Ocean Of Need

34 Clean

12th May Cont...

Your hand is back on my cheek as you kiss me softly, and say, 'Oh my dear, we've barely even started...'

'I don't think I can take much more,' I say.

I know,' you say as you untie me.

The binds loosening makes me feel like I'm going to float. You help me to my feet and walk me to the bed where I collapse onto it.

"Good girl, I've got you, you're OK,' you say as you pull me further up the bed, resting my head on a pillow.

You lay beside me, your head on the same pillow.

I smile and you mirror it. My inner thighs are still burning from being stretched open on the hard chair. I stretch out my arms, wiggle my toes, my body feels wonderful now, like I'm floating in time and space.

Your smile gets bigger. 'That orgasm was wonderful to see.'

'Yeah?'

'Yeah, I love seeing you like that. Completely in the moment, overwhelmed by pleasure. It's the best thing in the world.'

'But you didn't come. Doesn't that feel weird. Can I...'

"Little Pet, seeing you come, seeing your pleasure, that's everything to me. It's not a transactional thing, it's just pure beauty.'

'Oh. I didn't know that.' Not a transactional thing, Wow, I've never heard anyone say that before. 'I feel like my whole life has been a transaction.'

'How do you mean?'

'Well, my work with Jameson - I guess you know about that?'

'I know you worked with him, and I know of him. But I don't know what you did.'

'I was just the bait really. The pretty dumb girl, distracting them while Jameson asked them questions, read them, worked out the best way to fleece them, who their friends were, who their enemies were. He was subtle, good at it. They never knew what was going on till all their money was gone. They were horrible men - all of them. That's what we did. Robbed from horrible over privileged men, who could only think with their dicks while I was around.

Sometimes we'd keep all their money, sometimes we'd split it with their wives. A lot of those wives were very very angry. Like seething in their own second hand wealth - not able to leave for fear of being cut off, not wanting to stay and witness what their husbands were doing. Stuck in limbo between hell and poverty. We helped them if they helped us. Most of them wanted to help us, wanted to help themselves, wanted to get out. We were better than the police at getting them new identities and new lives.'

'Wow, Amber, I never knew that.'

'Oh it wasn't all for the good of the people,' I laugh.

'We did very well out of it too. Until...'

'Until?'

'Eurgh, I don't really want to talk about this. Feels a bit disloyal.'

'Disloyal to who?' Your jaw ticks. 'To Jameson? The guy who packed you off to America and ran the other way?'

'He didn't,' I bite, 'He'd never do that, you don't know.'

'So tell me, what happened - how did it all go so wrong.'

Shit, you're not going to let this go and I'm so far in that you might as well know. Because I want you to know that Jameson is not the ass you think he is.

'OK, I'll tell you.' I take a deep breath and launch myself into the story before I can change my mind. 'It was Jameson's fault. He got involved with one of the wives. He's such a fucking white Knight and she was so vulnerable - seemed so vulnerable,' I self correct. 'He let her get way too close, I kept warning him not to let his feelings get involved with a job. But he wouldn't listen. Turns out she was playing her own game. I can't help admiring her. Jameson saw a damsel in distress, but she saw an easy mark, a way to get rid of her husband. She set Jameson up, by the time we'd fleeced the guy and gone to collect the money, the safe was empty and she was gone.'

'Shit... that's got to hurt.'

'Oh it get's worse. Not only did she take the money, she also let her lover know about Jameson.'

'Her lover?'

'She was sleeping with her husband's main competitor. They'd been looking for ways to set her husband up for a while. Jameson provided her with a plan, her and the lover acted on it, then left Jameson as the fall guy.'

'Fuck. I thought he was running from the police.'

'Nope. Although they're probably involved by now too. That was the worry. That we'd end up behind bars - or maybe worse.'

'Worse. Worse how.'

I take another deep breath, then blurt, 'Even Jameson doesn't know this part of the story.'

You rub my back, tuck my hair behind my ear, and say, "I think we've established that it's just you and me now, Amber, You need to tell me.'

'I met Jameson in London after doing a runner from my family. He thinks that's where I'm from. He thinks I got involved with a bad crowd and that he rescued me.'

You frown, 'He didn't rescue you?'

'He did - kind of. But I put myself right in his path, it would have been impossible for him not to rescue me. He knew I was on the run, but not who from. I was too broken for him to push for the details. He took me in, and as time went on it became clear that he could trust me, clearer still that I was never going to say where I was from. He gave me a new identity, a new name.'

'He chose Amber?'

'Deborah. He chose Deborah. He loved that name. I didn't. He put me through art school. In the end even I started to believed my own cover. Deborah, an artist from London, sharing an art studio with a bunch of artists who only knew me as Deborah. It was a brilliant cover, so simple.'

'So your name is not Amber, and not Deborah.' He studies my face like he's memorising it, then something clicks into place. 'And you're not from London.'

'Correct.'

'Oh fuck... you're from Scotland.'

'Yup, ten out of ten. Now tell me my name.'

His eyes are wide as he takes in the enormity of the situation, 'You're Elizabeth. Holy fucking shit, you're Elizabeth McLaren. You're Robbie McLaren's daughter. You've been missing for six years...'

You jump from the bed as if it's on fire and start pacing.

I watch you pace. You played an excellent bluff. I really thought you were holding all the cards and that you'd worked out who I was. From the state of your panic I now know you didn't have a fucking clue.

I get up from the bed and walk into the shower, leaving you pacing the room.

You might leave now, you might make a phone call on the way to your pick-up. You'd be made for life if you gave me up. You know that.

I run the shower hot, stand under the pounding water, rolling my shoulders. It feels good not to be a secret inside a secret. Now you know everything about me.

You are the one person in the world who knows my name and knows where I am. Being found out has been my biggest fear. But now that I've told you, I feel clean.

The water washes over me and I wonder if you've left yet. I don't care anymore. I'm sick of running. Sick of the fake names and the nightmares. Never knowing who I am or where I am every time I wake up.

What's the worst my Father can do? Make me work for him? How bad could it be? He can never threaten me with cutting me off like he did when I was growing up, because I cut myself off and I did just fine on my own.

It's not like he can kill his darling princess. And what have I really achieved by leaving the family business anyway? I've gone from being one man's princess to another man's bait - although that's hardly fair on Jameson - he didn't want me working for him in the first place. It was just that I was so terribly good at it and the money was so damn easy to make. No violence, no suffering. Just a bunch of old entitled men getting what they deserved.

It would be better if you did give me up, because you're the only thing they can threaten me with. You getting hurt would fucking kill me...