Apt [Running to Love 6] (Siren Publishing Classic) (7 page)

Fiona had learned a great deal from Master Andrew, and one of the most important pieces was the issue of knowing one’s place and trusting one’s Dom. Except Dave hadn’t been her Dom, never would be her Dom, and Fiona had suddenly become enraged and nearly unable to hide it from her mom. She was tired of cutting Dave slack, tired of making excuses for him. He had acted like an ass, and Master Andrew was both right and wrong. She should have been able to trust Dave, Dom or no, and she
had
been forward, but he hadn’t handled it. He hadn’t given her what she needed and what was right. He did so love her. He was just being dense and continuing with his stupidity. So shame on him. Although it took one to know one, because she still loved him regardless of the hopelessness of it all.
Stupid
.

She told her mom she would read the note when she was next home and managed to restrain her curiosity. She even refused the offer to have it forwarded to her. Her unsettled feelings intruded on a training session that night, and Fiona knew she’d pushed Master Andrew. She had acted like a brat, alternately sullen, noncommunicative, and challenging. When he had demanded an explanation, Fiona had quipped that her stupidity had bitten her on the ass again but refused to share further. It was her burden, and he wasn’t really her Dom. The look that came over his face made her tremble in her shoes, had she been wearing any, but he’d instantly composed himself and told her that she would be corrected in one of the viewing rooms Friday night.

“I’m sorry, Sir,” she stammered. “I just…”

“Not interested, Fiona. I won’t tolerate that from you. Be here for ten this Friday night, or use your safe word.”

She had managed not to cry until he stalked out of the room, and then wept a veritable storm of tears. She had done it this time. He was her friend, her training Sir and like family, and she’d broken the very first rule he’d imposed on her. The other rules were around not coming without permission, not speaking without permission, and the like. Not always easy for her to obey, but the consequences for failure weren’t really related to disappointment. Fiona knew that he wouldn’t cut her out of his life and his family, but she’d actually disappointed him, and it felt bloody awful. So, here she was, ten to ten on Friday night, about to be put on the St. Andrew’s Cross and disciplined for the world to see until he deemed her capable of taking her self-deprecating comment back. She wondered if it would happen before or after an orgasm. Probably before. The big Dom was also big on reward.

The door opened, and there he stood, larger than life itself. He was such a huge man, and while stern and oh so firm, one of the kindest men she’d ever known. Fiona instantly knelt.

“Good evening, Fiona. I’m pleased you came.”

She didn’t reply. There really wasn’t anything to say, just as there had actually been no real choice. Fiona loved this lifestyle, the certainty, the routine, the expectations, and above all, the safety. It might make no sense to others who weren’t involved, but she felt embraced by it. She even dared hope that someday she would have her own Dom and her whole sexuality would be explored and celebrated. She so wanted to please and serve.

“We’ll leave in a moment, little one. But first, a couple of things. I had thought to use the flogger, but I believe I’ll employ the single tail tonight, and I’ll plug you before we go.”

Andrew wasn’t asking. Fiona didn’t hesitate. “Yes, Sir.”

“I was going to blindfold you, but we have some new people here tonight, and I think the lack of anonymity will serve to underscore the lesson.”

Her heart pounded against the walls of her chest. The single tail didn’t worry her. He was an expert. But she’d expected a blindfold, and while she trusted Master Andrew with her life, Fiona panicked. She had met the other members many times. She’d seen them doing scenes and knew that being displayed had been in the cards eventually. She secretly wanted it. But she’d thought to avoid seeing their faces, even as she wanted the blindfold to enhance her senses to the absolute maximum. She was so conflicted. And there would be newcomers! People she didn’t know. Her breath whistled in and out of her lungs, and Andrew moved quickly to calm her.

“Fiona. Breathe. Gently now. It will be fine. You may have the hood.”

Her pulse dropped instantly, and she settled. He simply knew her, knew what she needed, even if Dave didn’t. Although he did, in fact. She remembered one instance in particular.

The big storm had hit while her parents were in town, and Fiona freaked out. She had been visiting her cousins in Kansas when a tornado struck. The childhood memory of being in that storm cellar, while all the world above went insane and the doors of the cellar had lifted and creaked as if with Satan’s baleful breath, had resulted in what could have been a lifelong phobia of any storm. She was convinced they would all spawn tornadoes, and her reaction to even a hint of one bordered on psychotic, building from a difficulty to draw a full breath to curling in on herself in any available corner, screaming into her closed fists. Fiona had understood Dave’s PTSD because she had her own, even if the two probably weren’t nearly the same. They both got triggered and reacted in incomprehensible ways that distressed most people around them because it made them feel so helpless in the face of it.

And on that day of the first storm of the season Dave had scooped her up and held her, murmuring against her hair and rocking her gently. Fiona simply relaxed and let him take care of her, the threatening weather forgotten and the tornado phobia fading like mist before the sun. He’d inherently known what she needed. She needed him, him to ride out the storm with, regardless of any outcome, because they were together. And she’d only known him a week. Tears pricked her eyes, and she swallowed against them. Enough. This was the here and now.

Andrew drew her up, and she waited patiently while he fitted the soft-as-butter leather hood over her head. It was more of a mask than a hood, because he understood she needed the bottom half of her face uncovered, but it laced up the back in the manner of a full hood, and it spoke to her like most fetish wear did. The brief moment of disorientation passed, and he set his big arm around her shoulders, his strength apparent even through the silk of the robe, and guided her along. She felt the changes in flooring beneath her feet and gave over to the moment, pretending it was Dave who eased her with him so gently and lovingly, totally trustworthy. She could never feel for Andrew what she still felt for Dave, but it was okay to fantasize a little. Or a lot.

She could hear the soft comments of women and the lower rumblings of men, and the temperature dropped. Andrew kept these rooms a bit cooler despite the nudity that would be prevalent because everyone got hot when a correction scene was underway. She was the star of the scene, and already she was totally hot, although she felt the change in the air more when he slipped her robe off. Andrew checked to make sure her brain had equalized from the lack of movement and that she wasn’t anxious. Nervous was okay, but he wouldn’t want her terrified. Fiona successfully fought the urge to cover herself. If she had learned anything, it was that she’d come to accept her body and was very comfortable in her own skin.

He bound her wrists while another pair of hands held her to steady her, and then a length of something was wrapped around her waist to help her stand unsupported while her ankles were secured. Fiona held the moment in her mind’s eye. She was stretched tightly, presented before a myriad of gazes, about to be corrected for a very real infraction of the rules, and she welcomed it. He appeared to have forgotten the plug, but Andrew didn’t forget anything, so Fiona accepted his decision. Then she understood. She quite liked anal play and how it enhanced her climax, so Andrew had taken it from her to evoke his mastery even as he’d allowed her the hood. She took a breath, only to gasp on it as Andrew murmured in her ear.

“We have two visiting Doms, little one. I have bestowed the honor of your correction on one of them. You will count the twenty.”

Fiona opened her mouth to scream her safe word, but her brain choked off her emotions. Andrew had pushed her hard all this time and told her often that she was an apt pupil, one of his best. He cared about her as he would a member of his family, and she found she couldn’t add another disappointment to the one earlier in the week. Her mouth snapped shut, and she set her teeth. He wouldn’t allow her to come to harm, and the experience would probably be enlightening. She would pretend it was Dave. She felt Andrew step away, the warmth of him fading. She couldn’t help a shiver.

* * * *

Dave admired the lovely little form of Andrew’s sub as she was secured onto the Cross. She reminded him of Fiona, although he’d never seen all of Fiona. He had felt her and longed to strip her down and examine her from head to toe with his tongue, but had had to be content with furtive, teenage-like gropings on the front porch or on the couch when her parents weren’t home. It should have been juvenile, even in retrospect, but it hadn’t been. It had been like starting over. Getting his head screwed on straight, healing, and sharing his life with a beautiful woman, inside and out. One who loved him as he loved her, and goddamn it all to hell, he needed to drive to Lansdown and see her again. They must be home by now, and she was avoiding him, and he was going to say he was sorry and then spank her if she got uppity and was practicing some kind of revenge that women did. Not that Fiona was that kind of woman. He didn’t think. No, he knew. She would take some training, and he hoped he had the patience, but he was going to have her as his submissive, and enough was enough. He turned to Alistair to tell he was out of there, gone to find his woman, but Andrew quite suddenly stood in front of him, offering the single tail.

All eyes were on him, and Dave felt himself blanch. Holy shit. He knew this was an extreme honor, and if he hadn’t just decided to go and find his future it would be terrific, but…Alistair bent a look on him, and Dave remembered he was a partner now, the details yet to be sorted out, but still a partner. He also remembered that Andrew was sending them business because it was mutually profitable, so he’d better not fuck it up. He’d show his expertise with this little sub and probably be able to pass the aftercare to Andrew, and he’d be gone. Twenty lashes wouldn’t take much time. He would ask her what she’d learned, bring her off with that vibe laid out on the bench to reward her, and the deal would be cemented. Then he’d be gone.

He asked Andrew for her safe word and then moved to take his place, hefting the whip, ensuring that it was as well made and balanced as his own so that it could become an extension of his hand. It fit properly in his hold, and his muscle memory stepped up to replace his adrenaline rush of leaving this place to go to Fiona. Dave placed the flat of his hand on the small of the sub’s back to alert her to his presence and then stroked down her spine, taking in her somehow familiar scent, unable to resist the texture of her velvet skin, but then yanked his hand back as if he’d been scorched. What the fuck? His cock surged, and Dave swallowed hard against the arousal. He’d been thinking of Fiona, that was it. He somehow had projected his burning, all-encompassing need for her onto this lovely sub. His voice came out harsher than he intended, unrecognizable even to his own ears.

“Count them.”

She tensed, then murmured. “Sir.”

The hairs on the nape of his neck whispered erect to mirror the state of his cock, and Dave ruthlessly choked his libido off. He laid the first stripe without further ado across the fullest part of her buttocks, reveling in her sharp intake of breath.

Another whisper, just the barest breath. “One.”

He should be making her sound it out, but damned if he wasn’t worried that hearing her count louder, the inflection in the word telling him of her need, would somehow interfere with his best-laid plans. He hurried to lay the next two on either side of the first and hardly waited for her to choke out the count before applying one to the glorious expanse of her back.

“Four.”

Dave’s brain finally caught up with his body. Holy fuck. Holy mother. He felt faint. The room literally swam before his eyes. His senses had recognized her, and his cock had telegraphed the message to his brain, but somehow the blood exchange between those two competing organs had mitigated it. He threw a wild glance at Alistair, who was looking goddamn complacent, like somebody whose plan had just come together. And at Andrew, whose satisfied face he was going to rearrange in the very near future. He pulled himself together and spoke.

“You’ve added two, sub, and you’ll add more if you don’t speak up.”

Her little body tensed, and her head in that concealing hood came up. “Dave?”

“Count, Fiona.”

Christ, the arousal now came off her in waves, and he could only believe it was because she’d learned it was him. He could smell her essence, and it drew him like the finest of perfume. He quit trying to sort out how this had all come to pass, this well-played little drama in which he, and hopefully Fiona, had been innocent pawns. The next stripe made her arch and cry out, but she counted and then he got into the pacing. He lashed, and she called in response, although she slipped into subspace at number sixteen, and her voice was thin and far away. At twenty-two he cast the single tail aside with marked indifference for such a fine tool and went around to face her. Tears streaked her cheeks and stained the fine leather of her hood, and he simply had to release it before he brought her off. He had to see her when she came. It slipped free, and he held her face between his hands, dwarfing her beloved features, pressing a hard kiss on her parted lips.

He ignored the vibe, drifting his fingertips down her gorgeous body, lingering on the beaded tips of her perfectly sized breasts, over the slight swell of her belly to her glistening folds. He slid a finger along the cleft to dip it into her copious moisture then up and over the little nub at the apex. She moaned and pushed into him, and he didn’t hesitate.