Hollow Pleasure

*** Disclaimer ***

The following installment contains themes of hypnosis, mind control, non-consent, voyeurism, rough sex, gangbangs, cheating, and incest. You've been warned.

This is a work of fiction. All characters depicted are at least 18 years of age. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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Hollow Pleasure chapter 11

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THE ALLIES

They had spent the afternoon conducting research at the office of Galloway's boss and leading investigator, Halley Hargrove. Halley had actually proven to be a talented researcher (which was a relief because Galloway might have bravery and boldness on her side, but she was lost after a few basic Google searches and had begun to idly check her email instead).

Though they hadn't uncovered anything to explain the magic powers of Rob's computer or its power over the mind, Halley had managed to procure a complete history of their suspect— Robert Bradford. They found no criminal history, merely biographical information of his writing successes. That made sense, they supposed that a noted author wouldn't have anything in his history to tarnish his career— especially at this day and age where ruining people's lives with the scarlet letter of their past was all the rage.

More interesting than Rob, Halley had found a history of the Connelly house, where they lived. Everything she found fit the symptoms of classic haunted house.

"Did you know that the cemetery behind it had to be relocated so they could lay the foundation for the house where you two live?" Halley had browsed article after article.

Galloway snorted. "That makes sense. Nothing pisses off a spirit like having its eternal resting place dug up and moved."

"I didn't realize the cemetery is that old," Ethan admitted.

Halley continued to go through her findings. "While there's nothing specific, the house has reports of haunted activities. The historical society had an interest in it for a while, and used to host candle-lit ghost tours around the town during Halloween— before the current management bought it out and requested that they stop including the mansion as part of the tour. I guess the landlord had a hard enough time keeping tenants. Renters had a notoriously high turn-over rate."

Ethan was intrigued. "Does it say what was happening? Like what kind of ghost? What was it doing? Was it a demon?"

Halley merely shrugged. "It doesn't say, kid. Your guess is as good as mine."

It was a dead end.

Thoughts of ghosts were fresh in their minds as they left the office. "Well at least it sort of explains why Rob can suddenly make weird things happen with the tap of his keyboard," Ethan shrugged, as Galloway drove them home.

"Does it though?" Galloway asked. "Plenty of places are haunted. I've never heard of mind control abilities."

"We can tangle ourselves up in the details all day," Ethan said, "But the fact is that it's happening for some reason. So what are we going to do about it?"

Galloway gave him a sideways glance from the corner of her eye. A little smile formed across her lips. "Starting to sound like me, now."

"You're a bad influence, I guess," Ethan blushed as he said it.

Galloway couldn't stop the wide proud grin from spreading. "Still sore, are you?"

Ethan smiled guiltily. His face only grew redder. "A little, yeah. Are you?"

"Oh god yeah," Galloway laughed. "You're ummm... very gifted." She let her eyes wander down to Ethan's lap. His face was bright red, and he had to look away when he felt his crotch tensing beneath her stare.

"So umm... going back to my last question," he hurried to change the subject. After everything that happened, their wild night together, their passionate sex sessions, seeing each other completely naked and all of it... he was still shy. It was so cute. "What are we going to do about this?"

Ethan wasn't happy with Galloway's answer. She dropped him in front of the apartment, before heading right back to the office.

"Why?" he asked her, feeling like she was dumping him off.

"Because I need to coordinate something with Halley, Captain Graver, and some of the other officers. And I need to do it without you there."

"Why?" Ethan asked. "I thought we were all on the same team."

"We are," she assured him. "But what we're going to be discussing isn't completely legal. And if this goes horribly wrong in a way that gets us into trouble, I don't want you to have any prior knowledge, so you don't get charged with something." There it was. She was trying to protect him.

Ethan hated it. He was the man. He felt like he should be the one protecting her. But as he appraised Galloway, he realized that she was the type of woman who'd never need protecting. That was just her nature.

"Fine, but what do I do until you get home?" Ethan asked.

"I don't know. Make me a nice a dinner?" She smirked.

"Fuck you," Ethan said. "I'm not your mother." And they both laughed.

"It'll be that much easier to get me out of my pants again tonight if you do," Galloway batted her eyelashes at him.

"That sounds fun but could we maybe... you know... just sort of cuddle and kiss for a while? I remember a lot of kissing and hand holding last night. That was nice." Ethan reddened.

"You are such a girl," Galloway laughed.

Ethan responded with another "Fuck you."

Regardless, Galloway reached over and gave his hand a squeeze. "Fine, but I can't promise I won't try to rock your world again."

They settled on that deal. So when Galloway left Ethan in front of the house, he was surprised to see someone sitting on the front steps.

Ethan didn't know the name of the college girls in 1A, but had seen each of them in passing at some point or another. This particular one was the tall slender girl who was built like a supermodel. She had long straight dark hair, big eyes, and a sincere face. She would have been Ethan's biggest crush of the three college girls, if it wasn't for a very high-pitched squeaky voice that bordered on annoying.

Ethan wasn't sure what she was doing on the front steps, but she looked shaken and upset. Her eyes were haunted, and she was drowning in a hooded sweatshirt emblazoned with the eagle, globe, and anchor of the US Marine Corps. She was chewing one of her finger nails and staring off into space, seeing things within her own head.

Ethan started up the front steps, mindful of his crutches as he squeezed past her. She didn't even acknowledge him, too lost in her own thoughts. As he stepped up to the front door of the apartment building, he glanced back one last time and felt sorry for her. A memory flashed in his brain— one of him reading books on the front steps because he'd locked himself out of his apartment, and didn't want to ask anyone for help. That had been the day he'd met Galloway.

That was why he found himself blurting out "Hey you," in exactly the same way that she'd called out to him on that very first day.

She looked up, the surprise apparent in her expression. Her eyes had grown large, as she snapped out of her trance. "M-me?" She asked, in that high-pitched Minnie Mouse voice.

"Yeah, you. Is everything alright?"

"Oh, I'm okay," her answer was almost too quick. Ethan had never been good at reading people— too shy and self conscious for his own good. But he knew immediately she was lying. And although the old him would have accepted that answer, and he would have retreated back into his comfort zone, this time he didn't.

"Are you sure?" he pressed.

"Yeah, I'm good," she tried to smile but it feel short on quivering lips and nervous eyes. Then to her shock, Ethan came back, and shuffled himself into a sitting position beside her. He rested his crutches up on the railing.

"I always sort of noticed you," he admitted, "But I never caught your name?" Deep down, even as he asked it, he wondered where the hell those words had come from. He was never the type to approach first. Especially not gorgeous women like this one. Was this what it felt like to have self-esteem? The way he and Galloway had made love last night was certainly fresh in his mind. He felt good because of it. He felt like deep down, everyone was just as shy and afraid as he had been, and there was nothing to be afraid of.

"Danni," she smiled timidly.

"I'm Ethan," he said. Then he tilted his head to his crutches. "Better than Tiny Tim, right?"

At first she didn't react, as though she wasn't sure if it was okay for her to giggle at his lame joke or not. "Nice to meet you," she said, finally.

"Tough crowd, huh?" Ethan said.

"I'm sorry, I'm just so out of it right now. I'll just warn you Ethan, that I'm going to be really terrible company. I don't mean to bring you down too."

Ethan just went out on a limb. "There's something weird going on, isn't there?"

She scrutinized his face, and she cocked one of her eyebrows.

"Missing time? People acting... weird in sort of a pervy way? You feel like you've done things that are definitely not things you'd do or say?"

Now Danni blinked at him with a startled expression. "Yes!" She finally blurted out. "How did you know?"

"Because I've been experiencing it too. So has my friend in 2B— she's sort of a cop. So has the married couple across the hall from you. We've all been talking and things are happening to all of us."

Danni lowered her voice, glancing around as though someone might be within earshot. Her cheeks reddened her eyes looked ashamed. "I'm going to tell you something. But you promise you won't tell anyone? And do you promise you won't judge me?"

"No, I would never do that," Ethan said earnestly.

Danni told Ethan everything about what was happening with her and her brother. He listened intently, his face not registering any judgment, which only spurred on Danni's confession. She felt comfortable around him. When she was done, she buried her face in her hands. "Ohhh god, you must think I'm so fucked up."

"I don't," Ethan rested a reassuring hand on Danni's shoulder. "There's some things I should tell you too. But it's important that you remember that you're not alone."

But before they could go into exact details, Galloway pulled up and parked out front. She found them sitting side by side on the front steps, looking like a pair of frightened kids. They could have been a cute couple on a date, if they didn't look like they were trying to comfort each other. "Cheating on me already, are you?" Galloway mused, trying to breathe some humor into the situation.

"This is Danni," Ethan said told Galloway. "I think we all need to have a talk." They went back to Galloway's apartment together.

***

3A

In the afternoon, Robert Bradford sat in the turret stroking his chin like an evil villain straight out of a movie. He was watching his computer monitors, without really watching them. The source of his distraction was an obvious one.

Kelsey was moving throughout the apartment that she now shared with him, decorating for Halloween. She'd set up strobe-lights, flicker flame string lights, crime scene tape, and bubbling beakers throughout the place— especially in the turret. Rob figured if he was going to feel like a mad scientist, he may as well look the part.

She was only in her underwear. A pair of maroon satin panties and a bra (that unintentionally matched the color of Kate Galloway's dyed hair). Her bra appeared to be straining against her enormous double D cup breasts. Rob wondered if she was really an E-cup, and hadn't yet realized it. And her thong disappeared in the crack of her cute butt. She really didn't have much of an ass, but her large breasts, long smooth legs, and cute face more than made up for it. Her little bunny rabbit facial features with her turned-up nose, and slight overbite. Her brown hair full of blonde highlights was tied up the way she often did it— like a turned-up feather duster that bounced and swayed as she moved. Everything about her was smooth and tight and curvy and tan. But at the end of the day, he always came back to that face. He couldn't get enough.

He thought about taking her right then and there, but the fact was, he was still a little tired and sore from the rough pounding he'd given her last night. There was some bruising around her wrists from where he'd tied her to the bed, and he reminded himself to be more gentle next time. She was precious, after all. He wondered how she even had the energy to decorate today. Well... he partially knew, he glanced at his computer, and for just the briefest moments, his shoulders slumped.

It's all hollow. He thought. None of this is real. Kelsey might be in the room with him, but she's not here voluntarily, and it's not her driving her body. It's him, and only him, and the weird powers of his computer. For a second, Rob felt tremendously lonely.

But then he glanced back at Kelsey, and the sight of her stirred his libido into overruling his conscience.

Kelsey stood on her toes as she reached to the curtain rod and hung up some fake spider webs. She was softly humming to herself as she did. It was a tune that Rob didn't know, and certainly hadn't programmed into her actions for today.

"That's nice," he said to her. "What is that?"

"Huh?" Kelsey glanced his way, and threw him her usual cheerful smile.

"You're humming. What is that?"

"I was humming?"

"You were."

"Oh," she blushed. "It was a song my dad taught me. He was in Vietnam, and used to listen to this Australian song about the war all the time. It's a sad one, but I love it. I can stop if it's bothering you?"

"No, it's lovely," Rob said, staring at her. She smiled at him and continued her work. Rob was mystified. He began to wonder how much of her behavior was his mind control influence, and how much of it was her own personal free will. Rob had been creative with his influence over the other tenants throughout the house. Some he controlled hard, like Tina, or TJ. Others, he merely planted ideas into, and let it lead them to their own perversions, like Galloway. But watching Kelsey, Rob wondered just how it all worked. She certainly didn't act out the things that he typed with robotic precision. She injected her own personality into it, even if her actions weren't free will.

"A caged bird will still sing," Rob said to himself, and again felt an overwhelming feeling of sadness. For one impulsive moment, Rob thought about undoing everything on the computer that was controlling her, and giving her free will back— snapping her out of this spell he'd put her under.

"What was that?" Kelsey asked him, her expression perky and cheerful, like she usually was.

He swallowed. She would never be perky again... never give him another genuine smile if he undid everything and told her the truth. She would never forgive him, and she would never *ever* love him. He was in too deep. There was no going back now.

"Nothing," he smiled and turned back to the windows. He glanced outside in time to see Danni, the college girl on the first floor, sitting on the front steps of the building, watching the cars pass in the street. The kid with the crutches was squeezing past her in that shy way that he had. Rob could relate. He'd been just as nervous around pretty girls when he was that age, and Rob hadn't been forced to walk with crutches.

But then something miraculous happened. About halfway into the house, the kid turned around, spoke with the girl, then joined her on the front steps. They sat together talking for several long minutes.

"Way to go, kid!" he said to himself. Maybe Ethan's little roll in the hay with his sexy mother had been the confidence boost that he needed. True, the mother/son hookup had been sexy as hell, and mostly done for Rob's dark pleasure, but truth be told, Rob wanted Ethan to have a win. And when it came to the college girls in 1A, Rob's imagination had been a bit lacking. He was too distracted with Kelsey, too preoccupied with Galloway's corruption.

Maybe he ought to give these two kids a happy ending. Danni was certainly a hottie, with the exception of that squeaky voice of hers. But maybe he could give them a few nudges in the right direction.

Plus... if they became a couple, that opened the door to new possibilities. Danni and Ethan could enjoy his mother together. Or Rob could fuck Danni right in front of Ethan. That usually turned him on. Hell, it was turning him on right now, just to think about. Rob returned his attention to the computer screens, suddenly eager for another dalliance with TJ and her wimp-ass husband Chris. That was always fun.

But when he looked at the screens, he frowned. They still weren't back yet, and the apartment was just as trashed as the burglars had left it after Galloway's punishment. Rob wondered if this might be a good time to test how far his influence reached. If he could type something about them returning at a specific time, and seeing if his powers reached beyond the walls of the building. He suspected not, but he'd give it a try.

He was about to get started, when he heard a car door slam out front. Hopefully that'd be the Bergers, back from their out-of-town trip. But when he glanced out the window, he spotted Galloway. She was talking on the front steps with Ethan and Danni for a little while. Then the three of them went inside, together. Rob followed them on the cameras until the little trio went into Galloway's apartment— the only remaining blind spot in the building.

Rob sat for a while, pondering the implications of this. It could have been perfectly innocent. Galloway and Ethan were friends, after all. And if Ethan was making friends with Danni, maybe Galloway was going to help steer these two together. That'd be nice.

But Rob remembered yesterday. The incident with Ethan seeing Galloway with the burglars. It hardly seemed normal for them to just forget all about it, put it behind them, and suddenly have a dinner party for the three of them.

Rob once again cursed himself for not installing cameras in Galloway's unit. Because now he desperately wanted to know what was being talked about in there. He needed to get his game face on, and start paying more attention.

When he glanced at Kelsey, he saw that one of her bra straps had slid down her slender shoulder. Ugh, that would be easier said than done, because focus was not easy to come by, lately.

***

2B

They sat in the kitchen of Galloway's apartment. She wasn't a tea drinker so she didn't have any to offer to Danni, though she did have some hot chocolate packets. She made a mug for Ethan. Danni, on the other hand, probably needed something stronger. Galloway set a beer down on the table in front of the girl, and opened one for herself.

There was a long silence as the three of them shared a quiet drink.

Finally Galloway just came out and asked it. "Alright, what's going on with you?"

Danni blinked, surprised by Galloway's phrasing.

"Just tell her what you told me," Ethan prompted.

Danni did. She went into detail about the time gaps, her fuzzy memories, and her brother's weird sexual advances, as well as when he insisted they'd been doing this for a long time now. When she was done, she looked ashamed, confused, and exhausted.

Ethan patted her lightly on the shoulder. He told her everything that had happened with his mother. There was a shame in the way he spoke, but also a strange sense of pride— owning what he'd done in a way that showed accountability.

Galloway went last. She shared her stories— from her bad dreams to her abrupt change in sexual desires, hurting Quinn in bed, Quinn falling down the stairs, the incident with the burglars, and finally their investigation into the house. She told them about Chris and everything he'd relayed to Galloway.