Need (10 page)

The main entrance to the hotel held a lot more people than the lobby area we’d just come from, and I felt her draw even closer, if that were possible. I tightened my grip on her waist and kissed the top of her head before crossing the short distance to the valet. Thankfully, the hotel had staffed extra valets for the evening so we didn’t have to wait long for our car.

I felt a movement from Brianna, subtle though it was, and glanced down at her as I helped her into the passenger side of my car. She wasn’t going into a panic attack as she had been upstairs, but she wasn’t relaxed either. The look on her face was almost . . . blank.

The young man who’d brought our car came up to ask if something was wrong since I hadn’t moved from my position. I quickly assured him that everything was fine and went to get into the car myself.

Brianna was quiet the entire ride home. She’d barely moved aside from blinking. Her lack of reaction was bothering me. I would rather have had her hysterical than as she was now.

I parked my car and walked around to help her from the vehicle. She took my offered hand almost as if she were a robot following programming. I held her close to my side and prayed that once we were in a familiar space she would come out of it.

Unfortunately, nothing changed once we walked through my door. If anything, she seemed to become more distant.

Taking her hand, I led her into her bedroom. A small light flickered in her eyes, but was just as quickly gone again. 

I led her over beside her bed, and then went to get her something to change into. Reluctantly, I handed the clothes to her. Normally, I would have had no qualms about undressing her; however, given all of her trauma tonight, I felt it was best not to test her limits.

I lifted her chin with my index finger. Her eyes followed until they were looking into mine. Blank. Where had my Brianna gone?

“Go change and get ready for bed,” I said, nodding toward her bathroom. “I’ll wait here.” As soon as I let go of her chin, she slowly walked toward the bathroom and disappeared behind the door.

No longer able to see her, I pulled out my phone and dialed my assistant, Jamie. I tried not to disturb her on weekends, but it couldn’t be helped. She answered on the fourth ring and efficiently took down my instructions. Monday could not come soon enough.

Brianna

Numb. That was the only way to describe how I was feeling as I removed the purple gown from my body. I stood in front of the full-length mirror, but it almost felt like I wasn’t even there.

Habit was what drove me as I put on my nightclothes, washed my face, and brushed my teeth. There was no feeling as I scrubbed the make-up from my face or spread the mint toothpaste along my teeth and gums. They were just things. Actions. Nothing had meaning beyond doing what I had been told to do.

I walked slowly back into the room and came to a stop directly in front of . . . him.
Him.
Who was he? I thought I knew but . . . 

It was just better not to think.

He turned down the covers and told me to lie down. I obeyed.

I stared up at the ceiling. There were tiny patterns. I’d never noticed before.

He sat down beside me on the bed. His fingertips brushed the side of my face. I heard him speaking to me, but nothing registered. Nothing made sense.

The bed shifted and then I felt arms come around me. He had joined me in the bed. I knew I should be concerned. Should do something. Say something. But I couldn’t.

He didn’t try to talk to me again. The only noise in the room besides our breathing was the slight sound his lips made as they brushed against my hair. It was meant to be comforting. I knew that. Somehow, I knew that. I just felt . . . nothing.

At some point, I must have fallen asleep, but I couldn’t remember the falling. The morning sunlight filtered in through the single window of my room. He was no longer there beside me. I listened closely, and could hear movement in the other room.

Where last night I had felt nothing, today I felt everything. I replayed Karl’s attack and reached up to feel my collar still in place.

My collar. Cal.

And . . . Daren?

Stephan’s . . . friend?

Before I could halt them, the tears were running down my face, and I couldn’t get them to stop. He knew him!

A sense of betrayal ran through me. Lies. Lies!

Just then, Stephan walked through the door. His eyes were watching me closely. Apparently waiting, but for what I had no idea.

I sat up and told myself to stop crying. It didn’t work. If anything, the tears came quicker and with more force.

He crossed the room, sat down on the bed, and reached out for me. I pulled away, huddling in the far corner of my bed. He looked hurt, and I felt a pain in my chest.

There was no sound, but my crying. He was watching me. I knew he wanted to touch me, but he didn’t try again. We sat for a long time just watching each other. There were times when he looked like he wanted to cry, too. I was so confused.

Finally, he broke the silence. “Brianna, I want to tell you something. Will you listen?”

There was no need to think about it. I nodded.

“It appears we have a lot to talk about, but first I think I need to explain something—or should I say—someone.” He paused as if he was gauging my reaction, but I didn’t respond at all. “Do you remember my telling you that a friend had told me about you? That he’d seen you at a party? It was Daren. The one you saw last night. He is the one who told me about you being with Ian. If not for him, I would never have known you were there most likely against your will.”

“Daren?” I said slowly. “He . . . told you about me?” They were the first words I’d spoken since last night.

“Yes.” He shifted a little closer. “I have no idea what happened at that party, Brianna.”

“He beat me,” I whispered.

He paused. “Explain.”

And I did. As memories of my time with Ian went, this was one of the least traumatic. At the time, I had no idea of the man’s name. If he had spoken it, I had not heard.

Ian had bound me in ropes and suspended me from two hooks in the ceiling. I remembered him talking to the man as he was working and the man, Daren, telling him that Gina had not been able to come.

My old Master told the man that it had taken a lot of work to train me. That I had been a stubborn one, but now that I was trained, he wanted to show me off.

With every word, I was reliving that night. Stephan just sat, listening as I spoke through my tears.

“Ian offered to let Daren . . .” I choked. I couldn’t finish what I’d been about to say.

“He offered to let Daren play with you,” he said matter-of-factly.

I shook my head so hard that it started to hurt. “He took a stick and beat me!” I screamed.

Stephan closed his eyes. “A cane.”

“You know what it was?”

His eyes opened again. He was regarding me as if I was about to bolt, which given the circumstances, was entirely possible. “Of course I do. I’m a Dominant. Canes are very common.”

“Common!” I screamed.

“Yes,” he said in a voice that was so calm it made me want to pull my hair out.

“Would you use it on me?”

He knew what I was asking. “Yes, if you would let me.”

“Let . . . let . . . I couldn’t . . .”

At that moment, my legs decided to work. I threw the covers from my body and ran for the door.

I only made it as far as the living room before his arms came around my waist, halting my progress. What had been a surge of energy only a moment ago died in my limbs, and the tears once again began to flow as I went limp.

Stephan bent down, scooping me up into his arms. He carried me over to the couch but kept me on his lap, all the while, whispering calming words in my ear.

Eventually, the tears ebbed and I stiffened. “Please,” I begged.

He rubbed the tears from my cheeks with his thumbs and held them there. He looked into my eyes with so much emotion that I could not doubt his next words. “Brianna, I’ve told you repeatedly that I will not hurt you. I would never do anything to you that you told me you were not okay with. You were in a situation where things were done to you against your will, without you having a say one way or the other. That would not happen with us. 

Communication is so important. I need to know what you feel, how you feel, and why. You will have fears,” he said. “Especially given your past. But we can work through them.” He brushed my hair back behind my ear and stopped talking as he let everything sink in.

I wanted to believe him. Oh, how I wanted to believe him. The tears returned. 

“Shh,” he whispered as he kissed the tears away this time. “Shh, love. I need you to trust me. Trust me enough to know that I will respect your limits.” He pulled back enough to look into my eyes. “I told you I would push you, and I will. But, Brianna, I never want you to fear me or what I do to you.”

I could tell he meant what he said, but I still felt afraid. “I don’t . . . want to be afraid.”

He smiled. “You have a lot to learn. Some things may be scary, but that will be because you do not understand them. What I want from you . . . to become my submissive . . . it’s a learning process. For both of us.”

I thought about what he had said. Ian had never talked to me as Stephan had. He’d never explained anything to me other than that I was now his, and that he could do whatever he pleased to me.

So many feelings were warring inside me. I still didn’t want to leave. No matter how scared I was, that hadn’t changed.

I looked up at him, searching. Could I trust this man? Should I?

There were things about him I didn’t understand. Ian liked to hurt me. Loved it, even. Stephan seemed so different and yet he seemed to want to do some, if not all, of the same things.

No matter the logic of it, I knew what my answer would be. “I trust you.”

He leaned in so that his lips hovered above mine. “That, my dear Brianna, is all I ask.”

Brianna

Stephan pulled me back into his arms and held me for the longest time. I didn’t understand why I felt so safe with him, but I did.

    Slowly, my emotions settled down and I was able to remember all the things I’d said and done. I felt terrible. This man had done so much for me. He’d helped me through countless times when I’d panicked. He didn’t deserve this from me.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered into his neck.

“Brianna, you have nothing to be sorry for.” I started to protest, but he stopped me. “No. You will not apologize for getting upset over something you clearly don’t understand.”

“But . . .”

The look on his face made the words die in my throat. He wasn’t going to accept any type of ‘sorry’ no matter how I worded it.

We sat and watched each other for a few minutes. I kept trying to see some sign in his face as to what he was thinking, but I still had no idea when he moved me off his lap to sit beside him.

He turned to me. “Will you wait here? I have something I want to show you.” 

I nodded. 

He stood, and walked into his bedroom.

While he was gone, I kept wondering what he could possibly have to show me. My question was answered the moment he stepped back in the room. In his right hand, he held a long stick. A cane.

On instinct, my feet came up onto the couch, my whole body crunching into a tight ball. I waited for the first strike to hit me.

It didn’t.

I looked up slowly to find Stephan standing over me, waiting patiently. When he saw that he had my attention, he said, “I’m not going to cane you, Brianna. Put your legs down, please, and hold out your hands.”

My brain kept shouting at me not to, but I wouldn’t forget what he’d told me again. He wouldn’t lie to me, and he’d proven it more times than I could count. I could trust that when he told me something, it was true.

It took effort to uncoil my body, but I managed. One by one, my feet found their place on the floor in front of me. I put my hands out and opened them, hoping my trust in him was not misplaced. I watched as he took a seat on the coffee table directly in front of me, the cane lying across his lap. 

“This is a rattan cane,” he said, lifting it up with both hands. “There are many types of canes made out of a variety of materials. They come in all different thicknesses, but this is one of my favorites.” When he was finished with his explanation, he offered the cane to me. I didn’t know if I should take it. “Go on. It won’t bite, I promise,” he joked.

I tentatively reached across the small distance and touched the wood. It felt almost like a spindle on a chair.

He held perfectly still as my fingers examined the cane. It was as if he didn’t want to spook me. When I retracted my hand, he sat back and shifted his weight a little. 

“Close your eyes for me, Brianna.” My eyes widened instead. What was he going to do? He seemed to know what I was thinking. “I want to show you something, but you need to close your eyes first.”

Trust. With a deep breath, I clenched my eyes tight. It was the only way I could do this.

He took my hands, and helped me stand. He led me a few steps before stopping and asking me to hold perfectly still.