PREFACE

 

Without her handbag a woman feels she is immediately at a disadvantage; maybe being without money, credit cards, personal effects, memories or mementos makes her feel a little lost and helpless. Worse, without clothes a woman loses all of her identity, her camouflage; she has no image to project to the outside world, she has nothing. She is totally vulnerable and helpless. Tabitha had neither her bag nor her clothes.

Being naked with a lover or husband is often sensual, exciting; being naked in a bath is wonderfully relaxing. In a doctor's surgery it can be embarrassing but is largely clinical, and it is possible, indeed it is necessary to endure, as there is a purpose to the shame and indignity. However, there was no benefit to Tabitha being naked as she was now; it was almost impossible to endure - yet somehow she must. She stood undressed, stark naked before strangers, harsh men and women who didn't care one jot whether she lived or died, people who could cause her such pain. These people, these awful horrid people, stood fully clothed, eyeing her exposed body with cold yet excited eyes, making her feel even more shamed and vulnerable. It wasn't helped by the fact that she had to stand unmoving before them, hands clasped to her head as if she was a prisoner of war, allowing their lustful eyes to roam at will over the hollows and curves that she so longed to cover. Totally helpless and exposed, her fate and future were in the hands of her captors; she was controlled by people who hated and despised her, wanting only her suffering.

She knew she would do anything, absolutely anything, for them if only she could avoid this, avoid them hurting her as they had already demonstrated they could. She guessed, rightly, that this was the object of the exercise; to break her down, make her compliant. If only she could tell them that she'd obey, that she'd do anything they said and not cause any trouble - but she knew that talking was forbidden. Only suffering and humiliation were now allowed her.

How, she pondered, had this happened? How had she come to be in this awful predicament?

 

CHAPTER 1

 

Hours earlier, Tabitha luxuriated as the hot Mediterranean sun wrapped her lithe, tanned body in its warm golden rays. She stretched, moving outside the shade of the parasol for a few minutes to alternate her tan. The reassuring touch of Pete's hand draped casually across the small of her back, a couple of fingers splayed across her bottom, added to her contentment. She knew from the number of compliments she normally received, not least the many admiring glances afforded her on this welcome Greek break, that she had a good body. This year she had dared to expose more of it than usual with a thin pink thong, the strap of which covered her intimacies whilst cleaving between the cheeks to leave much of her perfectly proportioned bottom on view. The small top clinging to her smooth shoulders beneath her fan of tousled blonde hair simply uplifted her 36B boobs, which were perfectly shaped for a woman of twenty-four.

The feel of Pete's hand across her bottom also gave her a secret thrill of pleasure. She loved him and it showed others that she was with him, allowing her to tantalisingly expose her body a little bit, secure in the knowledge that none could take advantage, that Pete was there, she was his. That evening she knew that she would end up wrapped in his arms in bed, their nude bodies locked together... and then his hands would do a lot more than just rest on her bottom.

She remembered last night - and the night before that - when his hands and lips had explored almost every square inch of her trembling body, inside and out. His tongue had circled her nipples into two hard peaks of desire, then travelled down to the demanding liquid heat between her legs, lapping delightfully and thoroughly before he replaced his tongue with something else. Her shiver of pleasure was involuntary. This was, she decided, heaven; she was with Pete relaxing in the sun and in the company of her friend Lucy and her boyfriend. Could life get any better, she wondered?

 

 

"Refill, please."

Hassan, the teenage Arab barman, controlled his temper and his excitement of anticipation as he answered yet another curt summons from one of the Western tourists on the holiday resort hidden away in the tiny Greek island. She was a brown-haired beauty in her mid twenties wearing a skimpy bikini, brusquely demanding that her cocktail be freshened up. Because of her beauty he could almost overlook her demeaning attitude. He knew that his time would come.

He knew that he looked streetwise; a bit like a skinny young thug, he had been told. Even his attempts to grow a moustache to enhance his years did little to alter that, and so the likelihood of any of these rich Western bitches finding him attractive was remote. However, soon he would call the shots; he smiled inwardly in lurid anticipation.

Lately he had been trying to memorise the names of the most beautiful of the holidaymakers. This one was called Lucy, he recalled. She was English as was her friend, the even lovelier (if that were possible) blonde Tabitha. Her lush good looks made it easy to recall her name. Both Western women were delicious, making his young loins stir in frustration. However, he knew that they were presently out of bounds to him. If he allowed his feelings to come to the fore and made any kind of play for them, they would squeal away to their boyfriends, who would probably come on all macho, cause a disturbance, and possibly even ruin the plans he and his Father had for them.

"Hurry up, boy, stop daydreaming! You don't want to keep a lady waiting if you want to keep your job. And I can make pretty damn sure that you lose it, you know," another voice snapped out tartly.

He ground his teeth again as a woman in her late thirties, an English television presenter, Carol, threw her weight around, snapping her fingers for another drink. She too was very easy on the eyes for her age but treated him like dirt before the others. To ease his anger he tried to imagine what it would be like to rip the clothes from her supple body, break her and have her begging to fuck him. Maybe sometime, sometime soon, he would be able to indulge that fantasy.

Casting a final glance at Tabitha's blonde loveliness and the two perfect spheres of her bottom divided by the tiny coloured strip of the thong, he walked toward Carol with his tray.

He knew he ought to feel grateful as he allowed his furtive, excited eyes to sneak over the gleaming length of the many bodies, following the delicious curved spines to the delightful swelling of hindquarters where they lay on sun-beds with partners or husband and friends. Yet these Westerners treated him like dirt and he knew that if his glance so much as lingered too long on their enticing and beckoning curves, or if he dared to answer their curtness with the equal rudeness it demanded, it would cost him his job. Yet what did he really care? He knew the sham would soon be over and then would come payback time, when he would make these arrogant cows pay.

 

***

 

After a healthy salad lunch washed down with cold orange juice, Tabitha decided she would have a chilled white wine to take advantage of the 'all-inclusive' terms of their holiday. Then she would spend the last few hours of the afternoon reading a magazine and maybe dozing. She had already read the papers but much of it was boring stuff like a war somewhere, or about the Americans launching two new Star-war spy satellites, which could apparently zap targets from space. If she had liked science fiction she would have bought a book on the theme, she thought, throwing the paper aside with bored disdain.

She looked around for the barman, Hassan, she just about managed to recall that was his name, who had always been around whenever she raised a hand for service. To her irritation the boy was nowhere in sight, and then she realised that she hadn't seen him for an hour or so since lunch. Sometimes he gave her the creeps, with his small eyes seeming to peel the clothes from her body whilst almost laughing at some joke known only to him. If he dared to say anything or even try to lay one hand on her... Still, she supposed he had his uses - to make her holiday even more relaxing. She sighed, not yet realising that the delay in being served would be only a minor blot on the horizon of paradise, a blot which was about to get infinitely and frighteningly worse.