Dark Lessons

by Julia Sykes

  As soon as I hung up, I hurried back to Natalie. She still slept, her dark hair spilling over my pillow. She looked so fucking perfect there, in my bed.

  My mind spun. If she wasn’t working for us, she would face worse than arrest and prison time. She could be shipped off and thrown into a dark hole where I’d never find her.

  I knew deep in my bones that it didn’t matter what she’d done, or who she might be working for. I’d never let her go. I’d protect her, no matter what.

  Chapter 22

  Natalie

  Alex carried me back into my cell and sat down on my cot, holding me close to his chest. His long fingers brushed my cheek, taking up a stray lock of hair and tucking it behind my ear.

  “Tell me about Jason,” he said gently.

  I stopped breathing.

  He rubbed his big hand up and down my back in a soothing motion. “Now, Natalie,” he chided. “You know you don’t have any secrets from me. Did you think I would forget Agent Harper was the first person you asked for when you woke up?”

  I licked my dry lips. “I was confused. Disoriented.”

  “Then why do you cry out his name during our sessions?”

  My blood froze in my veins. I thought of Jason often as a way of coping with what was happening to me. The fantasy of being with him was my way to escape the horror. But I didn’t realize I ever spoke his name aloud.

  “I could arrange to bring him to you,” Alex continued on calmly. “Is that what you want? For me to bring him here?”

  “No!” I gasped out. I didn’t want Jason anywhere near my torturer.

  “We usually only take on new recruits,” he continued, as though I hadn’t spoken. “But I’ve looked at Agent Harper’s file. He would be a promising asset.”

  “Leave him alone!” I shouted, my voice ragged from hours of screaming.

  “You seem so desperate to have him with you,” he said, as falsely benign as ever. “I can make it happen.”

  “No.” I choked on a sob. “Please.”

  Alex studied me for a long moment, his golden eyes searching my soul. “If you don’t want him here, then you’re going to have to let go of these fantasies. I know you’re thinking of him when I bring you to orgasm. If you want him to be with you, I can always arrange for him to come and watch.”

  The idea of Jason witnessing my destruction, my humiliation, was too horrible to bear. I wanted him to remember me as I had been with him. He thought I was dead. It was better that way. If Alex got his hands on Jason, he’d do so much worse than make him watch as I was tortured. I couldn’t allow Alex to hurt Jason the way he was hurting me.

  “I’ll do anything,” I gasped out. “Just leave him alone.”

  “All right, Natalie. Agent Harper won’t be touched. If you promise me you’ll stop escaping into these fantasies during our sessions. I need you present with me for the process to work. Do you understand?”

  I nodded as tears flooded down my cheeks. In that moment, I locked my memories of Jason away, never to be accessed again. His life depended on it. I had to keep Alex away from him, at any cost. Even the cost of my sanity, my soul.

  “Natalie!” a deep, masculine voice called out my name. I curled into myself, fearing Alex’s return.

  His hands closed around my shoulders, shaking me.

  “Open your eyes, kitten. Look at me. Please.”

  Kitten.

  I’m with Jason.

  I gasped, and I my eyes snapped open. Fear thundered through my system.

  “Run,” I begged on a ragged whisper. “You can’t be here.”

  He pulled me into his arms. “You’re okay, kitten. You’re safe with me.”

  I twisted beneath him, trying to get free. My leg jerked against a leather cuff, and I realized I was chained down. My tears came faster, blinding me.

  “No,” I moaned. “He’ll hurt you. I can’t let him…” My throat closed up, unable to put what Alex would do to him into words.

  “We’re in my apartment, Natalie,” he told me calmly. “No one else is here. No one will hurt me. Or you.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to cope with the terror that was ripping my brain to shreds. I couldn’t think, couldn’t fight.

  “And then my heart with pleasure fills,” I whispered the familiar words like a prayer. “And then my heart with pleasure fills.”

  “Why are you saying that?” I was distantly aware of Jason’s frustrated question, but it didn’t stick in my mind.

  I repeated the mantra, until the full stanzas of the poem flowed through my mind, filling it with the cheery image of a field of bright yellow daffodils. Nothing could hurt me here. Nothing bad existed in this peaceful place. All concerns, all my dark memories and fears, melted away into nothing.

  I blinked up at Jason. His eyes were tight with worry. I reached out trailed my fingertips along the creases in his brow, as though I could smooth them away.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Where did you go just now?” he pressed. “You were crying in your sleep. You were scared when you woke up. You thought I was in danger. And now… You said that line—‘And then my heart with pleasure fills’—and it’s like nothing happened. What does it mean? Why did you think I was in danger? Did someone…” His voice roughened to a barely intelligible growl. “Did someone hurt you?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. The last thing I remember is falling asleep at the table. After you drugged me,” I added with reproach.

  “You’re cold,” he noted instead of commenting on my accusation. He rubbed at the goose bumps on my arms.

  Now that he mentioned it, I did feel chilled down to my bones. I shivered and burrowed into his warmth. I realized that I could feel his bare skin against mine for the first time in years. The sensation was so sweet, it brought tears to my eyes. Confusion briefly flashed through my mind when I noted that my cheeks were already wet. I hastily wiped at them and put it out of my mind, instead focusing on the joy of being in Jason’s arms.

  I traced the lines of his muscles, re-learning the shape of his hard chest and abs. They rippled beneath my touch, flexing under my fingers. I explored lower, feeling the sexy V at his hips that led down to…

  His hand closed around my wrist, stopping me. “No,” he ground out. “I promised myself I wouldn’t. Not until you come clean with me.”

  “I already told you I’m black ops. I can’t say more than that. I’m sorry. And you really do have to let me go. I can’t stay with you.”

  “Because you think someone will hurt me if you do?” His green eyes were incisive, flashing in the dim evening light that filtered through the curtains.

  I flinched. I couldn’t think about that. I knew I had to get away from Jason, to keep him separated from Alex.

  But I couldn’t allow myself to contemplate why that was. It was a base knowledge, burned deep into my psyche.

  “My life is dangerous,” I said to reason with myself as much as with him. “You can’t be part of it.”

  “That’s not good enough,” he told me. “You’ll have to be more honest than that. I can’t protect you if you don’t tell me the truth.”

  “I am telling the truth,” I insisted. “I’ve just told you all the truth I can. I won’t pull you into my world.”

  He studied me carefully, and when he finally spoke, his tone was cautious. “You’re not CIA. They don’t have any record of you working for them.”

  “Of course they don’t,” I replied levelly. “Not officially, anyway.”

  “No, Natalie. They don’t have any record of you at all. Everyone thinks you’re dead.”

  I shook my head. “You don’t understand. They’ll disavow me if they even suspect someone at the FBI is aware that I exist. No one will come to save me from justice. They’ll let me go to jail for drug and human trafficking. If they don’t kill me first.”

  “That’s not how we work,” he told me. “The US government wouldn’t assassinate
one of their own. Who are you really working for, Natalie?”

  I shrugged. “You’re lucky enough to live in a world where you think that’s true. Well, it’s not. My job is dangerous.”

  “Then why do you do it?” he asked, his voice strained. “Why did you leave me for a job where your employers would rather see you dead than be exposed?”

  My heart twisted. “I couldn’t come back to you. I’m sorry.”

  “Why?” he pressed, his eyes shining. “I would have died for you. I wanted to die with you. How could you leave me like that?”

  Dark memories stirred.

  I don’t want this, I’d begged. You said I had a choice to work with you or not. I don’t choose this.

  Alex’s bland smile flashed through my mind. You were allowed to choose to cooperate willingly. You chose wrong.

  “Stop saying that,” Jason’s voice ripped me out of the past.

  I blinked at him. “Saying what?”

  “That line. ‘And then my heart with pleasure fills.’ Every time you say it, I lose you. What does it mean?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  His big hands bracketed my face, his eyes piercing into me as though he could look into my mind. “What happened to you? Where have you been?”

  “I can’t—”

  He cut me off with a warning growl. “Don’t say you can’t tell me. I won’t accept that as an answer.”

  I pressed my lips together. If he wouldn’t accept the only answer I could give him, then I wouldn’t reply at all.

  “I’m sorry,” he said abruptly, his face firming into hard lines of determination.

  “For what?”

  The question barely left my lips before he flipped me onto my front. He was on me in an instant, straddling my lower back so I was pinned down beneath him. My fingers scrabbled at the sheets, but there was nowhere for me to go.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, panic and lust twining inside me in a confusing cocktail. I wanted to be trapped by Jason. A selfish, dark part of me didn’t want him to release me. But I also instinctively knew that I couldn’t allow him to trap me. I couldn’t indulge in the feel of his strong body dominating my own.

  He didn’t answer me. He reached over to the nightstand and grabbed the length of rope he’d used to bind me to the kitchen chair. I twisted beneath him, but he easily caught my wrists and looped the rope over them. The feel of the slightly rough fibers running over my soft skin made me shiver involuntarily. I shouldn’t be enjoying this. I couldn’t.

  He quickly subdued me, securing the rope around my wrists in a grip that was tight enough to ensure I couldn’t slip out, but it wouldn’t cut off my circulation. Jason would never harm me. But he would bind me so I couldn’t try to escape him. He tied the rope to one of the metal slats at the head of the bed, which seemed to have been crafted with the precise purpose of trapping me exactly where he wanted me.

  A soft whimper eased up my throat. I wasn’t sure if it was a sound of desire or fear. A little voice deep inside my mind shouted at me to struggle, but it was growing fainter by the second. Being overwhelmed by Jason felt so good. If he wouldn’t allow me to fight or flee, I no longer had the option to defy him. I didn’t have to worry about making the hard choice to leave him, because he was taking it from me. In binding me, he freed me. I shuddered and relaxed beneath him, giving in to the power he’d always wielded over me.

  “There’s my sweet kitten,” he said with painfully tender approval. He stroked my cheek, catching the tear that had spilled over. “You can cry. It’s okay. You’re safe with me,” he promised, giving me permission to finally release the roiling emotions that had been bottled up inside me for years.

  Another tear fell, and he kissed it away.

  His weight finally eased from my back, and he shifted to free my cuffed ankle from the chain that had kept me bound to the bed in my sleep.

  “On your knees,” he ordered, his voice gently coaxing, even though it was an unmistakable command. His unique ability to be so careful with me while still controlling my entire being made me melt.

  I shifted my knees so they were tucked beneath me. With my arms tied in front of me, my torso remained pressed against the mattress, forcing my back to arch. My ass was offered up to him for his use. The position made my core contract in anticipation of his cock, and wetness gathered between my legs as my body prepared to take him.

  His fingers stroked my slick folds, grazing over my clit as he petted my pussy. I whined and wriggled my hips, craving more even as I reveled in the reverent touch. He lightly slapped my sex, a gentle reprimand that made me moan.

  “Stay still,” he commanded. “I don’t want any hits to land where I don’t want them to.”

  “What…” I asked faintly, trying to get my lust-drunk brain to work.

  “Shhh,” he hushed me, still petting me to keep me calm. “I don’t want you to talk unless I ask you a question. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” I said meekly.

  He slapped my pussy again, hard enough to make me cry out in shock.

  “Who am I?” he prompted.

  “Master,” I released his title on a moan, loving the feel of it on my tongue. “Yes, Master.”

  “Good girl. I’m going to discipline you now. You need it badly. You need the release. And I need your obedience.”

  Before I could formulate a response, he briefly left me to retrieve something from his chest of drawers. He took a few seconds to rummage through the top drawer before he returned to me. He held the black leather paddle up so I could see it clearly, slapping it against his hand.

  “Do you remember what this feels like, kitten?”

  I bit my lip and nodded, my cheeks suffusing with heat. He’d paddled me before, the night he’d taken me to the BDSM club to celebrate my impending graduation from the FBI academy. So long ago. Before I’d died, and everything changed.

  “I’ve kept it,” he told me, his voice hitching slightly. “I’ve kept this, too.”

  He lifted the other item I hadn’t seen wrapped around the handle of the paddle: a thin strip of black leather with a silver ring set into the center.

  A lump formed in my throat, and my lower lip quivered as more tears spilled over.

  My collar.

  The symbol that marked me as his.

  He gathered up my hair and brushed it to one side. His gorgeous eyes were shining as the leather encircled my throat. He took his time buckling it closed, savoring the moment. When he finished, he traced the line of the collar with worshipful fingers.

  “I never thought…” His voice broke. He continued to touch the collar, as though he couldn’t help himself. “I never thought I’d see you like this again. All mine. Always mine.”

  “I love you,” I whispered, the words issuing from deep within my soul.

  A single tear slipped down his cheek, and he drew in a shuddering breath. “I love you, too.” His fingers sank into my hair, his fist closing in a possessive grip. “Fuck, Natalie. I love you so much.” His features twisted with something between regret and resolve. “That’s why I have to do this.”

  “Do what?” I asked with little more than idle interest. His statement should have made me nervous, but I was too consumed by love to muster up concern about anything.

  He traced the line of my spine with the cool leather paddle, making my nerve endings flare to life and sending pleasure racing straight to my head, intoxicating me.

  “You let me worry about that,” he said. “I just need you to relax and trust me. Can you do that for me?”

  “Yes, Master,” I sighed, surrendering.

  “Good little kitten,” he praised, and I basked in the glow of his approval. “Take a deep breath and relax into the pain.”

  I did as he instructed, drawing oxygen into my lungs and easing all the tension that lingered in my muscles.

  The first hit was sharp, shocking. It drew a cry from my chest, which amplified to a wail when he rained down several mor
e blows in quick succession. Stinging heat flared, spreading across my skin like wildfire. I choked on a sob, and the hits stopped. The smooth leather skimmed over the areas it had enflamed, achingly cool against my flaming skin. I whimpered and wriggled, uncertain if I was wordlessly asking for more or begging for reprieve.

  “Relax,” he urged. The smooth edge of the paddle traced the seam of my wet pussy, sliding through the slick arousal that coated my labia. I shivered as pleasure washed through my system at the light touch, and a low whine eased up my throat.

  “Are you ready for more, kitten?” he asked, lightly slapping my burning ass. Only, the burn wasn’t uncomfortable anymore. It pulsed erotic heat deep into my core, making me ache for him to fill me.

  “Yes, Master,” I whispered, completely losing myself in him.

  “Good girl.” He struck me again, taking up a harsh, punishing rhythm. I moaned and cried out, but I wasn’t sure if I made sounds of protest or pleasure. All I knew was his utter possession of my body, my mind, my soul. Master marked me as his with the collar and the heat of the paddle, ensuring that I wore signs of his ownership.

  The knowledge that I was his calmed me, and my mind went utterly quiet as I settled into peace. My breathing turned deep and even, and my eyes slid closed as I floated in bliss. My pussy still ached for him to fill me, but a languorous contentment had taken hold of my soul, and I fully surrendered to his will. He would fuck me when he chose to do so; my pleasure was his to give. The knowledge of his complete ownership kept me in a joyous state, even though my body still craved him. My Master would always take care of me. I trusted him and loved him with every fiber of my being.

  I was dimly aware of the rope around my wrists sliding free, and he gathered me in his arms. I was curled up in his lap, my face tucked into his chest as I breathed him in.

  “I need you to be honest with me, kitten,” he said, his voice in the deep register that let me know he was just as drunk on me as I was on him. “I need you to trust me.”

  “I do,” I murmured, snuggling into him. “I love you.”

  He kissed the top of my head. “I love you, too. But I need you to tell me where you’ve been. Who are you working for?”