by Claire Marta
She never felt so alone as she did at that moment.
Letting twenty minutes pass, Casey ventured from her room. The apartment was quiet. Too quiet. There was no sign of Morgan or her men. Malik and Iosefa were gone, too.
Walking into the kitchen, she sank into a chair with shaking legs.
This was all her fault.
She had brought Ivan and the Bratva into her world. Revenge for her brother was costing her the ones she loved. Was it worth it? a tiny voice questioned. Ben would still be dead. The only thing that had changed was his killer had a face and a name.
Morning dragged into afternoon. Casey tried to keep busy, dreading the hour that she’d agreed to meet Ivan. By the time she left for the club, her stomach was knotted with anxiety and her guilty conscience weighed heavily on her soul. She’d alienated her best friend, hurt two men who seemed to care about her, and had a vengeful Russian Dom who intended to punish her for her perceived transgressions toward him.
There was only one person she could talk to.
Precious Pet had agreed to meet her at eight, an hour ahead of Ivan.
“Crap,” the older woman said when Casey stepped inside the office and took off her mask. “No offense, sweetheart, but you look like shit.”
Casey couldn’t deny it. She felt even worse. “I’m sorry to dump on you like this, but I didn’t have anyone else I could talk to.”
Precious motioned her over to the sofa, locking the door behind her. Gliding over, the world-famous choreographer-turned-BDSM-club-owner sat down beside her. “I’m here,” she said and waited for her to start talking, knowing better than to pry.
“I fucked up,” Casey admitted, heaving a breath. “Morgan spent the night with her men and the apartment was empty, and, well, when she showed up this morning, she found two men in the kitchen that I had to get rid of.”
Precious Pet actually smiled.
Casey rubbed the bridge between her eyes. “You know what I do. I can’t afford attachments or distractions. I lied. I told them I had a one-time rule and that was all they were getting from me. I was pretty harsh with Morgan. I can’t blame her if she hates me right now. But that’s not why I needed to talk to you. I’m supposed to do a scene with Master S tonight. I can’t explain it, but he worries me.”
Precious nodded. “The last time you were here, we had trouble with him. He’s already on probation.” She angled a glance toward the door. “I should warn you. He’s reserved the stocks at nine o’clock tonight.”
Casey felt her stomach drop. She hated being put in stocks, rendered totally helpless but, worse, unable to see what was happening behind her. With the mood that Ivan was in, that could be a dangerous thing. Crap.
Precious saw that she was worried. “I’ll ask Sirs Moses and Aaron to keep an eye on him. If you have any problems, the two of them are more than enough manpower to handle Master S, yes?”
Moses and Aaron were the new floor monitors at the club. Doms in training. Master Gardeners in the making according to Precious Pet—and she would know. She and her husband had started the club twenty-some years ago. She’d bought the old church when it came available and expanded after he died. It was a playground for the rich and kinky. And yes, Casey qualified.
She just didn’t want anyone outside the lifestyle to know it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Casey breathed easier, feeling the first glimmer of hope that she’d had all day. “Thank you,” she told Precious Pet. “I appreciate it. I’ll feel better knowing someone has my back if Master S goes too far.”
Precious Pet grew quiet. Her brow creased and she started twisting her wedding band—a sure sign that something was bothering her as well.
“What is it?” Casey asked softly. “You mentioned earlier that we needed to talk.”
“We do.” The older woman nodded. “It’s just… the timing is unfortunate. I had hoped to do this under better circumstances but with your job and… other things…, I don’t know when we’ll have another chance to talk.”
Apprehension gripped Casey’s chest. She had a very bad feeling about this.
Precious Pet suddenly rose. “Let’s go to my desk,” she told her. “I have something I need you to see.”
A thousand things went through Casey’s mind. Financial problems. Membership issues. Employees. Building maintenance. The law. Blackmail.
Maybe the Bratva had their claws sunk into her. Ivan was a member here, after all. He’d know how to infiltrate and take over an operation. Casey brindled. If he was going after Precious Pet, he’d do it over her dead body!
“Have a seat.”
Casey claimed the chair across from the desk, ready to go to war for the older woman if she needed to.
Precious opened a drawer, pulled out a thick manila folder, and placed it on top of her desk pad. Clasping her hands on top of it, she caught Casey’s gaze and gave her a sad smile. “I’m afraid there’s no easy way to say this,” she told her. “But a team of experts in their field agrees. I only have six months to live.”
“No!” Casey cried, feeling the last of her sanity start to shred. In one sentence, her safety line had snapped and she found herself freefalling into an abyss of helplessness.
Precious Pet’s gaze had a suspicious gleam of moisture that she dashed away with her fingertips. “I wish things were different, for your sake as well as mine.”
“There has to be something we can do,” Casey insisted, refusing to lose her godmother, too. “A new treatment? Anything…? You can’t leave me!” she keened, her voice breaking with emotion.
“My dear, sweet girl,” Precious crooned, seeking to comfort her like she was the one who was dying. Maybe she was, inside. Since this morning, she had felt like a shell of herself. “Your mother and I were best friends. I’ve watched you grow from a newborn baby to the strong, beautiful woman you’ve become. You’ve been the daughter I never had. I’ve spent the last two weeks putting my house in order. When I’m gone, except for what I’m bequeathing to charity and what’s required for my final expenses, all this is yours.”
She patted the folder on the desk. “My lawyer has the details. My will lists you as my sole heir and the administrator of my estate. I’d rather see the administrator’s fees go to you than him. He’s gotten rich enough off me as it is.”
Casey’s head was swimming. She already had her hands full managing her parents’ estate. Helena and her husband were worth ten times as much. A good investment firm could handle most of it but The Secret Garden Club required a personal touch, hands-on management. Who the hell was she going to get to run the place when Precious Pet was gone?
Christ. Could this day get any more fucked up?
The tears came then. She couldn’t stop them. Her world was crumbling around her and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it.
Sobbing, Casey buried her face in her hands. Why Precious? Why now, on top of everything else that was happening to her? What had she ever done to warrant such cruel punishment? Everyone she cared about was torn from her. This was the reason she didn’t let herself care. Helena was the last link to her past. Her family. Hearing that she was going to lose her was as painful as the call she’d received about Ben’s murder. She’d known that Ben’s job came with risks. Helena had lived a clean, wholesome life. She should have been dancing on her hundredth birthday. Instead, she’d be gone.
The only good thing about any of this was that Casey would have the power to ban Ivan from the club. Once Popov had been brought to justice, she’d be free of the Russian Dom. His days at The Secret Garden Club were numbered.
“Shh.” Precious’s hand rubbed Casey’s shoulder. It was only then that she realized the older woman had rounded the desk to come to her.
Wiping away the tears dampening her cheeks, Casey peered up at her with watery eyes. “I... I don’t know what to say. This place is yours. You put everything into it. I can’t imagine it without you here.”
“When I’m gone, it will bring me
peace knowing it's in your hands.” Precious’s smile was sad. “I’ve always been proud of you. You’ve embraced this lifestyle and I know whatever the future brings, you will choose the right path for this place.”
Casey couldn’t think about that tonight. Noticing the time on the wall clock, she saw that her hour was almost up. The older woman followed her gaze.
“I have to go.” Casey swallowed, trying to clear the thickness in her throat. She was an emotional mess. This was not how she wanted to confront Ivan tonight. A cauldron of emotions was bubbling within her. Guilt and misery ate at the pieces left.
Precious nodded. “I promise you won’t be alone.”
Giving her godmother a hug, Casey put on her mask before leaving the office and hurried to the changing rooms. Not wanting to drive to the club in the schoolgirl outfit, she’d stuffed it in a small duffle bag. Changing quickly, she was mindful of leaving off her panties. The excitement she normally felt at The Garden was absent. In its place were apprehension, nervousness, and dread.
Bypassing the main hall, she headed for one of the smaller rooms, nicknamed The Exchange for its scenes with stocks and bonds. Her gaze swept the space for the imposing Russian. She found him standing in the corner of the room beside the thick wooden stocks that she hated.
The smile etched across Ivan’s lips was disturbing. The bear mask in place hid his features, but the coldness in his stare bore right through her.
Casey was aware of Sir Moses and Aaron standing like sentinels. Seeing them brought a small measure of relief. The rules of the club were clear. Ivan could only get away with so much in public.
“Kiska,” he murmured when she reached him. “Tonight you are mine. If you want our arrangement to continue, you will meet all my demands. You will take everything I give you.”
Their arrangement.
More than the death of his wife and child motivated him now. Casey knew she was caught in his web.
Lowering her eyes to the ground, she licked her dry lips. “Yes, Sir.”
He unlatched the small suitcase that lay on a side table and opened it to reveal his personal collection of adult toys and tools for kink. She was relieved to not see a violet wand, but the ball gag he pulled out made a fissure of fear rock through her.
“Come,” he growled. “It is time.”
Casey stepped up to the stocks, knees shaking and hands clenched into fists. Master S put the ball gag between her lips and fastened the strap behind her head. Making a show of it, he tucked a handkerchief into her fingers to drop if she needed to safeword.
He unfastened the latch and lifted the top, leaving three half-circle cutouts for her neck and wrists. Dragging in a shaky breath, she bent at her waist and eased forward, positioning her neck in the center hole and each wrist in an outer one. The top lowered. The latch clicked, pinning her in place with no way to see behind her. No way to know what was coming until it was too late.
Master S fondled her bare buttocks before rounding the stocks to stand before her. He checked the fit, making a show of it, letting everyone think that he was more concerned for her welfare than his need for control. He petted her red hair and bent down, nipping her ear and whispering into it.
“I will start with the cane,” he hummed. “Then the tawse. Then the whip. You will take it like a good slut. I will only give you what you have earned. You won’t need this,” he added, slipping the handkerchief from her fingers and tucking it in the back pocket of his pants. “No safewords. You teased me. Now it is my turn to leave you wanting more. More of the pain that only I can give you—and we both know how much you love it. You will accept your punishment, and you will thank me for it, da?”
The dark promise in his voice was mesmerizing. Casey nodded.
Damn him. He knew what she craved and was preying on it.
Master S returned to his case. A moment later, she heard him kneel and felt a leather cuff being strapped on her ankle with added weight. A spreader bar. Prying her feet apart, he secured the other ankle and rose, dragging his fingers up her legs as he did, wetting his finger with her juices and painting a bull’s eye on her anus.
He’d made such a production of it, Casey swore she felt every eye in the house focused on the two of them. The whole room seemed to be holding its breath, waiting for him to begin.
Behind her, she heard him go to the table, heard the whistle of a cane splitting the air. Practice swings. Warming up his arm and shoulder.
Here, batter, batter….
Strike one.
Casey yelped, the sound muffled by the ball in her mouth. She was already drooling, her spittle escaping to drip onto the floor. Forcing herself to relax, she mentally braced herself for the next blow.
Strike two.
Christ on a cracker. Ivan wasn’t pulling any punches. He’d promised punishment and he was delivering in spades. His hits were hard enough, he’d be drawing blood before long.
Strike three.
But far from out. The Dom was just finding his groove.
Another blow fell, and another. Painslut that she was, Casey started to experience that delicious disconnect and was on the edge of subspace when a fist in her hair pulled her back.
“Nyet,” he growled. “Not yet. You stay here with me. The tawse is next.”
Master S’s was thick, split leather, almost like a razor strop that had been cut down the center to lie in two halves. Swung by his hand, the tawse was nearly unbearable. Most submissives here couldn’t begin to handle it.
He knew that Casey could. Stopping after ten strokes, he rounded the stocks to fist her hair again and watch her drool onto the floor, loving how helpless she was and how willingly she had submitted to his Domination. “Half-way there,” he rumbled, eyeing the gag in her mouth and adjusting his erection. “I enjoyed having your head in my lap last night, your lips around my cock, making you suck me off after refusing to sleep with me. After we are done here, I think I will fuck your throat again. You are a rare woman to take me so deep. To take what I give. Ten more strokes of the tawse, then we finish with the whip. Maybe tonight, I take your ass and your pussy, too.”
Casey whimpered, shivering with dread. Where were Aaron and Moses? Dammit. They were supposed to be watching him!
A low growl sounded, but it didn’t come from Ivan. Two growls, she realized. The floor monitors? If they were close enough for her to hear them, maybe they were close enough to hear what Ivan planned.
Ivan picked up the whip and slashed it in the air, cracking it like the god of thunder, ready to rain down his retribution, taking payment in pounds of flesh. She knew that she had to stay still or risk serious injury but she couldn’t enjoy the pain that he inflicted. Instead of welcoming his blows, she counted the minutes until he was finished.
Tossing the whip aside, he crossed the floor to where she hung, limp in the stocks. Fingers roughly caressed the burning stripes on her buttocks. Casey’s cry was muffled. She pulled her wrists, desperate to end this charade. A true Dominant would have let her have a signal to stop. Ivan had robbed her of choice, had taken the handkerchief from her hand. He wasn’t a Dom. He was an Alpha asshole with a capital A, the son of a bitch.
He flipped up her skirt and reached between them. His dark promise echoed in her head.
Maybe tonight, I take your ass and your pussy, too.
She heard the telltale snick of a zipper and screamed behind the gag. The next thing she knew, Ivan was dragged away, judging from the sounds and curses coming from behind her.
“She’s mine!” he shouted. “You two want her, but you can’t give her what she needs. Only me! She’s my wildcat, not yours!”
Wildcat? Crap. That’s what Malik and Iosefa called her. How the hell did Ivan know… unless he’d gone farther than watching her apartment?
It looked like she was going to have to sweep for bugs again.
“She’s only yours if she says so!” Sir Moses stated.
Precious Pet’s voice cut through the crowd. “You four, cle
ar out this man’s room and see him to his car. As of tonight, he is banished from The Secret Garden Club and will no longer be allowed on any of its properties.”
Casey sagged in relief. Footsteps sounded. Someone unfastened her ankle cuffs and freed her from the spreader bar. The side latch clicked open. The top of the stock was raised.
Sir Moses caught her when her knees threatened to buckle. Scooping her up in his arms, he looked at her godmother. “She needs tending,” he growled, something in his voice striking a primal chord in her.
“My office,” Precious Pet said. “The door’s open. You know the way.”
Sir Aaron preceded them up the stairs and down the hall, opening the office door and holding it for them to enter. Locking it behind them, he went to an aftercare station and came back with dark chocolate, two bottles of spring water, and arnica cream. Feeding her one and helping her drink, he set everything in reach on a side table and sat on the sofa. Sir Moses sat next to him, both men handling her, turning her so that she lay with her chest on Sir Aaron’s lap and her ass over Sir Moses’s thigh.
Sir Moses flipped up the hem of her skirt and growled at the sight of her abused flesh.
The sound did strange things to her inside. Her pussy lips tingled, swollen and needy. Juices trickled from between her thighs.
“This is going to hurt,” he apologized, applying the arnica cream that Sir Aaron handed him.
Breath hissed between Casey’s teeth. Her ass was on fire. The flesh of her buttocks felt like Ivan had made mincemeat of it, but the pain of receiving aftercare from these two men was exactly what she needed. Ivan had tried to take something she wasn’t willing to give him. He’d stepped over a line. Here…, now…, this was her decision. What she craved. The only thing better was if she could talk them into fucking her.
Doms with benefits. Why settle for one when she could have two?
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Iosefa watched Malik rub Casey’s poor, abused flesh. Instead of whimpers and tears, she was grinding her mound against his hard, muscled thigh and wiggling her hips, silently begging for more.