Bette released Dan, officially known as prisoner 373154, back into the custody of his wife, Mary, on a bright cold Sunday morning. It was four weeks and a day exactly since Bette had agreed to keep Dan and have him work on her farm for a month. Bette and Mary had decided it would be best to keep Dan out of sight and out of reach of the media for a spell following his conviction and sentencing. Let the heat die down.
In Dan's view, and having had the previous four weeks to reflect on it, that conviction was a sham. After all, he reminded himself, he had only got an erection. That was the extent of his crime, and since when was getting an erection a crime he asked himself. Certainly not a crime deserving a sentence of three to five years in jail, he decided. But he was still stuck with an official recorded conviction and a formal sentence to serve at the pleasure of the sentencing magistrate. That was not a sham. That was real.
On that Sunday morning, all three stood on the driveway outside Bette's farmhouse engaging in what Dan considered to be a bit of pantomime madness. But he said nothing, mostly because he had a big metal ball gag strapped firmly into his mouth. His stretched jaws ached a bit, but he consoled himself with the fact that he was not naked and he was going home. He listened to Bette and Mary playacting at making a ceremony of the end of his farm labourer stint, hamming it up with pretend prisoner transfer terminology.
'Prisoner 373154 has now been securely transferred to the custody of his wife,' intoned Bette as she handed over a dog lead to Mary. Dan was attached to the other end of that dog lead via his leather collar that was locked around his neck. Two leather cuffs securely clipped his wrists together behind his back. A one foot length of chain linked his ankle cuffs. Mary had brought Dan's slave cuffs and collar from home. He'd been without them for the fast month and it felt almost comforting to put them back on. Like he belonged to somebody again.
'Thank you for ensuring the security of prisoner 373154 for the past four weeks,' responded Mary with a broad smile. Clearly she was enjoying herself. 'Let the record show that I have accepted custody responsibility' she pronounced in a mock haughty air, as she tugged on Dan's lead and he shuffled humiliatingly behind her to the car. 'I am now placing prisoner 373154 in my secure prisoner transportation vehicle,' Mary sniggered as she placed her hand on the top of Dan's head and forced him to bend low while getting into the passenger seat of her car. The car that used to be Dan's car.
Dan decided they were just trying to rub in the fact that he was actually a prisoner of the State, and that he had actually been sentenced to three to five years in jail. Just messing with my head. Take it all in good spirit. After all I'm going home. Focus on the positives, he told himself.
He watched as Mary took leave of Bette. To the casual observer it seemed the usual; kissy, kissy, huggy, huggy. But it went on a little longer than it needed, and Dan noticed Bette placing one hand firmly on Mary's buttock and pulling their bodies together, hard. Body pressing against body. Bette's fingers slipping deep between the cheeks of Mary's blue jeans. Mary lifted herself on her toes as Bette probed her crack, but she didn't pull away, she went with it, wriggling her ass a bit in response to the tease. More than pals then, Dan decided, feeling a bit left outside. He would like to have somebody hold him close like that, preferably Mary, when she's not busy licking Bette's pussy, that is, he mused cattily.
As Mary leaned across him to fix his seat belt, Dan breathed in her scent, relished her closeness to him after his four weeks of exile on the farm, surrounded by barnyard smells, devoid of close human contact. Dan was hungry for her touch, as the song put it. He'd almost forgotten what such close proximity to his wife was like. He edged forward a little so that her hair brushed his face without her noticing. Why shouldn't he touch this woman, he thought. She who, just four short months ago, shared his bed every night, They had rolled in each other's arms, slapped and tickled each other, chatted freely about their hopes and dreams, had a full shared life. Even in the months since he signed the slave contract she allowed him a bit of fun regularly enough. Yet he was unsure of the situation, unsure of what to do.
Dan would have liked to plant a quick kiss on her cheek, or ear, or hair, whatever, as her head moved past his face, just to prove his point, just to remind himself, and her, of that other life they shared not too long ago. But he couldn't bring himself to attempt it. Dan, never the bravest, found his confidence still shaken by the events of four weeks ago. After all Mary was now his official jailor. Worse; in modern street-speak, she owned him. Anyway, he rationalised, the ball gag would get in the way. And so the moment passed.
His month's isolation on the farm had allowed him a breathing space, a separation, from the reality that was now hitting home to him once more. Which was that he was now slightly afraid of Mary. Well, in fact, very afraid of her. The month living on the farm had been a holiday from all that. Bette kept him in the barn with the animals. Literally kept him at a distance. She made no bones about being fairly indifferent to his presence, other than getting a bit of value out of having him do farm work. But from now on it would be different. Dan would be living in close proximity with the woman who held his fate and future happiness in the palm of her hand. He would have to work constantly to ensure she continued to want him in her life. He would have to make himself worthwhile to her. Be an asset, not an expense. And do it every day. The thought was a bit scary.
Mary slammed the passenger door shut, went around, climbed into the driver's seat and started the car while waving her goodbyes to Bette. Dan's heart lifted a bit as the car moved off. At least he was heading home. As the car and passed Alice's place, Dan recalled the previous time he had taken this trip, four months ago. It was after his three days of slave training. His first three days of real slavery. That time he was sitting in the passenger seat of Mary's car too. He had just become fully and formally her slave, contract signed on the dotted line. That time his hands were not pinioned behind him and he didn't have a big steel ball gag clamped behind his teeth, stretching his jaws beyond comfortable.
Things have moved a little further down the slave road since then, Dan realised. Looking back, his prospects had seemed a lot sunnier on that first trip home. Like they were embarking on a fun thing. A spicing up the marriage thing. But this time round it didn't seem so much a fun thing. Dan was no longer sure what it was all about, really, except that he was now well and truly Mary's slave, and he was more than a little nervous about the way things might be going.
Mary glanced in Dan's direction as she indicated to turn onto the main road into town. It was as if she was reading Dan's thoughts. She started to fill in the picture for him.
'Well, Dan, I'll get straight down to business, ' she said briskly, in her no-nonsense tone, 'A lot of things have changed while you were doing your hard labour on Bette's farm.'
'Ooohaay.'
'You don't have to try to say anything Dan. You may not have noticed, but you are gagged. There's a reason for that. I want you to just listen to me. You've a bit of catching up to do.'
Spare me the sarcasm, thought Dan, But he waited patiently for whatever Mary was about to say. A shudder ran through him at the thought that she might be about to tell him that she had decided to consign him to State prison directly. Maybe I have become an inconvenience to her, thought Dan gloomily.
'A few little pointers, Dan. We are going to my new house, that's where you will stay while in my custody. In my new house, Dan. Not in our new house; my new house. I could ask you if you're OK with that Dan. But I'm not asking you. I'm telling you, that this is how it is Dan, and this how it is going to be from now on. Just so I know you get it, nod to show me you are happy with that, Dan. Not that it matters to me, really. Just nice to get a sign of appreciation. After all, Dan, I'm keeping you out of prison. That has to count for a bit.'
Dan nodded furiously to indicate his total happiness with the blatant robbery of his fifty percent share of their old home. He was thinking furiously while nodding furiously. He managed to put two and two together. It all made sense. He knew that Mary got her big promotion and the big salary raise and the big bonus. She had been going on and on about the possible promotion long before 'the erection incident' as he now thought of it. So Mary's career was on the up and up. She had bought a new house as a present for herself. Nice. And she's going to let me stay there, if I'm nice. Otherwise she will put me in jail for the next five years. She just said as much. Help.