Mastering Lexie (Stronghold Book 4)

by Golden Angel

  "All hail the Viking Overlord, Thwarter of Raw Cookie Dough Delights," Angel intoned, grinning goofily at him as he bent his head down to kiss her, one hand on her hip. Looking at them right now, no one would ever guess that he'd spanked the shit out of her ass last night. Because of his blonde hair and goatee, Angel always teased him about looking like a Viking.

  Lexie sighed internally, wistfully, and turned away from what seemed like an inherently private moment. As she turned her head, she caught a glimpse of Leigh's wistful, longing expression as well. Since Leigh was in a pretty serious, long-term relationship and lived with her boyfriend, that really didn't bode well for where she was mentally right now. Lexie's heart went out to the other woman. Here she was, high on happiness and hope that she and Patrick might finally be moving forward, while Leigh was obviously having the opposite experience.

  Both of them reached for a square of cookie dough at the same time, just as Adam lifted his head up and frowned at them.

  "Seriously you two, that's disgusting. You shouldn't be eating that shit raw."

  "It's fine," Angel said, poking him in the side. Her finger basically bounced off of his stomach. Lucky bitch. Once Lexie had started noticing her brother's friends, it had been pretty hard to miss what a seriously hot group of guys they all were. Each in their own way. It was Lexie's misfortune to be attracted to the biggest, baddest, pushiest and most infuriating of the lot. Although, in her opinion, Adam ran a fairly close second. He was nearly as bad as Patrick with the demanding over-protectiveness, although he'd eased up a bit since he and Angel got together. Probably distracted by having to keep her in line. "I eat it all the time and I've never gotten sick."

  "Yet. You haven't gotten sick yet." He scowled and poked his finger at the discarded plastic wrapping. "It even says on the packaging not to eat it."

  "That's just so we don't sue them if we get sick," Leigh said. Her eyes were sparkling as she grinned at Adam, any hints of envy or wistfulness completely wiped away by the bantering. "So far, we haven't."

  "It's still disgusting." Adam's gaze took in all three of their expressions and he shook his head, giving up a fight that he obviously wasn't going to win, and turning his attention back to Angel. "Patrick called, he needs an extra Dungeon Monitor for tonight, so I'm going over. Are you three going to behave yourselves?"

  "Sure."

  "Uh huh."

  "Nope." Angel grinned up at him, the only honest one in the bunch. "But we'll keep the trouble contained to the house."

  "Good." He looked up and pointed his finger at Lexie. "You especially. No more talking your friends into crazy schemes."

  Angel elbowed him in the side before Lexie could even respond. "Hey, she didn't talk us into anything. I was the one who thought of calling Pretty Boy."

  "Of course you did." Adam suddenly looked decidedly more grouchy, making Lexie want to giggle. She thought it was hilarious that, out of all the guys, it was Adam who had ended up with someone like Angel. Lexie wasn't the only one with mostly guy friends, but Adam hadn't known just how many close male friends Angel had when he first met her. In fact, Leigh had been Angel's only close female friend before she'd met the Stronghold girls. She'd been living with three male housemates, something that had definitely gotten under Adam's skin until he'd finally convinced Angel to move in with him. Even though he respected her friendships, and did his best to tolerate the fact that she tended to be extremely affectionate with all her friends, certain male friends definitely got under his skin more than others. Master Michael being at the top of that heap. Considering how possessive Adam was, watching his discomfort as he tried not to be an asshole for Angel’s sake was highly entertaining.

  "And it worked, so it was worth it," Angel said, going up on her tiptoes to kiss his nose. Adam's head swiveled around and she caught his cheek instead, as he looked at Lexie.

  "What do you mean it worked?"

  Lexie smiled, smugly. Adam had always stepped into Patrick's place as leader of the Sentinels when Master Mold wasn't around. It had driven her up the wall. Some of the other guys, like Chris or Andrew, she could wheedle her way around when she wanted something. Occasionally even Justin, who was normally a major hardass. Patrick or Adam, never.

  "I'm going back to work at Stronghold, and Patrick's agreed to start training me as a submissive," Lexie said, smirking at him. Ha! Take that!

  Adam's expression darkened. "I see." He looked like he wanted to say something more, but his jaw muscles tightened, and he nodded his head. "Ladies, I'm going to shower, and then I'll be out of your way."

  As soon as he was out of the room, all three women burst into giggles. Lexie knew that if she hadn't been drinking, she probably would have been more pissed than amused. The guys were always thinking they could run her life, but with Patrick finally on her side, there wasn't much they were going to be able to do.

  Chapter 4

  "What the hell, Patrick?!"

  Patrick lifted his head from his paperwork and grinned at the irate Domme standing in front of him. Dressed in her leathers, her flaming hair up in an intricate bun, Olivia had one hand on her hip and the other holding a crop which she was tapping against her thigh. The club submissives, seeing her in such a position, would immediately fall to their knees and beg for forgiveness for whatever crime Mistress thought they had committed. Patrick, on the other hand, was filled with a sense of satisfied glee.

  Apparently someone had gotten around to looking at her next Introduction scene assignment.

  "Yes, Olivia, is there something I can help you with?" He said the words with relish, indicating that he knew exactly what she was upset about, and that he'd done it on purpose.

  Her silvery eyes narrowed at the same time as her usually lush lips thinned. "Lexie belongs in the club, and you know it."

  "This has nothing to do with Lexie."

  "You're such a liar sometimes." She let out a frustrated huff of air, the crop tapping at her calf a little faster. "Fine. I'll take my punishment, for pointing out the obvious and calling you on your idiocy." The tip of the crop came up to point directly at him. "But you'd better not try to keep that girl out of the club anymore. If I have to do Introduction scenes with mewling subbies, whom you know Lisa and Erin would prefer, then you have to follow your own damned rules and stop trying to block Lex from getting what she needs."

  He grinned. It felt good, finally being one up on the Domme. Not only had he already agreed to train Lexie, but Olivia was going to have to deal with her least favorite type of submissive. The most recent male sub asking for an Introduction scene had indicated that he was eager to serve, enjoyed being humiliated and degraded, and that he would happily lick the boot of whatever Domme put one in front of his face. Mistresses Lisa and Erin both liked their subs like that. Olivia preferred the hard cases, the men who tended to have trouble admitting their submissive desires, the ones that needed a little extra encouragement to submit. This Introduction scene was going to bore her out of her mind, but she was honor bound to make the submissive happy. Which she would, even though it wasn’t her preferred type of scene. Hell, half the time, when he gave her the eager-to-please subbies, they ended up begging her to serve her past the Introduction scene. The fact that she was less interested in them only made them want her more.

  Before he could tell her that he'd already arranged to train Lexie, the door to his office banged open, and Adam came barreling in, looking like the blue-eyed Viking that Angel claimed he was. Except, instead of Viking armor, he had on black leathers.

  "What the hell, Patrick?"

  Olivia burst out laughing as Patrick raised his eyebrows. The Domme grinned and jerked her thumb at the irate blonde Dom. "How many people do you get in here asking that same question?"

  "On a good day?" Patrick let his voice trail off, both amused and a little pissed. Normally no one dared speak to him that way, and now two of his friends had come barging in, cursing him. Not exactly the start of a good night. Especially because he hadn’t want
ed to call Adam in the first place, figuring that it was better to have the Dom watching over Angel, Leigh and Lexie. Unfortunately, no one else had been able to come in on such short notice, and he’d been forced to call Adam as a last resort. It was that or be short a Dungeon Monitor. Even though they rarely had problems in the club, Patrick couldn’t help but feel that was risking the safety of his members, and that was something he refused to do. Since the girls were staying in, it should be fine. At least, that’s how he reassured himself. "What now, Adam?"

  "Lexie says you're going to be training her." Crossing his arms over his chest, Adam glared down at him. "What the fuck? We've been keeping her out of the club for months, and now you're going to train her?"

  "What ever happened to minding your own business?" Olivia snapped, stepping up beside Adam and glaring at the big, blonde Dom. Even though she was a little bit shorter than Adam regularly, with her wickedly spiked boots they were right on eye level. All amusement that she'd shown upon Adam's arrival was wiped away. "What the hell is wrong with you idiots that you can't see Lexie belongs in the club? And that she wants to be trained? Specifically by Patrick."

  Behind his desk, he winced a bit at Olivia baldly stating what everyone knew, but no one talked about. Adam winced too. None of them wanted to acknowledge Lexie's interest in Patrick, or his returned interest in her, because it was too uncomfortable. It messed with the status quo. It also messed with the group, because obviously people were already taking sides - and there was more than two sides to take.

  "She's too young."

  "There are plenty of submissives in the club who are younger than her," Olivia said flatly, crossing her own arms over her chest. The end of the crop waved rather threateningly in the air. "Try again."

  "She's like a little sister to us. It's... incestuous."

  "No one's asking you to train her, and if Patrick doesn't feel that way, then that's his business."

  "She's too innocent!"

  Olivia rolled her eyes. "Please tell me you don't think that Lexie is a virgin."

  Silence fell over the room. Adam shifted uncomfortably as Patrick grimaced. No, neither of them thought that... but neither of them wanted to think about the fact that she'd had sex before. Patrick, because he didn't like to think about anyone else touching Lexie, even though he knew he had no right to think that way. Adam, because no older brother wanted to think about his little sister having sex, even if she was an adopted little sister. Which, of course, was the crux of the problem. Other than Patrick, who had initially been horrified to realize that he was attracted to Lexie, all of the guys saw her as a little sister.

  None of them wanted to see her as a sexual object.

  In the club, that would be hard to avoid unless Patrick kept her to the private rooms, like Liam did with Hilary. But it was obvious that Lexie liked the exhibition aspect of kink, which meant that if he was going to fulfill her needs, they would need to spend some time in the main Dungeon. Where her 'older brothers' might see her in all her naked, ecstatic glory.

  Patrick couldn't say what had finally flipped the switch in his head, to make him see Lexie differently, but he could still sympathize with what Adam was feeling.

  "I just..." Adam scrubbed his hands over his face, one of them lingering to rub over his goatee.

  "You just want her to never grow up," Olivia said, her voice full of false sympathy. She let her arms drop from their crossed position and patted Adam on the shoulder with her free hand. The one that wasn't full of riding crop. "She’s already grown. Welcome to the real world, sweetie; where women have male friends and little girls grow up and have sex. I know this year has been oh-so-difficult for you, but you're such a trooper."

  "Fuck off," Adam said, brushing her hand away. The others in their group had, mostly, stopped ribbing Adam about his jealous reactions to Angel's friends, but it was a topic that never got old for Olivia. Probably because she and Adam had always been close, and she thought his reaction to Angel's guy friends was both hypocritical and ridiculous, along with being amusing. She didn't have a whole lot of sympathy for any of the guys when she thought they were dealing badly with their women.

  Sitting quietly wasn't normally Patrick's thing, but he was happy to let Olivia fight this battle for him. For one, his first response would have been to be defensive, and it probably would have ended in a shouting match between himself and Adam. For two, he wouldn't have been nearly as eloquent as Olivia, because he still wasn't sure he was doing the right thing. He was doing what he wanted to do, after having resisted those desires for months, but was it the right thing to do?

  "What about Jake?" Adam demanded, looking back and forth between Patrick and Olivia. Patrick winced. "What are we supposed to tell him?"

  "Nothing," Patrick said, firmly. "Not until he gets home and then I'll talk to him about... whatever it is I need to talk to him about at that point."

  "Oh my god, you Neanderthals!" Olivia exploded. The crop whacked down on Patrick's desk, making both men jump. Not a normal occurrence for Patrick; he'd never been anything but completely in control when in his office. This thing with Lexie had him all sorts of fucked up in the head when he couldn’t anticipate Olivia’s reactions. "Jake doesn't get a say in who Lexie dates. You don't get a say in who Lexie dates." She poked Adam in the chest with the crop and then swung it around to point at Patrick. "The only reason he gets a say is because he's who she wants to date."

  "We're not dating," Patrick growled. "I'm just training her."

  "Call it whatever you want," Olivia snapped at him. "The point is, it's her life. She's an adult, and she gets to make her own decisions. Not that I think Jake will be an asshole about this, but even if he was, it's still Lexie's life, not his. You all need to get your heads out of your asses."

  "You don't fuck around with your best friend's little sister," Patrick snapped back, his fist coming down on the desk as he glared at Olivia. "Not without talking to him about it. I get that you don't understand, but that's just the way it is."

  Adam nodded, although he turned his own furious gaze back on Patrick. "But that’s exactly what you'll be doing if you train her."

  "We're. Not. Going. To. Fuck." Patrick clipped the words out with finality. Even though the back of his mind was already chafing at the restriction. "What the hell kind of options do you think I have, Adam? I can't keep her out of the club if she wants to come in here with Michael. Even if I do keep her out of the club, what's to stop her from going to Blush? Or Chained?" He named two of the other club options for BDSM activities. Blush, despite its discreet name, didn't have the best reputation. Patrick abhorred Blush because it didn't screen its members and he knew of more than one submissive who had had an "incident" while at Blush. Incidents in which the club's so-called Dungeon Monitors didn't intervene. Chained was newer, and so far they hadn't heard anything bad, but it was way too far away for any of them to be able to keep an eye on her there.

  To his credit, Adam winced and stayed quiet, not having an answer for any of those questions.

  "Tell the others," Patrick said, taking back control of the reins from Olivia and Adam. They both immediately turned their bodies more towards him, responding to the seriousness of his tone. "I'm training Lexie. No one is going to distract Jake by running to him with the latest gossip. I'll talk to him when he gets back. People can think whatever the hell they want privately, but Lexie will be safe, here, at Stronghold, with me. I'm not going to explain myself twenty different times. We're not going to have people fighting in the group about this. Like Olivia said, it's nobody's fucking business." He barked an unamused laugh and looked at her. "Hell, if anyone else has any questions or objections, I'm sending them to talk to you."

  "Please do," Olivia said, smiling with a sweetness that was as dangerous as it was false. "Now if you two will excuse me, I'm going to go find an accommodating subbie to beat on."

  Both men were silent as she left the room, Adam sinking down into one of the chairs across from Patrick. The do
or slammed shut behind her, and Adam winced.

  "I feel sorry for whomever she picks up tonight," Adam murmured, his hand automatically going down to cradle his groin. Patrick didn't think the other man even realized he'd made the gesture.

  "She'll choose someone who can handle it," Patrick said, although he felt the same. But he knew whoever Olivia chose would be ecstatic at her attention, not to mention her viciousness. Just because he didn't understand the appeal of having his balls in a vise... well, to each their own.

  "Can you seriously handle Lexie?" Adam asked, his voice concerned instead of combative. "Not to mention Jake? I'll tell the guys but... we're all used to thinking of her like a little sister."

  "You're telling me," Patrick said. He picked up the pen he'd been using to do paperwork and then put it down again. "I don't know how things changed between her and me. I don't know why. I was thinking about talking to Jake... but then he got deployed, and I didn't want him worrying about her while he was gone."

  Adam nodded. "When does he get back?"

  "I don't know." Patrick glanced at the clock. "He's supposed to Skype me sometime this evening, and I'm hoping he'll be able to give me a clearer idea. But in the meantime, I've started thinking that maybe it's better this way. Lexie is definitely submissive. She needs to be trained, and I don't trust anyone else to do it right and keep their hands off of her while doing so. If I handle it personally, then I can at least explain everything to Jake and be solely responsible for her. I'm not sure how he'd take me just handing her off to someone else."

  "What if you two aren't compatible?" Adam asked, his face serious.

  That was a much harder question, because it was one that was very close to some of Patrick's deepest fears. He really didn't want to break Lexie's heart, but he'd rather do that then have her constantly trying to be something she wasn't in order to be with him. He also didn't want to lose her family or her friendship, but the way things were going, that was going to happen whether he trained her or not. The best case scenario would be finding out that they were completely compatible, that she was happy having something close to a total power exchange, and their relationship would just grow and change from friendship.