Healing Him

by Laura N Andrews

  “I do.” My eyes hold his. “I love to hear you beg me. I love to hear you want something from me.” Adding another finger, I continue my ministrations. For a brief moment, as he watches me, there’s fear in his eyes before a spark of determination brightens them. In this instant, I know he doesn’t want to let his fear control him. He wants me to. In those chocolate eyes, the sensual heat is for me. “You please me, boy.” My eyes focus on his mouth, and I watch his lips part in pleasure. His white-knuckled fingers grasp the rails.

  “Thank you, Sir.”

  “I know we’ll discuss it tomorrow, Ryan. But I need one thing to be clear between us. Answer me one question.”

  Lowering his gaze, he nods, and whispers, “Yes, Sir.”

  My eyes soften at his acceptance, and I still my fingers. “Your last Dom betrayed you.” It’s not a question, but a statement.

  His answer is barely audible. “Yes, Sir.”

  “Thank you, baby.” The endearment seems to shock him. I nibble on his inner thigh until he moans. “I need you to know I’ll never hurt you. If you ever safeword, I’ll stop what I’m doing immediately. Do you trust me?”

  Ryan nods. “Yes.” After a moment, his eyes widen. “Sir.”

  I smile. “Good. What are your safewords?”

  “Green, orange, and red, Sir,” he says with more confidence. He’s missed this.

  “Good boy. Now. Let’s see if you can come with only my fingers inside you.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Ryan’s eyes are wide with his desperate, sexual hunger. He’s missed this so much. Not only pleasing his Dom and feeling pride after being praised, not just being dominated, but more so having something inside him. His legs widen even more as his breathing accelerates. My large man is hungry for me. Desperate for me.

  When his hair falls into his eyes, I lean over and comb it back with my fingers. For a distracting moment, I wonder if Ryan prefers my hair short, or if he thinks I should keep growing it. Maybe I’ll ask him. Later. Much later. The need for friction intensifies, and I grip myself firmly with my other hand. “That’s it,” I praise, seeing him grasp onto the bedrail with more strength as he watches his cock leak onto his belly. My God, he’s hot. And what makes it hotter is, he’s doing this because I asked him to. He’s beautiful, and I tell him so.

  “Thank you, Sir,” he moans. “You’re beautiful too, Sir. I mean handsome. No, hot!”

  “I don’t mind the word ‘beautiful,’ boy.” I tilt my head. “Do you like the pet name ‘boy’?”

  His eyes snap up to mine, and he focuses on the meaning of the question. “You’re asking me ?”

  I smirk. “Yes, you.”

  His eyes run up and down my naked body. The heat in his eyes causes my cock to twitch. “I mean, you’re asking me what I’d prefer?”

  “Yes, Ryan. Pet? Cub? Slave?”

  He shakes his head. “Anything but slave. Or whore. Please, Sir.”

  Fuck. It’s clear Ryan wasn’t treasured by his previous Dom. Sure, some submissives don’t mind those nicknames, but Ryan’s obvious distaste for them shows me just one aspect in which he wasn’t happy. If he’s ever truly mine, I’ll be sure to show him how precious he is. This wonderful man deserves to be cherished. Memories are starting to come back to him, and I see the panic in his eyes. Wherever he is, it’s not in his room with me. I nod to his hands as they slowly release the rails.

  “I don’t believe I told you to let go, boy.” Ryan’s eyes fly up to mine. Poor boy . He looks lost. “Hands,” I remind him.

  He looks up, surprised. “I’m sorry, Sir.” Returning his hands to the rails, he grips onto them as if his life depends on it.

  “I think we’ll stick with ‘boy.’”

  “Thank you. I like it, Sir.” Ryan nods.

  “Good. Would you like to come, boy?” As I ask this, I curl my fingers up and he moans loudly.

  “Yes, Sir!”

  Stroking myself as vigorously as I piston my fingers inside him, I make sure to press against his prostate every time. The pleasure brings on a continuous murmur from Ryan. He closes his eyes. “Eyes open, boy.” His lids fly up and he meets my gaze. Panting heavily, sweating, and with a flushed face, he’s the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen. My orgasm reaches the point of no return. “Come.”

  “Ah! Sir….”

  “Yes, boy.” Watching him tips me over the edge. Our cum mixes together once again on his belly. After I catch my breath, I say, “Look at that.”

  Ryan glances down. “You like it, Sir?” he asks through heavy breaths.

  “Yes, boy. You’re beautiful when you come. But even more so now, with the evidence of our pleasure all over you.” Ryan sighs. He still has a solid grip on the bars. I pull my fingers out slowly. Hovering over him, I take his mouth in a hungry kiss. I demand entry by forcing my tongue into his mouth, swallowing Ryan’s pleasure-filled moans. Lowering myself, I cover his body with mine, with his legs on either side of me. Holding his head in my hands, I break away from his lips, only to whisper against them. “Very good, boy.”

  “Thank you, Sir.” His brown eyes stare up at me with such awe. As if I’m some type of god. The sudden desire to be anything he wants and everything he needs overpowers every other urge. In this moment, I know I’ll do anything, be anyone, if it means I have Ryan. As much as I want and need to dominate, he comes first. The depth of my realisation has me asking myself the most profound question. Is this love? Being absolutely whatever the person of your affection needs? Because if Ryan was to tell me now, or sometime down the track, that he couldn’t be a submissive anymore, it’d be all right. We would be all right. We’d make it work.

  * * *

  Something disturbs my sleep. Opening my eyes, I search the darkness to try to figure out what woke me up. The clock reads just after 4:00 a.m. There are harsh, quiet breaths and moans close by. Spooning Ryan as I am, I pull his shoulder and shift him until he’s on his back. In my half-asleep state, I’m aware he’s having a nightmare. Not knowing what else to do, I move to cover his body once again with mine. Only this time, it’s not about sex. Surrounding as much of his body with mine as I physically can, I attempt to fight away his nightmare with touch alone. A quiet voice in my head says this could indeed be the opposite of what he needs, but the other, louder voice tells me this is the right thing to do. Placing a kiss over his heart, I take his fisted hands in mine and press them down into the mattress. Hopefully my deep, quiet breathing soothes him. I rest my head on his chest and close my eyes. Slowly, finally, his heart rate calms down. Muscles which were stiff and protesting now relax beneath me. Eventually, a deep sleep finds us both.

  It feels like two minutes later when I’m woken up again. This time by my alarm. A deep grunt makes me smile. We must’ve shifted, because once again I’m behind Ryan, hugging him to my chest. Caressing his flank with my hand, I keep my eyes closed and move my mouth forward until I find the sweet spot just below his nape. After peppering a few slow kisses in the same spot, I pull away to turn off my alarm.

  “What time is it?” Ryan grumbles, facing me.

  Aw, he’s not a morning person.

  Staring at his sleepy form with bed hair, a small frown, and plump, pouty lips, I comb my fingers through his hair. “Eight.”

  “Eight?” His voice is a whine. “On a Saturday?” He moves as if to bury himself away from the world, if only to go back to sleep. Before he can shift too far away, I grab him in a tight hug before pressing him down into the mattress.

  Ryan laughs at my actions. “What are you doing?” He continues in a quiet murmur, “It’s too early for me to deal with kinky, Dominant Henry.”

  After laughing at his words, I answer his first question seriously. “I’m not letting you go anywhere.”

  His chuckle seems to be in an effort to lighten the mood. “I was only going to go back to sleep.”

  My lips hover above his as I speak. “You know I didn’t just mean right now, Ryan. I’m not letting you go. Ever.”
>
  By his reaction, it seems I couldn’t have picked a better set of words. Ryan shudders and he smiles. “You feeling possessive of me, Sir?”

  “Yes.”

  “I like that. A lot.”

  I tilt my head back. “We only started seeing each other a week ago, but—”

  “You’ve been in my thoughts ever since we met over a month ago.” Ryan’s admission makes me beyond happy. I grin and peck him on the lips.

  “Same here,” I say.

  Fisting my hands in his hair, I bring his head up as I tilt mine down. The kiss is hungry, slow, and delicious. Who cares about morning breath? I press him deeper into the mattress and move his hands to the rails before returning mine to his skin, caressing his sides as I nibble on his lips and play with his tongue. Ryan could stop me—he has the strength to—but he chooses not to. It makes his submission so much sweeter.

  * * *

  We shower together before getting changed and hopping into my car. When I adamantly protest him paying for breakfast, he places his hand on mine. “Please, Henry. I’d really like to. Last weekend, you said at dinner I can get the next one. I know Doms tend to want to provide for their subs, but this is to apologise for last night. I know it doesn’t make up for my actions. I guess I felt a little out of control. But please, let me do this. Please let me serve you in this way. Just this once.”

  I nod, pressing my foot down on the accelerator and steering the wheel when the traffic light changes. “Okay.” Glancing at him, I ask, “So, you’ve had a good D/s relationship before?” Unlike whoever it was who abused and scarred Ryan physically and emotionally. Abused to the point of causing him nightmares. My grip on the wheel turns my knuckles white.

  Ryan nods and smiles. “Yeah. When I first moved east to Melbourne, there was Derek. He was nice. A great Dom. We had two, three-month contracts.” He shrugs. “While we were together, he met someone else he became interested in. But he was loyal. He didn’t start seeing them until our second contract ended. He um… he helped me out. After…. He was the only one I spoke to about it.”

  When it doesn’t seem as if he’s going to continue, I say, “I’m glad you had someone you could talk to. He sounds like a great guy.”

  “Yeah, he is.” Ryan smiles as he recalls more pleasant memories. “So, you and Sean?”

  I shrug. “He was great too. Same amount of time, two contracts, but towards the end, I decided I needed more in a partner. We both acknowledged we didn’t love each other, and we deserved more in a relationship.” I glance at him again, wondering how he feels about the L-word. “I don’t mean to scare you when I say this, but I already feel more for you than I did with him. I think we could be really great together, Ryan.” I concentrate on parking the car and only face him when I turn the ignition off.

  Without saying anything, only licking his lips, he’s making it clear what he wants. His acceptance of me having control is growing. Ryan has wants and needs, but he’s giving all the decision-making to me. He’s putting all his desires aside and allowing me to choose when, how, and if I decide to satisfy them. Ryan starts to say something, but I cover his mouth in a passionate lip lock. With my hand in his hair, I yank his head back. “What are you doing to me, boy?”

  Ryan smiles. “I don’t know, Sir, but I think I like it.”

  “Me too.” After locking the car and taking his hand in mine, I lead the way into the café. When we find a table, Ryan pulls a chair out for me and asks what I’d like before heading over to the counter. While he’s ordering our food, I glance around. It’s before ten o’clock, and the place usually becomes crowded at about half past. The earlier Ryan and I have our conversation, the better. The need to know more about him is essential. To move forward, as his Dom, lover, and boyfriend, I have to be aware of how best to care for him. For him to move forward as my submissive, he needs to know I’ll be there for him, because I know all there is to know about him. Like any submissive, Ryan has to give me his vulnerability in order for me to harness his wants, needs, and desires to the best of my ability.

  Chapter Twelve

  He sits down in front of me, and I don’t waste any time. “So, before you tell me anything, I have an idea.”

  He gives me a wary smile. “Okay.”

  “Well, I was going to make a suggestion.” I clasp my hands together on the table.

  “What suggestion?”

  “I wondered if maybe the best thing for us is to write up a contract.”

  Ryan’s reaction tells me I’m right. His eyes widen and he licks his lips. “A contract?”

  I sigh. “Look, I know when we first met you didn’t want to be with anyone, let alone a Dom. But the thing is, this is who we are. If we want to embrace who we are, we have to figure out a way to make this work for us. But what we do is completely up to us. What happened to you…. I know—”

  “You don’t know anything!” Ryan hisses. His sudden anger surprises me. It also has me wanting to punish him for his rudeness, but I push it aside for now.

  “And why is that?” I point out gently. Ryan snaps his jaw shut. He looks like he’s about to say something as he lowers his eyes, but I beat him to it. I speak softly. “All I know so far is your previous Dominant betrayed you. I’m going to assume he hurt and abused you. To know you, I need to know a little more. With me, you let yourself be free and allow me to take control, and I know you enjoy it. We both do.”

  “So what if I like it? It doesn’t mean I want you to hit me. You said you wouldn’t hurt me.” Betrayal fuels the fire in his eyes.

  Shaking my head, I implore him. “I won’t ever hurt you or do something you’re not ready for. This is why we set out rules and guidelines in the contract. What I will do is push you out of your comfort zone in order to make you fly. I want to help you.” Something in my words interests him.

  Ryan fidgets in his seat. “Help me how?”

  “Help… heal you.”

  He’s silent until he finally replies with a whisper. “How can you heal me?”

  I hold his eyes. “We sign a contract. We enter into a D/s relationship.”

  Ryan shakes his head. “You think I can do this again? You think this will help me?”

  I place my hand on top of his. “I do. I figured it out yesterday.” I chuckle without humour. “You’ll never hear me call myself an expert when it comes to the BDSM lifestyle. I don’t have years and years of experience. But I’ve been trained. I know how to be a good Dom, and I know every relationship is different. Neither of us can go into this with assumptions of what we’re going to be like. You’ve never met a Dom like me, and in turn, I’ve never met a sub like you. The first of the few facts we’d have to acknowledge is that you don’t trust me.” I steamroll ahead when he tries to interrupt me. “Not completely, and not yet. But trust takes time. It’s clear you were in a bad relationship with a despicable man who called himself a Dom, and this is the only thing I know about it. I think it was emotional, psychological, and physical abuse.” I pause before continuing. “I get the feeling from David you’ve really bulked up since he last saw you. Perhaps the abuse is why you built yourself up to seem intimidating? You don’t want to appear as a submissive; you don’t want to seem weak. If anything, you want to appear to be a Dominant. And on the night we met, you were a brilliant actor. But I know now it was all a well-created façade. You are a submissive, baby. Just as I am a Dominant.”

  Ryan’s eyes water and my heart clenches as he squeezes my hand.

  “You can’t deny your desires, Ryan. You can’t suppress who you are anymore; otherwise, it’ll eat you up inside. And you know as well as I do the last thing a submissive is, is weak. In a D/s relationship, the Dom might seem to have the control, but he doesn’t. At the end of the day, the submissive does.”

  “I thought that,” he whispers. “But all I felt was weak when I was with… Luke.”

  “And it doesn’t surprise me.” His eyes flit to mine. A waitress brings us our coffees and we say our thanks. “If
you used your safeword, and he ignored it and continued to do something you weren’t comfortable with, he took your power away from you. It is not your fault. It’s his. And I can understand why you’d deny yourself after your submissive desires led you to him.” The last word is said with as much vitriol as I can manage.

  Ryan nods.

  “If I’m right, I think the only way we’ll work together is if we do what is natural to us. To have a contract with rules and boundaries specific to us. Tell me, baby. Did you and Luke have a contract?”

  He sighs, and I can see the disappointment is aimed at himself. “No.”

  I growl. What Dominant doesn’t have a contract?

  Ryan sits back but keeps one of his hands in mine. “I was stupid. We met at a nightclub. I was drunk, and when he asked if I was a sub, I admitted I was. He told me he was a Dominant and it was fate. He got us a hotel room. He was so charming and friendly the first night. He worked away a lot, so I only saw him maybe twice a month. That was his reasoning for no contract. Luke kept saying, when he was around more, we’d write one up. After the second month, he became… aggressive. He wouldn’t react immediately after I used my safeword. He’d delay. They were the warning signs, but I ignored them. He was so good-looking and charming. I was enamoured. I had no idea how… abusive he’d become. He kept calling me either slave or whore. Into the third month, he saw me more and more. I suggested a written agreement a few times already, but he shrugged it off and said we didn’t need one. The last time I saw him, four months after we met, I said I wanted one or we were through.”

  I nod. “Good, you deserve—”

  His eyes flash to mine. “He raped me.”

  My lips part in shock and my hand tightens. All I can do is shake my head. “Ryan. I’m… I’m so sorry.”

  He shrugs. “After the way he’d started to behave, I shouldn’t have been surprised. But that night…. I mean, you’ve seen his handiwork.” His free hand hovers over his stomach before his index finger lightly touches his nose.