by Lilia Moon
We never bring anyone into the public spaces this unprepared. The commitment to keeping Fettered a safe space is a sacred vow, and I need someone watching over our members in case this goes wrong.
I already know I’m going to be watching Emily.
My reasons for doing this are tangled as all hell. My cock is voting, and my brain, and several other parts of me that I don’t even want to think about. Ten minutes in my office and this woman has done a serious number on my ability to be a grown-up.
And my Dom needs are straining at the leash.
I tell them to damn well stand down. Emily’s probably going to catch one look at a set of handcuffs and run screaming.
And if she does, I’m going to need to chase after her and help her put herself back together, because I’m the asshole walking her into my club hoping she does something that will squash my libido flat.
Ari’s not at the front door as we go by, which means she got my message.
Harlan’s headed our way as we walk into the bar, holding two drinks and glaring at me, which means he got the message too. I take one of the orange martini glasses and set it in Emily’s hand. “Non-alcoholic—we like our patrons to keep their judgment fully intact while they’re here.”
She takes a semi-professional sip and her eyes widen slightly.
Ari, coming up on Harlan’s right shoulder, grins. “One of Quint’s special brews. The man’s a genius with fruit juice and crushed ice.”
Emily slants a look at me. “Okay, you win. Your people can do the drinks.”
“Can I do the streamers?” Ari’s not making any attempts to hide her enthusiasm—or her amusement at my expense.
Harlan’s nodding like he’s young and dumb and eager, when I know damn well he isn’t any of those things. “Ari handles the club decorating for special events. She’s got a good eye.”
Our front-door demon casts me a glance and then looks back at Emily. “I know Scorpio, if that helps.”
There’s no way she’s outing an acquaintance of hers in this context without their explicit consent.
Emily doesn’t look surprised at all. “Scorpio knows everyone.”
Ari nods, like the friendly twenty-something co-ed she is. “I’m guessing you don’t usually let her decorate, but her style isn’t that far from what Doxy and Jimmy will probably want.”
I can hear my teeth grinding. “I was thinking about showing Emily the oasis.” It’s the largest space we have for more private scenes, and I already know how happy it will make Doxy.
She fell in love in that room.
“It’s perfect.” Ari grasps Emily’s hands, her eyes full of starshine and romance. “It looks really beautiful when it’s candlelit. I have some pictures from a few weeks back I can show you once you’ve seen the space.”
Her birthday scene. I give Ari a look, hoping like hell she has some photos that don’t show her strapped to Milo’s latest invention in the middle of all the candlelight.
She just grins at me and winks.
Emily catches all of this. “It sounds like you’ve all being doing a lot of thinking.” Her voice is getting more professional as she speaks. “Let’s take a look at the space and then you can walk me through the rest of your ideas.”
It’s exactly what should happen next, but the last thing I want right now is Emily Madigan pulling herself back together. “We’re going to take a quick tour first, give you a sense of the layout and feel of the club.” I turn subtly toward a door, curious to see if she’s still tapped in to my signals.
Dom arrogance, but I’ve never claimed to be anything else.
Ari raises an eyebrow and glances at Harlan as she sees where I intend to head. There are ways to get to the oasis that don’t involve passing through the dungeon, and they both know it.
I remind myself that I own this place.
I put a hand on the small of Emily’s back to guide her, even though she doesn’t need it, and know my mistake as soon as I do it. Even through her proper, stylish wedding-planner suit, the contact reminds me of just how it feels to touch her—and how little of it I’ve done.
She leans into my hand. There’s no way she knows she’s doing it, but I know. It’s a cue every good Dom looks for. There’s desire, and then there’s desire to submit, and this woman is oozing both of them from every pore if you know what to look for.
I do.
Ari’s watching me with the kind of knowing look on her face that says she’s not missing any of this. Harlan isn’t either, but his eyes are far more suspicious.
As they should be.
I mentally growl at both of them. I’m not throwing Emily to the wolves. She’s got a supportive, experienced Dom at her back, even if she doesn’t know it yet.
I flick my eyes at Emily—it’s not me they should be watching.
It doesn’t take long for the measuring gaze on Ari’s face to shift to something different. She can see it too. It’s something switches are particularly good at reading, since they know what it is to desire both top and bottom.
I breathe out a little. Ari looks at me and shrugs, the left corner of her mouth quirking up. A blessing, or at least as close to one as I’m going to get.
Harlan won’t interfere—he’ll just kick my butt later if this goes wrong. Fettered is my club, but you wouldn’t know it from hanging out with him. Everything that goes on in this place happens on his watch, and he takes that at least as seriously as I do. Which is why he’s the club manager, my best friend, and the guy most likely to break my nose if this stupid move of mine hurts a hair on Emily’s head. His Dom instincts extend to every sub in this place.
In his eyes, Emily has just become one of them.
Chapter Eight
Emily
I’m taking in nothing. I know this, even as I try to see past the two people who’ve formed a human wall in front of me. Ari is trying to encourage me, I think, but the other man, the one Damon calls Harlan, just looks dangerous.
However, it’s not me he’s got in his sights—it’s the man with his hand on my back.
The hand that feels like it has reached in and taken over my whole existence. I’m anchored there, my heart beating in Damon’s palm.
He’s guiding me toward another set of doors, and even my inexperienced eyes know we’re about to step into a different world. I can hear the sounds. Feel the electricity. I wish I could tell him I don’t want to go in there—but it’s not true. I do.
Ari reaches over and takes my drink. She’s giving me a chance to think. To choose.
The hand at my back eases and I know it’s sending me the same message. If I step through those doors, I will be doing it of my own free will.
The part of me that has never been a coward rises up and gives both of them a smile. “I’m ready.” We all know that’s not true, but it tells them what they need to know. I choose. I say yes. Whatever happens through those doors, I’m agreeing to be there.
I hold on to that satisfying sense of grown-up bravery for four or five steps. Until my eyes start seeing.
There’s a woman right in front of me, sitting in what looks like a very comfortable recliner, her legs spread wide open. She’s blindfolded, tied down with soft leather straps that match the recliner. The man with her is dripping oil in a painstaking, slow spiral down her belly. She’s straining against the straps, desire trying to yank her free. He puts a hand on her thigh, says something low and guttural that I can’t make out.
She utterly relaxes.
I’m not seeing the next drops of oil, landing right on the most sensitive skin where she craves his touch, or his strong fingers, moving to follow the path of the oil. I’m not seeing her body arch, no longer fighting the straps, but using them to push into his touch.
I’m seeing her face. She’s gone somewhere I don’t even know exists. A woman utterly giving in to his touch. To her own pleasure.
I want to be her.
I rip my eyes away as explosions detonate in my gut. Jealousy. Fear.
Grief. She knows how to do something I can’t even begin to contemplate.
My eyes travel the room, seeking a different story. Looking for someone like me.
There’s another woman in the corner, ringed by an appreciative audience. She’s bent over some kind of bench. I can see the restraints, the things to hold her, but they’re not on. She’s holding two handles, her naked bottom stretching toward the man behind her. He grins and delivers a quick slap.
I don’t need to hear the words. I can see the connection between them.
I can see how wet she is. He hasn’t even started, and she’s bent over in front of a dozen people readying herself to come for him.
I feel myself moving closer. Wanting to know how she does this.
Someone behind me screams as she comes. I want to scream with her.
The woman bent over the bench wiggles her bottom at her partner again. I hear him this time. He’ll let her come. Once. Then another time after her ass is red.
His fingers trail through the wetness between her legs.
She spreads her legs wider, giving him access. He slides a finger inside her while the other hand rubs tight circles over her clit.
I hear myself whimper.
No one else hears me. They’re all watching her pleasure. Her face, lit up with a wild joy as she reaches for what he offers.
His fingers are fast and sure, and it’s obvious they’ve done this together before. She’s panting, moaning, building toward an orgasm with the sureness of a venting volcano. She shifts, pushing into his fingers. He takes them away and smacks the dripping wetness. She shrieks and pulls herself back into position.
He plunges two fingers into her and her volcano erupts. Loud, molten pleasure.
She’s still yelling with the power of her release when he starts spanking her, first one side and then the other. A rhythmic rain of sound that somehow gathers her back up, puts her back into his hands.
They’re just beginning.
Chapter Nine
Damon
Emily’s leaning against the wall of my dungeon, panting like she’s just run a hundred-meter dash. Her cheeks are flushed, her eyes are wild, and her body is screaming with desire in a way that has every Dom in a hundred paces watching.
That’s all they’ll do, because I’m making clear with every line of my body that she’s with me.
Emily hitches in a breath and my cock nearly breaks out of my pants. I tamp down, hard. Domination is all about control, and it starts with keeping my own damn self under wraps.
The woman using the wall to hold herself up is a different matter entirely. She might not know what her body is saying yet, but I do. Everything in her wants to surrender, is aching, begging for someone to hold her while she does it. I feel a grin tickling at my lips.
She’s come to the right place.
I’m about to make her an offer that women are lined up for months to get even a chance at. I take the two steps that will bring me to where she’s standing. I meld the side of my body to hers, offering Dom support. Physical connection, grounding her, giving that submissive energy somewhere to go.
For one insanely sweet moment, she leans into me, letting me be the container for the passion storming her walls. And then I feel her tense. Emily Madigan, business owner. She’s back. Even if she’s a little out of breath.
I can’t let that happen.
I lean in and breathe into the hollow of her neck. That’s it—I just breathe, letting her feel the heat of me. And then I move my mouth up, just a little, and speak into her ear, words for her and her alone. “I would love to help you with that.”
She freezes—but she doesn’t move away. I move back far enough to see her eyes. “It’s okay to want things here. Tell me what you want.” In this moment, there isn’t anything I wouldn’t give her. Attention. Focus. Release.
Which is when she starts shaking like a damn leaf.
I’m not the best Dom in Seattle for nothing, and I know when a sub’s been pushed past her limits. She’s not my sub and I have no idea what wall we’ve just blown through, but the fact that I’m the one who did it makes her mine, at least until the earthquake is over.
I reach down and swoop her up, settling her against my chest as fast and as gently as I possibly can.
Quint, on floor duty, reads the signs and strides to the door I’m headed for, getting there ahead of me. He raises a quizzical eyebrow and I shake my head. Whatever’s up with Emily, the last thing in the world she needs is two Doms hovering over her.
She shivers against my chest, squirming a little. The wedding planner, trying to get back on her feet.
Not until I know why she fell off them. I lean in and let my voice deepen. “Be still.”
She doesn’t freeze this time—she melts, right back into my chest. Seeking safety with the instincts of a woman born to surrender. Which means it makes no sense at all that the thing that put her here is me offering to catch her.
I stride down the hall and kick open the door to my private office, letting it swing shut behind me. I know no one will follow us here, and like every room in Fettered, it’s set up with the basics of good aftercare. Blankets, pillows, water, and the custom-blended oil that’s the best thing ever made for roughed-up skin and tender parts.
I grab a bottle of water and carry Emily to the oversized chair in the corner. A couple of soft voice commands and we have low lights and quiet music. Ambience. I’m rolling with the assumption that anyone who plans it for others will appreciate the little things.
She hasn’t moved in my arms, not since I told her not to.
I settle myself in the chair and feel her stiffening as I shift us around. “Stay. Let me make you comfortable.” No Dom voice this time, but I’m still not asking. I’m pretty sure that wherever Emily’s gone, too many choices will only get in the way of her finding her way back.
I breathe, letting her feel my chest rise and fall under her head. She fits like she was made to be here. I try to let the air moving in and out soothe me, too. I know that subs can freak out, and that probably runs true for regular women too, but I’ve been in this business a long time and I can usually stay ahead of it. I pride myself on knowing what the women in my life need and giving it to them.
To step wrong this fast and this hard is humbling in a way that feels like crap.
I tip my chin down and kiss the top of her head. She pulls tenderness out of me, this woman I don’t even know. “Emily.”
Her breathing changes, just enough to let me know she’s heard me.
“Em.” I put my fingers under her chin and gently tip it up. “We need to talk.”
The wide-open vulnerability in her eyes is receding, like a train moving away in a tunnel. I don’t want to let it go, but I know I need to. This woman isn’t my sub—she isn’t anyone’s sub. We have no ground rules, no commitments, no shared understanding. She knows almost nothing about the way I live my life, or why I do it, or why I want to stand on this edge she’s fallen over and help her up and learn how I can hold her while she goes over it again and again until it has no power over her anymore.
Until the only one she lets have that kind of power is me.
I take another deep breath, and I kick myself that this one is shaky.
She hears it—I can tell she does. She’s a details person, just like me, and that means she watches. She listens. Being her Dom would be a challenge and a half, because we’re never perfect, and a sub who can read that is about as vulnerable as a person gets.
I can see her pulling herself together, putting back on the trappings of the woman who walked into my club. It’s fascinating to watch. It’s not hardness, not armor—just a skin she shimmies into with a lot more grace than I expect from the woman who’s cuddling into my chest, riding the hard edge of some kind of crash.
Because that’s what this was, even if she’s trying to shove the truth of it underground as she shimmies.
Her hands move to push herself off my lap. I reach for her hi
ps. “Stay.” A request this time, and not one I’m used to making.
Her head shakes. “That’s a bad idea.”
My cock is feeling abandoned, and the rest of me isn’t all that pleased with the sudden emptiness in my lap either. I get up from the chair and lead us over to a love seat, one that will let us keep talking with something closer to socially acceptable space between us. Socially acceptable in her world, anyhow—that’s not really a concept that means much in mine.
She sits down, back to the elegant, graceful, contained woman who first walked in my front door. “I’m very sorry about that.”
She thinks we’re done.
I let her see my smile. Unless I’m very wrong about her, we’re just getting started.
Chapter Ten
Emily
I can’t believe I’ve just apologized to him. I’m not even sure for what. He’s the one who put me in his lap and is still sitting there with an enigmatic smile on his face.
I try to find any remnants of my brain that didn’t blow up in his dungeon.
He leans forward, closing the space between us to dangerous distances. “We need to talk.”
I want to cuddle back into his lap again. Somehow that felt far safer than this. “I’m not sure I’m ready for that.” It’s more honest than I’d planned to be.
“You saw something.” He sounds so very sure of himself. “Something that pushed buttons for you, and then I offered to help you and you ran from it.”
I don’t want to believe I run from anything. But I did, and that he sees it has my knees trembling. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
He breathes slowly, and I realize my lungs are still following his. “That’s your choice. But one of the reasons this club exists is to make a safe space for those deep needs we all have.” He pauses, and somehow it sucks all of the air out of the room. “Sometimes fear is just a cover for something we really need.”