The next day was a whirlwind of moving from location to location for all the street entertainment, shows, parties, and various revelries. I snapped almost three thousand photos that day, somehow managing to keep Piper by my side the whole time. Since we could move around, we didn't have the same problems with finding bathrooms, and we had time to stop for food twice, as well. Rain was moving in by evening, and I did my last assignment near a British-style tea shop where belly dancers had been performing just outside. We hung around, Piper and I, waiting out a heavy rain shower, drinking tea and chatting with British ex-pats who came by.

"Will you take our photo?" One woman had asked after learning that I was a photographer. I agreed. She handed me her phone and I snapped a few of her and her family, then gave back her phone. She flipped through them and I swear she looked disappointed before putting on a smile and saying, "Okay, thanks."

I watched them go and muttered, "Did they expect a miracle?"

"What?" Piper asked.

"They think that, because I take pictures for a living, I can magically turn their old phone's camera into a high-end one? She didn't seem excited when she realized that I take crappy phone shots just like everybody else."

"What's a high-end one?"

"Expensive, I mean. Like my cameras."

"Oh. Your cameras are expensive?"

"Definitely. I had to save up a lot to buy this one," I said, patting the one I'd left to sit out on our table while we waited, just in case a nice opportunity came along.

"I didn't know," she said, one of her favorite phrases. I found it adorable.

"You know," I told Piper, "I didn't take any pics of you today. You're here, enjoying the celebration, right? Want your pics in the official catalog?"

Piper nodded enthusiastically, "Yes!"

I had her stand near where the belly dancers were talking to a couple of admirers, the girl waiting for a chance to ask them for a picture with them. The women agreed as soon as Piper asked, and I snapped a dozen or so images with Piper beaming. I took several more of the girl by herself with the interior of the teahouse as the backdrop.

I showed them to Piper and she gushed her appreciation, "Oh, that's a good one of me! Oh, so's that one! I love modeling, Uncle Patrick. I just love it!"

I could tell. I replied, "You're a great model. No doubt about it."

"You think I'm great?"

"I do," I told her, "I thought so when I took your first pictures in Tokyo. You're a natural. Beautiful, charming, and you know how to make me look really good with the way you pose."

She giggled, "You think I'm beautiful?"

"Very beautiful, yes."

Piper beamed, clearly enjoying my compliments. I felt a little icky about it, honestly, but what I told her was the truth. She was beautiful. A year or two from all-out gorgeous. All it would take would be a little more rounding of her hips, supple curves on her chest, and a few inches of growth and Piper would be a legitimate heartbreaker for boys and men alike, and, I suspected, more than a few girls, as well.

"You about ready?" I asked, "Still have another long day tomorrow..."

Piper nodded, then stepped closer, wrapped her arms around my neck and looked at me closely with a fairly serious expression. She whispered, "I like being your girlfriend, you know. You say such nice things to me!"

I stirred and tried to keep my arousal in check. I pressed my lips to hers and Piper giggled. It wasn't really an odd thing to see such things in public, not even in India, so long as we didn't start Frenching or doing something more obscene. Just a peck between us, but it surely lit a fire in me that I don't think ever completely went out again.

- - -

"Uncle Patrick?" Piper asked me while I worked on filling out my assignment log. She was on her stomach on the bed, looking at something on her tablet.

"Yeah?"

"How do you know Mommy?"

"Veronica? She and I used to date in high school."

"Oh. I didn't know."

"She didn't explain about us in Tokyo?" I asked.

Piper shook her head, "No. She just said she knew you years ago..."

"Hmm... it was years ago. A lifetime ago, in some ways."

Piper asked, "Did you and Mommy do sex?"

I groaned, "Yeah..."

"Oh."

I watched Piper's face a moment. She looked at her screen and remained silent so long I went back to my log.

"Were you trying to make babies with her?" the girl asked after a period of silence.

"Err... no... we were just... having fun together..."

"Like, did you shoot baby stuff in her?"

I nodded, "Umm... yeah. Yeah, I did. Sometimes. Usually, we used condoms, but sometimes we didn't."

"What's condoms?"

"These things a guy wears over his penis... so that when he shoots, he doesn't risk making a baby with the woman..."

Piper wrinkled her nose, "That sounds weird."

"It's really not. Perfectly normal, really. That way... boys and girls can have sex and not get pregnant."

"Hmmm," she said, then grew quiet again. A moment later, she said, "They look kinda weird, especially these ones..."

Piper turned her screen to me and I saw tiles of condom-covered penises, all erect, a couple with deposits of semen in the tip. I said, "Err... well, some of those are the 'after' images..."

"After what?"

"After a guy shoots his stuff. See?" I pointed at one with the reservoir full of whitish fluids, "That's a man's semen. He already shot it..."

"Semen?"

"That's what you call the stuff that shoots out. It has a lot of names," I told the girl, "cum, sperm, semen, spunk, jizz... that's what that is."

"Oh, like the stuff you shot in the bathroom?"

I nodded.

"Hmm. So does it feel as good with a con-dom when you shoot?"

I pursed my lips, "Err... no. Not as good, but still pretty good. It's better than risking pregnancy, or diseases..."

"Diseases?"

"Yeah... sometimes people have diseases that spread through their genitals... Condoms help reduce the risk of spreading them..."

"Eww... that sounds gross..."

I shrugged, "Sort of. Most of them are easily treatable, but not all of them."

"But," she said, narrowing her eyes and looking at me, "you said you didn't always use con-doms with Mommy..."

"No... we... we trusted each other, mostly. We weren't having sex with anyone else and... well... we were sort of dumb kids, I suppose. Plus, your mom was on birth control, so she couldn't get pregnant."

Piper replied, her legs rocking, "Birth control?"

"A pill, or a shot, I forget which she got. Keeps a woman from being able to make a baby. For a short time, anyway."

"Oh." Piper grew quiet once more.

"Why are you so interested in all of this stuff, Piper?" I asked. "You're... you're kinda young, really, to be looking at images of penises in condoms... or any penises, really..."

She shrugged, tapped a couple of buttons on the screen, then turned off the tablet, rolling onto her back and looking up at me, "I dunno. I just wanna know stuff."

I nodded, "Alright. Suppose that's okay. It's sure normal, just... I dunno, maybe ten isn't too young to be sexually curious."

Piper stared at the ceiling a moment, her hand snaking down to scratch lightly over the leggings and between her thighs.

"How is your itching?" I asked her.

"Okay, better than yesterday. Still itches a little."

"Keep using the lotion. I think it might be working."

"Yeah, I will," Piper replied. Her hand snaked under the leggings and I watched as she did something other than scratch.

"Uh... Piper... what are you doing?"

She shrugged, not moving her hand, "I dunno. Just seeing what it feels like in my coo... uh... vul-va. It kinda feels slippery right now..."

I gulped. "That's... uh... that's the lotion, I'm sure. You put it on after your shower, right?"

"No," she told me, "I forgot." Her hand twisted a moment inside her leggings, then she brought it out, looking at her fingers, "See?" she said, raising her arm up and back, pushing her fingers closer to where my face was looking over above my laptop.

I groaned and muttered, "Jesus Christ..." I could see a sheen of wetness on Piper's fingers, clear but just a little bit milky in appearance. I couldn't help wondering if Piper's immature vagina was already responding to sexually stimulating ideas and images. "I see," I said louder, "that's normal..."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"It never felt this way before..."

"Do you touch your vulva often?"

She shrugged, "Just when it itches, I think..."

"So maybe," I told her, lightly vibrating with arousal, my cock pressed firmly down into the mattress, "it does that all the time and you just never noticed."

"Is it gross?"

I shook my head, "No... that's normal."

"But why does it do that?"

I sigh, "Because, Piper, a woman's vagina can make itself ready for a man's penis by releasing lubrication. It makes it... it makes it easier for the man to slide inside her... That's why it's slippery."

"Oh." Piper replied, then brought her hand back over her face. Her fingers slid together, back and forth, as the girl tested the slipperiness of her own juices. "Okay," she said, suddenly ignoring her cream and pushing her hand onto the mattress, smearing the lubrication on the comforter as she rolled off the bed, "I'll go do the lotion."

I watched her go, the girl shutting the bathroom door once inside. I looked at the dark comforter and saw a smear of the lightest white where Piper's fingers had been. I couldn't resist moving closer, sniffing just an inch above the spot. It was a light fragrance. Clean, just slightly florally. But the effect on my cock was immediate. I sniffed again, again, dry humping the mattress while I inhaled the light scent of Piper's pussy.

She returned and I rolled back as if I'd not been doing anything but looking at my laptop. "All done," she told me, "there was more of the... uh... stuff... on my vul-va... before I put the lotion on there. I wiped it off with tissue... is that what I should do?"

I shook myself. "Err... no... you don't need to clean it off unless it makes you feel uncomfortable. It's natural, your vagina releases that when you become aroused. Usually, you can just leave it alone..."

"What's aroused mean?"

"Sexually excited..."

Piper scrunched up her face, "But... I wasn't having sex... was I?"

I shook my head. "No. Sexually excited means you felt something which made your body get ready for sex... like... I suppose... when I look at the magazine, I see naked women and my penis gets erect. That's a man's way of getting sexually excited."

"Oh, I didn't know!" Piper rolled onto the bed and onto her stomach, elbows and forearms supporting her head. "So does a penis get slippery, too?"

"Kinda," I explained, less worried than I should have been to be once more talking to the child about such intimate topics. "A penis will sometimes have something called precum which comes out of the tip. It's a lot like what you found on your vulva. When a man gets aroused... sexually excited... his penis gets hard and he starts to create precum. The precum is slippery and makes it easier to penetrate a woman's vagina."

I watched Piper take in my words. "Neat," the girl said with a smile. "I wish I had a penis so I could see it get bigger, like yours. That would be neat, I think."

I grinned, "Well, I rather enjoy my penis, yes. But you have something similar, really just a very small version of a penis."

Piper looked at me like I'd just said she had a third arm. "Nuh-uh. I don't have a penis."

"No, you have something a little like it, though. A very small part down in your vulva called a clitoris, or clit for short. You have a clit, and it can get erect, like a penis does, but it doesn't have a hole in it or anything like that, so it can't shoot sperm or precum."

Piper thrust her hand into her leggings again, then immediately rolled off the bed, telling me, "I wanna go see..."

I continued to dry hump the bed, unable to ignore the fact that the beautiful young girl was in the bathroom trying to find her clit.

She came back out a few minutes later, looking frustrated. "I don't have anything like that..."

"You do," I told her, "it's just very small."

"Where?"

"Right at the top of your vulva," I replied, "it might be kinda hard to find..."

"Can you show me?"

I closed my eyes tight and almost refused. But my cock was pounding against the mattress and my brain was boiling with arousal. "Alright..."

"But I'll have to show you my vul-va, right?"

"Yes..."

"But you said not to..."

"I know... Just this one time, okay?"

"Okay," she said, grinning innocently, surely no idea of what such a sight would do to me.

Piper pulled down her leggings and panties, then crawled onto the bed, looking at me for instructions.

"Alright," I swallowed hard, "spread your legs and get closer to me..." God, I was so aroused. Was I really about to help the young girl find her clitoris? I couldn't believe I'd just agreed to do such a thing.

Piper complied, scooting her butt up to within a foot or so of my laptop. I closed the computer and set it on the floor, not looking between her legs for several long seconds, trembling with excitement. I turned back and stared at the immature, hairless flesh between Piper's thighs. She was looking at me with no shame or embarrassment on her face, her legs spread wide, her little genitals on full display just inches from my face.

My hand shook as I started to reach forwards, "I'll n-need.. n-need to touch your vulva, okay?"

Piper nodded clearly, "Sure."

"Okay..." I swallowed hard a couple of times, unable to believe what I was doing.

My finger pushed slowly down at the top of Piper's thin slit, the dark-pink flesh below looking a little moist from the lotion. Or, I realized, from her arousal. "It's right under here," I told her with a shaky voice. "It will be hard for you to see."

Piper's eyes were down, her back rounded as she tried to bend herself into position. She rolled her hips back, bending further, "Okay... I don't see anything..."

Using two fingers, I very gently drew up the semi-circle of flesh hiding Piper's clitoris. I watched as if in slow motion the pale pink nub which emerged.

Piper's clit was tiny, slippery, and quite erect.

I felt saliva pooling in my mouth. "Th-there... See it?"

Piper scrunched down as far as possible. "Oh! That's my... umm... what was it called?"

"Clit. Your clitoris. That's sort of like a little penis, but it just gets hard, it doesn't shoot anything."

"Oh!" Piper giggled, "Neat!" Her fingers slid down with mine and I slowly drew my hand away, letting the girl hold back her hood. Piper's little clit was visibly growing bigger. Still tiny, just a pinpoint, but clearly swelling as she and I looked on.

For several intensely arousing moments, Piper continued to move her fingers along the top of her hairless slit, sliding across her erect clit and pulling the hood back so that she could more easily see it.

I breathed, desperate to know, "Does it feel good to touch your vulva?"

Piper giggled, "Yeah."

I moaned lightly and damn near came in my slacks.

"Can I touch it again?"

"Sure!" she exclaimed, letting her hand fall away, leaning back a little, and waiting for me to do whatever I was going to do.

I reached my hand out and slowly began to slide my fingers around Piper's clitoris, gently beginning to circle her button, the soft skin there simply amazing to feel. I watched her face as I moved slowly, her expression not changing much, though her mouth opened slightly, her lips pursed and parted. "Does that feel good?"

Her light, breathy reply was so wonderful, "Yeah..."

Over long moments I touched Piper's nub. It stayed hard even as I pressed more firmly, tickling the underside a moment before using my index finger and thumb to roll the girl's clitoris directly.

Her first moan was magical. "Mmmm..."

"Oh, God..." I breathed.

"Mmmm..."

"Feels good?" I moaned.

"Yeah... Mmmm..."

Around and around I slid my fingers, Piper's hips starting to move with me on their own, rolling around with each pass of my flesh on hers. She'd been slippery when I started, but I'd rubbed most of the lotion and natural lubrication away, so I drew back my hand, drooled saliva on to my fingers, and brought it to her clit.

Piper jumped and giggled, "Oh!"

My attention focused on only one thing and I knew we were getting close. Piper's body rocked gently as I petted her pussy, the soft folds below the girl's clit warm and slippery. I slid a finger through her slit, then drew it around her nub again, circling, a second finger added to swipe further into her folds.

"Mmm... Mmm.. Mmmm... Oh! Mmmm..." More giggling, Piper's face flushing a rosy brown. She shuddered and moaned, "Mmmmm... Mmmmm... Mmmmmm..."

Suddenly she jerked, almost doubling over, her pussy moving away from me, "Hey!"

"You okay?" I breathed, worried that I might have scratched her with a fingernail.

"Yeah! I just... feel weird..."

"Weird good? Or weird bad?"

"Good, I think," Piper replied, looking down between her legs, "Like... ticklish, I guess... but... not..."

"Piper, I think you're really close to having an orgasm..."

"What's orgasm?"

"That's when you feel really, really good. When a guy shoots cum, that's an orgasm. But girls can orgasm, too, and, I promise, it will feel great... Do you want me to keep touching you and try to orgasm?"

She nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah!"

Piper leaned back and I started petting her pussy again, long, deliberate swipes up and down, just grazing past the tiny entrance to her vagina, then circling her little clit again, the hard flesh straining. Piper moaned louder, faster, "Mm... Mm... Mm... Mm... Mmmmmmm..."

"You're so close," I whispered, "so close..."

Piper was rolling her hips in a motion very mature for her immature body, her hairless slit glistening down below where her vagina was leaking nearly-clear, off-white juices. I swiped through her cream, sliding it over her dark-pink labia and up to her pale-pink clit. She shuddered strongly, bucking, her mouth open, sucking in air, then closed, eyes squeezed tight. "Mmmm! Mmmm! Mmmm! Mmmmmmmmm..." Her mouth opened again, and I felt my dick spurting in my slacks as Piper's orgasm crashed in.

Her body became a writhing set of limbs and torso, wonderful cries from her lips as her mouth opened in a tense circle, "Ohhhhhhhhhh... Ohhhhhhhh... Ohhhhhh..." Lips closed again, "Mmmmm... Mmmmm..." Another jerky shudder. "Ohhhh... Ohhhh... Ohhhhhhhhhh..."

I barely registered my own orgasm, so caught up in bringing Piper to her first climax. Her vulva had swollen, majora and minor both engorged, her inner lips more visible with her thighs spreading outward. A drop of moisture slid from Piper's vagina, squeezed out by her clenching channel, then another joined it, rolling down and over her tight little dark-brown anus and onto the bed.

My eyes were wide, the pool of cum against my groin warm but growing cooler. Piper opened her eyes, staring at me. "Neat! That was really neat!" she exclaimed. "Can I do another one?"

My fingers were moving quickly at her request, but she looked uncomfortable almost immediately, "Too much?"

"It kinda burns a little..."

I swallowed, perhaps for the first time in hours, letting my hand fall away from Piper's crotch and resting my wet fingers on her thigh, "You're sensitive. We'll need to wait to try again..."

"So, that was orgasm?" She said, looking down between her legs.

"Yes..."

"I liked it," Piper grins. "I liked it a lot!"

"Me too..."

"So, you can orgasms, too?"

"I can orgasm," I absently corrected her, "and... I just did..."

"Huh?"

"I... I got really turned on, Piper... errr... aroused. Sexually excited... By touching you and making you orgasm... I just... orgasmed in my pants."

She giggled, "Oh! Neat! I didn't know you could do that."

"Neither did I, actually." I dabbed a finger right against the moisture leaking from Piper's vagina, then brought it to my lips, sucking the girl's essence into my mouth. "Mmmm..."

"You tasted it?"

"Uh-huh... Mmmm..."

Piper was not one to pass up a chance to try something new. She slid her hand down, touched her vagina, then brought it to her mouth. "I don't taste anything..."

So I helped her, pushing my finger a little bit inside her lower lips, wetting the end of my digit, then bringing it to Piper's lips. "Try now..."

She sucked my fingers gently, then pulled back, running her tongue around. "It's kinda... sweet, I think."

I smiled, "Very... Your pussy tastes amazing, Piper."

"My pussy?"

"A private word for your vulva."

"Pussy," she repeated with a smile, "my pussy."

"Mmm..." I purred, loving the way Piper drew out the 'u' and 's' in the word. "Your have a very sexy pussy, Piper..."

She giggled and rolled forward, tucking her privates back behind her and hiding them from eyes and fingers, "Neat. Hey, that was fun, Uncle Patrick!"

"I agree."

"Can we do that again later? I want another org-as-m."

I moaned my agreement.

Later wouldn't come that night, however. Piper and I crawled into bed soon there after. I changed my slacks and put on clean underwear, the mess in the previous pair too thick to keep on. Piper snuggled against me and I held her tight, no longer avoiding letting her feel my half-erect cock pushing against her buttocks. She didn't mention it, though, telling me, "I'm learning so much, Uncle Patrick."

"Me, too, Piper. Me, too."

"I love you, Uncle Patrick."

"I love you, Piper." I kissed her neck, then her cheek. Piper turned back and I gave her an almost-innocent kiss on the lips, though I let my mouth linger there, feeling butterflies and less shame than I should have expected. Piper grinned and turned back. I squeezed her tight, told her I loved her again, and tried my best to digest what had just happened.

- - -

I suppose I didn't so much digest things as let them boil over in the night. I woke with all the shame I should have felt the night before. I'd masturbated a child! I couldn't believe I'd done such a thing. Piper trusted me, needed me to keep her safe, and I was molesting her! I was nearly sick to my stomach the next morning, up early and staying in the bathroom so long that Piper knocked and asked when she could take her shower.

I managed to clean up and shave, though I almost dreaded opening the door and seeing the girl right then. I just knew it would all come crashing down quickly once Piper realized I'd abused her. I couldn't do it again, no matter what I'd promised the night before. It had to end, an intense, one-time encounter. I was an adult. She was a child. She trusted me not to abuse that relationship. I'd blown it, big time, by masturbating her to orgasm. I wouldn't make the same mistake again.

Opening the door, my mood lightened just a little to see Piper standing there, smiling at me, her beautiful face framed by her beautiful raven-black hair, only a pair of thin pink panties covering her genitals. "Finally!" she giggled.

Piper pushed past me but didn't close the door. I fought the temptation to turn around and watch her shower, but my shame was thick and my guilt ensured that what I did, instead, was grab the knob and close the door as I stepped out.

- - -

I was practically a wreck, mentally at least, the third day of my assignment. I felt sick to my stomach, weak-kneed, and certain I was bound for the deepest levels of Hell if not an Indian prison. What I'd done was unforgivable, beyond the pale. I hated that I'd let myself take advantage of Piper's innocent curiosity, crossing the deeply-drawn line between guardian and abuser.

The girl showed no such concerns, Piper being her happy, curious self. She asked a lot of questions and made comments, nothing sexual and nothing about the night's activities, and I grunted and muttered my responses, feeling withdrawn and ashamed. If Piper noticed my mood, she didn't mention it that morning.

The day's events were smaller gatherings of important people, some in nice homes in the suburbs, others in tall office buildings. Each featured dignitaries and politicians and affluent citizens from Hyderabad and other places in India. Some even included foreign diplomats and emissaries from international corporations and organizations. Powerful people. Powerful egos. I took their photos mechanically, barely able to think straight, thankful that I was so used to doing my job that I could almost do it in my sleep.

We moved from location to location on schedule, fighting traffic gridlock several times, but arriving at each point with plenty of time to snap the required pictures before moving on again.

Once, a man came over and wanted to talk to Piper. We were in a hotel master suite on the top floor of the building, gorgeous views of Hyderabad all around. Perhaps two dozen attendees and, including me and Piper, maybe a dozen people working, me shooting photos, others serving drinks or bringing around trays of expensive hors d'oeuvres, still others offering a selection of cigars, the room heavy with dense smoke since I had arrived.

The man was tanned and his thinning hair slicked over to one side. He walked up and first introduced himself to me . I took a couple of photos of him with the party as the backdrop. He was a banking CEO and had just arrived in Hyderabad that morning. Franklin, as he told me to call him, was British and clearly quite interested in hearing himself talk, giving a long monologue which started with a story of how he made his first million, moved through several side stories, then ended with him asking who the "pretty little girl" was beside me.

"My niece, Piper."

"How lovely, young Piper! Are you enjoying the celebration this week?"

Piper shrugged, "Yeah. It's neat. We've been working."

That brought a small smile to my face.

The man chortled, "Ah, I'm sure you work very hard, my dear. Very hard."

Piper nodded, "I try to help," she said, looking a little like she thought the man was teasing her. Maybe he was. I wasn't sharp enough that day to pick it up.

Franklin knelt down and I felt the hairs on my arm stand up when he put his hand on Piper's cheek. "You are a doll, you know? You should be a model."

Piper took a step back, brushing away the man's hand before I could do the same. "Don't touch me."

"Oh, my dear, my apologies. I only meant to compliment you."

On instinct, I started snapping photos of the man clearly invading Piper's personal space as he leaned forward, though he kept his hand down this time. "You really should model, you know. Gorgeous features."

"I already model."

"Oh!" Franklin exclaimed, "whereabouts?"

"All over," Piper said evenly.

"Are you with an agency?"

"No," Piper replied, "Mommy takes me..."

"And where is Mommy now? Can I speak with her?"

I finally stepped in. "Listen, Franklin, I really need to get going. I have a lot more to do today. Piper, can you grab my case?"

Piper looked relieved to have an excuse to leave. Franklin stood slowly, watching Piper step away. I was very thankful that her shirt overhung the grey leggings she wore. Franklin turned to me with one of those horrifyingly-creepy smiles I'd seen often on men like him. "Do you know where she models?"

I wasn't about to give this man any information. "Sorry, no. She's... she's just with me a few days. I rarely see her..."

"Pity," he said, turning back as if he knew Piper was about to bend down to pick up my equipment case, "I'd love to see her... model..."

"Can't help you," I replied, honestly ready to deck the guy if he made one more creepy statement about Piper.

"Pity," Franklin repeated. He reached into his pocket and handed me a card. "I can represent your niece," he told me, "as sort of her... sponsor. I'm sure she would do much better events with a sponsor than her mommy could get her in. She has a look about her that would go over well with... special... judges. Give me a call anytime if you find out where she'll be modeling..."

The man turned then and made his way to a cluster of similarly-creepy looking men his age and I crumpled the card in my fist before shoving it in a front pocket. Piper leaned up and I tucked my head down. She told me, "That man is like some of the men when I model. Mommy makes them stay away from me, usually. I feel icky around him."

I cringed when I understood that what Franklin really desired from Piper, what the men at her events wanted, was something like what I'd done to her the night before. "Icky," I muttered, "I do too. Let's get out of here."

- - -

We stopped late in the evening at a pseudo-American cafe which served deli sandwiches, various salads, and, for some reason, Japanese popsicles. The insides of the cafe looked like a mix between 1950s Americana and the tacky stereotypical inside of an Indian straw market. I wasn't really sure what the owners were going for, but the food was pretty good and cheap, so Piper and I had our dinner there. They also offered free wifi, so I took advantage and started uploading that day's photographs.

I looked down while taking a bite of my turkey sub and saw Piper appearing to slowly scratch herself under the table. "Itching?"

She nodded, "A little."

"Just... be aware... people may notice you doing that..."

Piper shrugged, "It itches," the girl said matter-of-factly, as if that was reason enough not to worry.

"No, I mean," I whispered, leaning over closer to her side of the table, "they might think you are... you know... doing what we did last night."

Her face broadened into a grin, "Oh! That was so neat! But I'm not doing that, just scratching..."

"I know, but... it looks the same from here, pretty much..."

"Okay... I guess I can't do that here?"

I shook my head, "Please, don't. That's something that you should only do in private, okay?"

"Okay," she agreed. "Like... in the toilet?"

I nodded, "Right. But... not a public toilet, okay? People can hear you..."

"Oh! I didn't know! Am I loud?"

Despite my guilty conscience, I smiled, "A little."

"Alright, I'll have to try being quiet, right?"

"Err," I paused, "let's talk about this later, okay?" My eyes darted around us as the cafe began to bustle with a late evening crowd. My voice dropped below a whisper and Piper leaned close, "This kind of thing, Piper... we can't talk about it where people might here us, okay?"

"But why?"

"I'll tell you later. Promise."

She pouted a moment, then shrugged, "Okay."

- - -

I was utterly drained back in our hotel room. Physically. Emotionally. Everything in my mind and body screamed for release from the tension and strain. Times like this in my apartment, I would have taken to a marathon session of smoking pot and jerking off. But what I'd done to Piper the night before took away any sexual urgency and replaced it with deep despair.

I'd barely managed to finish my log for the day before I sat the laptop aside, laid my head back on a pillow, and closed my eyes.

"You look tired," Piper said, crawling up next to me.

"I am tired."

She rested her head on my arm, sparking a mix of both comfortable warmth and icy shame to rush through me. "So... I guess you don't want me to orgasm myself with you again..."

"Not tonight," I groaned.

"Okay... Can I do it by myself?"

I trembled. "If you want... just... please... go do it in the bathroom, okay?"

She sounded disappointed, "Nah... Its more fun with you, I think."

I didn't respond.

"Do you want to orgasm yourself?"

"No."

"Oh."

We rested together in silence for a long time. I heard Piper's breathing grow steady. The girl had fallen asleep, her face nestled into the side of my chest, her head on my upper arm. I smiled a little, enjoying moments like that. They took a bit of the edge of my burning guilt, but just a bit.

Eventually, I managed to get us under the covers, Piper's groggy protestations making it slow going, but once inside, the lights in the room off, Piper snuggled with me again, told me she loved me, and promptly fell asleep.

It was a long time before I could do the same.

- - -

The fourth day of the celebration in Hyderabad was supposed to be unofficial things. My assignment made it optional for me to go out and take photographs, though I knew it would be expected anyway. I'd had little sleep, and what dreams I had alternated between erotic moments spent playing between Piper's legs and desperate fear of being thrown in a filthy Indian prison.

I knew hanging out in the hotel would only add to my sense of shame and present additional temptations for me to wrap myself in more, so I opted to go out and work, Piper generally cheerful and once more acting like nothing had happened two nights before, commenting regularly on the colorful sarees and other outfits she saw people wearing.

"When are we going to Berlin?" Piper asked me when we had grabbed skewers of marinated chicken from a food market and settled ourselves onto creaking wooden stools at a counter along one wall in the open square.

It was Saturday. Piper's competition started Wednesday morning. I'd yet to get our travel arranged. My company would pay for the hotel and my ticket, but I still had to buy Piper's fare with my own money. "Not sure. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe Monday."

"It's gonna be soooo much fun, Uncle Patrick. I can't wait show you!"

"I've seen you performing, remember? In Tokyo."

"Yeah, I know," Piper told me, "But you have to help me this time."

"Huh?"

"Well," Piper replied, "Mommy has to help me with outfits and my makeup and whatnot. Since she's not here, you'll have to help me."

"But I'll be working, Piper."

"Then who's gonna help me?"

I shrugged, "I dunno. We'll figure it out once we get there, alright?" I hadn't considered the fact that I was essentially replacing Veronica completely in Piper's life, and that meant also being her tender for the modeling competition, it seemed. I worried about how I might be able to take care of her and handle my official assignment, but it was nothing I could deal with that afternoon.

Piper pouted, "Well, somebody has to help me..."

"We'll figure it out," I muttered, frustrated.

The girl crossed her arms and looked everywhere but at me, making it clear she didn't particularly care for the way I'd sidestepped her priority concern. I couldn't really much care, honestly. I was exhausted, the lack of sleep combining with my gnawing guilt and fear of Piper telling someone, anyone, what we'd done to make me grumpy and, I was sure, not a great companion that day. Piper continued to pout and give me what I took to assume was the silent treatment the rest of the afternoon.

- - -

We retired to the hotel room in the early evening. There were still a few places I could have gone to take photographs, but I was through with that day. I needed sleep. Badly. "Listen... I need to nap, okay? I'm really tired," I told Piper after I'd showered and stretched out under the covers. "If you want to watch something on your tablet, please put in your buds, okay?"

Piper glared at me, though I thought she was putting less effort into it than she had earlier that day. "Fine," she agreed, rolling off the bed and sitting with her back against the wall. Piper slipped in her earbuds, then paid me no attention in favor of whatever she'd brought up on her screen. I closed my eyes and fell rather quickly asleep.

- - -

I woke with the lights still on, forgetting that I'd taken a nap. I looked around and saw that Piper wasn't in the room. The bathroom door was open, so I grew concerned quickly. "Piper?" I called. There was no answer. I leapt from the bed and ensured she was not showering or on the toilet. Finding her gone from the room, I quickly put on my shoes and a shirt, ignoring that I was still wearing my night-time sweatpants, and raced out of the room. I punched Piper's cell on my phone, listened to it ring a few times, and left a frantic voicemail when she didn't asnwer.

I called Piper's name firmly but heard no answer in the hallway. Panicking a little, I called up the elevator and rode it down to the lobby. "Excuse me," I asked the clerk, the same woman who had given me some of her feminine lotion, "have you seen my niece? She's ten, long black hair?"

The woman shook her head, "No, sorry. When did you last see her?"

"Maybe three hours ago, in our room. I took a nap. She wasn't there when I got up."

"Oh, my," she said, picking up a blue phone and speaking something in a tongue I did not understand. After putting it down, she told me, "I've asked the security on duty to come around to help look."

I thanked her, then the woman said she would check the women's restroom just off the lobby, but she found no sign of Piper.

I really started to panic, trying to think of anywhere she might have gone. The guard came around a moment later, a dark-skinned local who said to call him Raj. Raj told me to check in the hallways on the main floor while he went back up to check the one where we were staying. I raced around, calling Piper's name several times. I opened a heavy doorway which led to the stairs and called, "Piper?"

"Uncle Patrick?" I heard a young voice echo from well above me.

"Oh, thank god!" I exclaimed. "I'm coming up. Don't move!"

I raced up the stairs, well out of breath but not really feeling it as I found the girl sitting quietly, tablet in her hands as if she had just been reading or watching something. She looked a little flushed. "Why did you leave the room?!"

She shrugged, "I dunno. I'm bored..."

"You shouldn't have gone out without me, Piper."

"I'm fine," the girl said defiantly, "I just came out to sit on the stairs."

"I called you several times!" I protested. "Why didn't you pick up?"

"Oh, sorry," she said, "I guess I left my phone plugged up in our room..."

"Please, Piper. Please, never go off without that, okay? What if you'd been kidnapped?"

I heard a heavy door open beside us and saw Raj poking through his head. In heavily-accented English, he said, "This must be her, yes?"

I nodded, "Yes. She's fine, thankfully. Thank you so much, Raj."

He smiled and replied, "The Goddesses smile on this girl today, yes? I will tell the desk all is well."

The door closed and I let out a long-held breath.

"You were scared for me, Uncle Patrick?"

"Terrified."

She looked a little contrite, "I'm sorry... I don't want you to be scared."

"It's okay," I told her, sitting down and wrapping an arm around her shoulders, "I just don't want to lose you, okay?"

Piper smiled and leaned her head against me, "Aww, thanks Uncle Patrick. I don't want to lose you, either."

That's when I glanced down and saw what Piper had been watching.

In what was about as graphic a display as she could have picked, the video playing was of a naked woman, on her back, legs fully spread, while a man hammered his big cock into her pussy. "Piper!" I started. "You can't be watching that!"

"Why not?"

"Because!" I exclaimed before managing to lower my voice. "That's for private times!"

"Oh, I didn't know that."

"Turn that off, please!"

She stopped the video, then locked the screen. "I didn't know that," Piper repeated.

"How long have you been watching... that..."

"Just a few minutes, I think. It hadn't been on very long, really. The others were kinda short, too..."

I groaned, "Others?"

"The other sexes I was watching. Did you know there a lot of them you can watch?"

"Jesus Christ," I muttered. "Yes... I know..."

"And there was this one, with these really black guys and this one woman... I didn't know more than one boy could sex with a woman at once but they did. And they did this thing, wher—"

I cut her off by literally covering her mouth with my hand. "Stop. Let's go back to the room, okay? This is also one of those things we cannot talk about where others might hear us, okay?" Piper looked at me with a little bit of fear, and I regretted using my hand to stop her talking. "Sorry, I shouldn't have done that... Sorry..."

I led us back to our room and deliberately locked every bolt available. "Piper," I began as she sat on the edge of the bed, "I think we need to draw a line on this stuff..."

"What line? What stuff?"

"The sex stuff. I'm... I'm feeling really uncomfortable. I'm not supposed to even talk to you about it, let alone... what we did a couple of nights ago."

"But why?"

I sighed, "I've been over this, remember? You're a child. I'm not..."

"But I want to learn stuff with you, Uncle Patrick!"

"I know, but... It's wrong. So wrong."

"But," Piper continued her protest, "I liked it! And I don't understand the way boys and girls sex together. I need to know!"

"No, you really don't, Piper," I told her. "You're ten-years old. You're much too young to be thinking about sex, and certainly too young to do anything like it. Give it a couple of years, or more, then you'll be ready."

She pouted. "That just sounds silly. I'm not too young. Maybe you're just too old."

Her insult, if that's what it was, struck deep and I recognized it as nothing but brutal honesty. "Yes. That's it, exactly. I'm much too old, Piper, to talk to you about sex or to touch your vulva or to make you have an orgasm. I should never have done any of that. Ever!"

She pouted harder, "But that's silly! Didn't you have fun? Don't you like teaching me things?"

"I did!" I exclaimed. "I do! But... Look," I said, finally sitting beside her and staring at my knees, "I can't do anything sexual with you without abusing you, can't you understand that?"

Piper shook her head, "No..."

"I'm an adult. I have power over you. I can make you do things you don't want to. I can lead you to do things you will later think about and see as abusive. Maybe not right now, okay? But later... So many little girls, and boys, have had men do this to them. They don't often think of those things as fun or good, Piper. Anything I do with you... legally and morally, it's abuse..."

"But... why?"

I was growing rather aggravated by those two words. "Because adults should not be having sex with children!"

Piper glared at me when I looked over, "But we didn't sex together, right? You just orgasmed me. I saw sexing in the videos. We didn't do any of that."

I sighed, "Technically, okay, we didn't have sex. But I promise you, Piper, it won't matter if you tell someone and the police show up to arrest me. I'll get thrown in prison either way..."

"Why would they do that?"

"Because it's illegal for me to have any sexual contact with you or anyone underage."

"That's horrible!" Piper exclaimed, looking at me with fear. "They'll put you in prison?!"

I nodded, "Just for what we did the other night. That's all it would take. I touched you some place I shouldn't have. I went further in making you orgasm. That's enough to spend the rest of my life in prison if anyone found out."

Piper's lips drew back, resolution in her expression, "I promise I won't tell, ever."

I shook my head and replied, "It's not that easy, Piper. Secrets like this... they are very difficult to keep, even if you want to. They tend to come out when talking with friends, or family."

"But," she said, plaintively, "I don't have any friends... and Mommy is my only family and she's gone..."

"I know," I replied, feeling sad that the child had no friends. "I'm your friend, though. And that's why I'm being honest with you..."

"But... but..." Piper started to sob a bit, "Don't you want to keep teaching me stuff?"

"Yes... But I can't, Piper. I just can't..."

She began sucking in her breath and shuddering as tears were quickly shed. I tightened my arm around her shoulder, but Piper brushed me away and flung herself into the far corner of the room to cry, alone, with her face against the wall.

I felt even more horrible than I did before.

- - -

Piper mostly cried herself to sleep in the corner. I carried her to bed sometime later, feeling simply awful. About everything. I could have avoided all of this heartbreak and frustration and guilt if I'd have simply stopped letting my arousal win out, if I'd have never let myself be interested in the private flesh between Piper's legs.

If only.

It didn't work like that, of course. Yes, I had control over what I did about it, but the emotions and arousal were innate, fundamental pieces of me which, until spending time with Piper, had never surfaced. I'd never had any attraction to children. Hell, before Piper, I barely registered the teen hotties I saw modeling and performing all over the world. They held no interest to me. If I had any attraction at all, it was to women my age, or maybe older. Piper was an extreme exception to my usual taste, and that attraction for her had been so intense that I'd found it impossible to stop myself from acting.

But I'd made a decision. Our sexual contact was through, and I would avoid talking to her about anything overtly sexual ever again. That was her mother's job, or at least not mine. Yes, I'd thought before that if she was old enough to ask then she deserved an honest answer, but I'd failed terribly at being only her teacher, a rote explainer capable of remaining distant from his pupil. No, I'd taken advantage of Piper's trust. Of her love for me. And I'd broken a deep and binding promise not to harm the child. I couldn't forgive myself, but I could, at minimum, never make those mistakes again.

That's what I told myself the next morning, anyway, as I arranged our trip to Berlin. Piper was back to giving me the silent treatment, not even responding when I'd asked if she was hungry and wanted breakfast. The girl shut herself in the bathroom for half-an-hour before coming out, her eyes puffy and red. My heart broke to see that she'd been crying again. I decided to see if maybe something besides my rejection was going on.

"Missing your mom, Piper?"

She shrugged but didn't respond.

"Sorry, Sweetheart. We'll keep trying her, okay? I'm sure she's fine. You'll see."

"Hope so..."

I offered, "Anything I can do to cheer you up?"

She paused, still not looking at me, "No. I already tried orgasming myself like you said you did when you get sad. It didn't work. Guess I'm not good at it."

I groaned but just pursed my lips and told her, "Well... how about I help you do your hair and then we'll go get some breakfast?"

"What do you know about hair?" Piper spat, still not giving me an inch.

"Very little. Maybe you can teach me? Show me how to braid it, like you wore it in Tokyo?"

Piper frowned, then muttered, "Fine. I'll get my brushes..."

- - -

Piper's hair was soft and silky. She'd reluctantly showed me how to brush it out fully and I'd done so as gently as I could, hoping to win some goodwill back from the way I'd essentially rejected her. "You have the most beautiful hair, Piper," I told her, no response given.

She demonstrated how to gather and separate her hair into bunches, then guided me through how to do a simple braid. The first attempt was so loose that it fell apart just a few twists in. Piper let off a frustrated breath, then showed me again. This one was much better, though it was a little asymmetrical from where my fingers didn't consistently tighten the strands together. I attached a ribbon near the end, twisting it a few times until it held the braid snuggly.

Piper went off to the bathroom to look in the mirror.

"Well?" I asked.

She offered a small smile which was the first I'd seen since the day before. "It's okay. You did alright."

"Sorry it's not better."

"It's okay," she repeated. "I'm getting hungry," Piper added as she began to lace up her shoes.

- - -

We had a day of idle time on Sunday. Our flight out of Hyderabad, stopping in Athens on the way to Berlin, left early Monday morning. I wasn't feeling much like doing anything, still utterly ashamed and feeling terrible for having to cause Piper emotional distress in order to avoid creating much worse in her head by continuing our sexual contact. The girl's cheerfulness was decidedly muted, but at least she was talking to me again, if with less enthusiasm than usual. She even took my hand at one point as we walked through a crowded marketplace in the early afternoon.

I watched a group of young children playing and thought about how they seemed so innocent and lively. They were a range of ages, I guessed, maybe five to nine or ten, a dozen or so kids kicking a soccer ball around in a small cleared patch of dusty concrete, laughing and chasing each other endlessly. How could I have taken that away from Piper by involving myself in her sexuality? Could she even go back to being a child again after what I'd done? Was she now fully sexualized, her mind hooked on seeking out the sort of attention I'd given her? Sure, I knew she didn't think things had been abusive, but I knew an older Piper would think back with more understanding of the world and believe otherwise. It made me feel sick to know that she would one day think of me as a predator and not a protector.

"Whatcha thinking?" she asked me after slurping down some frothy fruit drink, some of it clinging just above her upper lip.

I shook my head, "Nothing good."

"You're in a rotten mood," Piper told me evenly. "Stop it."

"Can't help it," I said quietly, "just feeling down right now..."

She leaned in close and said, "Because of me?"

The truth was that she was certainly part of it, but it wasn't in anyway her fault, so I replied, "No. No, I'm the one to blame. You've been just wonderful."

"Oh. I thought maybe you were mad at me again."

"I'm not mad at you. I'm just... This is tough, Piper. I know you can't understand what I'm dealing with, and I hope you never do. I crossed a line. I feel awful about it."

She whispered, "I won't tell anyone, Uncle Patrick. I promise."

"I know. It's beyond that now, Piper. I shouldn't have done anything to make you keep this secret."

She offered me a small smile, "I like that we have a secret, you know. That's special."

I shook my head and didn't reply.

Patrick, Male, 25

	- Narrator, professional photographer

	- 5'9, beige skin, 165lbs, muted-brown bangs

Piper, Female, 10

	- Child model

	- 4'7, tanned beige skin, 90lbs, blue-green eyes, straight raven-black hair