Chapter 1: Melisande

Rough hands curled over my breasts from behind, squeezing the mounds before scorching a trail down the side of my body and resting possessively on my hips. He was here again. My dream champion.

None other would treat me this way. Like I was precious. Like I mattered.

His touch was addictive. Decadent. Though the last two nights had been barely-remembered dreams, I clung to them, as they gave me renewed hope despite my reality.

I pushed those real-life intrusions aside for now. They didn’t belong in this sacred space. Here, now, I focused on pure sensation.

The smooth, cold feel of the wall in front of me. His large body behind me, radiating heat and strength with every caress. His skin was like supple suede stretched over steel.

How he made me feel like a goddess, and I gloried under his attentions. With him, I could forget myself. At least for a little while.

“Where are you, my sweet?” That voice. The hint of command in it made me tremble. He’d asked this question before, but I still didn’t know the answer. I wanted to obey, but I couldn’t. And I couldn’t bring myself to lie.

“I don’t know.”

“Would you tell me if you did?”

“Yes,” I gasped. Slick flowed from between my legs. I squeezed my thighs together, but there was no hiding from him. His dark laughter made my heart race as he dragged his large hands down my body to cup my sex.

He parted my pussy lips and teased along my seam with a feather-light touch. “That’s my good girl. Tell me your name.”

“Melisande,” I hissed, drawing out my name as I fell further into bliss. I wanted to drive my hips forward, increase the pressure of his finger against my clit, but he gripped my hips still. He was in absolute control here.

He carried on his playful, conversational tone as if he wasn’t skillfully destroying my body. “A beautiful name for a beautiful female. You know my name, don’t you, kitten? You screamed it for me when I made you come.” Yes, I knew it. It was branded into my very soul. “Lyova.” I pressed myself against his palm. He responded by holding me still. Oh yes, he was in absolute control.

I swallowed a sob.

I’d been with other men before, but nothing like this. Never responded anywhere close to this. He was attentive and hot, and knew his way around my body.

He pressed his massive length against my back, cupping my sex to keep my writhing body still. His fingers dipped into my wet heat, testing me, stretching me. I let my head fall back so that it rested against his shoulder.

“Brace yourself against the wall, my sweet girl. There you are. Just like that.”

He lined up our bodies and pushed himself inside of me. He met resistance and gently thrust in and out, swirling his finger over my clit. “Take all of me, my beauty,” he urged. “You can do it.” He angled my hips and pulled my thighs apart just a little more. Finally, he bottomed out, his entire length pulsing inside of me.

A primal growl rocked through his chest, vibrations coursing between us. “So tight.” He dragged his length in and out of me, keeping me still so he could control the pace.

It made no matter to me. I ceded myself over to him. Gave him total control in this manner. Trusting him to take care of me.

His rhythm grew wild, hips smacking against me, fingers marking me.  “Lyova! I can’t hold on.”

He nipped at my neck, trailing his teeth over the smooth contours of my shoulders before biting down. “Let go, my beauty. I’ve got you.”

And he did have me. Without breaking his rhythm, he spun me around, so that I wrapped my legs around his hips, the wall at my back. He kept me safe in the cradle of his arms, pinioning my arms above me as he drove into me harder and harder.

I gave in to the most decadent orgasm yet. I screamed for him, chanting his name until I no longer had words, no longer had a voice. He threw his head back and roared, the sound of it echoing into the farthest reaches of my heart and soul.

I willed myself to remember this dream. It would need to keep me company for many months to come. The worship in his golden eyes. The line of his body, the taut muscles, the way he gripped me, but never hurt me with his claws. The way his tail wrapped around my waist. Every part of him possessive of me.

I awakened in my bed, still feeling his delicate touches like kisses whispering against my skin. The dream dissipated like a fog on a dewy day and I found myself gazing up at the illuminating blue lights casting their neon glow. I touched myself, still feeling his caresses on my body. Still yearning for more. I touched my clit, imagining my fingers were his.

And then the light above me blinked, the bulb zeroing in on me.

I quickly pulled my hands away from myself, my libido dying.

I sighed as I slowly rose, pushing back the red tendrils framing my face. Looking at the time on the night stand I saw it was a couple hours before dawn. I still had some time to sleep. I probably should get some more rest.

Instead I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and turned my attention to the windows surrounding me, offering me a glorious view of the metal confines of my prison. Other windows filled with women gazed back at me. Their rooms illuminated in the same bright blue hue. Dark platforms rose and lowered with windows opening and closing. The facility was like one big tomb. A giant skyscraper for females like myself.

“Lights,” I called to the room around me, the soft blue turning into a bright golden glow, displaying the other rooms around me. 

Next to me a woman was changing into a short red dress, possibly preparing for her next client. Another girl was walking out to the platform, dark straps wrapping around her arms and legs to keep her still as it descended into the dark abyss. Everything was sound proof. I once tried talking to the other girls by banging on the windows. They never looked my way. They always seemed focused on their hair, their makeup, their clothes.

They never seemed interested in escaping, that was for sure. 

I used to live on the outer walls of the facility near the peak of the tall skyscraper. My rooms nestled in vast clouds spread out and golden as if I was in the heavens. It was a glorious treat.

“Do well and this could be your home,” Isaul had whispered against my ear. I shivered, rubbing the goosebumps appearing at the sound of his voice. “Fail, and I will send you below the clouds.”

The clouds were the fine line separating the rich from the wealthy. I lived somewhere in the Concord of the Sovereign Worlds, yet Isaul moved me around so frequently I never knew exactly where I was. It didn’t help that each facility was the same. Or even if I had that spectacular view, I would still see the same beautiful clouds and towering skyscrapers.

Below the clouds was the city life, filling with aircrafts flying from platform to platform. It wasn’t beautiful, but at least it got some light. Unlike the streets. The streets were filled with trash. The Varons below living off scraps, feeding off each other, fighting and trying to claw their way out all for nothing.

I was sent there once as punishment for refusing a job. It only took me an hour before I was crying and begging.

“Isaul,” I had cried, trying to follow him down the path he left. “Isaul, I’m sorry.” I remembered the Varons clothed in rags. They were unusually thin, wraith-like. “Isaul!” I remembered how the streets were like mazes. The tall, dark buildings towering over everything and everyone. There weren’t any platforms to take anyone higher than the first two or three levels.

“Don’t you look tasty,” I remembered a starved Varon mutter as he clawed to get to me.

I remembered screaming. I remembered running as fast as I could down that dark alley, tripping over something in the darkness. “Isaul!” I cried as I continued running. “Isaul, please! I’ll do it! I’ll do it!”

I remembered something grabbing me and I screamed, eyes widening when I saw Isaul’s grey face and golden eyes. “It’s all right, love,” he whispered to me, petting my red hair. “I forgive you.”

I shuddered, willing the memory away, yet I still heard the echoes of Isaul’s voice. “You’re lucky,” he had said. “I rarely forgive. But you’re special to me, Melisande.”

I watched the female in the red dress board the platform, the straps wrapping around her before it slowly descended into the darkness. I wondered what my next job would be. I never wondered when anymore. Isaul never kept me here long. Only for a moment’s peace before he ripped me away again.

I grabbed the black robe hanging near my bedside and shoved my feet into the fluffy slippers before traipsing toward my vanity. The blue light hovering above followed me. It always followed me when I was having my break away from my duties. It watched my every move, whether waking or sleeping. As if it were Isaul himself hovering above me, gazing down at me. 

I sat on a cushioned chair in front of my vanity. The lights surrounding the mirror beamed on with my presence. Green eyes sunken in with dark circles gazed back at me. 

Ugh. 

I looked like absolute shit. 

I could sleep a decade and I probably would still look like complete shit. I pinched my cheeks, hoping to give it some color, yet that only seemed to make me look worse.

Makeup then. Makeup always made everything better.

 I took the brush and ran it through my hair. The action triggered a memory of Isaul sniffing it, bringing the strands to his lips before kissing them. “Your hair is magnificent,” I remembered him whispering as he watched me in the mirror.

I shuddered and ripped the brush through my fiery strands, hating every bit of it. I just had to be born with red hair. But it wasn’t just that. My hair had a natural ombre to it, where it lightened at the bottom. My friends were always jealous, wishing they could have the same without paying for it. 

The guys I dated thought I did it on purpose, sometimes commenting on how they liked their women more natural. Insert eye roll here. Every man always said that, yet always commented, “You look so tired,” when I didn’t wear makeup.

I ripped the brush through my locks again, my scalp burning from the ferocity. It was my exotic looks that got me into this mess in the first place. If I could, I would shave my head, but then Isaul would just toss me into the streets.

And that was really the last place I wanted to be.

“Melisande,” I heard my name over comms.

I sighed and set down the brush. 

What now?

 “Yes,” I called dutifully, resting my hands in my lap. 

“Isaul is sending transport. You have an hour.”

I nodded and shifted out of my robe, dropping it in a pile on the floor soon followed by my pajamas. The light hovered around me, it’s blinking bulb looking up and down my naked body, approaching my breasts, circling around to get an angle of my ass.

I rolled my eyes. It was obviously either Isaul hoping to get some videos for future clients, or a paying asshole jacking off on the other end. Most likely it was both.

Why were aliens such disgusting horny fucks?

Or rather, why were males such disgusting horny fucks?

Maybe I was being too judgmental. Maybe they thought I was here, because I enjoyed this kind of work. Some females did, and all the power to them, but I–I was beamed here after filling out a dating app.

A fucking dating app.

I already suspected I was being an idiot when one asshole led me to the next. All I wanted was love. Nothing much. Didn’t we all want love in the end? So why was dating so hard? 

I never understood why men dumped me so quickly and easily after sex. Didn’t they like me? Sure, I wasn’t the most beautiful girl ever, but I was in shape. I had a cute face. I could be funny, witty, and charming with a hint of playfulness.

That’s what men wanted right?

But year after year I found myself alone, and feeling just a little desperate.

Just a little.

My friends recommended a few dating apps, telling me it helped them meet what’s-his-face who proposed last week, or that the men on the apps were actually interested in settling down.

Pfft.

Yeah, right, was my initial thought. I’m sure men on these apps were just trying to get laid like they were in the club.

Or anywhere for that matter.

And besides, I always thought I would meet my soulmate in person. I once imagined myself bumping into him at some social event. He would lock eyes with me, smile, and tell me some silly pick up line. I would giggle and we would spend the whole evening talking and that would be it. We would fall in love, get married, and live happily ever after.

Instead, after a few glasses of wine and feeling particularly lonely one night, I finished filling out an application form for some weird looking dating app and suddenly I was beamed to Isaul. 

The end. 

Game over.

And I lived happily never after.

I pulled up the black straps of my maxi dress. It had slits going all the way up on either side, yet covered my front and ass. It was sexy and comfortable. It was also Isaul’s favorite.

I quickly dabbed on some make-up accenting my eyes in brown eyeshadow and giving myself sultry red lips. I pinned up my hair, allowing a few tendrils to fall down and frame my face.

The platform appeared and the window opened. I stuffed my feet into some highly uncomfortable stilettos before running out to meet my transport. Knowing me, I probably forgot something, but being late wasn’t an option.

Isaul hated it when I was late.

And since my little mishap on the streets, I made sure I would never make Isaul angry ever again.

I was his broken-in perfect little money horse and what I hated most was that he knew that. He knew I would never go against him ever again.

I couldn’t. 

The straps circled around my legs and arms, holding me still as it left my room and lowered into the darkness of the facility below. I ignored the lurching in my stomach and closed my eyes, the wind within the skyscraper whipping at my face. 

This part sucked. It was like I was on a rollercoaster ride without a bar to hold on to. I wished I could scream.

I frequently wished I could scream.

I opened one eye and sighed in relief when I saw Isaul’s grey form awaiting below. He smirked as he watched me. His golden eyes scrutinising my attire. He was dressed in a black cloak, the hood up, covering his balding head. White hairs poked out from beneath the hood. 

Isaul stood surrounded by his guards, who ogled me discreetly as the platform lowered. I must be going somewhere extravagant, I thought as I saw the lightwing aircraft behind them and the gold and red attire his guards adorned. 

The platform locked in place, my straps circling back into their slots. I lowered my hands to my side and slightly bowed my head. “Master Isaul,” I whispered. 

“Melisande,” he stepped toward me, towering above me. I flinched when his fingers gripped my hair, thinking for a moment he would yank me by my strands. Instead he kissed the locks before stroking the side of his cheek with them. “Beautiful as always.”

I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want him to find me beautiful. I didn’t want him touching me. Everything he did, I hated, and I wished there was more I could do to show my hate for him.

But he was stronger. There was no way I could fight him.

In the end, it was just better to say nothing. 

“You were glorious,” he said, continuing to stroke my cheek as he circled me. His finger ran down the length of my exposed back. “I knew you were the one for the job. Lord Ladonian paid a lot of money.” He chuckled.

I stopped myself from rolling my eyes.

Lord Ladonian.

He was a high ranking Varon in the Sovereign Worlds, who loved to wear white. White everything. White shoes. White suits. White hats. When we met, he was in an all-white suit and a white cravat which he spilled red wine all over when I slid my hand down his pants.

He was also a very big man with nearly nothing swinging between his legs.

And man, did that idiot like to talk. On and on and on and on. He could make a conversation out of thin air. Isaul knew it, too, which is why he set up the job. 

It was simple enough. Meet with Lord Ladonian at some high-class brothel in the clouds. Liquor him up. Make him feel manly and wanted.

Fuck him.

Yet, the thing with me, that no one but Isaul and his goons knew, was I had surveillance tech injected into my body. Surveillance tech Isaul injected into my body in order to spy on clients and get as much information out of them as possible.

For blackmail.

Sure, Isaul made plenty of money as a pimp, but where he truly made his millions was from blackmail. He had dirt on many higher-ups in the Sovereign Worlds.

And Lord Ladonian, had some pretty terrible dirt.

“I sent the funds to your account.”

I closed my eyes, knowing what would happen next. I hated seeing the numbers, seeing how far away I was from my goal.

Isaul knew it too. He enjoyed taunting me like this.

“Alas, you still are far away from paying out your bonds.”

I opened my eyes and saw the numbers. 13,500/5,133,900 it read; displaying the 13,500 in yellow and the 5,133,900 in red. 

My debt. 

The only way I could be free from Isaul was to work and pay him back for my rooms at the facility, my beautiful clothes, my make-up, my food. Everything.

If I was crazy enough I would laugh.

“I do have another job for you,” said Isaul, circling around to face me.

My eyes met his for a moment, watching him raise an eyebrow at my hostility before I quickly lowered my gaze down to the platform. Isaul held out a chip in front of my view, displaying the picture of the angriest looking Varon I had ever seen. 

The alien was tall and bulky. He had pink scars across his grey face and short cropped orange hair. Yellow eyes stared back at me on the screen. He sneered at the camera as if this was taken right before he broke the photographer’s neck.

Ugh.

Why did I always get the crazy ones?

“You could refuse,” said Isaul. He sighed and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “However, I don’t think I can afford your place here if that is the case. Or your clothes for that matter. I would have to let you go, Melisande. You understand?”

An image of me running through the streets below the clouds flashed and I shuddered, remembering the Varon reaching out for me. 

“Don’t you look tasty.”

I took the chip from Isaul’s hand, reading the name next to the picture. 

Chorwan Vortu. 

Please don’t be an asshole. 

Isaul snapped his fingers and the guards proceeded to the aircraft. I followed behind him, pocketing the chip.

“When do we begin?”

Isaul wrapped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me toward him. His lips lightly touched my ear. “Tonight.”