Bette released Dan, officially known as prisoner 373154, back into the custody of his wife, Mary, on a bright cold Sunday morning. It was four weeks and a day exactly since Bette had agreed to keep Dan and have him work on her farm for a month. Bette and Mary had decided it would be best to keep Dan out of sight and out of reach of the media for a spell following his conviction and sentencing. Let the heat die down.

In Dan’s view, and having had the previous four weeks to reflect on it, that conviction was a sham. After all, he reminded himself, he had only got an erection. That was the extent of his crime, and since when was getting an erection a crime he asked himself. Certainly not a crime deserving a sentence of three to five years in jail, he decided. But he was still stuck with an official recorded conviction and a formal sentence to serve at the pleasure of the sentencing magistrate. That was not a sham. That was real.

On that Sunday morning, all three stood on the driveway outside Bette’s farmhouse engaging in what Dan considered to be a bit of pantomime madness. But he said nothing, mostly because he had a big metal ball gag strapped firmly into his mouth. His stretched jaws ached a bit, but he consoled himself with the fact that he was not naked and he was going home. He listened to Bette and Mary playacting at making a ceremony of the end of his farm labourer stint, hamming it up with pretend prisoner transfer terminology.

‘Prisoner 373154 has now been securely transferred to the custody of his wife,’ intoned Bette as she handed over a dog lead to Mary. Dan was attached to the other end of that dog lead via his leather collar that was locked around his neck. Two leather cuffs securely clipped his wrists together behind his back. A one foot length of chain linked his ankle cuffs. Mary had brought Dan’s slave cuffs and collar from home. He’d been without them for the fast month and it felt almost comforting to put them back on. Like he belonged to somebody again.

‘Thank you for ensuring the security of prisoner 373154 for the past four weeks,’ responded Mary with a broad smile. Clearly she was enjoying herself. ‘Let the record show that I have accepted custody responsibility’ she pronounced in a mock haughty air, as she tugged on Dan’s lead and he shuffled humiliatingly behind her to the car. ‘I am now placing prisoner 373154 in my secure prisoner transportation vehicle,’ Mary sniggered as she placed her hand on the top of Dan’s head and forced him to bend low while getting into the passenger seat of her car. The car that used to be Dan’s car.

Dan decided they were just trying to rub in the fact that he was actually a prisoner of the State, and that he had actually been sentenced to three to five years in jail. Just messing with my head. Take it all in good spirit. After all I’m going home. Focus on the positives, he told himself.

He watched as Mary took leave of Bette. To the casual observer it seemed the usual; kissy, kissy, huggy, huggy. But it went on a little longer than it needed, and Dan noticed Bette placing one hand firmly on Mary’s buttock and pulling their bodies together, hard. Body pressing against body. Bette’s fingers slipping deep between the cheeks of Mary’s blue jeans. Mary lifted herself on her toes as Bette probed her crack, but she didn’t pull away, she went with it, wriggling her ass a bit in response to the tease. More than pals then, Dan decided, feeling a bit left outside. He would like to have somebody hold him close like that, preferably Mary, when she’s not busy licking Bette’s pussy, that is, he mused cattily.

As Mary leaned across him to fix his seat belt, Dan breathed in her scent, relished her closeness to him after his four weeks of exile on the farm, surrounded by barnyard smells, devoid of close human contact. Dan was hungry for her touch, as the song put it. He’d almost forgotten what such close proximity to his wife was like. He edged forward a little so that her hair brushed his face without her noticing. Why shouldn’t he touch this woman, he wondered. She who, just four short months ago, shared his bed every night, They had rolled in each other’s arms, slapped and tickled each other, chatted freely about their hopes and dreams, had a full shared life. Even in the months since he signed the slave contract she allowed him a bit of fun regularly enough. Yet he was unsure of the situation, unsure of what to do.

Dan would have liked to plant a quick kiss on her cheek, or ear, or hair, whatever, as her head moved past his face, just to prove his point, just to remind himself, and her, of that other life they shared not too long ago. But he couldn’t bring himself to attempt it. Dan, never the bravest, found his confidence still shaken by the events of four weeks ago. After all Mary was now his official jailor. Worse; in modern street-speak, she owned him. Anyway, he rationalised, the ball gag would get in the way. And so the moment passed.

His month’s isolation on the farm had allowed him a breathing space, a separation, from the reality that was now hitting home to him once more. Which was that he was now slightly afraid of Mary. Well, in fact, very afraid of her. The month living on the farm had been a holiday from all that. Bette kept him in the barn with the animals. Literally kept him at a distance. She made no bones about being fairly indifferent to his presence, other than getting a bit of value out of having him do farm work. But from now on it would be different. Dan would be living in close proximity with the woman who held his fate and future happiness in the palm of her hand. He would have to work constantly to ensure she continued to want him in her life. He would have to make himself worthwhile to her. Be an asset, not an expense. And do it every day. The wondered was a bit scary.

Mary slammed the passenger door shut, went around, climbed into the driver’s seat and started the car while waving her goodbyes to Bette. Dan’s heart lifted a bit as the car moved off. At least he was heading home. As the car and passed Alice’s place, Dan recalled the previous time he had taken this trip, four months ago. It was after his three days of slave training. His first three days of real slavery. That time he was sitting in the passenger seat of Mary’s car too. He had just become fully and formally her slave, contract signed on the dotted line. That time his hands were not pinioned behind him and he didn’t have a big steel ball gag clamped behind his teeth, stretching his jaws beyond comfortable.

Things have moved a little further down the slave road since then, Dan realised. Looking back, his prospects had seemed a lot sunnier on that first trip home. Like they were embarking on a fun thing. A spicing up the marriage thing. But this time round it didn’t seem so much a fun thing. Dan was no longer sure what it was all about, really, except that he was now well and truly Mary’s slave, and he was more than a little nervous about the way things might be going.

Mary glanced in Dan’s direction as she indicated to turn onto the main road into town. It was as if she was reading Dan’s thoughts. She started to fill in the picture for him.

‘Well, Dan, I’ll get straight down to company, ‘ she said briskly, in her no-nonsense tone, ‘A lot of things have changed while you were doing your hard labour on Bette’s farm.’

‘Ooohaay.’

‘You don’t have to try to say anything Dan. You may not have noticed, but you are gagged. There’s a reason for that. I want you to just listen to me. You’ve a bit of catching up to do.’

Spare me the sarcasm, wondered Dan, But he waited patiently for whatever Mary was about to say. A shudder ran through him at the wondered that she might be about to tell him that she had decided to consign him to State prison directly. Maybe I have become an inconvenience to her, wondered Dan gloomily.

‘A few little pointers, Dan. We are gonna my new house, that’s where you will stay while in my custody. In my new house, Dan. Not in our new house; my new house. I could ask you if you’re OK with that Dan. But I’m not asking you. I’m telling you, that this is how it is Dan, and this how it is gonna be from now on. Just so I know you get it, nod to show me you are happy with that, Dan. Not that it matters to me, really. Just nice to get a sign of appreciation. After all, Dan, I’m keeping you out of prison. That has to count for a bit.’

Dan nodded furiously to indicate his total happiness with the blatant robbery of his fifty percent distribute of their old home. He was thinking furiously while nodding furiously. He managed to put two and two together. It all made sense. He knew that Mary got her big promotion and the big salary raise and the big bonus. She had been going on and on about the feasible promotion long before ‘the erection incident’ as he now wondered of it. So Mary’s career was on the up and up. She had bought a new house as a present for herself. Nice. And she’s gonna let me stay there, if I’m nice. Otherwise she will put me in jail for the next five years. She just said as much. Help.

Taking all that into profile, the extent to which the balance of power in their relationship had changed was crystal clear to Dan. Simply put there had been a total power exchange between Dan and Mary. This didn’t require deep scientific examination, but Dan could withstand. It was like they were two buckets of water, he decided. Starting out they were both half full. Now the Dan bucket was empty and the Mary bucket was full. Not a great example he decided. There was more going on than that. After all there was still lots more water pouring into Mary’s bucket and none into his.

During the first three months after he signed the slave contract, Dan was Mary’s slave in the home — by choice. But he was also gainfully employed as a teacher. He had a job, an income. He had options. If he wanted it enough, he could have walked then. Set himself up in another State, got some kind of teaching work. But now it was too late. Now Dan had nothing. He had surrendered the equal distribute in their house, lost his car to her, lost his job, his bank profile was wiped and he didn’t even own the clothes on his back. He was unemployable, had nowhere to call his home, and not a red cent to his name. On top of that he was now serving a real prison sentence — he was an actual convict in the eyes of the law.

Even worse, if he bunked out now he would become an on-the-run felon. He’d be caught and made serve the full five years of his three-to-five prison sentence, then, he’d get a separate sentence for the crime of absconding from lawful custody. Could get another ten years added. Dan understood from the movies that captured escapees got a fairly hard time when they were returned to jail. Dan’s knowledge of the prison system was largely informed by Hollywood. Running away was not an option, then.

The fact that they were only in the car a few minutes when Mary waved the threat of being made serve his prison sentence in a real prison was no accident, Dan decided. She wanted to remind him straight away that she held that power over him. Dan realised that if Mary felt vindictive enough she could even rig it so that he got the maximum sentence. She could send him into town to shop and report him as a runaway; have him put away for as good as ever. So this is what real TPE is then, Dan mused. TPE with knobs on. And it has happened to me. You can not say you’ll just put it out of you mind and carry on. It’s life changing. There might as well be a banner hung up in the hall of their house saying ‘I can send you to jail anytime I want.’ Every morning you get up and head for the kitchen and there it is in front of you in capital letters; ‘I can send you to jail anytime I want.’ You quickly duck under it and scurry into the kitchen to try and make your wife the best feasible breakfast she could ever wish for.

The acronym TPE had seemed a fun thing when Dan first came across it. It was in a glossary of BDSM terms at the front of a ‘How to Domme’ book he had thoughtfully bought for Mary. TPE = Total Power Exchange. Dan’s none too subtle plan was to entice educate and entice Mary into going along with his desire to up the BDSM play element of their marriage. Boy, did that work out or what?

Dan recalled enjoying Total Power Exchange when it meant being tied down on their bed safe in the knowledge that it would last a couple of hours at most and then everything went back to typical. That, and the fact that he used get to cum at the end of it following a nice bit of tease and denial. Dan decided the BDSM dictionary needed to be revised. A new term was needed; TTPE = Temporary Total Power Exchange. That’s what he really had in mind. He was mentally drafting his letter to the editor of that ‘How to Domme’ book when he got a sudden slap on the side of his face.

‘Dan. Pay attention! On to the next Item.’ Mary must have noticed Dan’s concentration wandering as he pondered the seismic shift in his status. Since another attempt at ‘okay’ would not meet with Madam’s approval, Dan nodded furiously again to show he was keeping up. Better stay on the good side of she who must definitely be obeyed from now on.

‘Bette emailed me the photos of your ass after Becky gave you the twenty strokes last week. Very artistic checkerboard effect I must say. You could play Sudoku on it. I think Becky took a bit of liberty with her brief, to be honest. It certainly looked very painful. But that, it so happens, is a bonus for you. I copied the photos on to the magistrate. She emailed me back saying she is satisfied that Becky’s work on your ass counts as this month’s judicial beating. It would have been due about now. So good news or what?’

Close call that, nodded Dan, thinking it’s a bit like being told at the last minute that your appointment for a painful procedure at the dentist has been cancelled. His ass was still a bit tender. A thin scab ran along the top of his buttocks where Becky had tried out her hit on top of another hit experiment the previous weekend. The prospect of being stretched naked and face down on that big table so the Magistrate could briskly beat another set of bruises on his ass had been at the back of Dan’s mind all morning; four weeks and a day since the last one. He had been keeping an eye on their route and got very worried when Mary turned the car away from the direction of their house. He had decided it was quite feasible that they were now heading for the magistrate’s house for his judicial beating. Until now. Phew!

Mary was still talking.

‘In fact, the magistrate said that she has gone off the idea of administering your monthly whipping altogether. It was a novelty for her the first time, I suppose. Maybe she used to sit up on her bench in the courtroom looking down at the low-life she was judging and wonder what it would be like to give them a good thrashing. Now that she has ticked that box she just wants to get on with playing her golf, or whatever.’

‘I suppose she was just using you Dan,’ laughed Mary, teasing him. ‘You were just an ass beating opportunity to her.’ Really rubbing it in now, she asked, though he couldn’t answer, ‘did you feel humiliated, Dan, at being used like that? Being stripped naked and beaten in front of all of us, just to satisfy some butch lady’s curiosity. All of us looking at you naked and bent over her table, thinking what a stupid twat you were?’

Dan was happy that the big steel ball gag meant he did not to have to try to answer Mary. Truth be told, he didn’t really mind Mary belittling him. In fact her mockery around the helplessness of his slave state was causing his cock to swell and press against its confining steel tube. Dan didn’t really mind at all, except for the painful stabs radiating through his swollen member as it pushed against the post that pierced the tip of his penis and skewered it permanently into the cock cage. Having his humiliation kink tickled wasn’t so bad. He was glad the track suit bottoms covered the slow twitching of his cock cage and hid it from Mary’s sight. Besides, after a month of not been spoken to, other than being told to ‘get this’ or ‘do that’ by Bette, Dan was perversely enjoying being in conversation with a fellow human, even a very one-sided conversation. At least Mary was talking to him, not ordering him about.

‘Anyway,’ Mary continued, ‘the magistrate said I could authorise Bette to do the monthly beating on her behalf as I see fit. I figure that means that your beatings are at my discretion from now on. If you are a very good, obedient and diligent slave I might just ease up on the monthly beating, push it out to six weeks or more, even skip a month altogether. Wondered she asked me to keep sending photographs, so we’ll have to give her something.’

More energetic nodding from Dan. Just keep nodding he wondered. While he was relieved to hear that beating his ass was no longer on the Magistrate’s personal agenda, Dan tried not to picture Bette administering his punishment instead. She had a mean streak, and a set of very large dildos. Think happy thoughts. He was going home. That was a biggie.

They were now driving through into a leafy outer suburb on the far side of town, a long way from their previous address. Dan was grateful that it was well away from the catchment of his old college. There was little chance of bumping into either former students or teaching colleagues. Mary turned into a wide gated driveway and clicked a remote. She paused the car as the high ironwork gates slowly swung open. A brass plaque on the gate pillar beside Dan read ‘Manor Homes Village.’ On the driver’s side was a redbrick security hut with one window facing out and another hatch type window where drivers could engage with the security person, if they needed to. On the far side of the security hut, the pedestrian entrance to the estate was also gated.

‘Home sweet home,’ said Mary. Dan took in the gentle sweep of the road and the mature trees and shrubs behind which sheltered large detached redbrick houses. Large compared to where they had been living. Mary drove past about four of the houses, each slightly different from the last, before turning onto a short driveway, about ten yards long, that led to into an already open garage door. Must have another remote for that wondered Dan. Once inside, the up-and-over door began clattering closed behind them.

Inside the garage, Mary had Dan bend forward in the passenger seat while she unclipped his hands and took the ball gag from his mouth. She told him to unclip the chain from his ankle cuffs. Dan gladly stepped out of the car, stretched his arms and worked his jaws which were stiff and stretched from the gag. Mary announced that she would give Dan the grand tour, immediately. Dan could tell that she couldn’t wait to show off her new property to somebody, anybody, even if it was only the slave. They toured the ground floor rooms with Mary pointing out all the high tech she’d had installed, including, she said, a garage door sensor that recognised her car as it approached the house. Clearly she was very proud of the house and the work she had done on it. Dan made sure to ooh and aah as necessary, saying all the right things at all the right times. It was nice to be able to talk again.

‘There are all sorts of sophisticated tech sensors inside too, Dan,’ she added mysteriously, as they moved from the large L-shaped living room to the kitchen. Only proper, wondered Dan, after all it was the tech industry that was providing her with a glittering career and income to match. No doubt she got the fancy electronic gear at a trade discount. The kitchen looked like the control room of a nuclear power station. ‘Don’t worry Dan,’ Mary said, quickly. She must have noted his worried frown. ‘You’ll get to know how to operate all the appliances, you’ll see. I’ve kept all the instruction manuals for you.’