by Jason Luke
She went through the front doors of the office block running on high heels and came down the steps onto the sidewalk waving her arm to hail a passing cab. She clambered into the back seat and glanced at the time on her phone before she allowed herself to relax with a long slow breath of relief.
When the cab pulled up out the front of Joshua’s mansion in the quiet exclusive suburb, dark had fallen like shroud over the day, and the night was eerily still. It was one thing she might never grow accustomed to; the bustling city that had conditioned her to the ambient noise of voices and sirens and traffic.
Gabriele paid the cab driver off and went briskly up the long driveway towards the front door of the house. She was fifteen minutes early. She felt exposed in the heavy silence, drawing attention to herself by the loud echo of her heels. She imagined the eyes of neighbors upon her, watching from behind their curtains and made curious by the jarring sound of her steps across the tranquil peace of their lives.
She knocked politely on the door, clutching her handbag in front of her hips and fidgeting in her stance. The same jittering nervousness from the night before washed over her. She felt like she was about to step into the unknown. It was a leap of faith – like skydiving out of a high-flying aircraft. She simply didn’t have the life experiences to know what to expect once the front door opened, and Joshua beckoned her inside. Fear of the unknown mingled with fluttering arousal and anticipation. It was almost enough to make her heart seize in her chest.
When Joshua appeared in the doorway, a shimmer of giddy shock overcame Gabriele. He was wearing a dark elegant suit, as though dressed to attend a gala event, or maybe the opera. He looked the picture of debonair charm; his eyes sparkling through the tiny crinkled lines caused by his grin.
“Welcome to your first training session,” he held the door wide and Gabriele went inside. She paused in the foyer. Joshua closed the door behind her and took her politely by the elbow.
“Follow me.”
They went up a staircase to the top floor of the house, following a wide corridor that ended in a vast spacious bedroom. The bed was king size, and the room lavishly decorated in soft green shades, contrasted by turquoise cushions and accessories. There were two floor-to-ceiling windows on the far wall and between them waited the high, wide bed. The carpet was shades of pale grey and on the wall to her left, beside a white upholstered reading chair, was an unlit fireplace.
Gabriele blinked in unfeigned awe. The room was almost the same size of her entire apartment. Joshua saw the expression on her face but said nothing. Instead he steered her towards a door to her right.
The door was closed.
Joshua stopped suddenly and shrugged off his coat. He draped it over the back of the reading chair and loosened his tie. Gabriele could smell the scent of his expensive aftershave as he leaned suddenly close to her.
“Beyond this door is the room where I train my submissives,” he explained. “Out here,” he made a broad gesture with his hands to encompass the rest of the house, “it’s life as normal. But in this next room, Gabriele, everything changes. The roles of Master and submissive apply once you step across the threshold. Are you sure you are ready for that?”
Gabriele wasn’t sure. She felt suddenly intimidated. A tremulous little shudder of anxiety sent an icy-cold chill down her spine.
She studied his eyes with trepidation, searching those deep dark mysterious pools for some insight into his soul. Was Joshua a good man? Would he hurt her like Randall had? Did she have the right to feel afraid of him and what he might do to her?
She took a deep breath. Desperation to keep Randall drove her to this point. She had to keep going if she ever had a hope of winning her man back.
Gabriele stepped through the door.
If the bedroom was ostentatious in its grandeur, then this room, she decided, was a disappointment. The walls were stark white, and there was tracked lighting in the ceiling. There were no windows. The carpeting was the same grey color of the bedroom, but the only furnishings were a single wooden table in the middle of the room, and a black leather chair set in one corner. On the table, she could see a length of soft rope and what looked like a leather glove. She pursed her lips, and as she turned back to search Joshua’s face with puzzlement, she noticed a couple of hooks that were embedded in the wall at head height. The rest of the room was bleak and empty.
Joshua came into the room, closing the door quietly behind him. He seemed restless with sudden energy, and the set of his face changed. He walked a pacing circle of the room in silence while Gabriele stood unmoving, like prey that was being hunted. She felt the atmosphere around her change, the air suddenly warmer and humming with tension.
“Get up against the wall,” Joshua ordered with his voice pitched low and commanding. “With your back to me. Now.”
Turmoil and confusion flashed across Gabriele’s face. For a split-second fear flickered in her eyes but it was gone in a blink. She turned silently and pressed her hands against the wall as if she was about to be patted down by a cop.
“Do you give your permission?” Joshua asked, still speaking in a powerful low voice. The tone sent voluptuous shivers through Gabriele’s body.
“Permission for what?” Gabriele whispered timidly.
“For me to touch you and command you?”
There was a long pause, fraught with tension. Joshua could hear her nervousness in the scratchy rasp of every breath. They both sensed that this moment was the defining instant.
“Yes.”
Joshua stepped close behind Gabriele and leaned forward so that his mouth was against her ear. “You will obey every order I give you. Understand?”
“Yes, Master.” The words came instinctively.
“You will not question me. Understand?”
“Yes, Master.”
“You will follow every instruction enthusiastically. Understand?”
“Yes, Master.” With every question and answer, Gabriele felt herself sinking deeper under the mesmerizing spell of Joshua’s resonate voice, and the will of his desires. She was helpless; unwilling and unable to resist. His presence was like the silken chains of a beautiful snare.
“And will you be willing…?”
“Yes!”
Joshua gently caressed the perfect shape of Gabriele’s ass with his hands, running them from the hem of her dress up over her bottom and then to the small of her back, exploring the feel of her exquisite body for the very first time and drinking in every curve and line like a blind man. His touch sparked little electric jolts through Gabriele’s tight dress. He could feel the soft movements of her responding to his fingers, and her struggles to control her breath. She made a sudden sharp hiss between her lips when his hands drifted over her bottom and lingered.
“The highest words of praise you can ever hope to hear from me is the expression, ‘good girl’,” Joshua explained. Slowly his hands slid around her body like he was embracing her, then drifted up over the mounds of her breasts.
“If you hear me say those words, you know that you have pleased me.” He rested the palms of his hands under her breasts, feeling the restrained shape of them, but doing so perfunctorily. Her heart was racing wildly “Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
It was the mistake Joshua expected, and it gave him the opportunity to reach up and grip Gabriele loosely around the neck. His hands hung there like a snug-fitting collar; no threat, and no malice.
“You will call me Master every time you address me.”
Gabriele nodded and swallowed. Joshua could feel the movement of the muscles in her throat as they pressed against the touch of his fingers.
“Yes, Master.”
He let his hands loosen. Deliberately he let them brush over her breasts again as they fell to his side. “Good girl,” he whispered.
He stepped back and ordered her to turn around. Gabriele faced him with her eyes downcast. Joshua reached possessively for the front of her dress and unfastened every button
from her collar to her navel, slowly exposing the pale smooth flesh of her body. The deep cleft of her cleavage between the lacy pillows of her bra mesmerized him.
“Tell me how you feel.”
“I’m aroused,” Gabriele admitted. She was trembling, and her voice wavered as she hung on the edge of breathlessness.
“Are you scared?”
“I was, Master,” she confessed.
“When?”
“All day at work, and when I first arrived tonight, Master.”
“When I showed you this room?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Why?”
Gabriele hesitated – not for fear of telling the truth, but merely because she found it difficult to express her emotions. “I… I wasn’t sure whether I was doing the right thing. I wasn’t sure whether I could completely trust you.” Her face flushed, worried that Joshua would be upset by her explanation, but he seemed unperturbed.
“Are you still scared?” he asked more gently.
“No, Master.”
“Why? What has changed?”
Gabriele licked her lips. “The feel of your hands on me,” she said abstractly. “I could tell by the way that you were touching me that you’re not a cruel man. You won’t deliberately hurt me.”
Joshua stared unblinking. Behind the fixed gaze there flashed a flurry of genuine concern. Gabriele had been badly handled by her boyfriend, and even if the scars of his treatment didn’t show on her skin, they were there in her words and her thoughts.
“I won’t hurt you,” he said to reassure her. “But I will discipline and punish you because those things are necessary to correct errant behavior.”
She nodded. “I expect it, Master. I came here to learn.”
He grunted. Then narrowed his eyes, circling back to her earlier comment. “I do not expect your full trust immediately, Gabby. That will take time to develop. At this early stage, all I expect is your obedience. But as a further safeguard, I’m going to give you a word; it’s a single word you can say at any time that will immediately stop whatever act we are engaged in. The safe word guarantees that nothing will take place during your training that is expressly against your will.”
Gabriele nodded. Another brick in the wall of her wary caution fell away.
“Your word will be ‘Saratoga’.”
Gabriele blinked. “Saratoga?”
Joshua nodded. “She was an old Navy aircraft carrier that served in the Pacific during the Second World War. It’s not the sort of word you would use in everyday conversation, which makes it suitable,” and then turned his voice into a caution. “But be careful. Your safe word can only ever be uttered if you feel truly uncomfortable, or in some way threatened. It’s not a get-out-of-jail-free card for you to use when you feel yourself challenged or stretched. The ramifications of using the safe word to stop your training are profound.”
Gabriele nodded. Her eyes were solemn and serious. “Yes, Master,” she replied obediently.
With the safe word decided, Gabriele felt a lift of relief. Joshua felt the urge to press on with the session.
He moved until he could clearly see her eyes and read the expressions on her face. Her lips were parted and glossy, her breath coming in tight little gasps. He caressed the top of her breast with the palm of his hand, and she closed her eyes like she was trying to amplify the fierce thrill of the sensation.
Joshua paused for a final moment of dramatic tension and then asked a question.
“Is your pussy wet right now?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Would you like to touch yourself?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Do you make yourself cum often?”
“Yes, Master.”
“And what did you fantasize about the last time you pleasured yourself?”
There was a pause in Gabriele’s reply like a faulty phone line with a delay. Joshua waited with his eyes narrowed.
“Submitting,” Gabriele’s answer was too long coming to be the pure truth, and Joshua knew instinctively she was evading.
“Submitting to who?” he persisted. “I want details.”
Gabriele glanced at him, saw the stern mask of his expression, and focused her eyes back forward. “I was submitting to you,” she said in a voice that was a low whisper of embarrassment.
“And in your fantasy did I fuck you, Gabriele?”
“Yes, Master.”
He paused and just studied her face in the ensuing silence. Her cheeks were hot with color and there was a nervous tick at the corner of one eye. Her lips were wet; her voice hoarse and scratchy.
“Do you like to suck cock?”
“I would, I’m sure.”
“What do you mean?” Joshua shot.
“If it was the right man,” Gabriele qualified. “If it was someone I respected and someone who aroused me.”
“Do you like swallowing cum?”
She shrugged. “I would, happily…”
“…If it was a man you respected, right?”
“Yes, Master.”
“But you’ve sucked your ex-boyfriend’s cock before, haven’t you.”
She gave a short sharp jerk of her head, and Joshua noticed the disdainful curl of her lips. “Yes.”
“Grudgingly?”
Gabriele made a weary face but said nothing.
“When was the last time you orgasmed?” Joshua asked the next question without pausing.
“Earlier.”
“Earlier today?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Before you went to work this morning?”
“Yes, Master.”
“And when you came, it was while you were thinking about me, not the masked man in your fantasies?”
“Yes,” Gabriele squirmed with acute embarrassment under the intense scrutiny. “I was thinking about you, Master.”
Joshua grunted. He imagined Gabriele lying naked on her bed, her legs spread wide and her hands busy between her legs. He pictured her slim toned young body writhing, and the muscles of her thighs and torso clenching beneath the smooth toned skin as the first tremors of her orgasm struck her. He pictured her face then, twisted and gasping, her eyes screwed tightly shut as the force of her release drove the air from her lungs in a long moan of pleasure. Despite himself, he felt himself harden.
“Strip,” he said.
Gabriele let out a long breath and nodded. She swallowed hard. She had never been more nervous, nor felt more exposed in her life.
Without another word she shrugged off her dress and then clawed behind her back to snag the clasp to her bra. It came away in her hand, and she let it fall at her feet. Her breasts were small and firm, Joshua noted. Her nipples were hard as pebbles.
His eyes were on her breasts, and she pulled her shoulders back, her chin lifted.
“Do you want the panties off?” there was a sudden calm boldness in Gabriele’s voice.
Joshua shook his head. His eyes were all over her body, hungry and appreciative. She stood with her hands by her side, utterly exposed for his inspection, with her eyes closed and her lips pressed together in a thin line that made her expression seem almost fearful. Joshua’s eyes dropped to the sheer black lace of her panties. Through the whorls of delicate pattern he could see the shaved smooth mound of her sex, and the shadowed cleft of her pussy.
After enduring a long still moment of shivering tension, Gabriele heard Joshua speak at last.
“Go to the table. I want you to present your body to me,” he said.
Gabriele opened her eyes. Her skin felt scorched from the heat of Joshua’s gaze. She went to the middle of the room. She had thought there was a leather glove on the tabletop when she had first come into the room. Now she realized it was, in fact, a blindfold.
“Bend over the counter.”
Gabriele folded herself forward from the waist so that her forearms and cheek were resting on the table, her legs spread, her back straight, and her breasts hanging invitingly in space.
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Joshua stepped behind her so that his cock nudged provocatively against her panties through the fabrics of their clothes, and then clawed his fingers down her back to get her attention. A rash of goosebumps sprung up along her arms and she groaned.
He reached for the blindfold. It was black, with an elastic band connected to each side of the mask. He slipped it over her head to cover her eyes and immerse her in the dark world of sensory stimulation.
“Learning to still your mind is something that all submissives should practice,” Joshua began. “Because being able to find that quiet space in your head will allow you to understand patience and peace. It will also attune you to your Master, which will make your reactions to his commands more instinctive. But…” he stressed the word for emphasis, “you must also learn to concentrate your mind. Focus is critical, and being able to direct all your thoughts to a specific task is just as vital as being able to let your mind drift. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Master,” Gabriele’s voice was small.
Casually Joshua ran his palms over her back again and then his hands worked lower, edging down to her narrow waist and over the delicate lace of her panties until he was rubbing her ass. Finally he let one hand dip boldly between her parted thighs and brush across the apex of her sex.
Gabriele flinched and then arched her back. Joshua’s hand was insistent and exploring; working the damp fabric between the lips of her pussy and teasing her clit. She pushed down against the pressure of his palm, and heard herself strangle a ragged breath of arousal. She forced herself to relax and focused her attention on the strong practiced movements of his fingers. Joshua was stroking her calmly, and her skin seemed alive with the electricity of each skilled touch.
“In my world of domination and submission you must learn to concentrate,” Joshua continued. His voice was pitched like a lovers croon, soft and settling. “Because my rules are probably a little different from other Masters. My rules suit me – they’re not snatched out of books or off websites. They’re specifically to satisfy my purposes.”
Gabriele clenched the muscles in her legs as he teased her mercilessly. He saw her hands bunch into fists like she was trying to restrain herself from crying out in passion.