Charge? she almost asked out loud. She hadn’t been asked for any money, and if they thought she was going to pay they had another think coming. I do not beg, and I most certainly do not pay for sex.
“Tom and Roger, you said. What about the other two Doms? Kyle and Carter.”
“They are taken.”
“Oh.” Well, that narrowed things down. She had a 50-50 chance. Although it wasn’t likely a matter of luck of the draw. Roger and Tom would decide. Or would they? “Do they give you a choice of what Dom you want?”
Natalie looked over at Carter’s back before turning back to her. “Well, no. And you’re expected to obey any of them. Even the taken ones.” She grinned. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t say no to sex, or anything you really need to. They’ll give you a safe word and they’ll all honor it.”
Julia nodded. She knew about safe words from her scenes with Tom. Hers had been “Freeze”. It was something she knew how to say when things got stressed. Maybe she should have used it when Tom got her to beg. But she hadn’t been in any physical danger so it hadn’t occurred to her. I could have refused. But then I wouldn’t have come.
Put that way, the responsibility was squarely on her shoulders. She’d sabotaged a budding relationship for an orgasm. No. It’s more complicated than that.
“What’s wrong?” asked Natalie.
“Just thinking,” Julia said, leaning back in her seat. The seaplane was speeding forward for takeoff and it was a lot noisier in the tiny cabin than it was riding a big commercial jet. Not so loud that she couldn’t talk if she was willing to shout, but loud enough that it felt awkward.
Half an hour later the plane descended on a stretch of open ocean. It skidded on the water, the waves tilting the wings to one side. For a moment Julia feared it would go over, but then it righted itself and glided along the surface, slowing down as it approached a familiar small island. Julia glanced over at Natalie, who seemed perfectly calm as she stared out the window. Maybe all the landings are like this. So much for not being afraid of anything.
Carter killed the engine, making it quiet again, almost peaceful. The plane slowed until it was going no faster than a boat, and then slowed some more as it approached the dock. Now that they were there, the trip to Submission Island seemed a horrible idea. There was no one standing on the dock. Tom wasn’t waiting for her. Why would he, after the way she’d treated him? Damn. The ability to turn back time would be awfully useful right now.
“You’ll be okay,” said Natalie, patting her on the knee. “You’re in good hands. Just relax and have fun.”
Easy for you to say, Miss Taken. But Julia knew it was good advice. Now that she was here, she was going to go through with it, wherever it took her.
The plane stopped. “Okay, ladies, we’re here,” Carter said unnecessarily. He hopped out onto the dock. Natalie gestured her forward, so Julia got up and headed toward the door.
“Don’t forget your bag,” Natalie said. Julia turned and accepted the purse Natalie handed her. She took a deep breath. After dealing with the drug lord, this should be easy. She handed Carter her bag, and then accepted his hands helping her down to the dock. Carter turned to Natalie as soon as Julia had her feet under her.
Natalie tossed Carter a suitcase, which he put down on the dock. Then she jumped, nearly bowling Carter over. He staggered to the edge of the pier before getting his balance. Natalie giggled. Carter laughed, a full, throaty bass laugh. The two had almost toppled into the water.
“That sort of behavior will get you a spanking,” Carter told Natalie.
“I was hoping,” said Natalie.
Carter laughed again. “Brat.”
“Master,” said Natalie sweetly.
Carter turned to Julia. “In a moment I’ll take you up to the house. First, if Natalie wants to risk a spill into the ocean, I’m going to have to insist that she’s dressed for swimming.”
“Uh-oh,” said Natalie. “Here?”
“Of course here. Here’s where you tried to go swimming, isn’t it?” Carter shrugged. He turned to Julia, shaking his head. “I don’t have to tell you about the jellyfish.”
“Stinger season is over in May on the beaches,” replied Julia. “We should be mostly good now. Not that there’s no danger, as it may go on a little longer up here, but I wouldn’t fret.”
“See!” said Natalie.
“I’m waiting,” said Carter.
Natalie rolled her eyes. “Yes, Master.” She took her shirt off and her bra. Then she kicked off her sandals. She looked at Carter.
Carter crossed his arms.
Natalie peeled off her jeans and panties at the same time, and stood stark naked on the dock. “Satisfied, Master?”
“Very. I think I may have you strip off here from now on.”
Natalie looked at Julia. “I don’t suppose you’d like to strip too? Sisterly solidarity?”
Julia felt the heat rising in her face. Way to give your boyfriend ideas. She remembered what Natalie had said about obeying all the Masters, even the taken ones. “Um, not really,” she said, but Carter spoke over her.
“She didn’t try to push me in. Pick up your clothes and bring ’em along. It would be a shame if they blew off into the ocean and you’ll need them when you leave.”
Julia helped Natalie gather her clothes. When they’d finished, Carter had both suitcase and purse in hand. “Most men would refuse to carry a purse,” Julia observed.
Carter grinned. “Most men are insecure.” He walked down the dock toward the mansion. His shoulders were nearly as wide as Tom’s and he carried Natalie’s heavy suitcase and her own two-ton purse as if they were nothing. Julia didn’t think she could make him look effeminate even if she had him tied down and had an hour to spend working on him with lipstick and mascara.
“What are you thinking?” asked Natalie.
“Oh, you’d really rather not know,” Julia said. One of her academy instructors had accused her of having too much imagination. It came in handy sometimes though, and she’d learned to discard her ideas when they were too far out. That one would have to stay in the rubbish bin.
She felt awkward and guilty walking fully clothed when Natalie didn’t have a stitch on, but that didn’t make her want to disrobe. Maybe if she knew what was waiting for her. Maybe if what was waiting for her was Tom. But as it was, no. She’d follow any orders she could, but she wasn’t going to take her clothes off unless she had to. She’d worn as short a skirt as she’d felt comfortable walking around the airport in, in hopes of keeping it on for as long as possible, and a nice creamy silk blouse that fit her perfectly for the same reason.
The pier ended in a porch that attached to the single house on Submission Island, although the word mansion described it better than house. Made of wood and glass, the second floor jutted over the water. It had a basement too, full of dungeon equipment. She hadn’t seen it for herself, although she was curious, but one of the suspects they’d pulled in had described it in detail. She’d asked a few more questions about it than directly bore on the case, if she were to be perfectly honest with herself. She shivered.
How can stuff be scary and sexy at the same time? Some cops were danger junkies. They loved putting their lives on the line to serve and protect. They didn’t make very good cops in the end, because the objective was to minimize danger, not seek it out. She was willing to take necessary risks, but if she could get the job done staying behind a desk interviewing suspects, she’d choose that every time. But knowing that about herself didn’t change the allure of the dungeon, and she’d thought that one day Tom might take her there. On the other hand, she’d refused his offers to go to the island precisely because she wanted things to happen on her turf, where she had control.
So much for that.
When they got to the porch, a man walked out. He was tall, with boyish good looks and a tousled head of strawberry-blond hair. Roger. She looked behind him to see if Tom was with him but he wasn’t. Roger closed the d
oor behind him.
“Kelly,” he said. “I’m glad you could make it.”
Him calling her the same thing Tom did made her bite her lip. She knew they talked. Why wasn’t Tom there? “Thanks, Roger,” she said.
Roger raised his eyebrows. “I suspect you’ve been informed, but for the remainder of these two weeks you are to refer to me as Sir or Master Roger. Anything else is disrespect, and I reserve the right to deal with disrespect by meting out punishment. Is that understood?”
He had the sharp and impersonal tone of a drill instructor at the academy. There was something comforting about that in a way. She had come to explore her submissive nature, not to get warm and cuddly. “Yes Sir.”
“Good. We’ll get along fine.”
“I’ll only be here for a week, Sir.” She looked at Carter. “Will you be able to take me back then?”
“Of course.”
“How unfortunate,” said Roger. “Natalie, would you mind showing her to her room? And if you haven’t filled her in on proper protocol, please do so.”
“Yes, Master Roger.”
Roger opened the door for both of them, and Carter stepped in after them with the suitcases. “I expect you down here in an hour, Kelly. And remove your bra before you come down. It will just be in our way.”
Our. Roger was going to play with her then, not Tom. Or maybe both? She remembered what she’d put on her application. If she had thought she’d actually be going, she wouldn’t have. Yes, a threesome with two men had been one of her fantasies for a long time, but she would have preferred to discuss with Tom first.
Maybe they share all the time.
“What are you thinking?” asked Natalie again as they walked up the stairs.
“You always want to know, don’t you?” Julia asked ruefully. She wasn’t usually so lost in thought. “Do Roger and Tom share women?”
Natalie nodded. “Sometimes.”
“Oh.”
“Do you have feelings for Master Tom?”
“No. Maybe.” Yes. “It’s complicated.”
Natalie nodded and opened a door. Inside was a nice, very feminine-looking bedroom. Far more of a girl’s room than her place at home. She wondered who had decorated it, because she had a hard time imagining any of the men putting that much pink into a room. Still, its softness was reassuring. She suspected she’d see plenty of black leather soon enough.
“May I come in?” asked Natalie.
“Yes. May I ask you a question?”
“Of course.”
“So you and Carter are a couple?”
“Master Carter. Yes.”
“How can you stand to call all these guys Master all the time? You’re obviously a smart woman. I don’t get it?”
“You think being submissive involves being dumb?” asked Natalie. “I don’t have to call them that if I don’t want to. Carter won’t punish me for it and no, I don’t call him Master Carter all the time. But you’re here for a week of fantasy and the more you put into it the more you’ll get out of it. That’s what the protocol is all about, really, putting everyone in the right headspace.”
“And pumping up the guys’ egos?”
“Oh, I think their egos are doing fine. Especially Roger’s. And he looks after everyone else’s. He’s a shrink, you know. But no, it’s more for you than for them. It can help you let go of your concerns and be in the moment here. For me, it helps me remember that here I don’t have to be a college professor. Here I can be fully Carter’s slave.”
Julia hadn’t looked at it that way. She had played along with Tom’s desire to have her call him Sir and was prepared to play along with Roger’s, although she didn’t intend to use the word Master because that seemed more extreme. But she’d assumed that it was for him, part of the quid pro quo for the delightful things he did to her body.
“It feels funny being dressed when you’re naked,” Julia said.
“Well, you can always strip. I’m sure the Doms won’t mind.” Natalie grinned. “But I’m okay, so don’t worry about me. It all gets back to the headspace I was talking about. If we were in Chicago, I’d probably have given Carter a serious glare. I trust him enough not to use my safe word the moment I’m stressed, but I’d have been a seriously unhappy camper at him making me the only naked person. But this place is different. And it’s gotten so that when I step out of the plane I can let my worries go and trust him to take care of me, and take pleasure from pleasing him. Trust me, he does a good job of taking care of me. And I’m sure Master Roger will do a good job of taking care of you.”
Julia nodded. She’d have to trust him. But it would be a whole lot easier if it were Tom.
Chapter Two
Tom knew he was being stubborn, but he also knew that it wasn’t fair to the incoming sub not to be able to give his best. A week ago he’d been looking forward to whoever might come. Megan, Ashley, whoever. He’d even badgered Roger about it. Now he wished Sergeant Kelly would call instead. It wasn’t reasonable, but there it was. And he knew he’d have to snap out of it.
I shouldn’t have called her and told her I wanted her. It made her not calling back worse. He sat at his oak desk and looked at the folder Roger had given him the evening before. Maybe reading the application of the new sub would snap him out of it. He liked to memorize their likes and dislikes and try to figure out how he could make their fantasies come true. Often their lists changed while they were on the island, as they discovered they enjoyed activities they hadn’t been looking forward to, while things that sounded hot in theory turned out to be not as much so in practice. He loved helping them find out. He liked to think every sub left Submission Island a more self-aware and more fulfilled person. On the whole, he thought it was true.
This time he found it hard to focus. He settled for noting the 0’s and 5’s. Something was missing—the first page. He leafed through the papers, thinking they were out of order, but it wasn’t there. It was harder to put the information together and figure out what kind of person it might represent without a name to attach it all to.
Of course, I could go find her and introduce myself. He’d heard what was probably Carter’s plane as it approached. Whoever the sub was, she was already on the island. But without reading the application and memorizing as much as he could, he could make mistakes that would damage the sub’s trust. Maybe I should let Roger handle her until Megan comes. And maybe I’ll snap out of this mood.
He took one more run through the boxes and got to the comment section.
Kidnapping, huh? That could be fun. And two men? He and Roger had double-teamed women before and it had been a lot of fun. One of his pleasures was overwhelming a woman’s senses, and a threesome provided that experience in spades.
No begging. As soon as he read it he knew he had hit an emotional minefield. He remembered Kelly’s voice as she pleaded for him to fuck her and begged to be permitted to come. He hadn’t thought that was the last he would hear from her. I shouldn’t have left so suddenly, but there was a million-dollar deal on the line. Rationally, no woman was worth passing that up. But he had the feeling he’d made the wrong decision.
Then again, he hadn’t vanished nearly as completely as she had. Now he wanted to hear her voice. Preferably saying “Please”.
Roger is right. I need to get laid. He looked at the boxes again. Sex wasn’t a zero for this girl, although for almost all the forms of penetration she’d checked a three, indicating some mixed feelings or more likely simply a preference for something else. Either way, it all started with meeting her. Satisfied that he’d memorized enough, he pushed back the swivel chair he was sitting on and stood up.
Time to get back in the saddle. Just in case though, he took out his phone. A satellite phone, it got reception even on Submission Island.
There were no messages. Tom headed downstairs.
No one was in the living room so he looked out the big glass sliding door. Carter was lounging in a chair by the side of the pool and Natalie was splashin
g, naked, in the water. Tom barely noticed them. A St. Andrew’s Cross that belonged downstairs in the dungeon was set up in a space normally occupied by a wooden picnic table. Roger was flogging a sub there. And that sub was Sergeant Julia Kelly.
Mine. He almost said it out loud. Jealousy washed over him, an unfamiliar emotion. He’d always been able to share whatever he had, whether it was possessions or women, with his friends. There were always others available. It wasn’t a competition and he respected the choice of the women on Submission Island to be with whoever suited them. The Doms, led by Roger, made a first guess, but they often ended up switching once the women got there if they made their preferences clear.
Thoughts spun through his head. Roger had known. He’d left the first page out of what he’d given Tom deliberately. What the hell was he trying to pull? Anger surged, nearly as unfamiliar as jealousy, and he yanked open the screen door loud enough that Carter jerked his head to look. Roger didn’t. His back was to Tom and so was Kelly’s. But that didn’t mean he hadn’t heard. The rhythm of his strokes on Kelly’s back slowed.
Kelly was stretched out, arms and legs extended so that her body matched the X of the cross. She was topless but she wore a skirt still. That wasn’t like Roger, who generally preferred his women stark naked. That slowed Tom down in his headlong charge to take the flogger from the man. Her back was pink but it wasn’t red, and the flogger Roger was using was far from the heaviest. That wasn’t too surprising—Roger preferred mind games to implements in general. She was bound to the cross with rope wrapped around her wrists and ankles. Tom’s hesitation let Carter reach his side.
“She’s a big girl.” Carter put a hand on Tom’s shoulder. “She can do what she wants. We’ll deal with Roger later.”
Tom didn’t want to deal with Roger later. Now seemed a very good time. Roger was always stressing the importance of living in the now. Tom had half a mind to punch Roger and bust his pretty nose. Now.
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