MASTER

by Eden Bradleyeden Bradley

  THE TRAINING HOUSE

  Book Three: MASTER

  by

  Eden Bradley

  MASTER

  © 2016 Eden Bradley

  Cover Design by Scott Carpenter

  Editing by D.S. Editing

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite e-book retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  DEDICATION

  This book must be dedicated to my wise and dear friend Robin L. Rotham for knocking this story into shape. Without you, I would have been lost and alone at the difficult end of this journey—thank you for making sure I was neither, as well as for your endless patience and for loving this series, and for never giving me a hard time about any of the strange things I feel compelled to write. As Christopher says, we are all freaks together, and I love you for it! : )

  I also must acknowledge all my wonderful readers for their support of The Training House Series. I know this series is a bit of kinky madness, and I appreciate all of you hanging in there with me, and coming to love these books as much as I do!

  CHAPTER ONE

  My beautiful Christopher stands naked before me, glaring as if he would kill me.

  Is it wrong that I’m half hoping he’ll try? Nothing would give me greater pleasure at the moment than forcibly reminding him where he belongs. With me. To me.

  I take a step forward. “Christopher, you need to calm down and—”

  “No! Just fucking no.” He’s raised his hands in front of him, one curled into a tight fist.

  My own hands twitch in response, but I slide them into the pockets of my slacks and run my gaze coolly over Christopher’s magnificent physique. His golden skin and high cheekbones are flushed, the amber lion eyes that are a gift of his combined Japanese, Cherokee and English heritage glittering dangerously—a dangerous animal in nothing but rage and bare skin.

  “No? After what you’ve done, that’s all you have to say to me?”

  “Oh, I have plenty more to say.”

  I’ve ignored Aimée so far, but now I focus on her with every bit of detachment I can muster. She’s sitting up on the bed behind him, clutching the sheet to her perfect breasts as she watches the drama unfolding between Christopher and me. The fear in her crystalline green eyes and the tears sliding down her porcelain cheeks are gratifying—I do love a slave’s tears—but they also wound me in a way that makes my chest go tight and my hands clench into fists in my pockets.

  I make myself turn from her and raise a brow at Christopher. “Is that so?”

  “Fuck right,” he snarls. “To start with, there will not be any ordering me back—ordering us back. No cleverly devised punishments for my infractions, and sure as hell not for hers. I know damn well what I’m guilty of. But the thing is, Damon, I am done. Done with the slave bullshit.” He pauses, wiping his lush mouth with the back of his hand. “Fuck. It’s not bullshit. I know that. But I can’t do it anymore.”

  “That’s fortunate, because neither can I,” I tell him, grinding my jaw against the anger I must keep under control. I am every bit as enraged as he is, for once. “Certainly not the way it’s been in the past.”

  “Why the hell are you here, anyway?” he demands. “I’ve always come and gone as I pleased, contract or not. It’s our little dance, isn’t it? One we’ve been doing for four years. You’ve never come after me before.”

  “You never took her with you before.”

  His golden eyes gleam with dark fire as he takes a step toward me. “So this is about Aimée?”

  “You know better than that,” I say flatly, fighting the urge to step back. I don’t like that he thinks he can intimidate me, and I like even less that he actually can. But I have to admit it’s also hot as hell. He’s absolutely gorgeous in all his lithe feline menace, which only infuriates me more. “Aimée is not the only different element this time. You and I both know it. But the fact that you would take another slave out of my House, that you would be party to her running out on her contract…it’s beneath you, Christopher.”

  “God damn it, Damon. I left because I had to take her with me.”

  Turning to Aimée, I demand, “Tell me in your own words you went with him willingly.”

  “Fucking right she did,” Christopher spits out. “We don’t do it any other way—people like us—and you goddamn well know it. Jesus fuck, Damon!”

  Aimée scrambles forward onto her knees and lays her hand on his arm. “Please, Christopher. He needs to hear it from me.”

  He stares at her for a moment, his expression stern, the muscles in his jaw clenching repeatedly. “Fine.”

  Sitting back on her heels, Aimée focuses her earnest gaze on mine. “Master Damon—Sir—I left of my own free will, fully aware of what the consequences could be: banishment from the formal slave training houses and more exclusive clubs all over the world. I’ve been around long enough to understand what we did carries very heavy consequences. But I left with him because…I couldn’t bear to be without him.”

  “And yet,” I almost choke on the words, “you were able to leave me?”

  Her long, golden lashes come down on her flushed cheeks. “I wish it didn’t have to be so.”

  “So do I.”

  “There,” Christopher growls. “You have it straight from Aimée’s pretty lips that she came with me of her own free will. Now what the fuck do you want, Damon? Just spit it out.”

  “All right,” I say with a sardonic smile, doing my best to move past the sharp ache of her simple statement. “I am here with an offer. A generous one, I think.”

  His lips quirk with a smile even less sincere than mine as he takes another menacing step forward and crosses his arms. “I’m interested to hear what you think of as generous.”

  My pulse spikes hard and I draw a long, steadying breath.

  Instantly the familiar, spicy scents of Christopher and sex nearly eviscerate me. I want to scream. I want to punish him, punish them both—fuck them both. Instead, I dig my nails into my palms, trying to keep my features arranged in such a way that I don’t betray the true depths of my pain and anger. I can’t let my emotions control me or I could lose him—lose them both—forever.

  Fuck.

  I force myself to calm—as much as I can, given the circumstances, given the strange bite of doubt woven through the anger and the driving need to really hurt them.

  “I would never have wished for things to happen this way, but you two acted, and here we are. And yes, Christopher, I do think it’s damn generous of me to bother coming after you, and even more for me to make you this offer.” Pausing, I examine his features, taking in every tight line, the shadows on his face, his steady gaze. “Come back to the Tra
ining House with me. You will be accepted back—into my House, into our circle—however, some of the terms have changed. And again, yes, there will be punishments devised. You know that’s how it works.”

  Christopher lets out a short, barking laugh. “Did you really think you’d drag us back to your House? Lock us in the basement with that evil bastard Gilby for a few days, make us see the error of our ways? What the fuck, Damon?”

  “No, there will be no ‘dragging’. I come with an offer, rather than a demand, although I’d much prefer to simply issue orders. If I had any illusions about that actually working, you know I’d have sent my handlers down here to throw their black bags over your heads and crate you back to my House in the van.”

  “And the terms of this supposedly incredible offer would be?”

  “The number one term is that you don’t leave again. No more skipping out on your contracts.” I’ve had enough of begging him not to go and being ignored.

  He props his fists on his hips, giving me a hard look. “You have got to be kidding me.”

  “Do I look as if I’m kidding?”

  I hesitate for a heartbeat, knowing this could be a deal breaker but unwilling to budge on this point. It’s the only way to prevent this from happening again. “The other stipulation is that the two of you will be separated while you’re retrained.”

  Christopher’s eyes narrow as he takes a step back, placing himself between me and Aimée. “Now I know you’re joking. The answer is no. No goddamn way in hell! Seriously, Damon? You just fucking waltz in here trying to be ‘the Master’. You used your bourgeois power and influence to track us down like dogs and barge into our hotel room at the ass-crack of dawn as if you owned it. As if you owned us. And I don’t care about the fucking contracts, what they say about us granting you that ownership. You know that shit has never mattered to me other than as a symbol, a token of the game of kink.”

  “Do you truly think of what we do as a game? It’s far too serious to be a game, Christopher.”

  He shrugs, his gorgeously-muscled bare shoulders rising an inch or two. “Whatever. A fucking fancy, intense game, but still a game. The protocol only raises the stakes.”

  I sigh. “What am I going to do with you, Christopher?”

  “Nothing. Not anymore. That’s the point. You are no longer my Master.”

  The words send a chill up my spine, and suddenly the idea that I truly could lose them is a teetering wall of terrible possibility that could crush me. Perhaps he’s right, that this is a fancy game we play. But if so, I intend to win. I can’t afford not to.

  “That remains to be seen.” I lean to look around his broad, golden shoulder. “And you, Aimée? Will you come back with me, if I promise everything will be forgiven?”

  She bites her lip, her brows drawing together, her inner turmoil clear on her face.

  Christopher whirls on her. “Aimée?”

  She shakes her head, her voice trembling. “Don’t make me choose. Please, both of you. Christopher,” she pleads, “I love you. And Master Damon,” she says, turning to me, “you know I love you, as well. I want to be with you both, to serve and surrender to you both. And I think…forgive me for being presumptuous, but I believe you love each other. I don’t know where that leaves us.”

  “Neither do I—and none of us will until Christopher gives me an answer.”

  He steps closer once more, until he’s near enough that I can smell his skin, that lethal combination of sex and the earth. Intoxicating. Powerful. Just like him. When he reaches out and lays a firm hand on my shoulder, I have to fight not to jump.

  “I have an answer for you, Damon,” he says in a silky tone that puts my nerves on high alert. Christopher calm is Christopher at his most lethal. “A counter-proposal. No, that’s a lie. Because this is the only way I’ll have it.”

  “You can take my offer, or decline it. This is not a negotiation.”

  “Then I decline. And now you can take my offer or decline it.”

  My heartbeat throbs in my ears, an ocean roar that drowns out everything but the man in front of me. Damn Christopher! He has all the power here and he knows it. Hell, he’s had it all since the moment he walked away from me and took Aimée with him.

  His hand slides away as he backs off to sit on the edge of the bed with Aimée, who curls against his side, looking back and forth between us with wary eyes.

  “Let’s not be vague with each other,” I say impatiently. “Tell me what’s on your mind—not that I’ll do as you ask, of course, but I will hear what you have to say.”

  “You still don’t get it, do you?” Christopher shakes his head, sighs. “Fine, let me lay it out for you. There will be no more slave Christopher. Period. End of that fucking sorry story. I am the Master now. Of myself. Of Aimée. And of you, until I decide you’ve learned what you need to from the experience.”

  It’s my turn to bark out an incredulous laugh. “What? Now who’s joking? You cannot possibly think that’s an option.”

  “Oh, but I do. It’s the only option there is. Go ahead—take a minute to absorb that fact. I can be generous, too.”

  His grin is purely wicked. Purely sex. And purely dominant, in a way I’ve only ever seen from a distance, when he was in Top mode and I couldn’t avoid him. I’ve always tried not to get too close when he’s out of the slave role because not only is he not mine then, but he’s even more attractive, which is annoying as fuck. I don’t do Tops. And I sure as hell don’t bottom, never mind being someone’s slave again. That’s ancient history.

  So why is my traitorous cock going hard at the idea?

  I skewer him with a look. “Absolutely not.”

  He raises a staying hand. “Ah, now, don’t be hasty, Damon. Take some time. Think about it.”

  “This is insane. You know who I am. What I am.”

  “I also know you were a slave yourself once, for the previous owner of the House.”

  Fuck. “That was a long time ago.”

  “We are who we are, Damon. You had that in you. You still do. Just as I will always have varying degrees of the extreme ends of the spectrum in me. Times change. We change, and right now I need to be Master. I am Master. And you?” He grins, that irresistible grin of his, with just one corner of his lush mouth quirking. “You need to belong to me.”

  “Regardless of where you are on the spectrum, that is not happening. Me being a slave again? Are you out of your mind?”

  “Yeah, probably. But I’m also the Master now. You can take it or leave it.”

  Beside him, Aimée winces. I hate seeing her so conflicted, and I hate even more knowing I’m the cause of it.

  “But why?” I demand, trying not to sound as desperate as I’m starting to feel.

  His golden eyes flash with fury. “Because you broke our trust. You, the Master. And I’m pretty damn certain you did it deliberately. If you want to regain that trust, you’ll have to earn it back as a slave. My slave. I also think it’ll do you a hell of a lot of good, but that’s just one Master’s opinion.”

  My Italian suit suddenly feels too tight—hell, my skin feels too tight—and I can barely breathe past the battle suddenly taking place in my lungs. I’m actually trembling.

  Fuck. Faced with a choice between serving as Christopher’s slave or losing him and Aimée forever, I’m panicking. I can’t lose them.

  But I can’t do this either. I can’t even consider it. Can I? The mere idea is…terrifying, and not because I can’t take pain—my own history has already proven I can. And yet my body is rooting for the possibility, my cock fully hard beneath my fine trousers.

  Still, it’s too damn much. Perhaps when I was younger, more adaptable, it might have worked. But at this point in my life?

  I shake my head slowly. “Christopher, I can’t. Surely you must see that.”

  Aimée buries her face in his chest, and her distress rips me apart inside, like shards of glass cutting me open. Jesus, I hate this. I hate not being in complete control of th
ings. Of everything—other than Christopher, who has always been a force unto himself. I’ve never expected to have total control over him. The reasons why are becoming more and more acutely apparent.

  He kisses Aimée’s temple and strokes her long, silky hair before setting her gently aside.

  “What I see,” he says as he stands again, “is a man who is about to make the biggest goddamn mistake of his life, so I’m not going to accept your answer. Get a room at some other hotel here in Monterey, Damon, and take a couple of days to consider what it is you’re throwing away. Leave your contact information at the front desk. Otherwise, don’t try to reach us. And don’t even think about sending any of your henchmen to try to change our minds,” he adds. “I’ll be in touch when we’re ready to talk. If we’re ready to talk.”

  I stare at him, unbelieving, insulted. “What do you think I am, Christopher? Do you think I’d drag you two out of here and back to live under my roof—under my rule—when you so clearly no longer desire to be slaves in my household? That I operate with no sense of ethics? At this level?”

  “No. No, you’ve always been a more ethical perv than I am.”

  He cracks a full grin then, obviously pleased with himself, and I’m relieved enough at the reprieve that it doesn’t annoy me nearly as much as it should.

  Straightening, I say, “Very well. But I’m not going to change my mind.”

  Aimée bites her lip and looks up at Christopher. When he nods, she slips from the bed and runs to me, pressing her hands and cheek to my chest.

  Sliding my arms around her naked body for the briefest moment, I watch Christopher glaring at me over her shoulder, then release her and step back. There is pain on her face, and I would spare her that, if I could. I would spare my own, for that matter. But this situation is impossible, with perhaps no way to win. Not for me. And from what I gather, not for her, either.

  I nod to them both, then turn and leave the room before I lose control. My knees tremble as I walk down the carpeted stairs to the lobby.