone I knew—and I loved him. But I could tell early on that there
was something dangerous about him. Any time I got nervous, he’d get
violent. I wasn’t allowed a safeword; he said that real slaves
didn’t need one. Every time I asked a question, he’d threaten to
leave me forever.

(AUD: Disapproval, boos, hisses.)

MOD: Those guys are really slick like
that—they isolate you from your community, and then convince you
that you’re worthless without them.

SK: That was it, right on the head. I felt
worthless, like I couldn’t live without him. And when he told me he
was planning to sell me, I nearly lost it. He got violent—brutal.
Threatened to leave me again, and swore that I’d never be a real
slave. When he left, I was crying, hysterical. Almost suicidal.

“It wasn’t like that,” Michael said,
dropping the transcript into his lap and feeling nauseated.
“She—she didn’t want to do it. I left. I never touched her... she
wasn’t crying when I left!”

“Well, she did a lot of crying at this
meeting. And I can’t even imagine what the repercussions of this
will be.” Okawa took the transcript back and placed it with the
other papers. “Thanks to you, she’ll be blabbing something about us
in every SM club she gets invited to.”

“But what about—I mean, her charge—what
should I do?”

“When you meet with the police, you will
tell them the truth—that you were engaged in a sexual relationship
with her which included bondage and discipline games. That you had
a disagreement, and then you broke up.

You haven’t heard from her since. They have
no physical evidence—no semen, no photos of bruises, no testimony
from witnesses. In fact, we found several people who remembered you
two as a couple from that Leather Forever conference where you
first picked her up.”

“Oh God, I just don’t believe it,” Michael
moaned. “Wait! What about the house? Are they coming here?”