Irena Goes to Market

Irena was cold. She was so cold that she felt as if her bones had been glazed in ice. She stumbled and almost fell into a ditch on the side of the road, but managed to steady herself in time. Her jeans were soaking wet to the knees with slush and her shoes squelched with every step she took. She had been so stupid. She could be in the limo with Soto right now, speeding through the countryside back towards his estate. Instead she had decided to argue with him. She had wanted to stay at school for winter break, to party with some of her friends. He had said no, she was going to come home with him right then and there. He missed her. He had caressed her thigh then, sending shivers up and down her body. That had just made her angrier. In the months that they had been apart she had begun telling herself that he had too much of a hold on her. Nonetheless, he had coaxed her into the limo. A part of her had even wanted to go.

They had passed the first couple hours of the ride in silence but then he had said, "I think it would be better if you don't return to this university next semester."

Irena felt as if someone had slapped her. "What?"

"Your grades have been suffering. And I don't like the sound of those people you hang around with now."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means that if you spent less time drinking and smoking weed with those friends of yours, you would actually be living up to your potential in your classes. You've been on the Dean's list two semesters in a row and now you're failing half of your classes."

Irena blushed. It was true. She was failing some of her classes, geology and comparative economics, but she didn't even care about those. And yes, she did spend a lot of time now smoking and drinking, but that was just part of life. School wasn't the only important thing. She had never had real friends before and the chance to stay with them over winter break had been keeping her going all through the hell of exam week. Now exams were over, she was exhausted and cranky at having to go back with Soto, and on top of that he had the nerve to tell her that she couldn't come back to school.

"Why can't you let me live my own life? You don't own me."

Soto raised an eyebrow at her. "Really? You don't happen to remember that paperwork your father signed over to me do you?"

"You can't own another human being. It's sick!"

"I seem remember that you enjoyed being owned by me quite a lot, once upon a time." His voice had not risen, if anything, it had grown quieter, but Irena could tell that he was starting to get angry. She had grown adept at reading his body and voice during the times they had been together. She had only seen him truly angry a few times. One of those occasions had been when he had caught her going through his private papers, searching for the documents which bound her to him. He had said nothing then, simply grabbed her roughly by the arm and thrown her out of the office. She hadn't seen him at all for three days and then one night she had woken up to find him kneeling over her in her own bed, the one she slept in when she didn't share Soto's. She had drawn breath to scream, but he had covered her mouth with his hand. Then he had ripped off her nightgown. Soto was a master at the arts of pain, but he was almost always a considerate lover. Not on this occasion. He had drawn her across his lap and begun to spank her hard. He usually stopped when her cries grew frantic, but this time he didn't stop until Irena was sobbing, her breathing frantic and her buttocks and thighs purple with welts and bruises. Then he had fucked her, not nicely, not tenderly. He had ravaged her, bringing her to two thundering climaxes before spending himself violently inside of her. He had collapsed on top of her for a moment, breathing hard, and then he had left. She hadn't seen him for another two days, but then there he was at dinner again, talking to her as if nothing untoward had happened. He hadn't made love to her for another week, and Irena had been glad of that because it took about that long for her to be able to sit down without wincing. The tone Soto was beginning to acquire now was the same one he had used to her that night he had surprised her in bed.

"I just don't think you should push me around like I'm a little kid. I'm twenty years old now, remember?" She couldn't look at him, so she stared out the window.

"Yes, and still remarkably like a child in some ways." He sounded amused, condescending. It infuriated her.

"You know what, fuck you!"

"There's no call for language." His voice had gotten even quieter.

"I'm not going to let you take me out of this school."

"You can't stop me, Irena. I'm the one paying the bills."

"You're just like my father!"

He snorted. "Hardly."

She hated the smug derision in his tone even more than his condescension. She began tapping on the barrier between the front and back of the limo. "Pull over," she said to the driver. "Pull over, I'm going to be sick." Soto made move to stop her. They were on an abandoned stretch of road, so the driver just pulled off onto the shoulder. Irena burst out of the car, but she did not get sick. What she did was say, "Ok this is it. I'm not getting back into that car."

Soto looked blank, then amused. "Stop being childish, Irena."

"I'm not going back with you."

"Yes you are."

"You're going to have to come out here and physically force me back into that limo, Antonio. Do you want to make me your prisoner again?" Soto's face bore no expression whatsoever. "No Irena, I don't want a prisoner. I want my slave." He caressed those last few words with his voice, and just hearing them sent a throb of desire through her. She ignored it.

"Well I'm not going to be that anymore either. Drive away. I'll find somewhere to go. Someone will give me a ride."

"Fine," Soto said, and shut his door. Irena looked at him, a bit taken aback. She hadn't been expecting him to back down so easily. He rolled down his window and said, "I'm going to keep driving. When you get tired of walking, give me a call on my cell phone and I'll come back to get you." He gave her a look then that made her stomach clench. "We are going to have a very long discussion about his when we get home, Irena."

She felt herself go bright red. "Fuck you," she said. He rolled up the window and a moment later the car sped off, leaving her standing alone on the road. She started walking in the opposite direction of the limo thinking that she would somehow find her way back to school. She'd had a vague idea of walking to the nearest town and using the money she had in her wallet (about sixty dollars) to get a bus ticket back to campus, but then she had passed a road sign and discovered that the nearest town was twenty miles away. She had almost taken out her cell phone and called Soto then, but her pride hadn't let her. She had kept walking and the cold had set about finding its way into her bones.

She hadn't seen a car until about half an hour later, and although she knew that what she was about to do was incredibly stupid, she stuck out her thumb in the hitchhiking gesture. The car passed her without slowing. The next five cars had done the same. Now, two hours later with night starting to come on, she barely even bothered to glance at the car which she could hear coming up behind her in the distance. What made her turn around was the sound of the car first slowing down so that it cruised along beside her at walking pace. The driver rolled down his window and said, "Good evening young lady. What in the world are you doing walking down the side of the road on a night like this?"

"I had a fight with my boyfriend," she said, greatly simplifying her relationship with Soto. "I told him to stop the car and I got out." She bit her lip. She was already beginning to feel quite stupid about her decision to storm out on Soto. What exactly had been going through her head? She should have talked to him rationally, not thrown a temper tantrum like a spoiled toddler.

"I see," the driver said, his voice giving nothing away. Irena looked at him carefully. He seemed harmless enough, an elderly man with wispy grey hair that floated around his bald head like dandelion fluff. He looked rather frail and Irena was pretty sure that if it came down to a fight she would at least be strong enough to incapacitate him long enough for her to make an escape. "Well, I can't stand to see a girl as young as you all alone on the side of the road. Hop in and I'll give you a ride to town." He smiled at her and she could tell that he wore dentures. He reminded her of her grandfather a little. This was probably going to be the best ride she could hope for if she didn't want to call Soto and beg him to come pick her up.

Irena walked around to the car's passenger side door and opened it. She looked inside the car before getting in, and seeing no weapons, drugs, or other warning signs, she slipped in to the heated interior. "Thank you so much," she said, holding her numbed hands out to the car's heating vents. "I don't know what I would have--" That was as far as she got before a damp cloth was clapped over her nose and mouth. A horrible acrid smell invaded her nostrils. She had time to think, looks like I fucked up big this time, before she was dragged down deep into chemical darkness.

******************

In the limo, Soto tried to read his newspaper but he wasn't having much success. Why had he allowed Irena to storm off like that? He should have dragged her back into the limo rather than allowing her to wander off on her own like that. He should have kept his temper and punished her in the safety of his playroom rather than allowing her to learn her lesson by wondering down a freezing road in the middle of the night. He had instructed Frank, his driver, to pull off of the road at a rest stop a couple miles from where Irena had left him. He had decided that they would wait there until he received a call from Irena asking him to come and pick her up. There was no way she would be able to make it all the way to the nearest town on her own and he was certain that she wasn't stupid enough to try and hitchhike.

However, two hours had passed and he still hadn't heard for her. Enough was enough. It was time for Irena to swallow her pride and come home. He pushed the button that allowed him to communicate to the driver. "Frank, let's get out of here and pick up Irena. I'll drag that girl back into this car if I have to."

"Will do boss," said Frank, and a moment later the limo pulled back onto the road. Frank began retracing their route and Soto kept his eyes trained on the shoulders of the road, looking for the dark silhouette of his troublesome little ward. Soto pulled out his cell phone and punched in Irena's number, intending to tell her that she was to stay put and wait for them to pick her up. The phone rang once, twice, three times, and then somewhat to his surprise it was picked up.

"Irena?" he said. There was a fraction of a second's pause then a muffled exclamation cut off by the drone of the dial tone. Soto hung up and frowned down at his phone. The voice on the line had been barely audible but it had not sounded like Irena's. He dialed the number twice more but both times the phone rang until it was picked up by the voicemail. He stowed his phone back in his pocket, his worry slowly beginning to transform into fear. He was sure Irena was safe. She was a smart girl. But that voice on the telephone had made him deeply uneasy. He massaged his temples with his hand. Irena had probably just hung up on him the first time and then refused to answer his calls afterwards.

"Boss?" Frank's voice sounded from the intercom.

"I don't want to worry you, but I just thought of something."

Soto's stomach cramped. "What is it Frank?"

"They're holding the market in Monroe this year aren't they?"

"Oh god, Frank," Soto groaned, "Please don't tell me that the market is tonight."

There was a pause and then reluctantly Frank said, "Actually it is. They were going to hold it in Mechanicsburg last month but the guys renting them the space backed out."

"I can't believe that I forgot!" Soto said, slamming his fist into the seat beside him. "They always do it around here this time of year. How could I have been so stupid?" He felt himself becoming both panicked and incredibly angry, which was not a good combination. He had been fighting this ridiculous market system for years and had become so discouraged that he had cut himself off from anything to do with it, including the society of which he was supposed to still be a member. Luckily Frank still troubled to keep up to date with the Society's schedule.

"She's probably still walking down the road, Sir. We'll find her."

Soto didn't respond. He returned his attention to the sides of the road, scanning the darkness for Irena's familiar form. He didn't see her. When they reached the Monroe city limits Soto had Frank turn around so that he could do another sweep of the road. Their second lap was just as unsuccessful as the first.

"What now, Sir?" Frank asked over the intercom.

Soto thought for a moment before answering. "Let's go to Monroe. We'll rent a hotel room somewhere. I need to get to a computer."

"What did you have in mind, Sir?"

"Irena doesn't know this but that phone I bought her is equipped with a GPS tracking system. I never used it before because she's so touchy about her privacy." Soto looked out the window again at the frigid windswept road. "However, I think that now she would forgive the intrusion. She's in some kind of trouble and whether or not she's found her way to the market, I intend to get her out of it."

******************

The first thing Irena became aware of when she awoke was that she had been hogtied. It was a sensation that she had become familiar with in the two years she had spent as Soto's ward. The second thing was that she was blindfolded, and the third was that she was completely naked. None of these circumstances would have been good but the fact that they were combined made Irena's stomach cramp with terror. She tried pulling against the ropes which bound her legs and ankles together but they didn't budge. Her head ached horribly, presumably from whatever chemicals had been used to knock her out. She must have been here for awhile, wherever "here" was. Irena forced herself to remain still, to give no indication that she had awoken. She listened as hard as she could, trying to get a sense of her surroundings.

There was the low rumble of many voices coming from all around her. It was hard to tell because almost everyone seemed to be talking at low volume, but she thought that there were quite a few more male voices than female. The sound echoed and bounced off the walls. That and the incredible number of people she thought were surrounding her led Irena to believe that she was in a very large room, maybe something like a warehouse. She began once more to pull experimentally at her bonds. The knots binding her ankles were secure but she thought that she could detect a slight looseness in the knots holding her wrists. She began to rotate her wrists in small controlled circles. In the past few months Soto had not only educated her in the pleasures of being bound but also in the skills of escaping from such bindings.

"There's always the chance that you might get into some trouble, Soto had said, "And knowing how to slip out of a sloppily tied knot is an excellent way to get out of it." Then he had kissed her and laughed. "If you ever manage to get out of one of my knots I think you'll be ready to escape from just about anything." She hadn't managed to slip out of Soto's careful knots, but she had gotten close, and the ropes now binding her hadn't been tied with anywhere near Soto's skill. She felt like she could shake loose of them in ten minutes or so if she was left alone to do it.

Just as she thought this, a hand came down hard on her ass. She yelped, startled. Unthinking, she jerked against her bonds and they began to tighten. She forced herself to lie perfectly still again. "Don't even think about trying to get out of those ropes, bitch," said a voice from beside her. The command was followed by another sharp slap. She held still this time and didn't cry out at all. It really wasn't that hard of a slap, just a way of telling her that someone else was now in charge. "We've got security all over the place. You wouldn't get far and then they'd send you over to the punishment tent, and trust me, that is one place that you want to avoid." The voice was deep, roughened by smoke and tinged with a little of the Bronx. Not the man who had kidnapped her.

"So, how much are you going to give me for her?" There he was, the kidnapper; the old man who had given her the ride. He sounded both excited and anxious.

"Depends," said the Bronx voice, considering. Irena heard the click of a lighter and then smelled the rich tang of cigarette smoke. "Where did you find her again, Bruce?"

"She was just walking down the side of the road. Said she'd gotten kicked out of the car by her boyfriend or something. I was on my way back from dropping off that last group of girls to you and there she was. I could tell she was pretty, so I thought, 'why waste an opportunity?'"

"Well, I'll give it to you that she's pretty. She's probably the best-looking girl I've got right now. But she's wild. Fresh off the road. She could cause me all kinds of trouble before the Market's over. I only pay top dollar for girls who've got basic training."

"Yeah but you know some of these guys will pay more for the wild ones. They like the challenge."

"I'll give you six thousand for her."

"Do you think I was born yesterday Bennie? Nine thousand or I walk with her right now. I guarantee you that Lila would pay me at least twelve for a specimen like this." A leathery old hand traced the ridge of her spine and Irena shivered. That must be Bruce. His hand stopped just short of her ass and then he was no longer touching her.

"I'll give you seven."

"Eight."

"Seventy-five hundred. That's my final offer Bruce. If you want any more than that you can go and try to sell her to Lila. See if she'll give you even half that much."

There was a brief pause and then Bruce said, "You drive a hard bargain Bennie, but I guess I'll take it. Seventy-five hundred." Irena heard the soft clap of their palms as they shook hands and then she heard the footsteps retreating a short distance away.

"Victoria," Irena heard Bennie say in his cigarette roughened voice. "Go fix up the new girl. She's awake."

"Yes Master," came the reply, pitched so low that she almost couldn't hear it over the noise of the crowd around her. The voice had been a young woman's, very sweet, a few feet to her right. She had had no idea that there was anyone there. A moment later she felt hands touching her head, and then her blindfold was removed. Irena had to blink against the sudden onslaught of bright light. When her vision returned to her she saw that she was indeed in what had to be an abandoned warehouse. Stalls like those usually erected by street peddlers had been put up in rows throughout the entire building. Some of these stalls sold things like whips, paddles, and floggers. Some looked as if they sold lingerie and leather. Most seemed to be selling people. Men and women, young and old, plain and beautiful were tethered everywhere, most of them naked. The stall vendors fussed around them, securing ropes, fixing hair, guiding bound limbs into the perfect positions. Irena realized that she was only one of a row of about a dozen young girls in a vendor's stall exactly like the others. All of these girls were naked, just like her.

The difference was that only Irena had been hogtied. These girls stood with their hands clasped behind their backs and their breasts and hips thrust forward. The only thing securing them to the spot was a long rope that had been threaded through the loops of the thick leather collars each of them wore around their necks. Irena wondered why they didn't try to run away. They could have escaped easily. Another naked girl moved to stand in front of her. She was very tall and pretty with olive skin and long chestnut hair. Her breasts were large and round with coral colored nipples, and she had shaved her pubic hair almost entirely away except for a small brown patch just above her clit.