Punished by the Dictator's Daughter (The Initiation 3, Book 3) (3 page)

4

Greg and I are alone in the dungeon cell. The
air is chilly and dank with all the droplets of water evaporating
from the walls. Somewhere above us, I can hear the plop-plop-plop
of falling water. There is a single flickering torch mounted
against one wall, which is the only light in the room afforded to
us. I suppose this is Aimelie’s way of allowing us to gaze deeply
into each other’s eyes.

I am afraid.

I am afraid of looking into Greg’s beautiful
brown eyes because of what I would see there. A declaration of
love, perhaps. An admission I am not yet ready to embrace.

Or perhaps I am flattering myself. Perhaps
Greg feels only affection for me because of our shared travails. He
is, after all, engaged to be married to the beauteous Alice. Would
he risk being part of the Devlin fortune just for me?

I do not have the self-confidence to think
so. While I am pretty, I do not have the composed beauty of a femme
fatale – or at least one who can launch a thousand ships. I am not
clever or interesting enough. And I am certainly far from being
sophisticated and experienced. Even my body – while nubile and lush
and ripe – is hardly that of a goddess. My best feature is perhaps
my hair, but that is scarcely enough to make me the object of every
man’s desire.

I feel foolish as I catch Greg’s eyes, even
though my heart is thudding against my chafed ribcage.

What I see there takes me aback.

Greg’s cock worms within me – eliciting
tendrils of exquisite sensation. Our collective breathing causes
his hard flesh to gently slide within me – but in mere
centimeters.

Greg says hoarsely, “You are afraid of
me.”

“No,” I lie.

“You are afraid that I will tell you
something I can’t take back. Aimelie is shrewder than we give her
credit for, and she is right. I do have . . . feelings for you,
Gina.” His voice breaks at this last.

No, no, no,
I pray, the blood
suffusing my ears like a waterfall.

He goes on, “But I know that you don’t have
those same feelings for me. I know you love Max.” He averts his
head. “I loved Alice once, but she is a spoilt, rude, devious and
cruel brat who has been allowed to run riot on everyone’s feelings
for too long. As soon as we get back, I’m going to break off the
engagement.”

The shock hits me.

“No, no, Greg, no. This is not because of me,
is it?” I say desperately.

He barks a short laugh. “No. OK, maybe
partially. But it’s primarily because I don’t want to be married to
someone who will make my life a living purgatory, no matter how
rich her daddy is and how many career opportunities he will give
me. I have made my own way before this, and I will continue to do
so.”

I remain silent.

He stares at my face.

He says gently, “Don’t worry, Gina. I’m not
going to impose my feelings upon you. You belong to Max and nothing
will change that. I just wanted to . . . you know, tell you how I
felt before . . . anything happened to us in this place – ”

He lets it trail. His expression is bruised,
as though he expects to be let down and hurt badly.

So he too is afraid of Potchenko and Aimelie
and their unpredictable mood swings. I debate whether to tell him
of my little tete-a-tete with Mansk, and decide against it. Even
though the cell’s walls seem ancient, their interiors may be
cobbled with hidden cameras and recording devices. I do not
prematurely want to reveal my cards.

Confusion swirls in my head, and that too
frightens me. For mine is not an open-and-shut case of ‘Yes, you
are right. I love Max and I will never reciprocate your love’. It
is not that my love for Max has wavered, but that my feelings for
Greg go alarmingly deeper than I thought they would. I have always
pushed them to the backburner. Refused to confront them because of
everything that is going on around us.

But his declaration now forces me to face
them head on, and the swell of emotion that eddies within my psyche
is an unexpected storm.

I swallow the hard lump that has bolted into
my throat. I owe him the truth in these uncertain climes, if
nothing else.

I say, “No, Greg, you’ve got it wrong. It
isn’t that I don’t love you. I do.”

“Like a brother,” he says with
bitterness.

“No. It’s more than that. That’s why I’m so
confused. I love Max. But I love you too . . . to an extent.”

It’s true. I think I must have fallen a
little in love with Greg during my Final Initiation. Back when I
wasn’t sure as yet of my feelings for Max. Back before we became a
couple. Back when Greg was the only beacon of kindness in a cruel
world where men and women sought to use my body for their pleasures
and nothing else.

“But not as much as you love him,” he
says.

“No. It’s different.”

I dare not describe it. My feelings for Max
have always been associated with awe and lust and love and a little
master-slave domination that still lingers no matter what has
changed. Of course they would be. He was my initiator and dom
before he became my boyfriend.

But my feelings for Greg . . . ahhh. Now
that’s complicated. With Greg, I feel assurance and attraction and
warmth and a gooey sense of safety, like being embraced in a pair
of arms that will protect, succor and defend me.

“I understand.” His face flinches, and he
looks away. His brown orbs are filled with unbearable pain.

My heart sinks. The last thing I want to do
is to hurt Greg at a time like this. Oh, that Aimelie. She’s smart.
She knows that Greg harbors feelings for me and she has made our
situation so dire that she knows we must confront those feelings
before it is too late. She is playing a cruel psychological game
with us, like a cat which must toy with its prey before she devours
it.

Unless her threats of keeping us here forever
are also part of that game.

Will she . . . or won’t she?

If only we have the answers!

“I was expecting this,” Greg says, “but it
doesn’t matter. I’ll get over it. It’s just that you . . . you make
me feel special, Gina. Like no one else. Whenever I’m with you, I
want to protect you. Keep you safe. I will never, ever let any harm
come to you, you know that, Gina.”

Yes, I do. Tears steal into my eyes.

“I would give my life if I thought I could
save you from being harmed,” he declares.

Yes, I know that too. I would do the same for
the boys . . . with a little push. I’m not as brave and noble as
Greg is.

I close my eyes desperately, squeezing hot
tears out of them.

“Oh no, don’t, Gina. The last thing I want to
do is to make you cry. I wish I can hold you, stroke your hair.
Don’t cry, please.”

But I can’t help it. The situation has gotten
into me. Burrowed like an alien host into my bones and taken
residence there like some pervading insect. The tears run fast and
flowing down my cheeks.

To stem them, I begin to move my hips. My
back chafes against the ropes that tie me to Greg, but I don’t
care. My pussy inches up and down his still solid cock, coring
myself into him in that little space proffered to me. My movements
are jerky, abrupt – but he still moans against me.

“Kiss me,” he whispers.

I know I am adding salt to his wounds, but I
do it anyhow. I press my lips onto his (at this position, we are at
the same height) and kiss him with all the feeling I harbor for him
in my conflicted little world. I kiss him and kiss him – my tongue
darting inside his mouth. He catches it and sucks at it, not
wanting to let go.

Our kisses deepen and become more heated, and
suddenly, it’s as if we are no longer strangers. The final barrier
has fallen and we give in to ourselves. He puts all his passion and
pent-up emotions into his kiss, and I respond hungrily to him.

Even as I grind against him, our mouths never
leave each other’s. My pussy compresses his cock, and somewhere
inside that confined recess, he locates my G-spot. I jerkily
massage him until we are both climbing, and kissing, and climbing
further, and kissing more feverishly and lovingly – so glad to be
still alive – and cresting a peak, and a further peak. Until we
both breach some infinitesimal edge, and I abandon myself to the
maelstrom of sensations and frightening emotions.

I scream my climax into the stone ceiling of
the dungeon cell, and I feel him ejaculate into me. Hot, gushy,
ropy strings of semen – swarming into my womb, cascading into every
groove and recess, filling me with a warm, pleasurable tide.

Once again, I feel safe. Protected. The way I
always feel around Greg.

He’s dependable, reliable, loving. And as
much as I hate to say this, I think he loves me more than Max
does.

I close my eyes, panting, and bury my face in
his shoulder.

All the more reason to get all of us out of
here.

5

Mansk comes to me when I least expect it.
When I have given up all hope of him ever giving me an answer.
Meanwhile, in the week that ensued, I am taken to Greg every day.
We make love, open now with our feelings for each other.

It isn’t that I have forgotten Max. Far from
it. Is it possible to love two men? Well, I do. I’m not being
greedy, nor am I using Greg as a spare wheel just in case the more
unpredictable Max doesn’t work out. I’m merely being honest.

If Aimelie had planned it this way, it is
working.

I am not allowed to see Max. From what I
hear, he is perpetually ensconced in Aimelie’s tower – slave to her
every command.

Potchenko, her father, is apparently on a
tour of the countryside, according to Mansk. He has a series of
executions he personally wants to oversee. I can imagine the myriad
heads that fall into the basket before the blade of the Guillotine,
and I shut my eyes in dismay.

This is when Mansk comes to me one night. I
am alone in the kitchen, nesting by my hearth as I always do. I am
curled up, naked, by the fire, dreaming of all things that might or
might not have been. But mostly, I dream of Max. Has Aimelie
succeeded in converting him? Does he still love me? Did he ever
love me?

My doubts creep to the forefront. I think of
Max’s kisses, his warmth, the way his penis spears my vagina – so
snugly and completely. I close my eyes and savor those three little
words he said to me:
I love you.
My beautiful blond god. It
was so surreal he could ever love someone like me, and that’s why
I’m having these nagging doubts.

Does he truly love me, or has our shared
situation deluded him into thinking he needed my compassion?

A hand gently shaking my shoulder wakes me. I
flutter open my eyes in surprise. Instead of Gerta, it is
Mansk.

“Listen,” he says. His mouth is grim. “We
have to talk.”

*

He squirrels me to a little broom closet and
shuts the door behind us. We have only elbow space amongst the
brooms, mops and pails, and the air smells of mustiness and
detergent. It might have smelled of lye in the olden days, if I
actually knew what lye smelled like.

Mansk grabs my tits and squeezes them. What?
He’s taking advantage of me now? It’s OK, I tell myself, my heart
thudding noisily. I am used to be taken advantage of anyway.
Anything to get us out of here.

He closes his mouth on mine and I can taste
cigarettes on his breath. I kiss him back voraciously, trying to
show him I really mean it. Our lives are on the line, and it’s not
as if he hasn’t taken me before.

When we come up for air, he says, “I have
thought through what you said, and I will help you.”

Oh thank God! I throw my arms around his neck
and shower kisses on his ruggedly scarred face in gratitude.

He grabs my hair and goes on, “I want asylum
in America. For me and my remaining family. And ten million
dollars, US currency.”

I don’t have ten million dollars, but I’m
willing to bet Russell Devlin has. So I nod my head, trying to
convince him that it’s as good as a done deal. I mean, I’m bringing
back Russell’s son and his future son-in-law intact, right? What’s
a mere ten million dollars to WASPs like the Devlins?

“You must do everything I say,” Mansk adds.
“Our lives depend on it.”

I nod again. And gasp as two of his fingers
grope for my clit. He scissors the sweet, tender flesh in his
pincer grip and squeezes . . . hard. I almost come explosively.

“What do I have to do?” I whisper. I think I
have an idea.

He continues to finger me. He caresses the
grooves between my outer labia, and evens out the folds of my inner
pussy lips. My back is against the closet wall and the sensations
that assault me are vivid and electric. I moan softly to encourage
him further. Oh yes, the lives of two men I love are at stake, so I
may as well feign enjoyment.

And most of it is not feigned anyway. I
really do like being fondled and caressed. And I do like Mansk,
even though he seems to have an unhealthy May-December crush on
me.

His breath is ragged against my neck. “I will
claim you later. Now I have to go arrange a few things. I will come
for you tonight.”

Tonight! So soon? But I am not ready. I am
far from being physically and mentally prepared. And yet, if I wait
a minute longer, something might happen to Max and Greg.

“Wh-what do I have to do?” I say shakily.

“Nothing. Just wait.”

“What about my friends? How will you get
them? How will you get past Aimelie’s guards?”

“The less you know now, the better.”

He wrenches the handle of the closet door.
The door opens and we tumble out. My hair is in disarray and my
face is flushed. I have to trust him, I tell myself. I have to put
my faith that he will do right by us.

It’s the only thing I can do.

“Later tonight,” he promises. “Wait for
me.”