The Quality of Her Tears

While slowly fucking me, he began explaining. It would be of the greatest importance to him and Papa, he said, that I started dating an American I would meet at the Louvre reception that night. I had a hard time concentrating as right then his generous flood triggered my orgasm. Panting, I begged him to repeat what he'd said. He plopped his fat cock out of me and fell on the bed, repeating it. I heard him now, but hardly understood. Smiling, I scraped a glob of his delicious white goo off his spent cock and sucked it into my mouth.

"But what's the fuss, chéri?" I asked, after swallowing. "You set up other dates for me; what is so special this time?"

"This time," he said, removing stray strands of sweaty hair from my brow, "this time you won't get to fuck him; you won't end up in bed with him – you won't even give him a blowjob." I mouthed a frustrated moan.

"Boooooring!" I said, lengthening the O while stretching my body. He chuckled.

"You have become such a slut, chérie," he said, rising from the bed.

"Oooh, yes," I replied with a smile and a moan. "But your slut, only yours."

So he showed me pictures of the American. He didn't look bad. I gathered he was tallish. His blond hair was rather full and pretty long; it had this wavy quality one often sees with college boys. He should have worn rimmed glasses, but he didn't. And he dressed well, though rather conservatively.

Jean-Luc told me the man was an arts expert. "He helps decide whether a painting is the real thing." I shrugged, once more studying the pictures.

"A nerd," I said. Jean-Luc chuckled.

"A nerd, maybe. But one whose word decides whether a painting is a multi million-dollar old master or a one-penny fake." He laid his finger on the photo. "He is one mighty little nerd, honey. And he is going to be your husband."

The uneasy, deep flutter once again surfaced.

"I already have a husband, Jean-Luc," I said, laying my hand on his pointing finger. It seemed to irritate him for just a second. Then he smiled again.

"Of course," he said. "And that is exactly why you'll marry him. He raised his hand, clutching my hair. Then he pulled my face down to the table until my nose touched the photograph.

"Do you understand, slut?" he hissed.

So here we were, entering the brilliantly lit hall to be introduced to the tiny president and his beautiful wife. A chamber orchestra played in a corner while pretty girls presented us with their elegant bodies, a glass of champagne and colorful hors d' oeuvres. And then there was the solemn uncovering of the masterpiece – a huge painting showing the original Napoleon on a prancing horse as the horizon went up in flames.

As we politely applauded, Jean-Luc pointed out the blond American, who sat a few rows in front of us on a fragile rococo chair.

"You're on your own now, pretty slut," he said and rose to leave. A rush of panic made me reach out for him, but he shook his head.

"Be my whore," he said, smiling. "Make me proud." And he was gone.

"I heard there was another American here," I said. He was nervous, I could tell. Nothing new there; a lot of men get paralysis of the tongue with me. But he recovered quickly.

"Is there?" he said, looking around. I rewarded the pretty weak joke with my best teenage giggle, pretending I had already emptied a few glasses of bubbly wine – which I had. Maybe I was as nervous as he.

"Me being the proverbial barbarian from over seas," I said, accepting yet another glass from him and pointing to the oversized painting, "could you please explain why there is such a hullaballoo about the prancing pony with the dwarf on top?" He chuckled; then he let a real laugh out. He took my hand and we walked over to the painting.

"The dwarf is Napoleon Bonaparte," he said. "Ever heard of him?" I nodded, playing the wide-eyed innocent.

"The painter is David, Jacques-Louis David. He did a lot of neo-classical paintings to glorify the French Revolution and the exploits of Bonaparte. As for the hullaballoo," he chuckled, "I guess this evening is about glorifying the French Republic too, though I don't see much revolting, unless you'd use the word in its other sense."

We laughed. It broke the ice.

His name was Carl Lundgren. He lived in New York where he went to study art history, after growing up in the Midwest. I told him about me being a freelance journalist, spending time in Paris to do research for a series of articles about the big French fashion houses. It was the cover Jean-Luc had told me to use.

Carl of course wondered how my job would link me to the evening, so I told him that my date was involved with the fine arts. I didn't know if I should point out Jean-Luc to him, but I didn't see him anyway.

Carl introduced me to people from the Louvre, explaining how he got involved with acquiring the painting. I could sense he loved introducing me. I did everything to feed his pride of having picked up the beauty of the ball. Then, as the function petered out, I told him my feet were slowly getting killed by my new shoes. It took him a second to catch up.

"I'd love to get you out of here," he said. "But didn't you arrive with someone dark and handsome? Where did he go, by the way?"

I assured him he was just a gay friend and that I'd love to catch up on more American memories. So we left for a late supper at a tiny restaurant, the offending pumps kicked off under the table.

He was witty, well read and genuinely interested in my Parisian adventures. They were mostly invented, but based on just enough truth to keep me from getting caught in a mistake.

When at last we stood in front of my apartment, my conditioning screamed for being fucked hard and soon, but all I did was allow him to kiss me tenderly and make a date for the next afternoon at the Jardins du Luxembourg.

I found Jean-Luc standing at the entrance to the apartment proper. He pulled me in and tore the dress off my body. I sighed and turned to liquid as he gave me the pounding I had been craving all evening.

Carl.

I stared at the creature Mia had become. The blaze of the crystal chandelier made her bleached hair sparkle. I felt lost in the maze of my thoughts.

"If you loved Maynard, why marry me...?" was all I could say. She blushed through the paleness of her cheeks.

"I was stupid," she said, looking away. "And I was scared. Jean-Luc was... is... a harsh Master. Living with him is... demanding – beautiful in a cruel, cruel way..." Her voice died slowly. Then she seemed to pick herself up again.

"Don't misunderstand, please, Carl. I loved him, but I wasn't ready for his exhausting demands. I was weak; I still am. It costs me everything not to get scared and run away from him. When we, you and I, met at the Elysée..." The word conjured up memories – sweet ones, wonderful ones. I just watched her lips, recalling.

"I was stupid and naïve back then," she went on, sighing. "I believed I could be strong and you could save me – that you could be the knight that whisked me away from my bittersweet hell... to another country, another life. I believed I could learn to love you. Maybe I even loved you, then, for a while. Aaah.." Another sigh turned into a half-sob. "Not even two months later I begged Jean-Luc to take me back, to punish me for my betrayal... to set me straight and pound me again with his glorious cock."

Her eyes were glassed over, her strangled hands pushed into her silk-clad crotch.

"I begged," she whispered. "But he refused." Her eyes were wide and dark now, her voice almost gone. "He told me to go to hell."

I don't think I ever felt so out of sync with reality. Here was this woman I had lived with for two years in marriage, the woman who told me over and over that she loved me – and she proved a complete stranger. No, she was more than that. She was completely alien – as my wife, as a woman and even as a human being, pregnant and not knowing who the father was.

I really couldn't find the words to shape a response. In just a few seconds she had taken everything I thought I ever had and squashed it. Every certainty disintegrated. It whirled to the floor like flakes of ash. I knew she'd cheated on me, but this... I tried to imagine that time again, only months after we...

Her hand touched my cheek, but I didn't feel it. Even her words went unheard. When at last my ears opened again, I had to reconstruct most of what she may have said.

"I am sorry, Carl. I have always stayed his woman, even when he dumped me after I married you. I've always stayed his slave woman," she said, searching my eyes to know for sure that I understood. "I fell in love with Jean-Luc when I first came to Paris. I was so young. I did everything he told me to. He and his Papa trained me to do whatever they wanted – I couldn't refuse. They punished me and rewarded me. They mixed my pain with incredible pleasure, my humiliation with praise. At first it confused me. I tried to hang on to what I considered normalcy, but mostly I hung on to my love for Jean-Luc.

"They went on and on, flogging me, fucking me. They drugged me and let me do... outrageous things to make me commit. At times I tried to escape, to shake myself free from their gruesome conditioning. I met you. You were so... sweet, so different. You were balm for my soul, but I guess it was too late. I had lost my taste for sweetness. In the end I couldn't stay away and then they broke me."

The silence she allowed was deafening. When she resumed her story, her voice was a whisper.

"I gathered the last remnants of my courage to be free long enough to marry you, Carl, to flee the country and start anew. But there was no use. I'd been Jean-Luc's toy... their toy for too long; I could no longer imagine a life of my own, a life with you. I was their slut and their whore; their property. But they refused to take me back. I was stuck with you."

Her story was a nightmare. A deep anger rose from the pit of my stomach, blinding me. Could I hit the woman I'd loved, a pregnant woman? Could I hit any woman or even any human being at all? I'd never been an aggressive person – never needed to be. But then and there I could have killed her. She saw it, but she didn't flinch. Her warped mind and body might even have welcomed it.

The urge for violence flared and died. My fists clenched and opened again. All kinds of memories, times and details went through my mind. There had been plenty of opportunities, I agreed, plenty moments for her to be with her lover and live the crazy life she'd admitted to.

"You betrayed me," I whispered. "Why? What did I do to you to deserve it?" She smiled weakly; it provoked a new flash of anger.

"Why, Carl?" she said. "I told you why. It wasn't about you. It was my fault entirely. I thought you could save me, but in the end I couldn't be saved, I guess. I am sorry for all the lies, but I had no choice." Her eyes closed as she stopped talking.

I knew I had to get away from here, from her; it hurt to even see her. I turned abruptly and walked to the windows that looked out on the lawn. I had no car, where could I go? I could just leave and run. I did still have questions, though.

"Why did you leave me the way you did?" I asked, talking to the darkening park. It had her reflected shape in it. I saw the light of the chandelier shine off her silk-clad, pregnant belly. "Why the charade of cheating on me? Couldn't you just have packed and left?" It took her a while to answer. When she at last did, her voice came from beside me. I had heard the clicking of her heels.

"I cheated on you because, in our last year, I started liking you," she said. Then she corrected herself. "Or rather: I stopped hating you." She obviously hadn't run out of confusing one-liners yet. But by now I'd learned not to say anything.

"You were a sweet and kind man, Carl. Being cut off from my Masters must have worn down their influence. I started having these... feelings about what I did and how I was betraying you. You worked so hard and spent all your money on me, on us, our marriage. You trusted me totally; maybe in the end it was this heart-breaking trust that hit me the most." Her voice stopped. I never looked her way.

"You know, honey," she went on, irritating me with the endearment. "I can feel no guilt; they cut that out of me, as they did with shame and compassion. Still, after two years as your wife I must have felt remnants of those feelings, because I couldn't go on. I just could not go on betraying you, so I started getting photographs of my fucking sessions." I looked at her. She nodded.

"Yes, Carl, after Jean-Luc dumped me, I looked for others. I have been fucking around on you during our whole marriage. I should be sorry, but I can't; it wasn't my fault. You see: it is my conditioning. I need to be fucked regularly; it is like breathing. I have to be fucked hard and by many men. It has been programmed into me." There was a short pause. I looked away.

"My job," she went on, "gave me an alibi to find the time and the men to feed my hunger. Sorry, but I would have gone crazy if you'd been the only one I'd have sex with in all that time. Sex with you was sweet and loving and awfully vanilla. I might have taken my life if it had been all I got."

I shook my head violently, as if to cleanse it from the poison she poured into it. I closed my ears with my hands, but the venom was already inside. My hands could not stop her words.

"So all I had to do was have one of my fuck sessions photographed. Of course it was important that you'd think you caught me. I had a picture planted into your golf bag with a note directing you to private investigators. I kept them pretty occupied for a few weeks."

I once more turned towards her. She smiled, but there were tears running down her face. They took me by surprise like they had that other time, when their sudden appearance surprised me too.

"Was it my brother, in the elevator?" I asked. "Did you fuck John?" She looked away.

"He was easy," she said, softly. "He'd wanted me since the first time he saw me. And if men want me, it is very hard for me not to give in. I fought his constant advances, just as I did your father's..." She smiled at my reaction.

"Oh yes, he too," she went on. "I couldn't let them though, could I? They would have blown my cover. But please..." Her voice petered out; then it came back. "I do understand that you may want to punish me for this, Carl." She once more opened her robe. The ugly silverware looked like a sacrilege. "I'd understand," she repeated, lowering her eyes in submission. It made bile rise from my stomach.

"Why did you want me to prove your cheating, Mia, photos and all?" I asked after swallowing the bitterness. "Why all the trouble?" She looked up as if returning from a far place.

"Well," she said, slightly puzzled. "Because you had to divorce me, of course."

Of course, I thought, once again stunned by the maze of craziness she built with words of everyday logic. She saw my skepticism; it darkened her eyes with irritation – or impatience, rather.

"The only way I could set you free was by you throwing me out, Carl," she went on. "Don't you see? It had to be you who sent me away to free yourself from me and my treason. You had to be the one breaking up the marriage and dump me, so I had a valid reason to return to Jean-Luc. He is a jealous man; he cut me off when I fled and married you. He'd never share, he needs to own. That is why I made the divorce as easy as I could, not wanting anything in return."

The crazy logic got to me again; the surreal, wacked logic of her words. But her eyes were wide and honest – she believed every word she said. I really had to get away from there.

"I have to get away from here, Mia. This is all too crazy."

"I know," she said. "I knew it would hurt. But it was the only way. I had to stop it, Carl."

"Bullshit, Mia," I said. "You did it for you – to get away from me and back to your kinky lover. And as for the easy divorce, I am still waiting for it."

Her hand went up to her mouth. "But they... I truly..." she stuttered. "I am so sorry..." I ignored her apology. I guess I understood. They'd stopped the divorce and now I was here.

So why was I here?

Mia.

Seeing Carl again was weird. He seemed so... out of place – so small. Well, he probably is. Jean-Luc had told me he would bring him to the mansion. I knew better than to ask him why, but the idea of seeing the man again got me restless. Leaving him had been a stupid stunt and I'd been punished for that. I fully accepted, of course. It was a clean-cut solution to an uncomplicated problem – just another step in my education. I loved uncomplicated. I needed things to stay that way, so why bring Carl back here? Did they want me to go with him again, be the good little wife once more? The prospect scared me. It worried me even more when I saw him. The world he came from had lost all meaning to me. And so had he.

I saw the pain in his eyes when I showed him my body. I saw the disbelief and the puzzlement when I told him the story Jean-Luc had briefed me on – a tear jerking story about our marriage and why I left him – how I'd used him just like they use me. Not a word about the real reasons. I guess he deserves to be clueless – to be lied to and cheated and used. He is weak, as weak as I am. Weak people must be abused, exploited. It is how the world works. I don't think he'd agree, though, Carl. But God, I would have loved to tell him how he'd been manipulated and by whom. Jean-Luc had set my world straight for me. He treated me like I should be treated – indifferent, uncaring. He put me at the center of my very own cruel universe.

I loved it that way. Seeing Carl reminded me of my failures and insecurities. I had no need for that.

After returning to my tiny quarters, I lay soaking in my perfumed bath, caressing my round belly and wondering what Jean-Luc's further plans for me might be. I knew it was ridiculous to even guess at them – but I loved pretending to be in his mind. It gave me the illusion of being close. It was my silly private dream of mattering to him.

Ever since my first bout of morning sickness I knew I was pregnant. I had no idea who the father might be. Would it be Gaston, the sweet giant who fucked me to rags? Papa, maybe? To my disappointment Jean-Luc had fucked me only a few times since I returned from America. But ah, there were so many others. Did I really care to know?

Oh yes, I'd love Jean-Luc to be the father, if only to have something to bind him to me. But otherwise no, I don't think so. I even had problems visualizing the child – or accepting that I carried one at all. All I knew was that it made me ugly and that soon my body would be distorted, slowing me down until I'd be a fat, wobbling piece of jelly. I would soon be totally unattractive and utterly useless.

I tried not to think about my situation. I certainly refused to think of the actual birth – the pain, the mess, the tearing up. I hated to imagine what would be left of my perfect body, my one and only claim to the love of my man.

Shaking my head to get rid of my thoughts, I sent my fingers to play lazily with the silver rings Jean-Luc had driven through my poor swollen nipples. Flashes of the painful ordeal lighted up the back of my mind, starting the familiar pulsing of my pierced clit. I was a doll, a programmed set of cogs that only needed a word, a touch to be set in motion. The wheels rolled and churned to create a friction that ignited a multitude of electrical waves. It was just a matter of cause and effect; I had no say in it. The mere weight of the jewelry that hung from my pierced clit could reduce me to a shivering heap of jelly. Well, even the chiming sound of its attached silver disk would stiffen my nipples. I was the Pavlov-slave of my body and my body was the slave of my lover – my owner.