The Nude Marathoner 1: Seduction

Part One: Seduction

Jonah stared out his office window over the city, the warm sunlight of the summer afternoon glinting off the traffic below him. One more day, he thought to himself, and I can kick back for two whole days of doing absolutely nothing for the first time in months. An athletic business administrator in his late twenties, Jonah was a rising star in the company; his time was so very rarely his own and it was beginning to wear on him. As if on cue to tell him the world had other plans yet again, he was brought back to reality in the form of his occasional date-mate and head of the secretarial pool, Suzie, who poked her head through his office door and flashed a 1000-megawatt smile in his direction. “Got a second?” she implored.

Tearing himself wistfully away from his musings, Jonah turned and took a couple of steps toward the beautiful blonde and returned her gaze with a weak smile of his own. “Sure. What do you need, kiddo?”

She approached him with a stride that was a perfectly seductive combination of apology, sympathy and sensual authority. “Did you hear what happened to Chris last night?” She was dressed in a smart blue silk blouse and a soft, flowing skirt that positively wafted as she crossed the space between them.

The young man shook his head, and allowed Suzie to grip his forearm with both her hands in a pleasantly familiar intimacy. Her touch was both tender and consoling as her mood darkened with the delivery of unhappy news. “His bike got sideswiped last night, and he’s broken his ankle.”

“Oh, Jeez. That’s terrible. Well, I guess, on the bright side: car versus bike rider, it could’ve been a whole lot worse,” he mused, already beginning to calculate how this might affect the office dynamic and for how long. “I suppose he should rest at home for a few days, hmmm?”

She nodded ruefully, then gripped him a bit tighter as she came to her most urgent point. “Of course. That goes without saying. But . . . the thing of it is . . . he was supposed to be running in the cancer charity marathon on Saturday morning.”

Instantly sensing more to this announcement and that it somehow was going to involve his own weekend, Jonah freed himself from her tightening fingers and moved to sit down behind his desk, using it as a shield against what he felt would be coming.

Suzie waited patiently for him to settle in, then slid herself morosely into one of his guest chairs. After a moment’s silence, she let her face descend toward her waiting palms and began earnestly. “The worst of it . . . he was part of a select group of runners chosen to participate in the special promotional team for that new Sun Tanners SPF 80 tanning spray. The company is donating $1000 to skin cancer treatment for every verified mile run by every team member, and $4000 if they finish. That’s $30,000 per finisher.”

Jonah had heard about this earlier, but had not really paid much attention to it. He was of the opinion that exercise was exercise and charity was charity, and mixing them was one of the things wrong with how people thought about things these days. Trying to suppress his personal views, he focused on being sensitive to the feelings of the gorgeous blonde sitting across from him. “That’s a lot of money,” he mumbled.

“I know!” she blurted out, raising her eyes up to meet his soft gaze once more. “They went through a whole vetting process to select a range of people from all walks of life that they knew were most likely going to finish. Chris is so upset about it all. His uncle died of melanoma and he wanted to help out in his memory. The company is really hot to make a big show of supporting treatment, since their research claims their new spray can make a huge difference in prevention for sunbathers and swimmers. They told Chris that, since none of the alternate runners are connected with him, they can’t put his uncle’s name on the donation list.”

That really IS too bad, Jonah thought to himself. His gaze held hers for an instant, and he let his eyes soften in genuine support for how much this news was affecting his sometime girlfriend and co-worker.

She sensed him relax, and suddenly brightened. “You used to run track in high school, didn’t you?”

“Mm-hmm. And two years in college, until the workload got too much,” he found himself admitting, letting his pride get the better of his caution.

She nearly jumped out of her chair, and moved to the front edge of his desk, planting her palms on the wooden surface, and leaning in toward him with equal measures of hope, inspiration and sensuality.

It was her fragrance that hit him first. Her sudden, impassioned lunge forward had sent a cloud of her scent straight across his desk and into his face. Taking in a breath instinctively as she approached him, his lungs filled with the perfume his mind registered as the one he had always said he found most appealing whenever she wore it. She let the fragrance work its magic for a moment, then spoke with muted authority. “I’ll bet if you substituted for him, they’d let you do it for his uncle’s memory. You’re fit. You’re a runner. You’re close enough to Chris. How could they refuse you?”

He slowly exhaled, and let the pieces of this little puzzle all fall into place in his conscious mind at last. So that’s what she’s after, he concluded silently. There goes my relaxing weekend. “You want me to run a marathon Saturday morning? That’s less than forty-eight hours away. All I could do would be a big stretch out tomorrow after work.”

She leaned in even closer, letting her long golden hair spill across the papers in front of him and her full breasts stretch against the soft satin of her blouse. She sighed deeply, letting the air from her mouth caress the skin of his cheeks enchantingly. “My darling, I know exactly how fit you are. It would mean ever so much to me . . . and to Chris, of course.”

“Of course,” he echoed, trying hard to resist her. “I really had planned to . . .”

“Plans, plans, plans,” she chided ever so sweetly. “Perhaps we could make some . . . other plans.” She smiled her most devilishly slinky grin, letting her moist, full lips draw the two words out into about ten syllables.

They locked eyes for a long moment, and by the end of it, Jonah was hooked. Sighing himself in defeat, he smiled wanly at the temptress sprawled across his work. “What do you need me to do?”

“Don’t you worry about that. I’ll take care of the arrangements. I’ll even pick you up in a cab Saturday morning and deliver you to the hotel for registration. Say . . . six a.m.?”

“Fine.”

She stood back up, then twirled around and slid her bottom down onto the desk as if settling in like a contented Cheshire cat. His mind had begun to process what he would need to do to physically prepare for such a run, and he was startled that she seemed to have more to present to him. He raised his eyes again questioningly, and she cleared her throat before delivering the final bombshell.

“You’ll have to be naked.”

He blinked several times as if she had tossed a glass of cold water in his eyes, then finally managed to blurt out a response. “Excuse me?”

“You’ll be running the whole way in the nude. It’s part of the publicity stunt for the tanning spray. Their campaign is: ‘All you need is Sun Tanners.’ All forty members of the group have special permits to run the race completely naked. They even have a special clear rubberized treatment to apply to your feet so you don’t even need shoes. It’s all quite ingenious. For one point two million dollars to charity, the city said ‘Go for it!’”

“You’re kidding, right? You’re trying to punk me, hmm? That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard in . . . that’s just nuts!”

“Nope. I’m totally serious. Stark naked. Twenty six miles in broad daylight through the center of town. Utterly nude. All forty of you.”

“I can’t run naked through the streets. This is insane! There’ll be thousands of other runners, they won’t be naked, right? And the crowds . . . and the TV crews! I’m sorry. I mean, I’d like to help Chris and charity and all, but . . . Jeez!”

“I’ve seen the other runners. A hot, young stud like you will make quite an impression. If they’re not afraid to strip down, I can’t understand why you’d have a problem with it.”

“You can’t . . . are you serious?”

Suzie stopped talking and looked deeply into his eyes, realizing he would need just a bit more convincing, sensing that he was objecting just a bit too strenuously to be genuinely unwilling. She slid off the desk and moved around it to slip herself right into his lap and wrap her silk-clad arms around his neck with tender insistence, never losing eye contact with her prey the entire time.

“As I recall, you don’t normally have a problem with being naked. And, I certainly don’t have a problem with you being naked. You, my dear boy, are a lovely specimen of a man. And, completely nude, you’re even lovelier. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. To run stark naked through the streets, free and unashamed, and have people cheering and applauding you every step of the way! If you pass this up, I just may not want to speak to you again.” She paused a moment for effect. “On the other hand, if you do it, without any further fussing or resistance . . . well then . . . I will be ever so proud to know you. And very, very, very, very . . . appreciative.” As she spoke, she moved her face in toward his and let the last words echo right into his own gaping mouth as she melted into his lips for a gloriously passionate kiss. Her whole body slithered against his as she writhed in his lap, and he surrendered completely at last.

When she finally released his lips and straightened her back upright to look into his dreamy eyes, she knew she had succeeded. He managed a weak sigh, and no more than a whisper, “Fine. Whatever you want.”

She smiled broadly, gave him one last peck on the lips as a reward, then slid out of his lap and turned to leave. His eyes were transfixed on the sway of her glorious hips beneath the flowing pleats of her skirt as she strode to the hallway door. Flipping her long blonde tresses at him one last time, she threw him a radiant smile over her satin covered shoulder, then disappeared around the corner in a cloud of enchanting fragrance, of undeniable lust.

The next thirty-six hours passed for Jonah as if in a deep fog. It was as if he was outside of his own body, watching himself go through the motions of his work, and the basic tune-up routine of his exercise to prepare himself for running a full marathon. He ate, he slept, he shuffled papers, he conducted conversations, meetings, and phone calls, he stretched, he lifted light weights, he found Suzie at his front door, she was kissing him for luck, all in no particular or definable order . . . and suddenly, he awoke to find himself standing in the lobby of the hotel across from the starting area for the big run.

The young man looked around for a moment, trying to regain a sense of himself, and trying hard not to think about the fact that he was about to take off all of his clothes and run naked through the city streets. He swallowed hard, then bracing his spine upright, he marshaled a bit of false bravado sufficient to march to the reception desk and present himself to the hotel clerk.

“I’m here to check in for the run. I was told you had a room for me to change in?”

The clerk, oblivious to Jonah’s nerves and to how he stressed those last words, smiled politely and called up a list to her computer screen. “Of course, Sir. Name?”

“Jonah Richardson.” She scanned the list several times, and he noticed her face begin to form a tiny frown. He volunteered more information to assist her, “But I’m substituting for Christopher Harrier. He got in an accident and arranged for me to take his place.”

The clerk digested this as she continued her search, and found it at last to bear fruit. She allowed herself a brief triumphant smile, but then she darkened slightly. “Ah, yes, Sir. Here it is. But, we only have a record of Mr. Harrier’s cancellation. There’s nothing to indicate we should be saving the room, that you would be coming. I’m sorry. We gave it away last evening. We’re . . . we’re totally booked up now. This is our busy season.”

Jonah seemed almost relieved at this news, as if it was the world giving him a last second reprieve, a phone call from the Governor, as it were. He smiled a bit, but then thought he should press a bit just to satisfy Suzie, and cleared his throat to appear crestfallen and a bit annoyed. “That can’t be right. I’m part of the Sun Tanners team. It was supposed to have been arranged Thursday afternoon. It’s very important I run in the race.”

“I’m sure it is, Sir. I completely understand. But, we simply don’t have any rooms available.”

“But, I have to have a place to change. It was all supposed to be . . .”

“You say you’re with Sun Tanners?” She tried to hide a bit of a smirk as she finally realized that Jonah was to be one of the nude runners. “Their booth is right over there. Maybe she has your details with her paperwork.”

Jonah’s gaze followed the path of her pointed finger to see a Sun Tanners banner over a portable table covered by a satin sheet also sporting the ST logo. Behind the table sat a young brunette with bare shoulders, poring over some papers spread in front of her. His spirits sank deeper again as he realized the “last minute phone call” was apparently a wrong number. He flashed a wan smile to the hotel clerk, and dragged his feet across the lobby to speak with his disturbingly lovely executioner.

As Jonah lurched to the edge of the table, he noticed the young lady was even more attractive than he first thought, and that she appeared to be wearing nothing but a towel. She felt his presence, and looked up with a very, warm, inviting smile.

He hemmed and hawed a moment, then finally managed, “The clerk sent me over here. There seems to be some confusion about where I’m supposed to . . . get changed.”

She smiled even more warmly at how cute his nervousness made him, and she reached a hand out in greeting. “You’re one of our runners?” He took her warm, soft hand and melted even more. “Yes,” he struggled out softly.

“Well, then, let me introduce myself. I’m Charlene. I’ll be running myself today, as you can probably tell.” She extended her naked arms out to the sides as if to confirm she was essentially without covering. “You are . . .?”

“Hmmm? Oh, me. I’m Jonah. Jonah Richardson. My assistant Suzie arranged for me to replace Chris Harrier, who broke his ankle and can’t run.” He was so utterly flustered that the words poured out of him almost as if the sentences strung together as one long word in a foreign language.

Charlene’s heart softened further at the attractive young man’s undeniable shyness, and she reran the memory tape of his speech in her mind a couple of times to decode his message. Getting it at last, she gripped his hand again with her soft, reassuring fingers, and scanned her own list. Still smiling, she put the list down again, and looked deeply into his eyes.

“Well, you’re not on my list either. Isn’t it just the way it goes? You try so hard to do something for others, and there’s nothing but trouble getting it done. But, don’t worry. I can write you up right now, and make sure you get a proper wristband so you can run. Just relax. You’ve come to the right girl at last.”

Jonah smiled half-heartedly, and tried to ease his nerves by glancing around the lobby again. “They said they had given my - his - my room away, and there’s no place for me to . . .”

Charlene lifted her hand to catch his attention back toward her and grinned comfortably. ”Oh, don’t worry about that. You can get undressed and leave your stuff in my room. I mean, it’s not like either of us has to worry about sleeping or anything. Right?”

Jonah blanched and blurted out, “Sure. I mean, right. That . . . that sounds like it should work.”

The beautiful girl reached under her towel, produced a hotel key card and handed it to him. “Room 624. Just go right in, pick a drawer and take everything off. Watch, jewelry, everything. We all have to be completely, verifiably naked to make it official. When you’re done, just come on back down here and I’ll have everything ready to put on your wristband.”

Jonah took the card as if it were going to bite off his finger. “There’s some place we go to get the sun block applied?”

“That’s right. As soon as I verify that you are naked, I can attach your wristband and send you to meet the rest of the group. I have to wait here a bit. There’s still two stragglers I need to process besides you. Now, off you go. Room 624. Don’t worry about anything I’ve left in the room. Just do what you need to do and hurry back down.”

Jonah swallowed hard and felt as if there was no more delaying the inevitability of his fate. “Okay. I’ll be right back.” Attempting to lighten his mood, he joked, “You won’t mind if I steal one of your towels, will you?”

Charlene’s face darkened immediately. “Oh, no. You can’t do that. You have to come down completely naked. I can’t give you your wristband if you’re wearing a towel. Just bring me back the key card. Otherwise, you have to be completely, utterly nude.”

Jonah was stunned again. “Surely I can’t just walk around the hotel naked. I mean . . .”

Charlene failed to suppress a laugh of pure delight. “Of course you can. That’s what we’re all doing. The hotel understands. They’re on board with the whole thing. Just take off your clothes, hit the john if you need to, then come right back to me here. If you don’t make a big deal about it, nobody will care.”

Jonah blubbered, almost whining. “But, you’re wearing a towel.”

Charlene softened again. “I was here for ninety minutes completely nude. They finally brought me this towel just because I’m sitting here so long. As long as everyone just goes about his or her business, nobody cares. The first arrivals have been scurrying around in the buff since before I got here to sign them in. Talk about eager beavers!” She winked and held his hand one last time. “You’ll do fine. Trust me. It’s okay. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt you.”

Jonah nodded, took a deep breath, and released her fingers to leave. He turned and, without looking back, headed for the row of elevators. Charlene smiled at his disappearing backside, and then went about getting his paperwork in order.

The elevator doors slid open and Jonah stepped out into the sixth floor hallway. He oriented himself and moved silently to find Room 624. He instinctively knocked first, then shook his head to clear his fogginess, and used the key to open the door. It closed behind him and he gingerly took a step forward.

Before he could take a second step, he was frozen in shock as a female voice called out from around the corner by what probably was the bed. “Is that you, baby?”

Feeling he had found the wrong room, Jonah tried to silently turn to go back out.

“Baby? Hello? Who’s there? Hello? Charlene?”

As his fingers circled the door handle, he heard Charlene’s name, and it shook him back again. He realized he had used the only key she gave him. This person knew Charlene. He had to be in the right room. He called out shyly. “Hello. Um, my name is Jonah. I’m . . . running on the team. Charlene sent me up to change here. Is there a problem?”

There was a pause as the female attached to the voice digested this, then she responded gaily, “Not at all. That’s perfectly fine. Come on in and do your thing. Don’t mind me.”

Relaxing a bit, Jonah stepped fully into the main room to find yet another in his cavalcade of shocks: the voice was coming from a very lovely young woman who was completely naked, with the exception of the fact that her wrists and ankles were strapped down holding her spreadeagled across the king size bed, and the fact that she was blindfolded with a black satin scarf.

As she sensed his discovery of her, she grinned sweetly and continued, “Jonah, was it? Hi, I’m Maggie. Lovely to meet you, such as we can call it that. You have a lovely, soft voice. I’m sure you’re impossibly sweet and handsome. Aren’t you?”

Jonah was speechless. Maggie continued, even more gaily. “As I said, don’t mind me. I’m obviously in no position to get in your way. I suppose you’re just needing to strip off and use the bathroom before you head back downstairs. Pity. I bet you’d be fun to have stay awhile and play.”

“Are you all right?”

“All right? I’m fantastic. Horny as heaven, of course, but that’s all part of the fun. I can’t wait until Charlene finishes that silly race, so she can come back and finish off my race. If you get my meaning.” She writhed sensually around on what Jonah saw to be cool, soft satin sheets, but remained helplessly bound.

Jonah finally found words. “This is just getting a bit too . . .”

She relaxed and spoke to him in soft, reassuring tones. “I’m just having a bit of a kick with you, Jonah. Don’t let it freak you out. Just us girls wanting to have their little fun, you know? Seriously, you go ahead and get yourself ready. Just pretend I’m not even here. I’ll have to give Char a bit of a spanking for not warning you I was up here, but there’s none of it your fault. Come on. Be a sport, and just relax and get naked.” She giggled a bit to herself and tried to turn a bit over on her side, twisting her head around oddly. “Here. I’ll turn away so you won’t think I’m peeking.”

He laughed at her good spirits in spite of himself, and found his fingers working at the buttons of his shirt as if they had a mind of their own.

Maggie heard his soft laughter and brightened again. “I think we left the bottom left drawer still empty. You can put your things in there. I promise not to touch anything.” She laughed louder this time, a playful peal of utter joy at the silliness of the situation.

Buoyed by Maggie’s irrepressible nature, Jonah found the empty drawer and began to fill it with his clothes. In a moment, he was standing at the foot of the bed, utterly nude. He checked himself nervously, caught himself to remember to remove his watch, then closed up the drawer again, and heaved a deep sigh to try and relax.

Maggie heard all this and correctly concluded her unseen visitor was now nude. A shiver of passion at being so bound and vulnerable in the presence of a perfect stranger coursed through her body, and Jonah couldn’t help but notice her writhe seductively against the satin sheets once more. He sighed again, still at sea over the whole thing, then braced himself to leave.

“Before you go, can I ask you one tiny, little favour?”

“What?”

Maggie smiled again into the darkness from behind her blindfold. “I assume you’re all naked and ready to go?”

“Yes.” He blushed a bit at having to put it in words, now public record.

“Could you just . . . could you just come over here a second and give me a little kiss? Just one tiny kiss, right on my silly little lips here. Please? You guys are making me lie here for goodness knows how long all tied up and helpless. I’m going to go crazy if I don’t have a little treat to think about while you’re all gone. Please? Just one tiny, little, teensy kiss? For luck? Pretty please? With all sorts of silky caresses on top?”

Jonah was floored. Not having any idea how to respond to this, he fought off the urge to just run out of the room, then realized he was naked, and froze again. Maggie continued to wiggle and plead on the bed in front of him, and he finally felt he had no choice but to comply with her request. He padded across the carpet around the bed and came to the edge beside her bound wrist.

She felt his presence, and her fingers instinctively began wiggling around to try and touch him, to draw him to her. He noticed her fingers getting perilously close to his exposed cock, and it jumped at this thought and he turned several shades of pink. Wanting to just do the deed and get away, he stepped sideways out of her hand’s reach, bent low over the huge bed, found he had to brace one knee up on the smooth, silky sheets, and planted a kiss on the hungry lips of the beautiful, bound tormentress.

He let himself kiss her for much longer than he intended, and she moaned hungrily as he finally managed to pull himself up and away. He found himself musing how odd it was that she was the one bound and helpless, and yet it seemed unmistakably that it was she who was torturing him.

As he stood up and padded away, she positively purred with delight. “Mmmmm. Thank you, sweetie. I was right. You are an absolute DOLL!”

Faced with the fact of now going out into the hallway in the nude, he panicked at last and made a quick dash, poking his head into the bathroom on the way by, and grabbing a big bath towel despite the admonition against it.

Maggie heard the sound of the door opening, and she purred again even louder. “MMMMMMMM. Hurry back, honey!”

Jonah quickly wrapped the towel tightly around his bare hips, and dashed into the hall, letting the door close on its own behind him.

Once in the hallway, he took a breath, realized he was alone, and took a moment to adjust the towel tighter around his middle. Thinking a second, he elected to use the stairs rather than the elevator, calculated which way would lead him closer to the lobby where Charlene awaited his return, and he quickly scurried to the stairway door and disappeared.

The quick dash down the six floors to the ground level were as uneventful as could be, and Jonah silently thanked his luck for getting a moment to get used to being in public like that without actually being seen. He reached the bottom, cracked the door a bit and peered out cautiously. He found he had a clear view straight down a passageway to across from where Charlene sat waiting. He gulped. That also meant that she could see him as well the instant he set foot out of the stairwell.

Realizing he had reached the real point of no return, he swallowed hard and removed the towel from around his waist. With one last silent prayer, he flung the fabric down the stairs toward the basement level, and took a second to process that he was now standing in a public area of a major downtown hotel, and he was completely, utterly naked. He fingered the key card nervously, and shook off the idea that he could still use that as some sort of covering. He took a final deep breath, and moved out into the public area.

Charlene of course saw him immediately, and smiled broadly and waved for him to hurry up and come to her. Figuring the best idea was just to not look at anything but her smiling face and to just keep moving forward, he strode towards her with an almost comical failure to show relaxed confidence. The lobby was indeed full of all sorts of people coming and going and doing their business, and they did pleasantly take note of the strange, yet handsome nude man almost stumbling along amongst them.

But Jonah did not notice anyone or how they perceived him. He made it without incident all the way to Charlene’s table, and pressed himself right up against the front of it to hide at least the forward parts of his nakedness. Charlene giggled at the sight of his clownish shyness, right as he suddenly became aware of exactly how soft and silky the cloth covering the table was as he brushed his naked penis across it over and over as he fidgeted. Flushing at the fact that he was becoming unmistakably stimulated, he took a half-step back again, and dropped a hand to shield the young woman’s view from his rising member. He was terrified to even think about who might possibly be looking at his exposed backside.

Charlene giggled again and pleasantly chided him with a smile. “Here now, stop clowning around and let me get you processed. Step back a bit so I can see you.”

He gave her a quizzical glare, and she explained again. “I have to make sure you are completely naked. If there’s so much as a nipple ring on you, they’ll disqualify you and they won’t give us the money. Now, step back and let me see you.” He reluctantly complied. “Now, turn around. No, no. Not like a dancer. Slower. So I can see everything.” After a couple of quick spins, he finally did one long, slow turn, mortified to find her studying him so intently. As he turned, he of course could not help but see the throngs of people, some of whom were stealing furtive glances at his comical antics. He turned quickly back to gaze at his guide, and she smiled in satisfaction. “Fine. You are officially naked. Give me your left wrist.”

He reached out his hand nervously, and she wrapped his wristband around it and pressed the fastener closed with a soft snap. She reached for an electronic scanner and waved it in front of his face. “This is what you’ll need to do at every mile marker. They’re not there for people who are running against time, but everyone registered for donations will need to get scanned like this at every mile station. If you miss one, it counts against you, so whatever you do, don’t make a mistake. Just scan your wrist like this until you hear the beep. Okay?” Jonah nodded that he understood, and fingered the band nervously.

Charlene finally took pity on his nerves, and proceeded with more purpose. “Good. You’re official. Now, just head on over to that escalator and up to the mezzanine. The end of the hall, the SeaScape Lounge. That’s where everyone is gathering and that’s where you’ll get the tanning spray and get your foot rubberizing applied as well. I’m just waiting for one more straggler who’s about to come back down for verifying, and I’ll be ditching this stupid towel and joining you there. Now, quick! Off you go!”

The lovely brunette rose up and nearly had to shove him into action, but he finally turned into the throng of people and made his way to the escalator. As he stepped on and began rising, he took another long, slow breath, and finally understood that, despite the odd curious stare and suppressed giggle, no one really seemed to care that he was naked. Perhaps he might survive this after all, he thought to himself. Just before he disappeared from view, he caught the hotel desk clerk looking up at him. He blanched as their eyes met, and she gave him a broad grin and two thumbs up. He found himself waving at her despite being utterly mortified, and then she was gone.

He quickly walked the length of the hall and found the door to the SeaScape Lounge. There was no indication that he was in the right place, so he politely knocked on the door, just in case. There was no response, so he gingerly cracked the door open and peered inside. Reassured at last, he found a large group of just about forty people at the far end of the large meeting room. They were all ages, shapes and sizes, both men and women, and they were all as naked as he was. Several clothed people, Sun Tanners staff, were finishing up with applying the necessary potions to everybody, and the mood was relaxed and extremely supportive and convivial.

Jonah stepped into the room, and was immediately waved over by a staffer to stand in the middle of a large section of plastic sheeting spread across the carpet. Without a word, he was immediately doused with sun block spray, beginning at his feet and carefully, thoroughly moving upward. As the staffer reached his head area, she finally spoke. “Please take a deep breath and close your eyes. Hold it until I tell you to relax.” He followed her instructions perfectly, and she was done. “Open. Thank you. Just stand over there and count to one hundred, then lay yourself down on that table over there, please.”

Jonah stood silently to let the spray dry on his skin, and he realized that several of the other nude runners were making eye contact with him and smiling in warm greetings of camaraderie. He found himself returning their smiles with increasing pleasantness, and noticed that he was at last able to breathe almost comfortably again. He began to feel gradually like he was human once more, a feeling he had not really had ever since Suzie had first poked her head into his office two days before. He finished counting, then lay down on the table and waited.

After a moment, another staffer approached and explained. “We’re applying this rubberizing compound to the soles of your feet. It’s not very thick, but it’s surprisingly strong and effective both to protect your feet from stones or glass objects, and also springy enough to help you run smoothly. Just let me spread it on here, and then you should wait two minutes for it to dry and you’ll be ready to run. Okay, Sir?”

Jonah found himself smiling at her, almost easily. “I understand. Thank you.”

He lay back and let the process continue. It was a bit hot to the first touch, but it quickly cooled as it dried on his feet. He suddenly found himself so relaxed that he actually drifted off to sleep a bit, and was jolted back to consciousness by the soft caressing fingers of Charlene standing smiling down at him. He propped himself up on his elbow and found that, true to her word, she was now completely naked, and, he thought to himself, even prettier than he had envisioned. He suddenly remembered the presence of Maggie, all naked and bound and waiting for this creature to return and play with her, and he blushed once more, not really sure exactly why.

She pinched his cheek affectionately, and giggled. “Get up, lazy bones. Now you have to actually run the darn marathon, silly.”

He smiled at her good-naturedly and stood up. She grabbed his hand and led him to the group of runners, and they all began happily introducing themselves to each other. As Jonah explained how he had been pressed into service at the last minute to help his friend, there was a general wave of support and admiration for being such a good sport and such a very good friend. He acknowledged their support with genuine gratitude, and really began to feel as if this was not such a horrible thing after all. They were all naked, to be sure, but they were nice, normal real people, and they accepted him as one of them, plain and simple.

Charlene released him to get her own feet done up, and he watched her lay down and found himself getting inappropriately aroused by the sight of her. Realizing this, he immediately turned away and began chatting with several of the naked, older men as they began explaining to each other their strategies for sticking together throughout the race so as to have the most fun and support. He understood that they were there to finish the run and to make sure the money was properly raised, and there was not a whisper of competitive spirit among the entire team. Time was irrelevant. Getting scanned at every marker and finishing was the only thing to do.

After a moment, two run officials arrived and herded them all in a group out the door. They made their way down the escalator and through the lobby, and the crowds parted and began cheering them on as they realized what was going on. Jonah found himself taking Charlene’s hand, and together, they drank in the convivial support and encouragement with increasing pride and relaxation.

The next hurdle was when they emerged from the hotel into the bright sunlight of the warm summer morning. There was a frankly shocking roar that arose from the onlookers lining the route barricaded off between the edge of the sidewalk in front of the hotel and the official race starting line.

Without a word among them, the forty naked runners were escorted to the line, and the signal came for them to begin. They each in turn passed by the electronic scanner and made it beep with their wristband, and then began sauntering forward. As the group completed the start, they all moved off in a pack, smiling and waving at the crowd looking on with pleasantly vocal support. They all settled in to a very relaxed jogging pace so as not to stress out the less fit members of the team, but Jonah soon observed that everyone seemed to be able to handle a jog without trouble. He found that the miraculous clear rubber on his feet totally lived up to its billing, and he was both cushioned and protected from the asphalt and concrete as if he were wearing his expensive running gear.

At last, with the run begun, he was able to face the fact of something he had never dreamed of in his entire life: he was jogging down the main street of the city, in the broadest of daylight, in the midst of thousands of people watching his every move, and he was utterly, completely, supremely nude. He let the sun wash across his entire skin; every nerve felt new and alive. He found his breath deepening; muscles he hadn’t been aware he had been clenching suddenly released into a deeper relaxed state.

The young man kept in the middle of their band of runners, and instinctively did his best to unobtrusively stay more or less beside the gloriously naked Charlene. He watched her tight, natural breasts bob along as the running woman found a rhythm to keep them in sync with her footsteps, rather than bouncing about haphazardly. For twenty-six miles, that would end up being quite painful. Jonah thought to himself, she must have some experience running with no top on.

Jonah relaxed further and began studying the various clothed runners as well, and found them to display the same range of personalities, only on a much grander scale. Young, old, big, small, athletic and those gamely trying to get by on force of will. Each with something to prove, something to share, something to experience. They were all part of one big community, all working, all playing, at one with the momentum of The Run.

* * * *

The really competitive athletes very quickly tore on ahead and left everyone else in a mass that ebbed and flowed into all sorts of shapes and distortions. Jonah found out in the first half mile that it was not as easy to all stay together amid the huge throng of joggers as they had discussed. Small groups of clothed runners would insert themselves, sometimes intentionally, sometimes just by chance, in the midst of the naked crew, and it took sometimes a block or two to regain their team’s relaxed cohesion. Within a few minutes, they found themselves approaching the first mile marker. There was already a line at the scanning machines, of which there appeared to be two, one on each edge of the roadway by the sidewalk. The lead nude runners picked one line, and they all fell in behind them, appreciating the chance to stop and catch their breath a bit, even share a smile and a wry comment or two as they processed themselves through.

Rules were that runners were not supposed to make contact with each other, otherwise Jonah would’ve been eager to hold Charlene’s hand again, perhaps even stroke her silky brown hair which had come loose from her pony tail and was mostly draped prettily across her now glistening shoulders. He satisfied himself with just continuing to drink in the whole experience, standing there in the street looking up at the buildings around them, scanning the smiling and laughing faces that took in their efforts. Of course, there were cameras and cell phones everywhere, and he suddenly understood that there would be photos of him shared across the internet for as long as digital photos existed. He smiled to himself, relaxing in the knowledge that he was so quickly comfortable about this as he was about just being nude.

It was their turn and they scanned their wrists quickly, satisfied by the confirmation beep, and then they formed up again and resumed their steady jog.

That’s forty thousand dollars for charity, he thought to himself, and his sense of freedom and peace were amplified with a swelling sense of pride in their service.

They jogged on, making sure to keep a steady, easy pace to conserve their bodies, and they grabbed cups of water at regular intervals to stay hydrated as the morning sun began to advance higher in the sky.

Without thinking, Jonah found his youth and natural strength moving him instinctively to take the lead in the group, and several times in the first few miles, he found that he had to pull himself back to avoid either running on ahead or making the others feel unintended pressure to speed up. A couple of times, he forced himself back into the middle of the group, trying to use his attraction to Charlene as motivation to slow down.

At the seventh mile marker, Charlene was next to him in the scanning line, and she finally spoke as she caught her breath. “You seem to have relaxed into things okay.”

He smiled back at her. “I don’t know what I was worried about. This is the simplest, most freeing feeling I’ve ever experienced. Nothing matters except breathing and running. It’s so unexpectedly peaceful and meditative. I’m so glad Suzie talked me into coming.”

Charlene smiled again. “You run like a stallion champing at the bit to dash on free, with the wind in your hair. I feel we’re actually inhibiting you a bit, forcing you to stay with us.”

Jonah darkened. “Oh no. It would be entirely different running naked all by myself. It’s comforting having everyone around us. I feel safe. Belonging. Connected.”

She beamed at him again, and stepped up to be scanned. He watched her lithe body stretch on out ahead, and he nearly missed his own swipe as he found his eyes resting on her firm, muscular buttocks ahead of him. His hand bumped the metal pole, and it brought him back to pay attention to what he needed to do. He heard the reassuring beep, and stepped quickly to keep pace with her.

She looked over her shoulder and smiled again at him, and, as she saw him step forward, she got an idea, and dashed faster out ahead, disappearing into a big clump of clothed runners. Jonah, feeling her frisky mood, took off in hot pursuit. The rest of the team formed up as usual, with a few of the older runners smiling broadly at the hot blooded youngsters among them.

Charlene was not as easy to catch as Jonah expected. She led him on a merry chase for almost the entire next mile, bobbing and weaving through the other masses of runners, clearly thrilled at the chance to play with him for a while. At last, he caught her and fell in beside her right shoulder, matching her stride for stride as they grinned in the sunny warmth of the beautiful summer day.

They approached the next mile marker, and she turned to him and spoke. “Which side do you want?” He gave her a questioning look. “Which side do you want?” she repeated. “You take one line, I’ll take the other and we’ll see which one of us gets through before the other.”

Taking the challenge as more of their flirty game, Jonah smiled and pointed to the left line. She nodded, and broke across him to dash quickly to the rear of the right side line. Smiling, she indicated with a sweep of her naked arm for him to take the other one.

With her quick move, it seemed that the beautiful naked girl, now standing alone in a throng of fully clothed runners and officials, had given herself a bit of an advantage, but that quickly proved incorrect, as Jonah in the left line found the processing going much faster. He looked to his partner and she frowned at him as he was almost to the scanner, while she had barely moved.

Suddenly, an official explained why there was a slowdown. The right side scanner was malfunctioning. Would everyone please move in an orderly fashion to the left side line and proceed as quickly as possible. Charlene groaned loudly as she was herded along with the whole other group to fall in behind Jonah’s line, a good fifty people unexpectedly between them. In a flash, Jonah was scanned, and he found himself waiting alone on the other side of the line marker.

Naked and alone. He looked back in the distance, and realized their rambunctiousness had put them a full minute or two ahead of the rest of the team. He tried to hold himself off to the side to at least wait for Charlene, but other runners kept coming straight at him, and he couldn’t find a spot to stay out of the way. Noticing this, a race official finally approached him and insisted that he either continue running or quit the race altogether.

After a brief exchange, Jonah found the official implacable, and sensed that he was actually a bit offended over the young man’s nudity. Shocked by this feeling after having been embraced in such acceptance and support so far, Jonah felt a sudden wave of hurt and embarrassment, and responded in the only way he could. He faced forward and started running again. He kept looking over his shoulder, and still Charlene was not nearly at the front of the line yet.

His heart sank, and he turned back forward, and tried just jogging as slowly as he could, but that only seemed to make him feel sadder and more alone. He was now not just nude, he was naked. He felt defenseless and alone, increasingly helpless and confused. He scanned the crowd of runners and onlookers, and suddenly they all seemed to mock him, even find him disgusting and freakish.

Despite his burning need to find a way to rejoin his team, his emotions overwhelmed him and he found himself instinctively speeding up as if to outrun his own sadness. He focused on the road ahead, and dug his feet into the road surface, calling up his longtime track runner’s spirit to kick in and provide him with something, anything that felt familiar. He tuned out the crowds, he tuned out the other runners. He was a runner, he was going to run. He stopped thinking about the fact that they all had clothes on and that he was nude. It didn’t matter any more. All that mattered was attaining the next marker and then moving on.

He found himself able to pass the clots of runners ahead of him with relative ease. It seemed that people instinctively sensed his sober intention, and even tried to make room for him and move out of his way. He hit the next marker with a very small group, and was hardly delayed more than a couple of seconds. People were now shocked at the naked man running alone amongst them, and he found he had even more room with each passing mile.

All thoughts of his team long out of his mind, he drove his legs forward, pumped his arms like pistons and breathed with real strength and power. The crowds were thinning even more, as he realized he was ahead of even most of the middle level runners in the event. At a couple of markers, he barely had to break stride to complete his scan. A quick swish of his arm, and he heard the reassuring beep, which was now his only companion on his suddenly very serious journey.

On and on he ran, one hour, then two, then three. Had his eyes played tricks on him? It seemed that the last marker had been number twenty-five. Could that be right? Was he nearly finished? He drove his legs harder into the road surface beneath his feet, suddenly happy about the freedom and lightness that came from not needing clothing or even footwear. He found the next marker, and smiled broadly to himself as he confirmed that it was number twenty-six.

He studied the buildings as he ran, and he realized that he did in fact recognize that he was approaching the final few blocks toward the finish line. Breathing deeply, he set his will for the final push, and trained his gaze on the couple of runners ahead of him who were also clearly experienced long distance athletes. He had started the run delighting in the glorious naked bottom of his beautiful companion, and now he would end it driving forward in pursuit of the taut, muscular legs emerging from tight blue jogging shorts of three balding but very fit and capable middle aged men.

He felt rather than heard the energy of the crowd assembled around the finish line. He looked up to see an enthusiastic demonstration as runner after runner crossed the end line up ahead of him. He expected that his lone naked form would cause a little bit extra stir, but at this point, he just wanted to get done, get his wristband processed and get back to the hotel to retrieve his clothes and go home.

As he pushed through the final fifty yards, he nearly brought himself up short as he could’ve sworn he heard Suzie’s voice penetrating through the crowd, calling his name and cheering for his strength and courage. Shaking it off as a fantasy of the adrenaline rush he had been riding for the past thirty minutes, he put his head down and tore across the line amid a very loud roar of cheers, laughter and a few catcalls. Ignoring all else, Jonah looked around, found the final scanner, and prompted the last, reassuring beep of confirmation. He was done. He looked around and saw the sign indicating the station to process his wristband at the end.

Moving to the booth, he grabbed a bottle of water and began sipping some and splashing some all over his nude flesh, glistening all over with sweat mixed with the tanning solution. When it was his turn, he approached the run official and held out his wristband to be examined.

The girl, a volunteer who was perhaps barely eighteen, was a little bit flustered and a little bit excited about getting to process the tall, sweaty naked man in front of her. She mumbled something to him, and he just looked at her oddly, so she repeated herself with more force and volume. “You’re with the nude run team?” He just looked at her as if she had asked him if the sun came out in the daytime. They just stared at each other a moment, until finally Jonah recovered himself enough to be civil again.

“With the Sun Tanners run team, yes. I need to get this wristband properly logged in. It’s worth $30,000 for the charity.” He said this with a bit of irritation, not pride.

The young girl instantly became very serious about it, and took his wrist with as much confidence as she could muster. She confirmed that it was the proper band, and she held his wrist with one hand and clipped it off with a pair of scissors in the other. She made him watch her deposit the clipped band into a metal strongbox that resembled some sort of old voting box, with the name of Sun Tanners stenciled on the side to show its official status.

Satisfied, Jonah tried his best to thank the girl with some amount of genuine gratitude, and she smiled at him with a mixture of fear, attraction and respect as she said it was she that should be thanking him for his hard work and courage.

Moving quickly on, Jonah began to work his way through the thronging people, trying to orient himself to the easiest path back to the hotel. With each passing second, exhaustion began to take hold of him, and he came down from his runner’s high and began to realize he was now just a naked man in a huge, crowded public square. People began to giggle at him and point, and there were more cameras and cell phones. A couple of people tried to stop him and ask him to pose for pictures with them, but he did his best to politely brush them off, letting his exhaustion sap his remaining strength faster and faster. Still feeling like he was wandering in circles in the vast throng of humanity, he finally stopped and just stood there for a moment to try and sort out what to do.

At that moment, a young, obviously fairly new female police officer approached him and stood in his path. “Excuse me, Sir. May I ask what you think you’re doing?”

Jonah looked at her oddly for a moment, and struggled to find the energy to speak normally. He realized that he had muttered a bit wordlessly, and the look on the officer’s face gave him the feeling that she thought that he might be drunk or on drugs or something.

“Are you all right, Sir? Are you aware that you don’t have any clothes on, Sir?”

Jonah’s head began to swim, and he suddenly felt that he WAS drunk. With the last bit of his will power, he steadied himself, and did his best to reply in a sober, even tone. “Yes, of course, Officer. I just completed the charity marathon for the Sun Tanners nude run team. I’m looking for the quickest way back to the hotel so I can get dressed and go home.”

The officer clearly had no idea what he was talking about, and pressed him further. “But you can’t be walking around in public without any clothes on, Sir. Do you have some sort of ID or something?”

He looked at her with a bit of irritation, then took a breath and replied calmly, “Not with me, obviously. I had my official wristband for the race, but I just turned it in at the finish line booth back . . . back . . . back there somewhere.” He tried to point out the booth, but he had turned himself around so much that he couldn’t exactly see it right then.

The officer reached out a hand a gripped his upper arm firmly and professionally. “Sir, that’s all well and good, but I’m going to have to detain you until I can make sense of what you’re telling me. I must say you appear to be under the influence of something, and you can’t just be wandering around the square with no clothes on.”

Jonah did his best to remain calm. “Of course I’m a little unsteady. I just ran over twenty-six miles. The race officials have all the permits for us to be naked. There’s a whole team of us. Forty people.”

“Forgive me, Sir, but I’m not seeing any forty people anywhere.”

“We got separated and I ran on ahead of them. I . . .”

The officer pulled a zip tie out of her belt and expertly guided Jonah’s wrists together behind his back. With one quick motion, she cuffed his wrists together, and then resumed holding him by the upper arm. “I am placing you in police custody, Sir. If you’ll just cooperate with my investigation, I’m sure we can straighten this out as quickly as possible.”

Suddenly finding himself naked, alone, and now helplessly bound with his hands tied behind his back, Jonah’s spirit sank and he began to tremble with nerves and vulnerability. This only seemed to confirm her assessment, and she began guiding him through the crowd toward her security station. Arriving there, she had him stand at one side, now drawing all sorts of looks and laughter, and more photographs, for a very different reason than his marathon running.

“I’m just trying to get my sergeant on the radio. He’ll get to the event officials, and we can find out if there is any truth to what you’re trying to tell me. Just stand there and continue to cooperate, and things won’t escalate to anything more serious.”

Jonah began to feel utterly ashamed of himself, and pleaded with her to have a bit of sensitivity toward him. “Look, Ma’am. I’m really not trying to be difficult, but I’m exhausted and I’m naked. People are staring, taking pictures, and I can’t even cover myself with my hands cuffed like this. Can’t you at least get me a blanket or a jacket or something? Please?”

The officer thought about this a moment, then agreed. “Just stand there a second, let me see what there is inside.” She disappeared for the briefest of seconds, only to reappear and confirm that he wasn’t going to run off the second she turned her back. Satisfied, she disappeared a bit longer and popped up again with a piece of black cloth in her hand.

“I can’t find a blanket or anything. But I think this will solve your embarrassment for the moment.” She unfolded the small black cloth, and raised it over Jonah’s head. He instinctively stepped back a pace, and she chided him sternly to stand still and cooperate. In frozen panic, he stood there and watched her raise the cloth up and tug it down over his head. She settled it in place as he realized she had just put a fairly tight hood over his entire head.

“There. Don’t get upset. We use these all the time. For people in custody who need to hide their identity or avoid getting photographed. It’s a very thin cloth. You should have no trouble at all breathing through it and even seeing through it, especially on this bright, sunny morning. But, to everyone else, you’re now totally anonymous.”

Trying to recover from this new shock, Jonah couldn’t at all track the logic of what she had just done to him. He was now naked, hands bound, and he couldn’t see anything. She had been totally wrong about the thickness of the cloth. He could feel the sun warming up the black material on his face, but he couldn’t see anything at all beyond a faint glow teasing up a fading memory of the formerly warming and cheerful daylight. As he tried to swallow down fresh waves of panic and confusion, she continued to issue instructions to him.

“Now. You just wait right here. You’re perfectly safe. I’m still trying to raise my supervisor and you’re not the only person I need to keep my eyes on. Behave yourself as best you can, and things won’t get any more serious.”

Any more serious, he chucked to himself in spite of his panic. All he had been doing was cooperating, and he was so far down a road that made not sense to him that he began to wonder if he was in the middle of some very long, very bizarre nightmare.

He stood as still as he could in the helpless darkness, afraid to move at all in any direction at the risk of falling down and badly hurting himself. Even the officer’s behaviour made no sense to him. What on earth is going on, he wondered. He tried harder and harder to focus on possible explanations, as he found the increased brain effort helped him ignore the waves of emotion threatening to overwhelm him.

Suddenly, something brushed his forearm. He jumped in reaction to it, but then something incredibly familiar penetrated his fog, and he steadied himself quickly.

The voice of Suzie. It was definitely the voice, and the touch, of his Suzie.

“Jonah? Jonah, is that you under there?”

“Suzie? Yes, it’s me. Oh god, Suzie! What is happening to me?”

She grabbed his upper arm as the officer had done, but with as much tenderness as force to steady and calm him as well. “There’s no time for that. Just tell me, did you give her your name or anything? Think. Did you?”

He thought. “Uh. No. No. I never said. I just told her about the nude run team. I never gave her anybody’s name at all.”

“Great. She’s around the other side for a second. I’m going to take your arm and guide you out of here. Just follow my lead and trust me. It’ll be all okay. Just relax and put yourself in my hands. Can you do that, baby?”

“Yes. Just hurry. I’m losing my mind.” Without another word, he felt her grip tighten, and with her other hand in the small of his naked back, she pushed and guided him quickly through the crowd, shooing away any obstacles with sober intensity.

Hardly stumbling at all, they made their way across the square, and Suzie guided the cuffed, hooded, naked man straight toward a waiting cab. Without hesitating a second, she carefully guided Jonah’s trembling form into the back of the cab, and then slid in beside him. She closed the door, and the driver pulled away and began pushing his way through the midday traffic of cars and pedestrians.

Suzie drew Jonah’s head and shoulders into her breast and held him with as much loving tenderness as she could muster. Having to suck air hard through the cloth, he found himself breathing in her scent, that glorious fragrance that always drove him to such distraction. It calmed him, and strengthened him, and he nestled into her breast and drew energy from their connection.

Finally, he spoke through the heavy cloth. “Can you please get this thing off my head and free my hands?”

“Now, now. Just lie still, baby. It’s better if you just stay as you are. I don’t have anything to cover you up, and this way, nobody will recognize you or bother with me. Just lie back into me and let me take care of everything. You’re safe now. You’re totally safe now.”

Not sure at all if this made any sense to him, he found he had no will to resist any more. He surrendered his thoughts of retrieving any vestige of normal perspective, and agreed to just settle in to this wonderful woman’s embrace and be safe. He was held, and he was safe. And that right then was his entire world. The cab drove on, and Jonah actually fell asleep in her arms. She nestled him close into her soft, cotton blouse, and let him sleep.

After a drive through and out of the city, the cab pulled into a dirt lane and, after winding through a woodlot full of thick, leafy trees, came to a stop in front of a large, well-kept building that seemed a cross between a huge old farmhouse and a rustic tourist lodge. Several cars were parked in a sizeable lot off to one side, and two young men, both naked, emerged from the front door to greet the arrivals. Suzie checked on her sleeping charge, and found that he was still deep in an exhausted slumber. She motioned silently for the two nude men to help her, and the three of them managed to pull Jonah’s body out of the taxi without waking him.

“Take him to the treatment room.” The men nodded with extreme respect to the young woman, and she turned to pay the cab driver and sent him on his way. Suzie took a moment to breathe in the cool, refreshing country air, and a silent transformation overtook her. She began to stand even straighter, and held herself with more confidence and authority, as if she was royalty coming home to her realm from adventures in far off lands. Smiling softly with profound contentment, she took one last deep breath, and went inside.

After changing from her simple office attire into a thick, warm bathrobe, Suzie went in to the treatment room and found Jonah, still cuffed and hooded, asleep on his side on what she referred to as one of her treatment tables. Opening a cupboard to check on what tools and supplies she would need, she moved to attend to him. With surprising strength and ease, the robed young woman slid the athletic man’s body over onto his stomach, allowing his genitals to drop down through a slot designed in the center of the table slab, and positioning his face into a frame that resembled the pad on a massage table that allowed the patient to keep his head straight and still breathe comfortably.

Satisfied with the general positioning, she set to work on securing him in place. First, she flipped up two padded metal shackles at the foot end and tightly locked his ankles into them so that his feet were spread about shoulder width apart and utterly fixed in place. Next, she found a sharp surgical-style knife and cut his hands free from the plastic zip tie, letting his wrists slip across his naked skin which was still a bit filmy from the day’s efforts. Moving with relaxed purpose, she took one wrist delicately and swung it around off the table and locked it into a padded shackle midway down the front leg of the table. Then, moving silently around to the other side, she repeated the action with the other wrist, so that Jonah was fully shackled hand and foot to the contraption, in such a way that his arms could reverse the strain of having been locked behind him for what must have been at least a couple of hours.

Satisfied that he was comfortable and yet complete secured, she moved to stand right in front of the top of his hooded head. Swinging a padded metal brace up and over, she carefully enclosed it around Jonah’s neck, locked it down, and secured him so that he could only raise his head up perhaps an inch or so at best.

Now that he was fully pinioned in place, she took his head in her hands with the tenderest of care and delicately rolled the cloth hood away from his face and off. Discarding the black fabric into what resembled a hospital laundry hamper, she carefully laid his head back down so that he was resting the edges of his face on the oval frame in such a way that he could talk, breathe and see easily and that someone under the table would have total access to his mouth, nose and eyes.

Taking a deep breath in preparation for the next stage of her work, Suzie bent down her lips right next to his ear and, with one hand warmly comforting him resting on his bare shoulder, whispered for him to wake up. After several soft repetitions of various affectionate nicknames, the slumbering man began to stir. She pressed her warm hand more firmly into his shoulder to let him know she was there to keep him safe, and she vocalized a bit louder that it was her and that he was safe and that he must wake up then.

He coughed a bit in the direction of the clean, tiled floor, and then he tensed his whole body in surprise at waking up in such an unexpected position.

“Where am I?”

Suzie bent down more fully to lay her warm breast across him while she continued her soft reassurances directly into his ear.

“It’s me, baby. I’m right here. You’re totally safe. I just needed to secure you to the table to protect you from waking suddenly and falling off and hurting yourself.”

Jonah registered this, and did a quick inventory to digest the fact that he was still naked, but now apparently immobilized on some sort of treatment bench.

“Where am I? What’s going on?”

She continued in absolute control and ease. “I have a little place in the country people don’t know about. Sort of my own little refuge away from the drab office life in the city. Just relax and let me take care of you. I need to get that rubberized coating off your feet, my darling, then we can get you all cleaned up and presentable again. Sound good?”

Jonah sighed deeply and realized he didn’t have either the will or the ability to object. “Fine. You must’ve been reading my mind.”

She chuckled softly to herself, and set to work. As she moved away for a moment, she let her warm hands trail all the way down his naked body to reassure him that she was not going anywhere. She returned with a small bottle of some sort of dissolving agent, and an applicator brush. She dipped the brush in and prepared to apply the stuff to the soles of his feet.

“Careful now. This may feel a bit cold for a second. Then it should turn pleasantly warm.” She laid her free hand on his calf to keep him calm and reassured. “It needs to stay on for two minutes, then I should be able to wipe everything off with a damp cloth. Ready?”

He took a deep breath and did his best to nod in agreement. She smiled at his acquiescence to her ministrations, and quickly painted the solution all over the soles and up the edges of both his feet. He did find it a bit cold, and squirmed against the shackles for a moment until he finally got used to the sensations.

“Ticklish?” she inquired, good-naturedly. He grunted a reply that didn’t seem to indicate yes or no and she laughed in delight at his confusion. “Don’t worry. They showed me exactly how to do this. You’ll be all done up before you know it.”

Jonah cleared his throat again and tried to distract himself with a bland bit of business or two. “What about all my clothes? We left everything at the hotel.”

She lightly spanked one of his butt cheeks with her free hand, and giggled at him. “Naughty boy. Didn’t I tell you I’d take care of everything?” she chided in mock disappointment. “I called the hotel from the cab and tracked down that nice girl, Charlene, that you made such friends with. She’s got all your belongings and she’ll take care of everything for me.”

Jonah sighed again, and decided the best thing was to just relax into the padding of his bed of restraints and keep his mouth shut. He wondered why he hadn’t really seemed to notice just how capable and efficient Suzie really was before this. These past few days she had demonstrated stunningly powerful talents to persuade, direct and take charge of things that she rarely let on about in the world of their corporate offices. Perhaps it was just that we never gave her the chance to prove herself. She had just been the sweet, sexy blonde in secretarial. He let his breath deepen and realized that he was extremely happy with discovering just how amazing sweet Suzie really was underneath the silk blouses and intoxicating perfumes. He felt that he had been let in on a mysterious, well-guarded secret, and felt oddly honoured to have been deemed somehow worthy of this gift.

He was brought up out of his reverie by the sensation of this very capable woman vigorously toweling his feet clean and dry of the goopy gunk residue of the rubberizing coating. After a couple of moments, she was done, and he felt even more relaxed as he became aware that his feet could breathe again after all these hours. He wiggled his toes contentedly, and Suzie, noticing this, bent down and grabbed each foot in turn with both hands and planted a big, wet, affectionate kiss on the newly freshened skin.

Disposing of the towels in the hamper, she put everything away and moved around to his head. Plopping herself down on the floor, she peeked up under the frame to let him see her face, and she smiled pleasantly. “You okay in there?”

He saw her bright, cheerful face, and it let him come alive, feeling almost human again. He returned her look with a relaxed smile of his own, and mumbled, “That was very nice. Thank you.”

Suzie reached over and held his hand right below the stainless steel manacle bolted to the table leg. “Good. Now, I’m going to set you free for a moment, but I want you to trust me about what’s next. Can you do that for me, baby?” He smiled again and nodded his consent.

“Good. Because I want to take you in and give you a good, therapeutic shower, but I’m going to cuff your hands back up so I can hook you to a rack I have in the shower stall. Before you say anything, I just want to remind you that you’ve been through an awful lot today, and even though you had a good nap, you’re a lot more exhausted than you might feel. I don’t want you to get dizzy and slip and fall and hurt yourself . . . or me, for that matter. You’re so much bigger than I am, and I’m not sure I could catch you in time before somebody got banged up. Will you let me take care of you, baby?”

Jonah pondered the logic of this strange request and found that, although he couldn’t fault the train of thinking, there was something about the whole process that felt more than it seemed on its face. Unable to put a form to his impressions, he decided at last that it was rather silly to argue with the chance to share a naked shower session with such a gloriously beautiful and surprisingly powerful young woman. “You’re the boss,” he said with a giggle.

She smiled, kissed her fingertip and planted it on the end of his nose. “I’m glad you understand that. Now,” she sprang back up to her feet and moved down to free his ankles. “Let’s get you into that shower and turn this greasy, sweaty beast into something that’s fit for presentation to civilized company.” With that, she released his ankles, moved to his hands and quickly freed his wrists.

Jonah instinctively tried to rise up now that he could move his arms and legs, but he stopped again as soon as he discovered that his neck was still gripped in place. Before he could comment on this, she returned with a set of padded stainless steel manacles, and took hold of his free wrists. Drawing them up with smooth confidence, she locked his wrists into the cuffs, then let his arms down easily to dangle on either side of his skull. Now that he had been restrained once more, she moved to free his neck from the metal bracket. She planted a tender kiss on the nape of his neck, and a delightful tingly shiver ran down the length of his spine.

She helped him sit up on the edge of the padded treatment table, and he at last got a chance to survey his environment. He was surprised to find out the amazing array of clinical equipment she had set up in the room. “What is this, a medical clinic?”

She helped him stand up and braced him as he found his balance. “Oh, it serves all sorts of very useful functions. We’re a ways out of the city, and it helps to have . . . things . . . at the ready.”

He stopped at last to give voice to his musings. “I must say, Suzie, you really are full of surprises. I know we’ve been getting close over the past while, but I had no idea the . . . the . . . well, I just . . . I just had no idea. You’re an amazing woman. Simply amazing.”

She grabbed his rising penis affectionately and shook it as if she was shaking hands with him. “Pleased to meet you, young man. I do believe there’s going to be a lot of discovering going on this weekend. Now, enough chit chat. It’s shower time.”

She pulled his cuffed arms up and looped one elbow over her head so she could assist him in walking across the room and out toward the shower area.

She led him into the hallway, and he barely had the chance to glance down the passage to get a sense that the building he was in was actually quite extensive, before she guided his naked form into the adjoining chamber.

 

03.11.12

story continues in The Nude Marathoner 2: Initiation

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