It was 4 very long days of Ava waiting to feel the twinges of her period begin after that. Eli seemed emboldened by the near proximity to knowing for sure, and it only seemed to fuel his desire for her. In the evenings he would arrive back to the house and immediately pull down her pants on the couch or wherever she was and without even asking if she was amenable to it, begin to eat her out with a voraciousness she had never seen before he would fuck her following her 2nd or 3rd solo climax. After, they would sit down to dinner like everything was perfectly normal – they were just any other couple with a healthy sex drive, not a captive and captor in this strange limbo between love and hate.

Thursday, the night before he was due to leave for Lockwood Manor, he seemed even more enthusiastic than usual. Ava intentionally sat on the settee in the front sitting room next to the bay window, remembering the fantasy she had that day she'd explored the house while he was gone, of him eating her out in full view of the window while pedestrians walked by completely unaware. She wore only a robe tonight, no panties. The decision to do so was fraught with more mental acrobatics about how he would take it but she knew she had 3 days without him around the corner, as well as a very pressing question that both of them needed answering – with each hoping for a different result than the other one.

When he strode in with their dinner for the evening and dropped the bag and his briefcase on the floor she watched him in silence as his eyes darted around the room, looking for where she was until he finally saw her. Another bag fell to the floor next to the takeout, but she had no time to ask what it was before he was upon her, kneeling in front of her and spreading her legs to his whistle of approval at finding her nearly naked and already puffy with want.

"Dessert before dinner," he mused, and dove down with his lips and tongue to her waiting quim, rolling his eyes into the back of his head upon tasting her slick heat.

Ava's eyes rolled back as well and she leaned her head against the settee, spreading her legs wider to give him full access. An act that had been seldom of interest to her before coming here was now one of the highlights of her day, and she let her gaze wander to the window as he worked, seeing the figures of a few strangers as they passed, the reality of her fantasy making this even more intense than usual.

Eli's hands reached under her to grab her cheeks and lap at her like a dog from a bowl. His mouth fastened to her clit, working the nub assiduously with his tongue. The obscene noises would have turned her stomach up until a few days ago, but she had noticed the stimulant was beginning to have less effect on her than before and chalked it up to her body developing a tolerance. When she took it now, the agonizing buildup did not appear so quickly as the first week. It often wasn't until Eli was nearly back that she would feel her pulse beginning to race in anticipation, her pussy twitching like it was preparing for another long evening of use.

She cried out through her first orgasm, letting her hands ruffle and pull on Eli's hair to direct him where to go. Each time after she came he would ignore her pleas to wait and give her rest, and his ambivalence to her plight only fueled her arousal and led to a faster repeat as he brought her to climax again.

He had left her robe open for his ministrations and she looked down the length of her naked body to watch him, noting her dusky rose-colored nipples and soft breasts that ached to be touched and suckled by him. Her flat stomach gave Ava the perfect vantage point to watch him succeed in bringing her to 3 more successive orgasms before he finally relented and began to kiss his way up her body, teeth marking and nibbling the skin along her ribs until he reached her breasts and cupped one in each hand, licking her nipples and sucking them so hard that she groaned.

"Please, Eli. Enough. I need your cock. Now."

He grinned ear to ear and brought his mouth to hers while he settled himself between her legs. It was quickly apparent that while the settee served as an ideal place for cunnilingus, it did not lend itself to comfortable fucking. Eli wrapped his arms around her and lowered their bodies onto the floor, kissing her throat as she looked over his shoulder to the window and saw a few other people passing by while she was about to get fucked just 12 feet away.

Eli went slow, tantalizing her with his depth before he withdrew to the tip and slid back in. After he did it a few times she grabbed his hips and dug into them with her nails.

"No more games. Fuck me. Now."

Ava wasn't even sure she recognized her own voice giving this man such filthy orders but he followed her command. Hard, purposeful strokes reached depths inside her no other man ever had, and she dismissed the anxious thought of what answer he was hoping to hear from her before he left, and let herself be carried away again by the motion of his cock plunging in and out of her.

Eli came at the same time as her, gasping in her ear like he was shocked at the veracity of his own climax. His face sank to rest his cheek against her breasts as he came down from his high. She lay there with her legs wrapped around him and his cock still inside her like a plug. Gradually, as it softened she felt him withdraw and let go of her hold on him, but with a sigh of contented pleasure.

Usually, Eli would clean himself off in the half-bath under the stairs and then set out dinner for them, but tonight he rolled onto his back and pulled her onto his chest with him, smiling into her eyes and stroking her cheek.

"What did I ever do with myself before I got to come home to you every night?"

It wasn't a question she should answer honestly, so Ava just closed her eyes and let her heartbeat begin to level out, nuzzling her face into his chest hair. She thought back to the extra bag she had seen him drop on the floor with his usual parcels. It wasn't too hard to guess what would be inside.

Ava got up first, pulling her robe closed over her chest and clambering towards the bathroom to heed Dr. Wu's advice. When she came out Eli had redressed and started to set out their dinner on the dining room table. It was an assortment of Ava's favorite foods, per her request when he had asked what she would like for their last night together before several days apart. He brought back lobster and truffle mac and cheese from the restaurant around the corner from her apartment, a goat cheese, berries and walnuts chicken salad from the café by work, and fried zucchini from the Italian place close to where they had gone for their first and only date 2 weeks ago.

Eli looked pleased with himself for delivering everything she had asked for and Ava felt a moment of guilt as she sat down on the barstool to tuck in. He was going above and beyond likely because he thought he was fulfilling some early pregnancy cravings and while she didn't care if she wasted his money – she was dreading his reaction if he discovered she wasn't. Of course, Ava analyzed every twinge of her body for symptoms that she might be. Up until now, she had only ever been trying to prevent pregnancy, and while this attempt wasn't going ahead with her consent, she only knew that most women felt sick during the early months, and had strange cravings. So far, she felt nothing out of the ordinary, but that was no guarantee she was out of the woods yet.

The food was all wonderful and she sat there next to him, ignoring the way he positioned his stool closer to hers so that their shoulders sometimes brushed while they ate. When Ava set down her fork to take a sip of water Eli spoke, unable to contain his excitement a moment longer, "I have a surprise for you," he grinned.

She tried to make her smile convincing, "Oh?"

He was already on his feet, reaching for the brown paper bag sitting on the counter next to the discarded takeout bags. Ava braced herself for what he was going to pull out, her suspicions confirmed when he retrieved 5 rectangular boxes, each a different brand of pregnancy test, then pushed them towards her on the marble.

"So we can know before I go."

Ava swallowed, she felt sick now, but it wasn't from any pregnancy real or imagined, it was from the lump in her throat at seeing her fears confirmed. She tried to act nonchalant, sipping her water again.

"Well? Aren't you ready to know?" he seemed annoyed that she wasn't as excited as him.

"I thought we were just waiting to see if my period showed up. Isn't it still pretty early for these to pick up on anything?" She was stalling. If luck was on her side, maybe she could delay until he was gone for the weekend. When he was hundreds of miles away, she could think clearly about what to do if the test was positive.

"No, these are the early detection ones. Some of them are just regular, but these ones," he indicated a 2-pack on the top of the others, "Should be able to pick up a positive as early as 3 days before a missed period."

Her heart was hammering. How else could she put this off? What might convince him to wait longer?

What's the point? If you are he'll know soon enough. Might as well get it over with.

She shook her head. Bad enough that she found herself trapped her in this situation where every decision made was outside her control. It wasn't even her choice whether to get pregnant or not, couldn't she be the one who decided how they discovered the result, and when?

"Go on," his voice was impatient, "Go take one now."

Numb fingers closed around the box and pulled it towards her, reading the lettering like the answer to how to solve her problems might be hidden in the fine print.

"I don't want to right now," she said, firmly.

Eli waited, his face making the switch from light-hearted to dangerous, "Waiting to find out won't change anything, Ava. Better to know now."

"Better for you, you mean."

"Better for you, as well, so I can make adjustments for you, to make your life more comfortable here."

"Oh, because it's so comfortable already?"

She was waiting for the drugs to kick in, to make her docile and needy in spite of all her reservations about it, as they normally did, but maybe it was just the overpowering fear of being made to pee on that stick and get a final answer, but she did not feel anything swaying her now, and it was making Eli angry in a way she hadn't seen for many days.

"I don't want to frighten you with threats or bribes, right now. This should be an easy thing for you to do, if not for yourself, then for me."

"Why would I want to do anything for you?"

He gritted his teeth, "Because I went over half the city tonight, finding your favorite things to eat; because I provide for you, I give you hours of leisure and free rein to buy whatever you want at my discretion; because I give you hours of pleasure—"

"Pleasure I never asked for," she reminded him, pushing her plate away in disgust.

That seemed to enrage him more. "If I have to drag you into that bathroom and hold you naked over the toilet until you finally give in I will do it, but you're not going to like what comes after."

"You think I've liked anything we've done up to this point?"

It was meant to piss him off worse, but Ava was alarmed to see he actually smiled, turning on his stool to face her.

"I think you love it, but you're afraid to admit it. You're scared to believe that you might get off to everything I'm doing without the benefit of being drugged, but I've got news for you Ava. You've been swallowing placebos for the last several days. Every orgasm I've given you since Sunday has been entirely from your own enjoyment, no stimulants to blame."

If she could have seen herself in that moment, Ava would have noted the way her face blanched at what he said, the wobble of her lips begging to reject what he said, even as she realized it was true. That's why the stimulants were no longer making her so horny that she had to wank herself off rather than wait for his arrival. Her body was now so accustomed to serving his whims that it responded against her will, fulfilling his depraved needs and confirming his plans.

"No…" she began, "You're lying." She leaned away from him but he just stood and moved closer, not letting her create space between them right now when he felt he had the upper hand.

"You don't need to fight it anymore, we can move forward, together, as a family."

It was too overwhelming. The food, his words, especially about a family, the waiting pregnancy tests lying there in front of her. Ava put a hand to her stomach, then bent over and hurled everything she had managed to eat today on the floor, narrowly missing Eli's feet by a couple of inches.

Her hand flew to her mouth in horror, looking down at it and then back to him, waiting for his anger to worsen. Instead, he looked pleased.

"That's a very good sign, Ava."

After her vomiting episode Eli had sent Ava upstairs to clean herself in the shower while he mopped up her mess. She trudged up the staircase like she had bricks for feet, still feeling sick but telling herself it had nothing to do with pregnancy and everything to do with shock over what he had said. In the shower, she checked herself over and over for any hint of blood, praying her body would give her a sign that it had rejected the opportunity to bear Eli's progeny, for this month at least. Using the washcloth she scrubbed her pussy for all traces left behind by him from their earlier tryst on the floor. Absently, she touched her stomach with both hands, imagining it growing rounder from Eli's efforts and then sinking down to the shower floor, her body wracked by sobs.

At some point, she heard the bathroom door open and Eli came in. She didn't pause her crying for him. What was the point of any of it now? The drugs had allowed her to excuse herself of guilt at climaxing from his ministrations every chance he got. Now that those were taken away, what would happen?

"Why?" she sobbed, "Why did you stop giving me the pills?"

It was harder to hear him from behind the shower door, but Eli spoke louder than usual, "I told you, Ava. There's no telling what effects the stimulants might have long-term, especially on a developing fetus. I couldn't risk you taking them much longer without jeopardizing what we've been working for."

"WE?" she lifted her head up and screamed at him, all restraint forgotten, "WHAT WE'VE BEEN WORKING FOR?"

Eli rolled his eyes, "You were doing so well, my love. Please don't take us 10 steps backward in one evening."

Ava was frantic. She couldn't do this. She couldn't be his prisoner another day; not knowing the price he was more than willing, and in fact, expecting her to pay for it. Wildly, she looked for something, anything she could use in the shower to cause herself injury. He didn't even allow her a razor to shave with. Her 2 weeks' worth of leg stubble was a testament to that.

It was hard to see him clearly from behind the steamed-up shower door, but it wasn't enough, she needed time, and distance. She needed him to leave, to give her space.

"Please go," she whined, leaning back against the shower wall as the water splashed all around her, "Please leave me alone. Just go on your trip. I need time—"

"I make the rules here, not you."

A fresh wave of tears came out and she wrapped her arms across her chest, knowing that his patience had very finite limits and she was testing every one of them right now.

Eli shook the cardboard box in his hand, "You still have a choice here. You can come out and take this test willingly, or I will come in there and get you, and you'll still take it either way."

He opened the door to prove what he said and stared down at her, sniffling and shaking on the shower floor, eyes pleading with him for empathy which he did not possess.

"Please," she closed her eyes and turned her face up to the ceiling, "Please don't do this."

His hands grabbed her wrists roughly, yanking her to her feet as she screamed, trailing water in her wake as he turned off the shower and dragged her through the door and then down the hall to the bedroom.

She fought. After days and days of giving in, she fought him hard, twisting and pulling away, aided by the fact that her skin was still slippery from the shower. At one point, he lost his grip on her wrists and she bolted for the door, still left open from his struggle to get her in here. She was almost to the railing—if she vaulted from the top of the stairs to the bottom it might be enough to kill her.

Eli's arms grabbed her around the waist just as her hands touched the banister.

"No!" she screamed, fighting and kicking as he used one hand to hold her and the other to clamp over her mouth. Ava thrashed her head until his finger slipped and then she bit down, hard.

"FUCK!" he shouted, gripping her jaw with his free hand and digging into her cheeks with his nails until she let go.

Ava screamed again, all sense of self-preservation forgotten. She knew what the end result would be as he pulled her to the bed finally and pinned her facedown with his full weight, reaching for the handcuffs as she bucked and writhed beneath him.

"Again with you choosing the hard way," he grunted in her ear, roughly wrenching her hand upward to the headboard where he clicked it on one of the spindles. She saw his injured finger, already turning purple around the curve of her teeth marks, as he yanked her other arm up and tried to move her head to bite it again, to sever it like she should have the first time.

He slapped her ass hard for that. A first, even for him.

"You want to act like an ungrateful whore, I'll treat you like one," he spat, slapping her other ass cheek with a satisfying whack.

Her hair was dripping profusely all over the sheets and pillows, not to mention down her body, but she could only jerk at the handcuffs holding her, then hold the headboard for support as he began to smack her ass again and again in earnest.

"Bad girls get punished," he said from behind her, "And you've been a very bad girl tonight, Ava."

She was struggling to breathe through the pain of his spankings, but managed to retort, "Sorry, I'm not interested in being your personal pornstar, Eli." She said his name with such derision, she wanted to make sure he heard every drop of hatred she held for him, but it didn't seem to deter him. Suddenly, she heard the sound of his pants dropping, then felt the mattress give by her knees as he knelt behind her, dragging the leathery tip of his dick across her reddened ass cheeks as a taunt.

"I will teach you to obey me one way or another," he said, and then his bulbous cock split her open without any delay.

Ava pressed her lips together until they turned white with the effort of not letting him hear her scream. Her muffled cries of pain only seemed to spur him on. With her hands unable to attack him, he reached around her and grabbed her wet, slippery breasts, his hot breath in her ear whispering taunts.

"You're going to take this test for me again and again, as many times as it takes before we get a positive. I'm going to keep fucking you over and over, as long as it takes until we get that positive. Until you're the one wanting it more than me. Until you're in love with me."

She thought to throw her head back into his face again but he fastened his mouth to her neck and sucked hard enough to leave hickies. He did it over and over again, making sure to mark up her neck in different spots then when he was satisfied he switched to the other side and did the same.

"God, it feels so good to be inside you baby. I can't wait to feel you cum."

Even in her pain and silent treatment, Ava couldn't resist goading him, "Without that medicine, you're never going to manage that now."

He withdrew to the tip and she felt another slap on her ass, this one unexpected enough that she lost her composure and cried out in shock. Another thrust in, then out. Smack. Thrust in, then out. Smack. Over and over he went, alternating which cheek he struck until she was gripping the headboard with white knuckles and begging him to stop.

"Please, Eli! I can't!"

Another smack. The stinging was made worse by the way he gently massaged the area afterward, offering a momentary respite before his palm descended again.

"PLEASE!"

He grunted in her ear as he thrust in again, his sweaty chest sticking to her back still damp from the shower when he brought their bodies closer. His hands left her breasts and one reached around her throat while the other snuck between her legs, expertly stroking her clit in time with his thrusts.

"I'm going to make you cum, Ava. Give in to it. You've already cum dozens of times this week without the drugs. It's a barrier you put up in your mind. You don't want to let yourself feel this pleasure but your body loves it. Stop fighting. Cum for me."

She threw her head back and felt the air as he dodged the blow with ease, tightening his grip on her throat as his teeth bit down on her shoulder, "Why do you make this so much harder than it needs to be?" he sighed, snapping his hips more firmly for a deeper impact.

Ava cried out again, she felt so full from this angle, and his fingers knew what she liked enough that her traitorous body was ramping up to cum even while her head refused to cooperate.

"I hate you," she whispered, tears running down her face to land on his arm as he held her in place for his thrusts. His fingers pinched her jaw, turning her head to meet his in a kiss. For a moment, his roughness lessened, like he was remembering that his goal was deeper than just dominating her, and his lips softly moved against hers while his tongue traced them. She wanted to tell him to just finish with her already so she could be let out of these handcuffs, but when he broke apart from their kiss she felt him move behind her, reaching over into the nightstand drawer to rustle around for something else.

Immediately afraid, Ava tried to turn her head and see what he was getting but by the time she did he already had it in his hands and behind her.

"Let's try something else to help you," he murmured, and she felt a strange, unfamiliar pressure against her asshole that she did not like.

"Stop," she shouted, "Remember what the doctor said!"

He pressed the appendage deeper, forcing her hole to begin stretching to accommodate it while she tensed against the intrusion.

"This is something different," his lips were kissing the back of her neck, trying to soothe her into relaxing, "It's a butt plug. It's not going anywhere else but the sink to get cleaned after this. Relax, it will feel much better once you do."

Ava kept her lips tightly closed as she groaned with the pain. Eli reached between them to gather some of her natural lubrication and rub it on the plug before he pushed in further.

"Almost there," he huffed, sounding as if he were the one struggling with this instead of her. When finally the plug bottomed out and he sighed in relief she opened her mouth and groaned in a mix of pain and pleasure. His dick was still thrusting slowly inside her and now, this intense fullness in both ends felt like too much to handle.

"Take it out, please." She felt her body responding in earnest. If he kept this thing in her, she would end up cumming for him, and that was the last thing she wanted to give him the satisfaction of right now.

"I will when we're done here," he promised, "You need to be reminded who knows what your body needs."

She braced her arms against the headboard, back bowed forward as he thrust into her from behind while the motion of moving against her pushed the butt plug in and out at the same time. Ava thought she might be able to hold out until he finally relented and came without her, but then his hands both wrapped around her waist, one holding her hips in place while the other reached for her clit. Then she knew she was done for.

"Don't do it, Eli. Don't make me," she was begging. It was one more boundary to cross, worse for knowing that he was going to achieve his goal without an ounce of drugs being to blame. Never before had she actively fought not to orgasm, which made it all the more explosive when she finally did.

Eli gave a final, bruising deep thrust and his pubis pushed the butt plug in so deeply that in conjunction with the way he worked her clit Ava suddenly strained at the handcuffs, wailing in defeat. She pushed and pulled against him, then eventually felt her body give in as she arched her back and screamed over and over. Her pussy had finally reached its limit, gripping his cock so tightly she didn't even notice he had cum too until she slumped forward a minute later, utterly spent.

The dazed aftermath quickly gave way to crying after he unlocked the handcuffs and she collapsed onto the bed. His cock withdrew from her cunt at the same moment he pulled the butt plug from her ass, and the empty, stretched-out feeling that remained made her sob all the more.

For his part, Eli disappeared for a moment. He came back from the bathroom with a towel to help wipe her up but she flinched when he touched her and he shrugged his shoulders before he threw it down at her.

Ava lay on her side, facing the window and trying not to move too much. It was like the first few days all over again. Her neck burned from his hickies and the tight hold of his fingers, her battered holes were stretched and raw, and now to boot her ass cheeks felt like they were on fire from his sadistic treatment.

When Eli returned again he was freshly showered and wearing his normal nightclothes. He slipped onto the other side of the bed, reaching for her and cradling her face in his hand while he smiled innocently like a psychopath. Even though it hurt like hell to move, she rolled over to the other side, turning her back to him. Unfazed, he held her, first stroking her spine like a lover might, and she was too tired from cumming and crying to object. He moved closer to her and rolled her onto her back so he could swing his heavy thigh over her hip, an added protection against her trying to get up. They lay there with legs entwined and he slung his arm over her waist and then linked his fingers into her hand. Her face was still turned away from him, but he didn't seem to mind. He kissed her shoulder.

"Tomorrow morning, before I leave… you can take the test then."

Ava blinked away more tears, but she knew he heard her sniffle by the way he held her closer, as though his presence were a comfort right now.

"Shh. Sleep now. Tomorrow is a fresh start for us."

She suppressed a wail rising in the back of her throat and whimpered out a low sob. He responded by rolling her back onto her side, then drawing his legs up to spoon her. At first, he held her breast in his hand. As she started to drift off, she felt his hand drift down to rest over her womb.


Her dreams were disjointed and confusing. In some she wandered the open forest, barefoot and pregnant, running for her life as Eli chased her through the trees with a feral look in his eyes. In others, she saw herself in the room down the hall, her body in a rocker and a baby at her breast; Eli behind them both looking down in wonderment. In her last dream, she was shackled to the bed, her neck held fast by a metal collar and a chain. Her arms and legs were each tied to one of the bed posters, and Eli stood at the foot of the bed, naked, erect, and beginning to crawl across the mattress toward her.

Ava woke with a start, suddenly aware of how badly she needed to pee. Eli's body was half encasing hers from his side of the bed and she very slowly began to extricate herself from his limbs. If she got to the bathroom now while he was asleep, she might not have enough to go later and buy herself a few more days of time.

It wasn't easy, but she managed to slip out from the bed and tiptoe across the room to the door. When she looked back at the bed, half-scared that she would see Eli sitting up and staring at her, she was relieved to see him still deep asleep with his arm across the spot where she slept as if waiting for her to come back to him. In the bathroom, she flipped on the light and her eyes immediately gravitated to the box of pregnancy tests Eli had left on the sink. What was she really accomplishing here? If anything, she was delaying the inevitable. Sooner or later Eli would get her to pee on that stick, or she would miss her period and have an answer that way. Of course, there was the chance that the residual effects from her IUD might still keep her from falling pregnant so easily, but it was clear Eli had no intention of stopping until she was. Why not just take the test right now and get it over with?

Her fingers fumbled with the box, trying to open it quietly enough that Eli wouldn't hear from the other room. She pulled out the first test and tried to muffle the sound of ripping the plastic packaging open by wrapping it in a towel first. She had seen plenty of these tests in her time, she had even bought them for friends before, but never needed to take one until now. The instructions were simple enough, but she still read them several times as if she weren't well aware of how they worked.

On the toilet, she sat down with her legs far enough apart to hold the test between them until she was ready. With shaking hands, she stuck the stick into the stream, praying silently for the result to be negative the entire time until her bladder was empty. After she was done, she wiped and put the cap back on the plastic stick then set it on the sink, reaching for her robe from earlier to have something covering her while she waited.

Something about this felt better than letting Eli take part. At the very least, whatever the result was, she could lay there in bed for a few hours and process it by herself while he slept on unawares. She just needed to hurry back in before he woke and realized she wasn't there. If that happened, he was sure to come looking, and this bathroom was the first place he would stop.

Ava paced quietly, not even daring to wash her hands or flush the toilet lest she woke Eli. She had no way of telling how much time had passed, so she counted to 60 5 times in a row. At last, she stopped, heart pounding in front of the sink, then looked in the mirror and took a deep breath before she looked down.

Not pregnant.

She stared. Her stomach did a flip and she sucked in a breath before remembering she needed to be quiet. A giddy feeling rose in her chest and she almost laughed. All his effort, all his repeated attempts to get her pregnant and she had managed to escape (for this month at least). She was beaming from ear to ear, picking up the test and looking at it every which way, almost dancing with joy at the result.

From the other side of the door, she heard the creak of a floorboard in the hall and froze on the spot. Her eyes jumped to the door as it swung open and Eli stood there in his nightclothes, looking very much awake and not pleased to see her here. He gestured to the test in her hand.

"What does it say?" His jaw was set and she felt suddenly more afraid of him than when he was actively raping her.

"It-it-it says," she held it out towards him and he snatched it from her hand.

His eyes saw the result but his expression was the same. It seemed he was thinking carefully through what to say next.

"Did you tamper with this?"

"No," her voice was tremulous, as unsteady as her hands.

He didn't believe her. "Take the other one. Now."

"I just peed, Eli. I don't have anything left in me."

She winced when he stepped closer, pointing the test at her, "Take. It. Now."

"I can't, I haven't drunk anything in hours. I swear I didn't mess with it, Eli. Just give me some water and wait a few hours. I won't fight you again, I'll take it willingly."

Inwardly, she smiled, wanting to add, Because, I know what it will say.

Eli was angry, that much was obvious, but she couldn't tell if it was more to do with the result of the test or her perceived deception in rigging it to read the way she wanted it to.

"Back to bed. Now."

Ava obeyed, drawing the robe tighter around her and taking care to walk her normal speed to keep from appearing too excited. The test was negative, she mused as she climbed back into bed, she could put up with anything right now knowing that the test was negative and she had three days to herself coming up. Her heart was pounding so hard from giddiness, she had to bury her face in the pillow to hide her smile.

Eli paused in the doorway, watching her the whole way. When she settled in the bed he turned and left, closing the door behind him. A few minutes later he returned with a bottle of water which he left on the nightstand before he left again without another word. When he closed the door behind him, she heard the familiar beep after it shut right before the keypad glowed red again for the first time in over a week.

Her smile was gone, but the feeling of relief was still there. She had dodged a bullet this month, and now she had space from him to process her feelings about it. For once, in the grand scheme of this whole debacle, life seemed too good to be true. She drank half of the water bottle and settled in to doze off again before he would return expecting confirmation of her results.

Sometime before dawn, she fell back to sleep, and this time when she dreamed it was of her old life. Ava dreamed of eating lunch in the office break room, chatting with her coworkers while refilling her water bottle, and seeing Eli walk into the breakroom for his lunch, eyeing her in a way that made her feel warm and tingly.

The door opened and she woke, looking across the room to see Eli standing there with the other test in hand.

"It's time."

She stood without argument, heading towards the bathroom again like she was a criminal about to submit to a drug test, but this one she knew she would pass, and that buoyed her along. When he handed the test to her she took it without complaint. On the toilet, her half-empty bladder struggled for a minute, but then mercifully gave enough for her to catch some on the tip of the stick. To her embarrassment, Eli stood and watched the entire time, not trusting her to take the test without trying to fool him.

The joke's on you. The test from earlier was probably even more accurate than this one.

After she was done she handed it to him and wiped herself before washing her hands.

"Can I take a shower?"

He was staring at the test, lost in his own thoughts. Ava waited a moment before she reached in the shower and turned it on. When he didn't react, she stripped off her robe and climbed in.

Somehow in spite of all that she had gone through just last night, she felt better than she had in days. Even after cumming repeatedly and falling into an exhausted heap most nights, it didn't compare to the satisfaction of knowing she had beaten him, at least for now. She stayed in there much longer than 5 minutes, she knew, but she turned her body away from him when he tossed the test in the wastebasket with a dejected sigh and hid her smile in the water.

After she was out and feeling remarkably cheerful, Ava sauntered into the room like she hadn't a care in the world. She opened the drawers from what had become her side of the dresser and carefully dressed while holding up the towel with one hand for modesty. Behind her, she could hear Eli on his laptop clacking away at the keys. Beyond that, he said nothing to her.

Already she was planning out her day. After she pulled on her loose-fitting tank she glanced over her shoulder at him, still focused on the screen and looking very peeved.

"Am I allowed to go downstairs and get breakfast?" she ventured to ask, hoping her voice sounded neutral enough for his liking right now.

"Fine," he snapped, not looking up at her once.

Downstairs she was positively jubilant. Alone in the kitchen, Ava hummed to herself as she pulled out the frying pan and some eggs from the fridge. The only thing that would make this moment better was knowing that Eli was far away from her stewing over his failure in some other locale. She cracked the eggs in a bowl and mixed them with a fork. For now, he had resorted to letting her use metal utensils, with the looming threat that if her misbehavior resurfaced he would have to rethink that. Ava thought back to last night and grimaced. If he didn't think he had punished her sufficiently after the payback he had meted out she should prepare herself to go back to plastic utensils for a while as added retribution.

She sat at the kitchen island to eat her breakfast, famished after puking up her entire dinner last night and then engaging in an hour-long nonconsensual fuck before falling into a fitful sleep. Once Eli left, she told herself she would take a nap. Several, in fact, over the next few days. Alone and unbothered.

The servant's stairs creaked and she turned suddenly to see Eli standing there dressed in a suit, still looking slightly cross, but not as much as before.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, kissing her on the top of her head as he passed by on his way to the fridge.

"Fine," she couldn't let him think she was gloating.

He looked at her and nodded, then pulled out a protein shake from the door of the fridge and quickly chugged it.

"I need to leave soon, it's a bit of a drive up there."

"How far?"

"About 6 hours." He puffed out his cheeks and sighed, "I wish I could bring you with me, but I don't think you're ready for that yet, especially after last night."

She froze. Not that she wanted to go with him, but the way he brought up the previous evening like he still had payback in store for her was unsettling.

Eli sat down next to her in his normal spot, staring her down once again like a principal about to tell her how disappointing her behavior was. He looked her dead in the eyes, and she dared not look away.

"While I'm gone, you will think very carefully about any attempts to repeat last night's antics. I thought to chain you to the room so you could only access the bathroom and nothing else, but then that makes it hard for you to get your meals and I don't think you'd be able to sleep as well."

He let that morbid possibility hang in the air between them for a minute.

"If you ever try to hurt yourself again while I'm gone, if you try to jump from the stairs or cut yourself or any of the other various and sundry ways I'm sure you've considered, I will make sure that I track down all the people you love, your sorority sisters, your friends, and one by one I'll force them to take your place. I'll establish a whole harem of your female friends and impregnate every last one if you succeed in ending your life."

Ava swallowed, there was no way he could know all of her friends. "You're lying."

Eli made a face of annoyance that she would doubt his capabilities, holding up a hand and using his fingers to begin counting off the names he could list. "Zehra Thomas, Ashley Gibson, Brittany Jones-Holzwarth, Meghan Flowers, Siobhan—"

"Enough," she snapped, her good mood now soured just as he likely intended, "I swear that I won't kill myself. Happy?"

His eyes narrowed, "Not entirely. But there are ways to rectify that."

She sighed. "I can't make myself pregnant for you at the drop of a hat, Eli. I have no control here, remember? If it doesn't take, I have no way of changing that."

"I'm well aware of how female reproduction works, but I want to also make very clear, that if I find you've been doing anything to keep yourself from conceiving - if you've managed to find a way—"

It was too much, she laughed in his face, "Oh okay, Eli. If I find a way to keep from carrying your bastard child I'll be sure to let you know right away."

His face went hard, "I'm serious, Ava. If I find out you've done anything… it will be very bad for you, and perhaps for one or some of your friends."

Ava thought back through the list of women he had mentioned. Some she had known for close to a decade; they confided deep secrets to her late at night over pints of rocky road ice cream and held her hair for her as she bent over the toilet after an all-nighter. They had made her bridesmaid in their weddings and named her godmother to their children. He was probably bluffing, but if he wasn't, how could she live with herself?

"I have yet to discover any way to avoid siring your children, Eli. Rest assured. It was dumb luck this month."

Her pussy twitched, and Ava crossed her legs in response. Last night she had cum harder than ever before in her life, but it was still wrong, this whole situation was. Now, without the drugs to aid her, how would she ever force herself to endure his overtures again?

"There's still a chance that you are," he reminded her, "You're still due for your period, which hasn't come yet. False negatives happen all the time."

Ava felt like she had been doused with cold water. Her face fell, and he smiled at that.

"My periods were irregular before. I told you that."

"And yet, you were never being fucked raw on the daily during your fertile window with no birth control, were you?"

She pushed herself away from the counter abruptly, grabbing her plate and fork to carry them towards the sink. Outside the window, she looked at the well-manicured garden of the house next door, pondering her most pressing question.

"Why are you so determined to knock me up?"

He was looking down at his phone now, "That's for me to know. Once again, you're not the one calling the shots in here."

Ava folded her arms over her chest, "Did I run over your puppy as a child or something? I don't understand what I've done to deserve this kind of punishment."

Eli sighed, "First of all, I'm 6, almost 7 years older than you, and so that first premise is utterly ridiculous since you didn't learn to drive until I was in college. Second, this is not a punishment, although you seem determined to view it that way."

"What other way is there to view being held captive and raped against my will? Impregnated against my will?"

He pinched the bridge of his nose like she was asking far too many questions right now and he was losing patience. Ava waited for him to offer a rebuttal or some kind but he gave none. His phone vibrated with a text and he went back to answer it. She was starting to load up the dishwasher when he finally spoke to her again.

"I've left the other pregnancy tests upstairs. If you haven't gotten your period by the time I'm back, we'll use another one."

"How many more of these are you going to make me pee on for you?"

"As many as it takes, Ava."

She leaned against the counter and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, "Well, thanks for letting me know. Anything else you need to tell me before you go?" All she wanted right now was to be left alone with her thoughts; his departure seemed both incredibly close and way too far away. Mental and physical exhaustion was pressing in on her but she needed to keep it together until he left.

"Trying to get rid of me so quickly?" his eyebrow arched, "There's enough food for you in the fridge to last several days. I'll be reachable via your tablet or just talk loud enough for the camera to pick up and I'll respond that way. Anything you have questions for me about?"

Ava shook her head, praying that meant he was about to go.

"Good. Then you can come back upstairs and let me fuck you one more time before I leave."

She looked at him, mouth agape, "Even after last night, and everything you did to me?"

"Well, clearly all my efforts haven't been working so I need to make sure I take every opportunity going forward. Are you going to fight me about it again, and force me to repeat last night?"

The memory of his cock in her cunt and the butt plug in her ass as she screamed out her climax sent a thrill through her heart that made her squeeze her legs together again. Damn him for training her body like this. "No."

"Excellent. Up the stairs we go, then."

It was almost impossible to make herself listen to this. She trekked the steps slowly, drawing out the moment she would need to open her legs for him again and give him more opportunity to fill her womb the way he was planning. From behind her, Eli's hand caressed her ass, still sore from his treatment last night. Ava stiffened but didn't stop.

At the top of the stairs, he pulled her wrist to turn her towards him and brought his mouth down on hers. He kissed her against the doorway as she spread her thighs and let him wedge himself between them, hiking up her legs to wrap around his waist. It was infuriating how handsome he looked like this, a gorgeous man in a suit ready to fuck her against the wall; like something from a romance novel, but the reality was quite the opposite, even if her hips began roving for the contact her pussy was craving.

He pushed her down onto the floor in the same spot she had mounted him that first night he drugged her. Ava gasped when he shucked down her pants and underwear and then his own before laying on top of her and rolling onto his back so that she once again found her pussy hovering over his waiting cock.

"Ride it," he ordered, "Show me how much you're going to miss me."

Ava gave him the most scathing look she could manage as she let herself sink down, letting his thick, veiny shaft impale her before she leaned onto him for support and started to grind her hips.

"You will cum before I leave," he told her, stroking her thighs and waist, holding onto her hips to guide them for his thrusts.

Every retort she wanted to lob at him died on her tongue. What use was it to say that she hated him, or the things he did to her? Was it even believable when her body still responded to his in spite of her best efforts not to? Why couldn't it be enough for him to rape her and try to force her into carrying his babies? Why must he insist on making her derive pleasure from it too?

She bucked her hips and tried to set a rhythm as she looked down at him. The front of her robe dipped low and he grabbed the ties to open it, sighing at the view of her breasts heaving as he lifted his hips, drilling into her from below. There was no way Ava would cum like this, but she didn't tell him that. Maybe, if she tried, she could manage to fake it well enough to be believable.

The thought had no sooner occurred to her than he flipped her over, pistoning between her legs like a jackhammer. She held onto his shoulders helplessly, wishing it was over and he could leave her to some peace. Instead, he kissed her, long and intimately, looking down into her face for a reaction as she felt him surge forward more with each thrust.

Without warning, he snaked his hand between them, finding her clit with his thumb and beginning to work it the way he had learned she liked. Ava rolled her head back with a groan, biting her lip to avoid voicing her unwillingness to cum right now. He didn't care though, he never did. His thumb worked her enough that she felt a weak orgasm, nothing like what she had experienced last night, but enough to make her pussy ripple around his cock so that he smiled arrogantly. Soon after, she felt his balls pulse as his dick jumped inside her, erupting one last time before he would leave her in peace.

Ava lay there for a moment, letting Eli rest on top of her while he caught his breath, not as though she had much of a choice in the matter.

Before hoisting himself off of her, Eli kissed her again, just a small peck on the lips, and then he was back on his feet and redressing while she lay there spread-eagled and mostly naked.

"Here," he reached down to help her up. She took his hand and stood. When she did, suddenly a sharp, blooming pain in her stomach hit her.

"Ow," she hissed, but then it faded to a dull ache, one which felt familiar.

"What's wrong?" he looked genuinely concerned, watching her for any indication of where the pain was felt. Ava ignored him and made for the bathroom, grabbing toilet paper off the roll and reaching down to wipe, already suspecting what she would find.

Blood smeared with the remnants of his cum on the paper. Not a lot just yet, but there were red streaks amidst the creamy discharge he had left behind, and she looked up to see him standing at the door, once again looking unhappy.

"Right. I better head out then," he sighed, "Come and kiss me 'bye'."

Ava looked incredulous. Was he really going to pretend he hadn't seen the beginning of her period?

He braced his arms on the door frame, filling the space with his sheer height as she stood, naked from the waist down, and awkwardly came forward to kiss him.

Eli wrapped his arms around her, pulling her tightly against him. She thought he was expecting a peck on the lips, but he kissed her long, fervently, like he was memorizing the taste of her lips while his hands caressed her bare ass.

"Mmm," he pulled away, "I'll be thinking about this the whole time I'm gone."

She reasoned that he was probably waiting for her to give some coy response but she didn't say anything. One last brush of his lips across her forehead and he made for the door back down to the kitchen, kicking her discarded yoga pants and panties her way before he did.

Ava stood there numb. She looked down at her clothes and then to the door. Was he really gone? Where did he keep his car that she had never noticed before? Her eyes traveled to the camera in the corner near the main staircase, then quickly she pulled her clothes back on. From the top of the stairs, she listened for any sounds that might indicate if he was still there, and after hearing nothing for several minutes, she clutched her wrist nervously and looked over at the door to her immediate left, remembering its intended purpose with a shudder before she headed back down.