Truly Helpless: A Nature of Desire Series Novel

by Joey W. Hill

  “So you like the dress, sweet boy?”

  “Fuck, yeah,” he muttered.

  She tsked and gave his buttock a light slap. “Clean up your language. This is a formal tea party. Best behavior. You’re going to have to work very, very hard to earn the right to take me in this dress. Are you ready to work very hard?”

  “I’ll do anything you want, Mistress.”

  She pressed her mouth to the back of his neck. “I remember the night I gave you the flogging for putting your feet on the wall. You said things like that. But you didn’t mean them. When you say that now, I get all wet and slippery for you.” She rubbed her mound against his ass, her teeth nipping him. Fuck, she was going to kill him.

  He’d gotten a haircut and the skin was so clean and smooth on his neck it made the touch of her lips all the more potent. His hands closed into half fists.

  “We’ve talked about your hands, haven’t we?”

  He loosened them with an effort. Though he’d been struggling for control of his lust, the fist clenching sent mixed signals to his mind. In a nerve-wracking scenario like he was facing in the next few minutes, that trigger could open the gateway to the side of himself he was learning to manage…and she was helping him to heal.

  “Good.” Regina slid her arms all the way around him, and began plucking open the buttons to the white shirt. “I’m taking this off. I want you in the slacks and shoes only, and so do our guests. No. Leave your hands as they are. I want to do it.”

  She did it thoroughly, caressing his chest, nipples and abdomen, stroking his arms as she slid shirt and jacket off of them. When she commanded him to turn and face her, he knew his eyes reflected the desire to have her. As she palmed his cock, he bit back a groan. Her eyes sparked.

  “You arranged this, Marius. You want to make amends, to say you’re sorry. But what do you need to remember above everything else? The most important thing?”

  Would she ever understand how grateful he was to say it and mean it? It still felt like a miracle to him, that he had reached the point he could do it.

  “You’re my Mistress. I serve your will.”

  She leaned in, brushing her sinful lips against his temple, his cheek. “Actually, what I intended you to say was ‘I’m yours.’ Possessive man.”

  He grinned, things loosening in his lower belly. “Sometimes a sub has to remind a Mistress she’s his, too.”

  She pinched his side with sharp nails. “Bad boy. You’ll pay for that in a lot of different ways today.” She sobered, laying her hand on his jaw. “That’s why I want you to remember you belong to me. You’re making amends, doing what a man should do. This is the right thing to do, and because it’s the right thing to do, you don’t stand alone. Understand?”

  He wasn’t sure he did, but her words settled things in him. Her penetrating look said she knew he was uncertain about it, and she didn’t push him to answer. “I’m going to go sit down. In five minutes, you come out and get things started.”

  He nodded, but when she started to step away, he was holding onto her waist. She raised a brow.

  “May I kiss you, Mistress?”

  “You may.”

  He focused on her beautiful lips, her warm skin, the vibrant quality that infused her dark eyes like sunlight. While he wanted his mouth on every part of her, he knew what part of her he needed to kiss right now. Dropping to one knee, he bent and kissed the top of her foot, pressing his lips there hard, his forehead brushing her shin. He heard the little catch of her breath and knew he’d pleased her, which was the best feeling there was.

  It would carry him through anything less than that in the next couple hours.

  Even before he emerged from the back room, the wave of female chatter told him they’d arrived. Seventeen women, including his Mistress. Though he was supposed to do the bulk of the serving, Chloe and Melissa, Marguerite’s staff, would be helping.

  He glanced down at himself. Upper body bare and dark, close fitting slacks belted at the waist. Shiny shoes. His cock was still semi-hard in the harness, thanks to his Mistress’s parting words.

  “While you’re serving those other Mistresses, I’ll be thinking about how every inch of you is mine. When your penance is done today, you’ll know it, too. And next time I ask you what the most important thing is to remember, you’ll say it the way you should.”

  He stepped out onto the main floor, and that chatter slowly died down as seventeen pairs of eyes turned and came to rest upon him. Neutral, assessing, the way Mistresses did. These were damn good Dommes, and he was hit anew by how he’d disrespected them, and the gift they could give a sub open to receiving it. He thought of how he’d feel about anyone who disrespected his Mistress and the surge of near-violence unsteadied him.

  Multiple five-seat round tables were decorated prettily with flowers, napkins and delicate dishes. He’d helped handle the set up last night, polishing everything and following Marguerite and Chloe’s direction for the arrangement of both furniture and place settings, but until he stood at the front of the room and took it all in, he hadn’t recognized the final, impressive results. Things looked nice, classy. Feminine.

  Marguerite was sitting at the table with his Mistress. Lyda was on Regina’s right, and their expressions, even Regina’s, were quiet and waiting. Expectant, intimidating and measuring, as Mistresses could be. In the right ways.

  Regina had walked him through what he wanted to say. She’d helped him get it clear in his own mind so it would come out sincere and from the heart, even if he stumbled a couple times.

  He cleared his throat. “Thanks…thank you for coming today. I…uh, wanted to do this because I know I didn’t do right by you when you gave me the honor of your attention in session. I disrespected you.”

  A scoffing sound, laden with contempt, caught his attention. Mistress Tia was one of Siren’s closest friends, and her expression wasn’t neutral. That was okay. Despite the drop in his stomach her brief reaction caused, he pressed onward.

  “I was pretty messed up. That’s not an excuse; just the reason. I don’t think there’s any right way to say I’m sorry for how I acted. Maybe it just has to be that way, you always disliking me because I was an asshole. I accept that, and I’m still sorry. I was wrong. What I did was wrong, no matter the reason. But from here forward, you can expect the courtesy and respect from me you all really deserve. I know only time will help you believe that, but this is the starting line for proving that to each of you. If there’s anything I can do to earn your forgiveness, I’ll do it.”

  Regina cleared her throat and he glanced her way. “I mean, if my Mistress agrees.”

  Chuckles rippled through the women. Not for him, but for Regina, showing their Domme appreciation and understanding of what limits a Mistress might impose on how generous her submissive could be in his reparations.

  “Yeah, you bitches don’t get a blank check,” Regina confirmed with good humor. “But this is a two-part apology. After the tea party, we’ll be adjourning to The Zone for a private event before the club opens for the night. I believe what you’re offered there will meet your approval.”

  That was also part of the reparation plan they’d discussed. He’d wanted to do something like this, the tea party, but he also wanted to offer something…more physical, to make amends. He hadn’t known how to make that work, because he was in a situation now where he only wanted to serve one Mistress. And he definitely didn’t want Regina thinking he felt differently about that. Fortunately, when she’d walked him through the quagmire of what he was trying to say, she’d understood. He wanted to offer something like what he should have given them before. Surrender to their demands; provide reparations in a way that matched the crime. She told him she would handle the second part.

  “Will you accept what I decide?” she’d asked. “Without knowing what it will be until it’s happening? No foreknowledge to prepare or shield yourself. Anticipation and dread should be part of the process.”

  “Yes, Mistress.�
�� Though now, at the glint in her eye, he had the good sense to feel a ripple of trepidation. No matter the purity of his intentions, his need to offer these Mistresses a sexual reparation meant his Mistress would take a pound of flesh in exchange for her permission to allow him to do so. A balance he’d need, so he was glad for it. Even as he dreaded the unknown.

  The Dommes murmured their appreciation, and he was surprised to see some assessing looks of his person as they anticipated what might be offered. Most of them had had nothing but contempt for him for months. But many of these women were also Regina’s friends or confidantes, so maybe she’d been letting them know how things were going.

  As Chloe rolled out the first trolley of tea and hors d’oeuvres, he began to serve. He’d been a waiter before, not just at Tyler and Marguerite’s Carnival, but at a couple different area restaurants, before he got into the fighting. He wasn’t bad at it; had particularly liked waiting on the female customers. Big shock there. They’d appreciated him as well, though not for the same reasons that Regina or any of the ladies here would have. At least not consciously.

  Today, no one offered him up any warm fuzzies, nor had he expected them to do so. Reparations didn’t mean instant forgiveness. But they were cordial and spoke among themselves as he’d expect, Mistresses accepting a sub’s service to them and reinforcing the role by seemingly ignoring him as long as he performed as he should. All while they tracked his every movement, that stirring duality. No one watched him more closely than his own Mistress, which stirred him up the most of all.

  Mistress Tia asked for iced instead of hot tea. He lifted the pitcher and poured some into her glass, with a rattle of ice and smooth fountain sound. “Lemon?” he asked.

  She picked up the tea, sipped it. Then her gaze lifted to his. He was a fighter. He could read the tells of an attack, a punch about to be thrown. Therefore he steeled himself as, in the next breath, she dashed the contents of the glass directly into his face with a shock of cold water and ice.

  Gasps, a scraping back of chairs. Her table fortunately had three occupants, rather than five, and he’d stood before the two empty chairs, so the other Dommes had been mostly out of range of the fallout. The only one affected was him, her, the floor, and the section of the table nearest them. He understood and accepted why she’d done it—no matter the sick frog jump in his gut—but he thought it had been a rude thing to do in Marguerite’s place.

  That wasn’t his call. As the tea dripped down his face, he pulled the towel off the cart and dropped to one knee before her, keeping his eyes down. “I apologize the tea wasn’t to your liking, Mistress. You got some of it on your arm. May I dry that for you before it gets on your clothes?”

  The stillness in the room had weight.

  His unexpected reaction didn’t seem to defuse her emotions, however. When his gaze flicked briefly to her face, he saw the cold anger.

  “You aren’t touching me. You’re a useless mongrel who should have been put down.”

  Chloe approached with more towels, but at Tia’s words, she came to a halt, her expression tightlipped. He saw her shoot a glance over her shoulder, and he expected she was looking to Marguerite for direction. Later, he would realize the expression on Chloe’s face was akin to “Tell me I can put this bitch in her place,” a championing he hadn’t expected.

  Now, though, he offered his hand towel to Chloe and took the ones for the floor from her. “So Mistress Tia doesn’t have to suffer the offense of my touch,” he said quietly.

  Chloe passed the towel to the Mistress, but when she started to kneel to help with clean up, he made a sharp, quelling sound, and shook his head, reaching up from his half kneeling position to clasp her arm briefly, a way to keep her on her feet. “If you and Melissa would start pouring the tea so the ladies aren’t waiting on me, I’ll clean the floor.”

  He felt like every eye was upon him as he started mopping up the liquid. He wondered what his Mistress was thinking. His gut was cold, a lot of things buzzing in his head trying to drag him down into darkness. A mongrel who should be put down. Had Tia deliberately chosen an animal reference, or was it just fate that took him back to that part of his life? No, he wasn’t going there right now. He couldn’t. Yet he couldn’t erase the overlapping of voices in his head, telling him he was nothing and she’d treated him just as he’d deserved.

  Maybe he should take his self-flagellation as an improvement. Before, the darkness would have surged forward, compelling him to use anger and cruelty to hide his feelings. He was embarrassed she’d done this in front of his Mistress. He could tell himself that Regina saw all of him, dark and light, but in a moment like this, it didn’t feel that way. He felt ugly before her, and since she was the only one in the room whose approval counted, it weighed him down, hurt his heart. He didn’t want to put on a mask, but he wasn’t sure how he was going to get up off the floor and do this without putting on a face not his own.

  “That’s more than enough.” He saw her feet clad in the sexy strappy heels stop at his side, and inhaled her scent with a flood of relief. He was ashamed at how welcome her presence was, her touch, when her gloved fingertips grazed his back and bare shoulders.

  He wanted to tell her not to interfere with this, that he’d prove he could handle anything they threw at him. He’d show her how much he’d changed, that he could do this. The slight tightening of her fingers on the back of his neck told him to be still. He didn’t always obey her, but this time the pressure convinced him to stay silent, kneeling. When she’d touched him, he’d automatically assumed a submissive posture, hands flat on the tile, head bowed.

  “He wants to show me he’s changing, becoming a better person,” Regina said. “I told him once that the most important thing to me was that he was trying to be the best person he could be with me. That’s what this is about, even more than making amends to all of you.”

  He swallowed. It sounded kind of bad, put that way, but hearing it said straight out, he knew she was right.

  “Because I think most of you understand the significance of that,” she continued, “you know I don’t bring it up as an ego stroke to me or a cut against any of you fine ladies. It’s progress in the evolution of a human being, which I believe deserves a certain level of respect.”

  “I had—” Tia started to object.

  “Shut up.” Regina spoke in such a chilling voice that Marius himself froze under her hand. “You want to keep your nose in its current shape, I’ll have my say, and then you will leave.”

  Tia wasn’t all that physically imposing, and next to Regina, that difference would be enhanced. Especially with his Mistress emanating a low-level fury that did odd things to Marius’s gut.

  “I was not in time to stop Siren from what she did to him,” she said, her tone sharp as a razor blade. “As Dominants, we are not immune to being fucked over and fucked up. But we appoint ourselves to a position of control, where we trust our instincts and our nature to dive deep into the mind of a submissive, figure out his twists and turns. There are risks to that, on both sides. But we’re all big girls, aren’t we? We wouldn’t be Dommes if we didn’t accept the consequences of taking that control.

  “One of the gifts that comes with that risk is a sub like this.” She stroked his hair, and he couldn’t resist the desire to lean into her touch, shoulder pressed to her thigh as his head remained bowed. “We all know there are times a sub might need a light to guide him to the true expression of his submission, to bring him peace and pleasure as we bring it to ourselves. Sometimes he’s too fucked up, and he needs a therapist to break some things up first. But if he’s a true sub, once he finds that help, a Domme can help him get the rest of the way there.”

  She took a breath. “What he did to Siren and the women in this room was wrong, but he knows that. Which is why he’s trying to make amends. You had the right not to come today. To refuse those amends. But you did not have the right to come here and attack him. So I want you to leave, Mistress Tia. Go contemplate wh
at true repentance is. And look up the meaning of grace while you’re at it.”

  Tia’s chair scraped back and she rose. A tense silence reigned as Marius saw the legs and feet of both women in a squared-off position. Then Tia’s closed-toe black stilettos changed direction as she claimed her purse off the back of the chair.

  “I’ll see you at the club, Mistress Tia,” Regina said formally. “Thank you for coming.”

  A bitten-off reply, and the woman was leaving, her heels clicking across the floor. Regina waited a beat, then trailed her fingers over the juncture between Marius’s bare shoulder and neck. “The ladies are waiting for you to serve them tea,” she said in a neutral tone.

  “Yes, Mistress.” He bit his lip, but couldn’t not say it. “You didn’t need to interfere with that. It was okay.”

  She squatted, cupping his jaw to bring his face up to meet her gaze. He was right. She was angry enough to spit nails, but there was a tenderness in her eyes that made him swallow and want to look away for reasons that had nothing to do with protocol.

  “Who decides upon your proper care and discipline, Duncan?” Her gaze held his in a lock, and what he saw in it made his stomach do a flop.

  “You, Mistress.”

  “That is correct. Tia disrespected me in a manner that was unacceptable to me, and to the other Dommes here. Not that I owe you an explanation. Do I?”

  “No, Mistress.”

  She nodded. “I’ll punish you later to help you remember that. For now, resume your duties.”

  The other women had remained silent until Tia’s departure, which left him uncertain of whether they had supported Tia’s action or disapproved of Regina’s. Until Marguerite spoke.

  “Ladies, you’ll find we’ve provided four types of tea for your enjoyment. I encourage you to sample them all, but your server will explain to you what they are so you’ll know what might best suit your preferences. He’ll also explain how particular hors d’oeuvres will bring out their flavor. Marius?”