“You didn’t state here how long you’ll be gone.”
“Francis isn’t sure either, sir,” Rachel responded. It was a whole new chapter in a world she wasn’t used to. She had stood in front of the mirror as she dressed up for her meeting with Francis that morning and practiced the words, sir, mister, and master trying to get familiar with them. The last time she had ever had the compulsion to refer to anyone as such had been in elementary school. She felt like a schoolgirl. She realized as the words began to flow easily out of her mouth that she liked feeling like a schoolgirl.
They were seated in his car. Tom was driving them to the temporary office Francis had set up. She was excited about the prospects his offer provided because Francis had caught a lot of media attention as one of the prominent designers thanks to his bold and dynamic designs during the fashion week and she was ready to take advantage of that.
Surely, he would send the pictures of her to major magazines and that would give her all the publicity she wanted. In a way, he would be her publicity agent given that her photos were accepted.
Nate fingered the handwritten formal letter she had penned down that morning. After a while, he folded it up and put it in his jacket pocket. “Tom will pick you up when you’re done.”
“Yes, sir.”
She folded her hands in her lap and looked down at them. She could feel his eyes on her. She was playing heavily into her role as a submissive averting her gaze.
“Are you okay?” he asked suddenly. His voice was soft with a hint of amusement.
She looked up but not at him. “Yes, sir…”
“You seem more withdrawn than you were before you signed the new contract.”
“Uhm I thought that was the point of it, my humility and servitude.”
When he snorted she looked up at him and realized the snort was a laugh. He was a handsome man and when he smiled or laughed with humor he was breathtaking. She wished he would smile more but behind every smile and every gaze, there was a hard look, a stone-cold look. Everyone had a story she knew that and she wondered what his story was. So far from what she could see his life was very private. She only knew what he allowed the world to know like the divorce, the rumors about him, the news of his wealth, and all that but no one knew the origin of the man called Nathaniel Madden. There were other billionaires in Gem Hills some of them were self-made and others were progeny billionaires and she practically knew all of them – she had made a career out of speaking about them and castigating everything they did. The only one still an enigma to her was the man sitting beside her now.
“Humility and servitude?” he chuckled. “Do you know what those words are?” he didn’t wait for an answer. “You’ve only learned their meanings haven’t you?”
“I always lived my life in humility. Throughout my journey as a journalist, I never considered myself better than those around me and I was always grateful for where I was before and where I am today – or I should say where I was before today.”
“That is not what humility is, Rachel.”
“And you know what humility is?” she asked making sure her voice was soft and gentle. “You make a life of the rush hour of Gem Hills, bidding the highest than your competitors, raking the money of the nation into your accounts after successful investments. I have no doubt too that men like you influence electoral processes so what do you know about humility when you have all the power any human in the world would do anything to have?”
He looked down at her an unreadable look in his eyes. A corner of his mouth lifted. It looked like he was about to reveal an insight into himself to her in his next words. She watched his lips part then they shut and he smiled. “You are not wrong about some of the things you said about me but those are the perks that come with being Nathaniel Madden. If you were just as rich –“ that was a jab at the situation she found herself. “you wouldn’t find a problem with raking in the nation’s wealth as you put it.” He looked away. “But being a submissive while it does require servitude and humility doesn’t mean you can’t have fun. You don’t have to be so stiff with your duties.”
“I am stiff?”
“You won’t make it fun if you don’t disrespect me, I get a high from disrespectful girls after all. Spanking your ass for being bratty and disrespectful is high on my list of things to do to you before this month is over.”
Rachel smiled. She couldn’t understand him. How had they shifted from the topics of billionaires and humility to her duties as a submissive? One minute he wanted her respectful and submissive and the next minute he was berating her for not being bratty enough. After signing the contract she had told herself the best way to enjoy the rest of the month with him was to be as submissive as possible but now that he talked about it – and now that she thought about it, it probably wasn’t fun to be completely submissive. But she was always like that.
Growing up with a mother who made sure she impressed values and proper etiquette in her daughters with the proverbial rod, she always followed the rules. Which was why she was sure her mother was currently rolling in her grave knowing her daughter was squirting and cumming for a man she only knew a week and a half.
But her mother wasn’t alive now. If she was she too would have approved of Jacob Henderson as a husband and if she knew Jacob was cheating she would have encouraged Rachel to remain with him because according to Lilian Rivers, Rachel’s mother, marriage was all about endurance for better or worse. Maybe she thought so because she had married a good man, Rachel’s father who was a gentle soft-spoken man. As much as Rachel stood by her mother’s teachings and values, she couldn't stand for the devaluation of her worth which was why she would never go back to Jacob even if it was a matter of life and death.
Her mother wasn’t alive, she was free to do whatever it was to save herself and that meant she could submit herself to this man desiring her for her body.
Sorry, mom, she thought to herself, I am no longer that Rachel. Once bitten twice shy. I’ve been bitten more than once.
“So you want me to be disrespectful?” she asked tentatively. “How disrespectful, sir?”
“Enough to make me fuck the senses out of you.”
He was a very vulgar man when he wanted to be and she found herself liking it.