Tamed

by T M Chris

  It was all that fresh air. Now that he had an office job, he didn’t get outside much during the day. At least in the Marines, there’d always been some drill or other to get them moving. But he was glad for the job—glad to be back in the line of work he’d been trained for and glad for Eduardo who kept him sane. If he’d somehow managed to get this job before meeting Eduardo, he’d have lost it so fast no one would’ve had time to learn his name. They’d have remembered him forever as “the big, scary guy who flipped out in the caf that day.”

  “Your turn, old man.” He went over and kicked Eduardo’s foot—lightly—and Eduardo heaved himself up with a mock sigh and took over the job of throwing the stick. Eduardo wore a glove to do it, not as willing to subject himself to saliva and mud as Jake was. It wasn’t the same glove he wore to spank Jake’s ass, but Jake couldn’t help making the association.

  They often did short sessions now that he knew it was okay to mess up. He kept making his to-do lists more ambitious—adding stretch goals, as Eduardo called them—knowing that he didn’t have to tick off every single thing. He was starting to see that his biggest problem was fear of failure, a sort of presumptive giving up. Why even try if he was doomed to fail? But he didn’t have to beat himself up for not being perfect anymore.

  “That’s my job,” Eduardo would say if he caught Jake at it. Then Eduardo would add an extra ten strokes for “damaging my property,” which Jake figured was fair. He’d done a lot of damage to himself in the past—destroying relationships, bringing consequences down on his head, sinking deeper and deeper into a place of self-loathing.

  Now if there was something left on his to-do list at the end of the day, or something he’d fucked up a little, he turned it over to Eduardo. Eduardo turned him over his knee, and a few brisk minutes later, Jake would be forgiven. The spankings were a good stress reliever, a good conscience reliever, and just a general relief—to know that someone else was responsible for keeping him on track.

  After a discipline session, they might spend the rest of the night as equals or they might scene. Eduardo had an impressive array of costumes and characters to have fun with. Jake particularly liked the Marine Sergeant—liked getting to tell Eduardo everything he’d never been able to tell his real superiors, being careful to make sure that both Eduardo and Earl knew it was only in play, of course.

  He hadn’t acted out in a bad way since that horrible night a few months ago. Between frequent spankings and the occasional scene, his internal pressure valve had been running at a manageable level. His boss liked him, his co-workers liked him, and Eduardo maybe more-than liked him. Life was good.

  “What are you so deep in thought about?” Eduardo asked.

  “You.”

  “Oh? Big plans for tonight?”

  “Not like that.” He wasn’t up for a scene tonight. “But maybe something.” He gave Eduardo a lascivious look, and Eduardo laughed in response.

  “All right, big guy. We’ll see if you can stay awake for it. Earl’s tuckered out, too. Time to get both my boys home.”

  Back at home—well, it was Eduardo’s home, but Jake sure spent a lot of time there—Eduardo pampered him with food. Since there was no need for discipline and Jake wasn’t in the mood for a scene, they opened a bottle of wine with dinner. They ate out on the patio, Earl at their feet as tuckered out as Eduardo had predicted he’d be.

  Autumn was winding down. Soon they wouldn’t be able to eat outside like this. But it was perfect tonight—the sky deepening to a rich purple, fireflies going off like fireworks in the darker corners of the yard, the neighborhood quiet behind Eduardo’s privacy fencing which was flocked by the ornamental bushes he tended to as carefully as he tended to Jake.

  “What kind of dessert are you thinking of?” Eduardo asked as he rose to clear their plates. Despite his languor, Jake popped up to help. Eduardo had already done all the cooking, and Jake’s only excuse for being tired was that it’d been a nice day.

  “Maybe fuck me?”

  “Are you sure you’re up for that?”

  “It doesn’t have to be rough.”

  Eduardo chuckled. “We’ll see about that. Go ahead and get ready. I’ll finish things in here and get Earl settled.”

  It was an unspoken rule that they didn’t fuck in front of Earl, even when there wasn’t anything rough going on. They jerked each other off in front of Earl and blew each other in front of Earl, so Jake wasn’t sure what the difference was, but yeah. Fucking was private times.

  He went into Eduardo’s room and used the en suite to shower and get thoroughly clean. When he came back out, he found Eduardo waiting for him on the bed, already undressed. Jake took a minute to appreciate seeing him this way, all stretched out and naked. The springy grey hair on his chest always gave him a thrill. It wasn’t a Daddy thing. Or hell, maybe it was a Daddy thing. All he knew was that Eduardo was definitely a Daddy he was down to fuck.

  Eduardo wasn’t hard yet, but Jake was about halfway there himself, unable to resist the temptation of some quick touches in the shower. He loved Eduardo’s cock, soft or hard, but he especially loved getting it hard.

  “For me?” he asked, crawling up the bed between Eduardo’s legs to nuzzle into the scent that meant security and sex.

  “It’s definitely not for anyone else.”

  They’d made that agreement a month ago. Eduardo had asked Jake if he was seeing anyone in a non-Dom capacity, and Jake had admitted that he’d never seen anyone in a non-Dom capacity, not outside of one or two-night meaningless encounters, which he had no need for now. Then they’d agreed to make it exclusive—both for play and for real—and since neither of them had been with anyone else since the night they met, they exchanged test results and stopped using condoms, which was a level of trust Jake had never expected anyone to have in him. It really meant something.

  For one thing, it meant he didn’t need to cover up this gorgeous cock before he got it in him. He stopped snuffling at it and started licking it, then moved on to sucking it. The mood was unhurried, a continuation of the day at the park and the evening on the patio. Eduardo didn’t rush him, content to let Jake bring him up to full arousal slowly, but his cock was good and hard now. It was ready for Jake, and Jake was ready for it.

  He rolled over onto his back, telling Eduardo without words how he wanted it, and Eduardo got onto his knees and opened Jake as slowly as Jake had hardened him.

  “Maybe you really do want it soft tonight,” he observed.

  “You think I can’t want it soft?”

  “I think you’re going to change your mind. But I like this. It’s like a cuddle fuck.” Eduardo slid his fingers out of Jake’s ass and lined his cock up with it. “Slow, then.”

  He pushed just the head inside. He’d prepped Jake so thoroughly that it didn’t hurt at all, not even a quick burn, and Jake was ready for more instantly. But of course Eduardo had to be difficult about it and press in slow, slow, slow, waiting for Jake to complain. He liked it though—not something he was used to, but good. The slow slide meant he felt every inch of Eduardo’s cock and the way his body expanded to take it in.

  It was a different kind of owning than the rough, commanding fuck Eduardo usually gave him, but Eduardo was a master at this tempo too, drawing back and working in again in long, controlled slides. Positioned face to face the way they were, they could see right into each other’s eyes. Jake had been fucked face-up before, but he’d never looked. Not there. Not straight into another man’s eyes as the man’s cock worked inside him.

  The things he saw on Eduardo’s face made his heart swell. Caring. Hunger. Tenderness. Passion. What had been pleasantly sensual became richly erotic. He was giving himself to Eduardo—all of him, wholly. No fight or pretense or play, just complete abandon. He’d never felt this before, and he knew with a shocking clarity that he’d never had the emotional maturity to feel it before.

  He pulled Eduardo’s face down into a kiss that was like water after a ten mile hike—pure renew
al. They moved harder, faster, breaking apart so they could breathe. Eduardo came first for a change. He was always so controlled, so perfect, but he devolved into an undignified rut as his orgasm washed over him, the intensity on his face tipping Jake over the edge to join him. He hadn’t even touched himself. The friction of their bodies and the sight of the man above him was enough to get him there.

  Eduardo collapsed on top of him, giving Jake a rare opportunity to be the one doing the holding. He wrapped tired arms around his lover’s body and snuggled his face into his neck.

  “Good thing I didn’t want it fast,” he teased. “I’d have killed you.”

  “Shut up,” Eduardo retorted, but his voice held nothing but humor and satisfaction.

  “Yes, Lalo.”

  Eduardo rolled off to the side and propped himself up on an elbow to gaze down at him. “I thought you’d forgotten what I told you about my nickname being Lalo.”

  “Not forgotten.” He’d never forgotten for a minute. “Just wasn’t sure I had the right to call you that.”

  “If you don’t have the right, I don’t know who does. I like hearing it from you.” He leaned in for a kiss. “I’m very glad to have you here, very glad we’ve come to mean so much to each other. I love you, Jake.”

  “I love you too,” he murmured, trying not to wet Eduardo’s chest with his tears. It was so unexpected, that he got to have this. Got to have Eduardo and Sir, and now Lalo, too. An almost-dog and an almost-home. A job. “I don’t know why you’d want me though.” Even back in the very beginning, he hadn’t understood why Eduardo would want to take on a sub as difficult as he was.

  “Because my pieces fit your holes, I suppose. I’m a bossy person. I like being in charge.”

  Jake snorted, because that was an understatement if he’d ever heard one. “You are the boss, though.”

  Eduardo was a named partner in a big law firm—about as important as a person could be.

  “I’m the boss, but I don’t get to be bossy. I have to be diplomatic, pretend to care about my employees’ opinions.” Eduardo wiggled his eyebrows to show he was joking, but Jake understood that he was also not joking. “I can’t just dictate, and I definitely don’t get to punish. I have some associates who could use a good over-the-knee spanking from time to time, believe me.”

  “So you come home and whale on me instead?”

  “Sort of, yes. That’s why I don’t mind if you need a little correction here and there. Not that I would ever expect you to be perfect, but I get something out of it when you’re not.”

  “I wonder if I’ll ever be a boss.” He was a long way from it now, at the very bottom of the corporate ladder, which meant he got shit on sometimes. His manager wasn’t bad, but the customers could be awful, and he was supposed to treat them with respect even when they didn’t deserve it.

  “Do you want to be a boss?”

  “I don’t know. Definitely not of you.” He wasn’t even that great at being boss of himself. “So is that why you adopted Earl? Because he was a discipline case?”

  “They were going to put him down. He’d been housed with a couple of foster families who returned him for being too aggressive. I didn’t go to the shelter to find a difficult dog on purpose, but I couldn’t stand the thought of such a beautiful animal being put to sleep because his previous owners failed him.”

  “It’s awful,” Jake agreed. It made his heart ache to think Earl had almost died.

  “I figured what worked on a sub might work on a dog. Not the spankings or the sex, but the steady discipline, clear rewards and punishments and being even-handed in how I administer them.”

  “And loving in how you administer them.” Jake had felt the love in Eduardo’s severity right from the beginning, had always known the discipline was for his benefit. He bet Earl had too.

  “Speaking of Earl…” Eduardo went out to the living room but came back alone. “Totally conked out,” he said.

  Jake missed Earl as they fell asleep, but by morning he was there—the three of them splayed across the bed, as always, taking up every inch of it, almost like a family.

  Chapter 8

  Jake didn’t have much in the way of friends, and he definitely didn’t have any friends in the scene. There were Doms he’d pissed off and subs he secretly hated because they did everything better than him, but not friends. What did he need scene friends for anyway? He was happy spending his evenings with Eduardo and Earl in their cozy bungalow where he understood what was expected of him and seemed to be able to do it. But Eduardo thought he needed friends, so they were going to a club. It was embarrassing enough having to be “socialized,” but then Eduardo made him wear his leather shorts, and that was worse.

  “I love these.” Eduardo said, giving him the once-over before they left his house.

  “I feel ridiculous in them.”

  “I know. That’s part of what I love about them.” Eduardo trailed a hand over his ass in a manner that was possessive but not punishing. “I remember how you looked on that barstool, all flustered and hungry and huge, dressed like a sub but ready to kill. It was eye-catching.”

  “I didn’t realize you’d noticed me.”

  “Of course I did. I’d planned to come over as soon as I finished with my friend. That’s who we’re meeting tonight, by the way—Dale. So he’s already seen you in these.”

  Great. Jake wanted to sulk at being dressed up like a bauble to show off, but he was too pleased that Eduardo thought he was worthy of being shown off.

  Dale was Eduardo’s age, not nearly as handsome with it, and a little too sure he was right about, well, everything. His sub was older too, but small-framed and kind of campy, which made him come across as younger. Sammy was dressed pretty similarly to Jake except with a chest harness and a leather cap that struck Jake as silly, but he smiled a lot and neither of them watched Jake like he was a poisonous snake, which was how he was accustomed to being treated at clubs.

  They were in the public bar area where he’d met Eduardo that first night, but the place was a lot more crowded tonight, with so many guys in leather shorts he didn’t even stand out and a DJ playing music way too loud. Having a conversation was difficult, and the two Doms were talking about boring legal stuff anyway. Sammy got fidgety, and Dale told the two of them to run along and amuse themselves. Eduardo agreed, making a shooing motion that meant Jake had to hang out with this twinkie in a leather cap.

  “Dance?” Sammy suggested, and Jake figured why not, but as soon as they were on the dance floor, Sammy was all over him, rubbing their chests together and grinding up against him. Sammy’s head topped out at about Jake’s shoulders, which meant Jake kept inadvertently knocking his hat off. He had a big bald spot, so now Jake understood why the hat was there, and every time he bent over to pick it up, he tried to push his ass back into Jake’s groin, except that his ass didn’t actually reach that high.

  “I don’t want to get in trouble,” Jake shouted as he peeled Sammy off him one more time.

  “I like getting in trouble,” Sammy shouted back. “It’s part of my schtick.”

  “I don’t think Eduardo wants me acting out on purpose,” Jake tried to say, but it was too much to shout, and even after three tries, Sammy still didn’t get it. He pulled Jake off the dance floor, dragging him down to the far end of the bar where it was thankfully much quieter. Jake was about to order a beer, but Eduardo caught his eye and wagged his finger back and forth, so he changed it to a club soda.

  “All right,” Sammy said when they’d gotten their drinks and had found a booth to tuck themselves into. “Say that again.”

  “I said Eduardo doesn’t wants me acting out. I’m not going to piss him off on purpose.”

  “I thought you were the biggest discipline problem in the joint.”

  “Not on purpose.” Jake frowned at his drink. How was he supposed to make friends when everybody had already heard of him? “And not anymore.”

  “So Eduardo never punishes you? What fun
is that?”

  “He punishes me, but it’s not fun. Is it fun when Dale punishes you?”

  “Sure.” Sammy sucked on the tiny stirrer that came with his drink, pursing his lips and looking up at Jake through his eyelashes. “That’s the game. I act like a brat, Dale gives my ass a whooping, and then I get some good dick.”

  “Punishment isn’t a game, and it shouldn’t be about sex.”

  “Honey, if it’s not a game and it’s not sex, then it’s just someone beating on you. Tell me Eduardo respects your safeword at least.”

  “I…” He didn’t have a safeword, not for punishment, but he had a feeling he shouldn’t tell Sammy that. He’d already said too much, though, because Sammy had his head cocked to the side, his cap leaning so rakishly in the other direction he was about to lose it again.

  “Look,” Jake said, even as he wondered why he was bothering to explain something to Sammy he only vaguely understand himself. “Punishment is punishment. I don’t want it to stop just because I say some word.”

  “Oooh.” Sammy opened his mouth wide around the syllable.

  “But that’s okay because if I really needed it to stop I could always just, like, stand up.” Which he had done. Not lately, but he knew he could. “You don’t have to worry about me. When I fight, I win.”

  “I’ll bet you do,” Sammy said with a flirtatious wink. “Hey, as along as everyone’s on the same page, I don’t care what floats your boat. And if you don’t want to get in trouble, I won’t get you in trouble.”

  “Thanks.” That’d been surprisingly easy.

  “Shame, though. I figured I’d have some fun with you, then have some fun with Dale. But we’ll just be buds.” Sammy held his fist out, completely baffling Jake until he realized he was meant to give it a bump.

  It was hard to feel like a dude-bro wearing leather shorts sitting across from a guy in a chest harness, but he appreciated the attempt. And he did want to be good. Eduardo had brought him there with a purpose, which wasn’t for Jake to do the bump and grind with his friend’s sub.