Naughty Bits Part II: The Training Session

Berkley Heat titles by Joey W. Hill

The Vampire Queen’s Servant

The Mark of the Vampire Queen

A Vampire’s Claim

Beloved Vampire

Vampire Mistress

Vampire Trinity

Vampire Instinct

Bound by the Vampire Queen

Taken by a Vampire

Unrestrained

Berkley Sensation titles by Joey W. Hill

A Mermaid’s Kiss

A Witch’s Beauty

A Mermaid’s Ransom

Something About Witches

In the Company of Witches

Anthologies

Laced with Desire

(with Jaci Burton, Jasmine Haynes, and Denise Rossetti)

Unlaced

(with Jaci Burton, Jasmine Haynes, and Denise Rossetti)

Specials

Honor Bound

Controlled Response

Naughty Bits Serial

Part I: The Lingerie Shop

Part II: The Training Session

Part II

The Training Session

Joey W. Hill

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

NAUGHTY BITS: THE TRAINING SESSION

An InterMix Book / published by arrangement with the author

PUBLISHING HISTORY

InterMix eBook edition / May 2014

Copyright © 2014 by Joey W. Hill.

Excerpt from
Naughty Bits: Bound to Please
copyright © 2014 by Joey W. Hill.

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My thanks to Dotty—avid reader, expert hairdresser and all round lovely person—who helped make sure that Madison cut Logan’s hair properly. Logan particularly thanks you for that, Dotty!

As always, I deeply appreciate your support and enthusiasm for my work. You’re a treasure, as well as a reassurance—if my stories attract great folks like you, I must be doing something right (grin).

Looking forward to the next time we get to hang out!

What did one wear to help a modern-day Master train a sex slave? Was it black tie, or like going to a Habitat for Humanity worksite, where one expected to get sweaty and dirty?

In the end, she did what a woman did when she was going to be around a handsome man. In this case, two of them. She dressed up, but toned it down enough to make it look like the effort was a casual afterthought. The off-one-shoulder tunic top was belted at the waist so it formed a short skirt over black jeans. The shirt clung to her breasts without being slutty, reinforcing her intent to support the mood but not become part of the performance. No matter that her damp palms and elevated pulse rate seemed to indicate otherwise. After brushing out her hair so it was a silken ripple over her bared shoulder, she slid into a pair of heeled boots and was ready to go.

She hadn’t returned to Naughty Bits this week, instead focusing on the grand-opening details from home. A side benefit of that was she didn’t have to worry about Logan cornering her to find out if she’d done what he suggested with that wooden box.

It had been a gift from him, the box containing a set of suggestive tarot cards and a pair of cuffs. He’d given her a solitary exercise to do with them, something intended to help her get in touch with her own sensuality. She’d ended up wearing the cuffs and masturbating to climax, imagining him as she lay upon those fanned-out cards.

The next morning, when he’d called the house, responding to her message that she wouldn’t be back to the store this week, she’d still been too flummoxed by that experience to talk to him directly. Instead, she’d listened to him on her voice mail. He’d thanked her for letting him know her schedule and told her to give him a call if she needed anything. Very cordial.

“Don’t forget about Friday. I could use an assistant. The boy can be a handful.”

She’d spent the interim days doing this and that, but she still couldn’t bring herself to do much in Wonderland, Alice’s second-floor bedroom that was chock-full of costumes and dress-up clothes. She did have her coffee in there Friday morning, looking at the assortment of outfits like a museum display as she thought about the past . . . the future.

Truth, all of it had helped harden her resolve about tonight’s plans. If she couldn’t go through the contents of that room, how could she possibly figure out what would work best with Naughty Bits’ customers? Joining Logan for Troy’s training session would help her. She’d face it like a dental appointment. It was a necessary cleaning of plaque buildup, a mental block preventing her from shining the way she could.
Focus. No sentiment. No Alice memories. Just sex, whips and chains tonight.

It wasn’t quite dark when she pulled into the alley behind her store, but twilight was settling in, the time of possibilities. She unlocked the back door and slipped into her storeroom, letting the door close behind her. Putting her purse on one of the shelves, she saw the connecting door between her storeroom and Logan’s was open, underscoring the invitation. She stepped across that threshold and moved to the curtained pass-through to the main area of his store. Everything was quiet and dark, only the dim security lights providing illumination. “Hello?”

“Sorry. Here I am.” At the muffled bump, muttered curse, she relaxed, hearing Troy’s voice, his feet hurrying toward her down one of the aisles. When he turned the corner, she was confronted with a lot of firm male flesh. All he was wearing was a pair of drawstring pants. A light sheen of sweat made his muscles above them gleam.

“I’m so sorry, Madison. I was finishing up my workout in the glass-cutting area and time got away from me. Master Logan told me to be at the storeroom door so you wouldn’t think you were walking onto a horror movie set.”

“The one where two charismatic men lure an unsuspecting woman into their shop after hours to chop up her body with power tools and compost her?”

“You have Alice’s sense of humor. A bit more dry and edgy, but still.” Troy grinned. Taking her hand like a high school kid latching on to his girlfriend, he drew her through the storeroom, toward the annex door. She didn’t mind him holding her hand.

Why couldn’t she be like other women her age? The ones who said, “Who needs them?” when it came to men. The self-sufficient females who were content to have their girls’ night out with wine and lots of male bashing. She couldn’t seem to stop wanting a man.
The
man. The one she was always hoping she’d find, but who apparently didn’t exist for her.

Two years ago she thought she’d overcome the weakness. After seven failed relationships, it was clear she needed to focus on her career and stay away from temptation. She’d chosen a career that paid well but didn’t engage her passions. Staying on an even keel had seemed safer, at all levels of her life.

Alice had called it self-euthanizing. Making herself numb. Madison had hung up on her during that phone call.

Stay away from men
. It was a simple enough rule. Yet here she was. She was an idiot.

“What kind of workout do you do around sharp glass?”

“Yoga. I used to be a gym freak, and then Shale, that’s my Mistress, showed me yoga is just as strenuous, but less hard on the joints. My first session made me a believer. I couldn’t walk the next day.” That quick grin again. “And the glass-cutting area has pretty clear floor space, so it’s good for doing the positions. No chance of being cut, unless I don’t sweep it the way I should.”

She could imagine that was part of Logan’s incentive to make sure his assistant did his job. “So what is this training going to involve?”

Please God, let it not be me putting Troy over my knee for a spanking while he sucks his thumb and calls me Mommy.
She wouldn’t joke about such a thing, in case that was his deal, but she fervently hoped it wasn’t.

“Master Logan will have to tell you that.” Troy’s tone was apologetic.

Not “Mr. Scott,” making it clear that their relationship had a very different cast tonight. Was she expected to call him “Master Logan”? Did she want to do so?

Troy escorted her to the woodworking area. Light spilled in from an open door on the left wall, one that had been closed the night Logan showed her this room. She’d assumed it was a supply closet, and that the training area Logan used was the same as his woodworking area.

The other room was definitely not a supply closet. This space was the same size as the woodworking area, the annex building bisected to accommodate it. The whole place was a fun house, each door revealing another wonder.

The room was unfinished, setting the proper ambiance for its purpose. The open beams above showed the electrical wiring, and the concrete floor was marked with a wild spatter of paints and whitewall compound. There was no drywall, the insulation tucked in and sealed with plastic, pegboards attached to the framing over it. The boards were occupied by an array of paddles, floggers, whips, chains, fasteners, coils of rope. Promising pain, pleasure, bondage.

A pair of chains with shackles hung from the main support beam. A cushioned work mat was placed on the floor beneath them, and over that a large clear plastic tarp was spread, like the kind used for painting. Catching fluids.

“Where is Ma—Logan?”

“Here.” He came out from a bathroom, drying his hands. Wearing a dark button-down shirt loose over his jeans and the heavy-tread work shoes, he was as distracting and appealing as other men would be in a tuxedo. She saw his gaze turn to a workbench where an array of coiled ropes in different colors and thicknesses had been laid out. His critical glance suggested it had been Troy’s job to arrange what Logan desired to have at hand. She wondered what the consequences would be if Troy had missed anything. As her gaze returned to the chains, the plastic, her stomach tied itself neatly into a knot.

“I’m not really sure what I’m doing here.” She blurted it out, then colored. He nodded, unperturbed.

“You can leave at any time, Madison, but I’m hoping you’ll stay with us throughout the entire session. We’ll start with something simple. Troy, go to the shackles. Madison, put them on his wrists.”

Just like that. No chitchat, no time for her to get more nervous than she already was. In a way it was helpful, being treated like the assistant she expected to be, something functional and not the center of attention. Though that knot still tightened another notch at the way he told her to do it. It wasn’t a
please, would you mind
kind of tone. It was an order.

Troy obediently moved to the mat. Logan was studying the ropes on the workbench, but she wasn’t fooled by the inattention. She knew he was tracking her responses, because he emanated that Master-of-the-Universe vibe she’d accused him of having, primarily because it turned her on so much.

She made her feet move, followed Troy. When she reached the mat, she closed her hand around one manacle, dangling near Troy’s shoulder. As he raised a hand so she could put the cuff around it, she noticed a new tension to his face. Not fear. Anticipation. She could feel it increase as she locked the cuff around his wrist. As she did it, her own increased as well. Needing to reassure herself of his well-being, she murmured “Okay?”

The young man nodded. His focus seemed to be turning inward as she completed the task, as if putting on the cuffs transported him to a different plane. She remembered the way her own state of mind had shifted when she’d locked the cuffs on to herself at home, knowing the key was behind the ice, temporarily inaccessible.

Because of the lack of floor or ceiling cover, the hollow room echoed every noise, including the metallic sound of the shackles being fitted into place. Troy’s wrists had a light dusting of pale blond hairs over them. She slid a fingertip over them, petting them like a cat’s fur. When she glanced up at his face, she saw those blue eyes had shifted to hers.

“Finish the task, Madison.”

Logan’s tone held a slight reproof. If he did prescribe a punishment for her transgression, would running be an option?

She stepped back.

“Lift your arms above your head, Troy. Eyes down. She’s lovely, but you haven’t earned the right or my permission to look at her.”

The young man cast his gaze downward, though she noticed his line of sight remained on her legs. Logan noticed it, too, because his lips twitched. “So it’s going to be that kind of night, is it?”

He pushed a button embedded in a wall plate. At the sound of gears engaging, she glanced up to see the chains were attached to a track. The concept was similar to a garage-door opener, only this motor drew up the slack in the chains until Troy’s arms were pulled taut over his head. The greater the stretch of his torso, the more lost Troy’s expression became in that inward focus. The abdomen muscles elongated, the chest and rib cage arching as his heels left the ground. Logan stopped him there, only the balls of his feet still touching.

As captivating a picture as Troy was, she found herself trying to watch them both. Logan’s full attention was on Troy, apparently gauging the tension he was placing on his muscles, studying the arches of his bare feet. From his rear position he had the enviable view of Troy’s ass, all tight and tilted. Then he caught
her
attention fully.

“You wanted to touch him, Madison. You can touch him now. Touch him however you wish with your body, but only above the waist with your hands. Until I say stop, he’s your possession to enjoy.”

Logan stepped forward, leading by example. He ran a palm down Troy’s back, then gripped his nape. Troy’s lips parted, the tip of his tongue coming out to lick them like a nervous animal. Logan pressed himself against his back, his hand shifting to curl around Troy’s throat. The look in Logan’s eyes shifted as well, to dangerous and feral.

“You have no control now, Troy. I can do whatever I want to you.”

“Yes, Master.” Troy gasped as Logan gripped his hair, jerked his head back.

“I didn’t say you could talk, did I?”

Troy shook his head, the best he could against that powerful hold. “I’ll let it pass, since you were polite.” Logan’s touch eased, his knuckles sliding down the valley of Troy’s spine, then he stepped back, looked at Madison.

“Think of how you felt when you saw him stocking the shelves, Madison. You wanted to touch him, didn’t you? Only yes or no answers.”

She swallowed. “Yes.”

Logan nodded. “It’s nice, isn’t it? Touching something this beautiful without having to play games, to excuse yourself or apologize? You see a rose and you touch it, smell it. You don’t explain yourself to the rose, figure out the right approach. You don’t stop touching it because you think you’ve overstayed your welcome or you’re wondering how the rose is feeling about it all. You could tear the petals off if you wanted to do so, but instead you find yourself cherishing it all the more because of your power over it.”

He slid his hand up to Troy’s nape again, his large fingers stroking through the thick, sandy hair. Troy’s eyes closed, another shudder passing through his body. “You cup it in your hand,” Logan continued, “appreciate and cherish it through that touch, through your attention. It makes that moment all the more powerful. He’s a rose, Madison. A rose with some thorns, but the chains neutralize those. He’s pure pleasure, all for you to touch and savor.”

Madison made a mental note to have bottled water on hand to wet a dry throat when she was around Logan. She may have only known him for a day, but he generated an erotic charge in her that she’d never experienced, even in her longest-term relationship.

Her feet were moving, bringing her closer to Troy. Her hand was already out. Troy’s eyes were open again, but his gaze was lowered, per Logan’s order. When she was standing before him, she found she wanted something different.