THE DISCOVERY (THE ART OF PERFECT PREPARATION)

Eleven days had passed since the first night.

Eleven days in which Marc had barely slept more than three hours at a time. The cage was no longer an object: it was a constant presence, a steel bite reminding him with every step, every brush of fabric, that his cock no longer belonged to him. His foreskin had grown used to the metallic friction, but his balls were still swollen, sensitive, a purplish color that hurt even when he sat on the metro.

Antonio had written to him on Thursday at 7:14 p.m.:

“Tomorrow. 9:30 p.m. Small backpack. Only the cage under your clothes and the collar. Nothing else. If you’re late, don’t bother coming.”

Marc arrived at exactly 9:29 p.m. He stood in the entrance hall, trembling, with the feeling that everyone could see the collar under the high neck of his sweatshirt. When Antonio opened the door, immaculate as always in his black wool coat, he did not even smile. He only placed his hand on the back of Marc’s neck, harder than the first time, and guided him inside the house without saying a word.

As soon as the door closed, the air changed.

“Undress.”

Antonio’s voice was low, almost kind, but it contained absolute certainty: there was no turning back. Marc took off his clothes with clumsy fingers. The cage shone under the cold light of the playroom. Antonio looked at it for a second and nodded, satisfied.

“Good. It’s already marking your skin. I like that.”

What came next was slower, deeper and crueler than the first time.

Antonio did not tie him up immediately. First he made him kneel in the center of the room, on the bare concrete. He put the 22 mm gag in without warning, pushing it in until Marc’s jaw cracked as it opened to its maximum. He tightened the straps two holes more than necessary. The boy’s eyes instantly filled with tears.

“Breathe through your nose,” he ordered while putting the clamps on his nipples. This time he did not adjust them little by little: he snapped them shut. Marc let out a muffled, long, animal moan. The weight of the chain pulled downward and every breath was an electric stab that went down to his groin.

Antonio sat in the leather chair in front of him and watched him for almost ten minutes without touching him. He only looked at him. Marc felt that gaze as if it were peeling his skin off. The humiliation was so dense he could almost chew it.

“You look more handsome like this,” Antonio finally said, with that cultured and calm voice that contrasted brutally with the scene. “With drool falling down your chest and red eyes. That is your true face, Marc. The one you should always have.”

He got up, took off his sweater and shirt with precise movements. His fifty-three-year-old body was well trained, but that was not what imposed itself. It was the calm. The certainty of someone who has spent years doing exactly the same thing with...