A quick note:

To celebrate the completion of my latest novel — TRANCE, Inc. — I wanted to release a fun commission project that I wrote for my friend/reader Mercedesbens.

This is Day 4 of my five-day release schedule.

Lots of love,

JC

* * *

I crept up the stone stairs in a crouch, keeping to the shadows up against the side of the building. The stone railing steadied me, and I hesitated a moment to give my eyes a chance to adjust. I needed my senses on high alert. Then, keeping my breath quiet, I slipped up onto the porch and approached the glass-paneled door. I put my hand gently on the handle and pressed down, trying to stay quiet as I—

Locked.

Fuck! I abruptly remembered the notification that all my doors and windows had been sealed shut automatically. And, of course, my keys were inside. I'm locked out of my own house.

I hesitated only a second as I considered my options. Then, my elbow smashed through the glass. "I'm coming, babe..." I muttered, carefully reaching through the hole in the door and unlocking it. I crept through the living room, keeping low and maneuvering around behind the couch for cover even though there was no way my entry had gone unnoticed. "I won't leave you in there all alone."

But Janet wasn't alone. I could hear a voice as I slunk through the shadowed hall toward the kitchen. It was a man's voice, and what he said... it didn't make any sense.

"Oh yeah... That's perfect, baby..."

I moved more quickly, my feet quiet on the hardwood floor. I hesitated just back from the entrance, steeling myself. When I took a slow, deep breath, I could smell the delicious, wafting scent of salmon. Then, I peered around the corner into the room.

What the hell...?

Maybe my not-so-stealthy entrance had gone unnoticed, because what I saw in the kitchen was certainly demanding the focus of everyone involved.

I saw the man first, side on. He was of average height, dressed all in black with a matching ski mask pulled down over his features. Janet had clearly been eating dinner and editing her cooking video when he arrived because, looking past him, I could see her laptop open on the counter next to an unfinished plate. A pang of guilt shot through me — If I hadn't canceled our date, maybe she wouldn't be in this position. That emotion was subsumed, however, by the absolute tsunami of rage that rolled over me like a flood. What my girlfriend was doing now was a hundred times worse than me missing a date.

Janet knelt on the floor before the masked man, naked from the waist up and staring devotedly up into his face. Her dark eyes were wide and intent, and her mouth was wrapped around his thick, throbbing cock.

My mind fractured, and my surprised anger actually rocked me a step back into the shadows.

The intruder had gathered Janet's dark hair up behind her head in one fist and was clearly using his grip to control her rhythm. I could hear her gag softly as his length slid into her throat, but it was followed immediately by a sound that I recognized all too well... The low, pleasant moan that my girlfriend made when she was exceptionally turned on.

This isn't happening...

Only it was.

My girlfriend's knees were spread wide and she was playing with herself through those teal yoga pants, her fingers making circles between her thighs. Her eyes were wide, and the noises she made were desperate, horny and... arousing.

No! I ignored the heat that coiled in my belly as I watched Janet's naked tits bouncing back and forth with every bob of her head on his prick. Instead, I focused on the man as he lowered his free hand to play with one of her nipples. I just need to make sure he's not armed, I assured myself, feeling the blood rush south and begin to inflate my manhood.

"You like that, baby?" The man's voice was rough, harsh with arousal, and it came out in a pant as he thrust his cock between my girlfriend's sculpted lips. "You like taking my cock like a brainless little fucktoy?"

No... I thought desperately, wondering why my own cock was aching and starting to lengthen to full mast. She doesn't...

But Janet's response was irrefutable. "Mhmm..." The curvaceous brunette slid her mouth up his shaft, wrapping her free hand around his girth and stroking as her tongue swirled around the head. Her lips came free with a little pop, and she stared up into his face with wide, glazed eyes. "I love sucking your cock, sir..." she murmured. "Just like you said I would..."

The man grunted in pleasure, then pulled her back toward him. "Less talking," he muttered, stifling further words by stuffing his cock back into her mouth. "More sucking." Janet moaned, her eyes rolling back as she took his length deep into her throat and he added, "We don't know when that asshole boyfriend of yours is coming back."

I frowned, confused. Wait... What? It was then that I noticed something else.

It looked like a pair of chunky black swim goggles, dangling from the burglar's free hand, but I recognized it immediately.

My prototype! How...? And then I remembered that, in my rush earlier to get Cass out the door, I'd not resealed my project in its special box. I'd left both out on the entryway table, waiting for me to get to them tomorrow morning. Suddenly, I knew exactly what had happened to my girlfriend.

And I wasn't going to stand back and watch.

"You fucker!" I shouted, striding out into the room with all the righteous anger of an inventor whose project is being misused. "What the hell are you doing?"

The man's head whipped around in surprise but Janet barely seemed to notice. She just went on sucking, bobbing forward and back, like there wasn't a thought in her head. The intruder flinched, only then I thought I saw the flash of a grin through the mouth hole of his mask. He reacted quickly.

"Why, Braillen. We were just talking about you."

I frowned. When he spoke, I recognized his voice. It can't be...

"Allen?!" I demanded. "What the fuck?"

"Relaxation of the central nervous system? Extreme suggestibility?" my assistant went on, not even bothering to answer. The man sounded far too relaxed for the situation, though I could attest that Janet's blowjobs made it hard to get worked up about anything else. "Do you realize what you could do with this? Your visual therapy bullshit might help blind people, or whatever, but this..." He groaned and his voice trailed off for a moment as a wave of ecstasy rolled through him.

My girlfriend's body shuddered at the same time, and I could see her struggling to hold back an orgasm. Then, she began to suck his cock with even greater enthusiasm. Like she was begging for him to cum, to up her belly with his seed.

She's about to cum... I realized. How powerful are those things? Evidently far more powerful than I'd realized.

My eyes narrowed as I stared at my masked assistant. Allen had said that he'd overheard a couple of brief comments about the prototype, but I knew he didn't understand how it worked. I didn't even know that. The goggles were programmed with light patterns that were intended to stimulate particular areas of the brain. Instead, however, preliminary subjects had responded to the treatment by entering what seemed to be some sort of hypnotic trance. If Allen knew that much, he had either overheard one hell of a conversation or he had been investigating the project behind my back, despite my strict rules about secrecy.

Somehow, I suspected the latter. I took a step forward, a scowl forming on my mouth, but I came up short when Allen raised the prototype over his head.

"Better not get any closer, Mr. Novak," he panted. "Things like this are so fragile. And I know you wouldn't want to see all your hard work destroyed."

I gritted my teeth. In the moment I hated myself for it, but I knew that Allen was telling the truth. Even if it didn't do what I wanted, my invention was my brainchild. It was hundreds of hours of work, held hostage in the hands of a corporate spy who had infiltrated my business to the highest level. I hesitated, teetering between my powerful urge to protect my creation and the equal and opposite urge to save my girlfriend.

"What do you want, you sick bastard?" I demanded. Maybe if I can stall him, I thought, I'll give the police time to arrive.

Allen waved the goggles tauntingly, and I felt my heart drop as I saw his fist shake like he was going to dash my invention to pieces on the floor. "You're sitting on a gold mine here, and you brought it home for the weekend to fix it? How could you think this needed fixing?" He grinned evilly and gestured at Janet with his free hand. "I was almost glad when Mr. McIntosh asked me to steal it. Finally, it looks like you've made something useful."

"Woah there," I said, holding up my hands and shaking my head. I tried to adopt a calm, reasonable tone, in spite of the roaring fire of my fury. Mr. McIntosh? No... Georgio, what have you done? "Allen... Are you saying you're a fucking spy in my organization?"

To my surprise, the man reacted with a snarl of outrage. "That's it!" The man actually released Janet's hair, ripped off his mask, and threw it to the floor with petulant anger. "My name," the man spat, "is Julien!"

I blinked, stunned. "What...?" I muttered.

"Not Allen. Julien. When you forgot the first time it was insulting, but I could forgive it. Now, though? I'm your personal assistant for crying out loud. Because of you, everyone at the office calls me Allen, too! And all because you're so scatterbrained that you can't even keep track of anything. No wonder you needed me so badly. You deserve this shit, Braillen."

I think berating me was something Allen... Julien had been waiting to do for a long time, because his face was actually red and his entire body shook with the combined anger and pleasurable release of ranting in my general direction. Of course, the fact that my girlfriend was still blowing him like a pornstar must have made his victory that much sweeter.

I didn't know what to do. I was frozen with shock and indecision. But then, a voice came from near behind me and Allen and I both turned in surprise.

"Put down the prototype."

It was Cass. My best friend strode into the kitchen with her head held high, her blue eyes shining fiercely. Her voice, to my surprise, was cold and calm.

"Who the hell are you?" Allen demanded, though he seemed more surprised than threatened. His jaw was clenched, like he was barely holding onto control of himself as Janet's moans slowly increased in urgency.

Cass walked calmly across the space, holding out her hand. The man was so surprised that he didn't do anything to stop her. Hell, I was too surprised to try and stop her, despite the fact that the man was obviously mad enough to follow through on his threat.

"Hand it over," she ordered, "and I'll forget about the fact that you violated my best friend's partner and used this break-in as an opportunity to fulfill some personal vendetta." There was something in her voice I hadn't heard before. An imperious command. "The Seated Queen demands her crown."

I frowned, confused. Cass had, obviously, been named after the Cassiopeia constellation, and Seated Queen was part of the story that Cassiopeia had symbolized to ancient astronomers. But, while I might not understand her actions, that didn't prevent me from taking advantage of them. I slowly began to inch sideways, trying to get into Allen's peripheral vision as the man's mouth dropped open.

He gasped, and this time it wasn't with arousal. It was with surprise. "But..." he stammered. "That's the code phrase Mr. McIntosh said my contact would use to confirm delivery of the device..."

I was two or three steps closer to my assistant by now, but I froze. My eyes turned blankly to stare at Cass as something clicked into place in my mind, shifting my entire perception of reality in a single moment.

Cass met my gaze with her own. "That's right..." she murmured, almost sadly, before I could speak. For a moment, it was like it was just Cassiopeia and me, alone in the universe.

"I'm Georgio Danielli."

* * *

Thanks for reading!

I'll see you tomorrow for the next publication: Starry Eyed -- Ch. 5.