Part 9 (1/2)
”Linda?” Flame asked.
There was more silence. Then, ”I don't understand.” Her voice was small and uncertain. ”What does that mean?”
”It's pretty simple, really. I went to a slave auction with James and I saw the slaves being sold and they all looked so scared. But they looked alive. Vital. And I felt so... not alive. As a lady, I knew exactly what I was going to be doing the next day and the next and all the rest of the days of my life. The slaves had no idea what was going to happen to them after they were sold. I wanted to be as alive as they were. Can you understand that?”
”No.”
”I know. I find it hard to understand, too. But I knew in my gut that I had to do it. I had to get up on the block and be sold. It was humiliating and terrifying. Every second, from the moment I stepped onto the auction block to the moment that I was put into a kennel is etched on my brain forever. I've never had a day of my life, not even my wedding day, that was as emotionally powerful as every single second standing on the block, listening to men bid on me. Committing yourself to marriage is pale and insignificant compared to committing yourself to slavery.”
There was another silence.
Flame let her friend digest what she had said.
Finally, Linda said, ”You're sick. Insane. You belong in an asylum. In a straightjacket in a padded cell. You need to be locked up for your own good.”
”I am locked up most of the time. An hour ago, I was chained to a whipping bench and raped by my owner. Barely a day pa.s.ses that he doesn't put in some kind of bondage and use me for s.e.x. It doesn't matter what I want. He wouldn't dream of asking my permission. He does whatever he wants to me. Anything. Without restriction. On Sat.u.r.day, he's hosting a dinner party and I'll be servicing his guests in the billiard room after the meal. There'll be seven men. They'll spend hours forcing me to perform every kind of s.e.x act that they can imagine. They'll penetrate me every way that a woman can be penetrated. It's going to happen to me in two days and there's not a d.a.m.n thing that I can do to stop it. Not a d.a.m.n thing.”
Flame could hear her friend breathing heavily into the phone. She didn't know if she had disgusted her friend or stimulated her l.u.s.t or both, but she had certainly aroused some strong emotion in her.
”Maybe you can understand, after all,” Flame said. ”As a slave, I often feel fear and pain and humiliation. And sometimes, even a bit of joy, too. But I'm feeling something every moment of every day. I never felt that when I was a lady. When I was a lady, there was never a time, not even on my wedding night when I gave my virginity to my new husband, that I felt such intense emotion as I feel whenever my owner is using me. You can't imagine how keenly I feel my own emotions now. All the time.”
Flame stopped talking and let Linda absorb that idea.
”There's no divorce from slavery, you know,” Linda said. ”No annulment. You can't even be widowed from slavery. If your owner dies, you're part of the estate and will be sold to someone else. You can't ever come back to us. You can't return and we wouldn't take you back even if you could. You're gone forever. You left me. You left your husband. You left everyone.”
”No,” Flame said. ”I didn't leave my husband. James left me. He was there when I was being auctioned. He watched men bidding on me and he didn't lift a finger. He could have bought me for less than he bought his other slave at the same auction. Instead, when I was on the auction block, he walked away and let a stranger buy me. If he wanted me he could have owned me. He could have had me more completely and utterly than he ever had me as his wife. I thought that he loved me, but I was wrong. He didn't want me so he left. He took his new slave with him and left me behind.”
”Why would he want you? You weren't a person any more. You made yourself a piece of property. You stopped wanting to be his wife and became the property of the highest bidder. What did that say about him, that you would rather be the slave of a stranger than a lord's wife?”
”I was saying that I would rather be his slave than his wife. I was kept in his manor like a stuffed trophy animal while he was out in the kennels f.u.c.king his slaves. I wanted him to be f.u.c.king me, too. I wanted to please him and that was never going to happen while I was his wife.”
”And now you're not his wife. And you're not being f.u.c.ked by him. Now you're being f.u.c.ked by some other man. By lots of other men. And you know what's happening to your husband? All the eligible women in the county are flocking around him like moths around a candle, each dying to be the next Lady Fortson. He has his pick of the ladies.”
”I hope he picks one who will be happy with him.”
”He'll find one who won't sell herself into slavery right in front of him. That for d.a.m.n sure.” Linda sounded angry.
Flame hadn't meant to make her friend angry. ”I'm sorry. I don't expect you to understand what I did.” She laughed ruefully. ”And I certainly don't expect that any other lady will ever sell herself into slavery.”
”You can be d.a.m.n sure that we won't.”
”I called because I was hoping that you'll do me a favor.”
”Really?” Linda's voice dripped with sarcasm. ”You should know how often I do favors for slaves.”
”I'm hoping that you'll consider me a special case.”
”Not b.l.o.o.d.y likely.”
Flame took a deep breath. ”My owner is throwing a dinner party on Sat.u.r.day and I was hoping that he could borrow one of your slaves for the evening.”
Linda laughed bitterly. ”A slave wants to borrow a slave. Isn't that one for the record books.”
Flame answered with a laugh that was light rather than bitter. ”I know. My owner's wife would have asked but she doesn't know anyone else who owns a slave.”
”No? Sounds like your owner isn't a man of much substance.”
”No, he's not.”
”So why in h.e.l.l would I lend him a slave? What would he ever be able to do for me in return?”
”He owns a slave. He'd be happy to lend her to you the next time you need one.”
There was another pause. ”You mean you? You're telling me that I could borrow you the next time that I need to host a party for a dozen men and need someone to service them?”
”Yes.”
”No.”
”Don't be so quick to decide. Think about it for a minute,” Flame said. ”People in your circle know my history. They'll find me a rather exotic treat. Your husband's friends will be talking about his party for years after they've forgotten all the other parties that they've attended.”
Flame held her breath, waiting to see if she had convinced her friend.
”You're shameless.”
”No. I feel my shame more sharply than you can know. I was raised to be a lady from birth. That doesn't go away. My shame cuts me all the way to the bone. I've abased myself even asking you for a favor. Offering myself for the s.e.xual gratification of men that I've dined with, men of lower rank than me, men that I've snubbed socially, is the most degrading thing that I've ever done. If you want to punish me most cruelly, make me suffer most deeply, all you have to do is agree to my offer.”
”And you still want me to lend you a slave?”
”I'm begging you. I'd abase myself before you if you were here. I'd drop to my knees and press my face to the ground at your feet.”
”I'll think about it,” Linda said at last. ”I don't negotiate with slaves. Tell your owner's wife to call me.”
She disconnected.
Flame hoped that Linda would agree. She had to find a slave for her owner to borrow, no matter what it cost her. What she had offered to Linda, that she could be borrowed to service her former friends, would be unbearable but she had no choice. Every slave had to bear the unbearable.
She went to find Mrs. Dodge and tell her how to talk to Lady Linda Hoffman. She could only hope that she wouldn't be beaten too severely for her effrontery.
Flame's heart thudded and her stomach churned. In her entire life, exactly two men had used her for s.e.x her husband, James, and her owner, Dodge.
In two hours, she would be f.u.c.ked by six more men, not counting Dodge who would surely f.u.c.k her as well.
The number of men in her entire life who had used her for s.e.x would increase fourfold in the course of a couple of hours.
She had no idea what it would feel like to be used over and over in different ways by so many men in such a short time, but she doubted that she would enjoy it. What she did know was that none of the men that used her tonight would care a whit whether she enjoyed it or not.
Unless Baronet Grenfeld was still offended that she had refused a second dance with him. He might care too much. He might make absolutely certain that she found not the least shred of joy tonight.