He softened his voice to keep their conversation private. “You’re not in the right headspace.”
“Master Aidan…” She shook her head, blinking. It never returned life to her empty gaze. “No, please don’t do this, sir.”
His gut twisted. That sadness he’d first seen and hoped he could fix fucking ruined him. “I can’t play with you like this.” He took a step back, shutting down any connection. “I won’t.”
She raised her wrists, offering them for his rope. “Sir, no, please, I’m fine. Sorry, I was thinking there…”
His breathing became restricted at her begging. He didn’t know what he had done wrong. And he surely didn’t want a submissive begging when, in fact, she loathed his touch. “You’re safe-wording.”
“I’m not.” Her lip quivered, voice trembling. “I never said the club’s safe word, Dragon.”
“You don’t have to say it with your voice.” He clenched his fists in his pocket, ignoring his desire to gather her in his arms. He forced himself to remember that his touch was the worst thing for her. Whatever he’d done, it had damaged the trust between them. He couldn’t help her now, but he could prevent it from getting worse. “Your body is screaming it at me.”
“No, sir, that’s not true,” she whispered.
Seeing that misery in her features fucking destroyed him. He took a step forward, craving to hold her until she only felt loved. Then he froze. Don’t touch her. “I don’t know what I’ve done…” He hesitated, choosing his words carefully. “As much as I wanted—and hoped—that I could help you, we seem to be at an impasse, Cora.”
Aidan had thought that night camping together had been wonderful. He’d thought about it ever since, and smiled every time at the memory. “When you cried in my arms…I assumed it changed things…” The tightening of his chest and quivering of his muscles forced his mouth closed.
“It did.” Her voice cracked as she continued to hold out her wrists. “But I…”
Aidan’s heart sank, and he couldn’t hear any more. He didn’t want to accept that as her Dom he had failed her. Nor could he admit that he’d crushed the trust. Everything he lived for, all the morals that made him who he was, shattered. “I’m not giving you what you need, Cora.”
“You do give me what I need, sir.” She lowered her arms as if he’d placed weights on them. Tears welled in her eyes. “Please, don’t do this.”
The dungeon had never looked so dark, empty, and cold. Though he noticed that most of the members who had stopped to watch the show had vanished, Kyler, Porter, and Dmitri remained.
His friends looked to him with sympathy, even though Kyler’s eyes were flinty, indicating that Aidan was somehow at fault. All his actions weren’t without thought or purpose to help her. He narrowed his eyes on Kyler, his nostrils flaring.
Cora couldn’t stand his touch.
She had rejected him as her Dom.
What choice did that leave him?
With his body tensing, he turned to Cora. “I’m not going to push this matter. But I do believe it’s best that you scene with the other Club Sin Masters. This”—he pointed between them—“it’s not working anymore, no matter how much I try.”
“No…” Her face became ashen, hands trembled at her sides. “It is working. It’s me…”
He shut his eyes, consumed with the desire to go to her. Those were selfish wants; his need to heal a submissive. This submissive he had weakened, and that made him, as a Dom, a complete failure. “No, Cora, it’s not.”
“Master Aidan…” she whispered with a tearful voice.
“Enough.”
The sharp command had Aidan glancing over his shoulder. Porter had a reddened face and protruding eyes. “I’m ending this. Right now.” Porter glanced to Cora and growled, “Cora, to me now.”
Cora inhaled sharply, looking from Porter to Aidan.
Aidan’s lips flattened. Her glancing between them told him she didn’t want to make this decision. The Club Sin Masters knew what that meant, and so did Aidan—if she chose Porter, her old Dom, that’s where her trust lay.
At the ongoing struggle in her expression, and the tears in her eyes, the floor dropped from under him. Even if inside Aidan craved to tell Porter to fuck off and to leave his submissive alone, he had to do what was best for Cora. He lowered his voice to indicate the order couldn’t be refused. “Go to him, Cora.”
With a soul ice cold, he turned away from her and approached Dmitri. He heard Cora’s hitch of her breath when he left, and then he heard her gasp, as likely Porter had taken her in his arms. He didn’t want to look.
He couldn’t bear it.
Aidan brushed past Kyler, who said nothing and merely glared. Aidan held his gaze and lifted his chin, not needing Kyler’s shit now. He didn’t need to explain again that he had no idea what had gone wrong between them. For fuck’s sake, he had taken her out to deepen their connection. Instead of trusting him, she now cringed at his touch. He didn’t owe Kyler shit.
When he neared Dmitri, his good friend stood from his chair. His shoulders hunched as he met Aidan halfway. “All right?”
Aidan didn’t acknowledge Dmitri. He couldn’t face him, not now. With heavy steps through the dungeon, passing members and scenes of desire, dominance, and submission, he didn’t want to accept a moment that would forever haunt him.
Most of all, he didn’t want to see that the submissive he had played with for two years was now being comforted in the arms of her former Dom.
Chapter Nineteen
Cora trembled on the couch in a quiet corner of the dungeon, wrapped in two warm, fuzzy blankets, since one hadn’t cut through the ice in her blood. With her head resting on the arm of the sofa, she noticed Master Kyler standing in front of her. His arms were folded and his legs were spread wide, looking in full cop protection mode.
She didn’t doubt a single member would be allowed to get close, and she was grateful. The sensation of Master Aidan’s rope hitting the floor marked the worst moment in her life. She’d never had a Dom turn his back on her. And she couldn’t have anticipated the impact of that sensation on her body. She quaked from the inside out; her arms, her legs, her hands, and even her teeth chattered.
A firm finger tucked under her chin and lifted her attention to Porter’s hard gaze. A look she’d seen many times when they dated. He’d been pushed enough, his commanding look told her.
Nothing could possibly save her now.
Her heart shattered.
Porter loosened the hold on her chin but held her head in place. “All right, Cora, we played this your way.” He lowered his voice, stern and serious. “Now we’re doing this my way.” He stared at her head-on, giving her no space to run and hide. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
A long pause followed before he asked, “Do you respect me?”
“Of course,” she replied.
Even if she sounded weak and almost pathetic, she didn’t care. In the seconds after Aidan’s rope dropped, a realization smacked her like a freight train. His rejection had crushed the strong parts of her, and with that powerful part gone, it brought a memory of a time long ago that she had felt exactly the same way.
As if the walls of protection she’d built around herself vanished when he tugged away the rope. It reminded her of when she had decided to ignore her feelings for Aidan. One action had drawn her back to that period in her life, as if no time had passed at all.
She couldn’t ignore herself anymore.
This broke her heart.
Porter’s lips thinned. “If you lie to me, you will insult me.”
“I know that,” she replied.
The techno music shifted to a soft instrumental song, and Cora didn’t doubt that Master Dmitri was responsible. She appreciated it, too, as it helped to comfort her. In her peripheral vision, she saw Master Kyler shoo away Kenzie. While it relieved Cora, she also thought it sweet of Kenzie to check in on her. By now everyone in the dungeon was aware of her scene, or lac
k thereof. That was humiliating and embarrassing in itself.
Porter dropped his hand from her chin. “All right, now that we have that established, tell me what is going on.” Concern creased the corners of his eyes, making Porter look so much older than Cora remembered. “I’ve never in my life seen you like you were tonight. Why are you not telling Aidan the truth?”
Staring into Porter’s solid features, Cora couldn’t find the strength to hide her feelings any longer, nor could she lie to herself. Tonight she had officially dropped. She’d become a weak person she never wanted to be. “It’s difficult.”
“Yes, clearly,” Porter agreed sternly. “Why?”
Cora hesitated, dragging in her runaway thoughts. She couldn’t avoid this any longer, and in her job, she’d call this rock bottom. Nonetheless, it didn’t make talking about something she’d pushed away long ago any easier, no matter how much she tried to numb herself to it. “I don’t know how to talk about this.”
“That excuse will no longer work. You broke tonight. You need to explain why.” Porter tucked the blankets around her a little tighter before he lifted his gaze. “Did Master Aidan hurt the trust between you?”
Alarmed at his suggestion, she snapped, “No!”
He scanned her face, regarding her. “Then what is it?”
Knowing Porter and the determination of this Dom, she believed with total certainty he wouldn’t drop the matter until she explained herself. She flipped over onto her back and pressed her head against the couch. “You know when we broke up, it didn’t upset me. We were okay. It was better between us as friends.” She snuggled into the blankets. “I was happier. But then I came to Club Sin.”
His head cocked, his gaze probing hers. “All this started when you joined Club Sin?”
She nodded.
Porter studied her hard, then asked with raised brows, “Being in this club is bad for you?”
She heaved a sigh in total understanding of his surprise. Club Sin was, by far, the perfect place for her. A great club for any submissive who enjoyed the power exchange and kink in the dungeon but not out of it. All the Doms held the same morals, a similar view on limits, and the Doms were experienced, even caring to extremes. “Not bad, but it changed me.”
“Changed how?”
Drawn into feelings she had fought against for so long, she admitted a truth she’d avoided: “It made me shut down.”
He glanced out to Master Kyler as Master Dmitri sidled up to him. Master Dmitri never looked to Cora, nor approached. He simply nodded to Master Kyler and then strode away. Porter turned to Cora. “But why would you do that—what happened that made you make that decision?”
Heaviness formed in Cora’s limbs as she remembered all the reasons she did what she did, but this Dom wasn’t the one she needed to tell it to. The Dom she owed that truth had abandoned her. Lord, she’d given the same advice to the girls group—“talking about this stuff is tough, but it’s good you were brave and honest.”
Master Aidan couldn’t deal with her if she wasn’t being honest. And that was the truth to submission. The Dom held the control only if the submissive allowed it, and she hadn’t been. She’d been allowing him only a sliver of control, and when he pushed for more, she had refused.
Of course, for his own sake and hers. Maybe, though, that hadn’t been the right thing to do. Tonight she’d caused him to walk away. Cora didn’t know if her actions had helped or hurt the situation. Maybe shielding him from his pain had only damaged him more.
In front of all his friends and other Doms, she had embarrassed him. She gave Aidan no other option than to release her as his submissive. What kind of Dom would he have been if he had continued to play with her when she had obviously rejected his touch? Tears welled in her eyes, and she dropped her head into her hands. “This is what I didn’t want. I wanted to play. I didn’t want to think. I didn’t want to feel.”
Porter removed her hands, forcing her to look at him. “How is that fair to you?”
“Because it worked,” she replied.
“Did it?” His brows rose. “Seems to me it didn’t work at all.”
Cora absorbed his words, and she couldn’t refuse the statement. She’d never been a weak submissive, but she had ignored emotions when maybe she shouldn’t have. What she had done had changed her, and not for the better. Though she believed sometimes a person didn’t have a choice. “Okay, fine, but the talking bit is difficult.”
“Being honest with yourself isn’t easy? Telling Aidan how you feel is hard?” Porter shook his head, cursing silently. “Cora, this isn’t making any sense.”
She ran her fingers under the cozy blanket, admitting an overwhelming truth. “I wish I had you.”
Porter gave steady eye contact. “You do, always.”
“No,” she retorted, unsure of how to get this out right. “I wish I had what you made me feel back then. How safe it was for me to share anything with you.”
His gaze blazed. “Is that what has happened here, you don’t feel safe?”
A tear slid down her cheek, which she hurried to swipe away. “No, I don’t.”
“Excuse me?”
Cora jerked her head to Master Kyler looming over her. The dungeon at his back looked pitch black, but the light from the scone on the wall highlighted his frown. “I—”
“I wanted to stay out of this,” he interjected in a tight voice, “but this has become a Club Sin matter.” He leaned down toward her, his body rigid. “You don’t feel safe?”
If this could get any worse, it just fucking had.
Great. Not only did she insult one Club Sin Master tonight, she’d insulted two of them. She cleared her throat, withdrawing into the couch. “No, it’s not that.”
“Don’t lie,” Porter growled.
Cora looked from Porter to Master Kyler, and her thoughts swam. What would happen if she admitted the truth? Would it make things better with Aidan? Would it fix everything or only make it worse?
How much worse can it possibly get?
Through all her runaway thoughts, one truth stood out. These were not the Doms she needed to explain her personal torment to. Everything she’d said to them had been the truth—she didn’t feel safe in Club Sin, but…she wasn’t explaining herself right, they were missing the context of it all. “With you I feel safe,” she said to Master Kyler.
When he leaned away, the tension in the corners of his eyes faded. “What makes you feel unsafe, then?”
Uncontrollable tears slid down her cheek. Yes, she owed honesty, and believed it would save her. Everyone knew she loved Aidan, she never doubted that. But no one knew what she’d done for him—how she hid her feelings to protect him. Nobody knew the why she had never told him. “I need more time before I talk about it.”
Master Kyler knelt down in front of her and took her hand. “You need to talk about whatever you’ve been ignoring. The things you’re saying…the way you broke tonight…” He hesitated, his gaze softening. “You’re struggling, Cora. Let us help you.”
“Yes, I’m realizing that now.” She heaved a sigh, wiping away another tear. “But I can’t talk to either of you.”
“Why?” they both asked in unison.
With the soft instrumental music around her, she glanced between them. Two incredible men that she’d put into the male-best-friend category, men who would always be there for her and that she depended on. “Because it doesn’t involve either of you.”
Porter took her other hand. “You don’t run from a problem, you chew on it until it’s no longer a problem. You don’t fear the impossible, you go after it. Enough is enough already. You can’t keep living like this.”
No, she couldn’t, even she knew that. For too long she’d hid her feelings to protect Aidan. Also, not to lose him, and she had lost him anyway. She hadn’t even talked to Presley or Kenzie about what she felt and why she hurt.
She’d always shielded Aidan in hopes that one day he’d see her waiting in front of him. Though some
people would think she was crazy, she understood his pain. She sympathized with his need for more time to recover from Lily.
Hell, she was paid to understand those dark emotions.
Now she’d reached that fork in the road when she had to make a decision. Forget about feelings that could—and did—weaken her, or face a hard truth that would require all of her strength.
She couldn’t give Aidan more time. Either he needed to face his demons or she had to move on. She’d always told herself if it ever got rocky between them or she thought he wasn’t treating her right, she would walk away.
That day had come.
This couldn’t continue.
Porter squeezed her hand tight. “You have a choice: Continue acting this way or don’t. It’s that simple, Cora.”
Kyler jerked his chin in agreement.
Cora stayed silent, still unsure how to answer. It all seemed so simple, didn’t it?
Only problem?
It wasn’t simple at all.
With what she had to face, she knew the three things ingrained into her as a submissive would be destroyed—safe, sane, and consensual. What she had to do wasn’t safe for her. What she had to talk about wouldn’t be consensual. And as far as she was concerned, walking into all of that definitely wasn’t sane.
Chapter Twenty
The next Monday, outside of the Regional Justice Center, Aidan lowered his briefcase and suit jacket onto the ground. He hadn’t gone to Club Sin Saturday night, and after a telephone call from Kyler he’d learned neither had Cora. She’d had a girls’ night in with Kenzie and Presley.
That gave him peace. At least she wasn’t alone.
The sun beat down on him and sweat beaded his forehead as he sat down on the large stone stairs. He leaned his head back and embraced the outdoors, instead of the confines of a courtroom. He stretched his neck and noticed the ache of his body. Muscles he didn’t know existed were sore from the long workouts to ease his troubles with Cora.
Her rejection of his touch had made the passing days utter hell. His nights had seemed longer. Through those long hours, he had examined every event and considered each moment. Still, he had no understanding of what he’d done to break her trust. Nor did he understand why he felt so lost without her.
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