Cowered by Felicity Brandon

Author:Felicity Brandon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Women's Fiction, Dystopian, Gothic, Psychological, Women's Crime
Publisher: Felicity Brandon
Published: 2023-11-17T00:00:00+00:00

I HADN’T BEEN TO LONDON for years, but arriving in a crate designed for a large dog while collared and leashed wasn’t exactly how I’d foreseen my return. It was another humiliating notch on an already overwhelmingly disturbing bedpost. Jake’s smirk when he released me on my hands and knees was the final nail in the coffin.

“We’re here.” Crouching before me, he grabbed the end of the leash attached to my neck and wrapped it around his wrist. Jake was dressed to the nines in an old-fashioned tuxedo with a bow tie. Fleetingly, I wondered where he’d got his hands on such clothing. No one seemed to dress that way anymore, but then the more significant question flashed in my mind—why was I naked and gagged while he enjoyed some expensive suit? The answer evidently was obvious. He was there to be celebrated, while I was only evidence of his success. The whore he’d knocked up and kept. How charming. I could hear the prospective toasts now. “Time to impress the President.”

One tug at my neck had been enough to persuade me out. The crate had been uncomfortable and degrading, but the prospect of crawling around a room full of people in formal attire wasn’t much more attractive.

“Remember what I told you.” His voice had that menacing edge I’d come to recognize and fear. “If you show me up, I’ll have you sent straight to one of the farms.” He chuckled, rising to his full height. “I can still come and visit; make sure you’re looking after my baby.”

Anxiety churned at his cautionary tone. The purported farms might well be my fate anyhow, but the longer I could dodge that awful bullet, the better.

His long strides didn’t give me much time to muse on the matter, the chain between us tightening so fast I was forced to press my palms into the shiny polished floor and hurry after him. I didn’t have an opportunity to glance up and take in the faces of the owners of the shoes I passed, and I was absurdly grateful for that. It was one thing to be nude. Being naked all the time had become normal, but to be exposed and humiliated this way in front of so many other people—men and women who had been judged better than me—that was utterly crushing.

In truth, it wasn’t only my abject mortification that gnawed. Sadly, that had also become a day-to-day detail of my existence since Jake and his friends had snatched me from the streets. It was the fact there were other people who appeared to indulge his way of thinking. How could so many others think this was acceptable? How could they see me, a leashed pregnant woman, on my hands and knees crawling after a man, and not stop to intervene? That was the question that haunted me.

At some point, Jake stopped, making small talk with two other men while they shared champagne. Quivering against his shin, I realized I was actually starting to feel like a real animal.

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