Masters of Eden Read online

  “You should have thought of that before getting yourself into trouble on Earth,” Mixer said without a trace of sympathy. “Now get your butt back to that simulator before I wear it out.”

  Eden scowled, but turned and went back the way she came, closely followed by Mixer, who had no intention of letting her wander the station alone—at least not any more than she already had.

  Her heart pounded in her chest as she walked toward the simulation room. She was angry. Angry at the situation she found herself in, angry at Mixer for being such an overbearing jerk, angry at what the future was going to hold if she didn’t get herself out of there. There was still eleven weeks before she could be hurled into space, but time meant nothing when you didn’t have a plan.

  “Get your butt back on that treadmill,” Mixer growled behind her.

  “Oh, fuck off,” Eden swore.

  He swatted her bottom hard, but it only served to agitate her further. “Leave me alone!” She rounded on him fiercely, her teeth bared in a semi-snarl.

  “No,” he said implacably. “It’s my job not to leave you alone. It’s my job to get you ready for the rest of your life. You have to learn how to obey, young lady. You have to learn to submit.”

  Eden made a rude middle-fingered gesture to tell him what she thought of that plan. What an asshole. He really thought he could just overpower her with his machismo and she’d melt into some sort of willing sex slave ready to be shipped off to the colonies.

  “Put the headset back on before I whip your little ass,” he growled.

  She put the headset back on, only because escaping the situation seemed like a good idea. The screen was black at first, then it flickered into life. The golden plain was gone, replaced by a stone-walled room. It looked almost medieval, dominated by a bed covered in white silk sheets. On the other side of the room, a fire crackled.

  Looking down, Eden realized she was naked. “What the hell is going on?”

  “Training,” Mixer’s voice rumbled through her mind. She turned and saw him standing beside her. He was naked from the waist up, his broad torso all smooth muscle and black curling hair.

  “What… what sort of training? And why aren’t I wearing any clothes?”

  Solving the problem even as she asked the question, Eden reached for a nearby tapestry, tugged it off the wall, and wrapped it around herself.

  “You don’t need clothes,” Mixer said simply. “But don’t worry. I don’t intend to ravage you. This is obedience training. In this simulation, you’ll learn how to do as you are told when you’re told.”

  Eden didn’t think so.

  “We will start with a few positions,” he said. “On your knees.”

  “You have got to be kidding… hey!”

  Mixer crossed the space between them, pulled the tapestry away from her with a rough tug, and tossed it away. “On your knees, wench.”

  “Sheesh,” Eden grumbled. “Role play might be your thing, but it’s not mine.”

  It was inevitable that he would swat her, and he did. He took a very firm hold of her arm, swung her around, and smacked her toward the bed until she climbed up on it in an attempt to escape the stinging blows.

  “Disobedience earns punishment,” Mixer growled. “Obedience earns reward. You’re half kneeling now anyway. Want to see what happens when you do what you’re asked?”

  She was curious, and he was right. She was kneeling really, all she had to do was sit back against her haunches, which she did.

  He smiled. To her surprise, he looked very handsome when he smiled. Rakish, almost. “Good girl,” he praised.

  She was about to ask what her reward would be when he wrapped his hand softly around the back of her thigh and drew it up toward her bottom. His long fingers teased up the inside of her leg, drawing closer to the apex of her thighs where her quivering pussy was anticipating his touch.

  A minute ago, she’d hated him. She still did really, but she was a red-blooded woman and it had been a very long time since she’d felt a man’s touch. Mixer paused, his fingers just beneath her pussy. She could feel them there, steady and warm.

  “Do you want me to pet your pussy?” The question was drawled in her ear as he leaned closer.

  She struggled with the answer, wanting to say no to spite him, but yes to sate her desire. It had been a very long time since a man had touched her intimately like this and she’d missed it. When she did manage to force a word out, it was husky with desire.

  “Y…yes.”

  His fingertips slid the rest of the way and made tantalizingly soft contact with her outer lips. He petted her gently, the pads of his fingers caressing the soft dark down. Her breath came in quiet panting sounds as he spread her outer lips and touched the luscious damp flesh beyond.

  “You’re wet,” he drawled. “Does my bad girl like being good after all?”

  “You’re a bastard,” she complained as the tip of his index finger swirled the juices at the entrance of her body.

  “Maybe,” he agreed, “but you’re going to beg me to fuck you before I’m done. When I’m finished, you’ll lift your ass, spread your cheeks, and ask me to fill you.”

  His words were blunt and coarse, but they sparked something in Eden. Something she didn’t know was there. He started rubbing her clit with her juices, massaging her pussy with an expert, possessive touch that left her melting against him.

  “You’re a little spitfire,” he rumbled against her ear. “You need a firm hand, that’s all.”

  “You don’t know me or what I need,” she bit back rebelliously.

  He slid a finger inside her and her pussy clenched in response. A tremor ran through her frame as she moaned.

  “I think we both know that’s not true,” he said, lightly nipping her neck.

  As much as she wanted to hate him, she couldn’t. She could already tell that he would be an excellent lover, masterful and sensitive at the same time. Part of her wanted to lie back and spread her legs and let him have his way with her.

  But that wasn’t on the agenda. After a few sliding strokes, his finger slid out of her.

  “Now for position two,” he said. “Same as this one, but with your hands behind your head.”

  She sneered a little. “What’s the point of that one?”

  “Makes you easier to cuff.”

  “Like you need help cuffing me.”

  “It’s not whether you can be overpowered by force or not. It’s that you can behave long enough to submit to this position, which will make you vulnerable, expose your midline, your breasts.”

  She squirmed. He was challenging her in an area she’d never been very good in. Eden had never done anything she was told to do. She had never been naturally obedient, and it had gotten her deported. Now it was getting her played with by a powerful man who knew exactly what he was doing.

  “Hands behind your head,” he ordered.

  She shook her head. She didn’t want to. Suddenly, she felt shy. Teetering on the brink of actual submission, she threw herself back onto the safe ground of disobedience. Instead of putting her hands behind her head, she curled down and hid herself under the sheets, pulling them over her naked body and face too.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  She didn’t reply; she was tensed for the slap which she was sure would come. He would punish her for disobedience.

  That didn’t happen. He hooked a finger over the sheet and drew it back so he could look down into her face.

  “What are you doing, brat?”

  She shrugged. There weren’t words for how she was feeling, for how her arousal was flowing across her upper thighs, or the way her entire body was tingling with prickly heat. She felt almost as though she’d been drugged, all warm and cozy with a side of rebellion. Not the rebellion that got you shoved into a pod and thrown into space; the snuggly kind of rebellion that got you a chiding look from the man who was making your heart race and your mouth go dry.

  Mixer smirked at her and shook
his head. “Only one position for today, hmm? I suppose it’s a start.”

  He moved away and started fiddling with something.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Ending the simulation,” he said.

  “But…” her voice came out in a whimper as the room faded away.

  Mixer lifted the headset off her head and winked down at her. “I told you there were consequences for refusal.”

  Eden’s mouth dropped open in dismay. She was back in reality, fully clothed, her body untouched. In her mind however, they had just shared tremendous intimacy. But Mixer didn’t seem to care about that. He was too busy hanging up the headsets to notice how she was flushed with arousal.

  “Back to your cell,” he said. “You’re done for the day.”

  “I’m… done?” Anger started to creep in around the edges. She was horny as hell, and he clearly had no intention of finishing what he’d started. Maybe it was just a simulation, but it felt real enough to produce a physical reaction and dammit, that made it real. She could feel her pussy clenching uselessly, the muscles of her vagina searching for the manifestation of a memory of a stimulation they’d never actually felt.

  “Mhm.” He leaned in, his lips close to her ear. “Next time, you might want to obey instead of play the brat.”

  She struck out at him, fingers clawed slightly to allow her nails to scratch his cheek as she slapped him. He must not have been expecting the retaliation, because she caught him full strength and drew blood in three thin lines.

  His hiss was probably born of irritation more than pain, but it didn’t make any difference as he grabbed her by the back of her neck and hauled her hard against his body, his teeth snapping a hair away from her nose as he snarled something unintelligible at her.

  “Fuck you,” she swore. “I’m not some toy for you to use and leave hanging.”

  “So you think hitting me is going to end up in an orgasm for you? Is that what you think?” His big meaty hand was still clasped around the back of her neck, his eyes boring into hers. “You missed the point of the lesson.”

  “If the point of the lesson was to make me hate you, then I didn’t miss it,” she hissed at him.

  “It doesn’t matter if you hate me, girl. It only matters that you learn to do as you’re told.”

  “Never!”

  Mixer didn’t waste any more of his precious breath talking. He hauled Eden back to her cell and, as she had suspected he would all along, spanked her. The punishment was delivered with her bare bottom bent over just one of his powerful thighs, the other one being used to clamp around the back of her legs and hold her in place. He spanked her with the slow, steady hard swats of a man who is making a point.

  Each one of the stinging slaps jolted through her body, making her crotch ride against his hard thigh and giving her a momentary spike of pleasure as her clit was squeezed. In her heightened state of arousal, even that was enough reward. With every hard swat, she got a little bit closer to climax.

  Focused on reaching that peak, she quite forgot to complain about being spanked. She also forgot to squirm and wriggle and try to avoid it. Instead, her hips lifted toward his hand as it swept down and she gasped when it landed.

  “Don’t you dare enjoy this,” Mixer growled, sliding one hand up the back of her neck to curl it in her hair. He pulled her head up a little, making her arch as he spanked her hard and fast, multiplying the stimulation against both her jiggling cheeks and the hard little nub of her clitoris.

  His stern growling and manhandling did nothing to make her pleasure abate; if anything it heightened everything, sent her rocketing toward orgasm as his big, strong hand branded her cheeks.

  “Oh, my god!” Eden cried out to the deity as warmth began to spread throughout her entire body, followed quickly by a tingling that began in her clit and emanated straight down to her toes. She was cumming. She was cumming hard, right there over the lap of the man who she would have hated but for the fact that there was no room for hate when your entire being was flooded with endorphins and you were floating on a virtual cloud of goodwill and much-needed release.

  “Brat,” Mixer rumbled, settling his hand on her bottom. Somewhere in the fuzzy recesses of her mind, Eden realized that he wasn’t actually half as mean as he was making himself out to be. Yes, he liked to growl and swat, but he’d known exactly what she was doing, and he’d let her cum. And he was no longer spanking her, just holding her post-orgasmic body against his thighs.

  She relaxed, letting him take her weight. Maybe he’d spank her more, maybe he wouldn’t. Right then, she didn’t care. She just wanted to let the feeling flow through her.

  *

  Ghost had seen most everything that had passed between Mixer and Eden. The feed from the simulation came in just as clear as the feed from her cell. He had not intervened, but he wasn’t entirely happy with what he’d seen. When Mixer returned to the bridge with a smirk on his face, Ghost got on his case immediately.

  “That was not appropriate,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “Not appropriate? Of course it was. I was preparing her for what she’s going to be used for.”

  Used for. The words struck a very wrong chord with Ghost.

  “You can be an asshole sometimes,” he said, staring ice daggers at his comrade.

  “Why? Because I did what you were too scared to do? You took her to a field of flowers and hoped she’d fall in love with you,” Mixer snorted. “And all she did was break out. I bet she’s not running anywhere now, is she?” He jabbed a thick finger toward the monitor, which showed Eden napping, apparently worn out. “It’s our job to get her where she’s going, and make sure she’s ready to live the life she’s going to live there,” Mixer said. “I’m doing that. What are you doing?”

  “Not rushing to have sex with her,” Ghost said. “Not bypassing important lessons in favor of erotic ones.”

  “It wasn’t sex. It was a simulation. I haven’t touched her precious lady parts,” Mixer held up his hands in mock surrender. “And I didn’t do anything she didn’t want. You’re just annoyed because she’s like every other girl in the universe. She likes a bad boy.”

  “And that’s you, is it? You’re a bad boy?”

  “Jack off and get over yourself already,” Mixer advised him. “Or if you want a turn with her, be my guest.”

  “I don’t need your permission,” Ghost reminded him. “And she’s not a toy. She’s not something to take turns with.”

  Mixer was smirking broadly. “Three days and you’re in love.”

  “I am not in love.”

  “Yes, you are. You’ve been in love ever since she zapped you senseless. You like that she’s a pain in the ass rebel. You like that she’s disobedient. You like everything about that brat of a woman.”

  “Maybe I do like her,” Ghost admitted. “It’s not a crime to like someone.”

  “It might be if you’re the transporting officer and she’s your prisoner and you get soft and let her escape.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Men do stupid things when they’re in love,” Mixer said. “They bend the rules. Don’t make that mistake. She’s not in this for you or for me. She just wants to get out of her punishment, that’s all. No matter how much you love her, she’s not going to love you back.”

  “I’m not in love with her,” Ghost snarled, coming to the end of his patience. “She’s been here three days.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Mixer smirked. “Some people fall in love in five minutes. Three days is plenty of time to get attached, especially to the first hot piece of tail we’ve seen in a long time.”

  “Look. She might be a prisoner, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve respect. Quit calling her a piece of tail.”

  “Yessir,” Mixer agreed, still with that goofy broad grin on his face. “I will show due respect to your lady.”

  There was little point reasserting that Eden wasn’t his lady. Mixer was in fine
form, and Ghost knew all too well that he wasn’t going to drop the issue. Best to just let him think whatever ridiculous thoughts might come into his head.

  “I’ll take the next session,” Ghost said firmly.

  “Oh, I bet you will,” Mixer winked. “She’s actually pretty compliant if you know what buttons to press—like the one between her thighs.”

  “Enough,” Ghost snapped. “I viewed the simulation. Personally, I wouldn’t have stopped when you did. She was submitting.”

  “She was submitting a little, but she was also trying to find a cutesy way out of doing as she was told,” Mixer said, the smile fading as he concentrated on the discussion at hand. “If she wants to roll around and show her belly, that’s fine, but not at the expense of an order.”

  “It was a missed opportunity to push through a barrier.”

  “There will be plenty more opportunities. Next time, she knows the fun ends when she stops obeying.”

  “Does it? Because it looked to me like she disobeyed, you unhooked her, took her back to her cell, and gave her an orgasm as a reward.”

  Mixer opened his mouth to retort, but words didn’t come out. “Well,” he said. “Uh…”

  “And now she’s napping, quite content, having gotten exactly what she needed without obeying you. She hit you. She drew blood. And she got to cum.”

  “Of course it sounds bad when you put it like that.”

  “It was bad,” Ghost said smoothly, taking charge as he always did when Mixer forgot the chain of command. “You’re distracted by her. You rushed to get her naked, and you let her act out because she’s horny. None of that is good training. Today she learned that she can sexually and physically manipulate you.”

  Mixer grunted something inaudible, a sure sign of defeat.

  “We’ll let her rest, then run her later on. I want her tired out, too tired to go sneaking around. Too tired to plan for an escape.”