Gemma woke up the following morning, felt how hungover she was, drank a glass of water, shut the blinds and went back to sleep with the covers pulled over her head.

By the time she felt okay enough to be vertical again, it was noonish. Rachelle hadn’t texted her, and she hoped her friend was ok, but couldn’t remember why she was worried. The previous night was a blur after about cocktail #3 at the staff party—Gemma was half surprised she’d woken up in her own bed. And she’d woken up wearing headphones, like she’d decided to listen to music once she’d got back to her room. Ah, well, whatever. She’d done way stupider things after a big night.

Now the day was getting away from her, and, hangover or not, that wouldn’t do. The beach was waiting, and she wanted to get her tan on. It was another perfect sunny day as she climbed into one of the big canvas chairs, though the beach was busy and she couldn’t get a spot as far from the bustle as she would’ve liked.

Before she got too comfy, she checked her phone. She’d sent Rachelle a couple more texts, just to make sure, and her friend had finally replied.

Awesome time last night!! Thanks for coming!

Ok, then. Gemma let go of the nebulous worry she’d had about Rachelle and got serious about her tan. She opened the resort’s special music app, remembering how enjoyable their mix had been the first time… and was surprised to see it was on Track 6 of the playlist, when she’d only tanned to Track 1 the day before.

She thought back to the headphones she was still wearing when she’d awakened that morning. It seemed a waste to have listened to music meant for tanning while she slept through the night indoors, but there were fifteen tracks on the playlist. She could always go back to the ones she’d missed if she wanted.

Gemma hit Play on Track 6 and lay back, eyes closed behind her sunglasses, letting the warmth and the music both soak deep into her body.

She was drifting in a strange, erotic dream. Was she still on the beach? She could hear the surf and voices, but they didn’t matter. What mattered were the bodies—hot, naked men’s bodies—and how they were touching her, and how she was touching them. How their cocks felt thrusting into her and how it just felt so right to suck and fuck, and how she couldn’t help touching herself all over when she thought about serving and pleasing these men. Men who had no faces or names, but she knew, with the nonrational certainty of dreams, that they were Owners.

And Owners were important. Owners made the rules. Owners were the focus of all her desire.

And she had so much desire…

Gemma came to when the voice told her it was time to turn over, and she realized what she’d been fantasizing right there on the beach. She grew hot with embarrassment on top of the heat of the sun and the heat… elsewhere. As she flipped onto her front, she could tell she was soaking wet under her bikini bottoms and once again cursed the fact she couldn’t find a more secluded spot to tan in. Of all the bad times to have such a sexy fucking dream…

It left her horny like dreams rarely did, too. Lying on her front, as the music flowed over and through her, was a sweet sort of torture. The most sensitive parts of her body were now pressed against the rough canvas and it was all she could do to keep herself from humping the fabric… how would that look to the other tourists on the beach? But she was so close to just arching her ass up so she could reach between her legs and take the edge off.

The thought of masturbating in public, especially in such a vulnerable pose, should have chilled her arousal. But it didn’t. In fact, another realization took precedence, far more frightening. And it didn’t cool her down, either:

Gemma couldn’t move.

It wasn’t just that she wanted to avoid rubbing against the canvas or fingerfucking herself in public; she tried to adjust her position and found her body was locked in place. It simply wouldn’t listen to her.

What the fuck is going on??

In a moment she’d gone from desperate not to be noticed to wanting to call out for help, but she couldn’t speak. She was trapped in her own body, and only the throbbing arousal interrupting her thoughts kept the terror that filled her blunted.

Gemma struggled, but you wouldn’t have known it to look at her. For a moment the music in her ears loomed into the centre of her awareness, and just as she was wondering if it could somehow have something to do with her sudden paralysis, she felt an orgasm build between her legs and explode up through her whole body. That body, however, hardly twitched, and no one could have heard the tiny moan that escaped.

And Gemma failed to be embarrassed by this involuntary climax, because, as soon as she came, her mind went utterly blank.

She woke in her bed, with no memory of how she’d gotten there, for the second time in 24 hours. This would have worried Gemma, but the only thing she could think about was the pulsing between her legs. She forgot to recollect her time tanning and the strange paralysis that had gripped her; all that mattered was touching and squeezing and rubbing her naked body. She’d ditched her bikini near the door of the room. The first orgasm came quickly, but that wasn’t enough for her, not today. She slid two fingers into her cunt, driven even deeper into squirming lust by the sound of how wet she was, and she didn’t care if the neighbours heard her moan as she threw her head back on the pillow and fucked her hand til she came again.

And it still wasn’t enough. She got on all fours and stuck her ass in the air, wiggling back and forth like she was begging an Owner A what? Ohhhfuck… that’s so good to grab her and ram her from behind. But all she had were her fingers, her travel vibe was still in her suitcase and damned if she was going to stop touching long enough to get it.

As she approached the next orgasm, Gemma buried her face between the pillows. The wired headphones in her ears ran down to the resort’s music player, and its screen now read Track 10.

Gemma woke the next morning feeling blissful. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept so deeply and so well.

She couldn’t remember being paralyzed and tormented by strange sexual fantasies while suntanning, either. The past few days had blurred together into a pleasant haze of vacation. Gemma dug the music player out from between the pillows and made her bed, humming happily to herself.

It was another perfect sunny morning and she couldn’t wait to get her tan on. Only a ravenous hunger convinced her to stop at the breakfast buffet before she hit the beach.

Today’s lounge chair was nice and secluded and she lay back, her skin slick with tanning oil and already warmed by the tropical sun. The music player was offering a new playlist, which it claimed had special selections just for her, though she assumed it told that to everyone. Gemma shut her eyes behind her shades and sank into the music, plunging into the delicious dream of heat that wasn’t just the hot sun on her body. Another fire, this one of arousal, was already growing deep inside her and she gave herself up to it with a little moan.

If anyone on the beach could see her squirm, or surrender to the need to slide her hands under her bikini and rub in time to the bewitching music, Gemma was far too deep in her trance to care. The music transported her far away, to an indistinct dreamscape where she knelt and posed and squirmed on a huge white bed, while men admired and ogled and photographed and touched and handled and fucked her.

She couldn’t see any of their faces, but it didn’t matter. Lost in a haze, she cared only for their hot muscular bodies, warm, hard, lusting, needing her. She’d never felt like such a sexual object in her life, and it was beyond wonderful.

Her bikini bottoms were soaked by the time she rose from the canvas lounge chair and drifted like a sleepwalker towards the promenade of townhouses where the guests, staff, and Owners stayed. Her obvious arousal would have embarrassed her, but, also like a sleepwalker, she thought of nothing but her erotic dreams. Her eyes were wide and glassy behind her mirrored sunglasses, the music whispering promises of pleasure into her receptive brain.

Gemma entered the unfamiliar townhouse without a thought in her head—a thought like, What am I doing here? The door was unlocked, and the interior was posh, luxuriously decorated in a way not even the most expensive guest suites were. She knew without it reaching her drowsy consciousness that this must be an Owner’s house and this was where she belonged. As she crossed the threshold of the doorway, she also knew she was crossing another sort of threshold, one she could never return from, and part of her was giddy, excited. And wet.

How much time passed before the trance lifted? Gemma didn’t know. She didn’t remember kneeling on the floor at the edge of the plush throw rug in the middle of the big living room. Her mind felt soft and dreamy, and she understood the music she’d been tanning to for days, the music Rachelle had given her, was somehow to blame. Where was Rachelle, and what the hell had she gotten Gemma into? She wasn’t just dreamy and horny. Somehow, the music seemed to choke off her free will. She hadn’t chosen to leave the beach, hadn’t chosen to come here, certainly hadn’t chosen to kneel on the floor, but she couldn’t resist the compulsion to do those things and, worse, couldn’t muster up the strength to do anything else.

Like stand up.

Like get out of this room and shut the door quietly, hoping whoever lived here never noticed her trespassing.

Like hire the first cab to the airport she could and get the fuck back home. She could always buy new clothes; she’d just grab her passport and go.

Someone was coming down the stairs. It was a man: tall, dark, muscular tattooed arms in a simple white t-shirt, swim trunks, barefoot. He was wearing sunglasses, fresh from the upstairs balcony. He came down the stairs, looking Gemma over like he had all the time in the world, knowing she wouldn’t run or scream or even complain her legs were getting sore. Somehow, Gemma knew she wouldn’t say a word until she was told. Inside her head, she whimpered in despair.

The guy stood on the rug looking down at her, curling his toes in the plush material as if to rub it in that she was kneeling on polished concrete. He took off his shades, hung one arm in the neck of his shirt. He had arresting eyes, Gemma saw, in a chiseled face. She felt her body respond to him and hated herself through her confusion; she should be terrified of this guy, not turned on, no matter how hot he was.

He kept looking at her like he was drinking his fill, then pulled a phone from the pocket of his trunks, dialled, and held it to his ear. After a moment, he spoke, looking away over Gemma’s head.

He knew she would not move. And though she tried, or thought she was trying, she didn’t. Her body felt heavy, tingly, drugged. Was she drugged? Had Rachelle given her something, somehow, along with the music? It was crazy to think sound alone could hijack her like this…

“Yeah, the new material’s come in. Meet me at the place and we’ll make sure it’s the stuff we want.

“Yeah, Number Seven’s friend. Bring her along, too.”

Number Seven? Does he mean Rachelle?

The guy crouched down, so he was eye level with Gemma, only a foot away. He looked awfully fucking pleased with himself, and she wanted nothing more than to stick her thumbs in his eye sockets. Through the haze of inappropriate arousal the music, or drugs, or whatever was pouring into her, a chill of fear went down her spine when he spoke to her.

“You must be pretty confused right now, cutie. Try to relax. Your friend’s gonna be here soon, and she’ll help you. This is like a job interview, kind of, but don’t worry, you’re gonna do great.

“I’m Sonny, by the way. My business partner’s Ty. He’ll be joining us soon, too. This resort is our place and we kind of have to do all the ‘interviews’ ourselves. Just a quirk of our hiring process, you know?” Sonny smiled at what was clearly some sort of inside joke. But Gemma wondered. Did this guy Own this place? Like, not just the condo, but the whole resort?

She considered him. Couldn’t be that much older than she was, but he was an Owner? A surprising shiver hummed through Gemma’s body as she thought that word. Owner. What the hell was happening to her? What the hell was this guy doing to her, since he seemed to know exactly what was going on? It drove her crazy that she couldn’t even ask the fucker how he was controlling her body like this.

Sonny rose to his feet, went to a cabinet, and took out a pair of headphones. Unlike the little wireless earbuds Gemma had almost forgotten were still pumping music into her head, these were big and sturdy, over-the-ear headphones in a muted champagne colour. They looked heavy, expensive. He crouched in front of Gemma again, holding the headphones up between them.

“I’m gonna swap out what you’re listening to for something a little stronger. It’ll help pass the time until Ty and Seven get here… and it’ll help after that, too.”

Gemma tensed, as much as she could within the strange paralysis. Was he going to take her earbuds out? He’d have to, to put the big headphones on. She assumed once those big cups were firmly over her ears, whatever hold they had on her would get even stronger. Her heart was racing, and even though it was in part because Sonny’s closeness made her pussy wet, she also knew this was her one chance. If the silence released her from the music’s hold for just a few seconds…

“Now, you’re gonna behave while I switch out your headphones, right, babe? Just stay perfectly still, like you are right now. You gonna do that for me?”

She could feel the rage hot on her cheeks. She wondered if he could see it in her eyes, hoped not. It would be better if he didn’t see it coming. She prayed she could take him by surprise, just for a second, knock him on his ass…

“In fact, you’ll do what your Owner says, won’t you, cutie?”

The words thrummed through Gemma’s head, louder than the music. More important. Nothing could be more important.

“Yes, Owner.”

Did I really just say that? It was a strange sensation, hearing herself speak without even thinking of what to say.

“Good girl. Don’t move.”

And Gemma knew, her heart sinking even as her pussy tingled, that she would do as she was told.

There was a moment of quiet—blissful, thunderous quiet—when Sonny took the earbuds out. It should have been the sweetest sound Gemma ever heard, the moment where she made her move, escaped this goddamn place and whatever the fuck was going on here.

But she didn’t move. She did as she was told. Her own words—“Yes, Owner”—echoed in her head, making her feel helpless and humiliated.

Then there was the tight closeness of the headphones as the soft pads closed around her ears. The total silence of active noise cancellation, as even the rustle of Sonny, as he made sure the headphones were secure over her hair, faded away.

Gemma didn’t move, just like he’d told her. And then it was too late.

The new music wasn’t loud, but it was deep. The headphones were excellent, the sound much richer and more complex than what her earbuds could produce. The midrange tones captured her attention, and, moments later, she felt the building throb of the bass coursing through her body. What had been like a strange paralysis, a lack of volition, became a deep and profound relaxation, like she was falling asleep with her eyes open. Sonny was walking away from her, she hoped to occupy himself with something else until the others arrived. Gemma was aware of him receding across the room, and then her mind went completely blank.