Not tight black skirts and corsets.
If it hadn’t been for her fucking awesome long brown hair, he never would have found her. As it was, as soon as he spotted her, he had to grip the edge of the wall he was hiding against.
Holy mother of God. The woman had no idea what she did to men. Every man in the place had taken notice. Many of them probably didn’t know who she was. All of them were drooling and glancing.
Sasha didn’t have a fucking clue.
Lincoln adjusted his cock and reminded himself for the thousandth time why he was there. He had a job. Keep Sasha safe. That description did not include lusting after her sweet body. Rowen would punch him in the face if he saw how Lincoln was salivating.
Sasha made his heart pound. It took every ounce of energy he had to remain on the fringes of the room and let her be.
As Sasha moved from the innocent flogging scene to the far more hardcore cropping scene, he stood still, watching, waiting, stiffening. Not breathing.
In an ideal world, he intended to remain in the shadows, keep an eye on Sasha, and then slip out after she decided to leave. How long would she stay? Her body language told everyone in the room she was green. She flinched occasionally, blushed, crossed her legs, and even squeezed her breasts with one forearm.
Every move made Lincoln adjust his cock.
There was another man watching her too. Master Colin. Lincoln gritted his teeth as he watched Colin’s gaze roam up and down Sasha’s body as if he wanted to devour her.
Not tonight, Colin.
Colin was one of the good guys, though. It wasn’t his fault a beautiful woman had come to the club. He probably didn’t know who Sasha was. And it was entirely possible Pierson had asked Colin to follow her. It wasn’t as though Lincoln could trail along behind her himself.
His intention was for her to never know he’d been there.
Make sure she’s safe. Get out of here. Take a cold shower.
Whatever you do, do not approach her. It will end badly.
Chapter 4
Sasha was totally mesmerized by the next scene in front of her when someone touched her bare shoulder, making her twist around to find a hard male chest invading her personal space. She lifted her gaze to find a man smiling. “Master Pierson wanted me to check on you. Said you’re new here.”
She nodded. “I am. Thank you.”
He glanced at the spanking scene and back at her. “You’re intrigued. Have you ever been spanked before?”
She shook her head rapidly. “No. I… Uh… No,” she stammered.
“You want to experience it? I’d be happy to give you a demonstration if you’d like.” He lifted a hand to shake hers. “Master Colin.”
“Sasha.” She shook his warm hand, still trying to wrap her mind around his suggestion. Did she want him to spank her? Lord, she’d only been at the club half an hour. Was she ready for something like that?
Her heart had only moments ago stopped beating out of her chest from witnessing the previous scene with the crop. The spanking scene was far more her speed. At least to watch. There was a difference between witnessing and participating, though.
He didn’t say anything else, clearly giving her time to consider the option. He was handsome. Thirty-something. Five ten maybe. Brown hair cropped short. He wasn’t wearing fetish clothing, but instead blue jeans and a black T-shirt. Harmless.
She hadn’t come to Breeze with any particular expectations, but now that she was presented with the opportunity to try something new, she decided to grab it. You only live once. “Sure. I, uh… I’d like that.”
His smile grew, and he took her elbow and led her from the scene.
She was nervous. Very nervous. But as she glanced around, she spotted the club monitors in several corners of the room. Faith was following her with her gaze and nodded. There was no reason to be concerned. Besides, if Master Pierson sent Master Colin to check on her, she had to assume he was well vetted. She was safe. She blew out a breath and tried to calm her nerves.
Master Colin led her across the room toward a St. Andrew’s cross, the giant wooden X looming larger than life. When they arrived, he slid his hands to her hips from behind and encouraged her to step closer.
She bit her bottom lip and closed her eyes, trying to gather courage.
Master Colin eased his hands up her sides and then her arms as he lifted them gently into the air. He set them on the cross and tapped her wrists. “Don’t move,” he whispered. She lifted her gaze to watch him remove a peg from higher up the wood and reinsert it at the level of her hand. He did the same on the other side and then spoke again. “Grab the pegs, Sasha.”
She did as instructed, acutely aware of her chest rising and falling, hoping her nipples remained covered by the front of the corset.
“Now relax. I can sense you’re a newbie. I’m not going to restrain you physically. Instead, I want you to hold on to the cross on your own. Understand?”
“Yes, Sir.” The word came out naturally.
“Any time you scene with someone, whether or not you know them, always use a safeword. I’m partial to red. Okay?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Perfect. Relax, Sasha. I’m not going to hurt you. This is just a demonstration. If you like it, you can ask someone to spank you harder next time. For tonight, I’ll strike you lightly so you can experience the way it feels to have a hand on your bottom.”
She nodded.
“Breathe, Sasha,” he whispered close to her ear. “Deep breaths.”
She tried, concentrating on inhaling and exhaling.
Meanwhile Master Colin stroked her skin.
She closed her eyes again, leaning her forehead against the cross. She didn’t know this man. It seemed crazy to let a stranger touch her like this. But since her stubborn brother wouldn’t let her play with the people she knew, she needed to suck it up.
Her mind wandered as Master Colin’s fingers glided up and down her arms and then across her bare shoulders. She enjoyed the calming strokes, but couldn’t focus on the person touching her. Instead, she found herself picturing someone else in his place.
Lincoln.
She wished she could think of anyone else on earth stroking her skin, but as usual, Lincoln filled her fantasy. He had for years. Five of them. Every time she closed her eyes and touched herself, she pictured Zodiac’s owner controlling her.
It was irrational. After all, he didn’t even like her. Sure, he’d eventually warmed enough to glance her way and grunt at her on occasion, but he obviously didn’t care for her as anyone other than his friend’s little sister. Perhaps his lack of interest was what attracted her to him. Call her crazy, but maybe visualizing Lincoln was safe.
Because it would never happen.
He was an apparition. A fantasy. Not someone real. A sexy body. A stern domineering face. Nothing else. Two-dimensional.
When Master Colin’s hand smoothed down the fabric covering her butt, she gritted her teeth. Could she do this? She wanted to. She needed to experience new things.
“You okay, Sasha?”
“Yes, Sir,” she murmured.
“I’m going to spank you now. Easy. It won’t even leave a pink mark.”
“Okay, Sir.” She braced herself, trying to remain loose and probably failing.
When his hand landed on the upper swell of her butt, she blew out a breath. It wasn’t bad. In fact, it didn’t hurt at all.
“You okay?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“More?”
“Yes, please, Sir.” She wasn’t sure she liked it, but she wanted him to continue.
Master Colin set a hand on her shoulder and gave her two more quick swats to the same spot on her upper cheeks.
She exhaled, finding the spanking to be oddly boring.
His hand moved lower next, and he swatted her bare thighs, harder, but not hard enough to hurt. When he rubbed the backs of her legs, she tried not to move. She wasn’t aroused. She wasn’t sure she even liked hi
m touching her like that. She didn’t know him, and his touch felt almost clinical. She was floating, sort of detached, as if she were watching instead of experiencing.
“More?” he asked, his lips close to her ear.
“Yes, Sir,” she whispered. She had no idea why she consented to continuing this scene, but she forced herself to stay in the moment. If she didn’t, how would she know what she liked?
Master Colin touched the bottom of her skirt with the tips of his fingers and slowly eased it up her butt cheeks. She pursed her lips, willing herself to let him continue.
When he had the bottoms of her globes exposed, he spanked her bare butt with his other hand.
Sasha yelped and jumped backward, releasing the cross.
“Sasha?” His voice was far away.
Panic filled her. It was hard to explain. It had nothing to do with the spanking. It was something else.
She couldn’t face him. In fact, she was afraid she might fall in her high heels as she fled without glancing back. Unease crept up her spine as she rushed to the right of the cross and slammed straight into the hard chest of another man.
She set her hands on the man’s pecs and shoved, needing to escape the room and her embarrassment. What was wrong with her?
She lifted her gaze, expecting to find a monitor or the owner in her space, but instead, the breath whooshed from her lungs, her eyes going wide. “Lincoln?”
Chapter 5
Lincoln was struggling to find his speech almost as badly as Sasha. He’d been watching her for almost an hour as she observed the flogging and the cropping and a spanking and then followed this stranger to the St. Andrew’s cross. He couldn’t believe how readily she’d agreed to do a scene.
With a total stranger.
Granted, Lincoln knew the man. If he hadn’t been well-acquainted with Master Colin, he never would have permitted Sasha to do something so foolish. But under the circumstances, since Lincoln’s main goal was to get Sasha to give up this ridiculous interest in BDSM, he forced himself to hang back and watch.
Lincoln also knew he wasn’t being fair. He definitely felt a double standard when it came to Sasha that he’d never felt toward any other submissive, male or female. Except Sasha was not a submissive.
Master Colin had done nothing wrong. He’d followed every proper protocol, taking things slowly, reassuring her, giving her a safeword, checking in often. There was no way he could have read the apprehension Lincoln saw on Sasha’s face.
For one thing, Sasha had hidden her expression with her hair. For another thing, she’d schooled her voice to give nothing away every time she answered him. She’d even managed to keep her body relatively loose. She had done her research, knew what to say and how to act. But she hadn’t been able to anticipate her reaction.
What made her jump out of the scene? Was it the spanking? Lincoln didn’t think so. Master Colin hadn’t struck her any harder that last time than the previous swats. No. It was something else that triggered her. Maybe it was the clothes she’d worn? Or the position stretched out on the cross? Or had something flashed through her mind at that precise moment to set her off?
Lincoln could kick himself for waiting about two seconds too long to intervene, but on the other hand, no actual harm was done to her, and he had to hope she’d received enough of a jolt to give up this foolish desire to join a club.
Master Colin stood behind her, eyes wide, mouth hanging open. He was about to speak when Lincoln shook his head, cutting him off. He would assure the man he’d done nothing wrong later. For now, he just wanted him to back off.
Master Colin nodded and turned away, his expression filled with concern.
A petite blonde woman rushed forward from behind Sasha next, her brow furrowed. She wore the red band of the dungeon monitors. As she opened her mouth to speak, Lincoln shook her off also, hoping he communicated he had things under control with his gaze.
The blonde hesitated, frowning, not backing off.
Sasha set her forehead against Lincoln’s chest and fisted his T-shirt in her hands at his sides. Her shoulders heaved. She was crying.
His chest seized. Dammit. Without thinking, he leaned down, swept her small body into his arms, and cradled her against his chest. With a nod to the blonde monitor, he spun around and headed to the aftercare room.
Seconds later, he was seated on a leather couch, Sasha’s sweet body across his lap, her face still buried in his chest. He was relieved no one else currently occupied the room.
He tugged a throw blanket off the arm of the couch and wrapped it around her. If nothing else, at least he wouldn’t have to continue to stare at her sexy body in the skimpy outfit she wore. When had she purchased fetish wear?
Tonight she was not presenting herself as someone who taught preschool by day and hung with her girlfriends or her brother in the evenings. Tonight she was a sexy vixen who had turned the heads of everyone in the club. Not that she didn’t also draw an equal amount of attention in her usual innocent attire.
Lincoln had to get a grip on his growing erection before she realized what was pressing against her thigh. Dammit. This was not happening to him. He was here to rescue his friend’s sister, not lust after her.
Surely his attraction had nothing to do with Sasha herself and everything to do with how she’d so innocently watched the flogging scene with wide eyes and pink cheeks, her arm crossed over her breasts to pinch off the swell of her nipples.
He’d nearly choked watching her react to the scene.
Yeah. He’d missed nothing. He wasn’t sure he’d even blinked from the moment she’d entered the main room of the club.
When she’d moved toward the man wielding the crop, she’d tensed, flinched, closed her eyes. She had not been turned on. Her ardor had completely tamped down.
And then the spanking scene. It had been mesmerizing watching her entire demeanor switch back to curious as she loosened her frame and eased her legs apart. She undoubtedly had no idea she’d done so.
Meanwhile, Lincoln’s cock had stiffened so hard it probably had zipper grooves along it. She was such an open book, her every reaction etched on her face. The way her cheeks pinkened or turned completely white. The way her eyes went wide or narrow. So expressive. So damn sexy. So innocent.
That innocence was what fueled him to protect her. She didn’t belong in this world. Had she figured that out? He hoped so. Maybe she was titillated by it, but she needed to flush it out of her system and move on. Hell, he needed her to flush it out of her system and move on.
Lincoln knew Marcus well enough to know that he ran the same tight ship as Lincoln. He would be aware of everything and ensure that nothing got overlooked. In fact, the owner of Breeze leaned into the room at that moment as if he’d read Lincoln’s mind. He would probably be grateful Lincoln had been there to save Sasha from her foolish self so he didn’t have to deal with her himself.
Lincoln gave him a nod, letting him know he had it under control.
Marcus’s eyes were drawn together, but his shoulders relaxed as he turned around and left them alone. It was early still by club standards. Most scenes were just getting underway, which meant few people would be seeking the solace of aftercare for a while.
Lincoln had never had this much contact with Sasha. She’s in my lap. I’m holding her entire body. He could count the number of times he’d touched her on one hand, starting with the night he’d met her and taken her hand in his.
Not to say he didn’t remember that moment five years ago. He did, with perfect clarity. He’d been drawn to her from the instant he’d entered the room. He’d known she was Rowen’s sister. He’d also known Rowen was twenty-seven. At no point did it occur to him that his sister was ten years younger than him.
For the rest of Lincoln’s life, he would regret the way he so rudely reacted to finding out she was seventeen. He’d hurt her. Badly. There was no doubt. He’d also looked like an ass in front of everyone in the room who had become his employees that day.
Lincoln himself had only been twenty-five that day, but he’d lived enough life for a forty-year-old man, and he knew several things for certain—one of which was that he was a sadist. He enjoyed helping submissives find release through various levels of pain. He was well-known in the club and even in Miami for his play with masochists at whatever level they needed. Both women and men came to him to get their fetish fulfilled.
That was just where his interest lay. His kink ran deep. His desires unwavering. He’d known it was his calling since he was seventeen and sneaking into a club he had no business attending. The same age as Sasha had been when he acted like she was a child and chastised her verbally in front of everyone. But dammit, it was different for her. She was innocent. She’d become a preschool teacher for fuck’s sake.
Sure, he knew half his issue with Sasha was aggravation with himself for not only lusting after her that first day but not being able to shake the desire in all these years.
The truth was, Lincoln was a sadist who needed a masochist in his life to fulfill him.
Sasha Easton would never be that woman.
She was the polar opposite. Soft and gentle. Loving and sweet. Maybe she could dabble in the fringe of the fetish world for an hour or two with the right partner, but she was no masochist. And she would scream and run if she had any idea what sort of fantasies he had. Several of which revolved around her.
His fantasies were just that—day dreams. Nothing more. Visions of Sasha on her knees submitting to him had plagued him for too many years.
The woman had some sort of hold on him he couldn’t shake. But he’d never act on it. Never mention it to a single soul. He couldn’t. She wasn’t right for him. He certainly wasn’t right for her. She was nothing more than a cute girl with a hot body which he had twisted into something totally unobtainable in his mind. In fact, he had intentionally never permitted himself to get to know her over the years in order to keep the driving need to own her at bay.
Training Sasha (Club Zodiac Book 1) Page 4