At Work Ch. 08

Francesca decided to take Anne along on her next business trip. That morning she packed her suitcase and called for a taxi. The driver assisted her into the vehicle with her case and tied Anne's leash to a short chain in back.

Anne followed them on foot, her eyes on the ground careful not to trip and fall. Once she stepped on a sharp stone and almost cried out but stifled it; she did not want to call attention to herself and embarrass her owner. Enough people were staring at her already.

The driver knew his business; he drove the cab at a slow pace through town to the train station. If he enjoyed the sight in his mirror, he said nothing.

Once there, Francesca handed Anne over to an attendant who attached a tag to her collar. He took her to a livestock car at the back of the train and drove her in with a crack of his whip.

Anne saw a dozen or more bound women inside, reclining on the straw or peering out between the slats. The air in the car was fetid despite the slight breeze; Anne was glad to be making the journey now, and wondered how cold it got in winter.

Soon the car began to move abruptly, knocking her down on another woman. She apologized and was rewarded with a grunt of acknowledgment.

The inmates got no food or water on the first leg of the trip, but at a junction where the train waited for a connection they were driven out into a high-walled courtyard. The more experienced travelers quickly occupied the small shaded area under the south wall, leaving Anne to bake in the sun. The communal feed and water troughs were crowded, but she was not hungry in the heat. She lay down and tried to turn every few minutes to avoid sunburn.

After a while she lapped up some cloudy water, and soon the inmates were herded back to their car for the second half of the journey. The car had no latrine, and Anne became desperate a few minutes into the trip. She tried to squat; the train lurched and threw her forward to the amusement of several inmates.

One of them admonished her to use a straw-filled corner of the car where she could brace herself on two sides.

As she stood up she saw a large woman towering over her and lowered her head in deference.

"Kneel." Anne knelt at her feet.

"What's your name?" Anne told her.

"I'm Linda. Do me."

The woman lay on her back in the center of the car. Anne crept forward on her belly. Not knowing how soon the train would reach its destination, she proceeded straight to business after a few seconds of licking the inside of Linda's thighs. Soon she began to taste results, and after a minute Linda pushed her head away.

"Now you. Lie down." Anne did as she was told, and Linda (who knew how much time they had) took her more slowly. She writhed with pleasure as Linda's tongue penetrated her and forgot everything but the soft wet exploring object.

Finally Linda paused and withdrew. Drenched in sweat Anne looked up at a circle of women staring expressionless back down at her.

"Get up," Linda ordered. "Crouch over by the wall."

Linda sat on her like a footstool, braced against the back wall for the remainder of the trip.

Eventually they reached their destination. Linda got up and was the first out the door of the car where they were driven down a chute to another courtyard. Following behind her, Anne saw a small wiry middle-aged woman approach them.

Linda shrank visibly and knelt as the woman attached a leash to her collar before leading her away. In her other hand the woman carried a whip of knotted cords.

Francesca took Anne up and walked her outside. The hotel was not far from the station; she led Anne along city streets to its front entrance, handed her leash to a doorman, and went inside to register a room for herself and basement space for Anne.

On her return the two women accompanied a talkative porter to a side door leading down a flight of stairs. He assured them that accommodations for guests' girls were quite hygienic, and epidemics almost nonexistent since the last remodeling.

Individual cells were smaller now to accommodate more girls - in the past the overflow had to be chained outside to a wall in the alley, most unsatisfactory - but they contained "all the conveniences".

The basement was a large, low-ceilinged room lit from above by a pair of bulbs that glowed night and day. It was filled with cages, tall enough for Anne to stand in and just long enough for her to lie down. Anne was led into C35 and the door padlocked. Francesca tipped the porter, explained Anne's provisioning (high protein, half-size rations), and the two of them left.

Anne was pleased to see that her cage included a primitive sanitary facility set in the floor as well as a filled water bowl and an empty feed bowl.

The smooth concrete floor was no worse than she was used to at St. Agnes Academy, and she looked forward to a good night's sleep.

"Anne? Is that you?" She heard a voice from C34 and looked over to see Erika, an attractive woman in her thirties with long blond hair. The two met when they were at St. Agnes; they were chained together from time to time and became good friends.

"Erika! I haven't seen you since you were sold. Who bought you?"

"An agent for the Terminal Club."

"What is that?"

"It's a group of very wealthy men. One of them buys me for a while, then he sells me to another one. I've been traded twenty or thirty times in cities where they have chapters. I have to work hard to appeal to them at my age. If nobody makes an offer they terminate me, that's where the name comes from. They already told me how they do it."

"Oh, how?" The words were out of Anne's mouth before she realized what she had said; it was too late to call them back.

Erika told her while Anne tried not to cringe or shudder. "It's all in a soundproof room of course."

Anne was completely without words. The most she could do was say "Oh" now and then.

"And how are you?"

It took Anne a moment to gather her wits.

"Don't worry, everyone is shocked when I tell them. Take your time, they're not coming for me for a little while."

Anne briefly described her purchase by Mr. Schuyler at auction, her belief that she would be executed when he tired of her, and her rescue by Francesca.

Shortly after she finished, three large men approached Erika's cage. One of them unlocked the door and stood outside while the other two bound and leashed her. As they led her out she said goodbye but was hustled away before Anne could reply.

Anne closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Erika's fate could easily have been her own, struggling every night to avoid "termination" and knowing that sooner or later she would fail.

She heard rumors of the secretive club at the academy, but its bidders did not identify themselves at the auctions and no girls ever returned from it to tell their experiences.

Erika entered the academy later in life than most, sent there by her husband when he tired of her and seeking a new life. She must have known her career would be a short one.

Francesca arrived with a porter and signed Anne out; he turned the captive over to her and they walked outside.

"I want to take you to a little restaurant nearby and meet my friends. Anne, are you OK? You look pale all over. You haven't caught some bug already, have you?"

"No ma'am, maybe it was climbing the stairs; I'll be all right."

"We'll walk more slowly then; it's only a couple blocks. See the scarves in that window; do you think Barbara would look good in one of those? They're her colors. Let's go in."

She led Anne into an elegant shop, the kind Anne had once patronized herself. Anne knelt on the carpet as her mistress reviewed a selection with a store clerk. A greater variety of merchandise was available on the upper floors, but only clients were permitted there.

"We would be happy to hold your girl downstairs while you visit us," the clerk told her. Francesca handed the leash over and proceeded to the elevator.

The clerk led Anne through a fire door and down a flight of metal stairs to a room in the basement. Its walls were covered with mirrors from floor to ceiling which gave it the appearance of infinite space in all directions. Even the floor was made of some highly polished material. Used during fashion shows as a staging area for models, at other times it served as a holding pen.

Lighting tubes overhead cast a shadowless light. Anne saw a young woman crouched in a far corner.

The attendant led Anne to the corner by the door; she instructed Anne to face it and squat with her hips just off the ground and her feet apart ("No, more. That's it.") before attaching the leash to a ring set in the floor and leaving.

Anne saw herself exposed wherever she looked. The walls reflected her face, her breasts, and belly; in the floor her fleece, her parted lips, and the open cleft between her buttocks.

Glancing across the room in the mirror, she saw the reflection of the girl looking at her. She smiled back. Her companion began to speak but without sound, possibly in fear of being overheard.

In the confused reflection of her image, Anne was unable to read her lips. She made out the repeated word "help", but what help could she offer, chained to the floor?

Anne tried to mouth the question "What?" but she had no more success than the other.

Should she speak out loud? Was there something to fear in this outpost of refined elegance?

After a few minutes of this failed pantomime, an attendant came for the girl. Taking up her leash, he led her to the door. As she passed Anne, in a low but distinct voice she said "I'm sorry". Anne's head whirled in confusion.

In a little while the attendant returned and brought Anne back upstairs to be reunited with her owner. Francesca had chosen a silk scarf in bright floral colors, waving it in the air to show off its light supple drape.

"I think she'll like it; she doesn't have a chance to buy for herself, poor thing," Francesca said as the clerk took the item away for gift-wrapping.

Once again Anne did not understand, but she felt she should not ask for an explanation.

They walked out with Francesca's purchase in hand to a restaurant paneled in dark wood and were shown to a private room. Francesca ordered tea for herself and a bowl of water with a slice of lemon for Anne.

"I brought a bag of feed for you; you're on a diet. Besides, I expect you'll get some treats," she said with a twinkle in her eye. "Now kneel up close to the table."

A waiter brought the beverages and a empty saucer for Anne. A moment later there was a knock on the door and three friends of Francesca's entered. The greeted each other with hugs and kisses. Francesca shook Anne's leash and she stood up to be introduced.

The evening was a merry one. The three (two men and a woman) had all been students with Francesca and were also attending the conference. Each of the three found ways to offer a bit of their food to Anne, and by the main course Francesca had given up on Anne's diet for the evening.

They enjoyed holding out a piece of meat on a fork for her to take, or offering her one end of a string bean and watching it disappear into her pursed lips.

Between courses each of the men mounted her while the two women looked on; they pronounced her quite skilled in the art.

"But of course Francesca knows that," the woman said to general laughter. As a special reward for her services Anne was allowed a bite of dessert.

Finally the event concluded and the last of the coffee was drunk. Francesca led her back to the hotel in the darkness and saw Anne into her cell where a porter signed her back in and fastened the padlock. C34 was empty.

Anne did not sleep well that night.

The next morning a man in a white smock examined her. He told her to stand and inspected the inside of her mouth; after some embarrassing health problems among girls in the basement, the hotel had begun regular checks of the inmates. Next he ordered her to bend over and probed her from below.

"Had a busy night, I see."

She reddened.

"Don't be embarrassed; that's what you're for, lady."

Completing his exam, he left the cell, pasting a green "OK" sticker on the door while a porter replaced her padlock.

The day proceeded uneventfully. An attendant refilled her water bowl and poured her a small quantity of feed at noon, and around sunset Francesca came to take her home, leading Anne through the darkening streets of the city to the train station.

She was still wearing the luggage tag on her collar; the ticket clerk removed it with a pair of clippers and replaced it with a new one.

The return trip was a nighttime mirror of the outbound journey. Anne was more experienced this time and used the corner of the car when necessary, though the darkness made this a tricky proposition.

The courtyard at the midway stopover was unlit except by the moon, giving it a spectral appearance as if it were filled with a harem of naked ghosts. The stone floor was cold; Anne huddled under a wall out of the wind.

The station agent emerged from his office carrying a flashlight and ran it over the girls one by one. He selected a slightly built young woman next to Anne and told her to stand. Anne was next; he picked her too and they followed him inside. The willowy girl (Anne never learned her name) had an appealing little rear; Anne admired it as she walked behind the other two.

He led them down a corridor to the employees' break room where a dozen men awaited them. The group looked the pair over; the agent told the girl to bend over a large table and motioned for Anne to kneel.

Anne heard her cry out, from pain or pleasure she could not tell, as the first man entered her; but with the agent in her mouth she had no time to consider it.

It never occurred to her to wonder if her owner would mind this casual usage by strangers; they both knew this was the main - perhaps the only - reason for her existence.

When he was done another man used her the same way. The third made her bend over the table next to the girl. Anne saw her smile and wink; she cried out herself, just like the girl, when he spread her open and breached her.

Several of them (she did not know how many) took her; each time she opened her eyes she saw the girl looking at her. She tried to smile back between men, but when one was in her it was all she could do to entertain him.

When they had all been satisfied, the agent told the two women to stand. Anne rose slowly after her exertions, but the girl sprang up at once. He let her suck on a water bottle then gave it to Anne to drink from. The water had a pleasant lemony flavor.

He herded them outside to the courtyard. An assistant with a cattle prod was already driving women back into the car for the final leg of the trip; he shocked a couple of sleeping girls with it, who jumped and squealed at its touch. Anne hurried into the train as he approached her. The girl was not fast enough; she yelped when he used it on her.

She felt a little guilty she had not let the girl go first and taken the prod herself. She wondered what it was like and imagined it probing her. Maybe she should ask the girl; no, best not to.

She found an open space and lay down on it. The next thing she knew the girl was lying next to her, pressing her face to Anne's.

Anne opened her mouth to let the girl in, and for a minute or more they shared everything: traces of the men's seed, the lemony taste of the water, their breath and the tingle of their linked tongues.

Anne rolled onto her back and the girl lay on her, their legs twined, till they reached their destination. The girl gave her a last wet kiss, got up and left. Anne saw her go off with a pair of men.