ASHLEY'S MISTAKE

by Pixie Isobella (2023).

The effects had been minor at first. And then the full calamity had burst in upon her.

Smiling, the man across the desk took the shirt from Ashley’s unresisting hands.

‘Thank you for taking your shirt off, darling,’ he said, smiling. ‘I’ll take that. You won’t be needing it anymore.’

Ashley tried to resist the urge to obey him. She was unsuccessful. I am a puppet, she thought, horrified. She had tried to disobey his orders. She had tried to stop her arms from unbuttoning her shirt. But now her shirt was gone and her bra-clad breasts were fully on display for the smiling stranger opposite her.

How is this even happening?

Ashley knew it must have been the tea. Nothing else made any sense. She sat in the interview chair, feeling like a hunted animal. Only now, too late, did the bitter undertaste in the hot drink make some kind of bizarre sense.

Her breath came fast and heavy as if she had been running. Without her shirt, her breasts felt so very exposed. She wished she could stop the man seated across the desk from looking at her exposed boobs with such a knowing look in his eyes.

‘No,’ he said bluntly, as if he had guessed what was in her thoughts. ‘You’re a toy now. That phone call I just made was to your new owner. He’s on his way here as we speak.’ The man smiled at her. ‘Have another sip of your tea, darling. We do need to have you on your best behaviour. Don’t we?’

Unable to stop herself from obeying him, Ashley reached out and lifted the cup to her lips. She took a sip and swallowed, feeling like a traitor to herself. The warm, bitter milky tea ran down her throat, and she wanted to cry.

I am trapped and I have no idea how to escape.

‘Good.’ The man’s voice was approving. Ashley hated how the approbation in the man’s voice made her flush with pleasure. He kept speaking. ‘I suggest you do your best to please your new owner. I’ve heard he can be…’ he paused, as if choosing his words carefully, then continued, ‘harsh, let us say, with those who displease him.’

Ashley was silent. The man hadn’t given her permission to speak, after all.

He shrugged. ‘It’s up to you. I recommend you try to be as sweet and obedient as possible.’

Only half an hour earlier, seated in the foyer of Chalice Corporation, Ashley had been so very bored. Waiting for her ‘job interview’ in what was most certainly a colossal waste of her time as an officer in the local police force.

Her first chance at undercover work, she had wanted to blend in. She had wanted Chalice to think she was just a regular job candidate. A regular person desperate to be accepted into their tedious slice of the corporate world. She had accepted the offer of a cup of tea without thought, smiling at the receptionist who had handed it to her.

This is why, she thought later, ruefully, furiously. This is why we don’t let non-specialist police officers go undercover on dangerous operations.

Her division at the local law enforcement knew that something was odd about Chalice Corporation. They had sent her inside undercover to investigate. In the guise of a desperate college graduate, she had responded to a job application, pretending to be seeking basic professional work. She had received a text message inviting her for an interview almost immediately - later on the same day, in fact.

Chalice Corporation had only been in town for a few months. They didn’t seem to have a fixed office. They would run intense recruitment blitzes from plush hotels, at which no-one ever seemed to get hired. Afterwards, some candidates seemed to go missing. Ashley’s bosses suspected tax fraud or money laundering or some kind of immigration racket.

Ashley herself had thought it was a storm in a teacup but she was also just glad to get out of the station. She had jumped at the chance to spend some time away from the bullies who made her every day a living nightmare.

In retrospect, she realised she had possibly been too quick to say yes. This task ought to have been a plum assignment for a more popular officer. She should have asked more questions about why it was being assigned to her.

‘We can’t put a wire on you,’ her superior had said. ‘We know they run the candidates through a metal detector. Just keep your eyes peeled in there and don’t agree to anything. You can do that, can’t you?’

The snide tone in his voice had made Ashley feel disobedient and disrespectful.

I should have listened, she later thought with some regret. Don’t agree to anything, Ashley, you clown. Don’t say fucking yes, when they offer you the tea that everyone else is drinking.

Ashley drank the tea that was offered to her, wondering at the odd bitter taste. But all the other candidates were sipping either it or the coffee brought to them by the pretty desk staff in the same ornate gold and blue teacups.

She hadn’t noticed the odd effects immediately. She had felt strangely flushed and warm, as if she was being heated from inside, but she hadn’t thought anything about it. After all, she was undercover in a sting operation that should probably have been handed over to a federal agency to handle. Some nerves were inevitable.

She kept repeating her mantra to herself. Get in. Do a job interview for a minor administration position I could do in my sleep. Get out. Write a good report. Prove to my superiors that I’m good at this job. That had been the plan. But she should have known by now that she couldn’t win.

Ashley’s name was called out after almost 45 minutes of watching other candidates get called. Most of them came back out looking disappointed within 10 to 15 minutes. There were a few exceptions. An arrogant white man in his thirties who thought he was attractive didn’t come back out. Neither did an athletic woman about Ashley’s age who had the look of a university postgraduate seeking part-time work to cover the bills. A plump woman in her forties with dark red hair and a beautiful smile also didn’t return.

Ashley shrugged to herself. She didn’t understand business recruitment practices but she figured it was normal to have a multi-step interview process. Presumably those people were going through to the next stage. She didn’t understand why they were considering the arrogant bloke, though. He would make everyone working with him miserable and do less work.

‘Ashley Trentham.’

It was one of the pretty desk staff calling her name. This one was a cute younger woman with dark goth-style lipstick and bobbed straight hair dyed almost perfectly white. Ashley rose, slinging her handbag over her shoulder and walked across, holding out her hand and smiling. The woman led her through into the interior of the hotel, along some bland corridors and - yes, here it was - through a metal detection check.

‘Sorry about this,’ the woman murmured. ‘We had a bad experience and now the CEO insists.’

Ashley shrugged. ‘No skin off my nose,’ she said, trying to seem compliant and normal.

I am a safe, reliable, polite person that anyone would want to hire to move pieces of paper across the desk and occasionally mend the photocopiers. I am harmless. You can hire me.

She left her handbag and jacket behind in a cloak room and then the woman ushered her into the interview room. A man and a woman, both in their thirties or early forties were waiting for her.

‘Just a couple of preliminary questions to confirm some basics,’ said the man, who introduced himself as Brandon. ‘And then we’ll get started properly.’ His smile was confident, with an odd laughter glimmering inside his eyes. ‘I can call you Ashley, right?’

‘Yes, sure,’ nodded Ashley. ‘Ashley is fine.’

‘Such a lovely name,’ the woman said, the same odd laughter lurking in her face. She had told Ashley to call her Moira.

These people are weird, thought Ashley to herself. Whatever.

‘Did you enjoy the tea?’ asked Moira, placing another full cup in front of Ashley. ‘We get it made specially for our candidates. Why don’t you drink some more?’

‘Yes, Ma’am,’ Ashley replied, wondering where this was going. She didn’t really want any more - the bitter flavour had started to get to her - but she found herself reaching out to lift the cup and drink anyway. ‘Thank you.’

‘Good,’ said Brandon. ‘Very good. Do you notice any side effects?’ he asked. ‘Do you feel the same as normal?’

The question puzzled Ashley, though not as much as it might have puzzled her an hour earlier. ‘I…’ she stopped and started again.

I feel fine, she tried to say. Can we please start the interview?

Instead, she heard her mouth saying, much more honestly, ‘I feel… fine? A bit hot. Warm, you know? Like I’m burning up from inside.’

‘Oh that’s good,’ said Brandon, his voice rich and warm almost as if in congratulation. ‘That’s excellent, my dear. You’re responding well.’ He grinned, the glimmer of teeth in his mouth seeming suddenly shark-like. ‘Last question, then we’ll get you started properly.’ He turned to the woman. ‘Would you like to do the honours, Moira?’

‘Of course, Brandon,’ she said, winking at him and turning back to Ashley.

These people are really strange, thought Ashley. Though I don’t know how I can put that in a report. ‘Oh yes. They fed me tea and were overly concerned about whether I liked it or not. He called me ‘my dear’. Probably they have an internal harassment problem.’

‘Are you listening, Ashley?’ Moira asked, her eyes focusing on Ashley. ‘This question is important.’

‘Yes, Ma’am,’ Ashley said, jerking her attention back to the room.

She was starting to feel really hot, uncomfortably so, and she wondered if she was coming down with a virus. Her breasts felt hot and overly large inside her bra and white interview shirt. She was embarrassed to realise that her pussy was tingling hopefully, needily. She knew if she put a hand between her legs, she would be wet and aroused.

Fuck, what is wrong with me?

‘That’s good,’ the woman said. ‘Please always listen. Focus and attention is key to your new path. Now… Last question. Do you prefer women or men? In bed, I mean. Sexually. To fuck.’

Ashley blinked at her in surprise, trying to understand the question. *What the hell was going on? What kind of operation were these people running anyway? Or maybe she was hallucinating?*

‘You seem to be having some difficulty.’ Moira smiled at her kindly. ‘That’s not unusual. Let me re-phrase it to make it easier for you. Would you rather use your mouth and fingers on a woman, helping a female partner cum, her soft body writhing deliciously before you? Or would you rather lie back, legs spread in missionary position with a large dick grinding away inside your sweet little cunt?’

The woman smiled at her again, a cruel little smile, while Ashley gaped at her in shock at the crude words. Moira kept speaking when Ashley didn’t respond immediately.

‘A response is compulsory, my dear. I am waiting for your answer.’

Ashley flushed, unable to believe the question. But also, unbelievably, embarrassingly, she heard herself answering. She tried to stop herself speaking but, horrifyingly, she couldn’t. It was like another part of her took over, making her answer honestly.

‘I can go both ways,’ she said in her clear, pleasant voice. ‘I like women. They’re fun. I’m probably more into men at the moment. Dicks feel good inside me, you know? Unless he’s an asshole of course.’ She cleared her throat, trying to clear her head. ‘Why are you asking me this?’

‘Oh, you’re a curious one,’ Moira tittered and smiled at her, showing a little slip of predatory teeth. ‘We’ll have to train that out of you, won’t we, my dear? Anyway, that was a pretty clear answer. Men it is then.’

The woman sighed as if in disappointment. Then she giggled, pressing her lips together tightly, the sound halfway between cruelty and genuine amusement. ‘You have made your choice. Most of the men you’ll get here will be assholes, I’m afraid. But you also won’t care after a while.’

Moira rose from behind the desk, her eyes slipping down over Ashley’s body in a way that made her feel distinctly under-dressed. ‘I’m sure you’re going to be a success.’ Her eyes rested on Ashley’s breasts. ‘Lovely assets.’ She smiled at Ashley again as she pushed her chair back to leave.

‘I’ll leave you in Brandon’s capable hands. Have fun learning to obey, my dear.’