Us: Book Three in The Everett Gaming Series

by Drew Sera

  I crouched next to Matt and put my hand on his shoulder to support him and remind him that he wasn’t alone out here and that it would be okay. I took hold of Gina’s loose hand and started to rub on it to warm it up. I gazed around stunned at the darkness. I tend to forget how dark it gets up here at night. I was glad Sydney was inside.

  Matt kept talking and looking at Gina while I continued to crouch by him for support. Anthony had cut the rope off her other wrist, and she pulled it towards Matt’s body and crawled up against him. She was okay. She regained control and snapped out of it once she was out of the tight restraints. Matt threw his arms around her and hugged her tightly.

  “Oh, pet. I’m so sorry. I slipped and cut your back with the flogger. You scared me.”

  “S-sorry, S-sir.”

  He wasn’t angry with her of course. Matt looked at Anthony and then over to me. “Thank you guys.”

  I looked at Anthony and spoke up.

  “You may want to thank Sydney. She heard you calling out before Anthony and I did. She was starting to head this way when I stopped her. I thought that she thought you were hurting Gina. But really, it was just her hearing you calling out. I’m sorry we weren’t quicker.”

  Matt just shook his head and continued to hold Gina. Anthony found their bottle of water and handed it to me. I opened it and gave it to Matt to make Gina sip. Anthony then came over with a first aid kit and set it on the ground.

  “Do you want me to clean this up, Matt?”

  “Please, I need to hold her,” Matt began to explain.

  “I know you do. I wasn’t suggesting you let go of her. I’ve become pretty skilled at using bandages and gauze to clean wounds.”

  He and I both had since Sydney came into our life. Anthony pulled on the latex gloves and opened a sterile cleaning wipe and dabbed it over Gina’s back. I watched Anthony go through a few of the wipes and Gina sucked in some air as he went over the wound.

  “Gina, it’s not so bad. Just a tiny cut. Your Master can only make tiny cuts.”

  Both Matt and Gina laughed quietly. Her laughter was a good sign and reassurance that she was returning to normal and was able to respond to humor. Anthony dabbed a cotton ball with some alcohol over her cut and then placed a bandage over it.

  “There you go, Gina. All done. I know it’s not Dr. Reid perfect, but it’s clean, and he can tend to it when we get inside.”

  Anthony looked up at the dark sky and then back at me. I knew he was thinking the same as me. We needed to start heading back because none of us geniuses had a fucking flashlight. Anthony handed me Gina’s clothes, and then we all stopped moving as we heard our fragile kitten’s panicked voice.

  “Anthony...Colin...I can’t find you.”

  She sounded scared and possibly in tears. Anthony looked down at me, and I told him to go. What the fuck was she doing outside of the cabin? We’d deal with that but right now Sydney was scared and alone. Anthony and I vowed to make certain that she never found herself scared and alone again.

  40

  Monday, December 23rd

  Anthony

  I took off running in the dark towards the stressed voice of my sunshine. I kept calling out so that she could hear my voice and know that I was close. I told her not to move and to keep talking, and I’d find her. She wasn’t saying much so I had to keep saying her name. The altitude was playing hell on me as I ran. I finally stopped for a moment while trying to hear her. My heart pounded in my chest when I couldn’t find her right away.

  “Fuck! Find her,” I said under my breath while turning around on the spot I stood.

  I moved towards her voice again and felt the ache in my chest begin to subside when I saw her. I found her way off the path and sitting on a downed tree. She was cold and her teeth were chattering. Sydney had gotten very turned around and was facing the opposite direction. She was just wearing a sweatshirt and jeans. Nothing water proof.

  “Sydney,” I said while trying to catch my breath. She looked up at me with wide eyes. The bottom of her jeans were wet and her hands were red from being cold. I pulled off my fleece jacket and put it on her and picked her up.

  “S-sir! You’ll get cold.”

  “I think I’ll make it. I can’t risk you getting sick.”

  I picked her up and carried her back to the cabin while her arms were wrapped around my neck. When we got inside, I took her over to the fireplace, pulled all of her clothes off, and wrapped her in a blanket while I started a fire. Anger and maybe a little fear worked it’s way into my system as I threw wood into the fireplace.

  She was off the walking path. Way off. That fucking bastard Howard had tied her to a fence overnight in the cold. Her not being able to find us became a huge problem for her. It was a trigger, and she could have gone into shock out there. If she had remained quiet, I wouldn’t have found her easily. She could have gotten lost and froze out there. It was in the low twenties outside. My mind filled with thoughts of her being afraid to be outside: cold, naked, and bound to a fence while nursing wounds from a pseudo Dom. It was something she listed on her fears and limits list that Colin had her write out a while back. She got freaked out just driving up to the cabin in the pitch darkness. What the fuck was she thinking heading out in the dark on her own? I threw the last piece of wood in the fireplace and it landed with a thud.

  I turned to look at her. She was crouched down and had her arms wrapped around her legs. Vulnerable. Fuck! My damn chest clenched. I was angry; angry that she had gotten lost outside tonight; angry that she put concern over someone else before her own regard for safety; angry that the fear I was feeling about possibly losing her and knowing that I haven’t told her how much I love her. I was angry for being angry. I tried to calm myself when the front door opened and Matt came in carrying Gina with Colin behind them. Sydney started to turn her head, but I stopped her.

  “Eyes.” She looked at me while I dealt with my issues. Loving her and not being able to tell her has been killing me. And I was so fucking pissed off at myself as I sat there thinking about seeing her lost on that downed tree, looking in the wrong direction for me. She was lost. If she hadn’t called out to us, she could have gone deeper into the woods, not dressed for the temperatures, and gotten sick.

  Matt took Gina upstairs and Colin came over and sat down beside me. He could tell I was angry and struggling. I turned and looked at him. “Did you tell her to stay inside?”

  Colin looked down at our fragile kitten and said that he had told her to stay in the cabin and that he even watched her go into the cabin. I looked at her, not sure of what to do. I’ve never been in this position before. My chest was caving in, and my head was ready to explode.

  “He told you to stay inside, Sydney. Do you know why?” I stood and paced around the room as I rubbed my chest. I thought the extra moving would calm my nerves and settle me. “Come on, Sydney. You’re a bright girl. Why would Colin tell you to stay inside?”

  “So I was safe, Sir.”

  It fucking killed me to hear her voice sound like that. It sounded defeated and resigned to the fact that she’d get yelled at and deserved it. Fucking killed me. I was losing control.

  “Anth,” Colin calmly said my name. I’m sure he said it to get me to stop, think and calm down. “Sydney, go upstairs and kneel at the foot of the bed and wait for Anthony and I.”

  Sydney hurried her blanket clad body up the stairs and I stopped pacing and tried to pull myself together.

  “Anthony, she was trying to help. Granted, she disobeyed. But her heart was in the right place, as always.”

  “Colin, she was twenty yards off the path uphill! Twenty yards! Fucking snow up past her ankles. I had to take her clothes off when we got in because the pants were wet.” I gathered her wet clothes and threw them at his feet. “That’s what she had on. Jeans and a sweatshirt. No boots, no gloves, not even a fucking coat! Twenty yards off the path! She was sitting on a downed tree, huddled together. It’s twenty-three degrees out. You do the math,
Colin.”

  I began my pacing and finally was out of energy and flopped down by Colin. He was patiently folding her damp clothes and was shaking his head.

  “I can do the math, Anthony.”

  “Col, remember she has been bound to a fucking fence in the fucking cold. She could have gotten more lost, panicked, or shocked out on us. Then what?”

  “I get it, Anthony. And you don’t need to remind me what’s on her lists because I’ve committed those to memory. She was trying to help. Poor decisions were made, and we can punish accordingly. But we weren’t continuing as we were. You’re a mess.”

  I knew that assessment was pretty dead on accurate. I was upset at how close we came to literally losing her tonight in the thick of the dark woods. God forbid if something had happened and she ended up in the hospital with hypothermia. I’d be sick knowing that I haven’t told her how much I love her.

  I needed to take a hard look at myself and my future. I couldn’t pussy out of this any longer, and I needed to tell her. She needs to know. I thought about all of the things we got for Sydney for Christmas, but something she needs the most is to hear how I feel about her. I was going to take care of that. I would tell her in front of my family of Colin, Matt, and Gina. I wasn’t ashamed.

  41

  Monday, December 23rd

  Colin

  I opened the door to our room and found our fragile kitten kneeling at the foot of the bed on the hard floor. She was naked, shaking, and looked to be wound very tightly. Her head was down, which I hated. I set her damp clothes down on the dresser quietly and looked her over.

  “I didn’t tell you to lower your head, baby.”

  She nodded and then I heard the sniffles. I crouched down in front of her, and she brought her head up. Her blue eyes were swimming with tears and grabbed at my heart. I caught the tears as they spilled over.

  “Sir? I’m sorry I disobeyed you. I’m sorry I made Anthony angry. I’m so sorry. I will do better.”

  Punishing Sydney was going to be tricky. One wrong move and there could be a serious problem. I worried about this very day coming; the day Anthony and I would need to reprimand her for something. I knew punishment with Sydney could not include a lack of positive physical contact. She already felt bad and was shaking. I could see her abdomen flexing. Poor thing was so upset and was trying to keep it in.

  I picked her up, sat down on the bench at the foot of the bed, and held her against me. I wrapped a blanket around her chilled body and cuddled her. She felt so tight and tense in my arms though. I was choosing my words carefully because Sydney is still very fragile. She needs to know and understand that when Anthony and I give her instructions like I did this afternoon, that they’re for a reason. And she needed to know that Anthony wasn’t angry with her, he’s angry at himself.

  “Sydney, what were your plans when you left the cabin? You didn’t have a coat on or gloves,” I said to her calmly while looking in her eyes.

  Anthony came into the room and looked calmer now. He leaned on the dresser by her wet clothes.

  “I wanted to help. Everyone is always helping me, and I wanted to show that I am useful and can help. I paced around inside and worried that something really wrong happened and maybe the scene went really bad. I had only heard Matt’s voice but not Gina’s. So I figured something had happened with the scene and her. I didn’t know if Matt took water and candy with him. Maybe Gina needed some sugar to help ground her. I put some M&M’s in my sweatshirt, grabbed a bottle of water, and rushed out to see if I could help.”

  Anthony stood up straight and found her sweatshirt. He pulled out a small bag of M&M’s from the front pouch and set them on the dresser. Her heart is something else.

  “I knew that you guys would be angry for me disobeying, but I knew that I couldn’t sit inside if I could help.”

  What a girl we have. Where she pulls up courage and strength from, I’ll never know. But just when I think she’s delicate, she goes and does something like wagering to be tied up in the name of charity, or she disobeys her Dom to help another sub in need. While this warmed my heart, it also terrified me. I worried that she may have tendency to abandon her own safety to help someone. This was something Anthony and I would have to keep an eye on. It was important for her to understand that we give her instructions or ask her to do something for her to be safe.

  “Sydney, that was very kind and thoughtful of you. However, I told you to stay inside so that I could go help. I couldn’t be the best I needed to be if I knew I was going to have to worry about keeping you safe in the element. Baby, the woods are new to you. You got lost and were pretty far off the path. You put yourself at risk, which displeases us, even though you knew in your heart you were doing the right thing. You scared us when Anthony went looking for you. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Sir. I do. I won’t disobey your instructions again. I should have known better and waited inside. I could have helped once you were back. I’m sorry.”

  “Good girl.” I tilted her head up to look at me, and I gave her a kiss. I tugged her across my lap so that she was facing Anthony. Though he was calmer, he still looked tense. “Sydney, Anthony was angry at the fact that if he hadn’t found you, you could have gotten sick or hurt out there. Just the thought of us losing you even for a little while, makes us crazy. Please understand that he and I have lived our lives knowing that we were designed to be alone; designed not to have a little sub to share our life with or look after. He and I have known for a long time that we have particular tastes that probably couldn’t be met. Then you dropped into our lives, and we soon found that everything we wanted and needed was with you. So the mere thought of you getting lost in the dark woods and being scared put us over the edge.”

  “A-are you going to hit me with a belt, to punish me? It’s ok, I deserve it.”

  I shook my head at her question, though she couldn’t see me because she was still facing Anthony. A prominent vein was visible in Anthony’s neck. He and I had agreed that we would never strike her with any impact implement as punishment. She’s had too much of that shit already done to her, and if he and I did it, it’d be too risky. Any impact play with implements would be too risky, at least for now. Besides, Anthony and I weren’t into using an implement to shell out punishments. In fact, since he and I never had a sub of our own, neither of us ever really had to punish one. Anthony and I have negotiated punishment scenes at Irons for play, and those were all in fun. I’ve worked with some Doms on punishments with their subs or slaves, but I’ve never had one to punish myself. I didn’t think this would be a common thing with Sydney either.

  “Baby, remember Anthony and I told you we’d never hit you with a belt as punishment? Remember?”

  She nodded but started to look down. I caught her chin and kept her eyes on mine. “No nodding, Sydney. Your voice is too important in this relationship. You don’t hide it.”

  “I remember, Sir.”

  “Have we ever gone back on our word to you?” I asked her.

  “No, Sir,” she said quietly.

  “Good girl. And remember, even though you are being punished, it doesn’t mean you’re a bad person. Anthony and I don’t hold grudges, and once the punishment is done, it’s done. Okay?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  Okay, that was out of the way. All that remained now was for Anthony and I to figure out a suitable punishment. I looked over at him for ideas. I know from working with Doms and their subs, that we work on punishments that fit the behavior. We work on steering clear of any fears or things on the limit list and go from there. Sydney had quite a bit of things we needed to navigate around. He and I had previously discussed if it came time to punish her for something, we’d try to take something she was scared of and work on it so it wasn’t so bad for her. But I’ll admit, I had reservations about this now, as it was in our face to react. She squirmed on my lap and I could feel myself harden. I thought about possibly just finding a really large anal plug and making her stand w
ith it for a while. But then I worried it may make her afraid of toys. I know Matt teetered around with punishments as well, he uses spankings though, if needed.

  “Sydney, I want you to go take a warm bath and Anthony and I will discuss your punishment.”

  “Yes, Sir.” She slid off my lap and hurried into the bathroom to start the water.

  I leaned back in the chair and looked at Anthony. “Well, here we are, time to punish our little kitten.”

  He sat down on the chair opposite the bench I was sitting on and looked towards the bathroom door.

  “Anthony, we need to do this and we need to do it together. She knows that she made a bad decision. We have to be firm and united on it.”

  “I know. I agree. What can we do?”

  I was going to step out on a limb and suggest a spanking. Initially, I never would have suggested it. But it would be something he and I could both administer and both be touching her at the same time. Matt’s had success with Gina. Granted, every little sub is different and ours was most definitely different. It would pose some potential issues, but until we hit it head on, we’d never know.

  “Anth, what about a spanking?”

  He stared at me before getting up and crossing the room to the window. He had his hands on his hips and didn’t say anything. I wasn’t surprised at his reaction to my suggestion but felt I needed to point out some things to him.

  “Anth, spankings weren’t on her list. Yes, it’s striking her. But we’ll do it with our hands and not an object. No objects.”

  “Goddammit, Colin.”

  I went over and stood by him to deliver my next part. “You’re not Howard, Anthony. And you’re not your step-father.” He knew this of course, but I think he needed to hear it too. He nodded, and with that I knew he’d carry it out alongside me. “Five each?”