Shell Game

Mike?

Michelle's face suddenly rose unbidden from Courtney's memory, mouthing a disappointed whisper. That's not fair.

--- Six Months Previously

"That's him, there. Sitting under the elm tree." Michelle grabbed Courtney's arm as Courtney started to walk toward him. "Wait, what are you doing?"

"I am introducing myself."

"No! You can't let him know you know who he is! I promised I wouldn't tell anyone. He only admitted to me who he was when I recognized the name."

"Then I guess I should go without you. What's he reading?"

Michelle's brow was furrowed. "It's one of our course books, essays from Cahiers du Cinema, about the French New Wave."

"French New Wave? Like Devo?" Were they French?

"No! Movies. Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Andre Bazin."

Courtney remembered a French movie that a high school sometimes-friend once made her watch, before he would help her with a calculus assignment. The movie had been all edits and ennui. What was the name? "Breathless?"

"Yes, that was Godard."

"Well, if I can't talk to your friend Travis about how he is the son of Walter Bickle, oil baron and 63rd richest man in America, I need something else to talk to him about."

"Why talk to him about anything?"

"I would like to get to know him. He looks cute."

Michelle's face was dismay itself. "No."

College was about discovering yourself, and Michelle was about to learn that in this world, she needed to move fast, particularly when it came to one of the most eligible bachelors on the planet. Courtney placed an expression of concern on her face. "He hasn't asked you out,or anything, has he?"

"No," Michelle conceded, looking down.

The feigned concern was replaced by feigned relief. "Good, because I wouldn't want to betray our friendship by hitting on someone you had a claim on." Courtney walked toward Trav, not looking back at her friend.

"That's not fair," she heard Michelle whisper faintly.

"You are reading Cahiers du Cinema? A fan of the New Wave, are we?"

He looked up and smiled. He really was cute. "I saw 400 Blows when I was fifteen, and it knocked me on my ass."

"Me too, except I was seventeen." Given the title, Courtney hoped that she hadn't just admitted to watching a porn movie. "Breathless was my favorite. It was very..." what was the word her high school friend had used to describe it? "...kinetic."

It was the right word. The man smiled. "Why don't you sit down? My name is Travis."

Courtney spared a glance to Michelle, but couldn't hold the sad, dead gaze that was returned.

--- Halloween

Mike. I am being fingered by Mike. Oh God Had she walked into a trap? MIchelle had rebounded quickly into Mike's arms, but had Michelle set Courtney up to be fucked by Michelle's beast of a boyfriend? How had she forgotten the way Michelle looked at her when she had cut in front of Michelle's ponderously slow and doomed attempts to get Trav to notice her? Was this payback?

Courtney couldn't take the chance. She took the small bite of breath that her corset allowed her, and summoned her reserves of strength, trying to scramble out of his (Mike's? Trav's?) clutches.

It didn't work. He had been leaning over her just in case she reacted this way to his words, and he simply pressed the weight of his body on top of her, driving the wind from her lungs. He then gave her ass another smack as punishment as she heard a cruel chuckle in her ear.

Courtney's efforts turned from escape to mere survival. She needed air, and was able to inhale what she needed only by relaxing her body to take off some of his weight. It was barely enough air to keep thinking.

No, it doesn't make any sense.The men had approached the women in costume, just as Michelle had said they would, and it had been Courtney's idea to switch costumes, not Michelle's. Maybe this really was Trav, just imitating Mike. The mask muffled the voice. Telling her to make him a sandwich was definitely something Mike would think funny to say while finger-fucking a woman, it could just be Trav's clever impersonation.

Who was he?

Whoever, he was, his fingers were sloppy, smearing her juices all around her folds and lips, neglecting her clitoris. Why was he neglecting her clit? Please, it would feel so good if he would just touch her...

No! She needed to retain control. Courtney tried to squirm away, but was again restrained by a hand grasping her hair and his weight upon her back.

If only she could think straight. The corset still strangled her. She could scarcely keep the oxygen necessary to function, and she was growing lightheaded from the constriction around her chest, and from the feel of Mike's fingers rubbing the slick wetness of her sex -- or was it Trav who was claiming her with such fierce determination. If it's him, why doesn't he take me like this all the fucking time.

Courtney was losing herself to the touch of Mike-or-Trav's insistent fingers, the strong weight of his chest on her back that denied her any choice but to be lie there and be taken. A low moan escaped her lips, and she raised her hips off the bed, pressing back against his fingers. Just do it. Fuck me with your fingers. Then fuck me with your... No!

She should just put a stop to this. She could scream -- or yell "rape". Wait, aren't you supposed to call "fire" instead of "rape"? People would hear, they would come running. But what if this really was Trav? How could she explain herself? If it was him living out his fantasy and she rejected him, she was finished. He might not kick her out tonight, but she would be done, she knew it.

There was no choice but to go through with it and keep her identity. This wasn't her responding like she was to some generic fantasy of mistaken identity and anonymous rape. She was That Bitch Courtney, not some doormat like Michelle just wanting some man to dominate her. She would never be such a fucking cliche.

She bit her lip and started reciting economic accounting identities in her head, to distract herself from what was happening to her. Send my mind away, don't think about how he is touching me, and how wet I am, and why I don't feel this way when Trav touches me, and why he doesn't just stick his cock in me and fuck me 'til I come. Oh, but that is what I want, isn't it? She allowed her hips to orbit around her captor's fingertips, thrilling in every variation it provided to the intimate friction between her legs. She managed to maneuver her clit to a brief contact with his fingers, and it was an electric jolt of pleasure, causing her to open her legs for him as she groaned.

Mike-or-Trav must have sensed her readiness, as the fingers withdrew, replace by an erect cock pressing between her legs, demanding entrance.

Yes! Courtney spread her legs to give him what he wanted, and an incandescence travelled from her cunt to her cortex as she felt him force his way inside her. Oh God! No, he didn't force himself, she had to admit. She had wanted this. If she had dared to speak she would have begged for it. Please stick your cock in me, she would have said. She almost said it anyway, even though he was already fucking her, thrusting inside her open and willing flesh with his magnificent member.

Why did this feel so different from normal with Trav? Was Mike bigger? She felt like she was being split open but maybe that was just her reaction to her own elevated lust.

Was he a better lover? No, the technique was nothing special. It was just a cock fucking her. Trav showed much more interest in her clit and her own pleasures, and he loved it when she came, not knowing that every one was faked.

Wasn't that it? Trav was so gutless and naive. She manipulated him with ease. He was no challenge. It was only a matter of time before he caved to her wishes and would accept the life wanted by both his father and Courtney herself. But what kind of man let himself be pushed around like that? No, this couldn't be Trav behind her. The lover abusing her pussy was a man -- strong, determined, and imposing himself upon her will, her life, and her sopping, wet cunt.

She wanted to cry, to scream, to shout, but the corset was still too tight, and with Mike-or-Trav on top of her, her lungs were burning with a fire almost as hot as the one that inflamed her loins. "Can't breathe," she managed to whisper.

His hands moved up her sides and spine, finding the zipper to her dress, and pulling it down to reach the laces of the horrid, uncomfortable corset. He was suddenly almost gentle, and she shifted from being convinced it was Mike behind he to certitude that it was really Travis.

She felt a light tugging on the laces, and some downward pressure on her back. Was he untying them? No, he worked his fingers up the laces, and as each lace popped, she knew he must be using a scissors or knife.

He moved fast, taking only seconds, and with each severed lace, the tension in her waist relaxed, and finally the last lace snapped and the corset was flung across the room. Her ribs were finally able to unknot, her naked chest could expand, and she opened her mouth to inhale the most delicious breath of air in her entire life, tasting of autumn, sweat, sex, and the exhilaration of freedom. The sensation of air filling her lungs coupled with a cock filling her cunt resulted in a sensual explosion from within. Courtney had experienced a few pleasant sensations she thought were orgasms with some of her earlier boyfriends, but this showed them for the lie they were. She had never felt this heat, this fire, this release. Those previous, pitiful sensations were flashlights next to a supernova in comparison to what she had just experienced

Courtney felt hands pawing at her newly liberated breasts, squeezing her nipples with a sharp pressure that was a thrilling contrast to the dull confinement of the corset. She released her breath as a long, passionate sigh, recovering from the sensations still exploding within her.

One of Mike-or-Trav's hands stayed on her breast, and another reached lower, as he continued to fuck her with the same relentless, insistent rhythm.

What was he doing? Everything was black, but Courtney could feel a moist pressure on her anus. Is that his thumb?

A second explosion sent her darkened vision into a kaleidoscope of pleasure. Tremors surged through her body as this climax exceeded the last. She wanted to scream. She needed to scream.

Courtney screamed.

It was as if her life before this moment had somehow primed her for the most humiliating climax possible -- taken forcefully from behind like a bitch while her lover's thumb violated her ass. No one had ever touched her there before. Why did I let him?, she thought, as her scream descended into an incoherent moan. The pleasurable aftershocks quaking through her hips forced a correction. Why didn't I let anyone else do this earlier? Why didn't I demand it of them?

Mike-or-Trav gave her well-abused nipple one more twist of pleasure as he increased the cadence of his thrusts, seeking the impossibility of a climax to match hers.

Courtney raised her ass off the mattress as much as he would allow, and leveraged her arms to push back against him, trying to extract as much pleasure from the contact as she could. She had come twice, and wanted another.

"More," she whispered.

The muffled low chuckle came from behind his mask. "Aren't you a greedy little bitch."

"Yes, I am," she admitted, grinding her ass against him for both his cock and thumb to penetrate as deeply as possible.

"Say it. Tell me what you are."

"I am a greedy little bitch."

With that, he pounded her harder, claiming her for his own. If he could make her come like this, she would spread her legs at every command, every slap, every time he called her a whore. She would suck his cock, learn to deep throat, wear a leash, and take his cock in her ass and fuck him until he was spent. Courtney vaguely remembered making similar promises before she first slept with Trav. She realized she had been hoping that was what her lover wanted of her.

She didn't care who the man behind her was, so long as he would fuck her like this forever -- or if not like this than any other way he wanted, on his own terms. She didn't care who her current lover was, but she knew as she felt him detonate with in her. There was too much self-regard and contempt in the fucking she had just received. It couldn't be Trav. It was Mike, and with that realization, the greedy little bitch got her wish, and came a third time.

--- Halloween

Michelle waited.

She had been outside the door, and listened as the night unfolded as planned, hearing every cry of Courtney's submission and defeat. Michelle had stepped away from the door and watched the bandit leave immediately after he finished his task, still clad in his mask. She had removed hers and she locked eyes with him. He stared at her for several seconds, not expecting her presence. She had nodded to him, and he walked away, emission accomplished.

But now this was the most important part, or it was all for nothing. They both had to see, so now she was sitting on the patio, waiting.

Michelle didn't have to wait long.

"How did you know?" Courtney closed the patio doors behind her. Her dress had been discarded. Michelle recognized one of Mike's t-shirts, which must have covered Courtney like a shift while she walked down the hall to get a pair of her own sweats. The handful of guests remaining inside the house were too caught up in their own bacchanalian pleasures to pay her any heed.

"I lived with you for two years. I watch what kind of guys you look at, who you flirt with, who gets you hot. I know what you want, even if you don't."

Courtney feigned offense. "Trav was perfect for me."

" Mike is the one who is perfect for you. Mike is the type of guy you will be happy with, not Trav. I am trying to make you see that. Mike is a smart, ambitious, business major who is almost as sociopathic as you are. He will go much farther on Wall Street than Trav ever will in his dad's oil company. Mike is the alpha male your type always wants, but Trav's money threw you off the scent. The only thing perfect for you about Trav is his wallet and his father's connections, but he won't have either very long."

Courtney seemed genuinely shocked. "What?"

"He is your fucking boyfriend, and you don't see he is going to walk away from the family fortune? It might be tomorrow, or after he graduates, but he is building up to a massive fight with his dad where he tells his father to take his billions and stick them up his ass." Michelle tried to conceal the pride she felt her in voice.

Courtney appeared to be considering Michelle's words. "Why this way, tricking me into getting fucked by Mike. It doesn't make any sense. You could have sent Mike to me in Trav's own costume and I wouldn't have known."

"Exactly."

Courtney frowned.

"You had to be able to figure it out. I knew you would suggest that the two of us switch costumes. You would see a way to outsmart someone who thought he was outsmarting you and you would jump at it. You can be so predictable. Did he tell you to make him a sandwich? I told him to say that. It's when you realized the truth, isn't it? You had to know and you had to keep fucking him anyway, so you could finally see the truth about yourself." Michelle let the anger show. "Also, You have been pretending to be me for six months, and I felt you should find out what the real thing was like."

"You think I stole Trav from you and this was your revenge?"

"Does it feel like revenge, Courtney? I heard you in there, just as I have heard you in Trav's bedroom. You weren't faking tonight."

Courtney wasn't the type to look down in shame. She held Michelle's gaze, but couldn't stop her face from reddening. "You just want Trav for yourself," she said weakly. "You took him while I was up with Mike. I saw you." But it didn't matter. She was defeated. She knew Michelle was right, and she wanted nothing to do with Trav any more. College was about discovering yourself, and she had realized that she was a greedy, horny, little bitch who could only be happy with someone very different from Travis.

"So now you just don't want me to win?" Michelle shook her head. "It's too late for that anyway. You pretended to be me to catch him, picking my brain, asking me all the questions about things you only pretended to love, but in order to convince you to release those claws you had sunk in his flesh, I had to become you, playing the part of the manipulative bitch. You don't have to worry about me winning Trav. He knows what I did, and he won't want anything to do with me. But at least he will be free of you."

"He knows?" Courtney knew she should act guilty. "I should talk to him."

"I will handle it. You don't care what he thinks of you anyway, any more." Michelle pointed up toward Mike's bedroom. "Go to him. The light just came on. He is back in the room now."

Courtney couldn't hold Michelle's gaze any more. The fight was gone. "Is he really like that all the time?"

Michelle had to force a smile. "All the time."

Courtney didn't leave.

"Courtney?"

Courtney stood still, her brow furrowed in indecision. "I don't know what to do."

Michelle's eyes narrowed. Courtney knew exactly what to do when it came to manipulation, but now that she had actual emotions, she was at a loss.

But the opening was too good to pass up. Michelle's lips broadened in a cold smile. "You might want to bring him a sandwich."

Michelle watched in satisfaction as Courtney departed the patio and turned left into the kitchen.

"Michelle?"

She started at the sound of the voice. It was him. Had he been listening?

"Shelly?"

Guilt welled up within her. She had used him, badly, and now he would hate her for it.

"Shell? Are you proud of yourself?" His words told her he had indeed been listening.

Michelle took a breath and turned to face him. Trav had stepped out of the bushes behind her. He must have come around from the front. Michelle hung her head in shame.

Trav wasn't happy. "You lied to me as well. You told me she was fantasizing about sleeping with Mike, and that she wanted to switch costumes with you so she could seduce Mike, to experience 'the darker side that I wouldn't give her'."

"It's not too late. She is still in the kitchen. You can tell her the truth -- that it was really you, that I convinced you to switch costumes and pretend to be Mike, if that is what you really want." Please don't, her eyes said.

"Courtney likes to say that college is about discovering yourself. I had never seen Courtney like that before. I hadn't realized she had been faking it with me, until I saw the real thing. Realizing she had been doing that for six months, manipulating me, pretending to like... being with me... it hurt."

Michelle looked up in dismay. "Don't you see, she faked it because you weren't right for her."

"That was the point, wasn't it? For me to see her when she wasn't faking? To see her without her mask? "

"And for her to see herself, yes."

"Well, it worked. It made me angry, provoking me into things I have never done before."

He ran his fingers through his hair. Michelle knew it to be a nervous gesture. He wasn't comfortable talking like this.

"You liked it." Michelle knew she was stating a fact. She feared where this might take him.

Trav grimaced. "Maybe with the right girl, but the right girl wouldn't pretend to be someone else." He looked at her sharply. "Why did you do it, Michelle? Was it really revenge, or to free yourself from Mike by throwing Courtney at him?"