Chapter 49

Valerie and Lucca spent Friday wiping, reinstalling, and configure one of Lucca’s old laptops. The old laptop turned out to be several generations newer than the one Valarie had previously owned, now stashed wherever Dana had stored all of her things.

Setting up her accounts was more complicated than either of them expected; Valerie could not access any of her existing online accounts without access to her phone or laptop, and creating new accounts and new email addresses required a phone number. Ultimately, Lucca also unearthed, wiped, and activated one of their old phones for her, as well. Like the laptop, it was much newer than Valerie’s phone had been, and it had a fully intact screen.

The new, virginal online identity felt strange to Valerie. She had a new phone number and a new email address, and in some strange way she felt like a new person, refreshed and reborn. Her old e-mail address had been created during her high school years, long pre-dating her transition.

Once Lucca was done working with her to get the phone and laptop set up and ready for Monday, she was left, quite literally, to her own devices. She sat cross-legged on her bed… the idea of her bed still felt strange, given the last few months. She stared at the phone and laptop like they were poisonous little snakes.

Dana had expressly forbade her from using screens, and nothing had changed there. The woman might never know, but if she asked, Valerie did not imagine that she would, or could, convincingly lie. She was not sure how Dana might choose to punish her for such a transgression, but she knew it would be much worse than whatever questionable value she might derive from a few hours of scrolling on social media.

She stashed the devices behind the pile of moving boxes, which had all been shoved into the corner of the room; out of sight, out of mind.

She was, ostensibly, staying with Lucca to work on the project for a few weeks. Dana had not given Valerie explicit permission to use screens for this purpose, and she contemplated the thought that Dana might decide that the rule had been broken, anyway, just on that basis.

The key difference, which helped keep her anxious spiraling about potential punishment at bay, was that this transgression (if it was one) was in service to securing a lifeline for herself that did not depend on her ability to survive Dana’s whims.

A few minutes of distraction on social media was not worth the risk of punishment; wiping away the terror she felt at the thought of walking away was a different matter.

She realized that with that lifeline that Lucca had promised, she could simply choose not to be punished, and the idea left her reeling for several minutes, thinking through all of the implications.

She climbed back off the bed, retrieved the laptop, and started researching some of the technologies that Lucca had mentioned. Many of them were familiar to her from her work, or from tinkering she had done on her own time.

She used to tinker. She remembered the feeling of being filled with wonder and curiosity, and she mourned the path her life had taken that had so thoroughly ground that spark into the dirt.

As she skimmed HOWTOs and quickstart guides, she started to feel like maybe the spark had not gone entirely cold.

Valerie’s Saturday morning began with a run around the perimeter of Lucca’s property, along the fence line. As she laced up her new running shoes, Lucca looked at her like she was insane; they had a lifting cage and free weights tucked into a corner of the hangar, and that was about the extent of their fitness regime. They were not, in their words, A Cardio Girlie.

Dana’s small home gym has been the only place where Valerie, when she was allowed free time, was able to find some respite from the noise in her own mind. Being across state lines and on the other side of a mountain range did not make her thoughts any quieter; and so she ran.

Valerie guessed that the perimeter, which went gently up and down the desert hills, was about two miles. She ran it twice, until any conscious thoughts she had were drowned out by the rhythmic pounding of her feet, the burning in her legs, and the ache as she drew breath deep into her lungs.

The dry desert air instantly dried the sweat off of her skin as she jogged from the gate back to the house. She was still breathing heavily as she stepped inside, and the relatively warm, motionless air, artificially humidified, brought out a light sheen of sweat. After a few moments to reorient herself to the unfamiliar layout of Lucca’s house, she made her way to the kitchen for water.

“Damn,” Lucca said from across the kitchen, to her left, and literally wolf-whistled as she stepped through the doorway.

Valerie was wearing only black running shoes, bike shorts, and a sports bra; she was flush from what she estimated was a four mile run, and her skin glistened. Her pierced nipples were visible through the unpadded bra. Lucca looked at her with an expression that hinted towards feral.

Lucca took a first step toward Valerie, and she found her pulse starting to speed back up. She turned to face Lucca more fully, and instinctively took a step back, up against the kitchen wall.

They stopped a couple feet from her; close enough for a handshake, but not quite inside her personal space.

Lucca wore a dark green and black chambray button-down, with just two or three of the lowest buttons done up; the resulting deep vee showed off their chest, the curve of their breasts, and a glimpse of the same style of black fine-line tattooing that covered both of their arms. Valerie caught herself staring at their skin, imagining what the tattoos might look like in their full glory, what they might feel like beneath her fingertips, and what they might taste like.

While Lucca had most certainly seen her naked, to say the least, she had never seen them in less than jeans and a tank top.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, okay?” Lucca’s voice was dusky, and quieter than usual.

Valerie’s head snapped up, making eye contact with them as they spoke. She nodded her assent.

“Tell me you understand,” Lucca commanded her.

“I—” she started, and her voice caught. She swallowed. “I understand, Mx.”

“Hands.”

Valerie extended her arms out and, in a single swift, smooth motion, Lucca grabbed both her wrists in one hand and forced her arms up above her head, all while taking a step forward. They closed the distance and pinned Valerie’s arms against the wall that she had backed herself up to. She gasped in surprise.

She pulled at Lucca’s grip, not truly trying to escape, but testing her strength against theirs, which was formidable. She doubted she could escape, even if she did truly want to. It was an effective demonstration of the difference between a cardio girlie and someone who lifts.

Lucca leaned in, and for a moment Valerie thought they were leaning in for a kiss. Her lips parted just slightly, unconsciously, but they took no note. They stopped a fraction of inch shy of burying their face in her armpit, and inhaled sharply, like someone snorting lines in a club bathroom.

“What are—” Valerie started to ask as Lucca straightened again, still holding her arms pinned; she stopped when they pressed their free hand against her mouth, silencing her. The hand slipped down to her throat, where it gripped, firm but not squeezing.

Lucca stepped even closer to her, not quite pressing her into the wall with their body, but she could feel them hard against her abdomen. Their upper hand slid down, forcing her arms closer to the top of her head, making room for their head in the space between her arm and her neck.

They bit down on the long muscle of her shoulder, halfway to her neck. She jerked in surprised, whimpering. They didn’t bite hard enough to break skin, but as her pinned arms writhed ineffectually against their grip, she knew they easily could.

They drew back enough to be able to see her face— her eyes were glassy and unfocused, and she was breathing heavily. She could feel herself straining against the Lycra bike shorts she had been running in.

“Ask for what you want,” Lucca whispered into her ear.

“Anything you-” Valerie replied, shakily, pleadingly.

“No. Ask, or you’ll get nothing.”

Valerie whimpered, and blushed crimson. She turned her head aside, but the gesture was not even symbolically effective.

“I…” Her breathing was ragged and clawing her own face off seemed arguably better than the idea of asking out loud. “Please… I want to cum.”

“Are you allowed to cum? Without your owner’s permission?” Lucca shot back, without bothering to mask the disdain that dripped off of the word owner.

“No… no, Mx..” Valerie’s voice was small, and as she tugged uselessly against Lucca’s hand that still pinned her arms to the wall, she was starting to tremble slightly.

“That’s too bad.”

Lucca stepped back suddenly, releasing her. She gasped, and would have collapsed into a puddle without the wall to lean against. She stared at Lucca, quivering with shock, desperation, and surprise.

“Please… please, Mx…”

“Goddess, you’re so pathetic,” Lucca said softly, their voice rich with hunger and approval.

Valerie opened her mouth, but no sounds came out, just another shuddering inhale and exhale. She dropped her arms to her side and tried to push herself away from the wall, ineffectively.

“Dana will punish you,” Lucca told her, after watching the display for a moment.

“I know, Mx,” she replied, softly, looking down and away from Lucca.

Valerie managed to push herself back up to standing, her breathing slowly steadying. Her simmering libido would take much longer to return to its baseline.

“Anyway,” Lucca continued, with a slight smirk, and a vague gesture toward Valerie’s feet. “I told you shoes off in the house. That’s one.” They raised a single finger, significantly. “Be a good girl and maybe I’ll let you have what you want.”

They turned their back on her, heading toward the stairs down to the basement.