OnLocation (2 page)

“Good. Make yourself at home. There’s towels in the cabinet
in the bathroom.”

“Why did you—” But he was already gone, and the door closed
behind him. She put her case on the bed and opened it up. Even when she was
only on location for a few days, she preferred having her stuff put away to
living out of her suitcase. Drawers would do fine as she didn’t have anything
that needed hanging. She put the camera on top of the dresser, opened a drawer
and put her underwear away. Then she pulled open the next drawer to stash her
other clothes.

It wasn’t empty. She recognized some of what was there. Two
dildos, one smooth and glass, the other purple and plastic and bumpy. A
vibrating massager, the kind that plugged in. Rope. Chains. A blindfold.
Candles. Some multi-tailed whips that were as lovely as the ones in
Exit to
Eden
. She ran her hands over the leather. It was soft.

Other things she wasn’t sure about; some straps of thick
fabric that had big metal rings on them might be for bondage, she supposed. An
implement that ended in a wheel with spiky points that she didn’t even want to
think about.

Submission Island. This drawer was the easiest one to reach
from the bed. She glanced around and noticed that the posts on the bed had
metal rings screwed into them, and she took a closer look. The bed hadn’t been
modified, she realized. It had been made this way when it was built. She
understood Kyle’s comment about his sisters, although she wondered if they
might be more open-minded than he thought. Big brothers—she assumed the sisters
were younger, although she realized she had no reason to think that—had a
tendency to think of their sisters as less worldly than they actually were.
Hell, her brother Frank probably still thought she was a virgin. Where men got
those silly ideas was beyond her.

She certainly wasn’t going to let a little bondage gear goad
her into exchanging this nice room for the plain, emotionless one that
Gallagher was in. It did make her more curious about the resort. This was
clearly a woman’s room, and yet not any particular woman’s room. She supposed
it was all part of the “Submission Island” thing. Women came to be treated—how,
exactly? Well, as long as Kyle didn’t get any ideas about her.

She found an empty drawer and put the rest of her clothes
away. On second thought, maybe Kyle having ideas wouldn’t be all bad.

No. She knew what attracted her, and it wasn’t anything
good. The sense of danger, represented by the whips and the chains. Kyle’s
distance. She may not have done BDSM before, but she’d been with enough men
with an attitude that she knew where it got her. She’d be well advised to keep
her mind on business. And her business was scouting locations on the island.
Maybe it wouldn’t be suitable at all, although Stegner seemed pretty set on it.

She kicked off her tennis shoes and pulled on boots. Even in
Australia, the spiders couldn’t bite through leather, she was sure. She walked
out of her room, downstairs and outside. Whatever she found, she could send
Gallagher out on his own to take pictures of tomorrow. And film. What the hell
they needed professional-quality video of at this stage, she didn’t know, but
she’d had that argument and she’d lost. She didn’t need to brood about it now.
Fresh air would help, and the air here was close to perfect—not too hot, not so
cold she needed a jacket. It had gotten misty but that didn’t bother her.
Hopefully she could find some places on the island that would be suitable for
Stegner’s movie, because he was not going to be happy if she didn’t. The
schedule didn’t allow for her to come back with a negative on the whole place,
so she’d have to do the best she could.

* * * * *

“I don’t think you should go wandering around on this island
without me,” said Gallagher crossly, a few hours later. He was seated at one end
of the dining room table, which was big enough to hold ten people. It was
vaguely rustic, with a thick countertop and dark wood that looked rough but had
been varnished to an even shine. The companionable thing to do, now that she
had a sandwich of her own, would have been to sit next to him. Instead she sat
on the side, as far away as she could be without being on the other end.

“I’ll do as I like. I have places for you to visit
tomorrow.” She had, in fact, found reasonable places to shoot some of the scenes.
The island had some drawbacks—no one would think the jungle belonged in the
Mediterranean, for instance. But she’d stood for a couple of hours on the beach
without seeing another soul and that was definitely good for shooting a movie.
The Med was crowded by comparison, although of course there were spots. Here
the sky and ocean were blue and seemed to stretch on forever. The little beach
at the end gave a perfect feeling of isolation for the shipwrecked Odysseus,
and most people wouldn’t look at a mangrove tree and know that it didn’t
belong. Probably.

There was blissful silence for a few minutes. Terry ate her
sandwich, promising herself that tomorrow she’d take the time to cook a real
meal. The movie had paid to have food here but hadn’t paid for anyone to
prepare it, which was fine. Sometimes when she scouted places, she got to stay
at five-star hotels and sometimes she ended up in straw huts. As things went,
this was more toward the five-star than she’d expected.

“Don’t you get lonely?” asked Gallagher.

“No.” It wasn’t entirely true, but she didn’t want to get
into it.

“Or horny?”

“We are not discussing that.”

“Look, I’m not looking for a ro—” Gallagher looked up and
Terry turned to follow his gaze. Kyle had entered the kitchen. He ignored the
two of them and got out a cast-iron skillet.

Roll in the hay?
“Good,” said Terry. How many times
did she have to say no?

Gallagher dropped his voice a fraction. “Just, you know, men
have needs. Some women do too.”

Maybe Gallagher thought Kyle couldn’t hear him, but Terry
wasn’t so sure. Kyle paused for a moment then opened the fridge. She realized
she was staring, but there was a lot to stare at. He was wearing a plain white
sleeveless undershirt and jeans. There was a tattoo of a dagger on his right
biceps. The lines of it only seemed to make the indentations and bulges of
sculpted muscle more obvious.

To her dismay, Gallagher was getting up and changing seats
to sit next to her. “You know, I’ve heard things about the people who run this
place. They are not nice people. Sadists. You do not want to get involved with
him.”

It was probably good advice, but it did nothing to change
the fact that the man was gorgeous. Telling her a man was dangerous had never
decreased the attraction, even though she knew it should.

Kyle plopped a large steak from the fridge onto the hot
skillet and sprinkled salt and black pepper on it. He ignored Terry and
Gallagher.

“Look,” she said to Gallagher, “does the phrase ‘not if you
were the last man on Earth’ mean anything to you?”

Gallagher thought about it for about fifteen seconds before
answering, “No.” Maybe his mouth was full.

Terry rolled her eyes. He couldn’t be so stupid as to not
understand her, could he? Maybe he didn’t have any better way to pass the time.
She wasn’t going to send him out to shoot his silly video at night, as tempting
as it was. Actually some night shots might be good to take—but after he got to
know his way around, so he wouldn’t trip and break an expensive video camera.
Not that Gallagher struck her as clumsy particularly, but distracted, maybe.
Anyway, at night it was best to be careful, particularly in a strange place.
She wondered if the spiders were more active at night or less. And then, not
wanting to think about spiders or her unwanted sidekick, she decided to focus
on her sandwich.

A few minutes later Kyle set a plate with his steak on it
down across from her and then went back to the kitchen. The steak looked cooked
on the outside, but she didn’t think it had been on the skillet very long. Why
did it not surprise her that he liked his steaks rare? She watched him make a
big salad then come back to sit down. Now the salad surprised her. But she
supposed if he ate potatoes with it he’d look a bit more like Gallagher.

“So what do you do for a living, Kyle?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he said. “I’m retired.”

He wasn’t a babe in the woods, but he didn’t look that old
either. Her guess was forties, maybe early forties. “From what?”

“Military. Why?”

“Just curious. So you live all alone on this island? I
thought there were others.”

“Carter lives here when he’s not with his girlfriend or
flying for someone. So not that much lately. Tom has a job selling things that
takes him all over. Roger works in Sydney. Roger’ll be here later in the week,
I’m told. The others come and go whenever.”

Gallagher cleared his throat uncomfortably. Clearly Kyle
made him nervous. She had to admit he wasn’t the warmest man she’d ever met,
but he intrigued her. And she thought she knew one clear way of getting
Gallagher off her back.

“Do you get lonely?” she asked.

He raised his eyebrows. “Not usually.”

Okay, that line worked no better on him than it did on her.
Hell, she was no good at this. “You’re a very attractive man,” she said.

That got a smile. “Thank you. You’re a pretty good-looking gal.”

Maybe there was hope for the conversation after all. “What
do you do here for recreation?”

“Me? Well, the yard’s pretty big. You may have noticed.
Keeps me busy. But at night, I usually take a swim in the pool or read a book.”

“When you’re alone.”

“Yes.”

Gallagher leaned over toward her. “Not safe,” he whispered.
She was almost sure Kyle could hear that.

“Are you interested in what we could do together?” asked
Kyle, looking amused.

“I was thinking I might be.”

He reached across the table and brushed a strand of hair
back from her cheek. Then he glanced over at Gallagher. “You’ve got someplace
else you need to be, I think.”

For a moment, the two men locked eyes. Gallagher was bigger
than Kyle, but Kyle had more muscle. And he’d been military, so he might know a
trick or two. Still, she hadn’t intended to start a fight. She had wanted to
get rid of Gallagher, of course, but she hadn’t expected Kyle to be so
straightforward about it. She assumed Gallagher would get the hint, although he
hadn’t been great with hints so far.

“Fine,” he said at last and got up. He stalked off to the
living room and up the stairs, leaving Kyle and her alone.

She smiled.

Kyle leaned forward, looking dead serious. “You wanted him
away, so I helped. But he’s right. I’m not safe at all. When I’m not alone, but
I’m with a woman, I tend to tie her up and do horrible, evil things to her. I
like causing pain, Miss Barstow. Once I start, I like being told ‘yes sir’ and
I don’t like being told no. It isn’t about love or romance or candlelight
dinners, it’s about how much a woman can take—which is sometimes more than she
expects. I expect her to be available anytime, anywhere, for anything I feel
like doing.”

Teresa ought to get up and leave. She knew that. He was
telling her as much. Hell, he was trying to scare her off. He held her gaze for
a long moment.

“And do they usually appreciate this?” she asked, pleased
with the feigned calmness in her voice.

He looked surprised, but only for a moment. “Yes, actually.
But it takes an unusual woman.”

“A submissive.” She knew the lingo.

“Not most submissives either.”

“So you’re thinking I should run away and leave well enough
alone.”

“Something like that. If you want him to think we had a
fuck, I’ll play along. And there’s a vibrator in your room if you need to get
off, although I suspect a smart girl like you packs her own.”

She did, but that was beside the point. “That’s none of your
business.”

“It was only an observation. And you’re right, it’s not—but
it would be if we were actually going to do anything together. I’d want to know
everything. What color is it? Is it life-size or smaller or bigger?
Realistically shaped or artistically abstract? I’d want to know exactly what it
is you enjoy when pleasuring yourself.”

“So you could do it?”

He smiled. No, it was more of a smirk. “Possibly. Or
possibly so I could make sure I withheld it. It all depends on what mood I’m
in.”

“What mood
you
are in.”

“That’s what I said. I’m not in the habit of lying. Or
sugarcoating.”

“And I am not in the habit of rolling over.”

Kyle chuckled. “Then it’s you and your vibrator. Nothing
wrong with that.”

“For one thing—anything, anywhere? Sex has to be safe or
you’re an idiot.”

“No one said anything about unsafe sex. Of course it has to
be safe.”

“And I’d have to be an idiot to let a man I barely know tie
me up. Especially in private.”

He grinned. “I could do it right here on this table.”

Terry blushed. She wasn’t an exhibitionist. And the fact
that the only person who might walk in on them was Gallagher made her stick out
her tongue. “I don’t want to do anything where that guy could take video.”

He laughed. “Okay, I’ll give on that one. You know, normally
no one is around here except for my friends and women who are—well, open-minded
enough to hang out with me and my friends. This is the first time anyone not
connected to BDSM in some way has been here for the two years since we pitched
in together and bought the island.”

“That would be different.” Terry took a deep breath, because
she wasn’t entirely sure it would be
that
different. The backseat of a
car was about as public as she’d ever gotten, or imagined herself getting. And
yet damn it all if the thought didn’t have her tingling. She remembered
wondering what sex would be like on the hood of the car rather than the
backseat. She hadn’t said anything back then because another car drove up. She
fixed her gaze on him. The fact that he was willing to negotiate some had drawn
her in. “And no tying me up in private.”

“You know, that’s a very sensible rule, in general, and
you’re a very sensible girl.”

“So, agreed?” she pressed.

“No.”

“No? Why no?”
I should tell him to take it or leave it.
But
she wanted to know.

“Because it’s a sensible rule in the city, but it’s not a
sensible rule here. You’re on an island. There’s a boat, granted, but I have
the keys. It’s a hundred and fifty kilometers to the mainland with tons of
jellyfish, and I don’t care how good a swimmer you are, you could never make
it. So you’re trapped, from the start. You’re not any less or more trapped if
you’re tied up. If I’m the kind of person that’s going to go crazy because you
can’t run, scream, what have you— Well, you’re fucked from the start, aren’t
you?”

She hadn’t thought of it that way. And now that he’d said
it, she wished she hadn’t. “There’s Gallagher. He’s here.”

“And he’d protect you? From me?” He laughed.

“He’s bigger than you.”

“I’m meaner. And I’ve had years of training I very much
doubt he has.”

“I don’t know what training he has. And neither do you.”

He shook his head. “There’s a way people carry themselves
when they know how to fight. Especially when they’re challenged, as he was at
the dinner table. He should have been trying to figure out how he was going to
get up and set himself, but instead he was trying to decide if he could sit
there and hope I wouldn’t do anything. He decided to run. Like it or not,
Terry, all the power here is mine, and you are a very captive audience. But,”
he spread his palms, “I would never take advantage of that without you agreeing
to it. I’d give you a safe word. You know what a safe word is?”

“It’s a word that if I said it, you’re supposed to stop.”

“I knew you weren’t too innocent.” He grinned at her.

“I’m not exactly a slut either.”

“But you can be with me. You will be. Or,” he shrugged, “you
can go enjoy the toys in your bedroom by yourself. There’s enough to keep you
busy for a week. As far as I’m concerned, you’re Roger’s guest. I never wanted
you here to begin with. I’m perfectly happy being alone.”

She was only there for a week. Admittedly that week could
get very uncomfortable alone—or almost alone—on an island if things didn’t turn
out well. But she’d most likely never see him again after it was all said and
done. She didn’t stick around on the set once everything was set up, usually.
She didn’t intend to this time. She had an assignment in Berlin she was looking
forward to and she planned to get started on it a week early.

In any case, if he thought of her as a slut for the week and
for the rest of his life, it wasn’t going to change anything in her life. She
could let herself go this once. It was so tempting.

“Still,” she said, “no ropes. I can always safe word them.”

“Negotiation is a good thing.” He cut a piece of his steak
and popped it into his mouth.

“That’s a yes?”

He waited until he finished chewing. “Some subs seem to
think negotiation is where they get all of what they want, because when they
play the Dom will be in charge and get all of what he wants. But negotiation is
actually for both parties. I don’t play soft, Terry— Is it Teresa?”

“No one calls me that.”

“I do. I spent several days thinking Terry Barstow was a
bloke and I want to get the image out of my mind. Teresa. I don’t play soft,
because it’s no fun for me, and I like what I like. I’m not interested in
guiding anyone gently into the wide world of BDSM—Roger will be here in a few
days, and if that’s what you want that’s his gig. Anyway, first time with me,
for someone without a lot of experience, yeah, I want you tied up. You’re less
likely to get hurt if you can’t move at the wrong time. As to using your safe
word—yes, you can. But if you’re going to do it over something I already know
I’m going to do, we might as well skip the process.”

She stared. What a maddening man. Didn’t he understand
compromise? She’d been dating boys who liked to think they were bad and edgy
for a long time, but they had always been willing to give to get sex. And she’d
always ended up thinking of them as poseurs. Kyle, she suspected, was the real
thing. That scared her, but she was aware that some of the need to squirm
wasn’t out of fright. She was getting very wet, and she shouldn’t be.

“I’ll think about it.”

“That’s very wise, I think.” He cut another piece of steak
and chewed.

“You could have made us all food as easily as you made one,”
she said.

“Yep. And so could you. There are more steaks in the fridge.
Can you cook?”

“Some.”

“You,” he pointed out, “got dinner first.”

She could feel her scowl deepening. “Why are you so—” She
couldn’t decide whether the word she wanted was frustrating or unyielding or
what, exactly.

“I don’t ever try to be anyone but myself. You should try it
sometime.”

“You’re trying to scare me off.”

“Am I? Maybe. I think there’s a ninety-nine out of one
hundred chance that’s the best thing I can do for you, and for me. If it is,
then yeah, I’ll happily scare you off.”

“One percent, huh?” She had to admit the interview wasn’t
going horribly well, but she would have thought she was doing better than that.
Most women would have walked away. Most women have more sense of
self-preservation.
She wondered what he meant about how she should try
being herself. She’d always thought of her boyfriends as the ones who were
putting on an act, but maybe he was right. Maybe she was too. Didn’t everyone
in the end? Even Kyle. He couldn’t be that tough, could he?

Yet he was perfectly calm, eating his steak as if they were
talking about the weather. “Why am I down to one percent?” she asked and wished
she hadn’t. It sounded pathetic, needy. She never wanted to be in that role.
She always hid her needs. It was safer that way.

He held her gaze while he finished chewing again. “Actually,
one percent is an upgrade. It was definitely not when you got off the boat. It
was one in a thousand when you started flirting with me to get rid of your
friend.”

Definitely not? She knew she was no movie star beauty.
Actually, some movie star beauties weren’t that good-looking without their
makeup. But she’d been around enough gorgeous people to know she wasn’t one.
Still, she didn’t like to think any man took his first look at her and thought
“definitely not” unless they were married, a priest or gay. Kyle didn’t seem to
be any of those.

“I do believe I’ve been insulted.” She got up. She needed to
clear her head.

He shrugged. “We’re all wrong sometimes.”

Maybe there was another way to take it, but she didn’t know
what it was.

“The reason I want to tie you up is that I intend to do very
intense things to you. Some pleasurable, some painful. And I don’t want you
thrashing around and hurting yourself, or me, in the process. I don’t want you
to concentrate on where to put your hands or what to do with your feet. I want
all your focus on exactly what I’m doing to you and nowhere else, whether I’m
teasing you, flogging you or fucking you.”

The words brought a warm flush to her cheeks, and elsewhere.
Teasing and fucking she understood. “Flogging,” she repeated. On the first
date? But nothing he proposed was a date, not really. It was raw, physical. She
had to believe there’d be an emotional component though, for herself if not for
him.

“It’s a broad term.” He smiled at her. “I don’t mean to
exclude whipping, caning, spanking or paddling. And it was just an example. Go.
Think about it. I’ll be around tomorrow, and if I’m not out and around my door
is the second one on the left from the stairs. Knock.”

“What if I’ve made up my mind?” Would he really do all those
things to her? She had no reason to think he was bluffing. How would it feel?
Would it hurt more than she could stand? Or worse, would it arouse her? The
thought of being aroused by something like that was hot, but she wasn’t sure what
it meant about her if she was.

“I said go and think. It was an order, Teresa. Dismissed.”
And with that, he looked down at his steak.

“But—”

“No buts. Go. Besides, my steak is going to get cold.”

From the look of the inside, it wasn’t all that warm to begin
with. She paused for a moment, then headed for her room. It was dark outside
and she had a mystery she’d been halfway through for a week. Time to go find
out how it turned out, she supposed. Kyle was the most maddening man. What was
up with him, anyway?

She realized as she opened her door that she wanted to find
out the answer to that a lot more than she wanted to know how her mystery novel
ended.

Nearly an hour later, her novel lay facedown on the bed.
She’d managed to read about fifteen pages. She had alternated between wondering
about him and being pissed at him. She thought about how his muscles would feel
under her hands. How his hands would feel clamped on her wrists, holding her
against a wall or down on the bed. Would she be facing him or facing away? He
could overpower her easily and do whatever he wanted. She didn’t want to be
overpowered. Still, it was intoxicating to know that he could. And if she
consented, well—then it wouldn’t really be overpowering, exactly, it’d be—well,
too damn confusing, that’s what it was.

She’d thought the book would distract her from arousal, but
it had worked the other way around. Her libido was distracting her from the
book. She opened the drawer in her dresser, the one that held all the toys. She
pulled out a flogger, the softer and lighter of the two in the drawer, and set
it on the bed. Then a thin bit of wood, maybe a couple of feet long. A cane. It
looked as though it would hurt a lot. She didn’t know what she was going to do
with them. She didn’t even know what he would do with them. Sailors got lashed
on the back, but that didn’t seem all that sexy. He’d go after her ass, she
supposed. Or maybe her thighs, or her breasts or her pussy. The thought of that
cane on her pussy made her wince. Surely he’d observe some limits.

She got out the big plug-in massager. Now that was what she
needed. Something to distract her from thinking about him. She usually didn’t
think that much about sex once she came, after all. She got out her own
vibrator from her bag—it was smooth, silver and not quite life-sized, but she
usually used it on the outside and didn’t care about that. She put it on the
bed with everything else and then plugged the massager in.

Quick and dirty and I’m done with it. Fantasies are safer
and often sexier than reality, anyway.
She gave herself permission to have
whatever wicked thoughts she liked, at least for a few minutes.

She lay down on the bed, turned on her vibrator and stuffed
it inside her flooded pussy. Maybe it was too long without that made her this
turned-on.
Kyle happened to get my juices going, nothing special.
She
turned the massager on and pressed its round head right to her clit. Its
humming vibration was much stronger than what she normally got and she nearly
jumped.