Zacatecas was a full-blown city, filled with hundreds of thousands of people, many of them tourists. Caleb took great care in finding a motel for them to spend the night. Kitten had said she wouldn’t run from him again, but the look in her eyes, whenever they passed American tourists with families, spoke differently. She would run again, given half the chance. Not that he could blame her. “I need to take a shower,” Caleb said into the silence of the room. “You can either sit in the bathroom with me, or I can tie you up. Option’s yours.”

Kitten stared at him hard. “Don’t trust me?” she taunted.

“Not when you’re looking at me like that, no.”

She sat stiffly on the edge of the bed, her anger emanating off of her like a toxic fog intent on choking him. “I told you I wouldn’t run. Go take your fucking shower and leave me alone.”

Caleb closed his eyes and took a deep breath to settle him. They were back to this. Well, he thought, this was just as good a time as any to reestablish the rules between them. When he opened his eyes, a warm tingle drifted down his spine and he finally felt like himself again. His gaze fell on the girl and he smiled when she flinched.

“Get up,” he said calmly, the threat in his voice muted but still present. The girl looked at him for a moment and swallowed harshly. It was obvious her anger had quickly turned to fear.

“Caleb?” Her voice was small, meek.

“Get up. Now.”

Slowly, Kitten cast her eyes toward the floor and stood on trembling legs. In fact, her entire body trembled. Caleb, at last, felt no remorse, no pity for the girl in front of him. She was his to do with as he pleased. The thought was an aphrodisiac on its own.

“Strip,” was his command and the girl flinched though his words had been softly spoken. A whimper escaped her lips, but she didn’t hesitate to follow his command. Slowly, she reached for the waistline of the flowing skirt Caleb had selected for her to wear and pushed it down over her hips until it pooled at her feet.

She ignored the panties and slid her trembling fingers to the top button of her blouse, there were more whimpers, but Caleb ignored them. He watched, painfully aroused by the adrenaline coursing through him as she gingerly let each button slip through its hole until she reached the bottom. The fabric parted, exposing a tantalizing line of flesh between her naked breasts. She looked up at him briefly, eyes pleading.

“Off with it.”

“Caleb…”

“That!” he growled with menace, “is not how you address me. Do it again and I’ll not forgive you.”

Kitten began to weep, but still stood. “Yes…. Please…don’t….”

“I gave you a choice. If you cannot make it, then I will make choices for you. Understood?”

She sniffled, “Yes…Master.” The words seemed painful for her to say, but Caleb cared nothing for her pain at the moment. She had defied him for the last time. He watched dispassionately as she slid the shirt from her shoulders and the panties from her legs. She stood, shaking and sobbing, but finally compliant.

“Kneel!” he barked for the sake of watching her scramble to obey. He smiled as her knees hit the threadbare carpet and her hands went to cup her breasts to hide them from view. His heart raced and he nearly groaned at the touch of his palm against his erection, trapped inside his pants.

He stepped slowly and deliberately toward her, watching with sadistic pleasure as she closed her eyes and her lips moved; she made no sound. He pulled at the tie holding her hair back, letting her long, dark mane cascade down her naked body, but hiding nothing.

“Do you remember what happened the night you decided to scream out my name?” he asked casually. The girl sobbed as she nodded. He lifted a piece of her hair and wound it around his hand, each turn bringing his hand closer to her scalp and tugging softly, but with ominous implication. “If I wanted you to nod, I’d move your fucking head myself. Answer…please.”

Kitten’s chest heaved with the force of her sob, but the answer came through, “Yes, Master.” Caleb undid the top button of his pants, jeans, pilfered from the good doctor. “Oh. No. Please, no, Master. Please, no.”

“Don’t speak unless it’s to answer a question you’ve been asked!” Kitten became silent, lips pressed together. “Breathe through your mouth; the last thing I want is for you to pass out without my permission.” She gasped, but didn’t speak. “How did I punish you?”

The words seemed to affect her like a physical blow and she pulled away from his hand, panicked, but with no place to go. Caleb pulled her hair hard enough to force her back into position, but not hard enough to injure. “Answer me.”

“You…you…I can’t!” she sobbed.

“Answer the question!”

“You fucked me!”

Caleb slid his zipper down slowly, drawing the moment out for the benefit of them both. “Yes, I fucked you. Right in your sexy little asshole.” She gasped at his words, her face a puffy mess from her open-mouthed sobbing. “Did you like it?”

She shook her head, “No, Master. No.”

Caleb tsked and brought her head toward his erection, still secure in his underwear, but undoubtedly hot against her skin nonetheless. “Liar. You came more than you had a right to. I know because I felt you, hot and clutching at my cock, begging me to come inside you. Isn’t that right?”

The girl shook her head, no, but she whispered, “Yes, Master.”

Memories played through Caleb’s mind as a series of erotic flashes. He remembered how good it had felt to be buried inside her and feel her push against him. It would be so easy to have her again, to have her in any way he wanted and to bring her to the heights of unbearable ecstasy until she no longer knew how pain or pleasure differed. However, he had a different point to make.

“What is your name?”

“Kitten!” she shouted without hesitation.

“To whom do you belong?”

“To, you,” she sobbed.

“Yes. To me. Now, tell me what I could do with you?” His tone was urgent.

“I don’t know!”

“You do know! Tell me.”

“Cal–”

“Don’t you dare! I am not your lover. I am not your friend! Who am I?”

“Master! You’re my…. I want to stop. Please make it stop.”

“Answer my question, what could I do with you?”

“Anything! Fucking anything!” she sobbed wetly.

“Yes, I could do anything to you. I could throw you face down and fuck you until you can’t stand and there would be nothing you could do about it. You’re beaten, bruised and damn near broken. I could kill you. Those bikers could have killed you, but you keep provoking!”

“No! No, Master.”

“Are you prideful?”

“No, Master.”

“No?”

“Yes! Yes, Master, I’m prideful. I’m sorry!”

“Is your pride worth the situation you are in?”

Caleb let her go and watched as she placed her hands on the floor and cried with her head bowed. “No, Master.”

He’d done what he set out to do. “Exactly, Kitten. Your pride isn’t worth it. It’s not worth the pain. It’s not worth the torture me, or anyone else, could put you through. It sure as fuck isn’t worth your life. Be smart! Fight the battles you can win and accept the ones you can’t. That’s how you survive.” That’s how you avoid being tied to a fucking mattress and soaked in your own blood.

“I’m sorry! Please…just stop. Don’t be this way anymore. I can’t stand it! I can’t stand being with you and not knowing who you are from one moment to the next!” Kitten cried.

Caleb buttoned his pants and crouched with one knee on the floor and pulled Kitten into his arms. She offered no resistance, her arms wound around his neck as though she had been desperate for them to be there all along and she sobbed into his neck.

“I like you so much better when you’re like this,” she whispered as she pressed her lips to his neck softly, over and over as though she sought to calm him, when it was her in need of calming.