Savages Recruit
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Publisher: Blushing Books

Savage's Recruit

(Military Discipline Book One)

By

Loki Renard

©2012 by Blushing Books® and Loki Renard

Copyright © 2012 by Blushing Books® and Loki Renard

All rights reserved.  No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Renard, Loki

Savage's Recruit (Military Discipline Book One)

eBook ISBN: 978-1-60968-891-2

Cover Design by stillydesign.com

This book is intended for adults only.  Spanking and other sexual activities represented in this book are fantasies only, intended for adults.  Nothing in this book should be interpreted as Blushing Books' or the author's advocating any non-consensual spanking activity or the spanking of minors.

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ABOUT LOKI RENARD

Prolific author of romantic and genre fiction, Loki Renard is primarily concerned with the dynamics of power as they exist between strong willed heroes and heroines alike. There is no room for wilting wallflowers in worlds where dynamic personalities clash and spark, kiss and spank, live and love.

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Other fabulous books to enjoy by Loki Renard are:

Ace of Brats

Wicked Sisters

A Governess Named Trouble

Captive Bride.

Chapter One

Beneath a pile of wrinkled bed linen, something stirred. A pale hand emerged from the pastel hump, followed by a mop of tussled blonde hair. A sound that may or may not have been human started as a rumble from beneath the sheets, culminating in the emergence of a woman who had most certainly seen better days. At that early stage it was impossible to tell if she was even slightly attractive in her natural state. Mascara and lipstick not removed the night before had smeared, clown panda style over her face and her skin took an ashen appearance in the intrusive morning light which glared mercilessly through the windows. The curtains had not been closed the night before. A gushing sound from elsewhere in the apartment indicated that the taps on the bathroom sink had suffered similar neglect.

Zora stretched and rolled over, groaning as she did. Her entire body was wracked with the spasms of a life of iniquity. If it had been possible for her liver to crawl up her throat and strangle her, it would have done so, she was sure. Another evening had passed spent in the tender arms of a bottle of bourbon and the morning brought with it the usual regrets.

Stumbling towards the kitchen clad only in a pair of boxers shorts and a tank top, Zora mangled the contents of her lower cupboards looking for aspirin. The coffee maker had done its job and a fresh pot was ready for consumption. She thanked heaven for the small mercies as she fished a chipped mug out of the dish drainer and sloshed a decent amount of the brew into it. A fair amount ended up on the counter top too, but the spillage was not relevant to Zora's interests at that point in time, so she abandoned the pool of steadily cooling coffee and retired to the futon in the lounge to collect her brain.

Switching on the television, she was immediately assailed by an onslaught of fairly bad news. Floods, fires, uprisings, underisings, corruption, bribery, economic collapse. It was all more depressing than reaching into a the bottom of a bag of chips and discovering a cigarette butt and a suspiciously wet napkin. In spite of the general doom and gloom being espoused before her eyes, outside the apartment it was a warm, sunny day. Zora tried to take comfort in that even as a busty blonde with collagen lips did her very best to convince unsuspecting viewers that men with funny hats were desperately trying to kill them.

“Trying to kill us and take our Botox,” Zora muttered, sipping her coffee. “To arms!”

Whilst Zora indulged in the luxury of healthy cynicism, not a hundred miles away the men and women who did battle for her freedom were facing yet another threat.

***

Deep under rust red rocky outcroppings, a briefing was taking place inside a subterranean compound.  It was a top secret location and a very well hidden one, one could have hiked all over it and not known of its existence. It was not located near a military base, nor were there any obvious security checkpoints looming out of the desert where it was buried. All the security needed for the state of the art facility was contained within its very walls and mounted behind impenetrable facades in the mountains.

If one was fortunate enough to be allowed inside, or unfortunate enough to unexpectedly wake up inside as many of the compound's guests often did, one would not have the foggiest idea just how far underground one really was. There were no windows and in the holding areas, fluorescent lights lit the sterile halls permanently, inducing an uncomfortable sense of timelessness. Day and night had no meaning at all in the bowels of the earth. It wasn't all bad however, a great amount of care had been taken to ensure that the areas intended to be inviting were very inviting indeed. In the areas frequented by staffers and those who commanded them there were seventy color palette color carpets spun from the finest New Zealand wool and tasteful light fittings that not only cast aside the native darkness of that subterranean dwelling, but also emitted rays designed to stimulate the production of Vitamin D. No expense had been spared in the construction and outfitting of the unnamed compound, known to those in the loop as Area X, for no economy had been necessary. Those tasked with the challenge of keeping the nation, nay, the world, safe were not required to suffer the ignominy of penny pinching.

In a comfortable office, complete with a large faux window that looked out onto a computer generated meadow, Captain Savage stood at attention, waiting for his superior to brief him. He had already been partially briefed of course, it would have been a shameful waste of his CO's time to come to a briefing without having at least a rudimentary grasp of the situation at hand.

Savage was a tall man, standing at just a hair over 6'3. The rest of his body followed along the super scale nature had set out for him. His shoulders were broad and held perfectly square. His muscular torso tapered to a strong waist and each of his thighs was a sculpted powerful slab, hard as iron. He was past the first bloom of youth, and the second for that matter, but that had not dulled the keen look in his eye, and the slight hint of salt in his short black hair only served to make him look more distinguished than ever. He was a serious man, and that was carved into every line of his face. His eyes were framed by thick, dark brows that naturally tapered to sharp points. They gave him an air of astute observation even when he was at rest. His nose had been broken several times, but the slight wave in the bridge did nothing to soften his appearance. The only concession Mother Nature had made was in his lower lip, which was rather full, perhaps even sensual. The scar that ran from the left side of it down his jaw line only enhanced the softness by way of contrast.

“We're in a hell of a bind Captain Savage.” General Hurtzwald slammed a folder of classified materials down on the glass table top in front of Savage. Picking them up, Savage appeared to give them a brief once over, but being a quick study, he'd already caught the salient points of the mission. A nuclear missile capable of hitting several target rich civilian environments was in the hands of Bulgarian militants. It was imperative that the missile be removed or permanently disabled in some other way as soon as possible. But there was some serious protection around this particular piece of machinery.

“That's some impressive technology,” Savage noted, gazing over the file.

“It's a hunk of deadly junk, but its protected by something that the boys tell me can detect even the smallest electronic signals. If it detects something, it triggers a total shut down, or a premature launch. Kabloey!” Hurtzwald demonstrated the potentially devastating impact of the missile launch by flailing his arms in the air.

Savage nodded impassively, as if the prospect of significant explosions did not bother him in the slightest. “So we won't be bringing any of our own hardware on this mission.”

“Not unless we want to get dead.” Hurtzwald rested against the desk on his fist. “It's a brain twister.”

“Yes it is,” Savage muttered, glancing over the details once more. It would have been so easy if it weren't for the electronic detection system. Surveillance had revealed that the computer hooked up to the system could be overridden with a series of algorithmically generated codes. The Bulgarians carried keys with these codes and entered the correct codes when prompted by the missile's protection system. It was a devilishly simple, but incredibly effective defense. Ordinarily it would have been a simple matter of gaining entry, hooking the enemy machine up to a processor and cracking the protection by brute force. As it was, they had to find some way around the system.

“We fuck this up, it could mean the end of the world as we know it, Savage,” General Hurtzwald growled, crossing his arms over his chest and staring off at the 'window' into what looked to be the distance, but was actually several feet of hardened alloy and beyond that, hundreds of feet of rock.

Privately Savage was of the opinion that every day was the end of the world as they knew it. He did not voice this opinion to his superior officer. He had long ago learned that philosophy was ill appreciated amongst those who made down and dirty life and death decisions. Instead he nodded curtly and schooled his features into the serious configuration that would let his CO know he had Savage's full attention.

The General turned back to him, an expectant expression on his wrinkled features. Savage knew what he wanted. It was the same thing they all wanted when they called him. The General wanted someone who would get the job done quickly, cleanly and more importantly, without any embarrassment. “We will find a way, Sir.”

“Damn right you will,” the General coughed. “Dismissed.”

Savage left the meeting with his mind working overtime. Officially of course, the meeting had never taken place. Officially he was fly fishing in Bermuda. According to his cover, he spent a lot of time in Bermuda. He'd never actually been there, but he hoped to one day visit for real. From the material he'd been given to study about the place, it looked like a damn nice spot to get away from it all.

As per his standard practice, Savage was already on the case. He had been since yesterday afternoon in fact. The meeting with the General was a formality. Savage's brow furrowed as he pondered the complexities of the situation. If they couldn't get that weapon out of there or at least disable it, it wouldn't just put millions of innocent lives in danger, it would forever change the balance of power in a volatile region of the world.

Striding into the compound's data center, Savage looked amidst the many glowing terminals manned by uniformed personnel for the one man in the room who he knew would stick out like a sore thumb. He saw him within seconds, the guy was sucking on a candy cigarette and perusing a video sharing site. Savage's temper spiked momentarily. They were dealing with a significant potential threat and all the boy could do was eat candy and play online.

“What have you got for me, Ethan?” Savage slapped the young bearded man on the back. Ordinarily all personnel were clean shaven, but Ethan was an exception. Ethan was a civilian. A civilian contracted to his last breath, but a civilian none the less. Ethan had taken advantage of the opportunity afforded by his status to wear wide legged jeans and hippy style floral shirt, grow his hair out and cultivate a beard that reached down to his chest.

“Well,” Ethan grinned smugly, removing the candy cigarette from his mouth between the tips of his fingers. “I might actually have something for you boss. I might just have saved the world.”

“By playing on the Internet?” The skepticism practically dripped from Savage's lips.

“Didn't they tell you grandpa? You can find anything you need online these days.” Ethan grinned and ducked unsuccessfully as Savage clipped him over the ear.

“Get on with it,” Savage's expression had grown dire. With the blow, Ethan caught onto his mood and the levity decreased to appropriate levels.

“Okay, so we can't get a computer in there, right? Not a regular computer.”

“Right.”

“But what's the best computer in the world?”

“I don't know.” Savage was growing visibly impatient at the apparently irrelevant line of questioning. “It doesn't matter because we'd have to be on site anyway, and the place is rigged to go if anything electronic gets in.”

“It's a stupid system,” Ethan sneered. “If it's that sensitive, anything could set it off. The world could end because a janitor forgot a MP3 player in his pants.”

“Well the Bulgarians didn't ask for your opinion, did they Ethan?”

“No. If they did there would be no way we'd get in,” Ethan's lips curled up in a smug smile. “Fortunately for us, I think we're going to get in. Watch this.”

With a quick series of clicks, Ethan closed a video of a fat cat diving repeatedly into boxes and queued up one of a fairly unremarkable looking woman next to a computer. A narrator with a nasal voice began explaining that the computer and the women were about to have a showdown. They would both be fed complex equations in a competition to see who was fastest, woman or machine. As he watched the view from the hand held camera shudder around the scene like a boat on a high wind, Savage was beginning to think that Ethan was deliberately wasting his time, stalling for some reason, but then the contest began. The woman was handed a piece of paper and after barely glancing at it, she rattled out a seven digit number. Several seconds later, the computer confirmed her accuracy. Another equation was given, then another. Time after time, the woman spat out numbers faster than the computer could.

“Holy hell,” Savage swore underneath his breath. “Is that real?”

“Yeah, I did some digging. That's real,” Ethan nodded. “But it's also out of this world.” He glanced up at his superior officer with the grin he only got when he knew he'd done well. “I think we found our man,” he announced. Wo-man,” he corrected himself.

The pieces fell into place in Savage's mind. “So instead of taking a computer in there, we take in someone who can process the algorithms just like a computer can.”

“Exactly,” Ethan smiled, snapping the end of the candy cigarette off in his mouth.

“This is why we keep you around,” Savage smiled as Ethan beamed with pride. “So what do we have on her? Who is this computer brain?”

“What do we have? We have everything,” Ethan smirked smugly, bringing up a profile complete with a mug shot which showed the woman far more clearly, but in a vastly unflattering light. Mascara had smudged under her almond eyes and her hair, the roots of which were dark, the tips of which were a frizzy blonde appeared to have bits and pieces of twig stuck in it. The shot was cropped at her shoulders, but it looked as if her clothing had sustained some damage prior to being booked. She was a hot mess, no doubt about it. In spite of what had clearly been a hard night, there was a little smirk on her wide crimson lips and a look of outright defiance in her eyes.

“Zora Matthews. Graduated 2002 with a degree in Accountancy. Thirty two years old. Single. No Dependents.” Ethan read the basic stats of the profile aloud. “Height, 5'8, Weight estimated at 165 pounds.”

“Not exactly what I'd expected,” Savage mused, taking in her wrecked appearance.

“Yeah, from the looks of things, she's a quirky one,” Ethan said. “Pretty much average in every way except for her brain.” He tapped through a few more windows. “Bonus points for us, she's located in San Sanadino, a couple of hours away.”

“Shouldn't be too hard to pick her up then,” Savage muttered as his initial enthusiasm waned. The longer he looked at the face on the screen, the more uncertain he felt about the whole plan. Civilians were tricky, panicky animals at the best of times. It wouldn't be easy to bring one up to speed for a mission of this nature. “What's the mugshot for?”

Ethan tabbed through a few sections and peered intensely at the monitor. “Nothing to worry about. Just a drunk and disorderly.” He grinned at his own impending joke. “When she's not solving advanced equations, Zora likes to party.”

“Well she's not going to be partying for a while,” Savage said grimly.

***

It was midday and Zora had not moved from the futon. Both she and her pounding head agreed that it wasn't worth the hassle. The depressing news had given way to infomercials. Whilst she watched an elderly couple wax poetic about the joys of shoving whole fruit into a juicer, Zora found herself wondering if there was any point to it all. Had the species really emerged from the primordial sludge only to spend their days looking for another shiny plastic device to clutter up the counter?

Her stomach growled. She was hungry. If she'd had one of those juicer things she could have prepared nutritious, allegedly tasty juice in just thirty seconds. As it was, she had to settle for toaster tarts. Wrapping a blanket around her shoulders, she shuffled back to the kitchen. Much to her pleasure, she found that she managed to get the tarts out of their plastic wrapping and into the toaster in under twenty seconds. That was a saving of ten seconds over potato corn juice and a triumph for convenience food.

Whilst her tarts toasted, Zora watched the toaster carefully. It was old and not very good at toasting anymore. It also had rather disturbing habit of ejecting its contents at inopportune times with a loud clanging of springs that had threatened to give her a coronary on more than one occasion.

She was keyed up for the inevitable ejection when a loud banging at the door made her shriek with fear. After realizing that she was not under toaster attack, she tossed the blanket from her shoulders and tip-toed to the door. She was ever so slightly behind on rent, which was terrible form for an accountant, but drinks didn't buy themselves. Carefully, she peered out of the peep hole and was relieved when she saw that it was not her landlord. Her landlord was short and barrel shaped and perpetually wore short sleeved shirts that showed his hairy forearms like trophies. There were two men outside her door and neither of them matched that description. One was so tall that she could only see his shoulder, the other was a fresh faced young man in a neatly pressed olive green uniform.

They were military, that was obvious enough. What were they doing at her door though? Zora thought about that for a moment, but her thoughts were scattered when the big man knocked again. Putting the safety chain on, she opened the door and peered out the small crack. “Can I help you?”

“Ms Matthews?” The voice was deep and sonorous, pleasant even. The man attached to the voice looked wildly out of place in her hallway. His face was chiseled and worn in a way that suggested hardship. He was a huge man and instinctively Zora felt the kind of fear that one experiences when one is face to face with someone or something much more powerful than oneself. The fact that he was handsome and smiling warmly took some of the edge off her reaction, but still the anxiety lingered.

“Yes?” She regretted having answered in the affirmative almost as soon as the ill considered word slipped out between her lips.

“We'd like to talk to you for a bit.”

Zora frowned. What had she gotten up to last night? Casting her mind back, she remembered the bar, but not much else. She couldn't even remember how she'd made it home, now she thought about it. “Why? Who are you?”

A government ID was pressed up against the crack. “I'm Captain Brett Savage. It's a matter best discussed privately.”

A feeling of foreboding was creeping over Zora. There was no good reason for them to be at her apartment. She must have done something really terrible to earn herself a visit from the military. A police officer at the door was bad enough, but this, this was some deep shit. “This isn't really a good time for me,” she explained apologetically. “I'm home sick today.”

Captain Savage's expression remained impassively neutral. “That's unfortunate Ma'am, but we only need a few minutes of your time.”

“I'm afraid I don't have a few minutes to give,” Zora replied stubbornly. The insistence was beginning to irritate her. “Besides, you might get sick.”

“I hate to intrude on your time off, Ma'am, but this is a matter of some importance. We'll take the risk.”

“Okay,” Zora sighed. The guy was just not going to let the matter drop. She must have really fucked up this time. “Come back in an hour. I need to get tidied up in here.”

Captain Savage did not seem overly pleased by the idea of waiting an hour. He fixed her with a stern look that she found reminiscent of the look her old headmaster used to give her when attempting to extract a confession about some prank or another. “It is something of a time sensitive issue, Ma'am.”

“It can't be anything that can't wait an hour,” Zora said, closing the door firmly in his face and bolting it securely. Stepping away from the door, she realized that she was shaking. The guy hadn't said an unkind word and yet somehow he'd managed to rattle her. Something was afoot. She sniffed the air. Something was burning.

She turned toward the kitchen where black smoke was rising from the toaster, along with a licking orange flame. “Shit!” Zora squealed and rushed over to unplug the appliance. Her breakfast had become a carbohydrate loaded inferno. She tipped the toaster over and tossed the burning tarts into the sink just as the door burst open, the lock kicked right out of the frame by a solid size ten shoe.

“What the fuck!” Zora screamed. “What are you doing?”

“I heard a scream,” Captain Savage explained, striding towards her. She took a step backwards and found herself pressed against the counter top as he reached in front of her turned the water on, dousing the flames that had been burning merrily in the sink.

“I was going to do that,” she frowned, craning her neck so she could glower at him with maximum efficiency.

He looked down at her calmly, not at all disturbed by her explosive temper. “You were busy cursing me, so I took the liberty,” Savage explained with just the slightest touch of a dry wit.

“Okay, well you can get out now,” Zora said. “Now that you've fucked my door.”

“There's no need to be upset, Ma'am,” Savage gave her some space and held his large hands up placatingly. “I didn't mean to intrude. I thought you might have been in danger.”

Slightly mollified, Zora nodded. “Okay, well I need to get sorted out here. Just give me a couple of minutes, okay?"

“Take your time,” Savage replied courteously. Zora watched as he walked away, back into the hall. She was alone again for the time being, but he was still outside and the feeling deep in her belly that something was wrong was growing ever more. This was too much to deal with, she decided. Too much to deal with on an empty belly and a hangover.

She went to the bedroom and closed the door behind her. Whilst the men waited outside her battered front door she picked out some unassuming clothing, a pair of blue jeans and a red hooded sweater. Pulling them on quickly, she grabbed a knapsack and tossed a a few handy things inside it, wallet, cell phone, net book, deodorant, passport just in case. A couple of spare sets of underwear followed and she was set. Glancing over her shoulder one last time at the now busted front door, she pushed the window above the bed open and dropped out onto the fire escape.

Chapter Two

As he lingered in the hallway waiting for Zora Matthews to make herself presentable, Savage began to doubt the wisdom of his decision to recruit her. This was a sensitive mission. It wasn't the place for a civilian, let alone one given to fits of screaming profanity at the slightest provocation. Even if he put her astoundingly rude behavior aside, there were other concerns. She seemed like a total wreck in every respect and he was beginning to suspect that she had a drinking problem. Not only had her file revealed several minor brushes with the law on long drunken nights out, but it was well after mid day and he'd been able to smell the stale beer on her breath. It was a pity really, if she cleaned up a bit and dropped the attitude, she'd actually be quite presentable. The stained tank top and shorts she'd been wearing showed a neatly curvaceous figure he'd rather enjoyed.

“Should I check on her, sir?” Brian asked, rocking back and forth on his toes impatiently. Brian Black was one of the members of Savage's unit, a solid young man with a solid personality. He had seen action, but somehow his saucer like blue eyes and placid round features still managed to reflect an idealized innocence. Brian could be trusted with the secret of life itself, Savage reckoned.

Considering Brian's suggestion, he glanced at his watch and nodded. “Yeah, see how she's going.”

“Yessir!” After saluting out of habit, Brian knocked on the door and then stepped into the apartment when there was no response. “Ma'am?”

Savage could hear Brian's footsteps receding as he went deeper into the apartment.  “Ma'am?” Again the polite inquiry went unanswered. Somewhere inside the apartment, a door creaked open. Savage waited for the almost inevitable squeal of outrage and profanity. It didn't come. What came instead was a cry from Brian. “Ma... Sir!” Savage entered quickly and found Brian standing in the bedroom, pointing towards the open window. No explanation was needed, but Brian conscientiously gave one anyway. “She's not here, sir. It looks like she went out the fire escape.”

“Interesting,” Savage mused. Brian was looking at him with a stunned expression, awaiting his next orders. Zora's sudden disappearance added a new layer of complexity to the entire situation, that was for sure. Not only was she vocally volatile, she was apparently given to ill-considered impulsive acts as well. For a long moment, Savage considered scrapping the mission entirely, but some little voice told him that possibly, just possibly, the traits he was seeing displayed so rampantly could be tempered with a good dose of discipline. Better a brave operative who had to be taught to rein their impulses in than a timid one who froze under pressure.  He nodded to himself before giving Brian his orders. “Tell you what, seeing as Ms Matthews has vacated the apartment, why don't you take a look around and see if there's anything that might be of interest or use to us.”

Whilst Brian set to work, Savage retrieved a pair of leather gloves from his pocket and put them on. Looking around the apartment more comprehensively, he had the opportunity to get a better sense of the departed Ms Matthews. She was messy, but she was also fairly minimalistic. The usual knick knacks and throw pillows women often decorated their living spaces with were missing. The walls were bare too, there wasn't a scrap of art in the place, not even a poster tacked to the bare plaster. In the kitchenette, the contents of the fridge revealed something of a bachelorette personality. A case of beer took up most of the space inside the little one person unit. Aside from that there was some milk, half a block of cheese and an almost empty bottle of ketchup, nothing else. The freezer section was full of 'heat and eat' rubbish meals and judging by the plastic film on the counter-top with congealed mince on it, they were her primary food source.

“There's nothing of any real note, sir,” Brian reported from the other room. “I found some bills and receipts, but nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Okay,” Savage said, taking another glance around the apartment. He was struck by how much it seemed as if Zora didn't actually live there. She stayed there clearly, but the touches of homeliness were few and far between. Even the furniture was bland and he guessed that it had probably come with the apartment. “Then we wait.”

“Wait, sir?”

Savage nodded. Though Zora had made a stupid decision, he doubted she'd taken off to South America. “She got spooked. She'll be back. In the meantime, we wait for that to happen and get us something better suited to surveillance.” The two men let themselves out of the apartment and retired downstairs. Savage hoped that Zora was lurking somewhere nearby, waiting for them to leave so she could go back inside and resume nursing her hangover.

Less than half an hour later, Savage and Brian were back. They parked quite brazenly across the street from the apartment in a truck marked 'Terry's Fish Supplies'. It was rusted and worn on the outer edges and only the sharpest of eyes would have suspected from looking at the exterior that it was anything other than a run of the mill delivery truck. The interior was a different matter. It was outfitted with a range of equipment including directional microphones and monitors that allowed the inhabitants to see and hear what was going on for quite some distance. As an additional precaution, they'd ditched their uniforms in favor of casual civilian clothing. It was obvious that Zora had no intention of co-operating and it would be much easier to catch her unawares if they blended in with the general public.

“Let's hope she wasn't too spooked,” Savage said as they settled into their stakeout. It was a warm day and the interior of the truck quickly began to get quite hot. Ventilation had been provided for the computers, but evidently ventilation for the operators was not considered to be nearly as important. Minutes passed into hours and he and Brian took turns keeping an eye on the apartment and its main entrance. Several people came and went, but none of them matched Zora's build.

By dinner time Savage and Brian were breaking into rations and swapping stories about other stakeouts they'd been on. When the sun finally set around eight pm, Zora was still nowhere to be seen - much to Savage's chagrin. It was taking a great deal longer to pick her up than he'd planned. He glared at the monitor, willing the woman to come home. Already she was far more trouble than he'd anticipated. His palms tingled with a familiar itch when he thought about the way she'd spoken to him. She was so thoughtlessly rude it stunned him. How she'd managed to get to her age and remain such a spoiled brat was quite the mystery, but there was no way he'd allow that behavior to continue once he found her.

Visions of the curves of her bottom bouncing under the ministrations of his palm danced through his head, placating him for the moment. She might think she was leading him a merry chase, but she would discover the error of her ways sooner rather than later. Savage was an old fashioned man in many respects. He would never hit a woman in anger, but he was a firm believer that a badly behaved lady always benefited from a good spanking and Ms Zora Matthews was one of the most badly behaved women he had ever encountered. He was very much looking forward to making the pleasure of her foul mouthed acquaintance again.

Brian finally broke the tense silence that had settled over the truck.“Maybe we should go look for her?”

Savage stood up and did his best to stretch in the cramped conditions. He couldn't stand upright, which made getting comfortable almost impossible. His neck was getting one heck of a crick in it. “Where do you suggest?”

Brian leafed through the profile Ethan had put together. “She's got a few friends in this area, and there's a coffee shop she's known to frequent according to cell records.” He looked up expectantly, hoping for his idea to be met with approval.

“No,” Savage shook his head. “I don't want everybody who knows her to remember two men looking for her just before she disappears. We need to get her out of here without being noticed.”

Brian nodded.“So this is going to be an extended grab?” The phrase referred to an operation in which the target did not return to their normal lives for a long time, perhaps forever.

Shrugging, Savage sat back down. It was far too early to tell what the outcome was going to be. After almost twelve hours they hadn't even managed to get their hands on her for a quick chat. “All going well, yeah. It depends on whether or not she's as useful as she seems to be.”

Brian nodded solemnly. “This isn't going to be easy for her. She's not the usual type.”

Rubbing his hand over his eyes, Savage had to agree. “Probably not. But these are the things we do.”

The next few hours were spent tediously, but Savage was a patient man and Brian was an obedient soldier. Neither showed their frustration or boredom. Eventually, at quarter to three in the morning, a stumbling figure approached the front of the building and started pawing at the keypad entry ineffectively.

“That has to be her,” Savage said, instantly moving from repose to action as a burst of adrenaline shot through his system. The two men made their way quickly and quietly out of the vehicle and moved towards the figure quite casually. They needn't have bothered at hiding their intention  however, she had clearly imbibed too much to care about the fact that she was being flanked by shadowy figures.

“Dammit, changing the code,” Zora muttered, stabbing the 0 key five times over.

Savage motioned for Brian to hang back before stepping forward and speaking in the most courteous tone he could muster. “Can I help you Ma'am?”

“I can't get in,” Zora groaned, resting her forehead against the door.

“Hey, you're Zora, right?” He adopted a more conversational, friendly tone.

“Yesh,” she glanced sidelong at him. He was relieved when the fog of incomprehension failed to lift from her gaze. She was so far gone she wouldn't have known him if he'd put his uniform on and played out the scene from earlier that day word for word. “Who are you?”

“Mike, remember? We met out drinking one night. Man, that was an awesome night!” Savage forced enthusiasm into his voice and succeeded in sounding as if getting plastered to the point of not knowing one's own name was something to be proud of.

“Oh. Yesh. Cool,” Zora drooled against the plexiglass.

Savage took the opportunity to lean in towards her and place a hand on her shoulder. With that physical contact, he had her. It didn't matter what happened now, she was coming with him. “I don't think this is your apartment though,” he said, planting a seed of confusion in her addled mind.

“Ish not?” She pushed back from the door and looked up at the building suspiciously.

He pointed in a random direction. “No, you live a couple of blocks from here, remember?”

“I do?” Zora appeared to think about that for a second as she gazed at his finger.

“Yeah,” Savage grinned. “This is Montgomery and fifth. You want Montgomery and eight.”

“Fuck,” she swore emphatically.

He laughed and squeezed her shoulder. “I can give you a ride if you want, me and my partner just finished work,” he offered.

“A ride?” A faint suggestion of suspicion passed over Zora's features, only to be replaced by an unmistakable wave of nausea. Savage got out of the way just in time to avoid the contents of her stomach being regurgitated at high pressure and speed onto the concrete. “Yeah, I guesh I could take a ride,” she slurred once her stomach was empty.

“Cool, right this way,” Savage offered her his arm and ended up shouldering most of her weight. She smelled foul, but at least she didn't offer very much resistance. By the time they got to the truck and helped her into the front seat, she was already slipping into what Savage knew would be a dammed heavy sleep.

With their cargo safely stowed in the center of the cab, Savage and Brian secured her by flanking her, Savage on the driver's size, Brian on the other. “Well that was a lot easier than it looked like it was going to be,” Brian said with a crooked smile.

“Sure was,” Savage agreed as he started the truck. “She's going to have a hell of a headache when she wakes up.”

Brian shook his head. “Kind of dumb to go drinking when you think somebody is on your tail.”

Savage was forced to agree, but he was hardly surprised. In his experience, smart people did stupid things all the time. In fact, smart people were sometimes more prone to doing stupid things than their dimmer counterparts. “I guess she didn't really think we were on her tail, I guess she thought she'd mess with us,” he surmised.

With a low groan, Zora slumped over in her seat and ended up with her head in Brian's lap. He looked down at her, his nose wrinkled in distaste.  Savage chuckled at his misfortune as they made for base. He was rather pleased with himself.  After all the waiting, it had been a very smooth capture indeed and now he had the foul mouthed Ms Matthews right where he wanted her.

***

Zora awoke to a bright light and a pounding sensation that was reminiscent of a gorilla trying to escape her skull. The stream of profanity that poured out of her mouth would have been enough to turn the air blue if profanity had such a power. She sat up gingerly, realizing that she had no idea where she was. At first this was not overly concerning. Zora often woke up in new and interesting places and most of the time she rather enjoyed the experience. Occasionally somebody would offer her breakfast or a cup of coffee.

Looking around at her surroundings, it seemed unlikely that she would be getting a cooked breakfast. The room was sterile white and the bed she laid on had the thinnest, most uncomfortably mattress in the world installed on it. Was she in jail? No, it was too clean a room for that and it was devoid of other desperate figures. She was entirely alone. Listening for some kind of clue, she heard nothing. The silence itself was unsettling in the extreme. Were the walls padded perhaps? Had she ended up in the loony bin? It seemed to be the most logical explanation. Looking down at herself she saw that she was no longer wearing her usual clothing. Her jeans and sweatshirt had been replaced with white scrubs. She looked like she came with the room, she thought to herself, momentarily distracted by her sense of the inane.

“Well this cannot be good,” she muttered to herself, sitting up slowly. The door to the room was a white affair with a slot in it, the sort of slot you might pass a tray of institutional slop through to a prisoner. Pulling the sheet around herself, Zora contemplated her situation. Panic was beginning to rise.

The sound of bolts being shot back in the door brought with it simultaneous shots of anxiety and relief. Her eyes almost bulged out of their sockets when she saw who walked through the door. He was tall, he was handsome, and he was smirking in a way that made her want to punch him. “You!” She exclaimed, pointing at him as if he might not know which 'you' she was referring to.

“Me,” Savage agreed. “Do you remember who I am?”

“Of course I remember,” Zora snapped. “I'm not stupid.”

“Some say that stupid is as stupid does, Ms 'I jumped out of a window then got blinding drunk',” Savage replied in dry tones.

Scowling furiously, Zora expressed her outrage. “You're behind this, aren't you? Where am I? What have you done with me? Where are my clothes?” Her voice rose to a fever pitch.

“You vomited all over your clothes,” Savage said mildly. “It was thought that sleeping in them might be unpleasant for you.”

“That doesn't answer my other questions,” Zora replied shamelessly, brushing aside the news that she'd been a filthy wreck in front of this man who even now was making her stomach quiver with the slightest raise of his dark brow. He was so composed, so serious. It unsettled her all the more. “Did I commit some kind of crime?”

“No,” Savage shook his head. “But we needed to talk to you and as you were unwilling to do that at your place, we figured things might go more smoothly at ours.”

“Okay,” Zora agreed. “What was so important?”

“It's complicated,” Savage said, drawing a metal chair up opposite the bed. He lowered his bulk into  it  with surprising grace for such a large man. Zora watched him carefully, wondering what could possibly be going on. “Let's start with a few questions for you first. Why did you run?” The question was delivered quite calmly, almost conversationally.

“Because there were strange men at my door and one of them broke it down,” Zora shrugged. “It struck me as concerning.”

Savage looked skeptical. “But you didn't go to the police. You went out drinking.”

“Have you been to the police lately? They'd have asked me to fill out a form and gotten back to me weeks later,” Zora said cynically. “I went to the bar because I figured it was better than hanging out on the streets. Then one thing lead to another.”

He nodded. “Do things often lead to other things where you and alcohol are concerned, Ms Matthews?”

“Sometimes,” Zora replied suspiciously, looking about her. “Is this some kind of intervention then? Did my mother send you?”

“Your mother did not send me,” Savage said, a smile quirking at his lips. “And no, it's not an intervention.”

“So what's with all the questions? Who cares how much I drink?” Zora was quickly becoming very defensive indeed. She was not stupid and she knew very well that she often drank too much, but drinking passed the hours and made her mind stop thinking so hard. Drinking was like visiting a relaxing resort of the mind.

“You have a skill,” Savage said, changing the subject abruptly.

“Okay,” Zora shrugged.

“It's a skill we might have a use for.”

Still befuddled, Zora shook her head at him.“What skill are we talking about? I assume its not my cooking skill.”

“Or your housekeeping skill,” Savage agreed far too readily for Zora's liking.

“Is it protocol to mock people you're trying to get to help you?” Her tone was acidic in the face of what she was sure was a very dry wit.

He ignored her question and fixed her with a direct look. “Zora, you have an aptitude for numbers. An aptitude for making very quick, very complicated calculations.”

So that was what they wanted. A walking talking calculator. “Eh,” Zora shrugged. “It's a party trick. You'd be surprised just how useless skills like that are in the real world.”

“The real world?” He turned his head slightly in inquiry.

“Yeah, you know. The 9 to 5.” Zorah waved her hand casually. “A nice rack is a better asset than being able to solve for x.”

Savage's jaw dropped slightly. “I know, shocking isn't it?” Zora smirked, enjoying his obvious discomfort.

“Your attitude is shocking,” he said severely. Surprised at being chastised for the way she spoke, Zora sat back and frowned. His censure had made her feel bad and she did not like feeling bad at all.

“I don't think I'll be able to help you,” she said icily. “May I leave now?”

Again he ignored her. “We're going to run a few tests over the next few days...”

“No,” Zora said obstinately. “I want to go home.”

“..In the meantime, you'll stay here,” Savage continued as if she had not spoken.

Looking about the place desperately, Zora tried to appeal to his better nature. “In a white room with nothing to do? Is one of the tests seeing if I can be bored to death?”

He gave her one of those chillingly stern looks. “You're in detox.”

“Detox? I'm not a drug addict.”

“Alcohol is a drug.”

“But not a real one.”

“It is very much a real one, Ms Matthews.”

Spurred by the note of condescension in Savage's tone and her continuing inability to get her own way, Zora's irritation was turning to outright anger. “This is ridiculous. I want to go home.”

“That's not possible.” Savage made the announcement, stood up and walked out of the room without another word. Zora stared at the closed door open mouthed as the bolts shut back into place. This couldn't be right. She'd been abducted against her will.

Furiously, she tried to think of some way to get out of the room. Ignoring her pounding head, she got out of bed and began walking around the small room, looking for some way to escape. There was no obvious way out, except through the bolted door. A dome in the middle of the room was probably a video camera, she figured. The notion that she was being watched whilst she paced around like a rat in a cage irritated her immensely. She picked up the chair and used it to stab towards the hard plastic dome. The dome didn't give way, but after just a few seconds of attempting to destroy it, the door to the room opened, a uniformed man walked in, plucked the chair out of her hands and then walked out again without so much as a word.

Deprived of the only thing in the room that wasn't bolted down, Zora sat back down on the bed and pondered her predicament. Clearly there was no way out unless they decided they wanted to let her out. Clearly they needed her for something. She smiled to herself as a plan began to formulate in her mind. It was simple. So simple. Savage wanted someone who was good with numbers, did he? Well she was about to put on the best addled mathematician act anyone had ever seen. He'd chalk it up to her so called drug abuse and she'd be free to go on her way.

Sitting back on the bed, Zora forced herself to be calm. Nothing would be gained by throwing a fit and acting like a mad woman. They'd just keep her there longer and probably do horrible things if she angered them enough. Instead of fighting the situation, she laid down and tried to get as comfortable as possible. If you couldn't beat them, you might as well fall asleep whilst they worked out what to do with you.

Chapter Three

A mechanical voice echoed through a shadowy room lit with a single light. “x2 - 10x + 26 = 0. Solve for x.”

Zora drummed her heels against the metal sides of the desk she was sitting on and pretended to think for a moment. She was wearing a fresh pair of white scrubs and after several days in Savage's clutches, she was already beginning to look a great deal healthier. The dark circles under her eyes were fading and her skin, finally free of the make up she regularly caked on was beginning to get something of a healthy glow about it. “Uh. Forty Two?”

“Incorrect,” the voice droned emotionlessly.

Zora barely contained a wicked smile. “Really? Well, my math really isn't what it used to be.” She tapped the side of her head. “Dead brain cells and all.” When there was no response, she continued speaking into the darkness. “Must be all those terrible drugs I was drinking.”

Outside the room, behind a two way mirror, Savage growled. Zora knew what was going on. She'd not been told that he was monitoring these tests, she'd not been told anything at all, but she was looking towards the mirror with a knowing smile as if she could feel him there. Leaning against the control table filled with monitors and buttons, resting his weight against the knuckles of his fists he growled. “She's doing this on purpose. She's giving the wrong answers deliberately.”

“Why would she do that?” Lieutenant Beedlesworth, the technician asked as he adjusted a dial and took a few notes. He was a studious man with thick square rimmed glasses and a mustache that always appeared to be right on the brink of filling in nicely. The idea that someone would deliberately give incorrect answers on a test was beyond him.

Before Zora could continue to taunt her captors, Savage switched the speaker off and turned his back to the room, his arms folded across his chest. “Because I made the mistake of telling her why we wanted her. Now she's trying to throw the tests so she can go home.”

“Oh.” Beedlesworth frowned. “That invalidates the process. This data is useless.” The disappointment in his tone was heavy. “The subject needs to be either unaware or cooperative, Captain.”

Savage nodded. “Take a break, I'll call you when she's ready to cooperate.”

“As you wish, sir.”

When Beedlesworth was gone, Savage took control. The first thing he did was to turn off the cameras and microphones that recorded everything. The second thing he did was to turn the lights up. Behind the mirror, Zora blinked and looked around as her eyes readjusted to the increased light levels. Looking at her grimly, Savage unbuttoned his shirt sleeves and rolled them up, exposing his muscled forearms. It was time to teach Ms Matthews a long overdue lesson.

She smirked when he entered the room. “Captain Savage. I've missed you these past few days,” she said in a tone dripping with smarmy self possession. She didn't bother to get up, instead she remained in a seated position on the table, her hands gripping the edge of it. Her casual body language screamed contempt for him.

“Ms Matthews,” Savage nodded, keeping his cool. It would not do for her to see how frustrated she was making him.

“Can I help you in some way? I am after all, here to help,” Zora smirked. A sudden, almost uncontrollable urge to wipe the smirk off her face rose in Savage, but he contained the impulse.

“You can help me by applying yourself to the task at hand,” he said calmly. “It is clear that you are deliberately giving incorrect answers.”

“Me? Never!” Zora gasped, then grinned. “It's just all those years of alcohol have dulled my poor little mind. See, I never had anyone to lock me up and throw away the key before so my mind has atrophied.”

“Zora,” Savage spoke with a low, authoritative tone that brought her up short. The smirk faded. When he wanted to be, Savage could be very intimidating indeed. His natural features lent themselves to a severe expression and when his patience was tried, the determined, chiseled angles of his face were accentuated all the more. “This is not a game. This is potentially a matter of life and death for many, many people. You need to start cooperating or you will not enjoy the consequences.”

She looked at him, her eyes widened, and for a moment he thought he had convinced her. But her wide eyed expression quickly collapsed into a pout. She hopped down from the table and turned away from him, clearly unwilling or unable to face him anymore. “It's not my problem,” she said petulantly. “I want to go home.”

Unwilling to allow her childish behavior, Savage grabbed her by the upper arm and swung her around to face him. “I am beginning to grow tired of you wasting my time,” he said, his eyes narrowed.

“Let go of me,” she spat. “Who gave you the right to put your hands on me?”

“I'll do more than put my hands on you in a minute,” he warned her.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“It means, little girl, that you are about to get the thrashing of your life.”

Zora stared at him for a moment, then laughed. “I'm hardly little.”

“Compared to me you're tiny,” he growled, pulling her closer so that she was forced to crane her neck to make eye contact with him.

“I'm not going to do what you want,” she declared rebelliously. “I don't care what you do.”

“We'll see about that,” Savage said grimly. Without further discussion, he sat down on the chair Zora had rejected in favor of the table and yanked her over his lap. She squealed with fear and outrage, but he ignored her cries. The room they were in was sound proofed so that the subjects inside it would not be distracted by noise from the outside and so that recordings would be crystal clear. The sound proofing also meant that nobody would hear what was going on in the exam room. She could shriek and howl all she liked and it wouldn't make the slightest difference to him.

His jaw set firmly, Savage wasted no time in pulling the scrub pants down. She wore no panties, so her rounded, creamy cheeks were exposed and vulnerable in an instant. They were quite nicely toned, he noticed, probably from all the climbing out of windows Zora was given to. She was kicking and thrashing about like a wild thing, cursing and doing her best to escape his grasp, but with no leverage she was unable to achieve anything besides scissoring her legs wildly and hobbling herself in her pants as they slipped further down her shapely thighs.

With grim satisfaction, Savage raised his hand and brought it down, open palmed across her cheeks. The loud smacking sound it produced, followed by Zora's shriek of pain was music to his ears. From almost the first moment he'd set eyes on her he'd wanted to do this. She needed a good spanking more than any woman he'd ever known and she was going to get it from him.

He repeated the treatment fast and hard, slapping one cheek then the other. Her quickly reddening cheeks wobbled and jiggled under the onslaught. He knew that his fast approach was preventing the full impact of the spanking from being felt, but it would settle in later, and that was what he wanted. In this moment he wanted nothing more than to impress upon Ms Matthews that she was his to command. As she wriggled and wailed, he continued the sound spanking, reddening her cheeks to a bright cherry color.

Her outraged reaction told him that she was most certainly not used to any kind of physical discipline. Her cries were frantic as she began pleading with him to stop, telling him that he was most certainly going to kill her. “Calm down and take your spanking,” he growled, pausing the onslaught for a moment when her struggles became too extreme.

“Please stop!” Zora cried. “I can't take it!”

“You'll be surprised what you can take,” he said, redoubling his efforts and slapping the underside of her cheeks with quick, searing strokes. The continued spanking after the brief respite made Zora break down completely. Tears coursed down her cheeks as she sobbed in frustration and pain. Savage didn't kid himself into thinking she was learning her lesson, he didn't expect her behavior to magically reform after a single spanking, but at least she'd know in the future that she wasn't untouchable.

When he determined she had enough, he reached down and pulled her pants up over her red bottom and stood up, keeping her firmly in his grasp. She was sniveling, her eyes were red and tears were streaming down over her cheeks. He hadn't hurt her that badly, there were far more severe ways of imparting discipline after all, like canes or belts or even slippers. No, a hard hand spanking alone didn't cause this kind of reaction, the realization that one could be punished for being an insufferable brat did.

Taking her by the hand, he lead the weeping Zora out of the exam room and walked her back to the room she'd been put in on her arrival. No words passed between them, he was not in the mood to offer comfort. Savage wanted her to truly feel the consequences of deliberate disobedience. He ushered her inside with a hard slap to her bottom that made her squeal. “Get yourself together. I will be back for you this afternoon,” he said sternly before shutting the door and bolting it firmly.

***

Left alone in the little room, Zora threw herself onto the bed and cried harder that she could remember crying since she was a child. Her bottom hurt terribly, even if she lay perfectly still she could feel it aching and throbbing. She could not believe what Savage had done to her. One moment they had been talking, the next moment he had been hitting her. Such a possibility had not crossed her mind until it had happened.

Who did he think he was to hit her because she wouldn't do what he wanted? It wasn't fair. Somehow he'd managed to make her bottom blaze and burn for ages after the fact. When she reached back timidly to see if it really was as swollen as she thought, she found that it was radiating warmth. She didn't even need to touch the skin to feel how hot he'd managed to make her bottom.

She did not know how long it took to stop crying, she only knew that when she did she had a headache in addition to her sore bottom. Homesickness was also beginning to overwhelm her. She was tired of the place with the people who never said more than one or two words to her and the bully who hit her when she didn't do what he wanted. She'd never felt so lonely or so desperate before.

It was something of a small relief when someone came for her later on. It was a relief because she was leaving the solitude of the maddeningly small room and because the 'someone' who had come wasn't Savage. Hopefully she wouldn't have to see him again. She didn't know what she would do if she did. She was torn between dying of shame immediately and rending the bully limb from limb.

To her disappointment she was returned to the exam room. Like the previous time, there was only one spot light in the room that lit the table and chair. This time she didn't bother to sit on the table, she stood leaning against the wall, lurking in the darkness as the mechanical voice informed her that the testing sequence was beginning. An equation was fired at her, but she did not answer it. She didn't bother to respond at all. With her arms folded over her chest, she stared at her toes, which were clad in silly white tennis shoes she didn't like in the slightest. Where her own shoes had gotten to was one of the many mysteries she had been confronted with during her stay.

A couple more questions went over her head before the lights went on full once more. The door of the room opened and she saw Savage filling the door frame. Immediately her heart skipped a beat as adrenaline began coursing through her body. Instinctively, she shuffled towards the corner of the room, her hands reaching back to cover her bottom as he approached. He looked taller and meaner than ever before. She was suddenly struck by how foolish she had ever been to provoke him. What had she been thinking?

“This is unfortunate, Ms Matthews, I thought you would have learned your lesson.” His voice was laced with a very real sound of disappointment.

Shaking her head and pressing back into the corner Zora looked for some way out of the mess. “What are you doing?” She gasped as he walked up to her and took her by the arm, leading her back towards the chair. She dug in with her heels, but the smooth floor offered no resistance and she simply slid in his wake.

“We are going to be repeating this morning's treatment,” Savage said, pulling her over his lap once more. Zora was not a small woman, but she felt positively waif like when he handled her so easily, as if she weighed nothing at all. In mere moments she was settled over his hard thighs, totally at his mercy once more.

“No! Why? Please don't,” she begged as he pulled her pants down, baring her recently spanked bottom.

“You aren't answering the questions.”

A deep sigh emanated from Zora. “Fine. Five million, four hundred thousand, three hundred and sixty two point five. Eight thousand and six. Negative two thousand, nine hundred and forty six. X equals 5.00, positive 1.00i and negative 1.00i.”

Savage paused, his hand in the air poised to come down hard on the bare cheeks positioned across his lap. “Excuse me?

“Five million, four hundred...”

“No,” he slapped her bottom to stop her speaking, but he did so lightly this time. It got her attention, but did not cause her undue pain. “What are those numbers?”

“The answers to the questions from this morning,” Zora said.

“Is that right?” Savage was not addressing her, but instead he was looking at the mirrored wall.

“Those are all correct,” the mechanical voice confirmed.

“Okay,” Savage nodded. “Keep going.”

“What? Let me up!” Zora appealed, squirming around to look at him. He simply shook his head at her and gave the order to proceed.

Zora found herself in the horrible position of being asked questions whilst she laid over Savage's lap, her pants around her knees. He did not strike her any more, he simply laid his large palm on the small of her back and remained silent as she stammered out answers as quickly as she could. She had no desire to be kept in that humiliating position a moment longer than absolutely necessary.

“All correct,” the voice declared. “Sequence complete.”

To Zora's relief, she felt Savage pull her pants up for her and ease her up from his lap. The moment her feet touched the floor she skittishly made her way to the far side of the table, feeling far safer with something solid between her and the man who had uprooted her from her life and made her bottom burn.

“So you can do it,” he observed.

“Yeah I guess I can,” Zora shrugged. “I guess this means I'm not going home.”

“Not yet, no,” Savage confirmed without the slightest bit of sympathy.

Tears prickled at her eyelids and she turned away from him, not wanting to let him see her cry again. She hated for anyone to see her cry and she'd already cried twice that day. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly, willing them to stop.

His hands descended on her shoulders and she felt herself being turned around to face him. She hadn't heard him get up, hadn't heard him move at all, but he was behind her, half sitting, half leaning on the edge of the table in a way that brought his eye level down to hers. “Zora,” he said firmly. She met his gaze uncertainly, not knowing what to expect. “It is alright,” he said, squeezing her shoulder.

She sniffed. “It is not alright,” she mumbled. She was confused. She wanted to hate this man for hitting her, but the same hands that had visited pain on her bottom were now making her feel safe. His gaze was not exactly warm, but it was direct and honest.

“Come with me,” he said, not bothering to argue with her. Wiping her tears on the back of her sleeve, she followed him out of the room and through the rabbit warren like corridors. They entered an elevator and went up a couple of floors. She found herself looking at the buttons on the elevator with curiosity. She still had no idea where she was being held and Savage wasn't going to tell her, but the elevator could be a way out, she surmised. There were twelve floors on the interface, split into two separate columns marked numerically. The rows were marked alphabetically. They had gotten in at level 1-C and they were going to 2-B.

2-B, Zora was interested to discover, was much more pleasant than 1-C. Instead of 'burn your retinas out' fluorescent lighting and plain walls, somebody had invested in a deep brown carpet and paneling on the walls. The light fittings were tastefully inset into the upper walls. It looked more like a hotel than a military base. She stopped dead in her tracks and looked around in confusion. “Where are we?”

Savage smiled slightly. “Same place, different place,” he said simply, approaching a door and pushing it open. Zora looked around the frame of the door to see what was clearly a bedroom. It was twice as large as the one she had left and though it was furnished simply it somehow felt homely. She couldn't put her finger on what made it feel that way until she approached the bed and saw that the pale blue blanket laying over it wasn't coincidentally like the one she had at home. It was the one she'd had at home.

“What the?” On an impulse, she turned to the wardrobe in the corner and opened it. Inside it were a bunch of clothes, some were hers, some were new. Every new piece was suited to her tastes however, something she would probably have bought herself if she'd had the time or the inclination. With her mouth open in surprise she turned to see Savage leaning up against the door frame, watching her. “What's going on?”

“It's your room. You'll be more comfortable in familiar surroundings,” he explained simply.

“Since when has my comfort mattered? Zora asked, unconsciously rubbing her bottom as she asked the question.

“Since you behaved yourself and did as you were told,” Savage said rather bluntly.

Zora wandered about the room, exploring it, but avoiding the doorway where he stood. All her personal effects appeared to have been delivered to her, not that there were many of them to begin with. She'd never been much of a 'things' sort of person, preferring the ability to come and go as she pleased without worrying about looking after a bunch of possessions. She was pleased to see that the flat screen television she'd dropped a bundle of cash on was installed on the wall. In another corner of the room, there was a small fridge. When she opened it she found it stocked with water and healthy snacks that made her nose wrinkle. There wasn't a beer or a piece of candy in sight. Closing the fridge once more, she turned to Savage. “What happened to my apartment, my job?”

For once, he gave her a direct answer. “You resigned from your job three days ago and you paid out the rest of your lease. Officially, you moved to Germany to brew beer.” The slight smirk on his face as he finished the story showed that he appreciated the wit that had clearly gone into it.

“Germany? Three days ago?” Zora frowned. “But I hadn't done any of the tests then. What would have happened if I'd failed them?”

Savage returned her gaze, but he did not answer the question. “Get some rest,” he said. “You've had a long day.” He left the room, and after the door closed, Zora heard a buzzing, clicking sound that surely indicated an electronic lock. Her cage might have been more homely, but she was just as much a prisoner as ever.

Alone once more, Zora felt anxiety brewing in her belly. Totally isolated from anyone she knew or cared about she was at the mercy of the man who had no qualms about striking her if she did not please him. His stern expression gave nothing away when he did not wish it to and she was left feeling very uncertain about her future.

Turning on the television, she laid on the bed on her stomach and tried to comfort herself. The news came on with its usual fare of mayhem, but she couldn't quite find the wherewithal to cynically mock it as she used to do. The outside world she'd taken for granted no longer existed for her, she was stuck in a nightmare that made some of the situations on the television look positively comfortable by comparison. She'd take a twenty percent rise in the cost of milk any day over finding herself at the mercy of a hard handed soldier with a secretive agenda.

Her mind wandered as she laid there, remembering how casually he'd pulled her over his lap, especially the second time. Then he'd just sat there whilst she answered the questions as if having a half naked female draped across him was a completely normal sort of thing. What kind of man was that comfortable stripping a woman of her self possession? She'd heard of spanking as a kinky kind of foreplay, but there had been nothing amorous about the way she'd been treated by him, he'd been entirely matter of fact, pulling her pants up and down when it suited him with no concern for her feelings at all.

She hated to admit it, even to herself, but she'd responded to him. As the ache and pain of the spanking went away, the warmth began to spread down between her thighs. She was getting aroused. She didn't want to be, but she couldn't help it. She was only human after all, and the touch of a strong, undeniably dominant man had set off a chain of biological reactions. That's all they were, she thought, distancing herself from the growing moistness, just biological reactions. They didn't mean anything. With a soft moan, she reached down between her legs, under her scrubs and tentatively touched herself, rubbing her clit the same way it had rubbed against the rough fabric of Captain Savage's pants when he spanked her. Entirely incidental fantasies of strong hands roving over her flesh took hold as she allowed herself to sink into much needed, thoroughly meaningless, release.

Chapter Four

Once Zora proved her abilities beyond all shadow of a doubt, things began to happen. Her first days had been spent bored out of her mind in detox, but with the early challenges cleared, Savage informed her that she was expected to work.

She assumed that meant she was finally going to get to do whatever it was that they had yanked her out of her life to do, so the news was somewhat welcome. Hopefully she could get the job done and go home. As nice as the room she'd been assigned was, it wasn't the same as her own apartment that she was free to come and go from as she pleased.

Early one morning Savage roused her from bed and brought her back down to the C levels. Level 3-C turned out to be a large room filled with computers. There were several military personnel at work, but she didn't have a chance to see what they were working on, the moment she tried to see what was on their screens she was tugged onwards to a far corner that was empty save for one eccentric figure.

“Zora this is Ethan. He's in charge of communications and intelligence for our team,” Savage said by way of introduction. Ethan was reclining with an outrageously nonsensical pair of sunglasses on his head, wearing a psychedelic tie dyed shirt apparently designed to make him stick out like a sore thumb. His long beard had been parted in twain and fixed at the ends with colored beads. It was almost enough to make him look older than he really was, but his clear rosy cheeks showed that he couldn't have been any older than his mid twenties.

“Nice shirt,” Zora smiled.

“Thanks,” Ethan grinned.

“Ethan is going to give you a crash course in systems and codes. Pay attention,” Savage ordered in no nonsense tones.

“Righto,” Zora pretended to be amicable. When Savage left she sighed and slumped down in her chair. “That guy is such a fucking hard ass.”

“You get that around here,” Ethan agreed sympathetically. He held out his box of candy cigarettes. “Smoke?”

Zora took one with a smile. “So they don't let you smoke here?”

“They do not,” Ethan confirmed.

“Don't let you drink either I guess.”

“Well, not officially,” Ethan looked around shiftily, then reached under his desk and pulled out a hip flask. He handed it to Zora, who unscrewed it and took a tentative sniff. The aroma that rose from the flask was a heavenly blend of sherry aromas mixed with something darker.

“What is this?”

The reply came in lowered, secretive tones. “Home brewed bourbon.”

“Nice,” Zora purred appreciatively. “May I?”

“Go ahead,” Ethan winked. “Just don't get caught.”

Zora sipped at the brew and found it just as delicious as it smelled. Almost immediately the warming sensation in her stomach made her feel at ease and she tool a long draught. “Oh god I needed that,” she sighed happily as the fire water ran through her veins, restoring some of her lost sense of normality.

Ethan slid the flask back into its hiding place. “More later, lets run over the codes first, okay?”

The taste had made Zora yearn for more, but she agreed. It wouldn't do for Savage to discover that she hadn't done anything all morning. God only knew what kind of punishment he'd dole out then. She applied herself to learning the codes with as much enthusiasm as she could possibly muster under the circumstances. They were easy enough, but there were a lot of them. Fortunately for Zora, her memory had not been affected by the small amount of alcohol in her system and she had no trouble learning them quickly. Numbers had always come more easily than spoken language to her.

“Impressive,” Ethan said when they ran through them a few minutes later.

“That's how I got here,” Zora shrugged. “I'm good with numbers.”

“Yeah I know, I saw your video online and showed it to Savage...” Ethan trailed off as Zora's expression became suddenly vicious.

“So this is your fault,” she said accusingly. “You're the reason I'm here.”

“Technically the Bulgarians are the reason you're here,” Ethan argued in his defense.

“What?” Zora frowned. “What Bulgarians?”

Ethan clammed up quickly, clearly aware that he'd put not one, but both of his feet in his mouth. “You should ask Savage,” he said, turning back to the computer and tapping away at it as if there was something terribly important he suddenly needed to do.

“Maybe later,” Zora growled. Her good mood had dissipated almost entirely. She was so tired of the secrets. All she wanted to do was drink. The little taste she'd had before hadn't sated her desire for a drink, it had only whetted it. Without the slightest compunction she reached under the desk and swiped Ethan's flask.

“Hey! That's mine,” Ethan protested.

She shrugged. “I'm sure there's more where this came from, right?”

“Well yeah, but...”

“But nothing. You got me stuck in this place. I reckon this is the least you can do for me,” Zora said, slipping the flask into her pocket.

“Be careful with it,” Ethan warned her, quickly giving up on any chance of getting the flask back.

“Don't worry about me, just try not to tell on me if Savage comes by, okay?” With a smirk set on her features, Zora headed out of the data center and back towards her room. She looked over her shoulder the whole way, half expecting Savage to pop out somewhere, but she managed to get back to the sanctuary of her private room without running into anyone at all. The compound was vast and there were far more places in it than there were people to be in them.

Taking the precaution of slipping into the en suite, Zora sat on the toilet, uncapped the flask and drank deeply. It burned as it went down, but it burned so good. She downed half the vessel before she started to feel a little bit queasy and hid the rest of it behind the toilet cistern.

Standing up was an interesting affair. The alcohol that had been pooling somewhere in her legs went straight to her head. It had been a while since she'd had a drink and the brew was strong, real strong. She stumbled out of the bathroom and crashed onto the bed on her back, giggling to herself. Now this was a good time and a damn good buzz. Determined to enjoy the brief moment of levity, Zora quickly lost herself in the twin pleasures of watching television and eating anything that came to hand.

Later on, the door of her room opened. She had no idea when it was precisely, at some point she'd fallen asleep amidst crumbs and when she woke up it was only because she was being shaken awake by Savage. “Zora, are you okay?” His expression was one of pure concern, until she stirred, then he sniffed and his demeanor changed instantly. “You're drunk.”

“Yup,” Zora giggled gleefully, stretching as she returned to consciousness. There was nothing better than waking up and still being a little bit buzzed. It was like a bonus from the alcohol fairy.

Savage frowned furiously. “How?”

“That's for me to know and you to find out,” Zora taunted him. She watched him glower all the more at her flippant response. “I can almost see the smoke coming out of your ears,” she laughed.

“Smoke is going to be rising off your backside before this is over,” he promised.

“Go ahead,” Zora lurched her hindquarters off the bed and gyrated her hips at him. “Spank me all you want, big boy,” she slurred.

He looked at her with something like disgust. “Not whilst you're like this. You won't feel it. Later, when you feel every lash.”

“Lash? Gonna spank me with your eyes?”

“With a tawse,” he informed her, folding his arms over his chest as he spoke. His jaw was clenched so tight she was surprised he could speak at all.

“What's a toorrsee?” Zora giggled as she formed the strange word with her mouth.

“You'll know the answer to that soon enough,” he said grimly, looking around the room.

“You're such a downer,” Zora sighed, dropping her hips down to the bed. “I did what you wanted me to do.”

“I wanted you to learn code, not drink yourself stupid.”

Zora rolled over on her back and began spewing lines of code towards the ceiling. When she was done, she looked over at Savage with a triumphant grin. “You mean that code? That code I totally know?”

He didn't reply, but that didn't bother her, she just pointed her finger at herself. “You know who... you know what I am?”

A muscle in his jaw ticked, but he responded to her question. “What or who are you?”

“A drunken master. Like Bruce Lee.”

“No,” he shook his head emphatically. “You're a drunken brat and I'm going to tear strips off your hide when you sober up.”

“You can't be angry at me. I did what you wanted!” Zora protested.

“This is not what I wanted,” Savage said as he walked over to her drawers. She wondered what he was doing until he pulled the top drawer out and dumped the contents onto the bed next to her. Her panties cascaded onto the coverlet, followed by tops, then pants. When he didn't find the alcohol in any of the dresser drawers, he opened the wardrobe and pulled everything out of there too. He had an expression of stern determination on his face that Zora found rather amusing. She should have been scared, but she was enjoying the thrill of playing cat and mouse far too much to truly care.

“Off the bed,” he ordered curtly. She didn't move fast enough and was forced to scramble when he picked the side of it up and turned it over. In an instant Zora's clothing and sheets were tossed into a large jumble on the floor.

In short order all the cupboards were emptied, the television had been switched off and removed from the wall, the fridge had been pulled away from its slot in the counter and checked. Zora slid down the wall and sat on the ground, watching him silently as he tore her room apart. With every failed attempt to find the source of the alcohol, he grew more irritated. Finally he went into the en suite and she heard the sound of the top of the toilet being removed. Then all went silent until he re-entered the room holding the flask. “Always the last place you look, huh?” Zora tried a lame attempt at humor, but it failed miserably. In the aftermath of her rude awakening her buzz was almost completely gone, leaving her feeling cold and concerned.

“Where did you get this?” He snapped the question.

Zora shook her head. “I'm not telling.”

“You will,” he growled, striding over to her. She cowered away when he reached for her, but he didn't hit her, he simply grasped her upper arm and guided her up to her feet. “Back to detox for you.”

Minutes later, Zora found herself alone and locked away in the same dull white room she'd occupied when she first arrived at the compound. “This is not good,” she said to herself as she sat down on the thin mattress, fighting a wave of nerve induced nausea. Savage had been livid, no he had been more than livid, he had been super furious. He'd hardly spoken a word to her, but his silence had held a heavy menace. Zora's attempts to sleep her anxieties away failed miserably and she spent a long night tossing and turning uncomfortably.

The next morning, Savage arrived looking thoroughly merciless as he stepped through the door clad in a black t shirt that clung to his muscular frame and black tactical pants. In his hand he held what looked like a leather strap with a wooden handle. Nursing a hangover, Zora groaned when she saw it. She was sitting cross-legged on the middle of the bed, her head in her hands. She covered her eyes when she saw his stern face and the implement he'd threatened her with. He didn't look angry anymore, he just looked determined. For some reason, determination scared her more than anger. “You're going to beat me now?”

“Spank, not beat,” he corrected her. “You know why, don't you?”

“Yeah,” she groaned, burying her face further in her hands.

His voice was calm, but firm. “Tell me.”

Flushing with embarrassment at having to recount her crimes, Zora muttered as quickly as possible. “Because I got drunk.”

“And because you wouldn't tell me where you got the alcohol from.”

She lifted her head and looked at him. “That's not fair.”

He sat on the end of the bed, the tawse held casually in one hand, the other hand resting on his knee. “Why not?”

“Because I'm not going to get someone else in trouble because of something dumb I did. It's not their fault.”

He considered her answer for all of a millisecond before dismissing it. “That's admirable, but defying me is going to earn you more punishment,” he said briskly. “Let's get this started. Stand up please, Ms Matthews.” She stood up. She didn't want to stand up, but she also didn't want to be accused of further defiance. “Good,” he nodded. “Now lower your pants and put yourself over my knee.”

Zora gawked at the very idea of meekly pulling her pants down so that he could thrash her. Her mouth opened and shut wordlessly as she tried to work out a way of the situation. His dark eyes bored into hers. “Now,  Ms Matthews.”

She broke out into a cold sweat and shook her head. “I can't,” she squeaked.

“You can.”

“No, I can't.” Her voice held a note of panic and her hands began to tremble. It was one thing to be pulled over his lap, to be a passive recipient of his discipline, but quite another to participate in it herself. He was demanding something she couldn't give.

“You can, Zora.” He spoke softly. It was not what she expected, she expected him to start barking orders at her. It would have been east to resist shouting, easy to grow aggressive in response, but he seemed to know that.

“I don't want to get hit,” she whimpered, looking down at her feet as her eyes filled with tears.

“Then don't misbehave next time.” He reached for her and pulled her closer to him by her hips. The touch of his strong hands was oddly intimate, and she was glad when he guided her over his lap without asking her to do it herself again. It was a small mercy and she was grateful for it.

“This is going to hurt,” he said, tugging down her pants and panties in one swift movement. The warning did not make it any easier. She lay tensely in place as he draped the split leather of the tawse over her cheeks, then pulled it away. With a quick snapping motion it was back, laying a hell fire sting across her sensitive skin. Zora shrieked as it landed, arching her back with the agony it caused. He held her down firmly, his forearm across her shoulders and repeated the treatment over and over, lashing her poor bare bottom until she knew she couldn't stand it anymore. He didn't speak or lecture, he didn't yell and he didn't comfort her with kind words, he simply spanked her over and over again. She had no idea how many times the tawse rose and fell, she only knew that it was falling on the same welted skin over and over again and with every new stroke the pain peaked at new heights.

She began blubbering for forgiveness, promising that she would never do such a thing again. She said everything she could think of to stop the spanking, but none of it did any good. He must not have a soul, not the slightest bit of sympathy anywhere in his body. He must hate her, really hate her, she reasoned in her pain addled state. Eventually she simply became limp over his lap, the hard ridges of his muscled thighs pressing against her stomach and hips as she sobbed.

When he finally stopped many, many lashes later, cessation of the spanking was of small consolation. The fire of pain he'd built was still burning, and though she heard him say something, she couldn't make it out through her tears. When he tried to stand her up, her legs failed her and she crumpled to the ground crying as if her heart was breaking. Her freedom, her autonomy, all the good in her world had been taken away, and it had been replaced by a heartless regime and a man who didn't care how much he hurt her as long as she did as she was told.

She curled up into the fetal position, crying so hard that it was difficult to breathe. He was still saying something, but she could not comprehend it. When his arms reached for her again she squealed and cowered away, afraid that he would beat her more. He did not hit her again though, he picked her up and placed her on his lap where he held her, gently stroking her hair.

“Come on Zora, it wasn't that bad,” he murmured, shifting her slightly in his arms. His voice was softer than she'd heard it before, he almost sounded like a different man altogether. She looked up between the wisps of tear wet hair that had stuck across her face and saw him looking down at her with genuine concern on his stern features. She sniffed then coughed as her tears threatened to half choke her. He was wrong, it was that bad. Her face crumpled as tears began to fall once more.

“Hey, come on little lady,” Savage said, brushing the hair out of her eyes gently. “Tell me why you are so upset. I know it hurts, but it doesn't hurt that bad.”

Caught off guard by what almost sounded like a term of endearment, Zora stopped crying enough to explain herself. “You hit me and you liked it. You hate me,” she said, her lower lip trembling as the tears threatened to overwhelm her again.

Savage frowned, and for a moment she was afraid she had angered him. “You think I spanked you because I hate you? What did we say at the beginning?”

“Nothing,” she said, entirely forgetting everything that had happened before she was spanked.

Savage persisted in the face of her discipline induced insomnia. “What did you tell me when I asked you why you were going to be spanked?”

“Because I got drunk and wouldn't tell you how,” Zora mumbled.

“That's right,” Savage said. “Because you did something you knew you were absolutely not allowed to do. This spanking was the consequence. Don't you dare take it into your head that this is some beating you received because I don't like you. This is not personal, it is what you get when you break the rules. Understand?”

She nodded as his eyes bored into her. “Yessir,” she whispered.

“Good,” he said firmly, standing her up. This time she found her feet without any trouble at all. “Pants up, Ms Matthews,” he ordered. Quickly she bent down and pulled her pants up, blushing as she realized how many times Savage had seen the most intimate areas of her body. He probably knew her body almost as well as some of her ex boyfriends did.

Savage stood up from the bed and walked around her whilst she rubbed her bottom, his hands clasped behind his back. “I am a firm believer in discipline, Ms Matthews. Discipline is something you've clearly lacked in your life. You should know that it is never done out of anger, or out of a personal desire for revenge. It is done to provide swift and memorable consequences.” He stopped and looked at her with just a hint of a smile playing around his lips. “Would you say that your little encounter with the tawse just now was memorable, Ms Matthews?”

Zora nodded, her hands still stuck down the back of her pants. She didn't know how she would sit with her bottom so sore. “Very memorable, Captain Savage,” she said softly.

“Do I have your word that you will not imbibe any more alcohol without my permission?”

Zora hesitated, but when his expression  hardened, she nodded quickly. “Okay, I won't. It's not fair, but I won't.”

He nodded. “It is not about what is fair, but what is good for you.”

As her misery faded, some of her self possession began to return. “And presumably, what is not good for the Bulgarians.”

Savage stopped short. “Who told you about the Bulgarians?” Zora did not reply, but she did not need to. It was clear from the expression on Savage's face that he was making sense of the situation. “Ethan mentioned them, didn't he?”

“Yeah,” Zora nodded. “He did.”

“And he gave you the alcohol too.”

“No.”

“Are you going to lie to me?” Savage asked the question in dangerously soft tones.

“I stole it from him,” Zora explained. It was close enough to the truth, there was only a fine line between theft and what she'd done to Ethan.

“I see,” he said. She needn't have worried about him buying that story. Clearly he had no trouble believing that she was a thief.

“So what about these Bulgarians?” Zora prompted.

Savage looked at her, but she saw from the closed expression on his face that she was not going to get an answer. He stepped towards the door and she knew that it was going to be another one of those many lingering questions that surrounded her stay. She was quickly growing tired of the mysteries. Apparently he thought she didn't deserve answers, all she deserved was pain and recrimination. “Fine, just go,” she said bitterly. “See you the next time you want to hit me.”

He stopped by the door and looked over his shoulder at her. “You'll get your answers when you're ready for them.”

“And in the meantime? What am I supposed to do?”

“Behave yourself.” He left quickly, closing the door behind him and bolting it too. Yet again Zora was locked away by herself, confused and hurt. Frustration overwhelmed her and she hurled herself against the sheet metal door, kicking and punching and swearing up a storm of rage. She battered her frail flesh against the solid door until she was so tired she could no longer lift her arms, then she collapsed onto the bed, feeling more miserable and alone than before.

Chapter Five

Savage paced back and forth in his office, his brow furrowed. Zora was proving more complicated and difficult to deal with than he'd imagined. He'd counted on discipline as a means of taming her, but every time he spanked her he seemed to make things worse. Her sobbing cries still echoed in his head from the last time he'd been forced to take her in hand and in his mind's eye he could see the look of disappointment on her face as he left her alone afterward. His plan to get her to a point where she'd trust him and be receptive to learning the full truth about her situation was quickly unraveling. Her stubborn resistance made it difficult to get through to her and he did not like the idea of resorting to ever more extreme measures.

“Dammit,” he swore to himself. This was not supposed to happen. He wasn't supposed to care, wasn't supposed to get attached, but he was starting to do both. For all her negative traits, Zora was brighter and braver than most. She'd been wrenched out of her comfort zone and subjected to what she considered harsh discipline and it had not cowed her in the slightest.

Savage was usually a man of honor, a man who did what he thought was right. He didn't like what he was doing with Zora. She'd never asked for what was happening to her, she'd never asked to be used as a tool in a war that was almost impossible to win. She deserved to know what was really going on. As he paced he admitted to himself that he wasn't keeping the truth from her because she wasn't ready to know, he was keeping the truth from her because he was loathing the prospect of dealing with the fallout when she realized what was really going on. For some bizarre reason, he cared about what she thought about him. When she knew the truth and realized the full ramifications of what he'd done, he would become a monster in her eyes.

“This is not the time to get sentimental, Brett,” he lectured himself. It was time to do what he should have done days ago. The window of opportunity for the mission was closing by the day. It was time to get Zora on board - one way or another.

Steeling himself, he sat down at his desk and sent for her. She turned up fairly quickly in the company of a soldier. Since her bout of illicit drinking she'd been confined to detox as a precaution. As a result she was once more wearing the white scrubs that made her look shapeless and left her rear end so very vulnerable.

“Ms Matthews,” he greeted her cordially.

“Captain Savage,” she replied, looking around his office with curious eyes. She had not been here before, but she was already looking for something of use to her. He knew the way her mind worked. She was an opportunist. No matter the situation, the intelligent look never left her eyes. She knew something was up and sooner or later she was going to figure it out. Better that she was told today than left to work things out on her own.

He took a moment to look her over. As a result of being unable to imbibe alcohol as she saw fit she'd lost some weight and her skin and hair both looked a great deal healthier and more attractive. As his gaze traveled over her body, he was aware that she was staring straight back at him, sizing him up in return. It was an interesting response. He was used to his subordinates avoiding his gaze in confrontational situations like this. Zora only resorted to that behavior when her pants were around her ankles.

“Ms Matthews, we will be taking a trip for a couple of weeks. It's clear that you're mentally more than able to handle the rigors of the job, but you need some physical training.”

Zora screwed her face up. “Physical training? Why?”

“It's standard procedure,” he said, brushing the question off.

That was all it took for her to launch into a tirade. “Standard procedure? There's a standard procedure for kidnapping people and forcing them to work for you? Good to know. I'd  hate to think anything that's been going on has been non standard. That would make shit really fucked up.”

Savage looked at her, somewhat stunned at her nerve. This was a woman who was in all probability still nursing welts on her backside. When would she learn a sense of respect?

“It is also,” he said as he stood up and walked around the table towards her, “a chance to instill further discipline.” She stood in place, looking defiant and he took the opportunity to deliver a hard slap to her backside. “That's for the foul language.”

“Ow fuck!” Zora squealed and turned away from him, protecting her bottom with her hands. “Don't hit me!” Savage watched as if in slow motion as she lifted her right leg off the ground, swung it behind her and brought the pointed tip of her shoe crashing into his shin.

The shoes were soft and she'd managed to kick him with the part of her foot least likely to inflict damage, so it didn't hurt terribly, but the fact that she'd had the nerve to do it at all was astounding. Without another word he grasped the fabric at the back of her shirt and lifted her over his desk. The nearest thing to hand with any real punitive power was a rubber backed slipper used for martial arts training. He brought it down across her clothed cheeks with a mighty wallop and was promptly forced to dodge a powerful kick directed at his groin.

“Girl, what do you think you are doing?” He growled, tightening his hold on her shirt. It wasn't a question she needed to answer, she wasn't squirming the way she usually did when she was spanked, as ludicrous as it seemed, she was actually fighting him.

“Get the hell off me!” She screamed. “Don't fucking hit me again!”

It would have been amusing, the idea that she could intimidate him into doing what she wanted, if it wasn't so dangerous and disrespectful. He redoubled his efforts with the slipper, but not before taking her pants down and baring her bottom. As he'd surmised, it still showed signs of welts, but he couldn't afford to take pity on her. She'd challenged him and he had to meet that challenge head on. What had started off as a cordial briefing turned into a thrashing in mere moments. He brought the slipper down hard across both her cheeks, aiming low to catch the fullest part. She shrieked as it made contact and scissored her legs, treating Savage to a display of her feminine nether regions.

He was a red blooded male and the sight was distracting, but as on previous occasions, he did not allow himself to become side tracked. It would not do at all to start seeing her in that desirable light. He brought the slipper down several more times, slapping her bottom until she stopped trying to resist and fell into a tearfully submissive state. In the time it took to physically convince her of the folly of her ways, her bottom had turned an angry red color with some darker patches that he feared would probably bruise.

“Get up,” he snapped curtly. She pushed off the table, her hair tangled around her face and matted in tears. He took her by the chin and forced her to look at him.“Don't you ever try to hit me, you understand?” He spoke in a low, threatening growl. “You do that again and you won't sit again for a long time.”

She nodded, but that wasn't enough for him. “Speak,” he snapped at her.

“I won't do it again,” she promised, her voice cracking with tears.

“No you won't. You're not done paying for that little stunt either,” he informed her. “Go get packed up.”

Zora didn't need telling twice, she yanked up her pants and rushed out of the room as quickly as her legs would carry her.

***

“Fucking asshole,” Zora muttered to herself as she packed some things into the black bag she'd been given for the purpose. Savage's threat of making it so she couldn't sit had been made a reality. That damn slipper hurt even more than the tawse thing. It wasn't just her bottom that was bruised either, her ego had taken a pounding over Savage’s desk too. She'd been so sure she'd found a way out of his punishments, but her plan for avoiding more spankings by fighting back when he tried giving her one had failed miserably.

She didn't have time to lick her wounds however, not ten minutes later Savage was in the doorway. “Ready?” He snapped the question at her, he was clearly back into hard ass mode. There was not the slightest bit of warmth in his expression, his face was like granite as he glowered at her.

He took her down to the transport bay where she was loaded into a windowless van with bench seats flanking the sides of it. It rather reminded her of a prison van, but it was slightly more well appointed with a desk in the middle. Savage got into the back with her and another man, the one she recognized from the day Savage had accosted her at her apartment got in the front to drive. To her embarrassment, she was forced to try to sit with Savage watching her. She tried to do so as gingerly as possible, but putting pressure on her bottom was unpleasant in the extreme. The moment she put her full weight on the seat she let out an involuntary yelp of pain. She didn't look at Savage but she knew he probably had a look of satisfaction on his face. He enjoyed beating her, she was sure of it.

“Lay down if you want,” he said gruffly. “This will be a long trip.”

Zora didn't want to lay down, but she also didn't want to sit on her sore ass the whole time. When the van started moving, jolting her backside as it went over increasingly bumpy ground she quickly elected to spread out on the vinyl seat on her stomach. Savage sat near the front of the van, his long legs stretched out in front of him, his arms folded across his chest. He nodded when he saw her taking the common sense approach to avoiding more pain. “Better?”

“I guess,” she said. It was a lot better actually, but she wasn't going to tell him how much he'd managed to unsettle her with his spanking, it would only encourage him.

“You've taken a hell of a hiding lately. Your rear looks like a war zone,” Savage said conversationally, as if there was nothing strange at all about discussing the state of her bottom.

She frowned at his matter of fact description. “Of course it hurts. You hit me with a shoe.”

There wasn't so much as a scrap of guilt on his face. “You deserved it. Tell me. What were you thinking?”

Growling to herself, Zora wished there was some way of escaping the conversation, but she was locked in a small, fast moving box with the man and there was no way out. “I was thinking I didn't want you to hit me anymore.”

“So you thought you'd kick me?” Savage smirked at what he clearly considered a laughable plan. “Not the brightest idea you've ever had.”

Fuck it, Zora thought to herself. She may as well tell him what she thought of him. “You're a bully,” she said. “You only hit me because you can.”

“No,” he shook his head. “I hit you because you need it.”

“That's insane,” Zora argued. “Nobody needs to be hit.”

“You do. You don't understand that you can't always get your way. You don't understand how important it is you do what you're told when you're told. There won't always be time to argue. In some matters, hesitation means death.”

“Not for me though,” Zora persisted. “I just do math. Who cares how I behave?”

“I do,” Savage said heavily.

“And we're back to square one. You hit me because you like hitting me.”

“If I hit you because I liked hitting you, I'd be spanking you right now,” Savage said, his voice low.

Zora caught the hint of a warning, but it only served to confuse her. She couldn't work out what she was doing wrong, if anything. She fell into silence as they traveled along fresh roads. Her bottom stung and twinged periodically, reminding her over and over again what he had done to her. “I just don't understand,” she said softly.

“You don't need to understand, you just need to obey.” The sentence sounded like a line right out of the hard ass training manual, and Zora wasn't buying it for a moment.

“When are you going to tell me what's going on?”

Savage sighed, his voice strained like that of a parent who has been asked a myriad of times if they were there yet. “Soon.”

“Not fair,” Zora pouted, burying her head in her crossed arms. He wanted her for something. He wanted her for something so bad he'd broken laws to get her and now he was telling her she had no right to know what it was. She didn't believe his promises to tell her at some point in the future. He was keeping secrets, and those secrets couldn't be good.

She closed her eyes, but even with her eyes closed she could feel his presence close by. He was solid, unyielding. A total mystery in many respects. She knew very little about him. He wasn't married, she could deduce that from the fact that he didn't wear a wedding ring. Did he have a partner? It seemed unlikely given the amount of time he spent working. Surely he was too handsome to be single though, women usually swooned for the military type, especially one who could be courteous and charming when he wanted to be. Catching herself at the beginning of a dangerously soppy spiral of thought, Zora berated herself silently. It didn't matter how attractive he was, he certainly wasn't interested in her. He'd seen her half naked more often than her last boyfriend had and he was completely indifferent to her apart from when she displeased him in some way.

Her mind drifted back to the evening he'd used the tawse on her, when she had been too upset to stand or speak he had held her gently and spoken to her with some small trace of affection. The mere memory of the moment made her feel warm all over. It had been such a fleeting moment though, and he had left her to her fear and misery afterward as usual. No, she couldn't start to think he cared, it was too obvious that he did not. She had no-one. She was utterly alone. Thinking that Savage was interested in her in any way other than a useful tool was just wishful dreaming.

“I know this is confusing and frightening.” His voice broke into her mental tirade. “But I'm going to do my damnedest to keep you safe, do you understand? Even from yourself.”

Zora's eyes fluttered open. “Keep me safe? Am I in danger?”

The look on Savage's face was conflicted. “I was going to wait to tell you this until you'd learned to trust me more, but it doesn't change anything one way or another and at this rate I'll be thrashing you until kingdom come.”

“Okay,” Zora said, scrambling up into a half sitting position. “Tell me.”

His eyes were dark and serious as he looked at her. “We need you for your math skills, Zora, that much is true, but you won't be working at the compound. You'll be in the field.”

“In the...” Zora's mouth dropped open as she realized what he meant. “You mean getting shot at?”

“Hopefully not, but it is a possibility,” Savage nodded.

“No. Fucking. Way,” Zora said, emphasizing each word. “You've got the wrong person.”

“I don't think so,” he shook his head.

“Yes, you do. I can't go out and do things like that. I'm a fucking accountant! I watch television! You need some G.I Jane lady.”

Savage smiled slightly. “You watch too many movies.”

“No, I watch enough movies,” Zora disagreed. “I watch just enough movies to keep me safe inside and not out in the middle of nowhere getting shot at.” She sat back, then yelped as her sore backside made full contact with the seat. “This is why you've been thrashing me? Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Watch your language, Ms Matthews,” Savage said sternly.

“Fuck off. My language is the least of your worries.”

“I will take your pants down in this van,” he warned.

“God, I don't care,” Zora frowned. She'd been sitting there wondering if he liked her and the whole time he was planning to get her shot at. “Fuck, I am such an idiot,” she exclaimed.

Savage's demeanor was swiftly returning to that of the no nonsense disciplinarian. “One more time and you'll be back over my knee.”

“Stop it,” Zora insisted. “Stop fucking....”

She did not get much further. True to his word, Savage reached for her and manhandled her across the small space between them. “No!” Zora shrieked, suddenly aware of the very real threat to her bottom. “Please!” She was pressed up against his body, mere inches from being over his knee. She tried to resist, but his muscles were like bands of iron. She was helpless when he wanted to enforce his will and in short order she ended up face down, balancing over one of his thighs like a see saw.

“Now listen,” Savage said firmly, placing his hand on her bottom. “I know you're afraid. But trust me, I am not going to let anything happen to this,” he patted her rear gently. “And once we're done training, you'll be ready for whatever the world has to throw at you, okay?”

His hand was large and warm, and the feeling of it against her sore bottom was strangely comforting. The same strength that had frightened her moments before was now being presented in a different light, as a sheltering force. “Why would you do that? Why would you care what happened to me?”

“Because underneath it all you're an innocent woman who doesn't deserve what's happening to her,” Savage said. “That's the way of the world. Bad things happen to good people. I joined the military because I wanted to stop some of those things. You're not going to be harmed on my watch as long as you do as you're told.”

She couldn't see his face, all she could see was the carpet on the van floor, but there was a note of very real sincerity in his voice. Instinctively she trusted him. He was not denying the danger, but he was offering her some measure of protection from it. “Thank you for telling me what's going on at least,” she said, finding some measure of gratitude.

“You're welcome,” he replied, letting her up. “When we get to the camp I'll get you some lotion for your behind,” he said, glancing towards her rear as she kneeled on the seat, keeping her hind quarters out of contact.

“That's awfully kind of you,” she mumbled. She did not move back to the side of the van she'd been on.  Instead she perched where he'd let her up, close enough to him that they were almost touching.

“You'll be briefed on the exact details closer to the time,” he informed her. “But I can tell you this, it should be a clean and simple operation, no casualties, no fire.”

Zora nodded and picked at a spot on the desk with her index finger. Her nerves were all too clear and he reached out and clasped her shoulder. “You'll be fine.”

“What if I can't do this?” She echoed the question he had refused to answer days before.

“You can do it,” Savage said confidently.

She looked at him sidelong. “What makes you so sure of that?”

“Well,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back on the seat. “For starters, it took almost twelve hours to pick you up because you did a Houdini out the window at the first sign of trouble.” He gave her a stern look and Zora smiled a little at the memory. “Secondly, just this morning you took it into your head to try to fight with someone much larger than you who had already shown he was prepared to cause you pain. You may not make the best decisions all the time, but you're more than brave enough to deal with this mission.”

“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 spirits 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.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Zora stayed motionless for a few minutes before gathering the nerve to move. When she popped her head back up above the line of mulch and bark she couldn't see or hear anything. Standing up gingerly, she shrieked as a powerful hand came down on her shoulder, accompanied by a low drawl. “There you are, Ms Matthews.”

“Oh god,” she whimpered. “Please don't hurt me.”

“That was quite the little chase,” Savage noted as he urged her towards the cabin. How he'd found her she didn't know, but he'd managed to move almost silently in the forest and now he was looking at her with grim satisfaction that did not bode well at all.

“It wasn't my fault, I didn't mean it, I... I wasn't trying to be bad,” Zora stammered. Whenever he was this close she was reminded just how much bigger and stronger he was and as they walked her heart sank into her stomach with every step.  He was going to destroy her.

“Well you did a remarkable job of it for someone who wasn't trying,” Savage said, ushering her into the confines of the cabin. He wasn't so obviously angry anymore, but she knew well enough that didn't mean anything. He hardly ever seemed angry when he punished her.

“Right,” he said when the door was bolted with them both safely inside. “We need to have a talk.”

“I'm sorry,” Zora apologized. “I got scared.”

Savage sat down at the table, not breaking eye contact with her for a moment. “Well that's a first I think.”

“It's not the first time I've been scared,” she said, confused.

He shook his head. “I mean it's the first time you've apologized prior to having your backside tanned.”

“Maybe I'm learning?” She spoke hopefully, clasping her hands behind her back, keeping just out of arm's reach. She kept glancing towards his thighs, hoping that she was not about to end up over them.

“I'll consider you to have learned when you no longer think that leaping out of a window will solve your problems,” he said sternly.

“You were mad!” Zora tried to defend her actions, but she was forced to step back when he rose from his seat and came towards her.

“Because you were unbelievably foul mouthed and you attempted to escape your punishment and on top of that you locked me out then disobeyed me again when I told you to let me in. You finished things off by jumping out a window for the second time in our acquaintance and hid in the forest until I tracked you down,” he paused for breath before continuing. “That's quite a mouthful of misbehavior, isn't it Ms Matthews?”

“Yes,” Zora agreed mournfully.

He put his hands on his hips and shook his head at her. “You're writing checks with your behavior that your backside can't cash, Zora.”

“I know,” she agreed. Her lower lip began trembling. She was terribly afraid of what was going to happen next. She squeaked with fear when he grabbed her firmly and pulled her shorts and panties down. His sigh of displeasure as he looked at her bottom didn't make her feel any better.

“We'll deal with most of this in the morning,” he announced, putting her clothes to rights once more. For the moment, stay here.”

She stood where she was, watching curiously as he went to his toilet bag and pulled out a bar of soap. “What are you...”

“Open,” he said, holding the bar of soap out towards her.

Zora's eyes became wide with incredulity. “Open what?”

“Your mouth,” he said dryly.

“You are not putting soap in my mouth,” Zora spluttered.

“Yes I am. Perhaps this will teach you not to express every foul thought that comes into your head.”

“It wasn't that baaa...” Zora protested. As she opened her mouth to say 'bad', Savage slipped the soap in and held it there whilst she squirmed and foamed. It was the same trick he'd used to get the gag in her mouth and she felt stupid for falling for it twice. The soap tasted bitter as all heck and she was forced to concentrate on not swallowing any of it as it began to bubble inside her mouth.

When he finally removed it after what felt like an age, she rushed to the door and spat foaming soap bubbles into the grass outside. Her face was flushed bright red with outrage and embarrassment. With that single act he'd managed to make her feel more like a bratty child being punished by a school master than he ever had when spanking her. She wanted to cry, but she refused to give him the satisfaction.

“You're supposed to wait until you're told to rinse, but I'll make an exception on this occasion,” Savage said, appearing by her side and holding out a bottle of water. She took it and rinsed her mouth which helped a little, but the bitter taste still lurked especially where the bar had managed to grind over her teeth, leaving shavings of soap. Pouting to herself, Zora slinked inside and curled up on one of the bedrolls on her side. The punishments never seemed to end with this man. When one wasn't possible, he just found another. It was quickly getting to the point where she wouldn't be able to do anything except what he said. It wasn't fair. She was a grown woman and he was reducing her to a petty subordinate whose opinions and thoughts didn't matter in the slightest.

“You're cute when you pout.” The low rumble of his voice surprised her. She looked up at him, surprised that he had said anything remotely positive to her at all, let alone a compliment. He was looking at her with an amused smile, as if he was enjoying her reaction.

“Well I am glad my pain amuses you,” she said stiffly.

He laughed. “You're not in pain.”

“I am in mental and emotional pain,” she asserted.

His lips quirked. “Is that so?”

“Yes. Yes it is. That was cruel and unusual punishment.”

A dark smirk established itself on his handsome features. “When you say things like that, Ms Matthews, it rather makes me want to show you what cruel and unusual punishment actually is.” He spoke in a purposeful drawl that made the words sound like more than just an idle threat. He spoke like a man who knew what he was talking about. What if he was some kind of sick sadist? Zora wouldn't have put it past him, after all, a man who thought spanking a grown woman was appropriate probably had some very strange ideas about other things too. His smile grew wider as she sat there silently. “Now you're curious, aren't you?”

A tingle of excitement zipped through Zora's lower belly. She forgot all about the taste of soap in her mouth as she looked into his eyes and saw something new there, something more open and more intimate than he'd shown her before. “I'm always curious,” she said, “but judging by what you've done to me today, I'm guessing you'd just end up sticking a bunch of things in my mouth.”

She'd intended it to be a witty, playful comment, but the moment it left her lips she realized how sexually charged it really was. “Sorry,” she squeaked, covering her mouth with her hand. His deep chuckle made her squirm quite involuntarily. “You'd be lucky,” he smiled. “Now get over here and get dinner started.”

“What's the point of making dinner when all I can taste is soap?” Zora argued almost reflexively. His smile faded into a punitive frown and just like that, the moment was gone. The fragile spark of mutual attraction faded into their usual dynamic of command and churlish rebellion.

Chapter Seven

Evening came to the mountains bringing with it the sort of silent calm that is unique to the uncivilized parts of the world where traffic and street lights are alien. Safely tucked up in the cabin Zora knelt on her sleeping bag and nursed a cup of tea whilst Savage tapped away on the computer she wasn't allowed to look at, much less touch. The uneasy and unspoken truce that had been declared and maintained for most of the evening was shattered when Savage checked his watch. “Time to go to bed,” he announced, closing the lid of the laptop.

Zora almost snarled. Not because she wasn't tired, she was exhausted physically and emotionally. No, the impulse that made her upper lip rise was born of frustration. She slammed her mug down on the table with petulant vigor and glowered at him under drawn brows.

“Let's not end the evening with a tantrum please,” Savage said in mild tones. She wished she knew what he was thinking, she wished she knew of some way to unsettle him, some way to claw back the power he'd taken from her so easily. But there were no hints, no clues. “You can get cleaned up and changed, or I can do that for you,” he said calmly, laying out a false dichotomy. It was a cheap trick and it wouldn't work on her.  She growled, but the growl caught in her throat and turned into a cough. Instead of sounding threatening, she sounded like a cat with a fur-ball. He smirked at the sound. “What on earth was that?”

“Shut up,” Zora muttered, breaking the self imposed silence she'd maintained for over an hour.

“Enough.” His tone became curt as his expression hardened. “I'm not going to tolerate any more disobedience or rudeness from you tonight. Go get ready for bed.” He gestured towards the door Zora hadn't noticed when she first arrived because it was hidden behind a curtain. She'd been busting to go to the toilet before he'd casually pulled the dark fabric back and revealed the cabin's one luxury, a functioning bathroom with hot running water that was heated by the fire.

Zora's bottom lip slid past her upper lip as she folded her arms across her chest. His overbearing attitude did nothing but make her more resistant. “Very well,” Savage said. “I guess we're going to do this the hard way, like we do everything else.” He closed the distance between them, took hold of her by the wrists and leaned down so that he was eye to eye with her. “Are you ready to go have a shower?”

“No,” Zora sulked. She was aware she was behaving childishly, but he was treating her like a child, so it was his fault. Where did he get off telling her she had to go and have a shower? Sure, she was covered in mud and dirt, but he had no right to question her personal hygiene. It was insulting, that's what it was.

“Okay,” Savage stood upright, hoisting her over his shoulder in one easy motion. Zora maintained her stoic pout as he carried her into the bathroom and deposited her unceremoniously in a sitting position on the toilet. He stood back, his arms folded over his broad chest. “If I leave you, are you going to have a shower?”

“No,” Zora growled.

“Very well then.” He reached down, grasped the bottom of her sweater and pulled it up and over her head. It was done so quickly that she reflexively lifted her arms to allow it to be pulled free of her body The next thing she knew, he was standing with her sweater in his hand and she was down one piece of clothing.

“Wait,” she squealed as his hands descended towards her undershirt. If she lost that, she'd be in her underwear in front of him.

He arched a brow at her. “Are you ready to do as you're told now?”

Zora's lips parted in dismay as she stared at him. “If I say no are you going to keep undressing me?”

“I am,” he confirmed.

“Surely you can't be serious.”

“I am serious, and don't call me Shirley.” He grinned as if he'd made the best joke in the world. When he smiled his entire handsome face was transformed by little dimples in his cheeks and laugh lines that crinkled around the corners of his eyes and mouth. The staunch, stern military man disappeared and a younger, more carefree man stood in his place. Smiling, he looked positively dashing and for a fleeting second, she almost smiled back.

Quickly making up for the close call in which she'd almost reacted positively to him, Zora stomped her foot. “Why can't you ever let me have my way?”

“Because that's not how this works,” Savage said, rolling up his sleeves in preparation for the coming battle of the undershirt. “ Besides, you're far too used to getting your own way.”

“How do you know? You don't know me,” she disagreed.

“I know you well enough, Ms Matthews,” he said, reaching down and taking hold of the back of her undershirt. She tried fighting him as he pulled it off, but her wriggling only made it easier for him to peel it away from her body. As a last resort she tried clamping her hands by her sides, but he tickled her and made her lift them.

Having lost her second to last defense,  Zora wrapped her hands over her bra clad bosom in a futile attempt to hide her body and glared at him. “Get out!”

“Are you going to have a shower?” His smile had grown wider and she knew it was because he'd glimpsed her cleavage. She was a fairly well endowed woman and the brassiere she wore just barely contained her breasts at the best of times. She'd been meaning to buy some new bras, but with one thing and another she'd never managed to get around to it and now she was half spilling out of something ridiculously lacy in front of her tormentor.

“Yes, I'll have a damn shower,” she growled. She had no choice. It was have a shower or be stripped naked and she would not allow him that victory.

“Thank you ma'am, that's all I wanted,” Savage said with exaggerated courtesy as he retired from the room with that damned annoying smile still plastered all over his face.

Zora shed the rest of her clothes and got into the shower, which was hot and wonderful. As the warm water beat down on her tired skin, she almost forgot how mad she was at Savage. The memory of being half way stripped by him wasn't going to fade quickly though, as she soaped her body, she remembered the way his hands had felt on her body, strong and sure. Under other circumstances it might have been erotic to have a determined man rid her of her clothing, under other circumstances she might not have hidden her breasts from view. Under other circumstances...

BANG! BANG! BANG! Savage's palm slammed against the door. “Five minutes and out, Ms Matthews,” he called.

“Oh FUCK you!” She shrieked the words almost reflexively, then squealed when the door opened. “Don't come in here!”

His tall, broad figure was shadowy behind the frosted shower door. “If you want to keep your modesty, you'll apologize now,” he growled.

“I'm sorry,” Zora whimpered. He did not reply, but he did leave the room. She finished up quickly, dried off and wrapped herself up in a towel as tight as it was possible. She had no clothes to change into in the bathroom, so she was forced to step out into the cabin wearing nothing more than a towel. Savage was waiting for her and he did not look happy.

“Get changed and get to bed,” he snapped. “If you're not in bed by the time I get back, you'll be feeling my palm across your ass.” He strode off into the bathroom, presumably to take a shower himself, leaving Zora to get dressed quickly. Instinct told her she'd pushed him enough for one evening, so she wasted no time in rolling out her bedroll and climbing inside her sleeping bag. Once inside, she wriggled around until she was at the very edge of the sleeping platform. The fact that they had to sleep together in the same room was bad enough, she wanted to be as far away from  him as possible.

A few minutes later, Savage emerged from the shower. He was a stickler for his own five minute rule apparently. Zora pretended to be asleep, but she couldn't help but peek through the blonde strands of her hair as he walked across the cabin. He was wearing nothing but a towel around his waist and she couldn't keep her eyes off his torso. Every muscle was defined and toned in a way that made her stifle a small sound of lust. He didn't walk, he stalked like a jungle cat, each one of his glorious muscles working visibly with each stride. It wasn't right to spy on him, it was completely wrong, but she was a woman with needs, needs that had long gone unsated and the sight of a mature male at the peak of physical fitness was like a beacon to her primitive brain.

He turned to face the fire, leaving his back to her and she bit her lower lip as he dropped the towel, revealing chiseled buttocks and long muscular legs. She was treated to the sight of his powerful body naked for just a moment, but it was a moment that would stay with her for a long time. His skin was still slightly damp and in her lust fevered brain he seemed to gleam in the reflected light of the fire like a mythical god.

All too quickly he pulled on a pair of boxer shorts and turned towards the sleeping platform. Zora squeezed her eyes shut quickly before he could see her looking at him. In the darkness she heard him shuffling about for a bit, then the swiffling sound of a sleeping bag told her that he was getting into bed. The platform sank a little as it took his weight when he lay down.

“Goodnight, Ms Matthews,” his deep timbre caressed her.

“Goodnight Captain,” she replied softly.  She barely dared breathe. She was lying not three feet away from his imposing figure, close enough that she could almost reach out and touch him. She turned and faced the cabin wall as a torrent of conflicting emotions crashed through her. He was infuriating and overbearing, but at the same time he was really really incredibly good looking. In the darkness of the night, Zora finally allowed herself to consciously acknowledge what had been creeping around the edges of her thoughts for days. She was attracted to him, and the worst thing about that attraction was the fact that it actually made her behave even more badly than usual. She'd managed to take a terrible situation and make it worse by becoming besotted with the man who was her captor. What a fool she was, what a stupid, silly fool.

***

As sunlight began to gently filter through the curtain, Savage woke up with a start. Years of training had taught him to rise out of sleep instantly alert at the slightest hint of danger. On this occasion he'd been woken by something touching him, pushing against him. Reflexively he reached for his weapon, but before his fingers could curl around the grip he saw the source of the pressure pushing him off his bed roll and left the gun where it was.

His gentle assailant was none other than Zora, fast asleep and snuggled up to his side as close as she could be. She'd insisted on going to sleep as far away from him as possible on the other side of the platform so the fact that she'd abandoned her own bedroll and wriggled several feet in the night to be pressed up against him made him smile as he relaxed.

In the faint light of the morning, Savage watched her sleep. When she was unconscious her frown faded and her expression became sweet. He let her lay on him, smiling to himself when she growled in her sleep, nuzzled under his arm and started drooling on his chest. Even unconscious she was a demanding little witch. It would have been easy to get comfortable, even fall back to sleep with her weight there a pleasant reminder that it wasn't all shouting and misbehavior, but he couldn't allow himself that luxury. “Don't start playing happy families, Brett,” he muttered to himself.

Gently shifting over, he extracted himself from his sleeping bag and left Zora clutching his pillow fiercely. She barely stirred as he moved away and stoked the fire that had burned low in the grate all night long. He managed to put a pot of water on top of the wood burner and have it get close to boiling point before the activity woke her. As she emerged into consciousness she stirred and rolled over, groaning in protest.

“Morning,” he said pleasantly. “Want coffee?”

Zora sat up, rubbing her eyes. “Yes please,” she said in a surprisingly well mannered tone.

“Sugar? Milk?”

“Milk, no sugar thanks,” she said tiredly, pulling the bag up around herself as she sat cross legged on the platform. He was glad to see her sitting normally, her backside had taken considerable punishment of late. Though he was a believer in discipline, he didn't like to leave a woman unable to sit unless it was really necessary. When the coffee was ready he handed her a cup of the brew and they sat together in the silence of the early morning, each lost in their own thoughts.

He was aware that she was watching him warily. Wondering, no doubt, what lay in store for her that day. Savage pondered that question himself. In spite of what he'd told her, the point of taking her up to the mountains wasn't for physical training. The running they'd done the previous day had been designed largely to tire her out. No, the real reason he wanted this time with her was to establish some kind of bond that would mean she'd listen to him in the field. He could thrash her all he wanted, but if she ran off in the middle of a mission, it could get them all killed.

“Toast?”

“Sure,” Zora said, her tone laced with suspicion. Savage smiled and began preparing the toast by sticking bread on a skewer and holding it near the flames.

“I think its time you and I had a talk, Ms Matthews,” he said as he kept the bread balanced neatly on the knife edge between gently toasting and bursting into flames.

“About what?”

“About whatever you want to talk about,” he said. “You have questions, I'm sure.”

“You've already answered all my questions by beating me,” Zora bit out sarcastically. “Everything I needed to know, I learned from getting hit.”

“Zora,” his voice was patient and low. “I'm not going to fight with you. If you don't want to talk, we can just go on another run.” He expertly slid the toast off the skewer and handed it to her on a tin plate. She took it with muttered thanks, the sulky expression stuck on her face.

“I thought you were going to hit me again today,” she said, picking at the toast.

“That depends on you actually,” he said, skewering another slice of bread.

“How's that?”

“I'm hoping we can come to an understanding,” Savage glanced over at her. “We don't know each other very well, but what we're going to be doing in a few days, that requires the sort of trust that takes months or longer to build.”

“Well then we're pretty fucked,” Zora muttered, pinching the toast together and stuffing it into her mouth. “Unless you can hit someone into trusting you,” she blurted messily around the half chewed wad of bread.

“Is the foul language really necessary?” He tried to keep the sharp tone out of his voice, but she was already testing his patience to its limits with her prickly attitude.

“No, but it makes me feel better.”

He gazed into the flames, trying to think of a way to defuse the situation and win her over. She was so damned contrary, in fact she was hell on wheels, but he couldn't exactly blame her. If he'd been in her position he wouldn't exactly be cooperative either. He'd been an idiot, he realized. Spanking her wasn't getting the desired results, at least not the way he'd been going about it anyway. He could whip her backside until the cows came home and she'd remain truculent. Getting into a battles of wills with Zora Matthews was like getting into a battle of wills with a tank.

“How bad is it going to be?” Zora asked, breaking the silence and his train of thought.

He glanced at her. “Depends what you're asking about.”

“This mission we're going on,” she clarified, mumbling into her coffee cup.

Surprise swept through Savage. Maybe he was getting through to her after all. “Well, the way its planned at the moment it won't be bad. This isn't a matter of brute force, this is a matter of deactivating a system. Once we've done that, our job is over.”

Zora nodded. “So I just have to go into a room and do a few calculations? That's it?”

Savage nodded. “That's it.”

“You'll be there, right?” The slight tremor in her voice belied the rough delivery. Underneath the bravado and the casual cussing he could see she was afraid.

He smiled at her reassuringly. “You won't be out of my sight for a second. There's an entire team backing you up.”

Her surprise was clear. “Really?”

“Oh yes,” he nodded. “I've got five of my best picked for this, Ms Matthews. You're going to be very well protected.”

“This must be important,” she said softly, her brow furrowing as she cradled her cup in her hands.

“It is,” Savage confirmed. “Very. This is no small job we're talking about here. This is a game changer. A great deal hinges on this success of the mission.”

“Like what?”

“Like the stability of Eastern Europe and potentially the world,” he said plainly. “We're talking about a nuclear threat.”

“Nuclear?” She barked with the sudden laughter of surprise, not humor. “What the fuck? Nuclear threat? What the hell are you getting me into Savage? That shit is serious.”

“It is,” Savage agreed, doing his best to dismiss the torrent of foul language spilling between  her lips.

“And you need someone like me to help you?” She shook her head. “You must really be desperate. Damn. I've been a pain, haven't I?” The last part of her statement came as something of an afterthought and it caught Savage off guard, making him chuckle.

“You could say that,” he agreed honestly.

She sat there, shaking her head and muttering the word 'nuclear' in between a series of swear words. Savage watched her quickly, half expecting her to make a dash for the door. “Damn,” she repeated herself, looking at him with a new, open gaze. “Nuclear.”

“Yes,” he confirmed. “Nuclear.”

“Nuclear,” Zora shook her head again. “And I'm... you need me?”

“We do.” He kept his answers short, letting her come to terms with the news in her own epithet filled way.

“Wow. I'm sorry, sort of,” Zora said. “I mean, I'm not sorry for most of it, but I'm sorry for... I don't know.” She blushed and stumbled over her words. “I don't know,” she repeated herself. “Nothing I'm worried about seems to matter compared to some nuclear shit. That hurts people.”

Savage was impressed and almost shocked. For the first time, Zora was openly acknowledging that something mattered besides her own fairly insular concerns. He'd taken her for an entirely self centered brat, but perhaps she was just a brat.

“None of this has been easy for you.” he said, abandoning his toast on his plate. “It doesn't have to be so hard though. You just need to do as you're told.”

“I don't know,” she frowned. “I don't like the way you boss me around, or the way you treat me like a child, but I do want to help.” Zora looked up at him, a frown on her face. “Do you know this is the first time you've bothered to have a proper conversation with me?”

She had a point, Savage had to concede inwardly. He'd been spending so much time trying to dominate her into submission he hadn't bothered to actually converse with her. “I mean usually you just hit me and walk away,” she said reproachfully.

“That's true,” he agreed. “Because I am treating you like I would treat one of my soldiers.”

Zora looked incredulous. “You spank your soldiers?”

“No,” he smiled wryly.

“I'm not a soldier,” Zora said. “I'm just a woman who can add a bit quicker than most. I don't like being treated like I'm an awful person because I want to have a drink or speak my mind.”

“I've never thought you were an awful person,” he said quickly, frowning at the idea that was what she had taken away from their interaction.

“But that's how you treat me. You gag me and shove soap in my mouth and hit me.” Her lower lip began to tremble slightly as she recounted the punishments which had clearly upset her more than she'd been letting on. “And you want to hit me with a switch today, whatever that is.”

“I'm sorry,” he said earnestly. “I'm used to dealing with people in a certain way. They do what I say, period. There's no discussion, no room for consideration of feelings. You might not be a soldier, but I need to train you like one so that you can do what we need you to do.”

“But you're not training me like a soldier. You just said that you don't spank your soldiers,” Zora said, her face reflecting her confusion. “You're treating me like I'm something you own, something that should never dare to disobey you.”

She was right. From the moment he'd carried her semi conscious body into the compound, Savage had been deeply possessive of her. He'd told himself it was because of the mission, because it was important that she learn to obey, but it had been more than that. Zora had challenged him from the moment she'd met him, she hadn't been afraid of him even when he showed her that he was prepared to use force to make her do as she was told. He was quite taken with her, and though he'd told himself that he was enforcing some kind of discipline, he was enforcing more than discipline, he was enforcing his dominion over her.

“I'm an old fashioned man,” he said in heavy tones as he began to confess. “You don't fall under the normal guidelines. All I had to do was get you to cooperate by any means necessary. I could have threatened you with endless jail time, I could have worn you down in other ways, but the moment I laid eyes on you I just wanted to spank you.”

“What?” Zora shook her head in disbelief. “Why?”

“Because,” he smiled at her. “You're a brat. You're a grown woman who behaves as if none of the usual rules apply to her.”

Zora shrugged, her features composed in a completely matter of fact poker face. “They don't.”

Chapter Eight

“So you do believe you're a law unto yourself.” Savage laughed at her brazen statement and sat back, leaning against the table with his arms folded across his broad chest. “How do you figure that, Ms Matthews?” His eyes crinkled at the corners with pure amusement as he waited for her to enlighten him.

It was Zora's turn to sigh as she searched for an explanation that would make sense. “When you're good at something, really good at something, it doesn't matter what else you do, people will cut you slack. When I was a kid I could do what I wanted at school. One time I set a desk on fire because they wouldn't let me out of class to play outside.”

“You set a desk on fire?” Savage's brows drew together in disapproval.

“Yeah,” Zora half grinned at the memory. “They would have suspended anyone else.  Probably sent them to a shrink. You know what they did to me?”

“I can't imagine,” he rumbled.

“They gave me the rest of the day off to 'collect myself',” Zora laughed. “I was their golden child. I could do no wrong.”

“So you've never been given the discipline you need,” Savage said softly. “No wonder you don't like it now.”

“I had a degree when I was thirteen,” Zora said. “Didn't have to get a job until I was twenty seven, and then I just screwed around until they fired me.”

“That's when you started drinking?”

“Nah,” Zora picked at her sleeping bag. “I've been drinking since I was fifteen.”

“My instincts were correct,” Savage said, leaning towards her, his large hands clasped between his legs.  “You are a spoiled little brat.”

A naughty little smile crept across her lips and she looked up at him under her lashes. “I figured it would be the same when I found out why you grabbed me,” she admitted. “You needed me to do something, so I figured I could do whatever I wanted. Eventually you'd let me have my way because you needed me.”

“That didn't work out as you planned, did it?” Savage chuckled.

“Not at all,” Zora smiled ruefully. “Not at all.”

They were both alien to one another. She'd never met anyone like him and he'd certainly never met anyone like her. He was used to people who did their jobs, fell in line and behaved themselves. He lived in a world where obedience to one's superiors wasn't just mandatory, it was as natural as breathing. She lived in a world where she was the only authority, and a poor one at that.

“I still can't believe the things you do to me.” She paused and looked at him quickly before bowing her head again. “Yesterday, I... I felt silly. I was running around like a little kid in trouble and then you... made me eat soap.”

“Brought it home to you, did it?”

“Yeah,” Zora nodded. She was in full confession mode and the truth spilled out of her lips regardless of the wisdom of sharing it with the man who spanked her. “I should have just quit when I was ahead. But I kept doing things because I didn't want you to know...” She trailed off, glancing at him quickly as if to see if she was sharing too much.

“Didn't want me to know what?” He spoke in soft, cajoling tones.

“That I'm scared of you, of the spankings,” she said quietly. “I don't want to keep getting beaten.”

“Well there is a simple way around that,” Savage said, shifting to sit on the platform near her. There was a vulnerability in her eyes that drew him in, convinced him to drop the super stern facade for a moment at least.

“What? Just do as I'm told? Change the habits of a lifetime in a few short weeks? Become a totally different person? It's not that easy,” Zora wiped her eyes on her sleeve. “Especially when I know you'll get rid of me when I'm no use to you anymore.”

There it was, the pain that underlay all her prickly resistance. Zora Matthews was used to being used for her talents and cast off once she'd performed. Savage's heart went out to her. No wonder she'd been so unimpressed when it turned out that she was needed by the government. She'd always been needed, but she'd never been wanted.

“Listen Zora,” Savage took her chin and gently turned her face towards him. “I'm here to help you, okay? I'm not going to stop spanking you when I think you need it, but you can talk to me. I won't leave you alone afterward anymore. You deserve better than that.”

She nodded timidly, the look in her eyes wary as if she couldn't quite believe what he was saying. “Come here,” he said, pulling her into a hug. “I know you think you've only ever been wanted or needed for one thing,” he said, stroking her hair. “But I'm not going to treat you that way. You're going to have rules and consequences because you need them. Yes, you have a job to do, but that's not where my interest ends, understand? You're a beautiful, intelligent woman who deserves to be cared about for more than just her mind.”

Zora's shoulders shook as she dissolved silently into long overdue tears. He held her as she cried, knowing that he had now well and truly crossed the line. He could no longer pretend that she was just another soldier to him. What she was precisely he couldn't say, what he did know is that he felt compelled to guide and care for her, and he intended to do both to the best of his ability.

“Let me take care of you,” he murmured.

“Nobody can take care of me,” Zora sniffled against his neck. “I'm too bad. Eventually you'll get tired of me, like all the others.”

“Oh no no,” Savage's voice rumbled deeply. “Don't you get it yet, Zora? I enjoy your rebellion. You can be as bad as you want to be, little girl. You'll always end up in the same place.”

“Where's that?”

“Let me show you,” his voice was a low purr as he gently guided her out of her sleeping bag and over his lap. She did not resist like she usually did and soon she lay over his lap wearing only a tank top and a pair of pink panties. “This is where you'll always end up,” he said, patting the curve of her cheek. “Every time you misbehave.” He slapped her bottom with a swift, sharp smack. “Every time you test me.” Another slap landed across her lower cheeks. “You'll find my lap ready and waiting for you.”

Zora squeaked when the slaps landed, but she did not thrash about or beg to be let up, instead she squirmed her hips in a subtle but sinuous grind, pressing herself against his hard thigh. Savage caught a groan in his throat. She had no idea what she was doing to him, what the sight of her rounded cheeks slowly gyrating over his lap did.

He spent a few moments rubbing her bottom and massaging her cheeks. The object of the exercise wasn't to cause pain, it was to teach her that there was comfort to be found over his lap too. He couldn't  give into the erotic charge that ran between them, that would only teach her that he wanted her for her body, it would be another way he would be taking advantage of her, using her for his own ends.

“Do you understand what I am saying?” His voice was hoarse as he let her up and let her sit on his knee. She was lighter than he'd thought she would be, and the weight of her head against his chest was pleasant, not to mention the curve of her hip pressed against the erection he was doing his damnedest to ignore.

“I understand,” she spoke in a whisper.

He stroked the hair back from her head. “When we go out there, I won't be this way with you. I'm going to give you orders and you're going to follow them, understand? In private we can talk and discuss things. When we're at work, there's no discussion, you do as you're told. People's lives depend on it.” Her face flushed with what was either fear or rebellion, but she did not argue, she simply nodded.

Savage was pleased. Finally they were at the point where he was not just another authority figure to be flouted. He could work with her now. She wouldn't be perfect, but she'd at least be willing to seriously try to help. It was time to bring in the team.

***

A new day broke and found Zora in good mood even before she woke up. She'd had very pleasant dreams in the night, dreams of a muscled man with a gravelly voice who commanded her body in the lewdest of acts. As consciousness returned she remembered what it felt like to be cradled on Savage's lap, to hear his deep voice reassure rather than chastise her. She was filled with a fuzzy warm feeling that made her look forward to the day ahead.

She tossed the sleeping bag off and stretched in the middle of the cabin. She was only wearing a tank top and the panties he'd lightly spanked her in the night before. Once he'd finished laying down the law he'd put her straight to bed, there had been no need for pajamas.

But where was he?  Looking around, Zora realized that Savage wasn't in the cabin. It was much later in the day than she'd expected it to be, sun streamed in the back window with full strength. He must have taken pity on her and let her sleep in. Maybe he was going to be a nice guy. Maybe he was going to go easy on her now.

She was caught up in her fuzzy warm thoughts when voices made her jump. Loud voices, male voices, very close. She didn't have time to retreat to her sleeping bag before the door opened and a bunch of complete strangers tramped in, catching her in her underwear, or as Savage probably would have quipped in one of his rare silly moods, catching her underwears.

There were three men and one woman, followed by Brian and Savage. Zora squealed in surprise and smartly retreated to her sleeping bag, draping it over her lower body as she stared at the newcomers with a mixture of surprise and irritation.

“This is the genius?” The woman spoke first, a note of snark in her tone that made the other three men grin like chimpanzees. Instantly offended, Zora glared at them all. One of the men was a short, stocky guy shorter than her. He had a barrel chest, thick black hair that had been buzzed into some semblance of order and dark eyes that glittered with the casual lechery of a stereotypical construction worker. Zora didn't much feel threatened by him. She was accustomed to running into men like him at the bars she frequented. Those types were usually harmless, no matter how stupid they sounded.

The other two men were typical military issue, tall and broad. One was clearly quite young, he hardly looked old enough to shave, but he had a zealous, eager look about him that made her think he'd probably toss himself into a volcano if Savage told him to. His brown hair was slightly longer than the others, a nod to modern masculine fashions. The other man was closer to her age she reckoned. He had a fine beard that graced his lower jaw and an equally fine mustache that didn't quite look properly grown in. His expression held more wisdom, and possibly more pain. He did not smirk as much as short guy and young guy, as Zora had labeled them in her head.

The woman was something different altogether. She was blonde, her hair swept back from her face in a severe pony tail. Her blue eyes were large and wide, her mouth generous and sensual. She looked like a damn model. If she'd not been wearing a black military uniform with guns strapped to her thighs, she'd have appeared almost out of place, save for the hard expression in those baby blues.

Zora wasn't usually a woman hating woman, but she wasn't above female rivalry and the hostile tone in the woman's taunt was enough to spark an instinctive reaction. There was a long silence as she and the blonde intruder stared at one another like two cats that had just surprised one another in a dark alley.

An awkward silence settled over the cabin until Savage cleared his throat and began making introductions. “Everyone, this is Zora, Zora, this is Tank,” he gestured to the short, stocky man. “Archie,” the young man waved with just a hint of awkwardness, “Steve,” the bearded fellow nodded. “And this is Anja. You know Brian already. This is the mission team.”

“Hi,” Zora said, forcing a smile. So these were the people who would have her life in their hands. As a group they were quite intimidating, especially with the way they were staring at her, sizing her up with critical eyes, finding her wanting. She squirmed uncomfortably where she sat, wishing they would look at someone else. Eventually Anja spoke, distracting the group, but Zora immediately wished she hadn't.

“So she's ready now? We're not going to be held up anymore? The world isn't going to be waiting for one woman?” Anja addressed the question to Savage, but it was Zora who felt her face grow red. Anja was obviously talking about her. Apparently the fact that she'd been resisting the call of duty was common knowledge. She wondered what else was common knowledge. Was she looking at a group of strangers who knew she got spanked? The idea made her toes curl.

“We weren't held up, Anja,” Savage replied bluntly. “This would be a tall order for anyone.” That made Zora feel a little better, at least he was still on her side.

Anja didn't say anything else. She was evidently given to snark, but not to answering back to the boss. With the introductions over, the group took seats around the table in the center of the room and started chatting about various topics, none of which made any sense to Zora. She watched them silently for a bit before excusing herself to take a shower. She needed it desperately, not only because she was dirty, but because she needed some time apart to compose herself. With the arrival of the rest of the team, the mission suddenly seemed much more real. She rested her head against the shower wall, letting the hot water pour over her body. Could she really do this? Savage seemed to think so. She wasn't so sure.

When Zora emerged from the bathroom, the little group had made themselves quite at home. Anja and Savage were sitting next to one another sharing a joke about something. Savage was sitting on the bench seat with his powerful body turned towards the stunning blonde and she was faced towards him, straddling the seat so that she could give him his full attention. Zora found herself glowering at the younger woman, whose eyes were sparkling with attraction as she gazed at her commanding officer. Savage had probably never spanked her, but Zora wondered if he'd done other things with her. There was a certain intimacy between them that seemed to transcend mere camaraderie.

Zora wasn't usually a jealous person, but then again, she didn't usually get attached to anyone either. Last night she and Savage had really connected on some level and today it was like it had never happened. Now he was surrounded by his people and just like that he seemed almost like a stranger again. It was painfully obvious to Zora that she didn't belong amongst these people, she was an intruder, someone with useful skills, but not someone who understood their world.

She watched as Anja laughed and touched Savage on the arm. It was only a light touch, a touch that could have been considered casual, but there was something in the way she did it that made it seem more possessive than that. As her fingers trailed over Savage's forearm, Anja turned her head and shot a triumphant look at Zora.

Zora looked back at her blankly. It was strange to see this woman treating her like she was some kind of threat. Anja was probably in her mid twenties, tall, Nordic without an ounce of extra fat on her body. In sharp contrast, Zora knew damn well she looked chubby and old by comparison. Sure, she wasn't completely hideous, but Anja was treating her like a rival. It made no sense whatsoever. Scraping together what was left of her dignity, Zora retired to the corner of the cabin and pretended to read a book.

She would perhaps have lurked in a corner forever if somebody had not broken out cards and proposed a game of blackjack. Zora found herself interested, and she didn't turn down the invitation to have a round against Tank as the dealer. This was something she was good at. Something she could excel at. Anja was sneering at her back the whole time, but Zora ignored her and won hand after hand, impressing Tank, Archie and Steve considerably.

“Man, we have to take you to Vegas,” Tank said, his dark eyes lighting up at the prospect of easy money.

Zora grinned and shook her head. “Not allowed in Vegas anymore. Not without a pretty good disguise.”

“Why not?” Archie was unable to contain his curiosity.

She smiled at his impulsive question. “Took a million off a casino in a few hours one evening. They ask you not to come back once you do that.” She paused for effect, remembering the rather rough handling she'd received. “They ask you not to come back quite forcibly.”

Tank laughed uproariously. “That's classic. What did you do with the money?”

Zora glanced over at Savage. He was not taking part in the game, but seemed to have no objection to the rest of them playing it. He was listening now though and he was probably not going to like what he heard. “Blew the lot in the desert and on court fees,”  she shrugged. “Plus there's taxes. They never tell you about those.”

“So you're banned because you're a cheat. She's cheating now too,” Anja accused hotly. She seemed pleased to have found a character flaw she could exploit. It seemed petty to Zora, but hey, if blondie wanted to start something over cards, she wouldn't back down. Zora had too much experience with bullies to let Anja keep picking on her. You had to take them on early and take them down hard, or they'd pick on you forever.

“If by cheating you mean using my brain, then yeah, I'm cheating,” Zora said in bored tones. “You must think you're surrounded by cheats constantly.”

The big baby blue eyes grew dark with anger as Anja tried to pin down the insult. “What are you trying to say?”

“My bad,” Zora smirked. “I'll put it in little words. You're dumb.”It was a cheap shot, and Zora knew it. She was deliberately picking at what she knew would be a sore point. Anja was a good looking woman, and a blonde to boot. There wasn't a blonde on the planet who hadn't been made to feel like they were stupid at one point or another. She was willing to bet that Anja was often treated like she was a halfwit and that it annoyed her.

“Be nice, Zora,” Savage warned.

“I am being nice,” Zora said. “Dumb is a compliment when it comes to G.I. Barbie.” She turned and looked straight at Anja as she spoke, savoring every bitchy word.

The table went silent as everyone waited for Anja to respond. The tension that had been brewing since the women met was at boiling point and something was going to give. Zora was curious as to what was going to happen next, but what happened next surprised her greatly. Anja didn't fire off a snarky remark or appeal to Savage's authority to rein Zora in. She pressed her lips together and stood up from the table. For one brief, brilliant moment, Zora thought she'd won. Then Anja turned and took a swing, twisting her hips to put all the power of her toned body behind the punch.

It was a straight punch, easily deflected or avoided if you knew how to deflect or avoid such things. Zora had no idea how to do either. The blow landed square on her jaw. There was a flash of pain, then nothing but darkness.

***

She came back to consciousness to the loud and angry sound of Savage's voice. “What the hell do you think you're doing, soldier?” He was bellowing at the top of his lungs like a drill sergeant, shouting things that would have sounded hysterical and ridiculous if they weren't coming out of a very angry, very aggressive man. Anja was backed up against the far wall looking scared as hell. Savage was much larger than her and he was as up in her face as he could get without actually pressing his face against hers. His hands were balled into fists at his sides and as Zora watched woozily she wondered if he was going to hit her.

“Hey, you're back,” Brian smiled, acting as if nothing untoward was happening at all. He reached out gently, assessing her for injuries. She let him. Brian had never been anything but courteous to her, but even his light touch made her gasp with fresh pain. It hurt. It hurt bad. She'd never been hit before, not really. Not sober anyway. The pounding ache in her face made Savage's spankings feel like love taps in comparison. She was grateful for the soft sleeping bag under her head, they'd obviously carried her to the sleeping platform after she was knocked out. Tank, Archie and Steve were all gone, why Zora didn't know. Perhaps they didn't like hearing their commanding officer yell. Zora certainly didn't like hearing it. The bellowing continued, making her head hurt all the more. The man had some lungs on him, that was for sure. She wished he'd shut up, there wasn't much point coming over all alpha now. The damage had already been done.

“Get the hell out of my sight,” Savage finally shouted. Anja took to her heels, fleeing the cabin with a quick scurrying motion. She no longer looked scary, she looked like a dog that had been chastised by its owner. If she'd had a tail it would have been between her legs.

“Zora's awake, Sir,” Brian informed Savage.

Savage came striding across the room, his expression a mixture of anger and concern. “Is she okay?”

“She's fine. Nothing broken. I'll get an ice pack for the jaw.”

Momentarily left alone with Savage, Zora looked up at him with dopey eyes. He was mad, but she couldn't quite bring herself to care. She felt sick. “Damn Matthews,” he shook his head at her. “You know exactly what to say, don't you?”

“So it's my fault?” Maybe she did care. Anger flashed through her battered body. He was really going to stand there and tell her that it was her fault his psycho soldier hit her?

“No, it's not your fault,” he shook his head. “But you had a role to play.”

“I'm supposed to tip toe around psychotic bitches so they don't hit me? Is that it?” Zora wasn't sure where her bravery was coming from, but it could very well have been from the fact that the 'psychotic bitch' in question was no longer in the room.

Brian returned with the ice and together the two men helped her sit up. Savage knelt down in front of Zora and held the cold pack against her jaw. His eyes were dark with displeasure as he looked at her. She was more than a little miffed about that. Shouldn't he be glad she was alright?

“Do you have any sense of self preservation at all, Matthews?” He asked the question roughly.

She shrugged, wincing as the cold momentarily made the pain worse before it made it better. “I says it like I sees it.”

Savage groaned, using his free hand to cradle his forehead, as if he was the one who'd been punched in the face. “You're not going to make this easy, are you?”

“I'm not making anything hard,” Zora pointed out. “She hit me. I never laid a finger on her.”

“What is forty five thousand eight hundred and eighty nine multiplied by four thousand nine hundred and twenty?” The question came fast, out of left field from Brian.

“Two billion, two hundred fifty-seven million, seven hundred thirty-eight thousand and eight hundred,” Zora replied without batting an eyelid.

“Well her brain still works,” Brian noted. She wondered how he knew, then she realized he was looking down at a calculator watch on his wrist. Zora hadn't seen one of those in decades. It was cool, she decided as the waves of nausea that accompanied the onset of concussion rolled over her. Really cool. Maybe they didn't need her after all. Maybe Brian and his calculator watch could save the world instead. Eighties technology for the win.

Chapter Nine

Zora found the after effects of having been knocked out very unpleasant indeed. In addition to the pain in her jaw and the pounding in her head, her sense of balance seemed to have been affected quite significantly. She wavered where she sat, almost tipping over before Savage steadied her. “Easy there girl,” he said, his voice a low growl.

Out of all the trouble she'd given him, this seemed to be the worst as far as his reaction went. He was pissed and it showed in every line of his usually handsome face. With his forehead crumpled and his brows drawn together, his usually sensual lips pressed into a thin line, he looked like the devil himself.

“I feel sick,” Zora blurted. Savage could glare at her all he wanted, but if he kept sitting in front of her like that, there was a decent chance the contents of her stomach would end up all over him.

“We should get someone medical to look at her. She could be concussed.” Brian was a bright young man, a very bright young man, Zora thought to herself as she fought the waves of nausea.

Savage gave Zora a long look, apparently more concerned with lecturing her than getting her medical attention. “Be careful with that mouth of yours in future,” he cautioned her. “We can't afford to have you taken out of the game.”

“Be careful with those armed dingbats of yours,” Zora snapped back. “No offense, Brian.”

“None taken,” Brian replied with a nod and just a flicker of a wink. Zora smiled. She was starting to really warm to Brian, he had a way of getting things done without being pushy, unlike Captain Savage.

“Are you two quite finished?” Savage looked between them, frowning.

“Sorry sir,” Brian apologized quickly.

“Yes, sorry sir,” Zora parroted. She made to grin, but the motion made her face ache. “Ow,” she muttered. “At least tell me she's going to get a spanking,” she added as an afterthought.

A bursting bark of laughter erupted out of Brian. He bent forward, slapping his hand on his thigh as merriment rolled out of his body. Brian was usually very contained, very business like, but the idea of Anja getting a spanking was enough to crack the shell of propriety the young aide surrounded himself with. Zora giggled a little bit, finding his amusement contagious. When he laughed he was cute, maybe not sexy cute, but definitely friend cute.

“No Zora, I'm not going to spank her,” Savage shook his head. “But she will be punished.” He paused for a moment, giving her a dark look. “As will you.”

“Me!” Zora squealed. “I already got punched in the face. Isn't that punishment enough?”

“That wasn't a punishment. That was an overreaction.”

“No way,” Zora complained, her eyes wide. “No way, that's not even fair.”

He ignored her protestations and turned to address Brian, who had by that stage composed himself. “Get the van, would you Brian?” Brian saluted and made a quick exit, looking all too pleased to avoid the further displeasure of his commanding officer.

Zora perked up at the mention of the van. “Ooh, are we going somewhere?”

“You're going to see a doctor,” Savage reminded her, picking up her hand and lifting it to the ice pack so that she could hold it for herself.

She frowned. Something about that didn't make sense. “Wait, we don't have anyone who can perform doctor services here? We're going to go into shooty shooty land with nobody to patch us up?”

Savage didn't even crack a hint of a smile. “We have a medic, it's not quite the same thing as a hospital.”

“Who's the medic?”

“Guess.”

Zora almost giggled, though it could have been the concussion making her so light headed. “Anja?”

“Bingo,” he said grimly.

“Brilliant, can't wait to go get shot at with her by my side.” Sarcasm dripped from every word. Anja would probably leave her for dead if she got the chance.

Savage gritted his teeth. “You make everything so difficult.” He was blaming her, he really was. As if it was her fault that Anja had antagonized her from the beginning. As if it was her fault that Anja had the hots for him.

“Hey, I'm not the one she wants to fuck,” Zora said crudely.

He stiffened, the muscles in his neck and shoulder going hard as if he was preparing for a physical blow. “I don't know what you're talking about,” he muttered. It might have been a convincing lie if he were able to keep eye contact, or if he remembered to tell her off for swearing.

“She was practically licking you,” Zora said smugly. “She was jealous.”

“She was not.” Savage was almost convincing. Almost. There was a shadow of doubt in his voice that rather made Zora think he knew damn well Anja was jealous. Now that she had Savage on the hook, she didn't intend to let him off it easily. He was sitting there blaming everything on her, but she wasn't the one running the show, he was, and the team he'd put together was no less volatile than an atom bomb.

“Why did you put her on the team knowing she likes you?”

“Same reason I have a misbehaved drunkard on the team,” Savage said roughly. “She's damn good at what she does.”

Confirmation of what she'd suspected didn't make Zora feel any better. It was her turn to feel a creeping, seething jealousy that warped her common sense. “Just keep her away from me. I don't know how much more my body can take, especially if you're going to punish me every time she assaults me.”

“I will not keep her away from you,” Savage said stubbornly. “You will have to learn not to antagonize others.”

“Maybe you should learn not to screw the crew,” Zora retorted. Savage rocked back almost as if she'd hit him and she knew she'd hit the mark. So they had been intimate, had they? Interesting. No wonder Anja was so jealous to find her lover shacking up in the woods with another woman. “So what's the story then?” She pressed the issue. It wasn't a good idea.

“Leave it alone, Zora.” He pulled away from her, a look of something like disgust on his face.

“But...”

He growled as he got to his feet. “Leave it.” His displeasure was almost like a physical force. For a moment she wondered if he was going to grab her and hit her, but she needn't have worried. He couldn't even bring himself to look at her. Without another word he stalked out of the cabin, leaving her to her own devices.

“Definitely touched a nerve there,” Zora muttered to herself, laying back down. Savage's reaction was completely out of order. He was angry with her, really angry and in a personal way, not in the professional way he'd been most other times. She was surprised to see this side of him, he'd practically run away from her when she'd asked him for the truth. Perhaps Captain Savage wasn't really the debonair gentleman he pretended to be. Maybe he had a few skeletons in his closet. Maybe he wasn't really in any position to go around telling other people how they should behave.

When the door opened again, she hoped it was Savage coming back to apologize, but it was Brian.

“Where's Savage?”

“He's busy. Don't worry, I'll take you down to to doctors,” Brian said kindly, his eyes warm.

Grumbling to herself, Zora allowed Brian to help her stand. She found that she could walk easily enough, though the rocking motion made by her own feet as she moved exacerbated the nausea. She discovered when she walked out the front door that Savage and the rest of his team were standing around outside the cabin. It looked like they had been having an animated discussion, but the moment Zora appeared they shut up. She walked to the van in a horrible, heavy silence that made her glad when she shut the door and slid down in the front seat.

Savage didn't even bother to come over and say goodbye before they set off down the hill. Obviously he wasn't coming to the doctor with her. So much for him caring about her. What had he said the other evening? 'Let me take care of you.' His caring evidently didn't extend to making sure her head stayed on straight.

She threw up three times on the bumpy ride down the mountain. The rocking motion of the van was unpleasant and the pounding in her head was growing worse by the moment. She felt like she'd spent the day downing raw shellfish past its fresh by date. The fact that a single punch could do that much damage was a very unpleasant surprise indeed.

“Hey, hang in there,” Brian said encouragingly. He was placid like a cow, nothing shook him. The fact that he was in a confined space with a woman chucking her guts out didn't make a difference to him.

“God,” she groaned, resting her head against the window. “I'm sorry Brian, this is gross.”

Brian glanced over at her with a quick smile. “Don't worry, it's not like its the first time.”

She rolled her head to look at him. “What do you mean?”

“The night we brought you were in you were pretty sick too.” The twisted smile on his face told her that he found the fact amusing.

“For a much better reason,” Zora said. She could have been embarrassed, but what was the point. Brian had seen her at her worst many times before. Aside from Savage, he probably knew her better than anyone else.

“Tell that to my uniform, I had to get a new one,” Brian smiled at the memory, as if it were somehow pleasant.

By the time they got down to the little town at the foot of the mountain and found the hospital, Zora was pale and clammy. The nausea still rolled over her at regular intervals, but there was nothing left to throw up, so she ended up dry retching whilst Brian patted her shoulder and made useless soothing noises. They were forced to wait in a depressing waiting room for what seemed like hours, surrounded by screaming sick children who would have done better tucked up in bed than paraded around in a fog of germs. Zora tried to read the old magazines, but they were so out of date that it made her feel nostalgic. She didn't like nostalgia, it make her feel old.

Brian did his best to alleviate her anxiety by chatting about any inane topic that came into his head, but she wished that Savage was there. Savage as he'd been the other evening, when he'd held her and reassured her, not Savage of earlier that day who had been a complete jerk.

Loneliness, pain and fear all conspired to make her feel very uncomfortable and when she finally got to see a doctor an hour later, she was in a very bad mood indeed. The doctor who examined her, an older man with a gray beard and bald pate, was not impressed by her condition. “We'll do a few tests and keep you in overnight. It's probably just a concussion, but you can never be too careful with these things,” he snorted, as if giving the diagnosis was a particularly laborious task.

“Yeah, okay,” Zora agreed. Gazing around the puce green room, she wished she was back at the cabin. Even Savage's stupid anger was better than being stuck in this institutional hell hole.

The doctor left and a nurse bustled in. She was a matronly older woman with strands of gray through her dark hair and a pleasant round face. “You're being admitted Ms Matthews,” she announced with the sort of cheer usually reserved for more positive occasions. Her thick arm shot out, holding a white gown decorated with sickening tiny flowers. As if sick people would be cheered by tiny flowers on their clothes. 'Hey, you're deathly ill, but look, tiny flowers!' It was insulting, that's what it was.

“Yeah, no, I'll just wear my clothes,” Zora refused.

“Don't be silly. Get this on,” the nurse draped the gown over the bed next to Zora. On the opposite side of the room, Brian looked slightly nervous, as if anticipating a meltdown.

Zora glared at the nurse. She might be used to bossing patients around, but Zora was no ordinary patient. She was fast becoming a professional pain in the ass in fact. “I'm not putting it on. Just show me the room,” she said impatiently.

The nurse's chubby face puckered into a bottom of stubbornness. “You can put it on, or I can have an orderly come and help you put it on.”

The threat didn't have quite the desired effect. “What the fuck? I'm out of here,” Zora exploded, leaping off the bed only to crumple immediately to her knees as pain shot through her skull.

“Zora,” Brian came forward and helped her to her feet. “Maybe you could put the gown on for just a bit?” His eyes were pleading with her to make this easy and she acquiesced. She told herself it was because she liked Brian and didn't want to cause him more trouble than she already had done. Really she had no choice. Anja had messed her the hell up. She was too sick to fight, too sick to hold her own.

“Okay, fine,” she muttered, snatching the paper thin gown off the table. A similar battle of wills took place when she was informed she had to go sit in bed. All her protestations that she was fine sitting up in a chair were ignored by the nurse, who seemed to take a perverse pleasure in asserting what little authority she had. Eventually, Zora agreed to get into bed simply to keep the peace and give her pounding head a rest. She hoped that would be the end of the interference, but there was no respite. She wasn't allowed to sleep, they kept her awake by keeping the lights on and the television on and popping in every fifteen minutes like cheerful torturers.

Much to her relief, Brian stayed with her, watching the television and making small talk about the relative merits of various characters on the soaps. He had an almost encyclopedic knowledge of the shows that Zora found mildly disturbing and rather amusing. So much for being a hard bitten military man.

Zora didn't much care for the on screen drama. She was more concerned with the altercation she'd had with Savage. She couldn't get the image of his angry expression out of her head. After dancing around the issue for a whole, she decided to take a direct approach. “Why was Savage so pissed at me today?” Zora put the question to Brian bluntly. There was no point beating around the bush with Brian. Either he knew and he'd tell her, or he didn't and he wouldn't.

“He doesn't like fighting in the ranks,” Brian answered.

Zora shook her head. Surely something that simple couldn't be the reason. “I wasn't fighting, but he was more angry at me than her.”

“You weren't physically fighting, but you wound her up. Don't think she's getting off lightly. You didn't see what he did with her yet,” Brian reminded her. “He was a little growly with you, he chewed her out and he's not finished.”

That was a valid point and it made Zora feel a bit better. Maybe his absence wasn't because he didn't like her. Maybe it was because he was kicking Anja's ass all over camp. She smiled a little at the thought.

“Dissent in the ranks is always a problem for a commanding officer,” Brian volunteered a little more information. “It gets people killed. That's why he's not standing for it. Neither of you are going to be happy until you put aside your differences. He'll make both your lives hell.”

“That doesn't sound like our Mr Savage,” Zora murmured, feeling her stomach flip. Now that she was somewhat reassured Savage didn't actually hate her, she felt a tingling thrill at how much trouble she was in. It was a perverse instinct that had never served her well, but damn it was fun to be naughty.

There was more to be discovered though, and she intended to discover it. “Was there anything between him and Anja?”

The question seemed to catch Brian off guard. He actually colored slightly, his full cheeks flushing. “I don't think that's something I can answer.”

“So there was. So maybe he's angry at me because I taunted his precious girlfriend,” Zora speculated.

“She's not his girlfriend. Never was,” Brian said quickly before clamming up again.

“But they've been together right? They're intimate?”

Brian's shoulders drooped. “You're not going to let this go, are you?” Zora shook her head emphatically and he sighed. “Okay, but you don't talk about this anymore. I'm just telling you this because you being paranoid isn't helping. Anja had a crush on him a few years back. She pursued him, but nothing ever came of it. There were rumors though, rumors that almost got him into a lot of trouble.”

“Ohhhhh,” Zora exclaimed as the pieces fell into place. “That makes sense.” No wonder Anja had been so hostile, and no wonder Savage had reacted so defensively when she implied that he'd slept with Anja.

She was about to ask more questions and weasel more about Savage out of his aide, but Brian's phone rang, interrupting her interrogation. Zora didn't have to wonder who it was, it was obvious by the way Brian practically snapped to attention in his seat.

“Yes sir,” he said, “Right away sir.” He hung up and looked at Zora. “I have to go.”

“Where?” Zora almost whined. She didn't want to be left alone in the hospital, feeling sick as hell.

“Captain Savage wants me,” Brian shrugged helplessly, as if he were nothing more than a puppet on strings.

“Fine,” Zora's brow furrowed. “Tell him I said he's a jackass.”

“I'm not telling him that. You stay here, I'll be back for you soon, I promise.” Brian smiled as he left, shaking his head a little.

Zora hunkered down in bed, her arms folded across her chest. If it weren't for how sick she felt, it would have been an unprecedented chance to escape. There was nobody watching her and it was just a normal little country hospital. There were no guards to hunt her down. She could have waltzed right out of the front door and disappeared without rousing any suspicion whatsoever. But could she escape in good conscience now? That was another question. She'd all but given Savage her word that she'd help. Leaving now would be like lying to him, breaking her word. Not that he seemed to give much of a damn about breaking his word. The other evening he'd cradled her like a damn baby and reassured her that he'd be there for her. Where the fuck was he now, huh? Bitter thoughts swirled in her head as she watched stupid show after stupid show, growing more irritated with every passing visit that saw a parade of nurses flashing lights in her eyes and asking her inane questions.

After a very long sleepless night, she was finally permitted to sleep, and sleep she did. It was a dreamless sleep of pure exhaustion that would have probably made her feel much better if it hadn't been interrupted all too soon by Brian, who had come to collect her.

She growled when she opened her eyes and saw him. “What the hell are you doing?” She clawed at her pillow, ready to use it like a missile if she didn't like the answer.

“Sorry, you'll be able to sleep up at the cabin,” he promised.

“Fuck that, I'm not going back up there,” Zora replied with a flash of rebellion.

Brian just smiled, completely unconcerned. “Come on Zora, if you don't come back you won't get the chance to give the Captain hell.”

That was true, and it was enough to ensure her cooperation. She might still escape, but she'd let Savage know what she thought of him first. She sat up in bed, discovering that she felt much better. The nausea had gone entirely and though her jaw throbbed dully, the painkillers kept the worst of her discomfort at bay. She dressed with grim determination and followed Brian out to the van, her head filled with thoughts about what she was going to say to Savage when she saw him. She was going to tear him a new one, no doubt about that.

When they got back to the cabin, Savage and his team were at work. On the grass in front of the cabin were a bunch of computer like devices covered in camouflage netting with Tank and Archie pouring over them. In the distance, Zora could see Anja running around the very perimeter of the clearing, followed closely by Steve. Steve was in shorts and a t-shirt, but Anja was in full uniform. A heavy oversized pack weighed her down as she ran, circling the place like an overburdened shark.

Zora got out of the van and swaggered over to Savage with a battle ready frown. He was going to get it now. Well, if he ever noticed she was there, that was. He seemed preoccupied with the blips on the screen of the machine, as if blips were the most interesting thing he'd ever seen. She stood there for a full minute, clearing her throat and shuffling her feet loudly before he turned and deigned to acknowledge her.

“Zora,” Savage smiled at her warmly. He seemed to be in a much better mood. His face had returned to its normally handsome appearance unsullied by anger and frustration. He no longer looked like he'd devour her soul if she annoyed him.  “How are you?”

Zora wasn't in a good mood at all, in fact her mood was reaching new lows every minute.“Tired,” she bit out. “They didn't let me sleep.”

“Sounds standard for a concussion. Go and get some sleep now. You've got a few hours.” With the order given, he turned back to supervising whatever the men were doing. It didn't look like a hell of a lot to Zora, certainly nothing to treat her so dismissively over. She made an angry, strangled sound and stomped her foot with a kicking motion that sent mud and small stones spraying at him. He turned with a mild frown. “Are we going to have more trouble so soon, Matthews? Sure you don't want to get some sleep first?”

“Are we going to have trouble? You bet your ass we are,” Zora growled. She wanted to yell at him, to make him apologize for how mean he had been the previous day, but she couldn't quite find the words. The fact that he obviously wasn't in the slightest bit sorry about how he'd spoken to her made her madder than before. He looked at her steadily, his arms folded over his chest, the muscle in his jaw ticking ever so slightly. She should have paid attention to that, but she didn't.

“Zora, go to bed.” Savage spoke in heavily authoritative tones. He would be obeyed. Yes he would be. He couldn't imagine anything other than being obeyed. He was after all, Captain Savage. Zora didn't care if he was the Great High Wing Commander of Planet Earth at that point, she was angry. All the thoughts she'd had in the night burst out in an almost nonsensical tirade.

“Fuck you, you let me sit in hospital all alone all night. Don't pretend you care about me. You don't give a fuck about anyone. You knew what would happen if you put Anja and I in the same room and you let it happen. Did it boost your ego, huh? To have women fighting over you?”

Savage stood there, completely stunned. For some reason he'd obviously expected her to go to bed. When was he going to get it through that thick skull of his that she didn't care about his supposed authority? Around him, the men looked either concerned, uncomfortable or somewhat amused, depending on their predispositions. Brian was doing his best to straight face it through the entire confrontation.

“I'm supposed to trust you to take care of me in another country where people will be trying to hurt us and you can't even make sure I'm safe here? No fucking way am I doing this anymore. Fucking asshole.” Zora turned her back on him and walked away.

It was a mistake. He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her back. She opened her mouth to yell at him, but all the air was knocked out of her when he went down on one knee and pulled her over the other one, which was straight out in front of him like a pivot. She clawed at the grass and dirt, trying to get up, but his large hand came down on the back of her neck, holding her in place as his other hand smacked her backside hard as hell.

Zora shouted with the pain as Savage began laying into her bottom in full view of Brian, Tank and Archie. He spanked her with hard slaps that seared across her bottom and though her pants stayed up, every thudding blow made her jerk forward over his muscled thigh. She flailed about under his hand, completely mortified. She could see the boots of the other men and their lower legs as they stood around, gawking at her as Savage grimly punished her.

It wasn't a long spanking, but it seemed to go on forever and ever. She gritted her teeth and promised herself that she wouldn't cry, that she wouldn't show how much it hurt, but little squeaks and squeals were forced out of her as the pain began to grow to a crescendo in her behind. She'd never live this down. She'd never be able to look at any of them again. She found herself actually dreading the moment she would be forced to get up and look at everyone more than the ongoing pain of the spanking.

No sooner had the thought crossed her mind than Savage stood up, pulling her up by the back of her shirt like a wayward puppy. He looked at her with a hard, unyielding expression that spoke to her without words. He wasn't going to let her get away with that behavior, not in front of his men. For a long moment he held her there, staring her down until she whimpered and lowered her eyes. Satisfied that his message had been received, he released his hold on her and slapped her bottom one last time before taking her hand in his own. “Lets put you to bed before you get into more trouble.”

Chapter Ten

Zora tore away from Savage and ran into the cabin where she hurled herself onto her sleeping bag and burst into floods of tears. He followed her, sighing inwardly. It just never seemed to get any better or any easier with this one. She pushed and she pushed and when she got what she deserved she was outraged. It was as if she didn't understand the concept of consequences at all. There was no doubt about it, Zora Matthews truly was the most spoiled brat Savage had ever encountered in his life.

She sobbed dramatically, her shoulders shaking as she buried her face in the sleeping bag. It was a pitiful sight to be sure, but he couldn't let her tug on his heart strings this way. She didn't need sympathy, she needed consistency. "Zora," he sat down next to her and reached out to rub her back. She flinched at first, but then let him continue once she figured out it didn't hurt and actually felt quite good. "You earned that, young lady," he said in a deep rumble.

She peeked out under the tangled mess of her hair with a vicious glare. Surprise surprise, he thought to himself, she was still angry at him."Shut up, you hate me."

He ignored the disrespect for the moment. "I do not hate you."

"Yes you do. You left me alone in the hospital all night." She buried her face back in her sleeping bag, She was no longer sobbing, but she was sulking with admirable commitment. Out of her field of vision, a wry look flickered over his face. To her a concussion was probably a big deal. To him a concussion was barely worth mentioning. Pain and suffering were always subjective and relative. He hoped that she'd always think that a single punch was the worst thing that could happen, that sort of naivety was something to be protected.

"I have a team to run Zora. I couldn't leave. I spared Brian as long as possible." He explained the situation with as much patience as he could muster. She had quickly grown all too used to having his undivided attention and like a spoiled child suddenly confronted with siblings, she was acting up.

She ignored his point to continue her line of complaint. "Yeah, well you yelled at me and were mean when I was sick too."

"You were behaving badly. You don't get to misbehave just because someone hits you."

She stammered, trying to form an objection that made sense. "Your rules are stupid and I don't like them," she finally blurted.

He chuckled. "Objection noted and dismissed. "

She rolled over onto her side and gave him a dirty look under her wet eyelashes. "You're going to have to find someone else to do your dirty work now. I can't do this anymore."

Savage could barely hide his smirk. It was amusing, the way she thought she had some kind of choice in the matter. "And why is that?"

"Because I'll die if I ever have to look at any of those people again."

"Don't be silly. It's not that big of a deal."

"Says the man who didn't get his ass spanked in front of people he barely knows."

"Zora if I were you I'd be more concerned about the fact you behaved like a hysterical child than about the fact you got spanked."

"Shut up," Zora muttered.

He wasn't going to stand for that disrespect and he demonstrated the fact by reaching over and giving her another hearty slap on the ass. "Stop behaving like a spoiled brat."

"No," she refused petulantly, putting her hand back to prevent further assault on her behind.

Dear god she was gorgeous when her cheeks were flushed and her eyes sparkled with tears. If circumstances had been different, he would have been at liberty to enjoy her state a lot more. He was increasingly plagued by fantasies about Zora Matthews, fantasies that did not stop at taking her panties down and spanking her bottom, but which allowed for a much fuller release of the tensions between them. She was contrary and stubborn, and when her eyes blazed into his with petulant fury he was filled with the desire to show her in no uncertain terms just how much that the illusion of control she clung to was just that, an illusion.

"I'm beginning to think, Ms Matthews, that you might be more trouble than you're worth." His voice held a note of amusement, but she obviously didn't hear it because she reacted like a screeching harridan.

"Really. Well that's quite a change of tone from the other evening. What happened to you caring for me, huh? What happened to you being able to handle me?" Her hands balled into small fists as she pushed up from the bed and glared at him. If he hadn't have known better, he would have thought that she was actually thinking of hitting him.

Rather than risk allowing her to do something very silly indeed, Savage took her by the arms and with as little force as possible, flipped her onto her back. She struggled, almost spitting fury but he simply held her there wordlessly until she stopped arching her back and trying to buck herself upright. Finally forced to accept physical submission, she lay still, panting slightly from her exertions. When she was still, he spoke in low, calm tones.

"I'm going to handle you and you're going to be very well cared for, even if it isn't in the way you think you should be cared for."

She squirmed, but she didn't get up. Instead she lay there, meeting his gaze. Little by little the hard, frantic look in her eyes softened into something more relaxed, more obedient.

"I'm sorry you were scared," he purred, releasing one of her hands and brushing stray wisps of hair out of her eyes. "But you were taken care of, were you not?"

Her lower lip pushed out in a pout, but she nodded. "I guess," she admitted.

"Sometimes I have responsibilities to attend to. We're on an accelerated clock now. I need the team to get as much training in as possible. If you're going to run around getting yourself hurt, you'll slow us down and make it more difficult for me to look after you," Savage explained patiently. He wouldn't ordinarily explain himself to a subordinate, but it seemed to help Zora to understand why things were done certain ways.

"Well what about Anja? What happens to her? I got a night in the hospital and a concussion and a spanking," Zora complained.

"Actually you got the spanking for shouting at me. I haven't dealt with your misbehavior with Anja yet," he corrected her. He rather enjoyed the way Zora's face fell and her mouth opened in an expression of dismay when she heard that piece of news. "But to answer your question, you've seen her punishment."

"What? No I haven't," Zora was clearly confused.

"She's not running around for fun."

Zora's expression crumpled into outright disgust. "That's it? She just has to run around?"

"With a very heavy pack, and in full gear, yes."

"That's not fair!"

Savage smirked. Zora had no idea what she was fast getting herself into, but he had no intention of warning her off her line of argument. A little physical exercise and physical discipline certainly would not go astray with this one. "Would you prefer to have her punishment?"

Zora was too busy being outraged at the apparent inequality to notice the tone of warning in his voice. "Yeah, I'd rather jog around a bit than get hit."

"Your wish will be fulfilled then," Savage agreed with a broad smile that should have warned her. "You can make amends in the same way she is."

***

Zora gasped for breath, panting heavily as she forced one foot in front of the other. Fifty laps he'd said. She was only on the fifth lap and already she wanted to lie down and pass out. The pack was heavy as all hell. Even standing still it had felt unpleasant. She slowed to a halt, bending down to catch her breath.

"GET MOVING SOLDIER."

Zora almost jumped out of her skin as Sergeant Steve Bracknell's voice blared against her ear like a foghorn. The usually quiet soldier had a talent for drilling it turned out. Savage had assigned him to deal with her punishment, citing the fact that Steve had done the same for Anja. If Zora wanted the same punishment as Anja, he'd said, she was going to get it.

"GET MOVING!"

Zora turned and scowled at Sergeant Bracknell. She didn't know him very well, but she knew damned well she didn't care for his tone. "Jesus, give it a rest would you? Relax, guy."

It was not the right thing to say. He came at her like a Pit Bull, his face red, his half grown mustache not looking as silly as it usually did. "MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE."

"Okay, okay," Zora agreed, holding her hands up to indicate surrender. At this rate she'd never get to face the terrorists, they'd kill her here at home first. With great effort she started her plodding pace once more. The brief pause seemed to have made everything harder. The pack was insanely heavy, running with it felt like trying to run on a planet with twice the gravity of Earth. No wonder Savage had been smirking like a damn fool when he'd agreed to this being her punishment.

Zora paused for another moment, but this time she was jerked forward forcibly by Steve, who grabbed her and began running with her trailing after him. It was getting to be too much, far too much. She tried to keep up, but she just couldn't. Her muscles were screaming and she was sure she was going to faint from exhaustion, so she did what any rational person would do. She bit Sergeant Steve. She bit him with a vengeance, sinking her teeth into the flesh of his hand.

His reaction was immediate. He tossed her onto the ground and started bawling her out. She barely understood anything he was yelling, but she was glad for the respite from physical activity, even if it meant she was wallowing around on the ground like a turtle turned over on its back. The weight of the pack made it almost impossible for her to get up.

"GET UP! GET UP NOW!"

The yelling started to sound silly after a bit and she started giggling. The more he yelled, the funnier she thought it was. She knew he wouldn't really hurt her after all, there would be hell to pay if he did. She wasn't afraid of him in the slightest.

"Dammit Matthews," Steve stopped yelling and frowned at her. "Take this seriously."

"I do take it seriously!"

A shadow fell over Zora. She looked up to see Savage looming over her. God only knew where he had come from, he moved like a spy sometimes, completely unseen. Before she could explain herself, Savage lifted her up, took the pack off her shoulders and slapped her ass hard enough to make her dance in place. "You will show Sergeant Bracknell respect, you understand?"

"Yes!" Zora gasped. She wasn't trying to be bad, she really wasn't. But she was discovering something about herself. For years she'd gone out of her way to be difficult and rebellious and now that she was trying to be good it turned out that being difficult and rebellious was second nature to her. Both men glowered at her as she endeavored to make amends."I'm sorry Sergeant," she apologized, very nicely she thought.

He grunted, not that taken with the apology. "Get running."

"I can't. I am all out of running," Zora shrugged, slipping back down to the ground.

Sergeant Steve and Savage looked at one another, then back at her. "You're not done with your punishment, Zora," Savage reminded her. "In fact, you've barely started."

"Do you have to be such a sadistic bastard?"

Again, it was the wrong thing to say. Steve looked shocked, but more disturbingly, Savage didn't show any emotion at all. His eyes had gone cold. "I'll take it from here, Steve," Savage dismissed the officer. He didn't look at the man as he saluted, his eyes were locked on Zora, like a predatory big cat might lock eyes on a helpless fawn left in long grasses. "You've really done it now, you know that, girl?"

"Have I?" Zora tried to be brave, but she felt herself starting to tremble. She might not be afraid of Steve, but she sure as hell was wary of Savage. He was going to do something very unpleasant indeed, she could feel it.

"Come with me," he ordered.

She struggled up from the ground and followed him back to the cabin. The other members of the team had taken the van and were off somewhere else, so the only other occupant was Steve, who was making preparations to shower.

"Take your time," Savage said to him. "Zora and I have business to attend to." Steve signaled his agreement with a thumbs up and a particularly pleased look. He obviously had some idea what 'business to attend to' meant. Steve took his leave to take a shower and without wasting another moment, Savage went into his pack and pulled out a short cane. It was perhaps a foot and a half long and very whippy indeed. It looked like something out of a museum, some anachronistic piece of equipment for the punishment of miscreants.

"What the hell is that?" Zora's eyes went almost as wide as her head.

"It's your comeuppance, young lady," Savage said, beckoning her forward. "You can strip down to your undershirt and panties please."

She colored with embarrassment. She'd dreamed about being with him in a state of undress, but not like this. It would not do to defy him though. She knew from experience that he'd strip her down himself. What could she do? The humiliation of stripping down like a naughty girl did not appeal, but what other choice was there? As her mind whirred, a sudden spark of mischief danced into her brain. What if she did let him strip her down, not as a naughty girl, but as a woman?

"If you want my clothes off, you're going to have to do that yourself," she said with a blatant grin.

He stared at her coldly and for just a moment, part of her died thinking that she'd been rebuffed. "Don't start playing games with me, Zora. You won't like the consequences." He was trying to appear aloof, but there was a slight throatiness in his tone that told her he wasn't quite as immune to the innuendo as he would have liked her to believe he was. It was just enough encouragement for her to stick with her mad plan.

"You're going to cane me? Okay. I guess I have no choice but to obey you." Mustering all the nerve she had, she turned around with her back to him and slowly undid her pants then pushed them down over her hips, arching her back as she did, making sure that her bottom slowly slid into view in the most tantalizing way possible.

Savage growled a low growl. "What do you think you're playing at?"

"I'm being obedient," she said in her best innocent, good girl voice. "That's what you want, isn't it, sir?" She let her hips undulate in a deliberate movement. All those evenings in clubs had not been a complete waste of time, Zora had learned to grind and dance with the best of them. She knew very well that the movement of her hips would translate to an erotic rolling of her bottom.

"Zora..." Savage's voice came out in a low growl that turned into a groan.

"Want my panties down too?" She hooked her thumbs into the waistband of her panties and teased at pulling them down, sneaking them down just a little until they sat across the middle of her cheeks. It was a wanton display of sexuality, but she didn't really expect him to take her up on the offer of her body, rather she wanted to throw him off balance and if at all possible, reduce the penalty for her misbehavior.

"You little minx." His voice came from directly behind her. He'd approached noiselessly and as he spoke his large hand descended on her bottom, squeezing it as he tugged her panties down below her bottom. "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?" His hand slid around to her hip and pulled her bare bottom back against the cloth of his crotch. She felt his erection through his pants as he leaned over her body and used his other hand to take her by the hair. Her efforts at arousing him had obviously been successful. He pulled her head back gently but firmly using his grip on her hair, making her arch her bottom against him as he murmured in her ear. "Be very, very careful what you wish for, girl." He was calling her bluff and she whimpered, feeling his raw masculine power. "Are you sure you want to do this? You want to play this game?"

She shook her head. "Nossir." Fingers of fear tickled up her spine. Savage was probably just as hard in bed as he was anywhere else. She would not get off more lightly if she teased him erotically, she would only end up deeper in his control. Already her body was responding to him, doing its best to shut off any remainder of common sense. She wanted to melt into his arms, to let him have his way with her. Only her fiercely independent streak was making her pull back from the edge.

"Wise girl," Savage purred. He stood up, but he did not let her go. His fingers remained wrapped in her hair as he walked her over to the table and bent her forward over it. She stayed in place, even when he tapped the cane across her bottom. "Time for you to answer for your misdeeds," he intoned. It could have been considered an overly dramatic statement in other circumstances, but in that moment Zora didn't find it overly dramatic at all. She whimpered with genuine fear. She'd gambled and lost, and she knew very well that once the punishment was over, the can of worms she'd opened with him was not going to close itself again easily.

The almighty sting of the cane was almost welcome as it drove thoughts of erotic embarrassment out of her head, replacing them with pain. She didn't struggle or fight during the caning, she stayed in place, accepting her punishment. He brought the cane down six times, laying each stroke below the previous one. It hurt with a blazing pain that captured her entirely and made her its slave. She barely held position, but whatever instinct that made her submit to the punishment in the first place kept her there just barely clinging on.

It was one of the harsher punishments she'd ever endured, but she didn't cry or pout. She stayed in place, breathing heavily as the sensation sunk into her bottom, melting into the arousal that had proceeded it. It didn't hurt as much as it should have done. Intellectually she knew that her bottom was lined and welted, but the hot pain was like a liquid fire in her lower belly, spreading between her legs. She didn't want to speak for fear of giving away how she was feeling.

"You can pull your pants up," Savage said from somewhere behind her. His voice was deep, gritty and it went through her, every word teasing her with promise of dark pleasures.

Breathing deeply, she backed away from the table and reached for her pants. Erotic pleasure pain or no, it was not pleasant dragging the material up over her bottom. She would not be sitting any time soon, that was for sure.

"Zora." His voice floated through the discomfort, sonorous and low. She looked up at him, hoping her confusion and desire were not evident in her eyes. She was burning for him. He looked at her with a curious expression. "Are you alright?"

She nodded quickly. "Yessir," she said, looking at a point just over his left shoulder. She didn't want to meet his eyes.

"Hm," he lifted the cane up and looked at it in surprise. "This is more effective than I thought." She smiled a little and shrugged, wincing as her bottom throbbed. The silence stretched out between them.

"You're quiet," he observed. Usually the aftermath of a punishment at his hands involved a whole lot of yelling and screaming. She didn't much feel inclined to do either in that moment, she felt strangely subdued, aroused and not inclined to bemoan her lot. "What's going on in that head of yours?"

She blushed. There was no way she was telling him what was going on in her head. Thankfully, Steve chose that moment to exit the bathroom. Zora muttered an excuse and took the opportunity to dash inside the one room that offered any kind of privacy at all. After locking the door and checking it twice, she pulled her pants back down and checked her bottom in the mirror. It looked much as she had imagined it would. Six perfectly parallel lines traversed the skin from the middle of her cheeks to the bottom. The lines were red and raised and a little bit of bruising was starting to show. When she ran her hand lightly over the marks the skin was hot and taut. He'd thrashed the hell out of her and she was sure that it would soon be very, very sore indeed. Not yet though. At that moment, all the heat and pain was being channeled into quite a different sensation.

She leaned up against the wall, keeping her bottom away from the hard surface and slid her hand down to the soft place of her arousal. Closing her eyes, Zora let her imagination run riot with all that could have been if they had not been out here with Steve in the next room. If they had been alone he could have pulled down her panties instead and slid inside her. The memory of the hard ridge of his arousal pressed against her bottom remained strong as she worked herself towards an immensely satisfying climax.

Chapter Eleven

Impossible. Surely it was impossible for a man to affect a woman this way, to change the pulse, the breath, to send rushes of chemicals flowing through the body with the merest flicker of a glance. Zora thought it impossible, yet it was happening to her and like a disease taking hold, the effects grew stronger every day. The Pandora's box unlocked when she'd tried to seduce Savage most outrageously had been thrown wide open and there was no putting back what she'd unleashed.

She sat on a hard wooden bench, material hard enough that she could feel the lines of her most recent thrashing sting when she moved slightly. He was at the head of the table and the rest of the team were assembled all around. They may as well not have been there. Zora didn't see them. She saw nothing but him. It was a briefing for something or other. Zora hadn't been listening. She didn't hear words anymore, instead she felt the rumble of his voice, luxuriated in the waves the sound made as they washed against her senses.

Every part of him had become magic, from the roughened skin on the back of his knuckles to the dark curl of his eyelashes. He leaned over the table and slid her a piece of paper. She didn't even look at it. She locked her eyes on him instead, swooning inwardly at the curve of his lips, the slight stubble creating a shadow around his chin. There was not a part of him that was not pure masculinity. There was not a part of him she did not desire. She imagined how it would be to feel that stubbled cheek pressed against her own, to hear words spoken breathlessly against her ear.

"Ms Matthews." He was only a couple of feet away from her, but when he spoke the sound seemed to float to her from far, far away.

She shook her head like a dog, her hair flopping from side to side with the exaggerated movement. "Huh?"

"If you would care to join us." The corners of his lips spread slightly as he smiled an ever so condescending smile. His tone put her in mind of a sarcastic teacher reminding a wayward student to pay attention, as did the soft titter of amusement from Anja.

"My pleasure," Zora replied evenly, meeting his gaze without shame. Her voice was slightly husky, as if she were getting a cold. Savage's expression grew serious for a moment as he gave her a quick, searching look. Perhaps he'd find her attitude lacking. She hoped so. That would probably mean another private interview with him, his hands on her body. She'd gotten cold feet when he'd responded to her initial advances, but she promised herself she would not do that again. The days since the caning had been ones filled with a wicked kind of regret, the regret of a prime sexual opportunity missed. Life was too short and uncertain to be afraid of fulfillment.

His eyes swiveled away from her and a brief pang of loss shot through her body. This was how far she was gone. She craved his attention so badly that even losing eye contact hurt. He was talking again. Something about the mission, something important. She tried to force herself to pay attention.

"...enter the facility and secure it at key points. Zora will enter the codes that will disable security. Once that's done, we're out and the other teams go in."

"That's it?" Zora interjected inappropriately. It was hard to keep the smirk off her face when his eyes snapped back to her.

"That's it. The other teams will secure the missile, we'll be out by that stage."

She slouched across the table channeling all her petulant energy. "We're doing all of this so I can walk into a room and punch codes into a computer?"

"We're doing all of this so you can walk into a room, punch codes into a computer and come out alive," Savage said, fixing her with a stern look.

"Ah. That makes sense. Carry on," she waved at him airily. It was a small power play, a tiny power play, but the thrill she got from it was great. She was fizzing inwardly with the joy of testing her mettle against his.

The conversation continued on around her, various team members confirming their understanding of their roles. It was of course, a great deal more complicated than it sounded in summary, but she did not concern herself with the nitty gritty. She didn't understand it and she didn't need to. Savage would keep her safe, she was certain of that. Well, fairly sure anyway. She returned to reality just long enough to catch the tail end of an announcement that made her heart race for a completely different reason.

"... leaving today to make the final preparations to ship out," Savage announced. "So get packed up and lets get out of here. Dismissed."

That was the cue for the team to burst into coordinated activity that had been drilled into them over the years. They made for the items they were responsible for with calm haste and began packing. Zora hadn't even begun to absorb the information before the sleeping bags had been packed away, with the exception of hers.

"Hop to it," Savage said, resting his hand on her shoulder and waggling his eyebrows meaningfully in the direction of her sleeping bag. A few minutes earlier his touch would have brought a near orgasmic flood of pleasure, but the news that they were leaving had interrupted the pleasure party in her imagination.

"We're really going?"

"Yes, we're heading to a base for deployment. We'll stock up on what we need there and then wait for the final orders to ship out. I'm thinking three days, but that could change."

Nodding mechanically as she took in the news, Zora obeyed the order and began packing away the few things she had. She was glad that there was something to do, it kept her out of everyone else's way and it meant that they didn't notice how very pale she'd suddenly gotten and how much her hands were trembling. It was real. Really real and it meant leaving behind everything she'd ever known and risking everything she had.

Though they'd only been at the cabin for a couple of weeks and it was crowded and annoying, it was starting to feel like home. There was something cozy about being packed in there so tightly, getting on one another's nerves. Now they were on the move again and just like that the atmosphere of the place had changed completely. She tried to convince herself that it would be fine. Her job was the simplest of them all, just walk in to a room and do some sums. Nothing to it. But if there truly was nothing to it, why was she suddenly so very afraid?

She was quiet as they all piled into the van, chatting amongst themselves quite calmly. Whilst everyone's backs were turned to her, a sudden impulse took hold. She slipped away from the van and back to the empty cabin. It felt hollow now that nobody was there. It was hard to believe how much had happened in that space, that now seemed so very small. She looked over at the wet back fire, remembering how the flame light had gleamed off Savage's naked body. There was the platform where they'd all been sleeping for days, lined up like a row of puppies. Then there was the table she'd been bent over. Would she ever return to this place? Would she live long enough to do so?

The door creaked open behind her and Savage's hand descended gently onto her shoulder. "Ready, Ms Matthews?" His voice rumbled through her, calming her. He was still here. She still had him. It wouldn't be too bad as long as he was there.

"Yeah," she agreed reluctantly.

He squeezed her shoulder. Perhaps he understood a little of how she was feeling. She allowed him to lead her out to the van and put her into the front of it with Brian, who was driving. She sat in the middle seat whilst Savage took the passenger side. Looking from Brian to Savage and back again, she felt an odd sense of deja-vu. "That's weird," she muttered. "Feels like we've done this before."

"This is pretty much how we took you in," Savage said, smiling slightly as Brian started the van. "You want to vomit in memory of that event?"

Zora stared at him for a long moment before she realized he was joking, though she probably had thrown up all over him at some point. "You'd deserve it if I did," she said. His chuckle made her smile in spite of her nerves and the twinge of sadness that peaked as the van turned to head down the hill and the cabin went out of sight entirely. She tried to distract herself by being flippant. "So are we there yet?"

"It's a long trip. Ten hours at least, depending on traffic."

Zora wriggled in her seat. Brian and Savage were not small men and they didn't leave a lot of room for her. She was pretty much forced to be pressed up against one of them, and as Brian was protected by the gearbox, Savage got the honor of her warm and cuddly presence.

With the soothing motion of the vehicle, and the solid feeling of being pressed up against a couple hundred pounds of muscle, some of Zora's amorous feelings began to renew themselves. In a spirit of mischief, she sneaked her hand back behind their bodies and tried to stick her fingers down the back of Savage's pants.

"What do you think you're doing?" He growled the words, but he wasn't really mad. He reached back, closed his fingers around her wrist and extracted the offending digits from their close proximity to his backside.

"Nothing," she grinned.

"You're getting very handsy, Ms Matthews," Savage noted, returning her hand to her her lap. She felt the lingering warmth of his fingers on her wrist and silently treasured it.

"Well you're pretty handsy too," she pointed out with a playful smile.

"I see." His jaw was set firmly, but his eyes were warm with a stern sort of amusement. "It's been too long since your last spanking."

The casual reference to her getting her ass tanned made Zora's jaw drop. She cast a horrified glance over at Brian, then back at Savage. "He can hear you, you know."

"Well then imagine what he's going to see if you keep this up," Savage mimicked her horrified tone, sending her into an almighty pouting session. She determined not to speak to him again if he was going to be so immature. Her resolve might have held if the journey had been a short one, but ten hours is a long time to drive, especially with a bunch of hyper focused military types who don't do bathroom breaks lightly. After just a couple of hours, Zora was whining about wanting to stop, even though she didn't really want to go.

"I want ice cream," she declared, leaning over Savage to press her face against the window as they drove by a perfectly good rest stop.

He grabbed her by the collar and moved her back to her seat gently. She knew she was pushing him. That was kind of the point. Maybe it had been too long since her last spanking. Maybe she was scared about deploying to save the world, maybe she was just a contrary little wench by nature. Maybe she really wanted ice cream. There were a million different reasons, but none of them really explained why she decided to lunge across him once more and try to open the door whilst they were moving.

"Zora!" This time the growl was not playful, nor was the hearty slap she got on her wrist. She yelped and withdrew her hand quickly. "This is not the time to get silly. You're a grown woman, not a little kid. Start acting like it," he lectured harshly.

The words stung Zora somewhere deep inside. What he said was true, but that didn't make the scolding more effective, it only served to strip away the tentative feelings of submission she'd been feeling and slam her abruptly back into her original rebellious state of mind. If she'd been behaving childishly it was because she'd felt safe with him, secure. His aggressive reaction shocked her out of that place, sent her scrambling for emotional refuge.

"Fine," she said, her tone very icy, very grown up. She did not look at Savage or speak to him again for the rest of the journey. Eventually Brian and Savage struck up a conversation about football players, which she ignored pointedly. When they did stop for food she refused it. At one time she would have used the opportunity to try to run away, but in the spirit of being a mature woman, she instead stayed in the van, fuming silently.

When they rolled into Fort Whatthefuckever as Zora dubbed it in her mind, her stomach was growling and she was about to burst from her need to pee. An eight hour sulk is a difficult thing to maintain, but she was holding onto her anger like she was going for a world record. How could she ever have considered thinking about wanting to sleep with the guy? He was old and he was mean and he could go fuck himself for all she cared.

Making a bad situation worse was the fact that he totally ignored her very obvious rage. Everyone did, which served to make her hate everyone. When they disembarked in the large military camp filled with soldiers coming and going, she hated them too. A woman scorned is a terrible thing, and Zora was very scorned indeed.

"Captain Savage," a military man with a mustache that would have made a walrus jealous greeted Savage with a crisp salute. Zora stood a couple of feet away, leaning up against the van and watching.

"Captain Brown," Savage responded with a salute in kind. They were like tin robots, playing out roles programmed into them.

Captain Brown put his hands behind his back and looked over the cluster of soldiers behind Savage. They hadn't exactly snapped to attention or anything, but there was a certain stiffness to the way they held themselves that imparted formality."This is your team?"

"Yes," Savage nodded once, curtly. "This is them."

Brown inclined his head in Zora's direction. "And the civilian?"Well that was nice, she wasn't even worth the honor of open acknowledgment. She could have been a dog or an interesting piece of wood for all anyone seemed to care.

"Ms Zora Matthews." Savage looked over at her. She knew from the way his eyes flicked from her to the ground in front of him that he wanted her to come over to him, but if she was going to be a dog, she wasn't in the mood to be a lapdog. "Come here," he said finally.

"Go fuck yourself."

His face drained of all emotion. One moment he was tense, the next moment there was nothing there, nothing in those cold eyes at all. She'd angered him obviously. Judging by the harsh looks she was getting from the team, she'd managed to piss most of them off too. Good.

Savage turned to his right hand man. "Get her out of here," he snarled at Brian.

"Come on Zora," Brian spoke in hushed tones as he grabbed her by the arm and practically dragged her away to a low line of buildings that served as barracks. He ushered her inside an empty room. It was a depressing place with bare concrete floor and wire framed bunk beds that looked like they'd be hell to sleep on.

"What's the big deal?" Zora shrugged out of Brian's grasp.

"You just embarrassed him in front of another commanding officer."

"So? He embarrasses me all the time."

Brian didn't have the opportunity to point out the problem with that line of thought because the door slammed and Savage came storming into the room. Brian only just got out of the way in time for Savage to grab Zora by the front of her shirt and lift her up off her feet, carrying her backwards until she met the wall none too gently, her feet still dangling off the ground.

Held there helplessly she felt his fury and frustration like never before. He had never been like this, even in the early days when she'd tested him he'd gotten angry, but not in the seething furious way he was now. When he spoke, it was through gritted teeth and a jaw clenched so tightly the muscles stood out on his face. "We are three days out from deployment. You will co-operate or I will make you wish you had never been born, do you understand me?"

Zora nodded quickly. She'd always felt this hard edge beneath the patience and the kindness, but seeing it was more overwhelming than she'd expected it to be. Savage had finally decided to abandon the nice guy approach and underneath the nice guy was a terrifying hardness that threatened to make her soil herself.

"Tell me!" He roared the words.

"I understand," she squeaked.

"I understand, SIR!"

"I understand sir," she said, her voice barely above a whisper, hoarse from fear.

He released his grip on her and let her fall the few inches to her feet. She stumbled against him accidentally, but recovered quickly, pulling away. She could not believe that she had played with him so affectionately earlier. She'd no more play with him now than she'd play with a tiger. He was breathing hard, his nostrils flared. "This is too important for you to fuck up."

"Okay, I'm sorry," she whimpered. Tears were not far away. She was scared of him now, scared in a way she never had been before. The look in his eyes was not a look she was accustomed to seeing, it was not a look that spoke to any affection or care. It was a look that demanded everything, up to and including her life.

He turned around and slammed his way out of the room, and that was when the tears came. She curled up on the floor, bawling hysterically. Brian tried his best to comfort her, but he was awkward and standoffish and patting her shoulder wasn't going to cut it.

The door opened again, but it wasn't Savage. It was Anja. "What's wrong with her?" The question was distant, but vaguely interested, as if Anja wanted to know how to get the same sort of result.

"Savage tore her a new one."

Shaking as she sobbed, Zora waited for Anja to gloat. She was probably loving this, seeing Savage finally reject Zora completely and publicly. "So you finally got the horns, huh?" Anja stepped over to her and sat on the bunk bed behind her. She made no move to touch Zora, but she didn't mock her either. "It was only a matter of time."

Zora had nothing to say. Her tears weren't just coming from a place of being sad and upset that she got yelled at, they were being fueled by a hysterical fear that Savage was nothing like he'd pretended to be, that she was about to go somewhere very dangerous with a man who might actually be more dangerous than all the terrorists put together.

"Don't worry, he'll calm down," Anja said, pulling some tissues out of one of her many pockets. "He likes you."

"He h..h..h..aates me," Zora sobbed.

"Fucking hell," Anja muttered under her breath. "He doesn't hate you. He's gaga over you alright? He's just pissed off because you made him look like an asshole in front of Brown and he's worried that you're going to get us all killed over there."

That made Zora stop crying long enough to talk coherently. "I'm not going to get you killed."

"Eh," Anja shrugged. "You're a loose cannon. Loose cannons kill people."

"No," Zora shook her head vehemently. "Not me."

Anja shrugged. "We'll see, won't we."

Wiping her eyes, Zora shook her head. "I am not going to get you killed. I can do my job. It's all this extra bullshit I can't stand."

The door slammed open again, making her squeal with fear. He was back, and he was holding a thick leather belt. He'd shed almost all uniform on the upper half of his body and was wearing only a white wife-beater that clung to the musculature of his torso. The muscles in his arm were bulging with tension. "Anja. Brian. Get out."

"Don't leave me," Zora begged them, but they left quickly and she was once more alone with a very angry, very large man. He towered above her, his powerful outline silhouetted in a fashion that she once would have found erotic but now seemed terrifying.

"Come here." He was still angry, but he'd found a modicum of self control. She didn't trust it though. It was too soon to forget how furious he really was under that thin veneer.

She shook her head and cowered away from him. "You're going to kill me."

Her defiance was enough to make the veneer crack and crumble away completely. "COME HERE!" He thundered the order, his bellowing voice making the windows shake. Maybe yelling louder was the way to get a soldier to obey. It wasn't the way to get Zora to obey, it was the way to scare the hell out of her. She panicked and scrabbled under the nearest bed. Bad idea. It wasn't wide enough to hide her from him and he reached down and dragged her out bodily, cutting the first lash of the belt across her ass before she was even all the way out.

Something else took over then. Scared out of her wits and caught up in the throes of a powerful flight or fight reaction, Zora's animal mind registered that her attempt at flight had failed. Another woman might have cringed and begged, but that approach had failed too and he was raising the lash again. Concerned only with protecting herself, Zora lashed out wildly with fists and feet.

Savage was much larger, much stronger, much more well trained, but desperation and panic can transform even the most ordinary woman into something quite extraordinary. It helped a great deal that he wasn't expecting a fight, he was expecting to lay into her ass with the strap. His arm was still raised high in the air when she struck with flailing fury, her fist meeting his nose with a solid CRACK, whilst almost simultaneously her booted toe lodged itself in the upper regions of his inner thigh.

The results were instantaneous, though strangely silent. He didn't shout in pain so much as make a strangled cry as he dropped the belt and clutched at his nose with one hand, sinking to the floor with his other hand cupping his junk.

Zora took the opportunity to run faster than she'd ever run in her life. She slammed out of the barracks and took to her heels. She did not get far. Anja and Brian were waiting outside, posted like sentries. Anja grabbed her as she rushed past and swung her around. "What are you doing?"

"Running," Zora panted. There was a little bit of blood on her knuckles when she looked down at them, but she was pretty sure it wasn't her own.

Anja's grip tightened on her. "What did you do to him?"

Zora didn't have to answer, the barracks door opened with a slow creak and Savage limped out, his nose a bloody mess. He was holding a handkerchief delicately under his nose to staunch the flow of blood. It wasn't doing a very good job, it had already turned red and was beginning to drip crimson dollops into the dusty ground. His wife-beater was a mess, spattered with the stuff.

"Sir," Anja dropped Zora, forgetting about her completely. "You're injured." She rushed forward and began examining him. Even the light touch of her delicate fingers on his face made him wince.

"I bink ibs broken," Savage offered his opinion quite calmly, as if this sort of thing happened to him all the time and was only worth the passing note of the event.

Anja rounded on Zora, her eyes narrowed with suspicion. "You did this to him? I'm supposed to believe that you're a plain old civilian and you did this to him?"

Zora put her hands up in the air, armed hold up style. "I didn't mean to. It was an accident."

Anja took a menacing step forward, as if she intended to avenge Savage then and there. "That's a hell of an accident," she growled. Her fists were balled up at her sides and Zora took a quick couple of steps away, putting distance between them in case Anja did take a swing.

"Enub Anja. I will deal wib Zora laber," Savage said. He was no longer enraged. He didn't even seem angry anymore. He reached out towards Zora and she cowered, expecting a slap, but he merely tussled her hair, mixing dust and blood into her already messy locks. She tried to work out what was going on, what he was feeling, but it was impossible to tell. She'd broken his nose. He should have been angrier than ever, but the temper that had gripped him was gone.

Instead it was Anja who took up the torch of recrimination. Her wide blue eyes glittered with venom and something else – was it fear? She hissed at Zora like feral cat, her words thick with judgment as she uttered what was fast becoming Zora's own special curse.

"Loose. Fucking. Canon."

Chapter Twelve

As time went by, Zora became more frantic and worried about what she'd done. She couldn't believe she'd slugged Savage in the nose. She wasn't a slugging sort of person, was she? Had she become a slugging sort of person without noticing?

What remained of the team had gathered around her almost immediately after Savage's departure and ushered her into the empty barracks that were theirs until they deployed. She rather got the feeling they were guarding her until such time as Savage came back to kill her.

For the most part they sat in silence, though Tank and Archie eventually broke out a pack of cards and started a game, a game Zora was pointedly not invited to play. The atmosphere was heavy and pensive. Zora was allowed to pace back and forth without anyone saying a word to her, but if she got to close to the door, Steve would silently move to stand in front of it, his arms folded across his chest, his beard bushy with intensity. Sometimes Steve's beard said more than he did. When he was in a good mood it flowed neatly down his chest, but when he was agitated it would prickle and bristle with the movement of his jaw. She was trapped alright. Giving up on the pacing, she sat down next to Brian who was reclining on one of the bunks with his eyes closed and nudged him gently. "Are you going to blank me too?"

Brian shook his head. He didn't open his eyes, though his lips twisted wryly. "You never cease to amaze, Zora."

"It was an accident," Zora pleaded. "You have to believe me."

"I do believe you," he said amiably. "There is no way it could have been anything else."

"Savage is going to kill me now, isn't he? I mean literally."

Brian opened his eyes and turned his serious gaze on her. "If he wanted to kill you, you'd be dead. If he wanted to hurt you, you'd be hurt. You might have hit him accidentally, but it's no accident you're sitting there without a scratch on you."

"Yeah," Zora admitted gloomily, putting her head in her hands and staring at the dusty floor. "You're probably right."

Brian patted her on the shoulder. "Relax, it's not like we haven't all broken a commanding officer's nose before."

She looked up hopefully. "Really?"

"Not really," he shook his head and gave her a small grin. "The story is probably all over base already."

Zora groaned into her hands. "Does this mean the mission won't be going ahead?"

"It has to go ahead, and it has to go ahead with you on it," Brian said simply. "Those are just the facts of the matter. There isn't anyone else who can do what you do."

Zora glanced over at the far end of the room where Steve had joined Tank and Archie at their game. "Let me guess, nobody is happy about that."

"They'll get over it. It's not their call to make," Brian said simply.

"And you? Do you not want me on the team?"

Brian shrugged. "It's not my call to make either."

"Ouch," Zora muttered as she got up and moved away from Brian to sit on her own. That hurt, though she couldn't blame Brian for not wanting her on the team, she had been behaving very erratically of late. Why couldn't she get herself together? Was there something wrong with her? Would she ever actually be of use to anyone?

She would have thought herself into a pile of sick, but fortunately for Zora her inner journey of self loathing was interrupted by the one person who definitely disliked her more than she disliked herself. "Where is she?" Anja barked the question as she barged into the barracks, slamming the door behind her. She laid eyes on Zora with an unpleasant smirk. "There you are. Savage will see you now," she said, her voice saturated with bitchiness.

Zora rushed across the compound with Anja, ignoring the other woman's frequent sneers and jibes. She didn't care about what Anja thought. She just wanted to see Savage and apologize for what she had done.

Anja ushered her into a small hospital wing, it was well kept and very clean, more so than the civilian hospital Zora had been in. Savage was in one of the private examination rooms, Anja informed her. "He wants to see you alone," she said, pausing outside a door marked 'Exam Room 3'. "But I'll be waiting outside in case you try to kill him again."

"Yeah, that's why you're waiting," Zora replied, pushing the door to Savage's room open. Bloody Anja just wanted to hear her get punished.

Anja was one sick puppy, but Zora forgot all about her when she laid eyes on Savage. He was sitting on the edge of a bed, his powerful frame bent slightly as he did up his shirt sleeves. He'd been cleaned up considerably since she'd last seen him and he was no longer covered in his own blood. He'd washed his face and someone had gotten him a new shirt. He looked good as new. Almost. As he turned his head to look at her, she saw that he had a thick white bandage over his nose and the skin under his left eye was swollen and quickly turning black. Horrified at what she'd managed to do to him, Zora simply stared dumbly, her hands clapped over her mouth.

To her immense relief he did not scowl or glower. If anything his expression was neutral and when he spoke, his tone was mild. "Well, young lady, what do you have to say for yourself?"

"I'm so sorry," Zora stammered, slowly lowering her hands. "I never meant to do that."

He raised a brow. "You do a lot of damage unintentionally," he noted dryly.

"Yeah," she agreed. "I'm sorry."

"This is partially my fault," he admitted. "I lost my temper with you. I should never have dealt with you when I was angry."

Reassured that he wasn't going to break her neck, Zora shuffled a little closer to him, stopping at the end of the bed where she picked at the corner of the bed sheet, then raised her eyes to meet his. "It's a pretty big temper you have. You were scary."

He looked at her with humor dancing in his eyes. "And apparently you don't react well to fear, or at least, not well for the thing you're afraid of." The humor faded and he sighed as his face contorted, making him look positively wracked with regret. "You're not ready for this. I shouldn't have brought you into it."

"I am plenty ready for this," Zora snapped, suddenly tired of being told she wasn't good enough. "What I'm not ready for is you treating me like a child one moment and snapping at me for not being more grown up the next. You need to stop messing with my head. I can do what you need me to do blindfolded if you just let me get on with it."

A small chuckle escaped him. "Is that so?"

She glared at him stubbornly. "Yes, it is so."

He stood up and moved towards her. "So you're saying that I'm too overbearing?"

She took a cautious step back, keeping her head held high. "I'm saying you can't make up your mind what to do with me and you get frustrated with me for not being any of the things you want. You screamed at me like I was some kind of insolent recruit and expected me to take it well. I'm not some teenage kid you can howl and smack into submission. It's not going to work, Brett." His first name felt slightly strange on her tongue, but at the same time she knew it was right to say it.

"Brett, huh?" He smirked. "You're very presumptuous, but you're right that this isn't working." His eyes darkened as he looked at her with a purposeful expression. I've made a decision about you Zora."

Zora felt her innards twist. He was going to send her away. She should have been glad of that, it meant that she would be spared a dangerous mission, but instead she felt a sense of loss. What would life be without him? What would it be like to pass day after day knowing that she was not going to see him?

"Don't look so terrified," he smiled. "It's best for us both. We can't continue on the way we've been going."

Her throat was suddenly tight. She nodded, not trusting her voice. He was right. This conclusion had been inevitable. He'd been trying to train her for ages, but it hadn't taken. If anything she was actually more outrageously behaved than she had been when he met her. Sure she didn't drink anymore, but who cared about a drink or two when you were punching people in the face? She lowered her head as he closed the distance between them, not wanting to look at him when he rejected her.

A strong hand took hold of her chin as he gently tipped her head up towards him. "I cannot treat you as a solider, because you are not one," he said softly. "You're stuck between two worlds. You have civilian instincts and when you're pushed, you lash out. You haven't learned to control your aggression and fear. Maybe you could learn that control in time, but we do not have time."

A small sob escaped Zora's lips. This was it. He was throwing her off the team. "I understand," she said softly, her voice cracking.

He searched her eyes, shaking his head at her. "You don't," he said heavily. "You are mine. In every sense of the word. I recruited you."

Zora wondered what happened to recruits that didn't work out. She doubted it was early retirement with full benefits. She began to tremble as she contemplated the possibility that she might very well have signed her own death warrant when she'd hit Savage.

"This is about more than you misbehaving at every turn. This is about more than missions. This is about you," he reached out and gently tapped her nose. "And me."

"You and me?" Zora's lower lip quivered.

He quirked a dark brow at her, holding her gaze with an intense look. "You're going to tell me you haven't felt what is between us?"

"No! I mean, yes," she shook her head, trying to change gears with the conversation. "I mean I knew how I felt but you... I didn't know you wanted... that."

"Oh I want that," Savage said. "I want that very badly indeed." He leaned in, purring against her ear. "The other night when you pretended to offer yourself to me, I almost took you."

"But Anja?"

"Anja?" Savage chuckled. "You still think I want Anja? No. She does her job well but she is too serious for my tastes. You on the other hand, you're spirited and free in a way that I can't even begin to describe. You're fun, Zora, in so many ways." He reached for her and slid his hands down the sides of her body, resting them on her hips.

"I'm so confused," Zora admitted, leaning forward so that her body was pressed against his. She loved the feeling of the hard lines of his body against her own. He was pure hard muscle, immovable, immutable.

"You hit me when I came for you. That's the thing about you Zora, you never back down. Even when you're scared, even when you're being dominated, you keep an awareness of yourself. I own your body, but I'll never own your mind or your soul no matter what I do, and that," he lowered his head and dropped a line of kisses along her neck. "Is intoxicating."

Zora's voice was soaked with incredulity. "I punched you into wanting me?"

He chuckled darkly against her skin. "You forced my hand by acting out. That's all. I'd advise you not to do it again. I'll be ready for it next time and you won't like what happens."

"Well don't come at me like a raving lunatic and I won't hit you," Zora spoke with just a hint of petulant attitude.

Savage ran his hands around her back and settled them on the swell of her bottom, pulling her closer to his body. She'd dreamed of what it would be like to held close to him like this, but none of the dreams matched the incredible erotic charge of the reality as his head descended towards her and their lips met in an electric kiss. "How about this," he said in a low purr. "How about I treat you like my lover, and you do as you're told."

Her heart in her throat, Zora barely trusted herself to speak. She was getting everything she'd wanted, and she was getting it on the back of the worst behavior she'd ever displayed. Sometimes life didn't make any sense.

"I'm sorry I scared you," he said softly. "That was wrong. I will not lose my temper with you like that again. I was frustrated," he said, squeezing her bottom meaningfully. "But I don't intend to be frustrated again." His meaning was clear. As he squeezed her bottom he pulled her against his crotch and she felt his hardness throbbing for her. He hadn't spanked her for hitting him, but she got the impression he planned to take it out on her in another way. She certainly hoped he did. Her body responded to him like no other. She could already feel a seeping moistness between her legs as her flesh prepared itself for him.

"I'm sorry I broke your nose," she apologized in turn. "Do you really mean that?"

"That I am I sorry I scared you? Certainly."

"No," Zora blushed. "The other thing."

He flashed a brilliant sexy smile."You mean my taking you as my lover? My dear, I see no other way forward. I cannot resist you and you desperately need a firm hand."

"I think my hand is firm enough," Zora joked, pointing at his nose.

He growled, then shook his head. "Such a little smart ass." Zora should have known not to mouth off whilst in his grasp, but it was too late. He had a firm grip on her and he pressed her over the waist high bed without any trouble at all. She might have given his nose a good seeing to, but everything else was in fine working order.

He slapped her bottom hard, really hard. Ordinarily she would have shouted the place down, but she had the feeling that she really actually deserved this spanking. It hurt of course, but she was slowly getting used to her backside hurting. You could only be outraged so many times before a spanking seemed almost run of the mill – especially when you'd just crushed the spanker's nose, and even more especially when you were too busy arching your hips up to the spanker, silently begging them to take you.

"How is that smart ass of yours feeling now?" Savage asked, giving her the full benefit of his open palm.

She squeaked in spite of her resolve to take her spanking well, and began wriggling her bottom with a fast, fierce rhythm to try to relieve the sting. "It's hot," she complained.

"Yes it is," he agreed throatily, applying his palm with gusto.

Zora had been prepared to take pain, but it didn't hurt as much when she wasn't fighting it. When she relaxed and sank into the sensations caused by his hand blazing across her cheeks, it felt intense but not screaming sore. The ripples of feeling slid through her body, taking her to another place, a place in which only she and Savage existed, in which his hand on her ass was the most natural thing in the world. A warm, tingly feeling zipped along her spine. She felt light, free.

She did not complain when he pulled her pants down, nor when he hooked his thumb into her underwear and took her panties down with her pants, leaving her bare bottomed and vulnerable in front of him. She had been in such a position before, but it was different this time. In the past he had assumed the role of the strict disciplinarian. Now he was more than that. His fingers brushed lightly along the length of her pussy, testing her wetness.

"You're ready for this, aren't you Zora?"

She heard a zipper behind her and knew that it didn't matter if she was ready or not. He was going to fuck her – no, not just fuck her. He was going to claim her. She felt him slide his palm over her warm bottom, then rest it on her lower back. He held her in place as he guided the head of his manhood towards her slit.

Zora arched like a cat in heat as he pushed inside her, the long pole of his flesh parting her, stretching her body around him. "Oh god," Savage grunted. "So tight." He thrust his hips, breaking what little resistance her body had as his cock slid inside her, skin to skin.

This was the most primal way of establishing dominance. It was impossible for Zora to feel anything other than submissive when bent over with a thick cock invading her body. Savage stroked inside her slowly, groaning his enjoyment of her velvety pussy.

"You're so wet, baby," he said, stroking his hand up her back to grasp her hair. "How long have you wanted this cock?"

The lewd question made her blush. Her fingers curled on the sheet of the bed as he shoved himself inside her harder, banging her for the answer. "A long time," she admitted in a wanton whimper.

"I've wanted this a long time too, girl," Savage said, slapping her bottom. "Right from when you were giving me trouble at the beginning I wanted to fuck you into being good for me." He drove his cock inside her deeply and held it there, letting her grind on him. "I should have thrown you over that interrogation table and had my way with you. It would have saved us both a lot of time."

She remembered the interrogation room. The image of being fucked in that darkened room, every thrust and moan caught on camera made Zora's pussy clench with excitement. Savage chuckled. "You like that don't you? You love the idea of being fucked when you're naughty."

He began fucking her harder, slamming his cock in and out of her with harsh strokes that made her squeal with pleasure. He leaned down over her back as he took her and pulling her hair to the side, fastened his teeth on the back of her neck, holding her and marking her as his own.

"I'm going to cum inside you," he grunted behind her ear. "I'm going to fill you with my cum."

"Please," Zora whimpered, arching her bottom up to him. Her pleasure was quickly coming to a crescendo, her pussy and clit tingling and pulsing with every thrust. "I want to come with you."

"Who says you get to cum?" Savage stopped moving, stood up straight and slapped her bottom hard enough to make her cry out. His cock was pulled out of her to the very tip, just seated inside her pussy lips, keeping her open for him. "You haven't been good enough to cum."

Zora whimpered with need. "But I can't help it."

"You will help it," Savage said, a low note of authority in his voice. "You will help it or I'll spank your pussy until you forget what an orgasm feels like." He thrust his cock slowly inside her, sheathing himself in her body once more. "Do you understand me?"

"Yessir," Zora whimpered, biting her lower lip as he started fucking her hard and fast once more. It took all her willpower not to cum. Every thrust urged her to explode in orgasm, but she held off, even as Savage's breath became ragged and short above her. He was about to cum inside her. He was about to fill her with his seed and she was simply to take it.

The thought of being fucked and not allowed to cum filled her with another burst of arousal that almost pushed her over the edge, but he felt her pussy spasm and slapped her bottom hard. "No cumming," he growled, thrusting aggressively inside her body. There was no mistaking what this was, this wasn't a tender love making session, this was a quick punishment fuck designed for one thing only – teaching Zora her place.

He pounded her so hard it was all she could do to hold on, her bottom jiggling with every thrust until he threw his head back and cried out in pleasure as his seed burst forth, coating her pussy. He came inside her with no regard for her pleasure, staking his claim to the most tender parts of her body.

Zora's pussy clenched and throbbed, but she did not come. She stayed right on the edge as Savage slowly became softer inside her then slipped out, letting a dribble of his cum follow his cock. Standing there, bent over the table with a very well fucked pussy, Zora was dazed. Dazed and very aroused. She would have rubbed herself up against his leg to get off like a dog if he would have let her, but it was not to be.

When Savage had recovered from his orgasm he lifted her up and turned her to face him, holding her against his body. She was half naked but he'd kept his clothes on through the entire proceedings. Only his cock had been freed to fuck her and now even that had been safely zipped away. He was the picture of control, whilst she was a wanton little slut, half naked with a well fucked pussy very much on display. She rested her head against his chest and sighed with contentment, feeling his seed trickling warmly out of her body. Her own desire to orgasm was still there, a dull ache between her legs.

"You are becoming very important to me, Zora," Savage murmured against her hair. "But you cannot, under any circumstances, speak to me the way you did in front of the Captain or hit me again, understand?"

"I understand," Zora felt ashamed. In her newly submissive state she could hardly believe that she'd told him to go fuck himself in front of someone important.

Savage's eyes darkened with dire promise as he looked down at her. "If you speak to me like that again, I'll whip you within an inch of your life."

Zora's eyes widened. "Within an inch of my life?"

"Well," Savage's fingers briefly brushed over her cheek, his voice whisper cold. "I can promise it will feel that way."

She trembled against him, knowing that he meant what he had said. He was not going to get rid of her, but he had claimed her now and her body was his domain. If he wanted to fuck her, he could fuck her. If he wanted her to cum, she would cum for him. And if he wanted to whip her for her misbehavior, well, she doubted she would ever catch him off guard and be able to stop him again. Her cute red ass was going to be grass if she crossed him.

Chapter Thirteen

Night had fallen and in the barracks everybody waited silently for Savage to make an appearance. Zora sensed that she was still very much not forgiven for breaking the Captain's nose and she sat alone, curled up on the top of a bunk. The rest of the team were scattered about the room, some taking the opportunity to have a last minute nap, others going through their equipment one last time. A row of packs sat along the end of the beds, waiting to be carried all the way to Bulgaria.

The packs were the only sign that something very serious indeed was taking place. The team were all wearing plain civilian clothes, a mixture of jeans and slacks and t-shirts and hooded tops. They looked nothing like a military unit, instead they looked like a bunch of scruffy tourists. Zora peeked over the end of the bed and watched as Steve and Tank fiddled with a radio. Steve's beard  had been separated into two distinct plaits tied with beads and he wore a rainbow tie-dyed oversized t-shirt that absolutely stank of weed. Zora was curious as to just how far Steve had taken his orders to look like a complete wastrel, but she didn't dare ask. He might have been dressed like a raging hippie, but his eyes were still deadly serious. Tank was wearing knee-length cut off jean shorts and Mickey Mouse flip flops which looked utterly ridiculous clinging to his hairy feet. A beery t-shirt and stained zippered hoody covered his midsection. To look at the pair of them, one would never have suspected that they were part of a crack team about to embark on a dangerous mission that could very well shape the fate of the world.

Zora was pretty impressed, she wasn't entirely sure what the plan was, Savage had told her to go along with things and she was happy to do so. It wasn't as if it made much difference to her either way, she still didn't understand half the things the team said to one another when they slipped into military jargon.

“This mission is going to fail,” Anja muttered from the bunk next to Zora's. The young woman was clothed in a skin tight tank top that made the most of her pert bosom and shapely waist and the jeans she wore were almost tight enough to allow a casual onlooker to perform a cavity search at a glance. She was speaking softly to Archie, but Zora had decent enough hearing and she was particularly tuned into Anja. The woman had been scowling and pouting since Savage had been released from the medical ward and Zora was waiting for the outburst she just knew would be coming.

“Shut up, Anja,” Zora piped up. She'd dressed more conservatively, in a black hooded jumper and equally black jeans which were new, but already scuffed at the bottom because the jeans were longer than her legs were.

It was the opening Anja had been looking for. “You shut up, you little slut.” She turned towards Zora with aggressive vehemence that made Zora recoil. She remembered all too well what it felt like to be slugged by the tall blonde and she was not keen to repeat the experience. “She's fucking Savage, you know that?” Anja dropped the bombshell gleefully. “I heard them in the ward.”

Steve and Tank stopped what they were doing and looked up at Anja, saying nothing. The silent men did not appear surprised, though Zora was sure that the atmosphere had just gotten a lot more chilly. “That's right. He's going to take us into enemy territory and risk our lives on the slapper he's sleeping with,” Anja crowed.

A low growl emerged from Zora. It was one thing to be afraid of Anja, it was quite another to sit there as the bitch tore her and Savage down. “If you don't trust him, why don't you get yourself transferred?”

“I follow orders and do as I'm told, unlike some people,” Anja shot back.

“But you whine about it like a little girl,” Zora replied, a sneer firmly established on her face. The younger woman's constant hostility was coming to a head where Zora was concerned. Sooner or later, one of them was going to have to go – and Zora was certain it wouldn't be her.

“Anja, please.” Brian interjected from behind a pair of oversized yellow rimmed shades. He was stretched out on one of the bottom bunks and until he'd opened his mouth, Zora had thought he was sleeping. Always soft spoken, Brian was none the less the ranking officer in the room, at least, Zora was pretty sure he was. She hadn't been paying as much attention as she should have done to the badges and stars and stripes and whatnot, but Savage delegated everything to Brian and the others seemed to salute him an awful lot. At Brian's soft command,  Anja settled into a disgruntled silence.

As it turned out, the blonde was lucky Brian had spoken up when he did, for heavy footsteps crunched on the gravel outside the barracks, announcing the Captain's arrival. “Right,” Savage pushed the door open and poked his handsome head inside. “Let's go.”

That was it. That was the order that had them clambering off the bunks, gathering their packs and making their way out into the night toward the jeep that would transport them all to the air field. Zora had expected more fanfare, more standing to attention, more stirring speeches, but that obviously wasn't Savage's style.

She followed along, carried by the momentum of the others, hardly believing that they were off to foil a dastardly terrorist plot. This was the moment she had feared from the moment Savage had told her what was required of her, but it all seemed so very mundane that she hardly felt any fear at all. Yes, there was a certain bubbling of anxiety, but nothing like the paralyzing force she'd worried about.

In spite of the intimacies they'd so recently shared, Savage didn't shower her with attention as they rode towards the field. She didn't blame him, even a peck on the cheek would probably make Anja's silly head explode. Still Zora glanced at him often for reassurance. He was all business, entirely composed, and remarkably, showing no signs of the stress and tension that had pervaded the team in the barracks. In moments like these, it was easy to see how Savage had risen through the ranks. He still had a bandage across the bridge of his nose and there was a distinct black ring under his eye, but he was still a commanding presence. He too was in civilian clothing, wearing a checkered shirt tucked into a belted pair of blue jeans. His feet were shod in stylish, but functional boots. All he needed was a cowboy hat to complete the image, Zora thought, grinning to herself as she wondered how Savage would fare with a lasso.

He'd probably be quite good at it. He was good at everything else. She closed her eyes and imagined that her arms were tied behind her, bound at the wrists with rough rope. In her day dream, Savage was in front of her, entirely shirtless, his muscular torso tanned under the harsh southern sun. He held the end of the rope and pulled it between her thighs, rough pressure settling across her clit where the seam of her jeans just so happened to rub...

“Eyes open, soldier!” Savage nudged her back to reality. Her cowboy fantasies were cut abruptly short as they reached the airfield and drove up onto the tarmac next to a plane that seemed to Zora to be as big as an office block laying on its side. There were uniformed soldiers all around it, preparing it for take off. It sat placidly in the middle all the activity, indifferent to the puny humans working frantically to get it off the ground in time. It was large and rather rotund, built for carrying things long distances, not for quick maneuvers and aggressive missions. Viewed from certain angles, it was almost friendly looking with its snub nose and round belly.

“C-17 Globemaster III,” Archie beamed as they all clambered out of the truck. “These things are awesome.”

Zora tried to share some of his enthusiasm and she almost managed it, until she climbed up the ramp at the back of the plane and into the belly of the beast. The friendly image was entirely lost once she attained the interior of the plane. Unlike a commercial liner outfitted with plastic paneling and nice soft seats and opaque grilled lighting, the interior of the Globemaster was cavernous and Spartan in appearance. There were metal struts and grilles all over the show and in the middle of the plane were three late model automobiles in bland colors, two cars and one van strapped down quite nonchalantly as if they flew all the time. This was a functional plane. This was a plane meant to do things. This was not a plane that took you to a lovely holiday destination, this was a plane that tossed you out the back of it without bothering to land first.

Zora felt her heart begin to race. There was no going back now. Her stomach lurched up into her throat, her mouth was suddenly dry. The team were obediently taking their places, strapping themselves into the bench seats and harnesses along the side of the plane, but Zora stalled, looking wistfully at the large ramp that lead down onto the ground, safe, lovely ground.

“Come on,” Savage said, placing his hand on the back of her neck and steering her towards a spare seat. She wanted to scream and cry like a baby, but she was too embarrassed to do so in front of the team, especially in front of Anja, so she settled for merely wringing her hands and gnawing at her fingernails as Savage pressed her down into a seat next to Brian and strapped her in. “Relax, kid,” he winked at her. She gave him a weak smile. There was nothing to be relaxed about, nothing at all. She'd just been strapped into a flying warehouse.

When Savage sat next to her, she felt a little bit better. Between Savage and Brian she was as protected as she was going to get, but still the butterflies weren't going away. They grew worse as the tail of the aircraft was closed and the engines were warmed up. The noise of the massive engines as they began to turn was outrageous and she covered her ears, ignoring Anja's smirk as the walls of the plane vibrated.

It wasn't much better when the plane started trundling heavily towards the runway, quickly gathering speed. To Zora's credit, she resisted the urge to scream as the massive beast of a machine hurtled down the runway and took to the air with an uncomfortable, weightless lurch that made her stomach rise once more.

“You okay?” Savage almost yelled the words in her ear to be heard over the nose of the engines. She shook her head. She was not okay. She was not okay at all. She was going to be sick. She was going to pass out from panic and fear. The plane jolted roughly as it hit a patch of turbulence and even breathing became difficult for Zora. She clutched at Savage's arm tight enough to leave marks and whimpered, a small sound lost in the powerful droning of the plane.

Savage made some comforting noises, but she couldn't hear him as the plane battled through rough patches of air, bumping about like a boat on the high seas. Closing her eyes tightly, Zora prayed that she'd survive the flight. She was no longer worried about terrorists.

As the plane reached its cruising altitude, the turbulence lessened significantly and Zora was able to open her eyes and let go of Savage's arm. “See, you're fine,” Savage murmured against her ear, stroking her hair with comforting swipes of his large hand.

“If she can't handle take off, how's she going to handle the mission?” Anja's snide tones floated across the creaking metal.

“Anja!” Savage roared with a burst of anger that took everyone, including Zora, by surprise. “Shut your damn mouth. If I hear another word out of you before we land – I'll give you something else to occupy it.”

The look of confusion on his face as Tank burst into laughter, followed by Archie and Brian made it clear that Savage hadn't quite worked out how what he'd said would sound before he said it. Anja blushed bright red and even Zora snickered at the unintended innuendo.

“I meant a gag or something,” he explained halfheartedly, seeming to know all too well that nobody cared what he'd meant. Their version of events was far more interesting.

Giggling to herself, Zora snuggled up against his side, feeling much better. The plane was still vibrating with the ongoing hum of the engines, but she figured that was probably preferable to the engines not being on. “You liked that did you?” Savage looked down at her with a smirk on his face.

“It did paint quite a picture,” she grinned up at him.

“I would have thought it would make you jealous, not giggly like a school girl,” he said, tweaking her nose.

“Me? Jealous of Anja? Never,” Zora smiled. She had once been quite concerned about the pretty blonde, but she really didn't feel all that jealous of Anja anymore. She was quite certain Savage had never confessed feelings to Anja, and she was even more certain that Anja had never known what it was like to be taken by Savage's powerful body. Zora squirmed as she remembered what it had felt like to have him inside her, his thickness propelled by muscles hardened from years of daring deeds.

“Brat,” Savage rumbled comfortingly, tussling her hair. Zora smiled and dared to stretch her legs out in front of her. They'd been clenched during take off and even the simple act of straightening them released a lot of the tension she'd been holding in her body.

It was a long flight, over ten hours. At some point Zora stopped being afraid that the plane was going to drop out of the sky and managed to actually fall asleep, her head resting against Savage's shoulder. She didn't wake up until the plane began to descend for landing. The descent was not nearly as dramatic as take off had been, and before long, they were on the ground. Zora let out a breath she hadn't known she was holding as the tail of the plane opened in the disconcerting way it had and the incongruous scent of flowers and sunlight filtered into the interior.

They had departed the US in the depths of night, but it was day time where they'd landed. Savage helped her unstrap herself and Zora was soon emerging into a warm, sunny day in the middle of nowhere. She looked around in confusion, expecting a military air field, but they had landed at a small airstrip that was little more than a paved asphalt surface lacking the most basic of amenities. There were no terminals, no control towers, nothing. In the distance were some houses that indicated human inhabitants, but that was it.

“Where are we?” She turned to Savage, confusion written all over her face.

“Metaxades, it's a small village.”

“Metaxades? Sounds...”

“Greek, we're in Greece,” Savage grinned, looking like a small boy very much pleased with himself. He stretched in the sun, the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up and the light sheen of sweat on his muscular forearms made them gleam powerfully. Zora felt a low bolt of arousal shoot through her abdomen. Even when she was feeling utterly lost in a strange country, he was capable of distracting her with his mere existence.

“I thought it was Bulgarians we were after?” Her brows crumpled towards her nose.

“The border between Bulgaria and Greece is to the West,” Savage pointed in the general direction of the West, a motion that brought his muscles to Zora's attention once more.

Squinting her eyes, Zora could only see farm land and beyond that, a glistening river.  “I don't see a border.”

“The Nestos is the border. That's the river.”

“Oh. So we're going to have to swim for it?”

“Not quite,” Savage smiled. They were very much engaged in the mission now, and yet Savage was nothing like Zora had expected him to be. The build up to the mission had been fraught with terrible tension and utmost seriousness, but now the big man was entirely at ease. He clapped her on the back heartily and turned towards the rest of the team. “Are we ready?”

They weren't ready. Archie, Steve and Brian had gone for the vehicles. Everybody stood back as they were started and driven convoy style out of the plane, a sight that Zora still found rather strange and unsettling.

“Here's the plan,” Savage took a moment to brief Zora privately in simple words she'd understand. At one time she might have found it condescending, but now she was glad he dispensed with the military talk that tended to make her nervous and confused. “The crew will take the plane, we'll take the cars and drive across the border posing as tourists.”

“Tourists who fight terrorists?” Zora quipped with a grin, which faded quickly as Savage shook his head sternly.

“No. You don't say that word again, understand? You don't say anything about anything to do with the mission. You call me Brett and you call everyone else by their first names too, got it?”

“Got it,” Zora nodded.

“Good.” Savage looked up and addressed the team. “Okay, as planned, Archie and Anja, you two are coupled up. Zora's with me. Tank, Brian and Steve, you lot are off on the stag trip.”

“Woo, titty bars!” Tank punched the air. “For cover, right?”

“Right,” Savage said, shrugging as if it didn't much matter to him what they did. “Just show up when you're needed.”

“What's our cover?” Zora asked curiously. Savage grinned and fished in his pocket. “You, Ms Zora,” he said, taking her hand and sliding a gold ring on to the finger next to the pinky,“will be my new bride. We're on our honeymoon, see? Mr and Mrs Brown.”

Zora blushed as Savage slid the band onto her ring finger, feeling a little thrill of possession run through her. It wasn't real of course, couldn't be real, but pretending was nice. “What are Anja and Archie supposed to be?” She changed the subject slightly so he wouldn't see just how pleased she was to pretend to be his wife.

“Archie and Anja are college kids on a culture break paid for by their indulgent parents,” Savage explained. “So we will split up now. Stags take the Toyota, kids get the Mitzi, and we'll take the Jag.” If Zora's grin had been any wider, it would have split her face in two. Here she was in beautiful Greece with Savage by her side playing her husband, no less. Even better, Anja was being sent off with Archie and wouldn't be bothering her anymore. “You look like the cat the got the cream,” Savage lowered his head and murmured in her ear.

“I'm just looking forward to the wedding night,” Zora batted her eyelashes as she pressed her body into his, grinding her hips rather shamelessly against his thigh. She didn't need any encouragement whatsoever to go along with their cover. Nor did Savage, it seemed.

“Oh I bet you are,” he purred, his hand sliding down her back to squeeze her bottom. “We just need to get you into a dress,” he said, running a critical eye over her. “Something that says 'honeymoon', not 'amateur criminal'.”

Zora rolled her eyes. He had to ruin it by trying to make her into a girly girl. “Maybe we need to get you into a dress,” she responded pertly. “Ow!” She cried out as Savage's big, hard palm came crashing down against her bottom.

“That's more than enough of your cheek, young lady,” he said gruffly, opening the door of the car Brian had delivered safely down the ramp. It was a sleek royal blue Jag that Zora rather liked, not too modern, not too old. She got into the passenger seat quite happily. If this was what going on top secret mission was like she could definitely get behind it.

She watched through the windscreen as the rest of the team split into their respective groups. Anja and Archie made a cute couple. They were both young enough to pass as college students and both good looking in a predictable sort of way. As for Tank, Steve and Brian, they piled into the van quite eagerly, no doubt anticipating the pleasures of pretending to be on an extended stag do almost as much as she was anticipating spending the night with Savage in a honeymoon suite.

“Right,” Savage got into the driver's side. “Let's get out of here.”

The three vehicles set out in three different directions so as not to bring suspicion upon themselves as they crossed over the border from Greece to Bulgaria. Within just a few minutes, Zora and Savage were alone on the road. Zora was over the moon. The smile did not leave her face as she looked out over the fields bathed in the same bright sunshine she imagined once fell upon the faces of the famous ancient Greeks. “This is awesome,” she said, kicking off her shoes and putting her socked feet up on the dash. “Full marks for the cover story.”

Savage smiled over at her and winked rakishly. “Thank you,” he said, changing down gear smoothly as they encountered some rougher road. “We will of course, have to play our roles fully.” His voice was thick with welcome innuendo, his eyes hungry as he glanced over at her and slid his hand over her thigh and up to her crotch in a brief, sweeping caress that made her moan.

“No great hardship,” Zora said, squirming in her seat happily. She was warm, she was happy and she was about to spend the evening in private luxury with the man of her dreams. She decided then and there that if she ever met any of those Bulgarian terrorists, she would shake them by the hand.

Chapter Fourteen

In the ancient settlement city of Haskovo, events were taking place in a luxurious honeymoon apartment decorated with portraits of Cupid and dominated by a super king size four poster bed draped with the kind of decorative fabric that would have made it seem quite at home anywhere from the first century to the twenty first century. Dimly lit with the soft glow of bulbs designed to look like candles, the tussled sheets strewn across the bed spoke to the lust that had recently been shared there.

Zora stood in front of a table, frowning down at a series of drawings and photographs of ugly buildings. She was wearing nothing but an oversized sweatshirt bought from the gift shop to cover her nakedness, her hair scraped back in a severe ponytail, her legs bare. From time to time, she nibbled at a fingernail and shuffled a picture here or there. The faint sound of a running shower emanated from the background as she applied herself to her studies.

Several minutes later, Savage emerged from the shower barely clad  in a complimentary silk robe. He padded across the thickly carpeted room and wrapped his arms around her midsection from behind, squeezing her against his torso. “Are you ready?” He purred the question into her ear, almost making it sound like an invitation to further pleasure, though it was anything but. To the causal observer perched on the rooftop across the road with a pair of binoculars, they might have looked like lovers casually enjoying one another's company, but the truth of the matter was that they were about to embark on the mission that had brought them halfway around the world.

“Always,” Zora replied with the utmost bravado, smoothing her palm over the rough hair that covered the backs of his muscular forearms. She'd come to know every inch of his body in the past week, and she was still awed by the gorgeous but functional power the man possessed. He'd been hewn into shape by the challenges of a lifetime and when she ran her fingers across his scar marked skin, she fancied she could sense some of the pains he must have endured in a world of danger that she was now part of.

They had traveled through Greece and crossed the Bulgarian border without incident. Their cover had not been difficult to maintain. Given free reign to express their affection and desire, there had barely been a moment in the past week that they hadn't had their hands all over each other's bodies. Zora had almost forgotten the mission at hand, until Savage pulled out a series of schematics in Haskovo and had her study them every evening before they made love, and sometimes afterward too.

Now he turned her in his arms, took her by the hand and undid her watch. “Remember. No electronics. No watch. No phone. Nothing. If the system picks up on any electromagnetic activity at all, it locks down.” He caught her eye. “With you inside.”

Zora paled ever so slightly. “And if that happens? You'll come and save me?”

“We'll try, but they'll have you first, and you really don't want that. So let's just make sure you don't carry anything in there that might set the system off.” He smiled reassuringly and Zora's concern melted away. This was the madness of early lust and early love. Her faith in the man now busy wanding her for traces of electromagnetic activity was so complete she would have walked into the fires of hell if he'd told her to. As he ran the detector over her body, she caught flashes of his fine physique through the gaps in his robes. Just the sight of the man made her loins tingle.

As Zora obligingly stayed in place, ogling him for all she was worth, Savage ran through the finer details one last time. “Your name is General Ekaterina Vlovich. You're a military inspector. The uniform you're wearing gives you the kind of rank these people dream of.”

“So the terrorists are the military?”

“Not quite. They're connected in some areas. It's hard to get the kind of hardware and systems these people have without military hookups. We're sending you in as an authority. If anyone questions you, glare at them.”

“Glare at them?” Zora spluttered. “That's your advice?”

“You've got a good glare on you,” Savage assured her. “If that doesn't work, there will be backup.”

“Wait wait wait,” Zora waved her hands in front of her face and shook her head. “That doesn't make sense. There will be backup if my glaring fails, but not if the whole thing shuts down?”

Savage kept going through the preparatory motions, his large, strong hands moving over her body  as he ignored her little display of incredulity. “It's easier to get someone to confirm your identity than it is to storm the place. Take off your sweater.”

Stripped down to her bra, Zora stood in place as Savage fitted a light bullet proof vest over her head. “Stab proof and bullet proof,” he said, gently pressing a closed fist against it.

Poking it with a finger, Zora saw a flaw in this part of the plan too. “Unless they stab or shoot you not in the chest.”

“They'll go for the chest first,” he said. “Center mass is the most reliable place to take someone down...”

She smirked as she interrupted him. “...unless they're wearing a bullet proof vest.”

“Quit being a smart-ass,” Savage resorted to the last defense of an authority who knows they've lost the argument but is pretty sure that they're in the right regardless. “Usually I'd put a camera on you, but that's not going to work for obvious reasons. You'll be alone when you go in, but the team will be around. You might see a few of them there. Under no circumstances can you acknowledge that you know any of them, understand? You get in there, you deactivate the system and you get out.”

Nodding, Zora looked back over at the layout schematics unrolled on the hotel table. She'd looked at it a hundred times over the last few days. The system control room was marked with three red concentric circles. The entrance of the base was marked with a gold star just like the ones she'd received on school projects as a child. As it had turned out, the security system for the missile wasn't on location with the actual missile, rather it was at the evil doers' HQ in the heart of Haskovo. Both missile site and security system were protected by the same electromagnetic sensor system, and triggering it at either location could lead to disaster, though shutting the system down at HQ left the missile completely vulnerable.

The path to the room itself wasn't terribly difficult to navigate, at least in theory. You went in the front doors, past the reception area and down the hall to the left. The system controls weren't heavily guarded, but the lobby was and the second floor doubled as barracks. They didn't need guards on every door to keep the place safe. If the slightest suspicious activity were detected, there was enough personnel on hand to ensure that it would be all over in minutes for anyone foolish enough to try to break in. With just one viable entrance and exit, the building was incredibly secure. Breaking in by force or stealth would have been an exercise in futility. The only way in was through the front door, and that was the way Zora was going to take. It was brazen, it was bold and it was risky as hell.

“You okay?” Savage gripped her by the chin and looked deep into her eyes, scanning them for any traces of anxiety or panic.

“I'll be fine.” Zora meant it. Terrorists aside, this was a matter of walking into a building and solving an equation. She could do that. She had to do that. To prove that she could. To prove that Anja was wrong. To prove to Savage that she was capable of keeping up with him. To prove to herself that she was the equal of any of them. Oh, and to save the world. “I just need a drink,” she teased.

“You do this, you can drink as much as you want,” he promised. “Within reason,” he amended quickly, seeing a familiar gleam come into her eyes. “Time to get into uniform,” he said, reaching into the closet and pulling out what was quite possibly the most unflattering uniform ever designed by man.

He handed her the uniform and proceeded to get dressed himself in a neat pair of black slacks, a white shirt, dark tie and black jacket. The look was completed with a peaked cap that made him look like a charming manservant.

Wrinkling her nose at her fashion misfortune, Zora put on a pair of thick beige pantyhose and an ill fitting olive green skirt with matching shirt. The black shoes that went with the outfit were thick soled and heavy, shined to the point she could see her face in them. That didn't make them any less uncomfortable. “No wonder these people are terrorists. Damn ugly uniform,” she muttered as Savage looped a black tie around her neck and tied it expertly faster than she could make out what he was doing.

“Okay,” he said, handing her the blazer and checking his watch. “We have one hour. Get that on and let's go. I'll drop you out front in the car.”

They made their way out of the hotel room and into the Jaguar that was fast becoming a second home. Zora breathed deeply as she got in, the smell of the now very familiar leather interior calming her as they began their penultimate journey through Haskovo.

In many ways it was a drive like any other, yet Zora was fraught with the queerest of tension. Savage reached out for her hand and held it the entire way. For the most part they drove in silence. What was there to say? He was dropping her off to perhaps die or face a possibly worse fate at the hands of terrorists. Yet the sun still shone, the birds still sang and all around the place, people went about their daily lives. The world would continue to turn whether she ended up in a deep dark underground dungeon or blinked out of existence entirely. Zora felt oddly separate and disconnected from the world. She was still a part of it, but she was not like the people who laughed and frowned their way across the pavements and streets, caught up in petty concerns. She was part of something deeper, the web that underlay society. She knew things that nobody else knew.

As that thought settled in her mind, a little tingle started at the base of her spine, not a tingle of fear, but a tingle of power. A similar tingle to the one she felt when she was deliberately defiant. She was about to do the unthinkable. She was about to walk into a military installation, disable its security systems, and walk out again. This mission was the ultimate in defiance and it thrilled her to her core.

Savage's rumble broke through her thoughts. “What are you smiling about?”

“Nothing,” Zora's little smile grew a little wider.

Savage chuckled. “You're enjoying this aren't you.”

“A little.”

“There's not much like it,” he admitted. “Once you've done this, not much else is going to compare.” The car began to slow as they approached the building. Zora had seen the concrete block facade many times in pictures, but in person it was much bigger, much more foreboding. “Remember, you own the place,” Savage reminded her, squeezing her hand one last time. “Just walk in there and do your thing. Anybody questions you, ignore them. If they insist on pushing it, somebody will come to your aid.”

Last minute nerves took the opportunity to assail Zora with doubts. “Aren't they going to wonder what I'm doing to the system? Aren't they going to ask questions? Won't they...”

“They don't have clearance to know,” Savage interjected. “They've been warned to expect an inspection, so they'll be on their best behavior, which doesn't include questioning a superior officer.”

“So their discipline will be their downfall?

“Quite.”

“Ironic, no?” She raised a brow at him.

“I get the point, brat,” Savage growled playfully as he brought the car to a halt. “Now get in there and do your job.”

He gave her a quick kiss and Zora exited the vehicle, straightened her shoulders and marched towards the front door of the monolithic concrete HQ. Two armed guards stood on either side of the door, their faces expressionless like dolls. She didn't know if they looked at her because as Savage had suggested, she was not looking at them. She was looking right through them with the forthright confidence of someone in command.  But in spite of her confidence, a little trickle of fear assailed her as she drew closer. What if they shot her? Or worse, what if they asked her something? She clip-clopped closer in her clumsy shoes and all that happened was the lighting fast saluting of subordinates who have spotted an important bit of ribbon. Zora walked between them without so much as a glance.

Once she was inside, she immediately spotted a friendly face. Tank had managed to squeeze himself into one of the ugly uniforms and was in residence at the front desk. He leaped up and saluted briskly, along with the other four armed guards in the lobby. She ignored him completely and proceeded through the reception area into the hallway beyond without any interference aside from the light fapping sounds of arms being lifted and dropped in salute. She was forced to keep her features composed as she realized it was working. It was actually working. This was what discipline got you, it got you mindless orderbots incapable of seeing past a symbol of authority. She'd make sure to drive that point home to Savage when it was all over and she was free once more.

As she walked through the facility in her starchy, itchy uniform she had entirely forgotten to feel afraid. It was all business now, everything that had been planned was unfolding perfectly. Olive green door on the left. Another door on the left. There it was. The third door on the left. A perfectly ordinary door. Not the sort of door behind which one security systems for high powered missiles should have waited. There was a large sign on the door, which could have said KEEP OUT, or maybe NO ELECTRONICS BEYOND THIS POINT, or maybe PONIES FOR CLOWNS. Zora wouldn't have known in any event, the script was completely unrecognizable to her.

She opened the door and walked into the room, which was entirely ordinary in almost every way. The walls were the same chipped institution green color of the rest of the facility and the carpet the same industrial brown high traffic material so rough and encrusted with the dirt of decades that it almost crunched beneath her shoes. She spotted the computer controlling the security system immediately. It sat at the back of the room on a thick metal desk.  The system the bad guys were using to guard their missile might have been ingenious, but it was in no way terribly expensive. They hadn't even sprung for a modern computer. Instead of the futuristic technology Zora had become accustomed to stateside, an antiquated CRT monitor waited for her, lit up with green text.

She approached it and immediately saw the formula waiting to be answered. She did not understand the native language, but the language of mathematics had never failed her. She gazed up on the question in the darkness, a single riddle standing between good and evil. This was the big moment, the moment upon which all things hinged. It passed utterly unremarkably. The answer popped into Zora's head in the same way a question on the two times table would pop into any reasonably educated adult's head, without thought or effort.

'424242.422' She typed the digits in and hit what had to be the enter key. The screen flickered for a moment, then flashed unintelligible green text.

That was it. At least, she thought that was probably it. If what she'd been told was true, the missile security system was now entirely offline. If it wasn't, well, she'd done her best. She turned and walked out of the room, back through the halls and out the front door without acknowledging anyone at all.

Her departure was noted by unseen observers, and over a mile away soldiers immediately began swarming in on a much more deadly, but no less dangerous mission that Zora would never know anything about. They would probably capture the missile, but that did not concern her, her job was done. She walked across the street without a care in the world and slipped back into the car where Savage waited patiently.

“Done,” she said casually, shrugging off the blazer.

His grin was broader than she'd ever seen it, but he didn't waste time in conversation. He was much too focused on getting them out of the area before any of the serious men with serious guns realized what had happened. He started the car and they made their way through the city, returning not to their hotel love nest, but to the airport.

“We're not going back on the big plane?” Zora wondered aloud as they passed by sign after sign with  an airplane painted on it in an obvious way even the dimmest tourist couldn't miss.

“The borders will be difficult to get through by the time we get to them. If we leave now through a commercial terminal, we're much less likely to arouse suspicion.” The smile had not left Savage's face, and it grew broader when he checked his cell whilst waiting at the lights. “They got confirmation. The system is down. The secondary mission is underway now. You did it Zora, you really did it.”

She smiled, trying not to seem too awfully pleased with herself even though she was bursting with pride. “I did? Oh good. I wondered if I'd done anything. It didn't seem like it. It was pretty non eventful.”

“That means you did a good job,” he chuckled. “If you ever find yourself with bullets whizzing over your head like in the movies, it means someone fucked something up somewhere.” He reached over and patted her hand. “You proved the doubters wrong.”

“Damn straight I did,” Zora agreed proudly. “So now what? Am I free now?” She looked at him as the last remnants of Haskovo flashed by the window.

“Well.” Savage's expression suddenly became decidedly less jovial. “Well,” he repeated himself.

“Well what?” Zora prompted him. “I get to be free now, right? I did what you wanted me to?”

“Well.” The big man seemed uncharacteristically tongue tied as they pulled into a parking space at the airport. “Let's sort that out once we're back home, huh?”

“Home? Where's home? You took my home, remember?” Zora's glee was quickly turning into frustration and anger.

“Just trust me, okay?” He looked over at her, his jaw set in the determined way that made him look more like a walking talking G.I Joe than ever. “Let's get back to the states and sort this out there.”

“You mean let's get back to the states and you can lock me up again like a dog, you mean?” Zora repeated herself as she began to get frothy with spittly anger.

“Just get changed into something less likely to draw attention. There's clothes in the back seat,” Savage said, taking refuge in orders.

“Fine.” Zora undid her seat belt and squeezed between the front seats and into the back. “But this isn't over.”

“Of course it's not,” Savage groaned, resting his forehead against the steering wheel. “God give me strength.”

“God give you strength? What about me?” Zora argued from the back, her voice muffled as a result of being stuck halfway out of an ugly uniform and halfway into a much more comfortable hooded sweatshirt. “This is silly!”

“I thought we'd come to an understanding,” Savage said, looking in the rear view mirror as Zora fought with her clothing. “You do as I say and nobody gets their ass spanked.”

“So what, I'm your slave forever?”

Her petulant tone was met with a broad smile. “I can't say I'd complain about that.”

“Ugh! You're impossible!” Having won the battle with her clothes, Zora glowered fiercely at him.

“As are you, brat,” he said, his voice lowering to a naturally authoritative bass. “Don't think having a successful mission means you can't be spanked.”

Zora felt her face flush. No matter how often it happened, no matter how many times his palm and other implements met her backside, she still couldn't get used to it. Being punished by Savage was always embarrassing. It made her feel small. Being spoken to in the rear view mirror like some petulant brat didn't exactly help.

Neither did kicking the back of his seat with a swift, hard kick that made him jolt forward.

“Zora!” Savage exclaimed in surprise, his dark eyes widened as he struggled to comprehend the sheer stupidity of what she'd done.

“Weren't expecting that, were you?” She smirked at the eyes in the mirror, enjoying the way they were all crinkled at the edges with anger and the way his brows had risen entirely out of view.

“No, but you better expect what's coming next!”

Zora squealed as Savage threw open the car door and made his way quickly to the back. She managed to slide across the seats and open the door on the far side, but only barely managed to squeak out of the back seat before his hand came grasping for her. She slammed the door on her side and stood with the car between her and the irate captain, breathing heavily not from physical exhaustion, but from excitement.

“Come here, Ms Matthews,” Savage growled, resorting to formality in the face of extreme bratting.

“I don't think so,” Zora shook her head. “Besides, shouldn't that be Mrs Brown? You're breaking our cover. Amateur.”

His glare intensified further at the taunt. “You are going to regret this,” he said, the promise holding more menace because of the quiet voice with which it was delivered.

“Probably,” Zora agreed. “But I'm not sure I care.”

Savage smirked an unpleasant, humorless smirk. “You should care, because you're going to be in a lot of pain when I'm done with you. Now come on. We have a flight to catch. Unless you want to stay here and wait for them to catch up with you.”

He looked very mad indeed, but Savage at even his maddest wasn't as scary as the threat of Bulgarian terrorists. “Okay,” she acquiesced, quickly thinking of a way to delay the trouble for a day at least. “But you can't touch me until we get back to America. Promise? I'll kick and scream all the way there if you do.”

Savage's handsome face was drawn into a mask of barely controlled irritation. “You'll keep,” he growled the dire promise. “Oh, you'll keep."

Chapter Fifteen

Zora and Savage made their way through the airport arm in arm but glaring at one another rather ferociously whenever their gazes happened to meet. To the casual onlooker they looked like a couple in the middle of a lover's tiff. The pair were very close to a successful escape, but they were not out of the country yet and it was more than possible that the airport could be shut down before they were able to board their flight and take off. Savage was all too aware of how things could go wrong just when you thought you were home free. Zora appeared to be entirely ignorant of the fact.

“Stop gawking around,” she hissed in irritated tones as he scanned the airport for the umpteenth time. “You look like a damn meerkat.”

His dark glower was enough to make her clamp her mouth shut. In anger's grasp it was easy to forget just how scary Savage could be. “When I get you back to the States....” he let the growled threat trail off as chimes played over the speaker system followed by a melodic accented voice.

Passengers for Flight 456 to San Francisco, you are now boarding at gate five.

“Come on,” he said, tugging Zora up by her arm and striding towards the gate at a fast pace that forced her to stumble after him in a quick trot. She gave some thought to biting his hand so that she could conduct herself at a more graceful and dignified pace, but he was on edge enough as it was. She didn't want to know what he would do if she made a scene in front of the gate. So she bit her tongue until they were safely seated in the first class section of a large Boeing jet being questioned by a very pretty air hostess with a toothy white smile.

“Can I get you a complimentary drink? Champagne? Orange Juice?” The air hostess batted her eyelashes at Savage and then at Zora, probably for equality's sake.

Zora looked at Savage hopefully. He'd said she could drink if she completed the mission successfully, and she had. The small, barely perceptible shake of his head dashed her hopes there though. Stupid hard ass of a man. He didn't even know how to enjoy comfort when he had it. He was sitting bolt upright in the plush seat, his feet planted firmly on the floor in a way that reminded her rather uncomfortably of the way he sat when she was over his lap.

“We'll have water please, still, not sparkling,” he said, speaking for them both.

“Of course sir.” The hostess flashed another broad smile and swept off to retrieve their liquid refreshments.

“I won't even bother to remind you about your promise about the drinking,” Zora said bitterly. Before  he could answer her with a litany of her most recent sins, she slipped the complimentary headphones over her ears and started fiddling with the entertainment system that folded out of the arm rest. To her delight it didn't just contain music and movies, but also video games with their very own console style controller. She soon lost herself in a world of pixels and polygons and barely paid any mind at all to what was going on around her as the plane lumbered down the runway and took to the sky with all the stolid dependability of a bus.

After an hour or so of slaughtering pixel people and taking liberal advantage of the complimentary candy, Zora's mood improved enough to allow her to acknowledge Savage's presence without snarling. She looked over and saw that he was reading a book. She'd not seen him read before and was mildly curious as to what kind of fiction might grab the man. Something military flavored she reckoned, maybe Clavell or Cussler or perhaps Clancy. When she leaned over for a closer look she was a little disappointed to see that it didn't seem to be fiction at all. There were complex diagrams and formulas inscribed on the pages, some of which made a little sense to her, others of which were completely beyond her grasp.

Interrupted by the shadow of her skull as it intruded in his reading light, Savage levered one of the earphones away from her head and inquired as to whether or not he could help her.

“Just wondering what you were reading,” she said, sitting back in her own seat.

He twisted his wrist to show her the cover. A Brief History of Time. “One of the most popular books nobody bothers to read,” he said with a smile. “This is my third attempt.”

“Trying to improve yourself with quantum theory?” Zora teased.

“In this chapter,” Savage said, ignoring Zora's little dig, “Dr Hawking makes an interesting point about the behavior of quantum particles being changed by observation.”

“Well it works for people, so why not quantum particles,” Zora said absently, drifting back into the game world which was far more interesting than anything quantum.

“Would that were true. You act up whether you're observed or not,” Savage said with a heavy sigh.

“Hey,” Zora shot him a quick glare. “I've been good lately. Actually, better than good. I've been great. Actually, better than great, I've been super.”

A thick brow rose. “You call kicking my chair and running away 'super', Ms Matthews?”

“I didn't say perfect,” Zora pointed out. “Maybe my natural state is one of misbehavior.”

“Maybe,” Savage allowed. “But I'm sure a state change can be achieved by frequent warming of certain areas.”

“A temporary state change at best,” Zora grinned at the pseudo nerdiness of their conversation. She was mildly surprised to discover that Savage wasn't all about muscle and discipline. It made sense, she supposed, he was certainly smart enough. Smarter than she was probably.

“Just as well I enjoy the warming process.” Something close to a leer passed over his features.

“Sadist.”

He smirked but did not reply and she didn't push the point. The air hostess was passing by with what seemed to be freshly baked scones and muffins. Zora decided to conduct her own scientific experiment and investigated the phenomenon of mile high baked goods very thoroughly by consuming several of each type with plenty of melted butter.

The tension between them temporarily put aside for the duration of time spent in the air, Zora and Savage happily snoozed, gamed, read  and gorged their way across the oceans and back to their homeland. Unfortunately, the almost idyllic atmosphere that had established itself in the glow of a successful mission and a comfortable flight dissipated the moment they landed in San Francisco on an uncommonly cold and rainy day.

As the plane's 'seat belt on' sign turned off for the final time, Zora looked out the window, feeling rather despondent at the gray skies and water droplets splattering themselves against the thick windows of the plane. “Ugh,” she muttered, allowing Savage to tug her up from her seat.

“Come on you.” He pulled her gently in front of himself and placed his hands on her shoulders, steering her towards the front of the plane inexorably.

“Why do I feel like I'm going to the gallows?” Zora groaned as she shuffled her way down the narrow space between the seats.

He leaned down, speaking close to her ear in a way that was very intimate indeed. “Because you're tired and melodramatic. You'll feel better after a rest.”

“After a rest where?”

He didn't answer that question. She figured it was because they were walking past the bright stewardess who had managed to last an eleven hour flight without getting so much as a hair out of place. Zora wondered if the hostess was really a woman, or some kind of advanced cyborg. She knew she wasn't looking nearly as well put together, her hair had frizzed up on the back of the chair and she was sure her eyes would be puffy. She felt gross and sticky when she moved and she was in dire need of a shower.

In her flight addled state, she allowed herself to be propelled out of the plane and along the extendable walkway that lead to the airport terminal proper. Before they got that far however, they were directed down a different hall by a man in a uniform. Too tired to ask why, and knowing that she wasn't going to get an answer anyway, Zora eventually found herself in the back of a Hummer with tinted windows.

“Where are we going?” She droned the question, not expecting to get an answer. She didn't even get one of Savage's all too casual brush offs. In fact, she was ignored entirely. He was chatting with the driver, a fresh faced young man who seemed very impressed by meeting the Captain Savage, as he kept enthusing. Zora didn't know if there were a lot of Captain Savages out there and the young soldier was making a collection of them, or if there was something particularly special about her Captain Savage. At that moment, she didn't much care.

“The Captain Savage,” she announced in loud, brash tones. “If you don't tell me where we're going, I'm going to bite you.”

“Hush,” Savage frowned at her.

Out of all the words he could have possibly used 'hush' was probably the worst. It was condescending and it was juvenile and it riled her. “Don't you hush me!”

If Zora had been a little less tired, a little less irritated or a little less concerned about her future, she might have paid more attention to the fact that she was pressing one of Brett Savage's most sensitive buttons, being disrespected in front of colleagues. It didn't occur to her however, not until she was pinned face down on the seat, her ass being slapped with the sort of gusto usually reserved for beating particularly dirty rugs.

“Stop it! That fucking hurts!” She complained at the top of her lungs.

“Good,” he replied heartlessly, slapping her harder, ignoring her squealing and deftly avoiding her flailing limbs as he painted her seat hot red through her pants.

As she wriggled and writhed, Zora hoped that the altercation might at least buy her a little time to figure out what was going on, but her spanking didn't hold up proceedings in the slightest. Even as Savage's arm rose and fell with rhythmic disciplinary ardor, the car started moving, sweeping them out of the airport and out to regions unknown. The windows were tinted with a variable tint that darkened as they drove, obscuring the view almost completely, and a partition discreetly rolled up between the back and front seats prevented her from seeing out the windscreen.

“STOP IT!” She shrieked as Savage's hand fell one too many times, coming very close to breaking what was left of her composure.

“Settle down, little girl,” Savage growled, one hand bunched in the fabric at the back of her neck, the other placed firmly on her still jean clad ass. The amount of sting and heat he could impart through the thick fabric of jeans stunned her as she squirmed, her hot bottom swollen against the harsh fabric.

“You settle down. I only asked a simple question,” Zora sniffed. Her fatigue was starting to get the better of her. There had been a lot of excitement of late, and not a lot of rest. Tears started leaking down her cheeks as she wriggled against the upholstery, a prisoner of Savage's iron grasp.

“We're going somewhere safe, I can't tell you where. You don't have clearance to know.”

“I don't have clearance? I just saved the fucking world!” Tears and pain did not modify her temper, which was still close to boiling point. A total meltdown of a tantrum was not far off and though she knew the consequences for such a thing would not be at all pleasant, she was only just holding herself in check.

“That's as maybe,” Savage said, allowing her to scramble up. “But so has everyone else where we're going.”

“So we're going to some super hero hideout?” She wiped her eyes on the back of her sleeve and pretended like she hadn't been crying.

“If you want to call it that,” Savage was smiling slightly, although the dark circles under his eyes showed that he was also pretty tired. For a moment, Zora felt a little bad for giving him such a hard time. Then she realized that she was still effectively being kidnapped and some of that empathy drained away. She sat awkwardly on the far side of the car, sniffing and rubbing her eyes on her sweatshirt as traitorous tears continued to bash their way through the leaky barricade of her self control.

“Come here,” Savage said gruffly, pulling her back against him. She curled up on the back seat as he cradled her head in his lap, gently tracing his fingers through her hair. Zora was stiff and resistant at first, but even she couldn't remain defiant as he soothed her. That was the great mystery of the man. He could be thrashing her bottom one moment, and caressing her gently the next. Just when she thought he didn't care how much he hurt her, he would comfort her with a soft touch.

She was so tired she started to doze in spite of her sore ass and frustration and didn't wake up until they were bouncing along over rocky roads. The motion reminded her of earlier trips. This had to be the place he'd brought her when he'd first grabbed her. She could feel the heat of the sun through the windows, and there was a dry, scratchy quality to the air that made her want to cough. He wasn't taking her home, he was taking her back to the most efficient prison on earth. A feeling of dread seized her tired and aching body. She'd secretly been hoping that he would return her to her own place, or perhaps, if things had really been going as well between them as she thought they had been going, to his place. But this wasn't her place or his place. This was a facility good for one thing, keeping people underground for all time. There was no escape to be had, and no life to be lived either. For a painful moment, she found herself regretting having gotten on the plane in Haskovo. She sat up and slid across to the other side of the car, as far away from Savage as possible. “We're back where we started.” Her voice was flat and devoid of emotion as she made the observation. “You bastard.”

“Zora...” He began to respond to her with the same dismissive tone he responded to her usual outbursts with, but she cut him off with a look of cold fury.

“I trusted you,” she said, her voice dangerously soft as the car tipped forward slightly and the small amount of light that had been filtering through the tint dimmed as they headed down into the bowels of the earth. “I did what you told me to. And you brought me back here. I'm nothing to you but your prisoner.”

“Zora, we have to follow procedure.”

“And what is procedure exactly? You told me you could do whatever you wanted with me. This is what you want to do with me? You want to stuff me away underground until I'm useful to you again?”

“You're getting ahead of yourself, girl.”

“Apparently,” she agreed, clamming up as they pulled up to a stop.

Her suspicions were confirmed when they disembarked into a windowless concrete car park. Savage directed her through a pair of sliding metal doors and into the interior of the compound. She knew the place instantly. It was the smell that hit her first, a stale smell with a faint hint of antiseptic and carpet cleaner.

Savage put a hand on her shoulder, holding her in place. “We need to debrief before anything else happens, understand?”

“Sure, whatever,” Zora replied through clenched teeth.

“I need to report in.” He looked down at her, his arms folded over his chest, a solemn expression on his face. “You're going to cause trouble if I leave you to your own devices.” It wasn't a question, it was a statement of fact. She wasn't going to get the benefit of the doubt, she wasn't getting the benefit of anything, certainly not her hard work.

From past experience she had a very good idea of where the conversation was leading, and she didn't like it one bit. “If you lock me up,” she began the threat without quite knowing where to end it, and cast about for a few seconds whilst she tried to think of a lever that would have some effect on the solid mass of man in front of her. “I'll hate you forever,” she vowed finally.

Savage raised his eyes skywards and took a deep breath. Perhaps he was calling on a deity for patience. Whatever he was doing, when his eyes fell on her again, they were settled and calm. “You need to get some rest,” he said firmly.

“I don't want rest. I want out of here,” Zora argued. She was starting to feel claustrophobic. Just the idea of all the earth and rock above her head was freaking her out, let alone the prospect of being locked up like a common criminal.

“Later. First you get rest.” He was implacable. He took her by the hand and lead her through the myriad of halls. When she dragged her heels, he gave her a sharp slap on her behind and yanked her around to face him. “Listen Zora, I'm taking you to my room right now. It's comfortable and you can get some rest there. If you're going to keep acting up, you can go into a cell. Which is it going to be?”

Her lower lip quivered as he frowned impatiently at her, his demeanor putting her in mind of a frazzled parent at the end of their tether. “Your room,” she said in a small voice.

His nod was curt. “My room it is. But one more word out of you, one more bit of attitude, and you're going into a cell, young lady.”

To Zora's embarrassment and frustration her sense of self possession deserted her entirely and she was sniffling with self pity by the time Savage deposited her in what he said was his bedroom. The big man's snapping was harder to take than his slapping, that was for sure.

“Have a shower and get some rest. I will see you in a bit. Remember, no trouble,” he said sternly as he ushered her into the room, which was not anywhere near as large or nice as she had thought it would be. It was about three times the size of a cell though and a bit of poking around after he locked her in and left her to her own devices revealed a well appointed en suite.

There wasn't much furniture to speak of, just a built in wardrobe, a wall mounted television and a double bed in one corner of the bed on a stark iron frame. When she sat on it gingerly, she was pleased to find it soft enough. It was nice of him to let her sleep there, she thought, resting her head on a pillow that smelled ever so faintly of his cologne.

It wasn't until she got into the shower and the hot water was beating down on her head and shoulders that she realized the mind game Savage had managed to play on her. She'd been flipping out about being brought back to the compound and he'd somehow made her feel grateful to be locked up in his bedroom.

“He is a dangerous brain ninja,” she observed out loud to herself, wondering how he'd managed  to manipulate her so neatly. The line of thought turned out to be like picking a loose thread on a sweater. The more she thought about things, the more things began to unravel. Who was Savage really anyway? He was some kind of special ops soldier, that was all she really knew about him. She'd assumed that he was of the bulk and muscle variety, but he'd done no real muscling at all that she'd seen, unless you counted spanking and that didn't count at all.

Maybe Savage's strength didn't lie in his physical being, maybe it was all in his mind. As she soaped herself, she recounted the events of the previous weeks. He'd managed to snatch her out of her life, then convince her to risk what was left of it in Bulgaria, all the while getting himself laid. Sure, she'd resisted and been a brat, but in the end she'd dutifully done what he wanted – and  after everything she'd done, she was back in lockup, being made to feel grateful for being able to sleep in his bed. What a mind fuck.

What if he didn't really like her at all? What if everything she'd ever experienced with him was just a big ploy designed to manipulate her? What if the spankings weren't even meant to be disciplinary? What if they were just a way to distract her from what was really going on? A way to make her feel naughty and bad for being a totally rational person?

The thoughts came thick and fast and unsettling. For the past few weeks she had been practically drunk on Savage. He had been there day and night. She'd barely had a thought that did not involve him. He'd captured her mind like a parasitic worm, taking over her free will and twisting it to his own ends.

She climbed out of the shower, toweled herself dry and put on the only clothing in the room that was even a little bit appropriate, one of Savage's t-shirts. It came halfway down her thighs and, like the pillow, it smelled faintly of him. But she wasn't buying it. With a suspicious eye, she looked around the room, looking for evidence that it really was his room and not some set up he'd planned in advance to keep her quiet and docile whilst he decided what to use her for next.

Maybe he wasn't even debriefing, maybe he was in his actual room. Maybe he was going to his actual house, maybe he was with someone else. The maddening thought struck home and once in her brain, refused to be dislodged.  As quickly as she'd been made to be docile and accepting of her imprisonment, Zora turned herself into a seething ball of anger.

“Fuck this!” She screamed at nobody and everybody. Odds were that there was a camera in the room. Why wouldn't there be? There was probably one in the bathroom for that matter. The perverts that monitored the place probably got their jollies watching her shower. “Fuck everything about this!”

She started charging about the room, looking for something to vent her frustration on. All she found were a couple of pairs of very shiny leather boots in the closet. She took them and began hurling footwear around the room, at the door, at the walls, at any surface that could be hit with a boot. When she'd thrown all four boots, she picked them up and started throwing them again, dodging them as they rebounded off the cream walls, leaving black smudged marks where they slammed into the paint. She was so caught up in the manifestation of the tantrum that had been brewing across continents that she didn't notice the door had opened until she threw a boot at it and it didn't make a pleasing 'thunk' against the wood but rather sailed merrily out into the hallway.

“ENOUGH, GIRL!” Savage boomed loudly from the cover of the corridor. The shock of his voice so sudden and loud made her jump and shriek in surprise. She went spinning around with a boot still clutched in her hand as Savage peered around the door frame in an attempt to avoid further footwear missiles.

“Get back!” She wielded the boot menacingly even as the large man filled the doorway and came towards her with a very dangerous expression indeed on his handsome features. “I said get back!”

He did not get back. He came on steadily, his eyes locked on her with a predatory gaze that kicked her fight or flight response into high gear. With a blood curdling shriek she hurled the boot at him as hard as she could.

Chapter Sixteen

The boot hurtled through the air, cartwheeling as it sped along its trajectory right at Savage's nose. A lesser man might have been hit by the missile but the earlier boots had prepared him and he sidestepped the flung footwear with ease as he made his way towards Zora who was already casting about for something else to throw.

He reached for her and she cowered momentarily, expecting a slap or worse, but he did not hit her. He drew her into a bear hug and kept a tight hold of her wriggling body as she fought him, her heels and elbows and fists drumming against his body. Try as she might, she couldn't free herself. Savage said nothing as she flailed about, he just held on tightly, preventing her from doing much damage to him or anything else in the room.

Unable to move, she finally resorted to a barrage of cursing that incorporated entirely new words concocted in her rage addled brain. That approach ultimately failed to have an effect either and she became hoarse from the shouting long before he showed any signs of giving in. Realizing she was hurting herself far more than him she hung in his grasp panting heavily, almost entirely out of breath and energy. That was when Savage finally spoke. “What's gotten into you, girl?” He transferred his grip to her wrists and turned her to face him. “You were fine fifteen minutes ago. Now you're acting like a three year old.”

“Fuck you!” Zora sobbed, trying to pry his hands off her. “You're a liar!” She might as well have been trying to shed iron manacles for all the good her attempts to move his solid fingers with her smaller digits did. He held on tight, refusing to let her go.

“I have not lied to you,” he replied, his voice low and gruff, but not angry.

“Yes you have!” She said breathlessly, panting from her exertions. “You say whatever you need to say to get me where you want me to be. That's lying. This isn't even your room, is it?”

“It's a room I sleep in sometimes,” he said, almost avoiding the question.

“But it's not your room.”

“It's better than a cell, isn't it?”

“That's not the point!” Her voice rose to a near hysterical shriek as she started fighting again. She took a big sweeping kick at his privates, an overly vicious move that set her off balance and made it easy for him to sweep her back and onto the ground.

“Enough, Zora. You're going to hurt yourself,” he warned, pinning her down on her back, his large hands on her wrists, the bulk of his body over her waist preventing most of her movement. “Now listen to me. You're tired. You just came back from a very stressful mission. You need your rest.”

Her eyes burned with anger. “No, you know what I need? I need to not be locked up underground. I'm a person. Not a fucking mole.”

“You don't have any other option right now.” His face had gone hard with determination. “You'll do as you're told or you'll suffer the consequences.”

It wasn't the right thing to say. At least, not if he wanted Zora to remain calm. “Fuck you and fuck your consequences. I hate you!” She spat the words angrily, trying to tug her wrists out from his grip, forcing him to clamp down harder.

“You're not giving me any choice Zora. I'm going to have to put you in a cell until you calm down.” The sorrow in his voice might have been real or it might have been an act. She wasn't buying it.

“Yeah I bet you're real sorry. I did everything you wanted. EVERYTHING. And now I get locked up in a box.” Her eyes glittered with spite. “Well I hope you don't need me for anything else, because I'm not doing anything for you ever again.”

When Savage replied, he did so in a soft, certain voice. “If I want you to do something, you'll do it.”

“No I won't.”

He terminated their conversation by hauling her up and over his shoulder. She cried tears of frustration and rage all the way to the cell. She'd been such a fool to think that he cared about her. The nights they'd spent in passionate embrace seemed very long ago as he strode through the halls with her as nothing more than his captive.

After being dumped unceremoniously on a much less comfortable mattress than the one in the pleasant room upstairs, Zora was left to languish in a small concrete cell two levels further underground. She hated Savage more than she'd ever hated anyone. Men you'd had sex with were not supposed to be able to find it in themselves to lock you up. They were supposed to be nice and simpering and meek dammit. Or at least grateful enough not to betray you the minute you got home.

She paced around the small cell, her fists clenched by the sides of her body, her teeth gritted with impotent rage. Eventually however, her anger faded and was replaced with a deep sense of exhaustion, an exhaustion that seemed to go right into her very bones. She flopped down on the bed, utterly defeated and slipped into sleep's welcome embrace.

***

“MATTHEWS!”

A voice like a foghorn blasted Zora into consciousness. When she opened her eyes to assess the situation she found she didn't know the owner of the voice. It was just some self important guy in a uniform. They all looked the same when they wore uniform, like interchangeable robots. “Where's Savage?” She thought the inquiry was fairly polite given the abruptness of her awakening, but by the spasm quick contortion of the soldier's face she gathered it was not nearly polite enough. Her question was ignored as further orders were barked at her, orders she was not overly inclined to take.

“Get up and get showered. You're wanted for debriefing.” He was fresh faced and full of self importance. Zora wondered if he even shaved yet. If he did, he had a hell of a razor.

“I don't give a rat's ass if I'm wanted to be the Empress of China.” She pulled the blankets up over her head and turned on her side to get some more rest. She might be a prisoner, but she'd get up when she was good and ready. In short order she experienced the sickening sensation of gravity working against her. The room rotated sharply as the soldier flipped the mattress with her still on it and tossed her onto the hard concrete floor.

“You asshole,” Zora observed from under the mattress.

“Get cleaned UP.” Whether the emphasis on the up was reference to something or simply an expression of frustration, Zora did not know. She did know she wasn't going to respond to this bullshit treatment the way she was supposed to.

“Go fuck yourself.”

That was how Zora ended up being dragged through the compound and shoved into a hard chair that made her squirm almost constantly in the effort to get comfortable whilst wearing nothing more than Savage's oversized shirt. A bright light shone in her eyes, making her squint. Beyond the light a dry crackling voice questioned her incessantly with questions that seemed to be entirely inane. None of these things served to improve her mood.

“You recently went on a mission,” the voice rasped officiously. “Can you describe it to me?”

Zora put her hands in  her lap and looked directly toward the speaker, pretending as if the light searing into her retinas painfully didn't bother her. “Awesome.”

“Excuse me?”

“It was awesome,” she clarified, poker faced.

The voice was entirely unperturbed and apparently immune to her attitude. “I meant, could you describe the progression of events?”

“Oh sure,” she said, pretending to comply. “Plane. Car. Drive. Terrorist. Terrorist. Code. Plane. Cells.”

“A little more detail?”

She sighed deeply before adding just a little more detail. “Big plane. Nice car. Long drive. Silly terrorist. Easy Code. Comfortable Plane. Violation of human rights cells.”

“Ms. Matthews...”

“No, no, it's cool. I know what you want. More detail? Really heap big plane go zooming over oceans. Zooooom.” She made the plane noise and stuck her arms out in a manner reminiscent of such a vehicle.   Unfortunately the retelling of the story did not get much further before she was interrupted by the voice once more.

“Ms Matthews, would you say that the mission concluded without incident?”

“Yeah,” Zora agreed, finally giving in and shading her eyes from the light with her left wing “Can we kill the light?”

“Soon.” There was a shuffling of papers. “Describe your exit.”

“I saved the world and we went to the airport where we got on a plane.”

“And that was without incident?”

“I'm here aren't I?”

“If you could answer the questions directly please, Ms Matthews.”

“Yes,” Zora rolled her eyes. “It was without incident.”

A pause. More shuffling. “During the mission, did you engage in sexual intercourse with Captain Savage?”

The question came out of left field. Zora blushed, which she hated, and stammered in the affirmative.

“How many times?”

“Four or five, I guess.”

“I don't need you to guess, Ms Matthews. I need you to know.”

“Seven times,” Zora snapped, thoroughly put out at the probing.

“And prior to the mission?”

“None of your business.”

The light was lowered and Zora found herself looking into the gaunt face of an older gentleman. Perhaps he had once been young and vital. Now the decorated uniform he wore seemed to hang off his shoulders, as if he were more a coat hanger than a man. “Everything is my business, Ms Matthews. I would advise you to take this procedure a great deal more seriously.”

She shivered as she met his murky hazel gaze. She'd met many dangerous people since being kidnapped and forced to work for the military machine, but this man was more than dangerous. Death hung about him, a dull fog of inevitable despair. Something about the hollow expression in his eyes and the gray pallor of his skin made him look like a man fading into nothingness before her very eyes. If he'd been wearing a black cape and carrying a scythe, he would have made a very passable Grim Reaper. She found herself wishing that the light was still pointed at her face, she'd take half blindness over the primal terror looping through her innards at the sight of the man any day.

Her interrogator laced his knobbly fingers together and addressed her in a voice that seemed to shiver its way up through the very earth. “I'm aware that you are unfamiliar with many of our methodologies, Ms Matthews. You will learn them in due time. For the moment, please keep your answers concise and factually accurate.”

“Okay,” Zora agreed, nodding quickly. She wanted the interview to be over. She wanted to know where Savage was. As much as she was sure she hated him, he made her feel better than the man in front of her.

“The information you were party to during the course of this mission is of the highest classification. It is not to be shared with the public now or at any time in the future. Do you understand?”

Zora nodded. “I understand. Not that I have any contact with the public. I've been locked away since I got here.”

The moldering eyes settled on her. “You are a security risk, Ms Matthews. You lack discipline. This was a known factor prior to your recruitment. It would appear that Captain Savage has thus far failed to remedy that issue.”

“How can you possibly know that?”

“This interview has provided me sufficient evidence to make that determination.” The officer made a few quick, scratchy notes on the papers and gathered them up.

“So what now?”

“That is not my decision to make.” He stood back, scraping his chair across the floor in a way that set her teeth on edge. “But if I were you,” he smiled a sickly smile. “I'd get used to close quarters living.”

Zora watched him leave and was subsequently escorted back to her cell by two severe looking soldiers who didn't respond to her attempts at conversation. Of Savage himself there was no sign.

She spent three days locked away in the little cell going stir crazy. She looked at the door every few seconds, expecting to see it open, but all that happened was that the food slot opened three times a day and a foil covered tray was slipped through it. She tried asking for clothing, but was ignored and eventually she took a spare blanket, gnawed a small hole in the middle of it then tore at the fabric until she had fashioned a poncho that covered more of her body than the shirt did.

Solitude was not her friend. She found herself sitting next to the door, her ears pricked up keenly for any sound. Sometimes footsteps would approach and her stomach would twist both in anticipation of seeing a friendly face and fear of something worse. It occurred to her more than once that this was a deliberate attempt to break her and make her more receptive to playing nicely. But Zora had never played nicely and though the kind of solitude she was subjected to was not pleasant, she was an introvert who had always been comfortable with her own company. She entertained herself by scratching stick figures into the paint on the walls with the foil from the food trays and moving the mattress around the room to test the Feng Shui of various positions.

On the third day, the door opened and Savage stood there. He was covered from head to toe in a mixture of mud, blood and grease and he stank to high heaven. She'd never been so happy to see him, but she hid the grin that threatened to break across her face and kept her expression impassive. “What happened to you?”

“There was another mission called. No time to get you out. I'm sorry.” He ambled into the cell and slumped down on the bed beside her with a groan.

She poked at the crusted red flaky stuff on his arm. “Is that your blood?”

“Some of it,” he said offhandedly.

“Is there any point asking what happened?”

“Couldn't tell you if I wanted to.” He sighed. “I wanted to get back sooner. But I figured you'd be safe enough, if not entirely comfortable.” He smiled what might have been a rueful smile. “Plus, three days is a decent cooling off period.”

“They had me debrief,” she told him. “It did not go well.”

“Sounds about right,” Savage smiled and shook his head. “Tell me you didn't give them too hard a time.”

“They gave me a harder time.” She lifted her poncho clad arm in demonstration of her dire circumstances.

“Yeah, they'll do that.” He closed his eyes, revealing the only clean spots on his body, the two pink patches of his eyelids. Whatever daemon he'd been battling, he'd clearly been looking it in the eye the whole time. No blinking. That was beneath a man like Savage.

“The guy said you hadn't disciplined me enough.”

Savage smirked but didn't open his eyes. “He's right.”

“What's going to happen to me?” There was a slight tremor in her voice. She was glad to see Savage, but the callous indifference of the treatment she'd received in the past 72 hours had given her more of a scare than she cared to admit. Still a little voice in her head told her to be careful. Had he really been called off on a mission? Or had he simply engineered three days of solitude to soften her up, to make her see him as her savior? If that was the case, he was a damn good actor. He looked trashed.

“That depends on you,” Savage said finally. “If you accept your new situation, things can be made pleasant for you.”

“And if I don't?”

“You're not going to be happy if you have to be locked up like a dog every time I'm not around.”

Zora's jaw dropped. “You're serious, aren't you.”

“Of course.”

“How can you do this to me? I'm a person. I'm a human.”

“Technically you're government property.”

There was the straw that broke the camel's back. She didn't yell or scream or hit, but she made her displeasure abundantly clear. “Technically you can suck my dick.”

His eyes snapped open as he gave her an incredulous look. “How do you do it, Zora?”

“How do I do what?”

“How do you keep giving me attitude even when you know it means you'll be stuck here?”

Zora shrugged. “Maybe I have a secret fetish for being locked up.”

His expression was thoughtful. “Maybe you do.”

“Yeah,” a small grin broke over her lips. “Maybe you should teach me a lesson by letting me go.”

A strange look passed over his face, an expression somewhere between concern and a smirk. Smircern. Consmirk. “You wouldn't last all that long if we just let you go.”

“No?” She thought he was joking at first, but her smile faded as she realized he wasn't.

He looked at her steadily, speaking quite casually, as if telling an innocent woman that terrorists wanted her dead was a completely normal part of his day. “The people we're working against would love to find someone like you out in the wild. A soft target who knows more than she should. I'd give you a week on the outside. Two at most.”

She felt fear's tight grasp back at work in her chest. “Are you trying to scare me?”

“No, just informing you of a few unpleasant truths you might not be aware of. You're in deeper than you think Zora. There were cameras in that base. They know what you look like and they'll be looking for you.”

Zora looked at him, her lip curling slowly with deep seated derision. “Well that's something you conveniently failed to mention before or during the mission,” she said, her voice tight and controlled. “How hard would it have been to say, 'hey Zora, thanks for risking your life, by the way, you're going to spend the rest of your life being hunted'.” She shook her head at him. “Brett, you're a total bastard.”

“And you,” he said, tweaking her nose with more humor and affection than she expected from him. “Are a spoiled, hard headed brat.”

She wiped the filth from his fingers off her nose with the back of her blanked poncho. “You don't care do you? You don't care what you've done to me or my life.”

“I care enough to keep you in one piece.”

“You think that's enough do you? You think that keeping someone in one piece is a job well done. You set the bar for caring real fucking low, you know that?”

His shoulders lifted in a brief shrug. “It's more than most in this line of work can expect.”

“I'm not in this line of work,” she reminded him. “I did one job because you made me.”

“That's how it starts. You know Ethan? He was brought in for a one off job too. Now he loves the place.”

“He drinks on the sly, Brett.”

“Brett again? You're being awfully familiar today,” he noted.

“I think we're past formality,” she said, flopping her makeshift poncho around. “And dignity, and common courtesy for that matter.”

“And past the shrieking as well,” he observed. “That's a good thing.”

“I wouldn't count your chickens there bucko,” Zora said, her expression clouding. “Just because I'm keeping myself from clawing your eyes out doesn't mean I'm going to play nice with you. I helped you out and you fucked me over. I won't forget that.”

“I don't know if I fucked you over, but I definitely fucked you.” The leer on his dirty face was mischievous.

She punched him in the shoulder. “Get the fuck out of here Brett.”

That lit the fire in his eyes and brought stern Savage back to the surface. “No no girl, you don't give the orders.”

“I sure as hell don't take them anymore either,” she said, her chin lifted with determination.

He snorted. “We'll see about that.”

“You want to play hardball with me? I've just spent the last three days wearing a blanket in the asshole of the earth. I walked into a terrorist installation to disarm a nuclear missile without a second thought. You think you scare me? I don't give a fuck what you do.” She put as much conviction as she could into the little speech, hoping he would believe her. The worst that could happen now was that he would simply get up and leave her locked up, possibly forever.

A spike of adrenaline shot through her as he stood up and smiled down at her with a thin smile that didn't touch his eyes. “And that, little Zora, is why you're one of us whether you like it or not. Now do you want to get out of here? Or do you want to spend another three days proving what a bad ass you are?”

“I want to get out of here,” she mumbled.

“I'm sorry,” he cupped his ear. “I didn't quite hear that.”

“Ugh,” Zora growled. “Fine. I want to get out of here. You win. I don't like being locked up,” she spat vengefully.

“Good,” he nodded. “Then hurry up.”

They made quite the pair as they left the cell, Savage moving with the stiff gait of one who has seen far too much action and Zora trailing after him, barefoot and clad in her ragged blanket. In the stainless steel and fluorescent lights of the halls they were both out of place, too filthy and messily human to really fit in amongst the uniform sterility of the place.

Zora was glad to be free from the little cell, but her relief was tempered by spinning confusion that threatened to drive her crazy. Savage was not the man she had always taken him to be. Yes he was honorable and strong and determined, but he wasn't playing by the normal rules. The man she'd given her body, and more than a little of her hear to, was more of a stranger to her than ever. She didn't understand his motivations, she didn't know what his true feelings on almost anything were and she was beginning to think she never would.

What she did know was that she was going to have to get more crafty if she wanted to get ahead of him. He'd been leading her by the nose from the moment she'd set eyes on him, and that could not continue. It was time to be smart. It was time to play the game.

Chapter Seventeen

Deep underground in an office that seemed to look out over expansive rolling fields thanks to the digital screens disguised as windows, General Hurtzwald greeted Savage with a hearty handshake and a great big beaming smile that threatened to crack his winkled skin right open. “Captain Savage, good work in Bulgaria,” he boomed. The General had never been the kind of man who modulated his voice. When he was happy, you knew it, when he was angry, you knew that too. Everybody in a five mile radius did.

“Thank you sir.” Savage nodded, acknowledging the compliment with his customary reserve. He stood at ease, his body naturally holding the good military posture that had been drilled into him since he was a young man. He was dressed in casual civilian clothes, a checkered shirt and blue jeans, but his bearing would have given him away anywhere.

“Dammed good job actually,” Hurtzwald wandered back around his desk, his hands clasped behind his back, making him look somewhat like an oversized penguin as he walked his stiff legged walk. The old man had the distinction of having been injured in almost every war since he'd been born and it showed when he moved. “That's going to make negotiations a great deal easier.”

“I am glad to hear it sir.” There was a certain lack of enthusiasm in Savage's responses. He knew very well that the General had not brought him in solely to compliment him on the Bulgarian mission. It had taken place several weeks earlier and he had been involved in other, equally important actions since then. Whatever the General wanted to talk to him about was obviously connected with the Bulgarian mission however, for he waffled on about it at general length for a good five minutes whilst Savage stood ramrod straight, his eyes following Hurtzwald as he paced about the room. It was not like the man to be so indirect, which meant the matter, when he got to it, would not be a pleasant one.

“We have an issue, Savage,” Hurtzwald finally approached the point of the meeting.

“Yes sir?” Savage's was a picture of perfect attentiveness, relaxed, but ready for whatever bomb the General was about to drop.

“Zora Matthews,” Hurtzwald said, standing behind his desk and placing his palms on the surface as he leaned across it to address Savage with an earnest gaze. “She's outlived her usefulness.”

A small tic in Savage's jaw was the only sign of the cold jolt that speared through him. Hurtzwald said it so casually. 'Outlived her usefulness'. What he really meant to say was 'I think we should murder Zora Matthews'. Keeping a tight control on his emotions, Savage nodded, then began the delicate process of attempting to argue a superior out of a decision. “With respect sir, I disagree.”

Hurtzwald snorted, a bullish sound. “You believe she has a function?”

“Yes. She handles herself well under pressure and she has an excellent mind. She went into the field with next to no training and performed better than most trained men. It would be a pity to...” he paused, searching for a phrase that made the subject less rage inducing. “...lose the benefit of her rare skill set.”

“Perhaps,” his commander acknowledged. “But I've seen the evaluations since then. She is not co-operating with anybody. She's not even trying to co-operate. So these skills and traits are not exactly useful to us, are they?”

Savage nodded in agreement, acknowledging the point, which was a valid one. “She does what she needs to do and little else, that is true. But she co-operated completely on the Bulgarian mission. Her work was invaluable to us and may well be again.” Though Savage spoke with a calm, detached tone, he knew he was quite literally arguing for Zora's life. People who did not serve the greater good did not live for long. The compound was extensive, but there was no room in it for anyone who failed to pull their weight.

“You have a personal component to your relationship,” Hurtzwald abruptly changed conversational course and approached the issue from the one perspective Savage really wished he wouldn't.

“Yes,” Savage made the admission readily. No point denying it. It was common knowledge, though they had not engaged in anything sexual since their return from Bulgaria. He had been too busy, and she too contrary.

“Why?” The commander's eyes twinkled lasciviously. Mention sex and all thought of death went out the window – temporarily at least.

Savage did not stoop to his level and deftly avoided being trapped into an admission of bias. “She would not have co-operated otherwise. She had no reason to do as we asked. A personal relationship provided that motivation.”

“So your decision to engage with Ms Matthews in the bedroom was purely tactical in nature? And it is not, in any way, interfering with your judgment now?” The commander gave him the old ice stare, a look designed to ferret out any untruth.

“Precisely.” Savage hoped the simple conviction in his voice was enough to convince Hurtzwald to at least agree to a stay of execution.

“Very well, I'll take your word on it this time Savage,” Hurtzwald relented. “But she shows improvement within the week or you put a bullet in her.” The commander beamed jovially as he gave the order. The deaths of others had long since ceased to weigh on his conscience. He gave such orders on a daily basis. The reluctance he'd shown to address the issue directly at first had everything to do with not wanting one of his best agents off side and nothing to do with whatever sanctity there might have been in life.

Savage left the meeting with his stomach in a knot. Hurtzwald's infamous iron fist had been removed from its kid glove and was making menacing motions at the woman who had quite inadvertently captured his heart. She didn't know that of course, even she thought his interest in her was a mere manipulation designed to elicit compliance. A life time of shielding his real emotions and playing roles on top of roles had lead him to a place where nobody could tell what it was he thought or felt. He was the perfect soldier, a machine that did what was necessary to get things done. Zora was supposed to be just another one of those things he did and if she was going to survive, it was essential everyone kept thinking that.

He made his way to the communications section where Zora was supposed to be working with Ethan. To his relief, the room did contain two occupants. She was where she was supposed to be, but only Ethan seemed to be busy at work, twirling the end of his beard in his fingers the way he did when he concentrated. Savage could tell from the door that Zora was not doing work of any kind. Instead she was lolling about in a chair, leaning so far backwards that her feet were dangling inches off the ground, staring at the roof and blathering on to Ethan, probably about a matter of little consequence.

“Zora.” He growled her name as he stepped into the room, hoping it would telegraph the general idea of taking him seriously.

It didn't. She pushed herself forward in the chair and planted her feet on the ground, a pout on her lips. “Where have you been?” Her eyes swept up and down his body. “Looks like you got out. Nice for some.” Attitude rolled off her in waves.  He had to give it to her. Zora knew how to stand her ground. Lesser women would have crumbled by now. Not her though. He wondered if she had it in her to take a subordinate role. Was she capable of even the slightest submission? He hoped so.

Taking the opportunity the moment gave him he stood over her, using his imposing bulk to intimidate. “No more,” he said in his most menacing voice. “No more fucking around, you got it? Run those numbers.”

She cocked her head to the side and looked at him. Gazing down at her, he saw the eyes of the woman he had made passionate love to and, just for a moment, his expression softened. He was fast realizing that the sex had probably been a mistake. It had given her the impression that they were equals on one level or another. He saw the impending refusal in her gaze before she opened her mouth and gave voice to her rebellion. “No.” To add insult to injury, she had the audacity to raise her hand and flip him the bird.

Even if Hurtzwald hadn't been threatening her life, that would have pissed him off. He reacted by grabbing her wrist and slapping her hand hard enough to leave red finger marks on the back of her knuckles. Years of hard living had callused his palms to a texture like iron, being slapped by him was no small matter. She gasped with the pain and her eyes flew wide open, her mouth parted in an 'o' of surprise and dismay. He had a fair idea why. Yes, he'd been spanking her for weeks on end, but he'd very rarely come close to using anywhere near his full strength on her. He still hadn't in fact. The slap she'd just experienced had fallen with a fraction of the force that was at his disposal. But it had shocked her. He waited to see if it would be enough.

The moment her eyes narrowed he knew it had failed. “Is that what you're going to do now? Just hit me for every little thing?” She started in on him, her voice dripping with very real derision. She thought him a bully. She was about to think him an even bigger one.

“Yes,” he growled, yanking her up from her chair with one arm and laying another very hard slap across her ass. It landed like a gunshot and she screamed as he started thrashing her right there in front of Ethan, who had rolled away from his terminal and was gawping at the scene unfolding in front of him.

Zora was too busy fighting to see Savage's expression as he laid several more viciously hard blows across her bottom, each one slightly harder than the one before. He had gritted his teeth, not enjoying his task in the slightest. He willed her to give in, the silent voice in his head screaming along with her. Give in. Just give in dammit. Stop fighting. His arm rose and fell over and over again, a repetitive solid movement outlined by frantically kicking legs and windmilling arms. Zora screamed with what could only be described as rage, her face turning beet red as she struggled against him.

Finally, when he was sure he must have bruised her, tears signaled the end of her resistance. He'd never been so glad to see her cry. Even when she pulled away from him and cowered next to Ethan sobbing deep breaths, he was happy. He might finally be getting through to her. She wouldn't understand why he was being harsh, but she'd know not to cross him. He'd rather she hated him and lived than loved him and died. He would be the very devil himself if that was what it took to keep her breathing.

“Get back to work.” He ground the words out mercilessly. When she didn't move he took her by the and yanked her down into her seat. “Work. Now.”

She put her hands on the keyboard, her fingers trembling as she cried. As the urge to sweep her up in a hug and reassure her caught him, he gritted his teeth and turned away without another word. There could be no affection. Not whilst her head was on the chopping block. It was better this way for both of them. Knowing that did not break his heart any less as he strode away, the muffled sounds of her weeping into her cupped hands following him all the way to the door.

***

“God, are you okay?” Ethan hissed the question urgently once Savage was well clear. “He beat the hell out of you.”

Zora nodded wordlessly. She was in shock emotionally and perhaps physically. Her bottom was throbbing and aching but she didn't dare get up from the chair for fear that Savage would return and beat her again. What had happened to the almost tender spankings? The gentle explanations? The hugs afterward? He'd promised he would never spank and leave her, but he had. He'd lied. Her sense of betrayal was the only thing deeper than the fear and pain that racked her body as she sniffled and tried to make out the numbers on the screen through the haze of her tears. “He's a fucking liar,” she whispered, tapping away as she finally began the task she'd been assigned.

“They all are,” Ethan agreed, pushing away from his workstation and settling his chair next to hers for the purposes of commiseration. “They say whatever they need to say.”

She snorted through her tears, tasting salt in her mouth. “And if you don't do what they want they beat you?”

“Not usually,” Ethan glanced at her. “Usually they just...”

“Just what?”

“Get rid of anyone who doesn't play by their rules.”

She wiped her eyes on her shirt and looked at him, her red rimmed eyes tinged with a spark of hope. “You mean they go home?”

He gave her a quizzical look. “No, they go dead.”

Her face grew pale. “They go dead?”

“Yeah,” Ethan looked worried, as if he'd said something he possibly wasn't supposed to say. “It's not exactly a secret. I thought you knew.”

The news made Zora felt very dizzy and very ill. “I did not know that,” she mumbled through her suddenly dry mouth. “I definitely did not know that.”

“Oh shit. I'm sorry.” Ethan squeezed her shoulder. “You're still here though, that's a good sign. Just keep your head down and do as you're told and you'll be fine.”

“Keeping my head down and doing as I'm told isn't exactly my strong suit,” Zora muttered as she bent her head to the assigned task. Her tears slowly dried on her cheeks as her fingers tapped ferociously at the keyboard. The task was too simple to be engaging, it felt like busy work. Perhaps it was. Maybe they were just trying to keep her busy before they killed her.  As she worked, her ass continued to throb and burn, a constant reminder of the hell Savage had unleashed on her. But why? She didn't get it. He was like a different person in this place. Outside the compound he was personable and kind, loving even. Inside he was a tyrannical monster. Which Savage was the real one? Did he care about her at all?

“There's an upside,” Ethan whispered at length, apparently as an afterthought.

“Yeah?” Zora doubted that there really was an upside.

“Make yourself useful and you can get away with an awful lot. It's a meritocracy. A really harsh one, but if you know how to work it, well, let's just say life isn't unpleasant. If you want out of here, you need to play by their rules.”

“You're starting to sound like a plant, Ethan,” Zora pointed out dryly.

He smiled shamefacedly. “I'm just telling you how it is. I'd rather you not disappear, you know? You're good value.”

“Tell them that,” Zora said.

“That's something you're going to have to do on your own.” Ethan winked. “I'm sure you'll find a way.”

Zora smiled slightly. Ethan was fast becoming her only friend. Brian had disappeared since the mission. That made her sad, but Anja had gone too and that didn't. It was lonely with nobody in her corner though, and she'd take Ethan's slightly awkward attempts at friendship, even if he wasn't exactly prepared to help her when she was in a tight spot. He'd made himself damn scarce when Savage had started whaling on her.

Biting her lower lip nervously, she promised herself one thing. She wasn't going to let any of them see how scared she was. They weren't going to win. She'd beat them at their own game if it was the last thing she did. Resolution made, she turned back to her newest friend. “So Ethan, want to teach me more about these systems?”

***

When Savage returned to check on her progress, he found Ethan and Zora very buddy buddy, snuggled up at the same terminal and laughing at something.

“What are you doing?” He snapped the question from the door, expecting a fear based reaction. She'd flinch, or cower, perhaps even squeak in concern. None of that happened.

“Learning.” She looked him right in the eye, no sign of fear whatsoever. For a moment he wondered if he'd really spanked her as hard as he thought he had. Then he saw the slight redness that still lingered about her eyes, the dew on her eyelashes. Damn she bounced back quickly.

“Have you completed your task?”

“Yes.” Again a straight answer, delivered without even blinking. There was nothing he could complain about in her demeanor, but he still felt as if he was somehow being told to fuck right off.

Next to her, Ethan was grinning like a chimpanzee. “She's done some additional work as well actually.”

“Good,” Savage nodded. “Then she can help you analyze the data from the Somali mission. I need it by midnight.”

“Righto boss,” Ethan made a mock salute. Zora had redirected her attention to her terminal and was ignoring him pointedly. He couldn't exactly blame her for that, though the pang of regret was unpleasant.

He turned around to leave and heard her giggle, a conspiratorial sound that he was excluded from. Glancing out the corner of his eye, he saw the way she leaned towards Ethan in a typically feminine display of casual intimacy. So that was how she was going to play it, was it? She was going to try to work Ethan into the mix. Interesting. Smart too. Ethan would have been Savage's pick if he'd been in her situation.

“Oh Ethan,” he said over his shoulder.

“Yeah boss?” There was a wariness in Ethan's voice, a slight guilt borne of the filthy thoughts Savage was sure would be running through his brain.

“Make sure the assessors get Zora's numbers, okay?”

“Sure thing boss.”

“Better do it, or he'll beat you.” Zora snarked sarcastically.

Savage's shoulders slumped. Was the girl insane? He'd just thrashed the hell out of her not an hour ago and she was already back proving she wasn't scared. A part of him wanted to ignore the challenge, but he knew what would happen if he didn't respond to the comment. She'd take it further, and further and eventually she'd end up with a bullet between the eyes.

Wordlessly he turned back towards her. As he took a step forward, he saw the flicker of genuine fear in her eyes and the way she slumped down in her chair, trying to make herself smaller. But it was too late. “Come with me Ms Matthews,” Savage snapped. To her credit, Zora got out of the chair fairly smartly, her hands going back to clutch at her sore bottom.  “Follow me,” he ordered tersely.

She followed him dutifully back to his office and stood, trembling ever so slightly as he closed the door behind her and gave her a long, hard look. At first she met his gaze, but then she whimpered and looked at the floor. He could see her lips moving slightly, as if she wanted to say something but couldn't quite bring herself to speak. Whether it was from fear or something else, he didn't know.

“Pants down, Matthews,” he ordered.

Her expression was pleading and she uttered a small squeak, as if she was going to beg him for mercy, but then she pressed her lips together and he watched as her hands went to her waist and she pushed her sweatpants down in one almost defiant motion.

“Turn around.”

She turned away from him. He surveyed the damage he'd already done to her bottom. As he'd suspected, there were signs of bruising already coming up. He could see it along the sides of her white cotton panties. It was going to have to be a light, stinging implement for this round.

“Over the desk.”

Savage admired her stoicism as she shuffled forward without looking at him and bent dutifully over the desk. Some might have mistaken her compliance for submission, but he knew she wasn't submitting to him, she was fighting him as hard now as she had been when she kicked and hit him. He walked around the desk and retrieved the short cane from the long drawer, then returned to her side where he made physical contact by placing his large palm on the small of her back. She was bent over nicely at that moment, but he would put money on that changing when the cane lashed down.

“In future, keep your opinions and smart remarks to yourself,” he said, whipping the thin bamboo down across her panty clad seat with a harsh crack. She made a muffled squeaking sound, but to his surprise, she stayed in position. He repeated the treatment, lashing the cane down across the center of her bottom, a stroke that landed just below the one before it. Again she made a stifled sound, but she did not cry out. He'd expected cursing and yelling and her usual barrage of temper but she hadn't spoken a word since he'd commanded her to follow him.

A third cut followed, then a fourth. Grunts were the only sound accompanying those cuts of the cane, and by the time he applied the fifth and the sixth, the grunts had turned into groans. The response was so much unlike her that he began to get quite concerned.

“Zora?” He leaned over to check her and saw that her eyes were pressed tightly closed, but tears were streaming down her face. Her mouth was clamped shut, but she was breathing heavily through her nose, her thighs trembling as she seemed to silently scream. She was trying so damn hard to hide the pain that her body shook with the effort. Savage felt his resolve begin to crumble yet again as he questioned his ability to be the harsh master she needed. “Look at me Matthews,” he ordered briskly. Her eyes snapped open and he saw her defiance written there plain as day. “Do we have an understanding?”

“Yes sir, we have an understanding.” He sighed inwardly. She was so cold. So distant. He didn't like it one bit. “An understand that you're a lying scumbag,” she clarified in a burst of sudden temper.

He had to hide a smile of relief. She was still in there after all. He managed to convert his smile into a hard smirk. “A scumbag that owns your ass, remember that and watch your mouth when you speak to me,” he said, giving her a light, almost playful tap on the rear. For a moment, they were back to their old selves. He knew it couldn't last, but he treasured it regardless.

“There's not going to be anything left of my ass by the time you're done with it,” she observed, the cheek coming back in full force.

Savage shook his head at her. “What am I going to do with you Matthews?”

She sighed as she stood up and started rubbing the sting out of her bottom. “Hit me until one of us gets shot.”

She had no idea how very right she was.

Chapter Eighteen

Image after image zoomed by in front of Zora's eyes. Glued to the screen in front of her, her face lit with the reddish hue of the desert images she inspected, she was like a zoned out zombie. Occasionally, something would catch her eye and she would hit a button to freeze the image. After a more careful inspection she would either decide it was nothing after all and move to the next picture or report the image for further analysis.

Weeks of harsh discipline and distance, not to mention constant supervision from a seemingly endless parade of authoritarian bosses had created a new Zora, a Zora who did her job and little else. Her performance had never been better, her numbers were high and there were even rumors that she might be up for a promotion. If any of those who supervised her transition from free thinking rebel to good little cog in the machine had paid closer attention, they might have noticed the spark of impishness that never entirely left her eye, even when she was engaged in the most punishingly monotonous of work. They might have perhaps considered the possibility that her apparent acquiescence to their extreme demands had come a little too easily. But the powers that were had far too much confidence in their own abilities to break and shape people to consider for a second that one civilian might be smarter than they.

And so Zora sat there, the model of a perfect worker bee. Occasionally she shifted slightly in the ergonomic chair, but that was the only deviation from her profiled activity and it did not draw the ire of the severe looking woman who sat at an elevated desk behind Zora, her hair scraped back into a bun so tight the white skin of her scalp was visible between the graying strands. Kransky was her name. Killer Kransky to those in the know. She probably had a first name, but Zora had never heard anyone use it.

Unlike Savage, Kransky didn't believe in spanking or physical punishment. She believed in berating evildoers at great lengths and assigning them tasks of such mind numbing monotony that it was not uncommon for those subjected to them to break down and cry. Zora had been smart enough to avoid crossing Kransky up to that point, she had been warned about the woman's reputation and she had no interest in moving a pile of Chinese Checkers from one side of a room to the other for days on end, as the last person to anger Kransky had done.

“Matthews!” Zora's name was barked officiously, as it was several times a day. Nobody in the place aside from Ethan seemed to be able to communicate without shouting.

Zora hit the button to stop the scrolling images and looked up from the screen with square eyes that took a moment to readjust to looking at people in the real world. It was Savage, making his first appearance for the better part of a week. “Yeah? I mean, yes, sir?” She added the 'sir' as Kransky made the grunting overtures of what could have been quite a tedious lecture.

“Report to my study. Now.” Savage snapped the order.

For once, she wasn't entirely sure what she'd done wrong. She'd been keeping her head down and working her tail off for weeks and had even been commended by a few of the old hands. Her skills had transferred well to data analysis, and she was being trained in the delicate art and science of gleaning complex webs of information from scattered intel.

After being dismissed by Kransky, she made her way quickly to Savage's study. She knew from the snooping she'd been doing whenever she was unobserved for a few minutes that the rotation they had him on was very heavy indeed, most weeks he was flying to one god forsaken place or another to get shot at. Even if they hadn't been in the queer stand-off they were in, there would have been hardly any time at all to rekindle their flagging relationship. She suspected that this was not an accident. Someone somewhere wanted them separated.

In spite of his occasionally harsh treatment, she missed him. She missed the way the skin around his eyes crinkled when he smiled, the way his body felt when he held her. Not being able to talk to him properly without being spied on by the people in the compound made things even more difficult.

“What did I do wrong?” She asked when she got to his office. He had been looking overly stern when he'd summoned her, but he now looked far more relaxed. Her senses tingled with the sure knowledge that something was afoot.

“Nothing yet,” he rumbled, sitting in one of the stuffed chairs. “But I want to prevent that.” His face grew solemn as he looked at her very sternly indeed, then flickered a small wink in her direction. The little gesture told her everything she needed to know. He was trying to get away with something.

“What do you mean?” She still had no idea what he was on about.

He patted his thigh. “I mean I want you over my lap. Now.” He raised his voice sternly once more.

She frowned, playing her role perfectly. “But I didn't do anything.”

“Think of it as maintenance,” he said with a small smirk. God he was handsome when he did that, the hard lines of his jaw making him look thoroughly rakish. Even sitting down he seemed large to Zora, he made the chair look small with his broad shoulders and tall frame. “What are you waiting for girl?” He prompted her when she did not move, but instead stood there gawping at him like a teenager with a crush.

It had been a long time since they'd been in the same room like this, without prior tension or trouble and Zora found herself feeling rather shy. Usually she could take refuge in defiance and anger, but she wasn't angry about anything and truth be told, she didn't really want to defy Savage either. She wanted to run into his arms and be cuddled and comforted. The nights she'd been spending alone had been very lonely and uncertain indeed. She clasped her hands behind her back and looked down at the floor, hoping he would take pity on her and not spank her too awfully hard for the benefit of anyone who might be watching.

“Come here please Zora,” he repeated his earlier command, but he did so in a softer, more cajoling tone. That was more the Savage she remembered, the man she had given her heart to. She shuffled forward until she was standing next to him, her eyes still averted. He didn't make her do anything else, once she was close enough that he could lay hands on her, he guided her over his lap, settling her in place with her bottom high over his left thigh.

She felt silly and small and very vulnerable as he patted her bottom. She was wearing light cotton pants, rather like scrubs. It was a uniform of sorts that she'd been given to wear by the officer in charge of the uniforms and suchlike. When she'd asked why Ethan didn't have to wear it, she'd been told that Ethan wasn't a class one liability, whatever that was. With Savage being so busy, a lot more people had been bossing her around of late, which she didn't particularly care for. They didn't spank her, but they somehow managed to make her more frustrated and angry than Savage ever had.

“I know it's been a while since we did this, but this is to remind you that I'm looking out for you girl,” he said gruffly. She squirmed in place, pressing her crotch against his thigh in a way she hoped he wouldn't notice. As harsh as their last encounter had been, she was still a woman of passion and satisfying herself night after night was becoming tedious. Even the relatively innocent touch of his thigh against her body was enough to send a warm flushing sensation through her loins.

He slapped her bottom lightly, first on one cheek, then the other, alternating the gentle spanks. It didn't hurt at all, in fact it felt pleasant. He worked like that for a time, building up a little sting in her rear. “I know you've been rather good lately. I want you to keep that up,” he said, giving her a slightly harder slap that made her squeak. “When you've proved yourself here, I won't have to be so hard on you.”

Zora wasn't sure exactly what he meant, she wasn't really listening. She was concentrating on squirming her bottom just enough to make herself feel nice between her legs without arousing his suspicions. It was a difficult task, she had to wait for each slap to land before giving her hips a wriggle.

“Are you listening to me, Zora?” The question was accompanied by a full bottom blow that caught her low across both cheeks and made her grind against his lap.

“Yes sir,” she whispered meekly.

“I'm not sure if you are,” he said, hooking his fingers into the waistband of her pants. “I think this is going to have to be delivered on your panties.” It was all Zora could do not to giggle in glee as he lowered her pants, exposing her white cotton panty clad bottom. “What innocent looking panties,” he noted. She could hear the smile in his voice as he smoothed his hand over her behind, the tips of his fingers just catching the gusset region and providing brief stimulation to her pouting slit.

Before she could get too excited by his touch, he started spanking her again, a little more firmly this time with sound swats that echoed off the walls. Anyone in the corridor would probably recognize the sound of a feminine bottom being spanked, the distinctive sound of palm meeting curved cheeks was not being muffled in any way by the thin panties.

Arching her back and beginning to yelp with every swat, Zora resigned herself to the spanking entirely. He had her held very firmly with one arm around her waist. She wasn't going anywhere any time soon, she was going to have to just hold on and wait until the big man was done with her bottom. Some reactions could not be helped however, and as her rear grew warmer and hotter, she became progressively more moist. Each time Savage's palm landed she seeped a little more dampness into the gusset of her panties, slowly soaking them.

“My my, what have we here?” Savage said, stopping suddenly. Zora felt the embarrassment of being caught in an obviously aroused state as Savage propped his leg up higher and inspected her rather thoroughly, running the pad of one finger up and down her panty clad slit, where a wet patch was very obvious indeed.

Moaning softly, Zora avoided making a reply. He was handling her with practiced ease, increasing her desire with soft, deft touches that made her wish he'd just stop spanking her and pull her panties down and have his way with her.

She got some of her wish when he pushed the gusset of the panties aside to look at her bare pussy. “My, my, that is wet,” he purred. “This is why spankings don't always work, isn't it Zora, because you get very wet indeed.”

“I was good this time,” she protested, trying not to gasp too audibly as he traced his finger over her delicate petals. She could remember what it was to have him hard and surging inside her, so the soft touch was an almost torturous reminder of other, better times.

“You were good,” he agreed. “Which is why you're getting this good girl spanking.” He set to work slowly peeling her panties off her bottom, leaving them at mid-thigh. She was now in her customary semi-naked state, her bare bottom and pussy fully accessible to him for whatever purpose he most desired. She made a soft mewl of satisfaction when he partially appeased her lust by slipping a finger inside her tight canal and stroking her affectionately.

There she was, panties down, bottom up, being fondled and caressed by the man who'd stolen her heart and mind. The time they'd spent apart seemed to fade away as she clung to him desperately wanting more. He slid his finger out of her sweet slit and began spanking her again with harder strokes that made her yelp and grind her erect little clit against his pants.

“Don't you cum now,” he warned her. “It will be the short cane if you do.”

“Please,” she whimpered.

“Not yet,” he replied. He wasn't done pleasuring her body. He wasn't done staking his claim and reminding her who she belonged to. She was not the only one laboring under arousal, his erection was quite evident against her side where it strained against his pants. As he slapped and fondled her bottom he seemed to reach a breaking point of arousal himself, a point at which all caution was thrown to the wind. “On your knees,” he ordered with a rough, primitive grunt. Zora trembled with greater arousal at the implication the order held as he helped her slide off his lap and onto her knees. She nuzzled in between his legs, protected by his thick thighs as he unzipped his pants and his solid cock sprang free. “Now show me what a good girl you are,” he prompted, twisting his hand in her hair as he pulled her closer. “Wrap those sweet lips around me.”

Sucking his cock made her feel instantly and genuinely more submissive, much more so than taking a spanking, much more so than all the dull obedience she'd been engaging in. His cock was large and thick and she obediently began suckling on it whilst he guided her head up and down, setting the pace for her sexual servicing.

“Yes Zora,” he groaned, arching his hips so as to feed her more of his cock. She used her mouth eagerly, and her tongue too, lapping at him with all the vigor of a Roman slave girl. In a way she was his slave, he determined what happened to her. At least, she hoped he still did. “Turn around and present your bottom to me,” he grunted, nearly hoarse from pleasure. She obeyed, quickly taking up position on her elbows and knees, grateful for the thick, quality carpet in the office. In that position, her bare bottom was raised skyward, the glistening lips of her pussy already parted for him. She thought maybe he was about to spank her again, but Savage had other plans in mind. She felt him place the hard head of his cock against her slit then, with a growl of possession, he drove deep into her, pushing her most secret and sensitive channels asunder. He fucked her there on the floor of his office, his hands holding her hips firmly so as to not let her get away.

It had been many weeks since they were joined and it showed in his impatience to have all of her at once, he fucked her with hard, deep strokes, consuming her pussy as if it were not hers but his to do with as he so desired. He was like a man possessed as he pounded into her, stretching her over and over. She was simply along for the ride, her desire and arousal coming second to his as he built quickly to a frantic climax. He slammed his hips against her bottom over and over again, the slapping sound of flesh on flesh filling the room. Quite suddenly he pulled out and a moment later  hot cum splashed all over her bottom and pussy. With a growl that almost sounded like a snarl, he used the head of his cock to push the semen that coated her cunt deep inside her. “Mine,” he growled, biting the back of her neck with a swift, possessive nip. “All mine.”

She swayed her hips, still caught in lust's needy embrace. He had reached his climax, but she had not and she thought she might go mad if she were not allowed to cum soon. She could feel her pulse in her clit as her now empty pussy clenched at thin air, desperately wanting something, needing something. Savage chuckled as she offered herself up like a cat in heat. “Oh you want more, do you?” He reached out and gave her a light slap across her pussy. “Do you think you can cum from a pussy spanking?”

The dirty words, rumbled in his masculine voice were almost enough to put Zora over the edge on her own. She grasped at the carpet desperately as he began slapping and fondling her pussy, rubbing it with soft, teasing strokes one moment, then bringing the flat of his fingers across her slit the next. “You are such a gorgeous little thing,” he purred, taking her hair in his free hand and making her arch her back for his ministrations. “I've missed this, I've missed you.” The sudden snapping of his wrist cut off Zora's attempt to reply as he punished her pussy lips with a relatively hard slap. “You've dreamed about this, haven't you, Zora,” he said, massaging her swollen lips. “How many nights did you wish I would come and fuck you?”

“All of them,” Zora admitted, her teeth clenched as her lust was turned against her, an instrument that made her admit the inadmissible. She wanted him. Oh god but she wanted him. Even when she thought she hated him, when he pulled her into that very office and spanked her harder than she thought she could bear being spanked she wanted him. With the rest of her life in ruins, he'd become the very center of her world and being separated from him and relegated from lover to misbehaved minion had been incredibly painful.

“All of them, you insatiable girl,” he chuckled, pressing three fingers inside her and stretching her open once more. “You have a hell of a sex drive, Matthews.”

She grunted, taking the finger fucking as he thrust his long digits inside her. She was coming closer to orgasm with every thrust. She squeezed her eyes closed, willing herself closer to cumming. The tugging on her hair, the incessant, almost rough thrusting between her legs, it was heaven and hell rolled up in one long, rolling wave of sensation that tossed her about but would not let her go.

When she finally reached her peak she did so with such a loud squeal of arousal that Savage was forced to clamp his hand over her mouth lest she raise alarm from any of the soldiers that might have been ambling up and down the hall outside. She shook and trembled in his arms, coming preciously close to losing consciousness as he held her close, chuckling softly with amusement at the power of her reaction. Panting with the exertion of her orgasm, Zora slowly came back to a full realization of her senses to find herself embraced in Savage's arms.

“You're going to get in trouble,” she whispered. He had not told her that they were not allowed to see one another, not in so many words, but Zora was bright enough to read between the lines and see what was going on. He might have had the authority to punish her if necessary, but she was pretty sure the powers that were would not be as happy with office sex.

He chuckled and squeezed her in his arms. “Maybe. But there's only so much a man can resist with a woman like you over his knee.”

“I better be careful about who spanks me then,” Zora giggled softly.

“Nobody better be laying a finger on you other than me,” he replied quite seriously. “They haven't, have they?”

“No,” she shook her head, allaying his fears. “They've just yelled at me and bullied me.”

“Good,” he nodded.

“Not really,” she argued reflexively.

“It's better than having half the base putting their hands on you, isn't it?” Savage turned her so she could get the full benefit of his quirked brow. “Or would you prefer to be the compound's whipping girl?”

Zora grinned and pretended to think. “Weelllll,” she said, laughing a little before growing serious once more. “You weren't supposed to do this, were you?”

“Who told you that?” Savage frowned.

“Nobody told me that.” She gave him a withering look for insulting her intelligence. “You've been acting erratically as hell and palming me off to anyone who will take me.”

“I have not...” he started to defend himself, then fell into silence. They'd hit the wall, the wall of lies that stood between them. There was something he could not tell her and there were an increasing number of things she would certainly not be telling him. As much as they might want each other, perhaps even love each other, they were operating on two very different sides of a dangerous coin. “I missed you,” he said, the words sounding suddenly hollow. “Can we not just enjoy this?”

“ Enjoy being fuck buddies?” Zora said cuttingly. “Sure. You know I love being your whore on demand.”

His eyes opened wide with surprise as they tumbled into the depths of another stupid argument. “It's not like that Zora, you know it isn't.”

Maybe she did know it wasn't like that. Maybe she could see the truth in his eyes when he looked at her. Maybe there was affection and longing there. But dammit, none of that was enough when she was being subjected to miserable treatment day in and day out. She shrugged as if she didn't believe him, the void that had been temporarily closed by their lovemaking opening up again in the pit of her stomach. “I don't know what to think anymore,” she said softly.

“You'll understand one day,” he said, resorting to patronizing excuses in a way that would have angered her under any circumstances.

“I'd understand now if you'd just damn well talk to me,” she said. “I know there's something going on, things have been weird ever since that creepy old guy assessed me. You've been weird.”

Savage sighed a deep sigh that spoke to a sorrow so profound she couldn't hope to understand it. “Zora, you have to trust me...”

She cut him off as she pulled away from him, hurriedly righting her clothing. “No Brett, I don't have to trust you. Trusting you has gotten me stuffed into cells, locked away underground and bitched at in ways I didn't think you could get bitched at. I've trusted you enough. It's time you damn well trusted me.”

It was a convincing argument, but she could see by the shuttered, almost blank look in his eyes that he was not buying it. Whatever secrets he held, he was holding onto them, and love or not, she was going to have to make her own way out of this mess he'd gotten her into.

Chapter Nineteen

In cool darkness Zora slumbered, clutching a thin blanket around her shoulders. Though her surroundings were spartan to say the least, a small beatific smile on her sleeping face showed her to be entirely at ease. She did not stir in the slightest until bright lights suddenly invaded the intimacy of shadows and a harsh metallic buzzing tone echoed around the small metal chamber demanding that consciousness be gained immediately.

As if a switch had been flicked, her eyes fluttered open to the harsh glare of bare fluorescent tubes. Welcoming the new day with more enthusiasm than anyone might have reasonably expected, she arched her back and stretched, reaching her arms skyward. The mattress beneath her was so thin she could feel the hard metal base of the bed beneath it, making it no great hardship to get up.

Outside, the compound was humming with activity. Boots stomped back and forth in the corridor with monotonous regularity. Everybody walked the same way here, stiffly and quickly like automatons. The place had come to remind her of a hive. It never slept, not really. There was always something going on somewhere, a mission going out, a prisoner being brought in. The people that inhabited the place were more like mindless drones than humans, they did as they were told, responding to buzzers and flashing lights in ways that would have made Pavlov proud. She’d long ago posited the theory that the entire place was an exercise in insanity, but she seemed to be the only person who noticed or cared. Most of the inhabitants were too consumed by their little roles to stop and look around and wonder why they were performing them in the first place.

Zora swept back the blankets and stood up purposefully, steeling herself for the task ahead. She’d been planning her escape for weeks, ever since it had become apparent that whatever had been between her and Savage was going by the wayside, sacrificed in favor of turning her into the perfect little worker bee. But escape was easier said than done. Actually, in the compound, escape was easier said than thought about. As hellish as the place was, every single person Zora had spoken to had been imbued with the unshakable belief that it was impossible to escape. If the subject were even approached, much less actually broached their faces would shut down, as if the part of their minds with any desire for freedom and autonomy had been cauterized. It had quickly become abundantly clear to Zora that any attempt to break free would have to be carried out entirely on her own.

So whilst she had been obediently bowing her head and learning the compound’s systems, she’d also been putting little bits and pieces in place, slowly putting together all the elements of a successful unauthorized departure. Today was the day she would make her attempt.  Although she’d done her homework, there was still an element of risk in the whole affair. But the groundwork was in place, and she would just have to hope that it was enough.

The plan itself was simple. Missions went out of the compound all the time via the vehicle bay. You couldn’t just wander out of the thing though, it was very long and very windy and equipped with all manner of sensors designed to keep good people in and bad people out. However Zora had identified a possible escape route via the mission vans themselves.

Mission vans weren’t simple affairs, they were highly customized vehicles with multiple storage panels in places you’d not usually expect to find space for storage. On the model that was going out that morning, there was a roof top compartment. Officially it was empty, but unofficially, Zora was going to be secreted away inside it for the duration of the journey to Los Angeles.

Of course the powers that be had thought of the possibility of stowaways before and there were counter measures in place. Every mission was meticulously inventoried before leaving and the van was cleared by weight. If a van was heavier than it should have been in a significant way, a shutdown would be triggered. Zora had discovered that in an incident in which a prankster had filled some of the gear bags with lead shot as a joke. A mission had been delayed for an hour whilst the van was stripped down and the person responsible had never been seen or heard from again. Their loss, probably of life, was her gain in terms of inspiration.

It had not been difficult to change some mission inventory data to suit her own purposes - all she’d done for weeks was scan information and learn systems. They had been foolish to put her to work on sensitive systems so quickly, but it was typical of the arrogance of the place. They assumed they were unbeatable. They were wrong. Very wrong, and Zora intended to show them that beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Zora Matthews wasn’t just a mathematical anomaly, she had also been blessed with several rather unique personality traits that helped her resist being programmed by authoritarian regimes. Most people capitulate very quickly when captured by powerful forces who offer rewards for good behavior and harsh punishments for bad. With no outside social forces promoting rebellion, it does not take long to reprogram a person. All it takes it separation from everything they’ve ever known and the consistent message that their new reality will be a persistent one. Humans are group animals and will quickly take on the ideals of a new society simply in order to fit in. Most people fear social isolation more than they fear death. Zora was not one of those people. She had always been a contrary introvert and when they’d told her that attempting to escape was futile, she heard nothing but a challenge.

Her plan came off without a hitch. Stuffing herself into the roof storage compartment was easily done, she’d already gotten clearance into the vehicle bay by offering to swap shifts with one of the lackeys who was all too happy not to load the early morning mission. Her escape was not hinging on being particularly daring or even original, it was hinging on the simple fact that nobody was expecting her to actually make a break for it. The culture of the compound was so strong that breaking out was frowned upon by those who were imprisoned there. The ability the leadership had to convince their captive workers that it was a privilege to be enslaved was impressive. Even Savage appeared to have bought into the whole sick charade, and he was a hell of a smart guy. She would miss him, but there was no way of saying goodbye, he wasn’t even in the country. She wondered what he would do when he discovered she was gone. Try to hunt her down probably. That was okay, she had contingencies in place for that too.

Stuffed in her hiding place, she sat in the darkness, barely daring to breathe as the sounds of masculine voices and heavy footsteps started gathering around the van. The team had arrived and they were in high spirits, like a pack of hounds excited at being unleashed to go hunt a fox. She needn’t have worried about being detected, they weren’t paying any attention to the condition of the van at all. That was programming for you, even the best soldiers in the world were blind to obvious threats when they felt safe on home ground.

It was not precisely pleasant inside the storage compartment, but she couldn’t help grinning with glee when she felt the van start beneath her and carry her up, up and away as it spiraled out of the compound and into the wide expanse of the desert.

It wasn’t until they broke surface and started hurtling along the rust red road towards civilization that she uncovered the first significant flaw in her plan. The storage locker was ventilated, but not by much and she could feel the heat of the desert sun beating down through the black exterior of the door, threatening to cook her alive. She couldn’t exactly open a window, so she was forced to suffer through the dense heat and dust that threatened to make her throat close over.

“Breathe, just breathe,” she whispered to herself, covering her nose with the top of her shirt. She knew the next few hours would not be pleasant, but at that point she would have walked through the fires of hell themselves if it meant freedom.

***

Savage was twenty thousand feet above the Indian ocean when he got a call that made his blood run cold. Brian was on the line, and Brian never called unless something had gone horribly wrong. He steeled himself for very bad news, a missile strike or perhaps a nuclear detonation. What Brian actually said was worse.

“Where is Matthews?”

Savage frowned at the floor of the airplane, slightly irritated by the way his subordinate had entirely dispensed with the formalities of conversation. “What do you mean, where is Matthews?”

“Have you moved her?”

“I've been dodging bullets in Kurdistan, how would I have moved her?” Savage's jaw was tight and he felt the beginnings of a tension headache coming on. “Is this your way of saying that you've lost her?”

“She can't be lost, not here.”

An impatient sigh escaped Savage. The man was wasting his time, beating about the bush with vague statements that didn’t make any sense. “What are you saying, Brian?”

“Sir, I think she's escaped, sir.”

Savage almost dropped the phone. Escape should have been impossible, no, was impossible from the compound. Unless you were a cross between a camel and a gopher with titanium claws. “That cant be,” he croaked, his throat going suddenly dry.

“It has to be,” Brian said, sounding as perplexed as he did. “She was last recorded as being present last night. This morning she left her cell and hasn't been seen since.”

“Has someone else moved her perhaps? Kransky?”

“Kransky’s leading the charge looking for her, sir.” Brian lowered his voice as if he didn’t want to be heard, which had the undesirable result of making it difficult for Savage to hear him too. “They’re not happy about this at all. Cancellation is on the table.”

The string of expletives that escaped Savage’s lips were as inventive as they were forceful. Brian waited patiently on the other end of the line until Savage had depleted his vocabulary entirely before asking for further orders. “What do you want me to do, sir?”

But Savage couldn't think of a single order to give. The matter would probably already be out of his hands. His commanders had been working on driving a wedge between him and Zora for quite some time. Though she was still technically his material, he’d lost the ability to determine her fate in the weeks of constant deployments. “I'll be there in a few hours. Keep me informed.”

He hung up, swore and punched a strut on the plane. It did not do much in the way of finding Zora, but it did hurt his hand quite a lot. Cradling his sore knuckles, he swore under his breath. One way or another, this stunt was definitely going to get Zora Matthews killed. If they found her, they'd put her down for sure. If they didn’t find her, well, the chances were high that someone else would.

The next several hours in the plane were some of the most hopeless in his life. In his opinion Zora wasn't good enough to stay free for long. They would find her, and quickly, probably before his plane landed. They might even kill her before he got the chance to intervene in any way.

How had she done it? Suspicion grew quickly in his mind as he pondered the other possibilities. What if she hadn't escaped? What if she had just been set up and killed and this was their way of breaking it to him? He shook his head to clear it of the disturbing thoughts. That wasn’t what Brian had reported and he couldn't go down that road, not yet. Nobody had ever escaped from the compound before, but if there was someone who could, it was probably Zora Matthews. She was just that bloody minded. He knew that they’d been underestimating her from the beginning and he was starting to wonder if he had too.

***

Sunshine beat down on Zora’s face as a sense of pure elation took over. It had been hairy there for a while, and taking a tumble off the top of a moving vehicle had proved to be an unpleasant experience resulting in skinned forearms and road rash, but she had done it! She was free! Blending in with the crowds, she was just another woman on the beach..

Of course there were some practical issues, she had no ID whatsoever and no cash as yet. But the day was still warm and there was no hurry so she reveled in the great outdoors, the pale golden sand and the ocean that seemed to stretch from the shore to infinity. This was life as it should be, a never ending tapestry of pure possibility.

She wandered about on the beach for a time, digging her toes into the sand and letting the waves lap gently about her feet. Then, when she tired of that amusement, she took herself a short way into the city, passing by a bank with gleaming plate glass windows which announced an excellent mortgage rate and urged passers by to open up an account for the purposes of saving for retirement. Zora smiled wryly at the notion of retirement, she was about to go into a form of retirement herself. She kept walking down the street, past high end clothing stores and their molded plastic clientele. The building she eventually entered was another bank, not that one would have known it was a bank to look at it. There were no signs with large numbers and percentage symbols on them, no cute representations of savings accounts fronted by cartoon pigs. There was nothing but a windowless facade and a small silver plaque that read ‘Son and Sons’.

“Can I help you ma’am?” A clean cut, suited banker greeted her as she entered the building. Unlike an ordinary bank there was no line of windows with gum chewing tellers cowering behind bulletproof glass. This was a bank for the richest of the rich only. Saudi Princes, celebrities and other modern royalty kept their assets safe there, far from the prying eyes of the hoi polloi.

“Yes, I have a safety deposit box here,” Zora said, smiling with the charming confidence of a person who knows they have a right to be somewhere even if they do have sand in between their toes and blood drying on their arms.

“Of course Madame,” the banker agreed. “Do you have any ID?”

“It’s a password coded box,” she said sweetly. “No ID required, it’s so odious presenting little slivers of plastic with one’s face stamped on them, don’t you think?”

“Of course Madame,” the banker agreed again. Zora strongly suspected that he would have agreed with almost anything she said. He was a man accustomed to dealing with people who had been warped by their own power to the point of constructing entirely new realities about themselves. It was unlikely that she would be anywhere near the strangest client he would see that week.

She followed the banker back to a barred and locked vault behind which several thousand safety deposit boxes were lodged in the wall. Even the high security area had been nicely appointed, with gilt edging on the bars, comfortable leather seats in which one might sit and peruse the contents of one’s deposit box and even a small bar well stocked with the finest liquors in the land.

“Number 5973,” she prompted the banker. She waited at the lovely oak table in the middle of the room whilst the worthy man retrieved the deposit box in question. In spite of the splendor surrounding it, the box itself was fairly unremarkable, nothing more than a sleek black metallic rectangle with a digital key-code pad mounted atop.

Ordinarily a password would not have been very good security, but the password to the box was no short four digit pin. It was a fifty six digit long string changed daily by an automated evolving algorithm. The only way to access the password was to be given it by the actual owner of the box - unless, of course, you happened to have been privy to one of the most in depth surveillance programs in the world and had once seen both the formula underlying the algorithm and one of the original passwords and you had the ability to do the mental mathematics required to generate several years of iterations to arrive at that day’s password. Handily enough, thanks to her time in the compound, Zora had seen all she needed to and could do all those things and she wasted no time in beginning to key in the number.

Whilst she worked, the banker stayed at a discrete distance. If he was suspicious of the casually dressed woman typing in an extended code apparently from memory, he did not let on. Fifty six digits later, Zora opened the box and retrieved the contents, which were promptly shoved into her pockets. “Thank you kindly,” she said, closing the box once more and handing it back to the banker. “Please return this to its rightful place.”

The banker gave a short bow and replaced the now empty safety deposit box back into the array. It would be quite some time before anyone discovered the theft. Much like those who ran the compound, those who had their valuables stashed away at the most secure and secretive bank you’ve never heard of rarely considered the possibility that they might be robbed.

With a broad smile on her face Zora wandered out of the bank and down the street to one of the best hotels in the city, where she paid for a penthouse suite with cash. The old Zora would never have contemplated outright theft, it had gone against her principles. But what was the point of having principles if they meant you scraped by on the street whilst secret military factions hunted you down? No. If she was going to go on the lam, she was going to do it in style.

***

Meanwhile, not all that far away, Savage’s plane was screeching down out of the sky. Already standing as the plane taxied to its stopping point, he was at the door before it opened. He didn’t wait for the stairs to be wheeled to the plane, instead he simply leaped the distance to the ground. He was more than eager to get on Zora’s tail, he was desperate. Every second wasted fluffing about with stairs and safety regulations was a second in which he could be saving her.

He spotted Brian waiting with a special operations car on the tarmac and ran over to the man. “Do they have her yet?” He asked urgently, his stomach clenching as he braced himself for the worst.

“No sir,” Brian shook his head. “She’s just...” he lifted his arms in the air with a gesture of confused hopelessness. “Disappeared.”

“Really.” Savage’s expression lightened with relief. “I would have thought they would have found her.”

A look of awe had established itself firmly on Brian’s features. “It’s like she’s gone without a trace. One moment she was there, the next moment she wasn’t. The system can’t find her and there are no reports matching her description anywhere.”

“Get in the car,” Savage snapped. “We can talk on the way.” He got into the driver’s seat and started the engine. Brian was forced to sprint around to get in the car in time, Savage had the car’s wheels rolling and lights flashing before his 2IC’s rear contacted the passenger seat.

“Nobody just disappears,” Savage pointed out pragmatically as he navigated the labyrinth of the airport with increasing frustration. There were far too many people milling about and getting in the way, and if they weren't careful, one or more of them was going to end up in the front grille. “She’s a pain in the ass, but she’s not magical. Do you think they moved her and aren’t telling us?”

“No,” Brian shook his head. “The entire compound is on high alert.” When Savage continued to look suspicious, Brian elaborated further. “They’ve been taking down walls and tearing out wiring looking for her. Her cell looks like a bomb hit it, they’ve stripped it bare and found nothing. They’re worried, real worried. Some are saying she might have been a spy the whole time.”

“Ridiculous,” Savage snorted, slamming the horn on at the car in front of him, which he considered to be taking an unnecessarily long time to pull over. “She’s just a woman, just a civilian. She wasn’t mixed up in anything until we grabbed her.”

“Then how did she escape?” Brian gave voice to the question of the day. “Nobody has ever escaped.”

“Well now they have,” Savage replied, glaring at the traffic that was flowing like thick syrup. God how he hated LAX. “No place is 100% secure, you know that.”

“But the compound... it’s...” Brain shook his head. “It shouldn’t be possible,” he declared. “Anyway,” he said, finally remembering his original orders and his reason for meeting Savage’s plane. “Hurtzwald wants to see you.”

“Oh I bet he does,” Savage said grimly. “I bet he does.”

Chapter Twenty

To have said that Savage was agitated would have been to make the understatement of the century. He was driving like a man possessed, clenching the steering wheel so hard his knuckles were white as he navigated heavy city traffic.

“Why in the damn hell do they make us take those civilian flights,” he growled, knowing the answer to the question already. You could get on a commercial flight without anybody taking any real notice. Millions of people took commercial flights every day and 99.9999% of them were not special agents of any kind. If you wanted to get from A to B without arousing interest and satellite tracking, you got in line, you took your shoes off, you went through the ridiculous body scanner and you flew the friendly skies just like everybody else. The problem was that when you were trying to get out of the airport you got stuck in traffic - just like everybody else. Usually it didn't matter, but on that day, with every minute taking them one moment closer to what he considered to be Zora's inevitable capture and demise, it was maddening.

“How the hell did she do it?” He slammed his hand against the steering wheel and glared out the window.

Brian did not reply. He was sitting very quietly on his side of the car, watching the traffic with a nervous expression on his normally impassive face as Savage swung the vehicle aggressively between lanes.

“I'm going to kill her,” Savage growled. “After I save her, I'm going to kill her.”

A gap opened up in the traffic ahead and he went for it, gunning the engine and briefly accelerating hard enough to push both occupants of the car back into their seats before coming to yet another stop. Horns blared around them, but he didn't care about horns. He didn't care what other people thought, they were lucky he was putting up with them at all. He glanced out his window at the raised grass verge, wondering if there was enough room to drive up on it and save some time.

Fortunately the lights turned green before he could test the theory and the traffic started to flow a bit more smoothly. Brian uttered an audible sigh of relief as they got up to a reasonable speed and Savage seemed to calm down a bit. His relief was short lived however, for not a mile down the road Savage suddenly swore loudly and jammed on the breaks, sending the car to a skidding halt in the middle of traffic.

Brian looked on in horror as his commanding officer wrenched the driver's side door open and leaped out into the road. He then proceeded to bound across four lanes of traffic without paying any attention to the drivers who were forced to slam their brakes on to avoid the large muscular man running out in front of them with all the focused intensity of a greyhound chasing a stuffed bunny on a stick.

Dashing between the deadly hulks of high speed metal that raced by all around him Savage ignored the cacophony of horns and harsh expletives. He barely heard them at all, his mind was focused on something much more important. Just for a moment he'd caught improbable sight of someone very familiar. He was sure it was Zora, just walking along the footpath as if she didn't have a care in the world, as if she were not a fugitive from those who operated beyond the law.

A car hurtled towards him, screeching brakes and burning rubber. It didn't stop quite in time and Savage was forced to make a mighty leap onto the hood in order to avoid being hit by the thing. He missed the drop-jawed look of amazement on the driver's face as he bounded over the car, leaving a large footprint in the alloy.

It was Zora. It had to be her. He'd recognize her anywhere. She'd changed over the months, she was no longer the straggly haired slightly chubby woman he'd first met. She was trimmer now, more toned and her hair had grown out into its natural dirty blonde state. She was walking in the opposite direction, no longer facing him, but he was sure it was her. She still had the slight hunch to her shoulders when she walked, not to mention a scuffing gait that made her look as though she were kicking stones out of the way with every step.

He got confirmation when she turned around to see what all the fuss was about on the road. A few small collisions had ensued in his wake and there were plenty of people screaming abuse at one another. Their eyes locked across the chaos and he saw horrified recognition dawn on her. Her eyes went wide like she'd seen a ghost and she turned and ran, clasping shopping bags in both hands.

Again he was reminded of how far she'd come. In the past he'd have chased her down in a few steps, but she managed to lead him on a bit of a merry chase as she dodged between buildings, using her smaller stature and superior maneuverability to slow him down on the turns. They ran through crowds of shoppers, most of whom seemed dead set on ignoring them completely. That was the paradox of a busy city, you were surrounded by people constantly, but you were also more alone than ever. You could be chased down by an apparent mad man and still people would walk on by, chatting about hats and sipping low fat ice chai soy lattes.

There were limits though, even in LA there were limits. Savage silently willed her to stop running before they caught the attention of a police officer. Almost immediately, as if she'd picked up the thought, she dodged down an alley where a chain link fence set up for the purposes of keeping thieves and beggars out caught her too. She tried to climb it, but her shopping slowed her down and he was on her in an instant. He grabbed her by the back of her shirt and yanked her down off the fence, catching her as she fell.

Zora parted her lips as if she were about to scream, but he clapped his hand over her mouth. “Shut up,” he growled harshly. “Shut the hell up if you want to live.”

Her eyes reflected fear and confusion, but she nodded. He took that as a sign that she wouldn't yell or try to run again and he took his hand away from her mouth. “Are you staying somewhere close by?”

She nodded silently and he shifted his grip from the back of her shirt to clasp her hand in his own.

“Take me there.”

***

Savage did not expect to be taken to the place he was taken. He'd expected another alley or perhaps an abandoned building, something rough and dark and out of the way. The penthouse suite he found himself standing in was none of those things. It looked out over the city and was furnished with two oversized antique mirrors that made the place seem twice as cavernously big as it really was. An unbelievably large bed was also in residence, big enough to sleep four or five comfortably at the very least.

Looking around at the opulence and splendor, he frowned to himself. There was something not right about this. No, there was something horribly wrong about it. He turned to Zora who was smirking broadly at him. “How did you afford this?” He doubted he was going to get an answer, much less a straight answer, but the question had to be asked.

As he'd expected, she simply shrugged. “That's my concern.”

“It's not just your concern, little girl,” he growled. “You have no idea how much trouble you're in.”

“I have some idea,” Zora replied, her eyes growing cold. “But it is irrelevant. I'm not going back to that place. Not ever. If you're here to drag me back, we have a serious problem.”

Savage shook his head with a humorless chuckle. “I'm not here to take you back. They'll kill you if they get their hands on you.”

“Oh.” She looked at him with a curiously detached expression. “Well I suppose that's good to know. Thanks for passing the message along.”

She was angry and he understood her anger. He wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and tell her that everything was going to be okay, but that wasn't a promise he could make. “Zora,” he shook his head. “I'm sorry I got you into all of this.”

A brief flicker of surprise passed through her gaze, quickly replaced with her native cynical skepticism. “Are you?” She took a step back from him and crossed her arms over her chest. “Because from where I'm standing, it looks like you're still running around doing their dirty work.”

It was going to be almost impossible to get her to trust him, let alone listen to him. She'd managed to do what he could not – get herself out of the compound. And she'd managed to find funding fairly quickly after the fact. For a brief moment Savage wondered if she was a spy after all. He quickly dismissed the thought as being ridiculous. There was no way she could be a spy. She was nothing but what he'd made her be.

“I'm going to let you go, Zora,” he said, hoping she believed him. “I'm going to try to help you too, but you have to be careful. You have to lay low. You can't do silly things.”

She raised a brow as if she were about to take offense at the notion anything she did was ill-advised. “Silly things?”

“Yeah,” he looked around at the splendor that surrounded him. “Like, I don't know, rob a bank or something.

She snickered and his heart sank. “Zora. Tell me you didn't actually rob a bank. If the police arrest you, they'll hand you straight back over to Hurtzwald and you know how that ends.”

“Who is Hurtzwald? And why would the military kill me? I haven't done anything to hurt them.”

They were both good questions. Savage dodged the first one and answered the second. “You're a pain in the ass, they don't like people being a pain in the ass. You're also an incredible security risk.” He fixed her with a searching look. “How did you manage to escape?”

“Not telling,” Zora smiled sweetly. “I might need to do it again someday.”

“No.” Savage shook his head. “If they catch you again and by some chance don't kill you, you can expect to be under constant supervision. Probably chained to someone day in and day out.”

“That would be awkward in the bathroom,” Zora noted flippantly. She wasn't taking him all that seriously, much to his chagrin. “So will they kill me, or won't they kill me?”

“I don't know.” Savage sighed, feeling very much as if he was wasting his breath. “It was on the cards when they thought you were useless...”

“Charming,” Zora interjected.

“... but you've proved you're not useless now, so I don't know.”

“These people are the worst employers ever,” Zora noted dryly. He watched as she took herself over to the extensive bar and poured herself a double bourbon. “They might promote you, might kill you, might stuff you into an underground cell and never let you see the light of day again. It's like Russian Roulette, but all the chambers are loaded.”

He smiled, the analogy was a good one. “It is,” he said walking over to her and taking the drink out of her hand. “So you're going to have to be careful and not turn back into a lush.”

A flash of anger passed over her pretty features. She did not like having her drink taken away from her, no siree. “Brett darling,” she said with impressive self control. “I don't answer to you anymore. Give me back my drink.”

“Zora sweetie,” he mimicked her tone as he placed the glass on a high shelf away from her. “You've been gone for less than twelve hours and I've already found you.” He leaned in close and lowered his voice to a menacing purr. “Do you really think there's anywhere you can go that I can't find you? Do you really think I can't make you answer to me if I want to?”

She looked far less sure of herself after his little speech. “How did you find me?” She had to have known the question wasn't going to get an answer, much like he'd known she wasn't going to tell him how she'd escaped.

“I have my methods,” he said, keeping the illusion of near omnipotent power as intact as possible.

She was about to argue, but she was interrupted by his phone ringing. Savage checked the device and saw that it was Brian calling. He held his finger to his lips at Zora, then answered it.

Once again, Brian didn't bother with pleasantries. “Uh Sir, are you in the Mattrion hotel?”

Puzzled at how Brian could have possibly deducted such a thing, Savage confirmed that he was. “How did you know?”

“Just a hunch sir,” Brian said quite calmly. “There are two police choppers being scrambled to that location, not to mention at least ten ground units.”

Savage hung up and grabbed Zora. “We have to go.”

She predictably started fighting him, futilely attempting to pull her arm out of his grip. “What? No! I'm not going anywhere with you.”

“Zora!” He yelled urgently. “They're coming. They're coming now. You understand me?”

“No!” She shouted back. “I don't believe you!”

He took a breath to calm himself and modulated his voice. This was not the time for a screaming match. “We don't have time to fight about this. Come with me. Now.”

“No!”

They could have argued like that until they were caught, if not for the sound of a distant chopper drawing steadily closer lending some credibility to his argument. Savage pointed out the window. “They're coming for you. If you want to stay here and wait for them, fine. I'm leaving.” He let Zora go and made his way quickly towards the door. He was out of the suite and on his way to the emergency stairwell before Zora came racing after him. She'd grabbed a backpack and looked ready to move.

“I don't trust you,” she said, “but I trust them even less.”

There was no more time for discussion. Savage lead them both into the stairwell. The warning had come just in time, but not quite soon enough to make a completely clean getaway. They managed to descend several floors before the clanging of metal stairwell doors and the sound of heavy boots on the stairs below announced the arrival of the cops.

Wordlessly, Savage pushed the door to the nearest floor open. Zora followed him without complaint. Fortunately for both of them they were dressed casually, Savage from his civilian flight, Zora from her recent shopping spree. In spite of her new-found wealth, she'd still elected to buy jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, though they'd probably cost five times as much as anything in a department store.

He reached for her hand and she laced her fingers with his, playing the role of adoring partner perfectly as they strolled down the rabbit warren like corridors of the hotel. They couldn't even hear the police officers anymore, the place was well equipped with soundproofing that allowed guests in one room to have a reasonably loud gathering without disturbing those staying next door.

They stopped to wait for a passing waiter pushing a dinner cart covered with a glistening white cloth and Zora took the opportunity to stand on tip toes and place a kiss on Savage's cheek. It was not a gesture of affection, it was just a way of getting close enough to whisper a dire promise. “You better not fuck me on this Brett,” she breathed.

He chuckled. “Last time I checked you liked it when I fucked you.”

She gave him a dirty look, but was not given the chance to respond. Behind them they could hear doors slamming open as the police began searching floor by floor.

“What the hell did you do?” Savage muttered to Zora, dragging her through the halls more quickly.

“What do you mean what did I do?” She injected just the right amount of righteous indignation into the question.

“This isn't us,” he growled. “You've managed to piss someone else off.”

“What can I say,” Zora said, tripping along after Savage as he tugged her in his wake. “It's a talent of mine.”

The officers were drawing closer, they could both hear them as they shouted back and forth. The situation was getting desperate, and witty banter aside, they were going to need a miracle to get out of this without being caught. Glancing at the waiter ahead of them, Savage hatched a plan.

***

Zora repressed a giggle as she crouched on her hands and knees, working hard to keep her balance as she was trundled along in the base of the dinner cart. Savage sure looked funny in the waiter's outfit. It was a little too small for him, the jacket not quite broad enough across the shoulders. There weren't many men on the planet built along Savage's lines.

The real waiter was stuffed inside a closet in one of the suites, tied up with bedsheets. They'd find him soon enough. He'd been compensated for his troubles with five hundred dollars in clean bank notes, which might mollify him somewhat. Maybe he'd even keep his mouth shut. Probably not.

Savage had been correct. The police weren't looking for him and they weren't working on behalf of Hurtzwald, who ever the heck that was. They were after a bank robber. She knew that because they'd told Savage as much when they'd questioned him after mistaking him for a waiter. Had he seen a blonde woman? Did he know where she might be?

She still wasn't certain that he wasn't going to try to take her back to the compound, but for the moment she had to trust him. He'd cleared most of the officers and steered the cart into the elevator, then subsequently into the parking lot. Peeking out from under the white cloth, she could see dirty concrete and car wheels.

“Right,” Savage said, pulling the cart to a halt and helping her out from under it. “Get in the car.”

It was no surprise to Zora that Brian had the car ready to help them escape. Brian was like a silent Jeeves, always there when you needed him. She eyed the vehicle suspiciously. “If you try to take me back there...”

“I'm not going to take you back there,” Savage sighed, finally running out of patience. Before she could argue any more he grabbed her by the back of her sweater and tossed her bodily into the back of the car. “Now shut up and hide down low whilst we get out of here.”

The police were checking cars as they left, but Savage ditched the waiter's jacket and Brian flashed his military ID and they were waved through whilst Zora took refuge under a blanket. She continued to hide until they were out of the city and whizzing along the gorgeous curves and lines of the PCH. Then, throwing back the blanket, she emerged to see the sparkling waters of the Pacific Ocean smashing merrily against rocky cliffs.

“We did it!” She announced gleefully. Her enthusiasm was not shared by the other occupants of the vehicle.

“I'm going to drop you off in one of the smaller towns off the highway. Keep your head down and for god's sake, keep your nose clean,” Savage growled at her. “If you commit a single crime I'm going to come after you and beat your ass until you can't sit for a month.”

“Oh yeah? Well...” Zora was going to come up with a counter threat, but the glare Savage gave her from the front seat was enough to make her shut her mouth.

The next few hours passed in something of a whirl. She didn't know how, but Savage had been busy, real busy. It was almost as if he had a contingency for this sort of situation already planned out. They turned inland and drove through the countryside until they reached a town so small she could hardly believe that it was a town at all. The bright blue sky was wide open and tall pine trees dotted the land at regular intervals, breaking up the valleys and ridges. There were a handful of houses and barns and she was sure she spotted a small general store, which struck her as very quaint indeed. She commented as much, but received no reply. Savage was not in the best of moods, so it was in silence that they drove through the center of town and down a couple of side roads to pull up in front of a small, but tidy house.

“Where are we?” Zora inquired cautiously.

“Iron Horse,” Savage said. “Population 300. Somewhere quiet you can keep your head down.”

She looked around and saw absolutely nothing of interest. “I'm supposed to stay here?”

“Damn right you're supposed to stay here,” he growled at her. “You even think of moving without telling me and I'll have your hide.”

Zora wrinkled her nose as she stepped out of the car. He really had dumped her right in the middle of nowhere. It wasn't quite as remote as the compound, but it might as well have been. The next house was barely in view across dusty paddocks fenced by shaky wooden struts. “Seriously? Here?”

“Here,” Savage said firmly. He took her by the shoulder, turned her around and slapped her ass hard. “Now get inside.”

“Ow!” Zora complained.

“Ow? You've got a lot more than just that coming to you girl,” he growled. “I cannot believe you actually robbed a bank. You were out for less than a day and you robbed a bank.”

“I needed money,” she explained.

“What you needed was a good thrashing,” he replied direly. He was in full blown angry Savage mode and she didn't like her chances of ending their encounter without feeling the palm of his hand again.

With a growing sense of despair, Zora traipsed inside the house. The kitchen she walked into was decorated with faded floral wallpaper and furnished with a rickety old table and three chairs. She dumped her backpack in a corner and frowned. “This isn't my idea of freedom,” she complained over her shoulder.

“It's here or the compound, your choice,” Savage snapped.

She was tired of being growled at. It was time the man lightened up a little. “What's the matter Bretty?” Zora smirked cheekily, throwing caution to the wind. “You seem tense...”

It was the final straw. He'd been patient with her escape, he'd been patient with the discovery she'd robbed a bank, he'd even helped her run from the cops, but she'd finally made the smart ass comment that broke the camel's back. She knew this because he roared as much as he grabbed her up to punish her. Try as she might to thwart his efforts, she was still no match for him. Setting his foot up on the seat of one of the kitchen chairs, he pushed her over his thigh and began slapping her ass with gusto. “Tense! Girl you don't know the half of it!”

See-sawing back and forth over his leg with her ass very quickly feeling like it was under attack by napalm, Zora felt that she probably did know the half of it and that she was being treated very unfairly indeed. Escaping wasn't a crime, and okay, maybe bank robbery technically was a crime, but she'd only stolen from a bad guy. She communicated precisely none of those thoughts because she was too busy yowling and trying to save her ass. Savage was whaling away at her behind with the sort of enraged strength that she always seemed to bring out in him.

“Goddammit stop it!” She screamed, thrashing about wildly in a way that did nothing but put her more off balance.

“I will not stop it,” he bellowed. “You are the most incorrigible, lawless brat I've ever known and you need a beating more than you need anything.”

“It's never stopped me before,” she screeched over the loud thwacking of his palm meeting her ass. “What makes you think it will work now?”

The logic was sound, but it didn't stop him from spanking her until she felt tears springing to her eyes. He'd wasted no time in building a deep ache in her ass that was being topped off with fiery blows that just kept coming, over and over again.

“Why are you doing this?” She tried a question, desperate to end the spanking. “It's just pointless!”

“Because I love you dammit!” He yelled. He stopped hitting her and just held her there, his palm laid across her blazing bottom. She could hear him breathing hard, perhaps from the exertion of the spanking, perhaps from something else. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter and more controlled. “I love you and I'm scared as hell I'm going to watch you die and I'm not going to be able to do a damn thing to stop it.”

He stood her up and Zora saw that she was not the only one with tears in her eyes. Savage's own dark gaze was glistening with emotion. She realized with a start that his pain was her doing. She never really thought of him as having actual feelings, everything always seemed so contrived with him. Maybe he did care after all. Certainly he'd risked his life and he was probably still risking his life in helping her escape. “I'm so sorry,” she whispered as guilt washed over her.

“No, I'm sorry,” he said, holding back his emotion with supreme effort. “I should have never brought you into this life.” He stiffened with resolve. “But now that I have, I'm going to make damn sure you're safe, and if that means beating your ass until you can't sit so you think twice before pulling one of your little stunts, then so be it.”

He reached for her and gathered her to him and she melted against his body, taking comfort in his strength as she dried her eyes on his shirt. It was a soft, tender moment she wished would last forever, but it barely lasted a minute before footsteps on the porch got their attention. They both turned as the screen door of the kitchen opened. It was Brian. “Sorry to interrupt sir,” he said. “Our window is closing. We have to get going.”

“I will be back,” Savage promised. He kissed her deeply, all his love and passion in the embrace as he wrapped his arms around her as if he never wanted to let her go. She breathed deeply, taking in his scent, making it a part of herself.

“I don't want you to go.” Zora felt as small as she sounded when she realized that he was really going, leaving her alone in the remote town. She'd escaped the compound without giving him much of a second thought, but now she really didn't want him to leave.

“I don't want to go either, little girl,” he held her close and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “But we can't be together until this is resolved.” He pulled away, giving her a final kiss that held so much longing it almost made her choke with emotion.

She watched him walk towards the door and her voice was plaintive as she rubbed her ass, hating the fact that the burning ache was going to stick around longer than Savage was. “What now? What do I do now?”

He turned and looked at her, all the intensity of life and death burning in his gaze.

“Now they hunt... and you hide.”

The End

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This book is intended for adults only.  Spanking and other sexual activities represented in this book are fantasies only, intended for adults.  Nothing in this book should be interpreted as advocating any non-consensual spanking activity or the spanking of minors.