Savages Recruit Page 7

  “So it was a good thing I kicked you?” A glimmer of mischief appeared in Zora’s eyes.

  “Don’t push it,” Savage replied.

  She didn’t push it, what she did do was contemplate what she’d been told. Even though he was being kind and reassuring, it didn’t put Savage in a good light. He’d stolen her away to take part in something dangerous. He’d taken her, a complete stranger, and put her life on the line. A new question came to mind as she thought about the outrageousness of what had taken place. “What happens when we’re done? When do I get to go home?”

  He looked at her, his expression suddenly hard with harsh truth. “Zora, there is no done. The things you’re going to see mean that you’ll never be able to go back to a normal life. You’ve already seen more than most people ever will. You’ll get more freedom in time, but for the moment, this is your life.”

  Zora shook her head. She was beginning to feel nauseous. “And you’re just telling me this now. Well thanks. Thanks for giving me a choice.”

  “Life doesn’t always give us choices, Zora. We make the best of the realities we find ourselves in.”

  She glared at him and shuffled around on her knees so that she could point a finger at him accusingly. “You had a choice. You had a choice to find someone who wanted this.”

  He glanced at her finger then swatted it away. “No. I had a job to do and a certain amount of time to do it in. I’m sorry that means your life has been disrupted, but it could not have happened any other way.”

  “That is such a cop out,” Zora said, her face screwed up in disgust.

  Savage appeared unmoved by her emotion. “You can argue, you can throw your little tantrums, but it isn’t going to change the reality.”

  “And what is the reality, Captain Savage?” Zora snarled. “Do tell me, you seem to be such an expert on the topic.”

  His eyes bored into hers as he answered without hesitation. “For the foreseeable future you sleep when I tell you to sleep, you wake when I tell you to wake, heck, you breathe when I tell you to breathe. Tantrums won’t change that fact, they’ll just waste your breath. If you disobey me I have dozens of implements to use on your hide.” Leaning towards her, he spoke in a dangerous low tone. “In short, Ms Matthews, I own you.”

  Chapter Six

  It was impossible to glower as much as Zora wanted to glower at Savage. She glowered as hard as she could and still it was not enough. He was entirely unaffected by her dirty looks, probably because his ego knew no bounds. Zora found the declaration that he ‘owned’ her ridiculous and yet somehow very difficult to disprove, especially when he had the backing of a monolithic institution. “I’ll escape and go to the media,” she threatened as the van began to climb a slope.

  He gave her a withering look. “Zora, think about that for a moment. Even if you could escape, which you can’t, can you name a single person who has successfully gone to the media against the military?”

  Zora frowned. “Well there was that one guy…”

  “That one guy spending the rest of his natural born life in military prison? That’s the guy you want to emulate?”

  As awful as Savage’s point was, it was a valid one. There was no way anyone would pay attention to her even if she did speak out. Her past scrapes with the law alone would ensure that her story was dismissed outright. “You suck,” she growled.

  “And you’re a disrespectful brat who is going to end up very sore and very sorry if she doesn’t adjust her attitude,” he replied. He obviously hoped the warning would be enough to settle Zora down, but it only had the effect of sending her off on one of her tirades.

  “Yeah,” she said in a voice dripping with sarcasm. “I hate it when my victims are disrespectful to me, it makes my kidnapping seem so much less awesome, which hurts my feelings.”

  He gave her a hard look. “One more smart ass comment and you’ll be gagged.”

  “Oh, gagged!” Zora said, ignoring the threat. “Kinky, why not tie me up and hang me from the ceiling whilst you’re at it?”

  “Right,” Savage said grimly, grabbing her by the collar. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a long bandanna which he quickly and rather expertly twirled into a solid rope style gag. Whilst Zora squirmed in his grasp and cussed up a storm, he held her by the back of the neck and slipped the middle of the gag into her mouth when she opened it to complain. It was the work of a few seconds to fasten it behind her head with a swift knot. She reached for it immediately of course, but he slapped the back of her hand hard enough to make her squeal through the cotton. “Touch it and you’ll get your wish of being tied up fulfilled,” he growled.

  With a little whimper, Zora finally settled down. She just couldn’t win with him. Unlike every other person in her life who had backed down when her behavior escalated, Savage had no problem rising to the challenge. She did not like the gag at all, but she didn’t touch it. She had no doubt that he would make good on his promise of tying her up and the idea of that panicked her.

  With nothing to do but sit and pout, Zora squirmed around until she was sitting on one leg, a technique that kept her sore bottom from making contact with hard surfaces but left her other leg free to do other things, like repetitively kick the table leg. It was supposed to annoy him, but he just smirked and shook his head at her.

  It wasn’t fair, Zora thought. Wasn’t fair at all. He knew exactly what to do to to her get what he wanted and she had no idea how he worked at all. With a long sigh that was exaggerated through the cloth of the gag, she stopped kicking the table and laid her head in her arms.

  Half an hour or so later, Savage reached over and undid the gag, releasing her from the oral prison. “You see how this works,” he said calmly. “Behave yourself and do as you’re told and your conditions improve. Act like a spoiled child and they deteriorate.”

  Zora bit back a retort. She wanted nothing more than to verbally tear strips off him, but the feeling of having her mouth held open around a gag was not at all pleasant and she didn’t want to experience that again. Instead of saying something rude and clever, she turned her head away from him and went back to resting on her arms. He might have won the battle, but he wouldn’t win the war, she promised herself that.

  An hour or so later, an hour spent in stewing silence, the van pulled to a halt and Savage opened the rear doors onto terrain that almost made Zora gasp with its beauty. It seemed like forever since she’d seen an open space and now they were sitting on a grassy field in the middle of a range of hills and mountains that seemed to go on forever. She clambered out quickly and stood on the grass, overwhelmed by the natural beauty all around her. It was a clear day and trees seemed to stretch out to the horizons on all sides. “One thing before we get started,” Savage said, turning her to face him. “Don’t get any ideas about running away. It takes days to tramp out of here and that’s with a map and supplies. If you run, best case scenario I find you and spank you every day for a month. Worst case scenario I don’t find you and one of the bears or wolf packs that roam these hills do. Understand?”

  Zora nodded. She was not experienced with the outdoors and she had very little desire to test her mettle against the wilds. It was beautiful out there, but she was accustomed to air conditioning and microwave ovens. She wouldn’t know how to feed herself, let alone find her way in those dense forests. As beautiful as it was, the sense of isolation that came with the location sent a shiver down her spine. She was relieved when she spotted a cabin nearby. The small touch of civilization was comforting and she made her way toward it quickly.

  Upon closer inspection her hopes that the cabin might have power were quickly dashed, it was a simple box shaped affair with just one window in the rear above a rough hewn table big enough to seat six or so. In addition to the table there was a wood burner on one side of the cabin and a raised platform on the other. She pointed at it, wrinkling her nose. “What’s that for?”

  “That’s where we sleep,” Savage informed her with a grin. His spiri
ts seemed to have been lifted by their new surroundings, or perhaps because he’d found a way of making her shut up, at any rate, he was in a very good mood indeed.

  “Really? We didn’t have any beds of nails lying around?” It was too good of a joke to pass up, the omnipresent threat of being gagged notwithstanding.

  Her comment was rewarded with a sharp swat to her bottom. “Go help Brian unpack and set up, he’ll tell you what needs to be done,” Savage ordered.

  For once, Zora obeyed without first taking the time to disagree. It was a waste of time she figured, besides, Brian wasn’t nearly as bad as Savage. He was quiet and respectful and he said please a lot, which she liked. He also helped carry all the heavy supplies, leaving her to traipse behind with sleeping bags and toilet paper. Savage didn’t help at all, he was too busy fiddling with a computer that he’d set up on the table.

  Unloading did not take long at all. “There you go,” Brian said, handing her a pair of bedrolls. “That’s the last of it.”

  “There’s only two,” Zora frowned, looking into the interior of the van to see if there might be another he’d forgotten.

  “Yes, it’s just the two of you.”

  “Oh.” She didn’t know whether to be excited or scared about that revelation. “For how long?”

  Brian checked his clipboard. “You’re scheduled for a week, but that could change.”

  “Okay, thanks,” Zora said thoughtfully, making her way back to the cabin slowly. Brian walked ahead at a faster pace and when she got there he was already on his way out, evidently having been dismissed. Zora waved as he left, then pushed the door open and put the bedrolls on the sleeping platform.

  Savage was buried in his work, but someone had started a fire and though she wasn’t all that cold, she went over and knelt in front of it. The flames were cheerful and warm. She was hoping that she’d be spared any of the physical training Savage had mentioned back at the compound, but her hopes were eventually dashed when he pushed back from the computer. “Right,” he said briskly. “Ready to go for a run?”

  “Not really,” Zora replied.

  “Get changed.” It was an order she would like to have refused. She considered objecting to getting changed in front of him, but then she realized that she only had to change her pants and he’d definitely seen her ass before. With a defiant demeanor, she kicked her pants off and put some running shorts on.

  Ever the gentleman, Savage wasn’t standing around watching her, he was getting changed himself. He had been wearing a thick black sweater, but he peeled it off over his head, taking his shirt with it and Zora was treated to the sight of washboard abs emerging from the waistband of his pants. For an older guy, he was ripped. As his sweater finally broke free of his head he caught her looking and winked rakishly. She blushed and looked away quickly as he finished getting ready.

  “Ready, Ms Matthews?” Savage said, holding the door of the cabin open for her.

  “I guess,” she replied, taking as long as possible to lace her sports shoes.

  “We’ll start slow,” he said, “just a couple of miles.”

  “I can’t run a couple of feet, let alone a couple of miles,” Zora objected.

  He smiled a dark smile. “You’d be surprised what you can do with the proper motivation.”

  They started out at a slow jog that took them across the clearing and onto a forest trail. After the first few hundred feet across the field, Zora was already beginning to pant. By the time they started up the forest trail, which happened to be on an incline, she was suffering. Savage wasn’t even breathing harder than usual, let alone beginning to break a sweat. “Isn’t this where the lions and tigers live?” Zora gasped, stopping and pressing her back up against a tree as she tried to catch her breath.

  “You’ll be fine,” Savage said, coming back for her and urging her forward.

  “No, you’ll be fine. I’ll be eaten,” she pointed out.

  “What’s the matter, Matthews?” he teased. “Not as easy as climbing out of a window?”

  “Oh shut up,” Zora growled. That earned her a hard slap on her thigh, a slap that angered her. “Screw this, I’m not running if you’re going to hit me.”

  “Yes you are,” he said implacably, slapping her again. She tried jumping out of the way, but he still managed to catch the same spot on her thigh, where a red splotch was quickly forming.

  “Want me to run? Fine,” Zora said rebelliously. She turned and ran away from him, back towards the cabin as fast as she could go. She forgot the pain in her lungs and legs as she took advantage of the downhill slope and ran flat tack towards the cabin. At first she was stoked to discover that she was actually keeping away from him, but after a few hundred more feet he caught up easily and slapped her sore backside.

  “Much better, Matthews,” he said, slapping the other cheek.

  “Stop it!” Zora squealed, dodging around the side of the cabin to avoid him. He followed, and she was forced to loop around the cabin entirely and head back up towards the track they’d been running on in the first place. To her dismay she realized that she was going to end up right where she started, but much more tired and out of breath than she otherwise would have been.

  “This is actually a very good idea,” Savage said, drawing abreast with her. “Much more enjoyable for me.”

  “Well if it’s about making it enjoyable for you, why don’t you just jerk off the whole way,” Zora snapped waspishly.

  His expression went from amused to grim in an instant and Zora knew she’d crossed the line. “I’m sorry.” She spoke quickly, but not quickly enough for Savage.

  “Come here,” he ordered, stopping dead in his tracks.

  Zora did not go there, Zora took to her heels with a fresh wind. With surprising agility, she doubled back on her path and made her way back to the cabin at high speed. By the time Savage realized what she was doing and stopped standing still in the hope she might actually obey him, it was too late to catch up with her, she had already run inside the cabin and bolted the door. Panting so hard she could barely talk, she slid down the inside of the door, keeping her back to it as if her weight would stop him coming in if the dead bolt failed.

  Almost immediately, she heard Savage’s voice. “Let me in, Zora.”

  She turned her head and spoke to the door. “You’re going to hit me.”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’m not letting you in.”

  “Zora.” He sounded mad. Really mad. His voice had a vicious low growl that she hadn’t heard before. “Don’t play this game with me. Open the door. Now.”

  The weight of authority in his voice alone was almost enough to make her open the door, but even as her fingers crept up to the bolt they stalled out of fear. She hadn’t planned to lock him out, her actions had been out of a desire to protect her hide. Now she was caught in a stand off of her own making. “Promise you won’t hit me,” she called.

  “Girl, when I get in there I am going to send you out for a switch, understand?” His voice was a low, frustrated growl now and she knew that she was pushing him to the very limits of his patience.

  “No, but it sounds awful,” Zora said.

  “Let me in and it won’t be as bad.”

  “Why can’t you just agree not to hit me?” The plaintive note in her voice was genuine. “I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

  “If you didn’t mean for it to happen then you should open the door.”

  “No! You’ll hit me!” Zora wailed, returning them to square one.

  It went quiet for a bit and Zora’s heart began to pound in anticipatory fear. It was worse when she didn’t know where he was or what he was doing. She squealed in fright when he appeared at the window in the back of the cabin. It was fastened thankfully, but he could see her from there and she could see him. The stern, unyielding expression on his face was almost enough to send her into a panic attack.

  In hindsight she probably shouldn’t have done what she did next, but all she wanted to
do was avoid his glare. She got up and ran across the cabin and pulled the curtain shut in his face. His immediate exclamation of anger sent shivers down her spine. She was in so much trouble, and unlike other times when she had been punished her immediately for her misbehavior, now she was forcing herself to wait for it. It made it so much worse, she realized as she retreated back to her original spot.

  “Zora.” His voice came from behind the door and she had the unsettling feeling that she was being stalked by someone who didn’t need to see her to know what she was doing.

  “Yes?”

  “Make this easy on yourself and open the door.”

  She wanted to believe that it would be easier on her if she opened the door, but he’d already said she was going to be in trouble. Then an idea came to her. Like most of Zora’s ideas it was a very bad idea, but it seemed to be a very good idea at the time. “Okay,” she said. “Give me a second.”

  “Don’t try anything funny, Zora,” Savage warned. The warning fell on deaf ears because Zora was already inching over towards the window at the back of the cabin. She opened it as quietly as possible, then shuffled back over to the front door.

  “Okay I am going to open the door now,” she announced, slipping the bolt back just enough so that it would open, but would tale a little bit of jiggling to slip out completely. The moment the handle turned, she ran to the back of the cabin and climbed out of the window. She hit the grass outside just as the bolt gave way with a sudden ‘groinch’ sound and the door of the cabin flew open.

  “MATTHEWS!” Savage boomed angrily into the empty cabin.

  Zora managed to make it to the tree line before he could make it to the window and see where she went. She lay flat on her belly in the undergrowth, peering at the cabin from her hiding place. She saw the curtains thrust aside and Savage’s burly frame standing in the window. He looked around for a moment, then went back outside.

  He walked around the back of the cabin and seemed to be looking at something on the ground, his eyes following along the path she’d run. Fear gripped her heart. Surely he couldn’t know which way she’d gone? She hunkered down as he started walking towards her hiding spot, but at the last moment he veered away and walked into a different part of the forest.