He smiles. “No, you haven’t, have you?” He seems satisfied with that, and lays his head back down beside mine, keeping his hand possessively on my stomach and pulling me further into the crook of his shoulder. We lie there like that for almost an hour, wordlessly. I’m thinking that that wasn’t entirely what I expected. Though he was ferociously controlling, he was also somewhat tender. Nothing painful or kinky was involved. Is this all he wanted?
“Professor…Sir,” I venture timidly, deciding to ask him about this.
“Umm hmmm.” He is half-asleep, his eyes closed, breathing into my hair so that strands of it play ticklishly on my forehead.
“That didn’t seem particularly…sadistic.”
He expels a rapid burst of air from his nostrils; the ancestor of a chuckle. “Beth, I’m a reasonable man. You need to accustom yourself to my body before we move on to anything more…creative. I don’t want to frighten you off before we’ve even begun. I will take things at your pace and if you are uncomfortable with anything I do, you have only to say so. Eventually your body will be entirely mine, but it will take time to achieve the level of understanding and trust needed for the kind o
f unconditional submission I’m hoping for from you.”
“Unconditional submission,” I repeat faintly.
“Yes, Beth. Don’t be afraid. You will always be taken care of. Your wellbeing is one of my top priorities. I intend to show you your darkest desires, the ones you suppress because you think them unacceptable, and give them to you; to free you from the constraints of your own fears. I will give you what you want.”
“Oh. What do I want?” I ask him, rather confused on this point.
“You want to be mine. You want me to hurt you. You want me to own you. You want me to love you.”
The words sear like lightning through my chest, connecting invisibly and inexorably with my groin. He is right. He is bloody right. That is what I want, and furthermore, it’s what I’ve always wanted.
“Why do you think I want that?” I ask.
“It’s obvious,” he says.
I want to ask why, but I hang fire. Is this something he saw in me right from the day he called me into his office to lecture me on my studently shortcomings? Or has it been a more gradual realisation? He has been testing me over these past few weeks, to see how I react to the infliction of pain, and I have passed, apparently with flying colours. The idea of Sinclair having this in mind all along is eerie, and yet powerfully, erotically flattering. I feel special, at last, for once. Beth the Amorous Also-Ran, the one who got the more popular girls’ hand-me-downs and cast-offs, the dreamy impractical clueless fool gets the most sought-after man on campus. It doesn’t matter that he only wants me because he knows he can tie me up and beat me – because that is what I want too; what I have always fantasised about on some level. The way I used to love playing kiss-chase on the village green for the thrill of being caught, the way I used to flick through Victorian school novels to get to the caning scene, the way I used to bind my hands to my bedpost with my school tie and imagine myself at the mercy of some domineering bastard…it was all leading to this. A man who will not think me perverse and be frightened by my tendencies, but will embrace them, and indulge them, and enact them and add his own to the mix. It could be so good.
There is, I must admit, one unsettling element in the compound, and that is my absolute lack of information on how he feels about me. I don’t want to be used and cast aside. I hear his words in my head…I will give you what you want….you want me to love you…That has to be grounds for optimism, doesn’t it?
The phone by the bedside shrills, jerking the pair of us from our lassitude. Sinclair answers, looking blearily at me as he speaks.
“Yes, did you get my message? That’s right. Well, I hope it doesn’t put you out too much…You’re sure? That’s good…that’s very understanding of you…” He half-snorts, smirking at me with dynamite-hot rumpled sexiness. “Yes, precisely. Thanks, let’s hope so. Yes, see you at half seven then. Bye.”
I don’t ask the question but he answers it anyway. “I’m taking you out tonight,” he says. “Birthday dinner with friends. I don’t suppose you’ve anything remotely suitable to wear to the Gourmet Boat, have you?”
My chest tightens. This is real. Official. I will be on his arm tonight at one of the chicest restaurants in town, being introduced to his sophisticate friends. But he’s absolutely right about having nothing to wear.
“Wow,” is all I can think of to say, with a drippy smile. “The Gourmet Boat. No. I haven’t.”
“We’ll have to fix that, won’t we? Come on. Up and dressed. I’ll buy you a dress.”
*
‘Surreal’ is a word I’ve always over-used…well, since I understood what it meant at least…but I think I can apply it with justification to the experience of shopping for frocks with Professor Sinclair. I expect him to take me down to the ugly seventies concrete shopping centre, or maybe The Mall, but in the event we remain close to home, finding a street of chi-chi boutiques I have never even bothered to look at before, correctly assuming to them to be well beyond my price range. As is everything bar Poundstretcher, I must admit.
There is an intimidating hush once the bell over the door has ceased its clangour, and it is almost as if the costly silks are whispering around us. ‘Who the hell does she think she is? It’s obvious she’s his tart – she couldn’t afford this herself…’ When the manageress emerges from behind a rack of floatiness like a solid form through phantoms, her tight welcoming smile says exactly the same thing.
“Good morning. Can I help you?”
“Yes, we’re going out to dinner tonight…a birthday celebration at a good restaurant…I wonder what you have in size…what? Ten?” He looks at me questioningly. I nod. This is somehow violently embarrassing. Part of me wishes he would leave me to speak for myself; another part is grateful at not having to. “Suitable for this young lady.”
Argh! He called me a ‘young lady’. That makes it so obvious I’m his mistress! I feel like I’m on parade, and it occurs to me that tonight will only increase this feeling tenfold.
“Of course, sir.” She moves over to the rails of clothes on the left-hand side of the room; less glitzy than those on the right. “The neckline on this is very flattering..and I think she has the figure for a more fitted cut…” Hang on! I am here! It isn’t going to be Sinclair wearing the bleeding thing, so why is she only addressing him?
“Is the colour quite right, though?” he demurs.
“Hmm.” The woman frowns and looks me up and down unforgivingly. “She can carry any shade of green or blue…she’s too young for black really…”