by Ann Jacobs
Wild One
Ann Jacobs
Book three in the Caden Kink series.
The black sheep of an aristocratic Creole family meets the Bar C’s princess.
Disgraced doctor Les Fourchet has come to the wide-open spaces of northwest Texas looking to stay away from the BDSM lifestyle that may have cost him his heritage. That idea goes out the window when he discovers kink club the Neon Lasso—and hot Texan Deidre Caden.
Deidre is the submissive of Les’ wildest fantasies. Their play at the club is scorching, but before he can offer her the life she deserves, Les must confess his humiliating past—and convince her powerful family of his worth.
Inside Scoop: This book contains hardcore BDSM scenes, medical play, male submission, group sex and references to dubious consent. Very hot—handle with care!
Wild One
Ann Jacobs
Prologue
October 10, the high plateau of northwest Texas
What the hell had he gotten himself into? The farther he drove, the more a voice inside his head insisted he’d made a big mistake by accepting this job.
He’d spent endless hours driving across a windswept plateau where every crossroad bordered endless fences. Occasional cattle-guarded driveways marked with distinctive brands of landowners punctuated the monotony of the scenery. Those few and far between reminders of change did little to dissuade Les Fourchet that he hated the sameness.
He also despised the long stretches where he seldom saw anything but mowed-down grain fields and pastures full of cattle and pumpjacks. The rare signs of human life—a Jeep or truck bouncing across a field, a small plane flying low dropping bales of feed onto a field, cowboys on horseback with spurs glittering in the autumn sun—brought home to him the vastness of the high plateau.
Occasionally he passed travelers on the straight, narrow road—an old pickup, a shiny European sports car—but not often enough to keep him from feeling isolated. He’d seen more tumbleweeds than people as he sped along the highway.
Time obviously moved slowly out here, even more slowly than on it did back home on the bank of the Sabine River. He figured that locals must amuse themselves by watching the wind blow through sparse, evergreen windbreaks and counting the round, crazily moving weeds that seemed to grow as they rolled across pastures, the way he recalled sitting on the riverbank as a kid, counting catfish jumping to alleviate his boredom.
This is what you wanted. You couldn’t stand the idea of going back home and seeing the disappointment in Mama’s eyes, the suspicion in Papa’s expression. You’d talked big about becoming a famous surgeon in Houston, but there was no way you were going to stay there and work in the same city as Jessica, much less the same hospital. Not after she dumped you with no more care than when she tossed her leftover lunch into the trash.
Nobody stuck a gun to your head or threatened to throw you to the alligators in the bayou. You couldn’t bear to see the hurt in your parents’ eyes, so you jumped at the chance to become an old-fashioned GP in the middle of nowhere, with a clientele so spread out you’d have to get to most of them by plane.
Now live with it.
This area of northwest Texas, so far, seemed more in need of veterinarians than doctors, but Doc Baines had assured him he’d be kept busy taking care of folks. The forty-year-old practice, he’d said, covered the nearly nine hundred square miles that made up Caden County.
Around six miles back, Les had spotted a sign marking the county line. Doc had mentioned that two huge ranches, the Bar C and the Laughing Wolf, took up most of the area, and that the town of Caden was located squarely in the middle of the county. Apparently it was surrounded on three sides by the Bar C and on the fourth by several smaller properties. When he spotted an elaborate metal arch topped with a horizontal line above a large letter C that he guessed must be the Bar C brand, he slowed down to get a better look.
He didn’t see any houses, but dozens of wind turbines rotated hypnotically in a large pasture on the north side of the highway. Livestock wandered on the ground beneath them, sharing the pasture with pumpjacks that moved rhythmically like the pendulums of clocks among the herd of sleek, fat cattle. Grazing placidly on grass still green despite the autumn chill in the air, the creatures seemed oblivious to the intrusive man-made presences all around them.
Les thought he finally understood the phrase “as big as Texas”. Belle Terre, where he’d grown up, had been large by local standards—a majestic antebellum home on nearly a thousand acres of rich farmland that bordered the Sabine River on the Louisiana side, near Natchitoches. The Bar C obviously dwarfed Belle Terre, going on as it did for miles on the seemingly endless plateau.
Up ahead he spied what looked almost like civilization—a three-story building of native stone set in the center of a barren-looking square. Like many rural Texas courthouses he’d seen during the drive northwest from Dallas, this one had sturdy-looking iron bars over the windows on the top floor. A multipurpose courthouse-slash-jail made sense for Caden County, which probably had less than five thousand total residents if one didn’t count itinerant cowhands.
Around the square he noticed several wooden buildings. According to the signs he read, they housed a barber shop, a general store, a feed store and several small shops as well as a place called The Corral that was apparently a combination café and bar. A few narrow roads between the buildings snaked off in various directions. Les figured he’d seen Caden’s entire business district. One of those roads probably led to the small house Doc Baines had said he could rent cheaply.
He pulled up into one of the diagonal parking spaces in front of the weathered building where Doc Baines’ shingle swayed in the wind. He cut the engine, determined to make the best of his situation in spite of the doubts that had developed during the long, lonesome drive.
Caden, Texas, represented a new start…a chance to bury humiliating memories he never could have escaped in Houston, much less back at Belle Terre. Back home he would remember the horrified reactions in his parents’ eyes every time he looked at them across the lace-draped Louis XIV dining table.
He leaned back against the headrest, rested his hands on the steering wheel and let his mind drift back in time—for what he swore would be the last time.
He’d just gotten home from twenty-four hours’ duty at the hospital. Mistress Jessica should be here soon, so Les hurried to ready himself for her. He’d had a relatively easy shift, so he skipped his usual nap and shaved not just his face and crotch but his entire body for her greater pleasure. He toweled himself dry, then inserted the silver rings she’d given him in his ears, his nipples and finally in the Prince Albert piercing she’d ordered him to get after he’d begged to become her slave. Standing in front of the mirror, he buckled her collar around his neck, getting hard as he anticipated her showing her pleasure by allowing him the rare pleasure of fucking her cunt.
Being a resident didn’t lend itself to letting him wear her jewelry all the time. That was too bad because part of him loved flaunting the outward signs of his mistress’s possession. He had just unclipped the leash from his collar and attached it to the ring in his PA piercing when he heard the doorbell ring.
“Forgot your key again, Mistress?” he asked as he hurried to the door, quelling the urge to check to see who was knocking before opening it.
That was one of the games Jessica played with him, testing his obedience and willingness to be humiliated for her. She had forbidden him to check the peephole when a knock came at the door. Of course, the few times she’d pulled the knocking trick, she’d been the one testing him.
Smiling, for he was expecting her and had become used to presenting himself as the worthless slave that he was, he threw open the door
to his Houston apartment and prepared to kneel at her feet.
Then he saw four feet, not two. A pair of Western-style boots he’d recognize anywhere and two sensible black pumps like the ones his mother always wore.
Fuck. What the hell were his parents doing here? He started to slam the door shut but it was too late. They’d already seen him.
“What?” Papa’s mouth gaped open. He was speechless for the first time Les could remember.
His mother screamed and clutched her chest, her face contorted into a fright mask as she stared at him, her eyes wide with apparent horror.
“I wasn’t expecting you.”
“Obviously.” Sarcasm dripped off his father’s tongue.
“I can explain,” he said, trying hard to brazen it out. Sooner or later they’d learn about the lifestyle he had adopted to please the woman he loved. It might as well be now. “I thought you were Jes—”
His father held up his hand. “There is no explanation that can make this right. We will leave now.” He steadied Mama and they turned away.
He closed the door behind them and looked down, seeing himself for the first time through their eyes. Not as his mistress’s treasured sex slave but as a caricature of a man, stark naked except for a thick leather slave collar, a matching leash that dragged on the floor behind him from the ring in his dick—and an elaborate red and gold tattooed heart and arrow on his lower abdomen that pointed down at his shaved, pierced penis. Text on a banner over the point of the arrow proclaimed him “Property of Mistress Jessica”.
Seeing himself through his parents’ eyes had opened Les’ to what he had become—a mere sex toy of a sadistic woman, not a partner to the chief resident surgeon who had been assigned to mentor him in his chosen profession. The inevitable breakup had begun then, though it had taken several months for him to reassert his own will—something Jessica hadn’t been able to accept. He had given back her jewelry and taken back himself.
Within months his piercings had closed, leaving barely visible marks where they had been, and just two days ago he’d had the last of twenty-two painful laser treatments to remove the tattoo. He wished it were as easy to eradicate the memories, but God help him, part of him still craved the kinky sex play that had immediately attracted him to the BDSM lifestyle. Just as he’d deferred to Jessica at work where she was his chief resident, he’d readily submitted to her will, first in the dungeon and later in every other aspect of their lives.
So here he was, two years’ worth of therapy later, staring at his future. He’d embraced who and what he was. A man who’d been driven by guilt, who would always regret having taken another life but who now could live with the painful memory without seeking pain. A man who would use that tragedy not to destroy himself but to be a good doctor, a good man. A stronger man.
Oddly enough, after analyzing his fiasco with Mistress Jessica, he’d realized the craving for kinky sex play that had attracted him to the BDSM lifestyle immediately wasn’t a mistake. He had just been playing on the wrong side of the fence. He had a Dom side—not for humiliation, like Jessica, but rather a nurturing side. He liked taking a woman over, bringing her pleasure, having her trust her soul in his hand for a little while, the way his patients trusted him to preserve their lives.
He had reconciled with his family although he doubted they would ever forget what he had been for a time—as much a slave as the ones who had worked the Fourchet cane fields centuries ago. Maybe more, for those slaves hadn’t chosen their lot in life and he had. Les had realized he no longer belonged in the old-fashioned community of Natchitoches. He’d probably known that when he’d decided to become a doctor, though he hadn’t realized it consciously at the time he’d made his decision.
He got out of the car and grabbed the medical bag they’d given him once they had finally accepted that he wasn’t going to continue his surgical residency in Houston or stay on at Belle Terre and set up a practice in Natchitoches. He stepped up and across the wooden sidewalk and paused at the door of the place where he’d agreed to work.
The sound of a toe-tapping country-western tune blared from The Corral. The scene reminded him that Doc Baines had mentioned there was a private club—the Neon Lasso—where some of the younger people went to play. When he looked around, though, he didn’t see it, so he assumed it must be tucked away somewhere out of view. He recalled what Doc had told him about social life for singles in Caden County.
There’s The Corral, across the square from the office. No movie theater or any other place to go within an hour’s drive if you’re looking for relaxation. Unless you count the Neon Lasso. It used to be an old-fashioned honky-tonk. Buck Oakley, the owner, turned it into a private club after the county lifted his liquor license a few years back. From what I hear, some pretty wild shenanigans go on there. A lot of the younger generation belong, from ranchers’ sons and daughters to lawyers to some of the more successful small businessmen around here. You might like it. We’re out in the country but we have things to do.
He glanced at the heavy wooden door and smiled when he saw that Doc Baines had already added his name—Leslie Fourchet, MD—to the logo etched into the glass inset. Maybe he’d found a home after all. Hesitating for only a second or two, he opened the door and stepped into a typical waiting room complete with uncomfortable chairs and stacks of out-of-date magazines on corner tables. One bored-looking patient flipped through a six-month-old issue of Outdoor Life. Instead of a cutout window for the receptionist, there was an old-fashioned desk from which a gray-haired woman asked him how she could help him.
When he told her who he was, she introduced herself as Martha Wells, Doc’s part-time secretary, and motioned for him to follow her.
In the back, Doc greeted him with enthusiasm, then gave him a quick tour of the place. Les was impressed, because while the façade of the place was anything but modern, the exam rooms had gleaming equipment. One had been set up as a minor surgery and a separate room was outfitted as a clinic where up to three patients could stay overnight if necessary.
Doc apparently noticed Les’ surprise. “It’s a long way to hospitals from out here, so I fixed this up where I can take care of patients who’re too sick to go home but not sick enough to justify an air ambulance ride to Lubbock. Don’t use it often but on occasion it comes in handy. Come on—in a while I’ll show you the storeroom and where we keep records, but now I have to take care of a patient.”
Off a hallway to the left were two offices. “This one’s for you. Make yourself at home. I’m damn glad you’re here,” Doc said before hurrying back toward the reception area.
Les looked around the roomy office. He’d expected a cubicle much like the one he’d shared with two other residents back at the outpatient clinic in Houston, but this was a comfortably equipped room with a window that overlooked the square and let in natural light. Curious, he sat in a brown leather-covered swivel chair that matched two side chairs, and surveyed his surroundings. A long, overstuffed couch with beige-and-brown-striped upholstery sat against the back wall. Les wondered if he’d be spending quite a few nights here, tending one or more patients in that makeshift clinic Doc had shown him.
As he looked out the window, he considered the place he’d signed on to stay for at least three years and wondered what the fuck he’d do to relieve the boredom of small-town living. More importantly, how would he indulge his fetish for kinky sex play?
Come off it. Didn’t you learn your lesson falling in love with Jessica?
He had no intention of falling under another Domme’s spell. Jessica had taught him about pleasure through pain…subjugating his will to another’s. She’d taught him to relish the D/s lifestyle, then she’d tossed him out like a pair of last year’s stilettos. And the therapy he’d endured after she’d dumped him had made him understand and set aside the guilt that had driven him to relish her punishment.
No way did he intend to give up his appetite for women, but he had a fantasy of finding one who’d not only meet his
sexual needs but also be a lover in the true sense of the word, as Jessica never had been. With the sparse population around here, he figured the best place to whet his sexual appetite might be in the former honky-tonk. After all, Doc had hinted in a roundabout way that it might be a sex club. Les made a mental note to get in touch with Buck Oakley and find out for sure before laying out the money to become a member.
One thing was certain. If Les were ever to play BDSM games again, he’d be the one in charge. He had submitted to a woman for the first and last time.
Chapter One
Two months later, on Christmas Day at the Bar C
It was as though she were in limbo—home, yet on the outside looking in. She wasn’t the party girl she’d tried so hard to become last summer, but she wasn’t the innocent young woman she’d been this time last year. She’d never be that again.
So much had changed in a year. Sure, the family room looked the same as it had before Mom had passed away. The eight-foot-tall blue spruce glittered with the same silvery snowflake lights that they’d used every year as far back as she could remember. Heirloom ornaments that had been handed down through generations of Caden women weighed down the tree’s fragrant branches. Beyond the large picture window real snow swirled around in a brisk wind and frosted the evergreen shrubs outside—just as it had on Christmases gone by at the home where Deidre Caden had lived all of her twenty-three years.
Until this summer when a broken heart had made her run away.
But this was her home. Hers. Nobody—not her cheating daddy and not Jack Duval, the man she’d wanted more than anything until she’d learned on the day of her mom’s funeral that he was her bastard half-brother—could take away her right to come back here and reclaim her place in this family, however dysfunctional it might be.
Nobody could force her to do as they said and not as they did—not any longer. Deidre glanced across the room to where Byron Caden the Fourth reigned over the activities in his burgundy leather recliner, which had been a gift last year from her mother. In the seven months since her father had been widowed, he’d dumped one longtime mistress—Jack Duval’s mother—and taken up with his neighbor and old friend Mavis Wolfe. Better Mavis than Marianne Duval, but it hurt Deidre to realize how quickly Four had forgotten the woman who had been the glue that had held their family together. It tore her up inside to realize that her mom would never again come down the stairs and embrace her family with unconditional love.