Striking a Balance
By Jennifer Bene
Text copyright © 2015 Jennifer Bene
All Rights Reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover art by Quarter Hazel Designs.
Paperback cover design by James,www.goonwrite.com
ISBN-13: 978-1523801138
ISBN-10: 1523801131
“The best way out is always through.”
- Robert Frost
Thank you, the reader, for continuing with Thalia’s story and moving to the second book in this trilogy. In this book we start to leave the darkness behind, but if it was easy to leave darkness behind it wouldn’t be something we respect. I really hope you enjoy meeting James and all the other characters in this book. As always I want to thank my editor, because I know they put up with my insanity with a smile (usually) and that is something I don’t always deserve.
Last, I want to thank all the lit readers who encouraged me, and all my friends who listened to me talk their ears off for hours about this story and still urged me to keep writing.
All of you make me feel incredibly lucky.
Chapter One
The Night of the Auction
The ride away from Marcus’ house and the chaotic auction was surreal. For the first part of it Thalia had been glued to the window watching the vibrant colors of the outside world dim as night took over, and then she’d sat slumped against the door staring up at the night sky. James, her new Master, had graciously given her the quiet she didn’t even realize she needed. Her mind wouldn’t shut up despite the alluring calm of the road noise and the dark, tree lined highway that they were on for about half the drive.
It suddenly hit her as she saw a sign signaling their approach to the city that the auction was over. The threat that Marcus had held over her was gone. The threat of Marcus himself, and his twisted brother, Anthony, was gone. A hysterical little laugh bubbled up in her chest and burst out without warning. She covered her mouth quickly, but James had jumped in his seat at the sudden noise before composing his face back into his calm demeanor as he looked over at her.
“Care to share the joke with me, pet?” His voice was warm silk, and she almost giggled again as his English accent shaped the words. She remembered his hand between her thighs, his mouth against hers and she tried to ignore the flush in her cheeks.
“I -...” She started to respond and realized she didn’t know how to explain herself. Her mind was swirling with all the panic and anxiety she’d built up about the auction, all the terrible things she’d imagined – and then there was James sitting next to her and calmly waiting for her answer. And thirty minutes ago he’d had her moaning under his touch. He was ridiculously handsome. The kind of handsome you saw in social circles that cared about ‘good breeding’ and trust funds and yacht clubs and, well, pretty much everything Thalia had never been close to associated with. His blond hair was artfully tousled so that it constantly seemed like he had just run his hand through it. But, actually, it had been her hands in it last, when he’d kissed her and slid his hand between her legs, and made her want to beg him to keep going. He had green eyes that looked like sea glass the first time she’d seen them, and like green bottle glass when he was aroused. A shiver went through her, and she noticed she was still incredibly wet from when he’d made her come at the party. On top of his accent, his looks, his social status, and the skill he’d shown her with his hands and his mouth... he had asked her permission. He had given her a choice to go with him. He had even asked if she’d be okay with him touching her before he’d even approached Marcus!
The hysterical laugh was threatening to burst out again.
In a million years she would have never imagined leaving Marcus’ house with someone like James – there had been days she wasn’t sure she’d be leaving alive at all. She psychotically felt safe with James. She knew that was insane. She didn’t know James, fuck, she didn’t know anything about Marcus except for his violence. She had only known both of their names for, what, an hour?
The laugh came out. She slapped both her hands over her mouth and leaned forward in the seat as her head swam and her ribs ached with the effort to quiet it. They were in the city now and the bright lights of buildings flashed by as James maneuvered the luxury SUV smoothly through the traffic. He glanced back over at her and arched an eyebrow, but he didn’t pressure her to speak.
She was glad, because she couldn’t answer him at the moment. Nothing was funny. She didn’t know why she was laughing. Of all things right now, she shouldn’t be laughing. Her breathing grew shallow as her situation came into focus. She was in a car with someone who was basically a stranger, a stranger who had purchased her from a really horrifying situation, but why would he have been there if he wasn’t the same? He turned into the parking lot of a very large, nice hotel and she finally felt the tears seeping through the shirt she was wearing. She was crying.
“Thalia...” His voice was soft as he pulled into a spot far from the entrance.
His gentle voice didn’t help. She folded forward, hugging her knees as sobs started coming out. Somewhere in her mind she had thought the auction was the end of it, but it wasn’t. She belonged to James now, and he would do whatever he wanted with her. Whether that was more of what he’d done at the party, and in the SUV, or if he was more like Anthony – she’d just have to find out. A sob choked out of her as fear washed over her again.
“Thalia.” His voice was suddenly stern. It wasn’t like the soft one he’d used with her since the auction. But it effectively short-circuited the cycle of fear and panic that was escalating inside her and she sat up in response, gasping a breath. His voice came again, “Look at me.”
She tilted her head so she could look at him through the curtain of her hair. He sighed and reached for her, but she flinched and he stopped his hand.
“Thalia. Tuck your hair behind your ears so I can see your face.” He took his hand back as he said it and allowed her to sweep her hair out of her face and quickly swipe her hands under her eyes, a black blur of mascara and eyeliner marking her hands. “Thank you.” He said, still in that calm, direct voice.
Thalia opened her mouth to speak, but every time she started a sentence she would remember the need to address him as Master, which only tumbled her back into her panic. Her chest hurt as she tried to breathe, and the air in the SUV seemed stifling. She grabbed at her throat, and she heard James curse and unbuckle his seatbelt. His strong grip was at the back of her neck as he pulled her seatbelt slack and pressed her head forward between her knees.
“Shh, Thalia. Take a deep breath, you’re hyperventilating. Shh.” He still sounded stern, but it was actually helping. The high-pitched whine she was hearing was her own breaths rapidly whistling in and out of her lungs. His calm, controlled voice was so different from her panic that she found herself trying to cling to it in the fog of her head. A few minutes like that and her head wasn’t swimming any more, her pulse had dropped a little and her chest didn’t hurt quite so much. Her breathing quieted slowly and she licked her lips before she spoke.
“Thank you, Master.” She murmured and he released his grip on her neck
and she sat up.
He rubbed a hand across his face before he gripped the steering wheel. “Thalia, I am not going to hurt you. Well, I will not hurt you anytime soon, and certainly not ever in any way you don’t want. I want you to heal. When you are healed and want to try submitting to me we’ll talk before anything happens. I promise you that.”
She bit her bottom lip and nodded, wiping her cheeks again and sweeping her hair back from her face. “Yes, Master. Thank you, Master.”
“God, Thalia.” He brushed his thumb across her lower lip and she forced herself not to pull back. He had not hurt her yet, or shown any inclination to. “We’re going to go upstairs and talk, and I want to check and make sure you’re okay. Can you handle that, can you handle walking in there with me?”
“Yes, Master.” She nodded and took a deep, shuddering breath to try and calm down the rest of the way.
“There’s my brave girl.” His thumb swiped across her cheek before he turned the car off.
It was a blur as he came around the car and helped her out. He walked towards the building and she followed him, but being around so many people after being deprived of interaction made the panic start coming back. After the longest elevator ride ever, where she hid against the wall while James effectively blocked anyone’s view of her, he finally tugged her elbow and they exited. The moment she was inside his room she dropped to her knees, the adrenaline making it a sharper movement than she meant it to be.
James shut the door behind her and she felt her muscles tense in response. He moved in front of her and she saw a physical change in him too, the same she’d seen when he had taken charge at the party, and bought her, and stood up to Marcus. He seemed larger standing over her, and she wanted to apologize for breaking down in the car. She was grateful he took her away from Marcus, and he did seem much nicer. She wanted to explain she was just afraid.
“Thalia, tell me your safe word.” The command surprised her.
“Uhm... it’s ch- chair, Master.” She stumbled through her response.
“Good. If at any point you need me to stop what I’m doing, say it. I will stop immediately, and we will talk about why you needed to stop. After we may continue, or we may not. Do you understand?” He was so calm and direct, it was comforting on a variety of levels. What he said, and how honest and confident he sounded when he said it.
“Yes, Master.” She nodded along with him, keeping her eyes low. Her mind repeated ‘chair’ over and over.
“Good. Stand up and undress.” He spoke clearly and then moved away from her to what she assumed was the bedroom behind a set of French doors. Thalia stood back up and slipped off the clothes he’d given her, folding them and setting them by the wall on top of her shoes. She’d spent the last week without clothes and the pinch and press of the fabric had felt strange, and so it was almost comforting to be naked again. Which was insane, and some part of her brain knew that. She moved back into a kneel, a little more gracefully, as he stepped back into the living area.
He stopped in front of her, towering over her, still fully dressed. She kept her eyes down, but just his presence sent a thrill through her, heat gathering in her lower belly as she anticipated what he would do. Then he spoke in that low, direct voice, “Good, pet. Come with me.”
She’d expected him to turn and start walking so she would follow, but he didn’t. She saw his hand at the edge of her vision and she looked up at it, careful not to raise her eyes too high. He wanted her to stand? He was helping her up? Her mouth opened to ask the question, but she stopped herself, “May I ask a question, Master?”
“Is it about the crawling?” He asked it smoothly and she nodded. A sigh escaped his lips, “You don’t have to crawl in my presence, pet. While the view is delightful, and I may ask for it sometimes for that reason, it’s not necessary.”
“Umm... th- thank you, Master.” At least that was one more mark in the good column, one less resemblance to Marcus or Anthony. Her hand was shaking when she took his, but his grip was firm and strong as he tugged her to her feet and led her to the bedroom where the sheets were pulled back so there was a large white expanse of clean flat sheet.
“Lay down. On your stomach.” She did and she waited to feel his hand between her legs, her eyes clenched tight, even as her pussy grew wet with the memory of his touch at the party and in the car. Instead after she heard movement to her left she felt his warm hands on her shoulders, slippery with some kind of oil. She jumped at first before his strong hands started moving confidently. His thumbs dug into the tight knots of her shoulders and she realized how tense she was, how every inch of her body had been coiled tight in anxiety and fear for a week.
A massage. He was giving her a massage. This was... confusing, and at the same time incredible. He was good at this.
A soft moan escaped her lips as he started to move his hands masterfully over her shoulders, sliding up the sides of her neck under the collar. For long minutes he silently worked the muscles in her shoulders before his hands slipped down her left arm. Her pulse slowed down, and she felt like she could finally breathe after the insane tension of the day.
At her bicep James paused, leaned down, and kissed her skin, his lips barely brushing her. It was a comforting, soothing kiss that surprised her in how gentle it was. He did it again at her wrist. On her right arm he kissed both sides of her wrist. When his hands returned to her back, his thumbs gliding along her spine he muttered a curse under his breath.
She tensed, and he brushed his fingers softly down her back, shushing her. “May I ask what’s wrong, Master?”
He didn’t answer her immediately, his lips brushing across her back over and over and over in soft kisses that followed where his hands worked her sore muscles. “Nothing is wrong, pet. You are such a brave girl, Thalia, so strong.” That’s when she realized the twinges of pain she was feeling weren’t just sore muscles, but bruises and healing welts. His mouth was tracing each of them.
“Master?” Breathing the single word was all she managed.
“I wanted to get you away from him earlier, pet, but Anthony refused my calls at first.” His fingers continued their gentle pressure across her body, easing each of her muscle groups, kissing each mark on her body. His mouth moved against her skin when he spoke again and his fingers tightened on her hip, “He didn't even try to take care of these, or of you.” He sounded so angry when he said it that her hands clenched into fists and her toes curled involuntarily as she waited for his anger to turn into action. The tone made the panic return, the fear, but he quickly brushed soothing hands down her sides.
“Fuck, Thalia, I'm sorry. I'm not upset with you at all, pet, I’m upset with Marcus. It was his responsibility to care for each and every mark he gave you.” A soft touch traced what must have been a line across her thigh, and then his lips kissed it. “I told myself I’d learn each welt and each bruise he’d left on you, but I hadn’t imagined you’d have so many in a week.”
“I -” she started but he stopped her. Her mind raced back to the last time she’d looked at herself in the mirror before the auction. The collection of marks on her body had changed gradually over the week and had blurred into nothing more than background noise to her reflection. But Anna, and Kaia, and Thomas, and now James had commented on it.
She must look worse than she imagined.
“It’s okay, just relax, pet.” She realized her breathing had picked back up, the panic edging back in with his anger, and every memory of Marcus’ hands or belt on her. “Your safety is my priority now, in everything we do. I promise I will keep you safe.” James’ palms slid down her thighs, massaging the aches and the tender skin there. His mouth placed a trail of soft kisses along the marks. In moments he was down her calves, and he sighed and got off the edge of the bed.
“Master?” She felt anxious when his touch left her, and she pushed herself up to look for him. He stepped back to the bed holding a small white box with a Red Cross label on the top. His green eyes found hers and she
felt a blush flood up her chest and into her cheeks, heating her skin. He had a look of concern, but it faded as he took control again. She dropped her eyes to the box in his hand, a first aid kit.
“Thalia, I’m here. Lie down.” Her heart rate slowed as she lay back down and she felt him untape the bandages on her feet. “I still cannot believe you broke his back door. You are a fighter.”
“It was stupid, Master.” She bit her lip and buried her face in the bedding, as she realized she’d spoken out of turn, contradicted him, and challenged him in a single sentence. She was afraid of what he’d do about her behavior. A cold swipe ran across the arch of her foot and she hissed through her teeth as it stung.
“Just antiseptic, pet, and while it was stupid considering your consequences... it takes a lot for someone to be brave like that with a person like Marcus in control of them.” He gently took care of her feet as she let that sink in. She remembered the fear that had held her when she had broken the sliding glass door, and the complete terror when she’d heard him shout her name.
“Yes, Master.” She said into the sheet, and she felt him place a kiss on the newly bandaged arch of each of her feet. He shifted to sit at her hip, his fingers brushing through her hair.
Striking a Balance (Thalia Book 2) (The Thalia Series) Page 1