Her Lawful Master (Pleasure Island Book 4)

by Anya Summers

  After thirty swats on her delectable rear, her ass glowed a becoming ruby red. Theo had sent her the message she needed to learn, that he would brook no rudeness or back talk the way he had today. Even though her punishment was done, he wasn’t ready to release her from his control just yet. He yearned to continue touching her, yearned to do a hell of a lot more than just touch her. Instead of releasing her, he massaged the fiery globes of her delectable rear. He truly couldn’t help himself, her supple backside beckoned his hands like beacons. When Piper didn’t protest his caress, he grew bolder, and ran a finger through her dewy folds.

  Bloody hell. He groaned internally; her pussy was drenched from his punishment. His fingers circled her nub, teasing her clit. A strangled moan erupted from her as he tormented her flesh, his strokes driving his desire higher.

  Christ, he was nearly desperate to taste her cream, bury his face between her thighs and suck on her bud until she screamed her release. He was delighted by her response to his caress, but he wanted this little she-cat to beg for his touch. Then he would pleasure them both.

  “Say the word, Piper, tell me what you want and I can give you the release your body is begging me for.”

  Her spine stiffened at his words and she snarled, “Let me go, Sir.”

  He almost smiled at her defiance. Two could play this game. Her body was so near release, she’d be miserable without an orgasm. She’d come to him, beg him to take her… when she was ready. In the meantime, he enjoyed watching her wriggle away from him as he undid her restraints.

  She yanked her pants back on. A slight hiss escaped her lips. It was the only indication of her discomfort from his discipline. He wanted to applaud her stalwart performance.

  “Piper, you let me know when you need me,” he said, noting that her nipples were hard points beneath her top, and her breathing labored.

  Her quixotic blue gaze whipped to his, full of self-righteous indignation, and he felt he was lucky she wasn’t holding a weapon. “Hell will have frozen over, Sir,” she said, and marched first out of arm’s reach and then the club before he could stop her.

  Theo didn’t regret disciplining her sweet ass. On the contrary, he had enjoyed himself more tonight than he had in months.

  Chapter 3

  Damn the stuffy Brit.

  Piper exited through the door leading out of the club at near Mach ten speeds and took the stairs down to the ground floor. The discipline had shaken her. Her anxiety level had skyrocketed at being forced into submission that way. She needed to take the anti-anxiety medication she had on standby as soon as she returned to the villa. It would be the only way she could stifle the rising panic. Piper hated that she was running away in defeat.

  What she wanted to do was go on the attack and hurl anything she could find at that smug bastard’s devilishly sexy head. Her bottom burned from his discipline. It had been years since she’d been spanked, what with her avoidance of clubs. The dratted man knew precisely how to strike for maximum impact. So much so that it felt like his large hand was imprinted on her behind. What gave him the right to spank her at will? It wasn’t like he was her Dom.

  Fury battled with her panic. She’d bring her grievance before Jared. The treatment she’d received at Theo’s hands tonight had been unprovoked and uncalled for. Was she a submissive? Yes, she was, but only in the bedroom. Outside of there, she didn’t submit—or bow and scrape—regardless of whether it offended a Dom or not. And if a Dom did feel slighted, that was his problem, not hers. Piper had not traveled to the island to be a Dom’s plaything or submissive whipping post, but to do her job.

  And that man, with his cultured British accent and huge hands, could go to hell. Piper drove her cart with fury riddling her body. She had stomped her way to the little vehicle rather than stick around to endure his smug expression. He’d known she had been turned on by the spanking, but had left her wanting rather than leaving her satisfied.

  If there was one thing she would never do, it was beg—for anything. There had been one instance in her life where she had pleaded for mercy, begged for the pain to stop, only to have her screams and pleas fall on deaf ears. Fourteen years had passed since then and there were times, like now, where the public humiliation she experienced at Theo’s hands dredged up the horrid memory.

  Panic beat frenetically in her system, her chest tight to the point where she was close to hyper-ventilating. Son of a bitch, she couldn’t breathe. Her hands shook on the steering wheel as she attempted a few deep, meditative breaths. Piper focused on drawing her breaths deep into her lungs and holding them there. It took her the entire drive back to the villa to corral her panic down to acceptable levels.

  As she parked the cart, she angrily swiped at the wetness trailing over her cheeks. She hated the weakness, hated how something so simple as being publicly disciplined could make all their faces return in blistering, hills-are-alive, surround-sound detail.

  Piper rode the elevator up and headed directly for her medication. She stood at the kitchen sink, in the state-of-the-art kitchen with its marble countertops, stainless steel appliances, and hardwood floors, and trembled as she struggled to open her prescription bottle. The Ativan was fast acting and would hit her system within twenty minutes or so, but to help herself in the meantime, she padded into the bathroom and headed directly into the shower. She had discovered years ago that showers, bubble baths and even, on occasion, relaxing in a hot tub, could help circumvent an attack before it was full blown as she waited for her medication to kick in. She stood directly under the hot spray. Anything to calm the fury-induced panic and burn away the vestiges of recalled horrors.

  No one save her therapist, Dr. Caroline Winters, knew the extent of her situation. It was better that people didn’t know. The last thing Piper wanted were the pitying glances or the knowing looks. It had taken her years to put herself back together after the attack. In the intervening years, she’d built an entirely new foundation for her life. Except she worried that, if anyone knew or discovered the lengths she’d had to go to to survive the rebuilding process, or how much of a handicap she walked around with, it would undermine the progress she’d made in her recovery. Granted, her therapist thought she was being defensive by refusing to open up to people about her attack. Which might well be the case, but just the fact that she could have sex and actually enjoy it was a feat of damn near mythic proportions. Other people didn’t need to know about her sad little story. It was none of their business. And she didn’t want to be looked at differently.

  The attack was why she didn’t play in clubs and couldn’t perform public scenes. They were a recipe for a panic episode. Piper had tried, a few times, with an older Dom in Germany a few years ago, and discovered a hard truth. She was a defective submissive who couldn’t submit outside the bedroom. A public scene unearthed her demons from that night. Her Dom at the time, Peter, had been patient and understanding with her, for the most part. He had done everything he was capable of to try and help her heal. But in the end, her dysfunctions were too much, so they had parted ways because he couldn’t contend with a submissive who couldn’t submit the way he needed.

  And since that relationship, Piper had a few—and by few, she meant she could count them on one hand—one night stands, but none of them had been very satisfying.

  Piper shut off the water, winced as the towel grazed her rear as she wrapped it around herself, and stepped from the shower. The man had not been gentle with his discipline in the slightest. She hated how good it had felt, that she had lost herself in his disciplined strokes for a time, and how all those demons that normally roared to the forefront in public had been blissfully silent.

  Why Theo? Why had they gone silent for him?

  It infuriated her, the conundrum he presented. She didn’t want or need the distraction. She had her life in a set pattern. It may not be the most exciting or emotionally satisfying, but it worked for Piper. Her siblings were always attempting to set her up or give her advice because they assumed th
at since she was single, she must be miserable. When that wasn’t it at all.

  They didn’t know the extent of her attack. They knew something had happened when she’d been on assignment in Africa all those years ago, that she’d become ill, but she’d kept the main details of the event, how near death she had come, from them. As the oldest sibling, it had always been her job to protect them, even from the harsh truth. And if she told them, they would worry every time she went on assignment. Piper couldn’t live under a microscope, even for the sake of those she loved. She needed freedom to come and go as she pleased.

  In her robe, with anxiety medicine humming in her veins and calming her enough that she could function, she sat at the kitchen table with her laptop and camera, uploading the shots she’d taken that day. Piper labored, sifting through the possibilities, burying herself in her work as she did, time and time again. She worked until nearly midnight, when the medication nudged her toward sleep. On the bright side, her medication always helped her fall asleep quickly. But instead of the deep, restful sleep she expected, all night she dreamt of warm cinnamon eyes, tossing, and turning until she gave up the pretense of sleep in the early hour before dawn.

  As she shuffled around the kitchen, the world outside her window sill at the darkest apex before dawn, Piper mainlined coffee like a heroin junkie getting their fix. She typically avoided taking the anxiety medicine unless absolutely necessary, since it tended to make her groggy the next day. While the caffeine worked its way into her system, she packed her backpack, stocking it with all the essentials she might need while tromping through the jungle, including her camera gear. As long as she was able to steer clear of any venomous snakes, she should be okay.

  Piper left her villa before the first streaks of dawn illuminated the night sky. She veered off the lighted pathway into the dense forest. The island held all manner of life. Trudging through the brush as fingers of sunlight inched across the sky, she found an abutment that might make for one killer of a shot—if she could just get her gear set up quickly enough.

  The villa next to hers had an uninterrupted east overlook view of the ocean that was stunning. She vaulted up the stairs to the deck and rushed to set up her equipment. It took her only a few minutes to erect her tripod and get her Nikon into position.

  Piper started shooting as the sun’s rays speared the horizon. The shuttering clicks of her camera filled the space, mingling with tweeting birds and buzzing insects as the world awakened for the day. It was magnificent. Part of the reason she loved what she did was getting a chance to witness the glory of nature.

  She moved closer to the edge of the deck, taking her camera off the tripod and leaning against the railing. Magnificent. These shots were incredible, the colors alone with the vivid orange and pinks. She wished for her darkroom to develop the prints immediately.

  “Would you mind telling me what the bloody hell you’re doing on my deck?” a male voice said behind her. Only it wasn’t any male voice. It was his. Theo. She could feel him directly behind her, and instead of unsettling her, like it should have, her body purred at his nearness.

  “I’m photographing the ocean for Jared’s island brochure, if you must know. It’s why he hired me. The view from this deck was calling me, and I had to get the shot. I hadn’t realized anyone was staying in this villa. I didn’t mean to disturb you but I have a job to do. And Jared gave me his blessing, confirming that I had access to everything.” She shrugged and finally moved, turning her head and glancing at him.

  Holy hotness!

  Looking decidedly rumpled, Theo’s six-foot frame stood in a pair of green plaid pajama bottoms and nothing else but acres of finely honed muscle, covered with a smattering of dark hair coating his chest and arms. The man was sexy as hell and she’d have to be dead not to be attracted to his dark good looks. And last she checked, she still had a pulse. His dark hair hadn’t been brushed yet and was messy, sticking out everywhere. It should have been unflattering. It wasn’t. That, combined with his sinful mouth curved in a downward pout over her intrusion into his morning, shrouded by a day’s worth of dark stubble, gave her the sudden urge to nibble on his plump lower lip and dry hump his leg. His enormous feet were bare and looking at their size, combined with his large hands, she wondered what might lie hidden under his pants. From the outline in his pajamas, he had been blessed and endowed.

  Was it wrong that she wanted to find out?

  “So you’re not above trespassing and bothering other guests to get your shot?” he asked, placing his hands on his hips. For a split second, she wanted those big hands of his on her body.

  “No, not really. Most of the island guests aren’t even up yet, so I figured if anyone was around they wouldn’t even know I was here. And now that I know it was you…” she said, feeling a perverse satisfaction that she might have ruined his morning.

  “Now that you know it was me, what?” he said, a tick in his jaw as he glared, his cinnamon eyes burning with indignation.

  Oh sweet heavens, Doms and their righteous fury over every little thing. If anyone needed to relax a bit, it was Theo.

  “Take a chill pill, big guy. I didn’t mean to disturb your morning ritual. I just,” she shifted a bit, suddenly seeing a shot in her mind. “Forget what I said—would you mind if I got you in the shot? Could you pose at the deck railing, looking out over the water? I swear I won’t get your face or anything, just your back, so no one will recognize that it’s you.”

  Suspicion mingled with his stern Alpha Dom countenance and he asked, “Why? I thought Jared expressly forbid you from photographing guests. That, with the privacy constraints, guests were not to be filmed at all.”

  “Yes, I know what he said and I’m not trying to violate the rules. Besides, if you want to get technical, you’re not a guest, either. But there’s this shot I can see in my head and it’s brilliant. Do me a solid, big guy, and pose for me. It will work, I will even give you a copy you can put in your home. And, to sweeten the pot, I will even give you final approval of the image before it ever sees the light of day.”

  “You want me just like this, without a shirt on, half nude in your photo?” He gestured to his chest.

  She rolled her eyes in exasperation as the light she needed was fading. “Oh Jesus, stop being so damn British for just a second and do the shot. I promise it won’t hurt. You might actually like it. And you could show it to all the subs in London who I’m sure will swoon over it.”

  “I’m long past the age where women swoon over me, love.”

  “No, you’re not, but you just want the compliment too damn badly. It’s not like you need a boost to your ego. Will you do the damn shot or not? I don’t have all day, man, we’re going to lose the light here.” Piper’s temper was escalating into dangerous territory. She didn’t know whether she would smack him upside the head or kiss him.

  “On one condition,” he said, his face an indecipherable mask.

  “And that condition would be?” She prayed for patience, because if she prayed for strength, she’d use it to strangle him. Why him? Why had she been saddled with him as the thorn in her side on her stay here? Couldn’t she have a nice, easy trip without being confronted with Master Uptight?

  With a shuttered, incomprehensible expression, he said, “Submit to me while we are here this week. No strings attached, and we go our separate ways at the end of the week.”

  “What?” Piper wouldn’t have been more surprised if he had morphed into the Loch Ness Monster. He wanted her, for the week, as his submissive? She would have believed the mystical creature bit more.

  He shrugged his broad shoulders nonchalantly, but his eyes held banked embers in them. Then, giving her body a once over, his gaze stripping her on the spot, he asked, “Or are you not a submissive? It’s a bleeding pity if you aren’t, but even so, I’d like you in my bed this week.”

  Damn it all. His blatant proposal should infuriate her, except it didn’t. In fact, it did the opposite. Her insides melted at the thought
of granting him an all-access pass to basically screw her brains out. Instead of telling him to get bent over his outrageous proposition, she said, “I am a sub, but I don’t think it’s a good idea. I can pay you for the shot.”

  The thought of feeling his enormous hands on her body made her shiver, and not in disgust. Especially not after feeling his fingers toy with her sex last night. The problem with accepting his proposal was that he was a Master, and a rather traditional one to boot. Theo would expect obedience and submission in all things and areas—and that wasn’t Piper.

  Theo shook his head and said, “I don’t want your money, love, but your body. Yes or no. My willingness to pose for you is losing its luster.”

  Damnit. She glanced at the rising sun and back at him.

  “You already said you find me attractive. What’s the harm, Piper? Take a risk. I promise to make it worth your while.” He wasn’t subtle and didn’t try to seduce. No, he was honest about what he wanted, which was her. Unexpected excitement shot through her and her insides quivered.

  Was losing her independence this week worth the shot? Could she submit to him? She wanted him, too, if the ooey-gooey melty sensations in her core were anything to go by. As independent as she had always been, the thought of submitting to his mastery and having sex with something that wasn’t battery operated made her body come to life. Theo stirred her, and he was correct in his assumption that she considered him a walking wet dream. It left her with no choice in the matter and her heart sank in her chest. Keeping up the pretense that she was unaffected by his proposition, Piper rolled her eyes at him and said, “Fine, we can do the hanky panky. Now go stand at the railing with your back to me.”

  She ignored the victory in his blazing cinnamon gaze and the hint of a grin making his laugh lines stand out on his handsome face. If she contemplated what she had just agreed to, she’d more than likely have a panic attack and lose the shot altogether. Once he stood overlooking the landscape, she spent the next five minutes directing him, having him put his hands on the railing, in his pockets, one on the rail and one on his hip. And through it all, she wondered about the bargain she’d struck.