Accidental Acquisition Read online

  “What’s that? It’s just a chalk drawing of a door!” Jillian protested. “How are we supposed to go through there?”

  “Like this.” Stepping up to the drawing, Mistress Douchenbag twisted a large ruby ring off her middle finger and pressed the glittering ruby against the door’s keyhole.

  Jillian heard a soft click.

  Just like a real key turning in a lock, she thought. And then, suddenly, the chalk drawing began to firm and fill itself in and become…

  “Oh, it’s a real door,” Jillian breathed, staring at the ornately carved brown wooden door with a brass doorknob which had been just a drawing only a moment ago.

  “Of course it’s a real door,” Mistress Douchenbag sniffed. “And a very exclusive one at that. Come—we must hurry before the molecules shift again and it’s nothing but a drawing once more.”

  She opened the door, which led into a kind of dimly lighted passageway, and went into it without a moment’s hesitation.

  Jillian did hesitate—but only for a moment. Once she made up her mind to do something, she generally followed through with it and she had promised to at least have tea with the Yonnite Mistress and hear her out before refusing to take Kalis as her bodyslave. A promise was a promise.

  So despite the warning little voice in her head, she ducked into the passageway and Kalis followed behind her, shutting the door behind them.

  6

  She’s the one—the one I’ve been dreaming of. Kalis watched the curvy little female as she made her way through Mistress Douchenbag’s passage ahead of him. She was just as beautiful as she’d been in all his dreams—a mature Elite—an older woman the Goddess had blessed with extra-bountiful curves. Gods, he was already half in love with her!

  But though he remembered clearly every dream he’d ever had of her, Jillian Marks seemed to have forgotten any dreams she might have had of him. She was extremely reluctant to take him as her bodyslave, for one thing, and she looked at him askance, ever since Mistress Douchenbag had mentioned that he was classified as a Deadly Weapon.

  Kalis wished the Yonnite Mistress would keep her damn mouth shut—she was only making matters worse. And her extreme fear of him had no basis in reality—he had only been protecting her shop, after all. It wasn’t his fault that what she’d seen had scared the shit out of her!

  Have to find a way to convince Jillian that I’d be a good fit for her, he thought, as he followed along behind her. Hopefully his skills at massage and pleasuring a female would stand him in good stead once they reached the spa. He would handle her with special care and let her know that his strength would never be turned against her, Kalis promised himself. She needed to understand that he would never hurt a female—especially not her.

  But she can’t be your mate—you can’t Claim her or bond her to you, whispered a little voice in his head. She’s not B’varren, as Kara was—she won’t understand the necessity of your other form being involved in the process. In fact, you’ll probably scare her half to fucking death if she sees it—just like Mistress Douchenbag was scared.

  He could still remember how white the Yonnite’s face had gotten when she saw him in his other form—the faint scream that had come from her lips before she fainted dead-away…

  Kalis shook his head in disgust. He’d tried in vain to explain what he was and how he’d only been trying to serve and protect her—that was what she’d bought him for, wasn’t it? But damn it, she wouldn’t understand…

  And he was afraid Jillian Marks wouldn’t understand either, if she saw him in his other form.

  No, it was better to keep to his first form—which was easy enough. He hadn’t used his other form—his Ursus—much at all since he’d left the Blood Circuit, where it had come in handy and saved his life more than once. But here, in the world outside the pit of cruelty and slaughter which had been his life for seventeen cycles, he seldom had need to transition into the beast he kept inside.

  And you’d better keep it inside you, at least until you can convince this new Mistress of your worth, whispered a little voice in his head. Even if you can never Claim her, you know you’re meant to be with her—to serve her. The Goddess wouldn’t have sent you dreams about her otherwise. But she’s never going to agree to take you if you show her your Ursus.

  He had learned his lesson, Kalis told himself. He would keep the other form dormant within him. Someday, maybe, he might show his other self to Jillian Marks but not yet…not yet…

  7

  Well, I’m committed now, Jillian thought, as they walked swiftly through the passage. It seemed to be made of blue strips of some kind of stiff material—a completely covered arching tunnel that led on for a very long way.

  But it wasn’t exactly a tunnel, Jillian thought, because it wasn’t underground. Through the blue strips of material, she could catch glimpses of the market and the customers and clients buying and selling their wares. It was more of a covered archway that led behind most of the stalls, clinging to the shadows of the booths in order to remain inconspicuous. The weak light of the Prius Six sun, filtering through the blue strips, gave the entire long passageway a bluish cast which made her feel like she was underwater.

  They traveled what seemed like miles and miles—though maybe Jillian was just tired of walking—until they finally came to another flat chalk door drawn on the side of a very large building that Jillian had never seen before.

  Once more, Mistress Douchenbag used her ruby ring as a kind of key and the door grew solid and real. As soon as it did, she rapped on it smartly three times and called,

  “Twyla Douchenbag and an esteemed guest to visit the Yonnite Spa. Let us in!”

  The door opened and a huge, bald bodyslave wearing tight leather trousers that were at least three sizes too small for him was revealed. Jillian wondered how he could even breathe—it looked like the bottom half of him had been shrink-wrapped in black leather.

  “Yes, Mistress Douchenbag,” he rumbled. “How can we serve you today? And who is your guest?”

  “Oh, hello, Torris. This is my cousin, Mistress Jillian, just arrived to visit me from Opulex,” Mistress Douchenbag said quickly. “I’ve told her all about the spa and she said she simply had to see it and try some of your tinga tea!”

  “Very well, but I’m afraid you’ll have to share a relaxation grotto, since you didn’t make a prior appointment,” the bald bodyslave warned. “I have two openings in the rose-gold room—Mistress Sollasolew and Mistress Tagalong are already being pampered there.”

  “Oh, Ylla and Hendris—two of my closest friends!” Mistress Douchenbag exclaimed. “Of course we’ll be happy to share a relaxation grotto with them!”

  “Come right in then, and I’ll send an order to the kitchens for two tinga teas,” the bald bodyslave said.

  “Excellent.” Mistress Douchenbag bustled past him and Jillian felt she had no choice but to follow. They entered the spa…and were immediately ensconced in luxury.

  Wow, some serious money must have gone into this place, Jillian thought, looking around. Having worked in Vegas for so long, she was used to seeing excess, but the Yonnite spa took things to a different level.

  The long entryway they were in was done in expensive-looking gray marble, shot through with glittering iridescent strips of some pearly mineral which threw miniature rainbows on the walls, floor, and ceiling. The ceiling itself was a high, marble arch hung with elaborate crystal chandeliers.

  The light fixtures somehow floated in place, without being attached to anything and shed a dim, golden glow over the echoing space. The faint sound of flute music and water burbling over stones was coming from some kind of hidden speaker system and an expensive fragrance that was fresh and floral at the same time drifted through the air.

  “This way,” the bald bodyslave gestured for them to follow him. As they did, Mistress Douchenbag continued talking.

  “Now, my cousin, Mistress Jillian, will be using Kalis for her pampering today but I am sadly without a bodyslave at t
he moment, until I can purchase a new one. So I’ll need you to assign one to me.”

  “I certainly will, Mistress,” the bodyslave rumbled. “I believe that Yandor is free—will he do?”

  “Oh yes! He has such lovely hands—I always enjoy a massage from Yandor,” the Mistress replied, sounding delighted.

  “Wait—a massage?” Jillian interrupted. “Who said anything about a massage?”

  Mistress Douchebag turned her head and gave Jillian a scornful look. “What did you think I meant by pampering? Of course we’re going to have a massage. And you can see what an excellent masseuse Kalis is! Why, he was trained at the Glorious Spa of Pleasures and Desire by his second Mistress, after she bought him from the Blood Circuit.”

  “Uh…so Kalis is going to massage me?” This was considerably more than Jillian had bargained for. She shot a quick glance over her shoulder at the big bodyslave, who was bringing up the rear.

  “It will be my pleasure to massage your beautiful body, little Mistress,” he rumbled softly, meeting her eyes with that silver-green gaze that she still found distractingly familiar. Where had she seen those eyes before?

  “Um…but…” she began.

  But before she could get a protest out, the bald bodyslave was bringing them to a stop before a carved wooden door in the marble hallway.

  “Just a moment please, Mistresses, while I announce you to the other ladies in the room,” he murmured. He put his head in the door and Jillian heard him explaining the situation. After a moment, he looked back at them and nodded. “Mistresses Sollasolew and Tagalong are expecting the two of you.”

  “Oh good—come on, Mistress Jillian!” Mistress Douchenbag exclaimed. She went through the doorway and Jillian followed her, very reluctantly.

  She found herself in a small wooden room with two booths to change in, hung with white linen privacy curtains.

  “Let’s hurry up and get naked!” the Yonnite Mistress exclaimed. “I’ve been needing a spa day for ages!”

  “Get naked?” Jillian exclaimed.

  “Well of course! How else can Kalis massage you properly?” Mistress Douchenbag shot her a scornful look. “Or are you ashamed of your body?”

  As it happened, Jillian wasn’t ashamed—she had a curvy figure but she tried to keep firm with regular exercise. It made being on her feet all day in the kitchen way easier if she was in shape. But still, she was closer to fifty than forty and she didn’t really want strangers she didn’t even know seeing her naked.

  “Well…” she began.

  “Oh, for Heavens sake! There are towels you can wrap up in if you’d rather be stupidly modest!” Mistress Douchenbag snapped, pointed to a stack of fluffy white towels on the end of the carved wooden bench. “Now hurry up and get undressed—the tinga tea will be here at any moment and it must be sipped at a certain temperature for the full effect! In fact, I must give some directions about it now,” she added. “Go on and get undressed!” She made a shooing gesture with one hand at Jillian and she slipped out of the room again, calling for the bald bodyslave.

  “I must tell you…” Jillian heard her strident voice saying, and then the words faded and she didn’t catch the rest of the Mistress’s instructions.

  Jillian felt a knot of uncertainty in her stomach. She looked at the wooden changing booth and then at Kalis uncertainly.

  “Is this…” She cleared her throat. “Is this a regular thing? I mean, should…am I really supposed to take off all my clothes? I mean, usually when I get a massage I at least leave my underwear on.”

  “To be completely nude is the usual way for massages here at the Yonnite spa,” he rumbled, nodding. “Though if you are shy about showing your lovely body, little Mistress, I can use the blindfold protocol.”

  “The, uh, blindfold protocol? What’s that?” Jillian demanded.

  “Why, I’ll wear a blindfold while I massage you, of course.” Kalis shrugged, his muscular shoulders rolling, as though it wasn’t a big deal. “It’s quite usual for shy Mistresses, who don’t wish to be looked at while they’re being massaged. Either that, or I can massage you completely in the dark,” he added. “But that would involve going into another room alone—just the two of us, little Mistress.”

  That sounded dangerous to Jillian. She didn’t feel comfortable being alone in a pitch-black room with a man she didn’t know. Though she was beginning to get a sense of Kalis and he seemed like a decent guy, she didn’t like the idea of going into a dark room alone with him and letting him rub her all over.

  In fact, why was she considering this at all, she asked herself? She most definitely hadn’t agreed to it. All she’d said was that she would drink a cup of tea with Mistress Douchenbag and now look—she was about to get naked and let the huge Kindred rub her body. This was ridiculous!

  “Look,” she said to Kalis. “I really don’t know how I got roped into this, but I need to be getting home.”

  “I understand.” He nodded. “You feel nervous to have my hands on your body.”

  “What? No!” Jillian denied quickly. “Or, I mean, maybe,” she added. “I mean, I’ve had massages before, but I usually have a female massage therapist,” she added weakly. “It’s not that I don’t like you—”

  “You just don’t trust me,” he finished for her. There was no bitterness in his voice—he was simply stating a fact. “I don’t blame you, little Mistress. As I said, I have yet to prove myself to you.”

  “You don’t have to—” Jillian began.

  “I must go and cleanse my hands so that I am fit to serve you, little Mistress. I will await you in the rose-gold room,” Kalis rumbled.

  He nodded respectfully at her and then went through the door at the far end of the changing room, presumably into the “pleasure grotto” as the bald bodyslave had called it.

  At almost the same moment, the outside door opened as well.

  “All right, here’s the tea!”

  Mistress Douchenbag bustled back into the room, followed by a bodyslave holding a silver tray with two tiny golden cups on it. Delicate wisps of steam were rising from both cups—which were filled with clear, aquamarine liquid.

  “What? You’re not ready yet?” she exclaimed, frowning at Jillian. “Hurry up and get undressed! We must sip this tea before it goes cold. Hurry, now!” she added, going into one of the dressing rooms herself.

  “Look, I didn’t agree to this,” Jillian said to her, speaking through the linen privacy curtain.

  “Yes, you did! You agreed to have tea with me and try out Kalis’s services before you made a decision,” Mistress Douchenbag shot back. “Part of his training is knowing how to give his Mistress an excellent massage. You’ll want to keep him for that skill alone.”

  “I’m not going to keep him!” Jillian protested in a low voice. She was glad the big Kindred had gone into the next room so he couldn’t hear them arguing about him as though he was an object neither of them wanted.

  Mistress Douchenbag stuck her head out from behind the curtain.

  “How can you know that you don’t want to keep him if you don’t at least try his services—which you promised to do?” she snapped, frowning at Jillian. “Now hurry up! The tea will get cold!”

  Then she pulled her head back behind the curtain and continued undressing.

  Jillian frowned at the place the other woman’s face had been. Mistress Douchenbag seemed really freaking focused on that tea.

  The bodyslave who had brought the tea had set the silver platter down on the wooden bench and departed the room. Seeing that she had a moment where no one was watching her, Jillian pulled her poison checker out of her jeans pocket and ran it hastily over the two cups of steaming, aquamarine tea.

  Somewhat to her surprise, the light at the end of the checker lit up bright green. She’d half expected the Yonnie Mistress to try and drug her—maybe to make her more susceptible to the idea of taking the big Kindred bodyslave home with her to the Mother Ship.

  Which I’m not about to do—es
pecially now I know he’s registered as a “deadly weapon” by the Yonnite Sacred Seven, she thought grimly.

  Oh, but you are going to let him put his hands all over you? demanded a little voice in her head.

  Well, he can hardly hurt me in the middle of a bunch of other people, Jillian told herself. And I was alone with him before and he was fine—a really nice guy, in fact.

  Then why is Mistress Douche-bag so damn desperate to get rid of him? asked the little voice.

  Jillian didn’t have an answer to that, but she supposed that she had inadvertently agreed to the massage when she agreed to take tea with the Yonnite Mistress.

  It’s just a massage and you know you haven’t had one in ages, she told herself, as she went to get undressed.

  She took off her jeans, t-shirt, and bra and folded them all neatly on the small wooden bench inside her booth. Then she hesitated, her thumbs hooked into the sides of her plain white cotton panties. Should she take them off?

  She’d used to get regular massages from an excellent massage therapist called Helga back when she worked at The Palms. Considering all the chopping, stirring, mixing, kneading, and heavy lifting that went on in a commercial kitchen, therapeutic massages were a must. But she had always kept her panties on and Helga was a woman—which made her feel more comfortable and less vulnerable.

  Then again, she hated to draw attention to herself by looking different from the other women in the room. What if they looked at her underwear and realized she wasn’t from Yonnie Six after all and threw her out? She very much doubted any self-respecting Yonnite Mistress would be caught dead wearing white cotton Granny-panties like she had on.

  I can always wrap myself in a towel and I’ll be lying face down the whole time anyway, she told herself. Reluctantly, she pushed the panties down and left them neatly folded beside her other clothing.

  Wrapping a towel firmly around herself, she finally left the changing booth.

  “Oh, there you are—at last!” Mistress Douchenbag was completely naked and apparently completely unashamed. She walked around nude as easily as she had when she was dressed—more easily, in fact, since she had finally taken off her three-foot-tall heels. “Come on,” she told Jillian. “Let’s have our tea before it gets too cold!”