The Femme Fatale's Curse

Hey Everyone -- Sorry it's been a while on this story. Here's an update; I hope they won't be as few and far between from now on. First, a recap: Jace, our (dickish) private investigator was hired to find a woman named Zena Abramova, but he's under a hypnotic curse to follow orders at the snap of a finger. There's like 18K words of other backstory in the other chapters, but that should be enough -- combined with the first part of this story -- to get you started, if you're new.

I had to do some plot stuff in the first half of the story, so there's that (although *I* still think it's hot, but maybe I'm biased). Whipping/foot worship/CBT stuff in the second half of the story. Everyone is over 18 years old. And, yeah, it's nothing but fantasy but even still...let's hope it's filthy fucking hot fantasy.

***

Next to his ear, someone snapped their fingers, and Jace opened his eyes.

The first thing he noticed was the ceiling above him: open rafters high up, shrouded in darkness. A warehouse by the look of it.

He sat up, put his weight on one elbow, and blinked. He found himself on a makeshift bed of sacks of cattle feed. The mealy scent of hay and hops and flour hung in the air all around him. Away and below him, Jace heard the mournful cry of a train whistle.

A warehouse indeed, then.

"Jace," a voice said next to him, and he turned.

Molly sat next to him on the floor, legs crossed, her log deep-scarlet hair tossed over one shoulder, tumbling to her hip. She'd slipped out of the corset Mistress Silvera had made him pick out for her at Lady O'Leary's; she now wore the jeans of a day laborer and a rough woolen shirt a bit too big for her. One of the sleeves fell to her wrist, where she had her had propped on the splintery wooden floorboards beneath her for support.

"Sorry," she said. "I used The Curse to put you to sleep, but I guess I had to use it to wake you up."

Jace sat up and scowled. His head hurt and he didn't know why. This was not what Jace Falcon, private investigator, did. He was not someone shepherded around the city by a bunch of conniving women for their own ends. He was Jace fucking Falcon, and the richest people in both Acidalia and Galena City would have paid good money for his services and discretion. *Had* paid good money for his services and discretion. He did not wake up kidnapped in strange warehouses at the mercy of chorus girls.

"Listen," he said. "I don't know who the fuck you think you are, but this has gone on long enough -- "

"I know who the fuck I am," Molly snapped at him. "I'm Zena Abramova and I am the only fucking friend you got on the face of this earth right now. But I don't have to be."

Jace blinked, mouth agape.

This could not be possible. Zena Abramova, prodigal daughter of Ludwig Abramova -- the oil baron -- who he'd been hired to find. Hired to bring back to her father.

The woman Eva was also looking for. The woman Eva thought she was going to use *him* to find.

Jace swallowed hard, regrouped mentally. He couldn't believe his luck.

Molly -- Zena -- stood walked away from him a few paces, and sighed. Jace snuck a guilty look at her gorgeous body as she did, tight and firm and toned in those denim jeans. He didn't feel bad about that at all.

They were in a small wooden room now, he could see. Three walls were built of wooden boards, but the fourth was constructed out of bags of feed piled on top of each other. Jace got the sense that whoever owned the warehouse didn't know about this hideout. Molly/Zena clearly felt comfortable here though, Jace saw; she was barefoot, the soles of her feet dusty beneath the hems of her jeans.

"You're Zena Abramova," Jace repeated, and tried to sound incredulous enough to keep the upper hand. "As in, daughter of Ludwig Abramova."

"Oh my fucking *God* yes," she said, and spun, rolled her eyes. "Seems like all anyone can do is mention that evil old man in the same breath as my name, but yeah, I'm Zena Abramova. Ludwig's daughter."

She paused, hands on her hips at the foot of the makeshift bed where Jace remained propped up on his elbows. She fixed him with a dark-eyed stare that could've pinned a butterfly to a notecard.

"And I know Ludwig hired you to find me," Zena said. "I was actually glad to hear that, because it showed he was getting desperate."

A thin smile curved across Jace's lips. "I don't suppose I could convince you to return to your father's mansion with me?"

"Fuck off, asshole," she said, and flipped him a middle finger, shook her head in disgust. "Annette was right about you, you know that?"

Jace swallowed and scowled. He still remembered eating Annette's sweaty ass in front of a bar full of cheering patrons at Lady O'Leary's.

"You should've heard the things she wanted to do to you once she found out about The Curse," Zena said. "Things that would wreck your entire fucking career. Things I talked her out of. That I could still let her do, if you don't wise up real quick and shut the hell up."

Jace rolled his eyes. "You mean worshipping her ass in front of a room full of people wasn't enough?"

Zena gave a dismissive wave. "That was Lady O'Leary's on a Saturday night. No one cares. No one even *mentions* Lady O'Leary's. If you thought that was public humiliation, that was nothing."

Jace swallowed hard and pursed his lips. He knew she was right.

"So how does a nice little girl like you --"

She smacked him harder across the face than he ever could have imagined she would. It made his ears ring; he could practically feel his cheek swelling in real time.

"Fuck," Jace muttered.

"Still a nice little girl?" Zena asked.

She put one foot on his balls, through his pants, and pressed down. Hard.

Jace winced, tried to get away, but she snapped her fingers and everything from the neck down went dead.

Except for the nerve endings, apparently, if the agony in his groin as any indication.

"How does a nice little girl like me wind up dancing in Acidalia's underbelly?" Zena asked. "That's where you were going with that?"

"Sure, we can start there," Jace said, trying to keep the strain out of his voice.

"You've got to be the richest girl -- er...woman -- in Atalantahna at this point.

Definitely in Acidalia. You left that for Lady O'Leary's?"

Zena glanced down at her foot in his groin, sighed, and removed it, much to Jace's great relief. She didn't free him from his paralysis though.

"There's more to life than money, Jace Falcon," she said.

"Easy for the richest woman in Atalantahna to say."

"Sure," she said. "It is. But it doesn't change that fact. For me. And if things work out the way I want them to, by the way, I won't be the richest woman in Atalantahna at all. I won't even be Zena Abramova at all. I'm going to be giving all that up."

Jace swallowed hard, winced at the pain he still felt in his balls. Zena stepped back, crossed her arms over her chest, glanced down at his groin and a small smile flitted across her lips. But only for a second.

"You should've seen the guy my dad wanted to marry me off to," Zena said, then snickered shook her head. "Actually, I'm pretty sure you *have* seen him. You might've even worked for him, since you're, like, this fixer for all the richest, worst people in this damned city."

"Reckon so," Jace said.

"Rufus Butler III," Zena said, her upper lip curled into a sneer as she said it, eager to impress him, he sensed, with the gravity of the name.

It worked. Jace blinked. "What? The fucking railroad baron?"

"The fucking railroad baron's son," Zena said. "The dashing playboy the papers can't shut up about. Ludwig seems to think it'd be the perfect match. A profitable union between the houses of Abramova and Butler. And, really, the perfect story of American capitalism -- two families who showed up on America's shores penniless and destitute two generations ago, now uniting to create an empire of industry. The irony is he's just turning us into old world royalty, marrying his daughter off to another family to create an empire."

She gave another dismissive wave.

"You could do worse," Jace said, with a cruel smile.

"Could I?" Zena asked, and laughed. "I don't know about that. I mean, the Butler kid reminds me a lot of you, actually, Jace."

Jace didn't have a comeback for that one.

"So," she said, as she slipped off the heavy leather belt she'd worn around her waist and wound one tail of its tails around her wrist. Its buckle whispered against the dusty floorboards. "I guess that probably means you're wondering why you're here."

"Not as much as I'm wondering why you just took your belt off," Jace said, doing his best to hide the apprehension in his voice.

"It's so I have it ready to smack you if you talk back to me again," she said.

A smile tugged at her lips.

"And because I'm going to have to spank you anyway for the next part of my plan to work."

Jace blinked, unsure of what to say.

"You can clearly use The Curse, Zena," he said, exhausted now. "What else do you need from me?"

"It's a good question," she said, and approached him.

She snapped her fingers at him. "Hands out."

Jace's hands went out, palms up. Zena put the belt in his grasp and it rested there, on his open, upturned palms. It was heavier than he thought it would be.

"I just want you to think about that for a bit," she said. "Think about how it's going to feel. And think about how much more you're going to feel it on your ass if you don't work with me on this."

She sighed, leaned against the wall of bags of feed, and tossed her hair over one shoulder.

"And it's not just punishment you have to think about," Zena said, crossed her arms over her chest again. "There's a reward too. If you work with me on this -- if you're a good boy, since you seemed to want to refer to me as a good girl -- then I think I can break The Curse for you. I can free you from it. And you could probably go back to being the asshole private investigator you were before all this started. I don't think your reputation would be damaged much."

Jace's breath caught in his chest. The thought was intoxicating.

"And I should believe you...why?" He asked.

"Because you don't have any other choice," Zena said. "Because I can snap my fingers and make you hold the belt I'm going to use to tan your hide here in a few minutes and you can't do anything except stare at it in your open palms."

She shrugged and twirled a lock of her dark hair around her finger.

Then she snapped again.

"Kiss the belt," she said, a smile on her lips now.

Jace scowled but felt his body obey, felt himself lean forward and press his lips to the worn leather in his hands.

"And you should also believe me because for once in his life, Jace Falcon doesn't hold all the cards," she went on. "But more to the point, for once in his life, Jace Falcon has the chance to be something other than a total asshole, and maybe show some empathy to someone else."

Jace swallowed hard. He tried not to let his hopefulness show. Far away, below and beneath them, there was another train whistle, the movement of heavy boxes, the shouts of warehouse hands communicating with one another as they went about the day's work.

"What about Eva?" Jace asked. "Who is she?"

"Eva," Zena said, and shook her head. "One of Countess von Bokken's girls. The Countess is teaching her about hypnosis, all the ways to use it to separate people from their money. Eva is her most promising student. And Countess von Bokken is one of Ludwig's mistresses. When I heard Eva was using you to try to find me, I figured the Countess was just helping Ludwig out, trying to track down his wayward daughter for him."

Zena sighed.

"I had to get you out of Eva's clutches if this was ever going to work," Zena said. "I had Annette's help with that. The whole thing with the key in your mouth worked better than I thought it would. The key got us into this warehouse; she works here. And I guarantee you Eva and Countess von Bokken are flipping shit right now, wondering how you got away."

Zena snickered.

"Or, rather, how I stole you from them," she said.

"But you said you think you can break The Curse?" Jace asked, doing his best to avoid sounding too eager. "You think you can undo what Countess von Bokken did?"

Zena grinned. "I got your attention with that, didn't I?"

Jace felt the blood rush to his face against his will.

"Yeah," Zena said, serious now. "I think I can. But you're going to have to trust me. And Annette. And you're going to have to do a few more humiliating, kinky things, I'm afraid. But in the end, yes, I think I can give you your life back. And at the end of it all, we can go our separate ways. I'm getting out of Acidalia. I just need your help to do it."

Jace started to say something biting in response, but then his eyes cut to the heavy belt still in his upturned hands in front of him, and thought better of it.

Zena saw the look and laughed.

"Thought of me spanking you didn't you?" She asked, then snapped her fingers. "Answer that truthfully."

"Yes," Jace said, the word springing unbidden from his mouth, his face growing hotter with a blush he couldn't control.

"Awwe," Zena said, and crossed the room to Jace, took a knee next to him. "Maybe there is hope for you after all. We're going to practice you feeling that belt on your ass here in a second, but I want to tell you why first."

Jace gritted his teeth in frustration, but said nothing.

"Countess von Bokken is hosting a masquerade ball next weekend," Zena said. "It's an end-of-the-summer thing. All of Acidalia and Galena City's high society will be there. Ludwig -- my father -- definitely will be. So will Eva. So will Rufus Butler III and his miserable fucking father and grandfather. And so will a few members of the Douglas clan, the family that makes those airship zeppelin things. Basically everyone in my life I'm trying to escape."

She took his chin in her hands, turned his face toward her.

"It shouldn't surprise you, but Countess von Bokken likes to torment weak-willed, submissive men at her parties," Zena continued. "So do her guests. Sometimes she likes to torment strong-minded men too, once she gets them under her hypnotic spell."

Zena took the belt from Jace's outstretched hands and smiled.

"Thanks for holding that for me," she said with a wink, and ran the leather down the side of Jace's face. "But about Countess von Bokken: she often hires -- shall we say -- gentlemen of the night to play the part of these submissives at her parties, for her guests to enjoy. And they earn every dollar she pays; her guests are usually half-crazed by drink and drugs by that point in the night. I've seen some pretty twisted sadism on display at her parties."

Jace swallowed hard. He'd had about enough of drunken depravities after last night at Lady O'Leary's.

Or at least, he'd had enough of being on the receiving end. How often had he joined in such things before The Curse, inflicting some humiliation or pain on someone else?

Too often, he thought for the first time. He hadn't contemplated what it would feel like on the receiving end.

"Anyway, Countess von Bokken usually contracts with a madam who manages these submissives for hire," Zena said. "And one of them just so happens to be our very own Annette, who you met last night."

Jace blinked. "What? Annette is a pimp for Countess von Bokken?"

Zena smiled. "Not *for* her specifically, but yeah, she manages a ring of submissives for these types of parties. And you're going to be one of them, so we can get you into the masquerade ball."

Jace hissed his breath out between his teeth. He didn't like this at all.

"Why me?" He asked.

"Because we can control you," Zena said. "Because you have a stake in this at this point. You stand to gain something by helping us, which is the only way to get you to pay attention to shit, if there's something in it for you, apparently. And also because Countess von Bokken will recognize you when we want her to. And so will Ludwig."

The floorboards of the makeshift room creaked, and they both turned.

Annette stepped into the room, dressed much as Zena was, in a man's work shirt, the top few buttons undone, and jeans. Her face was covered in dirt and soot, but even that couldn't hide the same cruel beauty he remembered from the night before: the high cheekbones and arched eyebrows that gave her face an angular look. She had her dark blond hair pulled back into a ponytail, bound by a bandana, and even from here Jace could see it was damp with sweat.

She glanced at the belt in Zena's hand, then at Jace -- still sitting on the sack of feed against the wall -- and grinned.

"Oh," she said. "So we're already at the practicing stage of things. Looks like work finished up just in time."

"I've filled him in," Zena said, and gave the belt an experimental SNAP on the floorboards. "At least, for most of it."

"Mmmm," Annette said, and crossed her arms over her chest.

She scraped her work boots on the floor, as if trying to rid the soles of something. He could see that even her shirt was sweat-soaked at this point too.

"So he knows he might need to undergo some training for the masquerade ball?" Annette asked Zena, still not taking here eyes from Jace. "Maybe a whipping or two to make his ass look right? And some practice for the tug of war?"

"Oh, um...yeah," Zena said, and smiled. "I forgot about the tug of war."

"The tug of war?" Jace asked, doing his best to keep his voice level. It didn't work.

Zena and Annette traded glances and laughed. Zena bent to scoop up a long, thin rope coiled in the corner behind her. Jace didn't like the look of it.

"One of the most popular events my submissives perform at these types of parties is tug of war...with their balls," Annette said, and he could tell she was enjoying explaining this to him, the captive in this situation. "We just tie two of the boys' pairs of balls together by a length of rope, then they play tug of war. The crowd likes to vote on the punishment for the loser, I find."

Jace opened his mouth to say something, then thought better of it and closed it. They both laughed at that.

"Annette thinks it's a good idea to practice that," Zena said, rope in hand now. "In addition to a few other things. And she's right -- in order for you to blend it, it would look better if you had a few welts on your ass. Most of her submissives get their asses whipped on a regular basis. So we're going to start that now."

She snapped her fingers.

"Stand and strip," she said, and Jace got to his feet, against his will.

He started with his shirt, stripped that away. Then his hands flew to his belt and undid that; he gritted his teeth as he watched his pants tumble to his ankles.

Annette leaned back against the wall of the room and made no effort to hide her gaze as it traveled up and down Jace's body. Much like Jace had looked at Zena from behind maybe 15 minutes ago, Jace thought.

Annette didn't look impressed with him though. She reached into her pocket and produced a flask, then took a solid sip from it.

Zena remained next to her, arms crossed, the rope still in one hand, the belt in her other.

"Underwear too," Annette said, after she smacked her lips with the liquor in the flask. "Come on now."

Jace's hands didn't need to be told, unfortunately. He hooked his fingers into his waistband and soon his underwear was on the floor as well.

"What do you think, Zena?" Annette asked, and glanced at the other woman. "His prick and balls too small to tie up?"

Jace balled his hands into fists, a humiliated blush still plastered to his face, but he found he wasn't able to say or do anything. The Curse remained in full effect.

Zena laughed. "I think I'll find a way."

"Perfect," Annette said, then cast a wicked glance in Jace's direction, her eyes and evil smile gleaming in her dirty, elfish face. "Do we know how he is at foot worship?"