Re: Book Tour — New Assistant (M/F, M/FF) Part Twelve Added
Posted: Sun May 28, 2023 8:46 pm
Part Thirteen:
“MMMMPPPHHHHMMMPH!” I felt Emily shudder in my hands as I gripped her waist from behind and felt us both finish simultaneously. I removed myself from her and began undoing the strappado holding her bent over.
“Fuck,” I whispered, making Emily laugh softly into her gag. I grabbed the neckties holding her elbows together behind her and pulled my naked assistant upright, still holding her from behind. Looking at ourselves in the dressing room mirror, I watched Emily moan softly as she watched me cupping and playing with her breasts, stopping occasionally to kiss her sweat-glossed neck. “Mmmpffff,” she panted rhythmically. I got my phone, and snapped a quick photo of us in the mirror, my arm wrapped around her torso, slightly lifting up her naked chest.
I span Emily around to face me, combing a few strands of hair from her face. “You did great keeping quiet.” My assistant giggled slightly, then shrugged her shoulders, intimating it was hardly a challenge. I traced my index finger lightly across her shoulder, then down the side of her bound arms, before drawing her in to me and squeezing her in an embrace, kissing the top of her forehead. “You’re too good to me,” I said, meaning every word. “Want to get ready for this reception?” Emily nodded, sweetly, hopping back around to give me her bound wrists.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
Fully dressed in our cocktail attire, Emily and I both settled in for the short, 30 minute drive back to the campus.
“I’m not sure I’ve been to an event like this,” Emily said bashfully. “Am I going to stick out?”
“Very much so,” I said. “But not for the reasons you’re worried about.” I looked at Emily and smiled. She looked stunning in her blue dress — formal and serious, but still elegant and feminine. I was dumbfounded at the magic she was able to do with a hairbrush and a few short minutes of passenger-seat make-up application. Emily noticed me smiling at her, and blushed, keeping her eyes fixed on the road. The car fell into silence with an exciting, stomach turning tension.
“What are we?” I finally blurt out.
“How do you mean?” My assistant turned toward me, laughing slightly.
“Are we a couple? Or are we just having fun? Or is this something in between? I am having so much fun. And I really, really like you. I just don’t want us to have different expectations of each other and end up hurting one another.” Emily took in what I had just said, nodding to herself. “What do you think?” I continued.
After quietly thinking to herself for several moments, Emily finally turned back to me. “We’re having fun. At least for now.”
“For now?”
“Yes. I like you so much Simon. And I’m having fun too. But we also need to remember that right now, we’re traveling across the country together as part of our jobs. That’s going to end someday. And I’m not saying that when it ends, we should go our separate ways. We might get to that point and both want to stay together. But for now, I think it’s best that we just keep having fun — make all the memories we can, you know?”
“I think you summed up exactly how I feel.” A giant pressure lifted off of my chest. I smiled at the interstate as I guided our car toward the campus. After a while, Emily laughed, reaching across the cabin to pinch my cheek with her fingers.
“Besides, who knows how many more girls you’re going to end up playing with for ‘inspiration.’”
I batted her hand away in fake annoyance. “And you — you going to get jealous if that happens?”
Emily blushed a little. “Maybe. But I can make you jealous too.”
“I doubt that.” I said, teasing her.
“I guess we’ll just have to see, then.”
We turned off the exit, onto the entryway into the college.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
The reception took place on the main floor of an old campus library — a distinguished building built in the late 1800s. The interior flooring and walls were mostly made of dark brown wood, and was lit by a range of old fashioned electric yellow lanterns. Soft violin and piano glistened across the room.
Nearly 200 people milled about the main hall, all well-dressed and mild mannered. The guests ranged from members of the English faculty, the Dean of the school, local sponsors and donors, as well as several undergraduates majoring in English or creative writing. What connected everyone there was both an earnest interest in writing and the constant presence of free wine and beer in their hands.
Roughly halfway through the event, around 7:00, Emily broke away from me to continue talking with a small group of senior English majors from the college (I couldn’t help but notice they a eemed very pretty from afar), as they were closer to her age then most of the well-intentioned, gray-headed guests that were coming my way. After enduring a solid fifteen minutes of grueling small talk, a tall, middle-aged brunette woman stepped toward me, smiling.
“Mr. Cusk! I’m so glad you could make it tonight! I was so excited when they accepted my proposal to bring you here.”
From this comment I knew exactly who I was talking to. “Professor Rice! Such a pleasure to finally meet you.” The professor smiled over her glasses at me, revealing brilliantly white teeth behind her dark red lipstick. This was not whom I expected to rendezvous with at the reception, as most female academics I encountered until that point had been wiry, cat-like women with frizzled hair. Professor Rice notably did not fit this stereotype, standing almost even with me, wearing a white dress with gold trim down the sides, which, like Emily’s was structured and not too revealing, but failed to hide her obvious curves and impressively thin waist. Her arms were toned for someone who I imagined was in her forties. Her legs looked as if she was a natural runner. Her chest pushed against the thick fabric of her outfit. Her hair, a sandy, light brown, fell cleanly to her shoulders.
“Please. Call me Meredith.” She extended a hand toward me, which I took, shaking firmly. “How are you liking it here? I heard your reading was a smash. I was distraught to miss it, but was pulled away for an emergency. I imagine you read from your first book? We read it in my class. The students absolutely adored it.”
“It was the most attended reading I’ve had on the tour this far, by no slight margin. I think I have you to thank for that.”
“You have yourself to thank, Mr. Cusk.”
“Simon.”
“Very well, you have yourself to thank, Simon. Most authors I teach don’t draw crowds like that. Which isn’t surprising to me at all. I have to admit I adore your work — your voice is one of my favorites in contemporary fiction. The younger readers as well.”
“That’s incredibly kind, thank you Meredith.”
We chatted for twenty or thirty minutes longer, exploring the ins and outs, the rising and falling of trends in writing recently and the challenges of thriller fiction in the modern day. I was blown away by Meredith’s insight — I had definitely never met someone who thought so sharply and critically about the genre, and was learning a great deal about my own craft by virtue of just listening. After awhile, Professor Rice switched topics.
“So my students and I are dying to know, and I promised to ask you. But what is next? Are you working on anything new?”
“Hardly. I’ve been contending with a real drought this past couple of years. I only recently have been able to cobble anything of use together, and I’m still not sure if it’s any good.”
“This is terribly invasive, I’m sorry, but do you mind if I see it? I’m sworn to secrecy. I’m just dying to know.”
I hesitated, before opening up the document on my phone and handing it to her.
After reading for several minutes, Meredith’s eyes widened. “Oh Simon,” she said, “you really have something here. Is this the opening chapter? It’s so different! It works so well.”
“Thank you,” I said, as years of writers block flooded out of my body through a single sigh.
“How did you get this level of quality after such a long time off? That usually takes people months of struggling to reach where they were.”
Meredith handed my phone backed to me, before dropping it toward the floor. “Shit!” She exclaimed as she reached down to catch it before it hit the ground. Snagging the phone clumsily with both hands, she sighed and reached the phone out to me, before glimpsing at what was now on the screen, and gasping. “Oh my,” she softly let out. There on the phone was the picture of Emily from earlier today, bound and gagged in the department store dressing room, with me holding her behind her.
“Shit! You aren’t supposed to see that. I’m so sorry.” Meredith stared blankly at me.
“That’s my assistant. Her name is Emily. She’s standing right over there.” I paused, sweating profusely at Meredith’s empty gaze. “It’s not professional, I know. But it’s….it’s actually what’s jogged me out of my writing slump. She came up with the idea, and ever since we started playing these…these games, I’ve been able to just write without feeling my usual inhibitions. You have to believe me.”
Meredith paused for several moments longer, staring across the hall toward Emily, who was giggling in her small crowd if you get women, while also glancing back toward the professor and I.
“I believe you,” she finally said. She paused for what seemed like forever, before inhaling sharply. “And while I’m surprised by your methods, at least they’re clearly working. I’d give anything to get out of my own writing slump, so I know it must be such a great change to finally be able to get back to that part of your life.”
“Hello!” Suddenly, Emily and the three college students appeared next to us. Emily extended her hand out to Meredith. “My name is Emily Clay. I’m Simon’s assistant.”
“I’ve heard great things about you Emily.” Meredith grinned wryly as she shook hands with Emily.
“Simon, these are a few of my students — meet Hannah, Katie, and Ellen.” Professor motioned toward the three younger women with Emily.
“Pleasure to meet you all.”
“We’re huge fans of yours, Mr. Cusk. Emily’s been giving us the rundown of how lucky she is to be working with you.” A short, curvaceous blonde stepped forward slightly. “She was very detailed in how close you two get to work together.” She smiled and glanced toward Emily, who blushed and pretended to be distracted.
“We’re actually quite jealous.” Another one of the girls, a thin, statuesque red-head, chimed in.
“I think I actually believe I may have just stumbled on these same details, ladies.” Professor Rice shot a devilish look my way, which startled Emily and I both.
“Oh REALLY?” Emily interjected, staring at me with huge eyes. It was clear that neither of us had done a very good job of keeping the nature of our relationship a secret from the other four women around us.
“Really.” Professor Rice continued. “And I’ve got to say, I’m truly jealous of the results. I’ve been stuck for years on my next novel as well. I’d kill to break this curse like Simon has appeared to.” She hesitated again. “I’m almost tempted to hire you myself.”
Emily glanced toward me, paused for a moment, then smiled sweetly toward Meredith. “Well in that case, Professor, I’m almost tempted to work with you.” My assistant looked toward me with a sinister glimmer in her eyes. “If only Simon weren’t such a jealous type.”
Flustered a little, and loosened considerably by the emptied wine glass in her hand, Professor Rice looked toward me. “Jealous? Oh Simon. That’s so outdated.”
“I’m not jealous!” I shot back to the two of them. “I just have no way to get back to the hotel without Emily, if she drives with you. That’s all. Pure logistics.”
Meredith and Emily both laughed in ridicule toward me, clearly having gotten me to backtrack into a nervous, immature defense of keeping my assistant to myself.
“I think we have a solution.” The third college student, also blonde, stepped into the conversation. She was tall, and incredibly fit, wearing a short green cocktail dress that showed off her long, tan legs. She grinned with sharp blue eyes toward me. “What if we give Mr. Cusk a ride home? We could keep him company until he’s ready to head back to the hotel.”
Emily’s eyes widened, as she watched me look the three gorgeous college students up and down, each of them smiling and batting their eyes toward me. Her face flushed as she looked at what I’d say.
“Well, Professor, if you think it would help, then who am I to keep her magic all to myself?”
“Splendid. Emily, are you still interested in working together?”
Emily grinned at me, mouthing the word “asshole,” and turned back to Meredith. “Of course I am, Professor. It would be an honor.”
As the two walked out of the ancient library, my phone went off. It was a text from Emily. “I’ll be sure to send you A LOT of pictures, since you’re not the jealous type…”
I looked up at the three beautiful young women in front of me, as they each motioned me to the door.
“So will I — have fun tonight, Miss Clay.”
“You too, Mr. Cusk.”
“MMMMPPPHHHHMMMPH!” I felt Emily shudder in my hands as I gripped her waist from behind and felt us both finish simultaneously. I removed myself from her and began undoing the strappado holding her bent over.
“Fuck,” I whispered, making Emily laugh softly into her gag. I grabbed the neckties holding her elbows together behind her and pulled my naked assistant upright, still holding her from behind. Looking at ourselves in the dressing room mirror, I watched Emily moan softly as she watched me cupping and playing with her breasts, stopping occasionally to kiss her sweat-glossed neck. “Mmmpffff,” she panted rhythmically. I got my phone, and snapped a quick photo of us in the mirror, my arm wrapped around her torso, slightly lifting up her naked chest.
I span Emily around to face me, combing a few strands of hair from her face. “You did great keeping quiet.” My assistant giggled slightly, then shrugged her shoulders, intimating it was hardly a challenge. I traced my index finger lightly across her shoulder, then down the side of her bound arms, before drawing her in to me and squeezing her in an embrace, kissing the top of her forehead. “You’re too good to me,” I said, meaning every word. “Want to get ready for this reception?” Emily nodded, sweetly, hopping back around to give me her bound wrists.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
Fully dressed in our cocktail attire, Emily and I both settled in for the short, 30 minute drive back to the campus.
“I’m not sure I’ve been to an event like this,” Emily said bashfully. “Am I going to stick out?”
“Very much so,” I said. “But not for the reasons you’re worried about.” I looked at Emily and smiled. She looked stunning in her blue dress — formal and serious, but still elegant and feminine. I was dumbfounded at the magic she was able to do with a hairbrush and a few short minutes of passenger-seat make-up application. Emily noticed me smiling at her, and blushed, keeping her eyes fixed on the road. The car fell into silence with an exciting, stomach turning tension.
“What are we?” I finally blurt out.
“How do you mean?” My assistant turned toward me, laughing slightly.
“Are we a couple? Or are we just having fun? Or is this something in between? I am having so much fun. And I really, really like you. I just don’t want us to have different expectations of each other and end up hurting one another.” Emily took in what I had just said, nodding to herself. “What do you think?” I continued.
After quietly thinking to herself for several moments, Emily finally turned back to me. “We’re having fun. At least for now.”
“For now?”
“Yes. I like you so much Simon. And I’m having fun too. But we also need to remember that right now, we’re traveling across the country together as part of our jobs. That’s going to end someday. And I’m not saying that when it ends, we should go our separate ways. We might get to that point and both want to stay together. But for now, I think it’s best that we just keep having fun — make all the memories we can, you know?”
“I think you summed up exactly how I feel.” A giant pressure lifted off of my chest. I smiled at the interstate as I guided our car toward the campus. After a while, Emily laughed, reaching across the cabin to pinch my cheek with her fingers.
“Besides, who knows how many more girls you’re going to end up playing with for ‘inspiration.’”
I batted her hand away in fake annoyance. “And you — you going to get jealous if that happens?”
Emily blushed a little. “Maybe. But I can make you jealous too.”
“I doubt that.” I said, teasing her.
“I guess we’ll just have to see, then.”
We turned off the exit, onto the entryway into the college.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
The reception took place on the main floor of an old campus library — a distinguished building built in the late 1800s. The interior flooring and walls were mostly made of dark brown wood, and was lit by a range of old fashioned electric yellow lanterns. Soft violin and piano glistened across the room.
Nearly 200 people milled about the main hall, all well-dressed and mild mannered. The guests ranged from members of the English faculty, the Dean of the school, local sponsors and donors, as well as several undergraduates majoring in English or creative writing. What connected everyone there was both an earnest interest in writing and the constant presence of free wine and beer in their hands.
Roughly halfway through the event, around 7:00, Emily broke away from me to continue talking with a small group of senior English majors from the college (I couldn’t help but notice they a eemed very pretty from afar), as they were closer to her age then most of the well-intentioned, gray-headed guests that were coming my way. After enduring a solid fifteen minutes of grueling small talk, a tall, middle-aged brunette woman stepped toward me, smiling.
“Mr. Cusk! I’m so glad you could make it tonight! I was so excited when they accepted my proposal to bring you here.”
From this comment I knew exactly who I was talking to. “Professor Rice! Such a pleasure to finally meet you.” The professor smiled over her glasses at me, revealing brilliantly white teeth behind her dark red lipstick. This was not whom I expected to rendezvous with at the reception, as most female academics I encountered until that point had been wiry, cat-like women with frizzled hair. Professor Rice notably did not fit this stereotype, standing almost even with me, wearing a white dress with gold trim down the sides, which, like Emily’s was structured and not too revealing, but failed to hide her obvious curves and impressively thin waist. Her arms were toned for someone who I imagined was in her forties. Her legs looked as if she was a natural runner. Her chest pushed against the thick fabric of her outfit. Her hair, a sandy, light brown, fell cleanly to her shoulders.
“Please. Call me Meredith.” She extended a hand toward me, which I took, shaking firmly. “How are you liking it here? I heard your reading was a smash. I was distraught to miss it, but was pulled away for an emergency. I imagine you read from your first book? We read it in my class. The students absolutely adored it.”
“It was the most attended reading I’ve had on the tour this far, by no slight margin. I think I have you to thank for that.”
“You have yourself to thank, Mr. Cusk.”
“Simon.”
“Very well, you have yourself to thank, Simon. Most authors I teach don’t draw crowds like that. Which isn’t surprising to me at all. I have to admit I adore your work — your voice is one of my favorites in contemporary fiction. The younger readers as well.”
“That’s incredibly kind, thank you Meredith.”
We chatted for twenty or thirty minutes longer, exploring the ins and outs, the rising and falling of trends in writing recently and the challenges of thriller fiction in the modern day. I was blown away by Meredith’s insight — I had definitely never met someone who thought so sharply and critically about the genre, and was learning a great deal about my own craft by virtue of just listening. After awhile, Professor Rice switched topics.
“So my students and I are dying to know, and I promised to ask you. But what is next? Are you working on anything new?”
“Hardly. I’ve been contending with a real drought this past couple of years. I only recently have been able to cobble anything of use together, and I’m still not sure if it’s any good.”
“This is terribly invasive, I’m sorry, but do you mind if I see it? I’m sworn to secrecy. I’m just dying to know.”
I hesitated, before opening up the document on my phone and handing it to her.
After reading for several minutes, Meredith’s eyes widened. “Oh Simon,” she said, “you really have something here. Is this the opening chapter? It’s so different! It works so well.”
“Thank you,” I said, as years of writers block flooded out of my body through a single sigh.
“How did you get this level of quality after such a long time off? That usually takes people months of struggling to reach where they were.”
Meredith handed my phone backed to me, before dropping it toward the floor. “Shit!” She exclaimed as she reached down to catch it before it hit the ground. Snagging the phone clumsily with both hands, she sighed and reached the phone out to me, before glimpsing at what was now on the screen, and gasping. “Oh my,” she softly let out. There on the phone was the picture of Emily from earlier today, bound and gagged in the department store dressing room, with me holding her behind her.
“Shit! You aren’t supposed to see that. I’m so sorry.” Meredith stared blankly at me.
“That’s my assistant. Her name is Emily. She’s standing right over there.” I paused, sweating profusely at Meredith’s empty gaze. “It’s not professional, I know. But it’s….it’s actually what’s jogged me out of my writing slump. She came up with the idea, and ever since we started playing these…these games, I’ve been able to just write without feeling my usual inhibitions. You have to believe me.”
Meredith paused for several moments longer, staring across the hall toward Emily, who was giggling in her small crowd if you get women, while also glancing back toward the professor and I.
“I believe you,” she finally said. She paused for what seemed like forever, before inhaling sharply. “And while I’m surprised by your methods, at least they’re clearly working. I’d give anything to get out of my own writing slump, so I know it must be such a great change to finally be able to get back to that part of your life.”
“Hello!” Suddenly, Emily and the three college students appeared next to us. Emily extended her hand out to Meredith. “My name is Emily Clay. I’m Simon’s assistant.”
“I’ve heard great things about you Emily.” Meredith grinned wryly as she shook hands with Emily.
“Simon, these are a few of my students — meet Hannah, Katie, and Ellen.” Professor motioned toward the three younger women with Emily.
“Pleasure to meet you all.”
“We’re huge fans of yours, Mr. Cusk. Emily’s been giving us the rundown of how lucky she is to be working with you.” A short, curvaceous blonde stepped forward slightly. “She was very detailed in how close you two get to work together.” She smiled and glanced toward Emily, who blushed and pretended to be distracted.
“We’re actually quite jealous.” Another one of the girls, a thin, statuesque red-head, chimed in.
“I think I actually believe I may have just stumbled on these same details, ladies.” Professor Rice shot a devilish look my way, which startled Emily and I both.
“Oh REALLY?” Emily interjected, staring at me with huge eyes. It was clear that neither of us had done a very good job of keeping the nature of our relationship a secret from the other four women around us.
“Really.” Professor Rice continued. “And I’ve got to say, I’m truly jealous of the results. I’ve been stuck for years on my next novel as well. I’d kill to break this curse like Simon has appeared to.” She hesitated again. “I’m almost tempted to hire you myself.”
Emily glanced toward me, paused for a moment, then smiled sweetly toward Meredith. “Well in that case, Professor, I’m almost tempted to work with you.” My assistant looked toward me with a sinister glimmer in her eyes. “If only Simon weren’t such a jealous type.”
Flustered a little, and loosened considerably by the emptied wine glass in her hand, Professor Rice looked toward me. “Jealous? Oh Simon. That’s so outdated.”
“I’m not jealous!” I shot back to the two of them. “I just have no way to get back to the hotel without Emily, if she drives with you. That’s all. Pure logistics.”
Meredith and Emily both laughed in ridicule toward me, clearly having gotten me to backtrack into a nervous, immature defense of keeping my assistant to myself.
“I think we have a solution.” The third college student, also blonde, stepped into the conversation. She was tall, and incredibly fit, wearing a short green cocktail dress that showed off her long, tan legs. She grinned with sharp blue eyes toward me. “What if we give Mr. Cusk a ride home? We could keep him company until he’s ready to head back to the hotel.”
Emily’s eyes widened, as she watched me look the three gorgeous college students up and down, each of them smiling and batting their eyes toward me. Her face flushed as she looked at what I’d say.
“Well, Professor, if you think it would help, then who am I to keep her magic all to myself?”
“Splendid. Emily, are you still interested in working together?”
Emily grinned at me, mouthing the word “asshole,” and turned back to Meredith. “Of course I am, Professor. It would be an honor.”
As the two walked out of the ancient library, my phone went off. It was a text from Emily. “I’ll be sure to send you A LOT of pictures, since you’re not the jealous type…”
I looked up at the three beautiful young women in front of me, as they each motioned me to the door.
“So will I — have fun tonight, Miss Clay.”
“You too, Mr. Cusk.”