F Campbell - Drusilla

“Am I scared, Di’?”

“You were. But those handcuffs are giving you strength. I bet if I had the key you wouldn’t let me use it.”

Drusilla fingered the steel. It had become as much a part of her as her fingers themselves. “You’re right,” she admitted slowly, “But, Diana darling, don’t spoil things between Bryce and me. I seem to be committed to something or other—let things take their course.”

“I’ll wait,” said Diana comfortably.

“Best you go to the bathroom,” Bryce advised briskly. Drusilla had become accustomed to such injunctions.

They were necessary where someone knew things you did not. The handcuffs no longer bothered her much at such times. When she returned, she voiced what appeared to be a certainty.

“Is this the day of reckoning, Bryce?”

“How did you guess!”

“The room’s finished.”

The room was as potent as all else that happened to her now. Drusilla felt it pointing at her like a beckoning finger. Because of her it had come into being. The carpenters had worked fast.

“like it?”

“It’s a prison.”

“Just the cell part, sweetheart. The rest’s for fun and games.”

“I don’t think I’m going to like it at all. Oh, Bryce, those—those—things! It’s grim.”

“It’s well illuminated.” Bryce turned a knob proudly. “See? It can be as bright or as dim as suits the mood.”

“Turn it on full. And that poor little window up there—it didn’t need to be barred.”

“Nice effect, though. Don’t you think?”

“And this awful little cell! Are you really going to lock me in it?”

“Only sometimes.”

“Oh, Bryce, don’t sound so damned pleased.”

“Why not! I am pleased. I’m particularly pleased with you. Come here.”

She went to him and clasped her shackled hands over his neck. Bryce hugged her tenderly. “Sometimes this isn’t easy for me,” he admitted in her ear. “But the way you’ve taken hold... ! You’re making me very happy.”

Drusilla nestled against her husband’s masculinity.

“This place reminds of me a Nazi interrogation chamber.”

“You’ve got goose pimples.”

“I’m going to disgrace myself. I know I am. You’re going to whip me, aren’t you?”

“Sure. The way you let Diana.”

“I didn’t ‘let’ her. I sorta’ got talked into it.”

“Probably hurts about the same either way.”

“Oh, Bryce!!”

“Well, don’t ever let’s get too gloomy about this.”

“You mean about my punishments? See, I’ve even managed to use that hateful word.”

“I’m beginning to like you a lot, darling.”

“What happened to the word love?”

“That’s different. A man can love a trollop. liking implies respect.”

“Was I really a trollop?”

“Ask yourself. You know best. But, sweetheart, no going back?”

“The way you said that means it’s going to hurt.”

“You may as well lie on the bench now.”

“Why? Are we going to make love?”

Bryce chuckled. “I’m not a bit sure that remark was innocent.” He lifted her joined hands back over his head and patted her seat. “This facility was specially made for you. Dispose yourself, woman.”

Drusilla knew a giggly wish for repartee, but recognized it for what it was: a tactic to delay. Scorning it, she climbed aboard her hard couch. “Face down, I suppose?” she inquired meekly.

“And bottoms up,” Bryce agreed cheerfully. “We’ll turn you over another time.”

Another time! And the monarchial ‘we’! Drusilla knew herself riding on a tide that could drift her anywhere. She discovered that her ankles had fallen neatly into circlets with her feet protruding beyond the end of the bench. Bryce was busily buckling them tight with straps that must have been there waiting.

“Honestly, sweetheart. Don’t you hate to lose these?” Drusilla looked up the length of her stretched out arms to where Bryce was inserting a key in a cuff. “Yes, I would,” she admitted slowly. “If it wasn’t that you’re about to fix me far tighter—you are, aren’t you! And don’t think I haven’t figured that you strapped my feet first so’s I couldn’t struggle.”

“Go ahead, struggle.” Laughing, he held up the jawed handcuffs warm from her skin. “Your hands are free.”

Drusilla had no intention of providing her amused husband with a demonstration of contorting frustration. But she massaged her wrists and stretched her arms wide in a sensual enjoyment of motions long denied. lifting herself on her elbows she confirmed the fact that there was no way she could free her feet and find freedom. “I’m helpless,” she conceded. “The way you’ve got my ankles strapped down I can’t possibly get off this contraption. There’s no need to fasten me any more.”

“Good try, ’Silla. Push your arms up.”

She did not complain. Might as well be tied for a sheep as a lamb, she thought wryly. Her wrists found other circles and other straps. Bryce buckled them tight and snug.

“I’ll whip your bottom sometime when only your ankles are strapped,” he promised genially. “Should be quite something, ”

“What you mean is that my agonized writhings would give you an erection,” she accused, falling into his mood. “Oh, gee, I can’t do anything like this.”

“Yes, you can. Try.”

“I can lift my head and get a bit of a wriggle out of my hips.”

“We must fix the hips, sweetheart.”

The strap across the small of her back was so inevitable she made no comment, contenting herself with an exaggerated “Ouch!” when Bryce buckled it tight.

“That noise was just in the hope I wouldn’t draw it as tight as I might,” he accused knowingly. “So now it gets tugged one more notch.”

Drusilla said “Ouch” again and meant it. The leather band circled her waist with a compulsive intimacy. “I can’t move at all now,” she mourned.

“Good! Don’t want you threshing around when the whip bites.”

“I wouldn’t thresh around. Can’t you give me credit for a bit of self-control?”

“Would you really like to lie there without restraint?”

Bryce asked gently.

Drusilla instantly remembered her shameful dance from Diana’s straps and bar. “No, never mind,” she declaimed hastily.

“Save you a lot of embarrassment, sweets. You’ve seen this before, haven’t you? I know you peeked.”.

Drusilla peered over a taut and helpless arm at the whip dangling from Bryce’s hand. It looked a lot more menacing now than it had in the hall stand. “I thought you’d just bought it to scare me,” she admitted. “And, yes, I peeked. But, darling, aren’t you going to use a cane—like Diana?”

“You liked Diana’s cane?”

“I don’t like either. But her cane looked less lethal than that awful thing you’re playing with.”

“On your lovely bottom, love, I suspect the cane hurts more than this. But I do have one.”

Without enthusiasm, Drusilla watched her husband go to the cupboard. It was easy to convince herself the cane he returned with was more deadly than Diana’s. Bryce held both instruments of punishment up for her inspection.

“Take your pick, ’Silla.”

“How do I know!” she retorted pettishly. “I don’t know either of them.”

“I do have a tawse.” It was as though he had saved the best till last.

Every nerve was tingling as Drusilla beheld the several thonged perfection of some leather-worker’s craft. At least it was shorter. She wondered if that was good. “And you bought all these things for me!” she said bitterly.

“Think you’ll like this better?”

“I’ll try it.”