“Yes.”
“Don’t keep saying that. It doesn’t help.”
He chucked her under the chin. “Don’t be starchy, sweetheart. Not after all the things you and I have done in bed.”
“But this is kinky.”
“So is climbing mountains, smoking cigars, or doing macrame.”
“Anything can be rationalized,” Drusilla said resentfully. “It’s just a case of what you want. If you want something bad enough you’ll concoct an argument.”
“Don’t get so het up, ’Silla. You can’t live sensibly, so we contrive deterrents. Your behavior shows a pattern. We’ll set up a code to deal with it.”
“Tie me up and whip my bottom?”
“Practical and delicious.”
“You’d have an erection all day. I know you!”
“True, but irrelevant.”
“How d’you know I won’t get—addicted? Then we’d be worse off.”
“Would we... ?”
His query had been heavy with possibilities. Drusilla, grudgingly, examined them. “I think it’s nuts,” she said doubtfully.
“I knew you’d agree, darling,” Bryce said amiably. “Tomorrow!”
Tomorrow was today. Awaiting release, Drusilla scanned the hours. They added up to a sense of something accomplished. She had survived. An air of faint condescension would rob Bryce of victory as he loosed. the ropes. An interesting experiment! She grinned enjoyably. And she’d make sure he had a barren bed—even though her own loins were heated! She supposed it was her nakedness.
Bryce was late. Drusilla was sure of it. He was being mean. But this was no more than to be expected. It was the obvious. Teach her a lesson! Let her know her dependence.
Seething inwardly, Drusilla dissembled. She would have to endure this. It would be altogether too satisfying for him to pass up. He must be positively aching for her to make some reference to her plight; ask him to let her loose; be a sorry girl... Piss on him! She held to the cool condescension but was anxious about the two drinks on an empty stomach. “Get yourself a Scotch,” she suggested kindly.
“This’ll do.” Bryce sipped and surveyed his naked wife over the rim of the glass. “Any reactions, sweetheart?”
“Boredom... ” She poured on the casual indifference.
“Was I supposed to be repentant, or humble, or something?”
“You must have felt something. You’ve got tear stains on your cheeks.”
It was monstrously unfair! Bryce held all the cards. Tied and helpless, she was an open book. “I got so mad,” she said truthfully.
He placed his glass on the floor and cupped her sex with a wise male hand. Drusilla clenched her teeth against the sudden gasp of sensation his touch evoked.
“You seem to have felt something,” he said amusedly as he wiped a wet palm on her naked hip.
“I expect it’s this being naked.”
“Enjoy any of it?”
“I told you—just boredom.”
“Enjoy any of it?”
He knew her too well! His male ego would magnify her wet sex. “It was interesting,” she conceded airily. “After I discovered I couldn’t get loose, there was a sort of clinical curiosity. What’s the word u detachment?”
“Ah.”
The gin was making Drusilla feel giggly. But first she wanted to scream. The two of them were absurd. Both were waiting for her to ask: “Aren’t you going to untie me?” Until she said it their exchange would be banal. Bryce could sit there all night sipping away and looking at her pubic hair. But she wanted to go to the bathroom.
“Aren’t you going to untie me?” she inquired in a wifely voice.
“Hadn’t thought of it.”
“I need to go to the bathroom.”
“Pee?”
“Yes. ”
“Let it go on the floor. It’s concrete.”
“Bryce!” It was the exclamation of an outraged housewife.
“Oh, all right!”
With an air of long suffering, Bryce emptied nails from a can and held the receptacle between her thighs. “Go ahead.”
“I can’t!”
“Why not? We’re married.”
“Because! Oh, Bryce, nobody can—do—do it like this!”
“Why not? Bet I could.”
“I bet you couldn’t! It’s awful. Please untie me.”
He shrugged and resumed his seat. He poured himself a second lemon gin. Between them on the concreted the rejected can waiting with inanimate indifference.
Drusilla blinked back tears. Bryce had scored—and she’d helped! Why hadn’t she kept quiet! And now that it had been accorded recognition, her internal need became doubly insistent.
“Oh, very well then.” Her tone was martyred. Bryce professed obtuseness. “Very well what?”
“You may—you may—hold the can.”
“You mean I need permission?”
“Bryce, don’t be unkind! All right, I’ll say it nicely like a good little girl. Please hold the can for me. I—I can’t—I can’t hold it for myself.”
As she watched her husband empty her contribution to the can down the drain, Drusilla knew defeat. The fact that it was an honourable defeat against overwhelming odds made it nonetheless bitter. Some sort of precedent had been established; not in her favour.
“Sensible girl.” Bryce resumed his seat and his gin. “That doesn’t mean you’re not going to untie me, does it?”
“What else? You’re comfortable again.”
“I’m not comfortable at all. These ropes hurt.”
“But they’re bearable?”
“That’s not the point. I’ve been tied long enough. Let me loose.”
“You telling or asking?”
“What’s it matter! But I’ll say please. Will you untie me if I say a pretty please?”
“No”
“What’s the use then! Oh, Bryce, don’t be so mean! Don’t frighten me—please! And I’m so tired of standing here.”
“Hmmmm. Why didn’t you say... ?”
Drusilla kept silent. She knew herself in a spot. It was infuriating, but the thoughts now flickering for expression in her husband’s mind would affect her dramatically. She was owned.
“Here’s the Code,” said Bryce.
Drusilla listened. She had no choice. As the words flowed, she knew that without this day at the post she would have listened to none of it.
“’Silla, I’m never going to really set you free. You’re better off without freedom.” Drusilla sniffed disdainfully.
“Any time you find the Code too much for you, tell me. Then it will be instant divorce.”
“Don’t I have anything to say?”
“You have the all-important thing. The power to veto. But that’s all.” Bryce grinned companionably. “But remember, you can’t veto when you’re in a spot like you’re in now. You’ll have to do it when you’re a free agent without coercion.”
“You mean I quit and go away mad?”
Bryce let it pass. He said one word: “Obedience.”
Sniff.
“Punishment.”
Sniff.
“Restraint—such as now.”
With simulated boredom, Drusilla looked everywhere but at the man on the box. Her traitorous heart was racing.
“And, since I’m going to be a bastard anyway, I’ll simply use you. For pleasure. The good old wicked Pasha thing. If I feel like whipping your ass I’ll do it. Or tying you to that post. Or maybe taking you to the theatre with a chain locked tight around your tummy, I’ll think of things... ”
“I’m sure you will.” She poured on the frost.
He went away and left her alone. Hours later he took her to bed. Drusilla forgot her resolution.
They were the most tumultuous orgasms she had ever known.
2
Pain
“You’re up to something,” Diana said pointedly. “There’s a look about you.”
Drusilla tried to erase the look. But without success. She could never hide anything from Diana Winslow anyway, so why try. From beneath the sunshade of the garden umbrella she looked across the Winslow swimming pool to the neatly coiffured Winslow palm. Breathlessly she said: “It’s Bryce. He’s gone crazy.”