In Consequence

TWELVE


Riddick watched Jack close her eyes against the consuming darkness. Her voice was surprisingly steady. “Riddick, you don’t need to do this again.”

“The hell I don’t. Who’s in charge here?”

“You are,” she said. “But you don’t need to put me in the dark again. What do you expect me to learn from it?”

He stopped to give it some thought. What exactly did he want her to learn? What did he want from her? She’d already submitted to his collar. He had the power… but she wasn’t accepting it willingly. “I need you to break down. I need you to let me in,” he replied.

The answer seemed obvious to him. It hadn’t occurred to him that she might not understand. The question was, did he want her to accept her place willingly? He loved that spark of anger inside her. He loved mastering her… bringing her under his control. He couldn’t wait until he could fully claim her, plunge into her again, and again, every thrust making her even more his possession.

“I don’t want to let you in.” Her voice was stubborn, but uncertain.

“Why not?” he pressed. Finally, they might be getting somewhere.

“I don’t trust you,” she replied.

Well, I knew that, he thought. “Why not?”

“You cut me!”

“You deserved it.”

“You kidnapped me.”

“So? I wanted you. Still do. If I can get what I want, I take it. You should know that by now. Next reason.”

“You made me a slave, Riddick! You took away my freedom.”

“Trust me, it’s better than the alternative.”

There was a silence. “What… how? I don’t understand.” Her voice sounded puzzled and small.

“You have any idea how much of a target you were?”

“What are you talking about?” Jack asked.

Riddick made it up as he went along. Maybe he’d tell her the truth later. “Some fuckers from your high school were planning on raping you. I heard ‘em talking when I tailed you at school.”

~*~

“You’re lying,” she said promptly. She hadn’t been in any danger on New Mecca. No way. It was her home. Homes were safe places. “Who?” she asked.

“Couple of football players. One of ‘em had an earring. Big guy.”

“Now I know you’re lying,” Jack said triumphantly. “That was my ex boyfriend Perry. He’d never do that.”

“You sure?” Riddick’s voice came at her in the darkness, barraging against her self-assured conviction.

Jack nodded, knowing he could see her. “Positive.” Riddick snorted. Jack began to get upset. Why the hell shouldn’t he believe her? He was the liar, not her.

On the other hand… they had broken up because he kept trying to get her in bed. She just hadn’t been ready for that. It wasn’t a nasty break-up or anything. He said he understood, but things had been strained since he agreed to stop bugging her about it. Finally they just… fell away from each other.

The drop of doubt threatened to flood inside her, to grow into a trickle, then a stream, then a river and drown her. She shook her head. “You’re a liar,” she whispered.

If he was telling the truth, then… was he trying to protect her? But why would he make her his slave? Jack reminded herself that this was Riddick she was dealing with. Who could ever understand his motivation? It didn’t make any sense.

“Whatever,” she finally snapped at him. “Just turn on the lights. You don’t need to get me to admit that I’m dependant on you again. You made your point last time crystal clear.”

There was no response. “Riddick?” she asked, putting a tentative hand toward the space he had been occupying.

He was gone. Shit.

~*~

Riddick could see the doubt on her face clearly in his mind as he walked away from her. It didn’t matter if she believed him right away. The girl thought too much. She’d convince herself it was true before the night was out.

He thought about what she said, about claiming not to need the lights off. Did she need the lights off? She wasn’t afraid like she was before, and that honestly took away from his pleasure.

He lay down on his bed and closed his eyes. What was he doing? What did he expect from her? Jack was a spitfire, a little hellion bitch, and he loved that about her. He tried to imagine Jack as meek as the slave Giselle had been, and shook his head. He just wanted her to stop fighting him! She didn’t need to wait on him hand and foot, she didn’t need to change who she was.

How could he win her over? He didn’t want to go through the effort, but he didn’t want to live the rest of his life with a girl who hated him, either. She wanted him when she was thirteen—if he hadn’t kidnapped her, if he had approached her and asked her to come with him—would she have said yes?

He didn’t know. How could he get through to her without cheapening his authority? He was in charge, and she must always submit to him. It was just the way things had to be.
What were the things that really riled her up?

Any real show of power on his part. When he shackled her to the wall. When he punished her just now.

He slipped back into his goggles. “Lights on,” he commanded. “Jack! Come here!”

She entered the room, blinking owlishly in the light. “Yes?”

Suddenly he didn’t know what to say. For some reason, as she stood in his doorway, gloriously naked and gloriously his, she was even more beautiful than she usually was.

The unfamiliar sentimentality rattled him. Bringing his mind to the matter at hand, he gestured to the bed, swinging his own legs into a crossed position.

When she didn’t immediately catch on, he snapped, “Sit.”

She was so tense. He could see it in her shoulders. “Come ‘ere,” he said, beckoning to her. She approached him slowly, and as soon as he could reach her, he grasped her body and spun her around so that her back was to him. Slowly, methodically, he began rubbing her shoulders. As his hands and her muscles got warmed up, he dug deeper.

“Relax, Jackie-girl. I’m not gonna hurt you.” Her shoulders relaxed a mere fraction. It was probably all he was going to get from her for now. Riddick could feel himself losing his temper again. He wanted this bit, the training, the getting used to each other—the hard part, in other words—to be over with already.

“Jack, all I really want is for you to stop fighting me.”

She turned her face toward him, looking surprised. “I have.”

Riddick didn’t answer. His first response was to laugh, but when he stopped to think about it, he found that she was right. She had. She begged him not to cut her, but she didn’t fight it. When she argued with him a few moments ago, he had asked the questions and instigated the conversation that prompted it.

“Jack,” he said after a long moment of silence, “Do you think you could ever be happy here with me?”

“What kind of a question is that?” she responded, sounding more annoyed than anything else. “Do I have a choice?”

“No,” he replied, “but believe it or not, I don’t want you to be miserable all the time.” He paused and gave a slightly sadistic chuckle. “Just whenever I feel like it.”

Jack was silent.

Riddick didn’t know how he felt. He was used to being the one in charge of everything. Everything. Anything he could control, he did. But though Jack was submissive to him now, she still rattled him. She was such a mixture of stubbornness and sexuality, fear and compliance, and at times, ugly defiance. She was the only girl in all the worlds for him. She was one of the very few people that Riddick could stand to be around for any length of time.

And, damn it, he wanted to fuck her brains out.