Contract Taken (Contracted Book 1)

by Aya DeAniege

  Nathaniel returned minutes later and took my right hand, placing a ball in it that rattled as my fingers were curled around it. He patted my hand and swallowed slightly.

  “You are allowed to use a safe word if you can't take any more. As I don't know your limits yet and don't know when it would be too much. But if you use this, and you are not at your limits, I will truly damage you, do you understand?"

  Through tears, I nodded. Nathaniel took my head in my hands and kissed my forehead gently.

  You break the rules, and you get disciplined. But you can always tell the difference between Doms who had been subs before and those who had not. It never occurred to me that the gentleness Nathaniel showed me on and off during discipline was because he was thinking about his own shortcomings, of the times when his Dom had strapped him down and beat him mercilessly for doing something wrong.

  It never occurred to me that I had been saved, in some way, that first time by Michie and Mayfair's disobedience at the meeting. If Nathaniel hadn't been able to work out some of his aggression on them, I might have had it a great deal worse. I remembered, I still remember, the look of Michie's back as he was tied to the x-frame.

  I thought that was going to be me.

  The point of the discipline, though, was the gag itself.

  Nathaniel helped me out of the dress and made no comment when I crossed my arms to cover my nakedness. There had been many times when I had stood before him naked over the past two weeks. Never before had I felt so vulnerable, however.

  He had me lay on the ottoman and tied me to it, tighter this time and with manacles that latched instead of having the velcro.

  “No, keep that down," he said, patting my backside. "Remember, that's not for discipline. If you put it in the air, I will be tempted. Very tempted, so keep it down. Anything not covered is open to discipline. Should have made you wear underwear. Ah well, I will try to remember."

  His hands roamed over my back, down my legs, then back up. Like an artist inspecting his canvas. How long had he been anticipating that first discipline? How long had he planned what he would do to me when I did something wrong?

  “When you're disciplined the neck and kidney area should be avoided. The point is never to cause permanent damage, though scarring can happen. Nothing should go over your head. At no point is anyone allowed to do something called breathing control on you unless you're in a panic and need help breathing. You shouldn't be left in awkward positions, tied up for long periods of times.

  “Look at me," he drew my face towards him. "I'm telling you this just in case, understand?" He shook his head. "Mr. Wrightworth will know this is in the contract. You can call him if someone does that, and he will see to the problem. Crying won't help you. Makes me wish I could put your mouth to use."

  I almost choked.

  Nathaniel wiped my tears away gently and then walked away. He returned with a little alarm, which he set for one hour and then placed where I couldn't see it. The alarm ticked gently, so I knew it was still going, but I had no idea how much time was left. He moved away, behind me and out of sight again.

  The first strike startled me. I didn't feel pain, and I still can't figure out if he struck me to cause pain or not. The second strike did hurt. I cried out, and Nathaniel made a small sound almost like a moan.

  “Oh yes, I forgot to mention that screaming is encouraged,” Nathaniel said, his voice sounding unsteady as he came to my shoulder, then walked away. “Let's see if I can't make you sound the way you did for Mr. Wrightworth, shall we?”

  He did not manage to bring about the terror that I had felt on that plane. He caused me pain, quite a bit of it, but not enough, certainly not the sort of pain I would experience in the months after that moment.

  Nathaniel beat me, and he beat me good, with a variety of items. At one point or another, the world became foggy, and I didn't quite notice anything else.

  It happens, and it's so amazingly wonderful but also dangerous at the same time. It's also not something that's supposed to happen during discipline. Because of that, I don't quite recall what happened.

  I do remember when he switched to the flogger from our session the week before. He even showed it to me. The first strike was gentle. The second made me cry out in pain. Nathaniel started to mutter something under his breath, then stopped.

  The flogger was applied for what felt like forever.

  Then he switched to the cane, which startled me out of my fog for a moment, but only a moment. Whereas the flogger struck my back, the cane moved down my legs. Somehow being struck somewhere else reminded me of how keenly my back hurt.

  Nathaniel didn't touch me as he worked. In the session almost a week before he had struck me several times, then had run his hands over the reddened flesh. Not this time, never during discipline. Even while playing with others, they would stop and run their hands over me once in a while. There was something about that touch that eased a tension inside of me, relaxed something that could not be beaten until it submitted.

  Not that many beat me with the idea of forcing me to submit.

  The ticking of the clock, yes, I remember that. The clock itself was something that Nathaniel and Mr. Wrightworth liked to use. They said it kept them honest. Some Doms didn't use the clock and kept very good time. Some didn't even say how long discipline would carry on for.

  Somehow the pair of them had found a clock with a distinct sound to it too. No other clock sounds like the one they used to time discipline. Thank goodness. Otherwise, I would have had a terrible decade or so when old analogue watches—you know, with the hour and second hands?—came back into fashion.

  When the clock went off, I whimpered and flinched away from the sound.

  “That is an hour," Nathaniel murmured with a sigh.

  He shut off the clock, then came around and knelt where I could see him. I remember thinking that he looked a little disappointed, and he probably was. He may have been a firm believer of punishment—because in some ways, at some times, Nathaniel was very much a sadist—but he was also a believer in not taking a new sub too far, too soon. He had probably wanted to take me as far as he had taken Michie, but he didn't know I'd be able to take such treatment.

  At least, not then.

  Ever so slowly, he reached behind my head and released the gag. My jaw was locked around the thing. I was a little furious at that. He had to help me get it to move and then pulled the gag out. Once the gag was out, he massaged my jaw and then ran hands over my throat.

  “Don't do that again,” he said.

  Except he sounded like Mr. Wrightworth had that day on the plane. Like he wanted me to do it again, to give him a reason to put the gag back in my mouth and punish me.

  “I'm sorry,” I wept.

  “Don't apologize," Nathaniel said, undoing first one and then the other wrist. "Once discipline is doled out, you've nothing to be sorry for. It's done, it's in the past, and we can move on. As long as you've learned your lesson, of course. If I ever find you insolent after a discipline, I will continue, and it will be worse. Understand?"

  “Yes,” I said.

  He helped me up, and then he helped me back into the dress and to the seating area, where he told me to sit in front of the hearth.

  Of course, I was going to do whatever he told me to do.

  Nathaniel went off to put away the items he had used. Then he went into the bathroom and was gone several minutes before he emerged again with the carefully tousled hair and a clean-shaven jaw. He came over to me and sat right beside me.

  “Sex is never a part of discipline for you. Not even if it would be deserved. As you saw, something you said no to can be used, but only if it's appropriate.”

  I almost blurted out a protest but kept my mouth shut.

  “The next time you see Mr. Wrightworth, you are to kneel for him and explain what you did, and then what I did to you, to punish you. Understand?”

  “Yes, Sir,” I said, my eyes on my lap.

  “I didn't bre
ak the skin, but you will have some bruising," Nathaniel muttered, almost sounding disappointed.

  Of course, he had said that he would beat me, but it wasn't until I saw Michie that morning that I realized just what he meant by 'beat' and that he was serious.

  “I will never lend you to others unless you want to be lent to them. There will be no coercion there, either. You need to want to be lent to them. If I think you're offering to please me, I will say no. The one except is Mr. Wrightworth. He shared with me. I will share with him. But he isn't allowed to share you with others, and I think you'd enjoy his attention."

  I blushed and kept my hands on my lap.

  “That's what I thought," Nathaniel murmured. "Which is why I said I would share with him. Not right away, not every day. We'll see your limits before that happens. If I lend you to him for a few days—he likes to book time off and enjoy those he plays with—he is not allowed to deny you sleep. He's not allowed to make you sleep standing up, and he is not allowed to lend you to others. Or invite others into the play unless it's me. Understand?"

  “Yes,” I said quietly.

  “Good," Nathaniel sighed out. "I may not appear it, but I am a jealous sort of Sir. I would much rather keep you to myself, but a sub who plays with another is either happier to be with their Dom or learns something new about themselves, something they enjoy.

  “If anyone else plays with you, I will hurt them. I've no intention of lending you out as discipline either. Some Doms do, but I've never had a problem beating insolence out of someone. Like, Michie. He's a good friend of mine," Nathaniel paused as I made a startled sound. "Yes, we play chess after meetings normally. I didn't think he'd be up for it this time around. For some reason, he is loyal to Mayfair, not the best Domme certainly. Then again, he's a sub through and through, and there are only two Dommes who attend the church meetings. Oberon has the rest of them up in the capital."

  “Why are you...?” I couldn't even finish the question.

  I just knew that he was oddly specific about future possibilities but not about the actual future.

  “My father is back in the city, it's the only time the Oxfords are polished,” Nathaniel said with a shake of his head. “Which means until he leaves, or I settle my affairs, he can't know that you are my sub. Or that I participate in the community. Or that I have sex.”

  “Why?” I asked, not believing what I was hearing.

  For a moment I thought that perhaps he was breaking up with me, but then he took my hand in his and I stopped doubting. Which was a really stupid thing to do, I know, but it was hard to think when Nathaniel touched me.

  “I don't want to get into that. Suffice to say. It will end poorly. Being a sub and being a nanny don't change too much. You're supposed to be learning your role, and part of that role would be to learn what a rich person needs to learn. You'll spend more time with Patrick, who is here to study my libraries. As a nanny, you should learn from him.

  “At no point are you to be alone with my father. Ever.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “That's a command, Darling. Never be alone with him. Ever.”

  “Okay, I get that, maybe if I knew why?” I looked at Nathaniel as I spoke.

  The ice wasn't just back in his eyes. There was also a mask in place, one the likes of which I couldn't even describe. There was a white, hot resentment barely contained by a veneer of porcelain.

  “I'm sorry, Sir,” I said, lowering my eyes immediately.

  “You can't call me Sir, either,” Nathaniel muttered. He was quiet a moment, then added, “You will have to call me Mr. Edwards.”

  “Who?” I asked, my head jerking up.

  “Edwards, that's my last name,” Nathaniel said as I frowned at him.

  “Right, Mr. Wrightworth said that before and I just wasn't paying attention,” I said with a shake of my head. “Haven't you opened like four tourist buildings by my old slum?”

  “We pay for the buildings and lease them out to interested parties," Nathaniel said. "We deal with a great many things, but nothing overseas. Which is why my father, upon his supposed retirement, went to another country halfway across the world so that he wouldn't be tempted to work.

  “He's come back, so obviously someone let something loose. Perhaps it was the open contract, or that the company is moving away from the Program. Goodness knows he helped found the damned thing.”

  “The Program has helped a great many people.”

  “He took the first four contracts,” Nathaniel said, then seemed to trail off, caught in thought.

  “Nathaniel?” I asked, leaning forward as I reached out to touch him.

  I was afraid to interrupt his thought. Afraid that if I did, I would bring out his anger and he wouldn't tell me what I thought I needed to know. I could piece things together, the way they had talked about Nathaniel's father but seemed to leave everything out. Even the way the community seemed to view him, almost reverently. Like he had lighted the way and the rest of them had followed.

  He wasn't their saviour. He didn't have an endearing quality to his name.

  Except maybe demanding the Program be founded.

  I was being told to stay away from a man, but not given the reasons why. And that's fine. Sometimes people don't want to talk about their past. It happens. But at that point in my life, the only time one would tell another person, a new person, to stay away from someone, was when there was a bitter feud. There was rarely anything wrong with either party.

  Bad blood, was all I thought of it. Nathaniel was the only one who might have told me differently, but he wasn't talking.

  He simply stood up and went to the nightstand, where he pulled out a book and returned to me woodenly.

  Like a man walking to his execution.

  Oh yeah, we had those too in the slums, but the history books don't exactly boast the violent bits or the fact that once a criminal was found, there was no place to just store them for five years for a time out.

  He gave me the book and then sat on the other end of the couch. It was awkward, having that distance between us all of a sudden.

  It hurt, somewhere deep in my chest, to see him put that distance between us, even if it didn't seem like he wanted to.

  “It's just for a little while," Nathaniel said quietly to me. "He won't be in the estate forever and doesn't have access to the security systems. Until he does come, though, we need to act as if he's here. It's just simpler that way."

  “You want me to read to you?” I asked.”

  “To practice your enunciation, I know you can read the words, the past week has proven that, but I don't feel you can pronounce everything the way I want you to,” Nathaniel responded.

  I glanced at the door, then leaned towards Nathaniel just slightly and whispered, “Would a rich person even train their nanny, or just hire someone who had been trained by someone else?”

  “Trained nannies can be bought,” Nathaniel muttered, his lip turning up ever so slightly. “I will not have my children taught by a woman who cannot obey. Not by a man at all. The only example of a man that they will need is me.”

  “What if your wife brings her own nanny?” I asked.

  “I expect she will," Nathaniel said. "There should be two, especially with the laws that are passing to protect the rights of poor people. I'd hate to be a bad example for other rich folks. You will need time off, but not until you are trained and I know you are mine, and mine alone."

  I tried not to shudder at those words.

  Footsteps ran past the door. Nathaniel paled considerably and straightened.

  For the first time, I saw a panic come over him. I tried not to gape as the mask slid back into place, but the pale colour remained.

  We are, all of us, caught in the past.

  The first time I returned to the slum, I fell back into old habits. There have been several studies on the fact. When we come together with people from our pasts, especially those who had a strong influence on us, we tend to revert to the way w
e were when we last saw them.

  I didn't know that then, I only saw Nathaniel panicking and felt the welling fear in the pit of my stomach.

  I don't like the unknown. It is something that has always been used to play with me, even to discipline me. The thought of the thing could be as bad as the actual thing. Nathaniel hadn't filled me in on his father to keep me from panicking and doing something stupid, but I was keenly aware of body language even then. I picked up on his mood, and it affected my own.

  My resolve hardened, and the fear trickled away as the door to Nathaniel's room opened without a knock.

  I wasn't facing the door. I was facing Nathaniel with an open book in my lap. If nothing else, I have been told that I am good, and quick, in a pinch. When trouble rains down everyone else panics, screams, and runs in circles. I am at my strongest in those moments.

  “But, Mr. Edwards, I would never betray your loyalty. I signed a contract to serve only you, not another.”

  Against the couch, Nathaniel's hand twitched ever so slightly. “There is the addendum.”

  “Of course, but first and foremost, as per my contract, I serve you. Not the one you give your ring to.”

  I should have asked about the importance of the ring, asked what it signified. Perhaps if I had, Nathaniel would have trusted me enough to tell me what it meant, who it was from, the history it represented.

  He almost seemed sad as he trailed a finger down that chain.

  “Naturally, though I hope you can come to love and serve as I will,” he murmured, eyes glazing over as he turned to the door. “Father, not knocking?”

  “Not greeting me properly, I see,” came a rich, deep voice from the doorway. “Nathaniel, who is this slip of a woman?”

  Chapter Twenty

  “Nathaniel, who is this slip of a woman?”

  Nathaniel's father had a voice that could charm the panties off of both men and women. It was very much a voice that one could get lost in. Even at its coldest, it made you want to beg him to hurt you. The sound was very much like Nathaniel's, but aged by time and perhaps just a little by drink. You know that sound, don't you, the deeper voice, the odd tone of someone who knew their way around alcohol?