Alison's Wonderland by Alison Tyler Read Free Book Online Page A

peeps from the sleeve of his suit. He’s very flash.
    “Because I’d like that,” I continue. “I’d like to be your whore.” Saying the words is easier than I’d anticipated. I’ve kept my desires to myself for so long that voicing them is a leap of faith, but once I’ve started, the words simply flow. “You could do whatever you want to me,” I say. “Let other men use me, as well. But I’ve never been a whore before. I might need some practice.”
    “Nah, it’s a doddle,” says David. “All you have to do is open your legs.”
    I don’t think he’s quite understood. “I think you should give me a test run,” I reply. “Make sure I’m good enough. And I think I should know what it’s like to meet a punter who wants to do terrible things to me.”
    “Uh-huh? What sort of terrible things?”
    “Call me names,” I say. “And, um, maybe I need to know how it is to go with a guy who gets off on kidnapping women, someone who wants to tie me up and gag me, who wants to use me as his plaything. A guy who won’t take any notice of my screams. A guy—”
    David swings to face me, grabs me around the arms, then bundles me backward into an alley. A few people glance our way, but nobody intervenes. Given that I’m chalk-white in a toga and David’s in a suit, they probably think we’re performance artists or actors. He slams me up against the wall, a hand clamped to my mouth. He glares at me, eyes full of glee.
    “Dirty little bitch,” he says, and he shoves a hand between my legs, bunching up the folds of my toga. “Gagging for it, aren’t you?” He rubs the cotton hard against my cunt. “Aren’t you, slut?”
    And I moan that I am, while thinking how times have changed since the sixties.
    “Come on,” he says. “I’ll give you a test run.” He grabs a fistful of my hair and frog-marches me deeper into the alley. He turns left, and I stumble ahead of him into a wider backstreet bordered by higgledy-piggledy buildings with narrow fire escapes zigzagging up their brickwork. Small, grimy windows cast smudges of light into the dusk of evening, steam plumes from vents, and clanging saucepans and barked orders punctuate the seedy calm of this hidden street. We are behind a stretch of restaurants and cheap hotels, stumbling through the grubby reality that feeds and fuels the tourist trade.
    It’s quieter here. David seems to know where he’s going and that makes me nervous. I start to wonder if this is what I really want. Oh, I know I’ll win, I always do, but as David shoves me into a recess, I have to ask myself: At what cost? I’ll escape with my life—if you can call it that—but what might this do to my mind?
    In the recess is a fire door partially blocked by a stack of wooden pallets, and the lilac of a UV insect zapper glows from a small, wire-mesh window. David presses me against a narrow wall, his forearm across my neck, pushing my chin high. He’s breathing fast, his eyes are wild, and that faint scab on his cheekbone gleams in the purplish half-light.
    “Test run, eh?” He covers my breast with his free hand, pummeling through my toga. “You like that?” he asks. “You like it when guys touch you there?”
    “Yes,” I whisper.
    David grins and I note he has excellent teeth. “Well, listen up,” he says. “It’s not about what you want. You’re a whore, see? Just a cheap little whore, so no one gives a fuck whether you like it or not.” His eyes are fixed on mine and he fluffsup the skirts of my gown, pinning the folds back with a thigh until he can reach between my legs. “Okay?”
    I nod. David rubs briskly at my underwear, fingers sawing before he pushes the fabric deeper into my wet split, separating me there. His forearm leans harder against my neck and he moves his face closer to mine as if to better gauge my response. I feel weak in every limb, so aroused I might melt to the floor. After all those hours on my pedestal, a remote and frozen beauty, untouchable