Page 189 of Deep Cover

That was weird enough. That he might have a foot fetish didn't seem impossible but neither did it seem logical. When he pulled out the shiny black, stiletto-heeled come-fuck-me pumps it didn't clear anything up. He slid knee-high stockings onto me, and I bit my lip because in whatever situation this was, I couldn't imagine anyone having a fetish for knee high nylons. Then the shoes went on, with their four inch heels and the next thing I knew, Vincent was hauling me to my feet.

"You and I are going to be attending a good many formal functions." His eyes were as cold as anything I could imagine and what he'd just said made no sense. "Sometimes Kie will attend with us and other times she will not. Occasionally you will be of use during the events and other times you will simply be on my arm."

Vincent was, I believed, a plastic surgeon of some great renown. I didn't see how he figured he could drag a slave with him to formal events without her true master figuring out where she was and coming for her, but that was his problem, not mine. I was all for Cole spotting us on some red carpet and coming to get me.

Only – only the thing with the flights had shown he could move us from point A to point B at the slightest whim. So best guess, the instant the events were over we'd be doing the Cinderella thing and racing back through the streets, climbing onto a plane and heading somewhere else. So that was a game. Lovely. So nice to be a pawn.

The heels – they were a fresh new hell. For an hour I staggered around the room, the plush carpeting catching the idiot heels, the guard growing so bored I saw her smothering yawns as I fought to keep from giggling. I'd lurch forward and fall back, waver from side to side, and when I caught my balance and "walked," it was in a skulking, half upright, half bent over like Ebenezer Scrooge sort of tack.

Vincent even laughed a few times, though that didn't make me happy, and even as he laughed he reached out with the bamboo cane he held and urged me to try harder.

When I fell, tired and hurting from weirdly used muscles and blisters on both feet, he dragged me up and threw me over the bed, face down, growled, "Don't move."

I heard the door close as the guard exited.

I heard the air displaced as the cane descended.

There was nothing to laugh about.

Wherever we were, it seemed like we were going to be dug in for a while. It didn't seem possible to me that Vincent actually thought he could take me to a society event complete with paparazzi and keep me from knowing what city I was in, so maybe that didn't matter. The other events – the ones where he said I might be "of use" – I thought those likely would be along the lines of the circle of freaks Cole knew in southern Nevada. They probably would be able to keep my very existence to themselves, and that scared me.

When I worked deep cover I was always aware of my mortality if nothing else. What kept me at it was the mortality of everyone else who was getting killed by the dealers and their wares. But it was never far from my mind that if I got killed while so deep undercover my PD didn't even know who or where I was, that I'd be dead and gone forever and my family would never know.

This felt a lot like that. Nobody knew where I was and the people I was with were violent and dangerous. It was a recipe for disaster.

At the end of the training with the shoes, at the end of the caning after the shoes, Vincent pulled me to my feet and ran a hand along my face as if we had only just had a small disagreement and were actually some kind of couple.

Everything in me wanted to spit in his face. He had dragged me from where I had been safe. He had threatened the man keeping me safe. He had drugged me which scared me considerably and he had beaten me. Even now the welts from the beating were sending deep hot pain through my entire body.

Cole had hurt me. Cole would be hurting me if I were still with him.

Why was this different?

Obviously, the threat of being killed, the fact that Vincent was a psychopath and maybe Kie was something that made psychopathy look benign.

I meant, the actual fact of being beaten. There had been times Cole hadn't held back at all. Times that I had felt the strength behind his blows. Usually when he was afraid for me. Usually when he thought I had done something stupid.

I wasn't arrogant enough or angry enough at his "corrections" to not recognize that.

But even when Cole hurt me far beyond anything sexual, there was a sexual component to it. Even if I was so furious at him I couldn't countenance his touching me. Even then, in the privacy of my own mind and the space between my legs, I could feel the ache and need growing.

There was nothing but pain from Vincent.

When he finished stroking my face and turned away I risked one question. "Sir?"

He turned back. I could see that because his feet turned back toward me. I kept my eyes resolutely on the ground, reminding myself that not seeing his angry bitter face and stony eyes was no loss.

"Yes?"

I hesitated. If I asked if I could ask a question, I would have just done so. If I asked anyway – oh, fuck it, I thought. How do you reason with crazy?

"I'd like to ask a question if I may, sir."

There was humor in his voice when he responded, "You may," but it wasn't pleasant and it was aimed at me, not for me. Not with me.

"Am I to be held for longer than the two weeks that was the agreed upon time at the auction?"

His feet moved and he hadn't said anything. As he moved behind me, I flinched. Next instant he had taken a handful of my too-long hair and wrapped it tight in his fist, dragging my head back and forcing me down to my knees in one movement.

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