by P Nelson
“You’re a weird guy, you know that?” Dillon muttered.
“We’re not here to discuss Linkin’s lack of a filter,” Flynn interrupted whatever Linkin was about to say. Eric suddenly knew exactly why they were here. A mixture of embarrassment and anger filled his stomach. “Why haven’t you been at the club?”
“Elizabeth needed me at home.” It was the truth. As much as Elizabeth had done her best to remain her usual perky self, Eric saw every time she became frustrated when she couldn’t speak. Every time she looked in the mirror and saw the scar Jerry had left her with.
“She has been better now for weeks. Why haven’t the two of you been back to the club?” Flynn hadn’t liked Eric’s deflection, and now, his voice became frosty.
“She’s not ready to scene again.” Eric wriggled his shoulders, anger overriding his embarrassment. “You don’t tell me how to work with my sub unless you’d like some unsolicited advice on your own relationship with Calla.”
Dillon sucked in a loud breath, and Flynn’s face turned to granite. “Going straight for the balls, eh, Eric?” Dillon commented.
“I know what my sub needs,” Eric continued, ignoring Dillon. “She needs to recover from a traumatic experience. If she goes back into the lifestyle too early, there’s no telling what may happen,”
“Did you talk to Calla about this?” Flynn’s voice suggested he already knew the answer.
“You guys are as bad as the bloody subs when it comes to gossip.” Eric threw up his hands. “I’m not ungrateful for everything you all have done for me over the last few weeks. A part of me isn’t sure I would have made it through that night without Linkin guiding me, but don’t force me to choose the wellbeing of my sub over our friendship. She’ll win every time.”
Flynn let out a frustrated breath, but it was Linkin who spoke up. “You’re right; subs gossip. A lot. At this point, I’m pretty sure I know more about your sex life than my own.” Eric frowned at him, but his expression must have changed to shocked as a realisation began to form in his brain.
“I don’t call it the sub wireless for nothing. If you want to know anything at the club, you just have to find the right sub and make her sing.” Dillon pursed his lips. “Orgasm denial is a very powerful tool, my friends.” Eric wanted to laugh at him, but he was still processing the fact Elizabeth was sharing their love life around. She was going to get a really good spanking when he got home.
“Normally, Delaney keeps that shit to herself or Martin. So, she must be pretty concerned to mention it to me,” Linkin interjected. “I want to see your naked sub beg for mercy, not hear about her feelings and stuff. Shit is about to get critical for you, my brother.” Linkin’s voice held no amusement as he said those words, and Eric’s back straightened. This was serious. “All of Delaney and Elizabeth’s schemes have come to nothing. Have you even noticed your sub has been trying to top you from the bottom for weeks?” Eric shook his head numb on the inside. He had been too busy in his own head, believing he was putting Elizabeth first, but really, he hadn’t been listening to her at all.
“You’ve got to give her a good old spanking for that, at least,” Dillon admonished. “I’m pretty sure we all learned that in Dom I am thy Master 101.”
Flynn turned to stare at Dillon. “You’re an idiot.”
“I’m all right with it.” He grinned back.
“Focus, people,” Linkin barked out. “Eric has got some serious sub insubordination on his hands. As his fellow Doms, we have to help him through this shit. So, what do you want to do?”
“He needs to tie Elizabeth up and spank her ass until she begs him to forgive her,” Dillon began. “When he’s finally satisfied her apology is genuine, he can fuck her brains out. The end.” He grinned as he stared at Eric, who glowered back at him. “That’s a perfectly acceptable way to deal with a naughty sub. Or if you want to be all hard-core about it, you can chain her over the bar and let any old Dom or Domme give her a smack on the ass. I saw the twins do that to one of the subs they were sharing once. Poor girl never disobeyed them again.”
“They aren’t actually twins, you know,” Flynn pointed out. Eric thought about Hjalmar and Edvin. It must be irritating to be referred to as the Swedish twins when all they had in common was the country of their birth and hockey. Well, and BDSM.
“I don’t want other Doms and Dommes touching my sub,” Eric finally spoke. He was annoyed at himself for not reading Elizabeth better. Angry he had missed her attempts to bring him back into their power exchange. He had no one to blame, but himself.
“Then, you’re going to have to make it a public punishment.” Linkin concluded. “Elizabeth needs to know this kind of behaviour is not acceptable, and by association, Delaney needs to learn to let Doms take care of their subs.”
“So, this isn’t just about Elizabeth,” Eric commented and reached into the pocket of his work slacks. His phone was vibrating. He looked at the time and realised he had been away from the office for far longer than he had told his admin. A message from Elizabeth popped up.
“Of course not. One sub’s insubordination spreads like a pox in a whorehouse. We need to get some penicillin on it quick, or we’ll all be left with drip dicks,” Linkin asserted, and Eric held back a gag at the image Linkin created.
“Gross, man. Seriously.” Even Dillon was offended.
“Looks like the pox has spread far and wide, gentlemen.” Eric held up his phone even though none of the group were close enough to read the screen.
“What is it?” Dillon squinted and came up off the couch to get a closer look.
“Elizabeth says she will meet me at the club tonight, and she has a surprise for me.” Eric glanced at the screen once more before pocketing the phone.
“We’re too late.” Linkin’s voice held a note of doom.
“The sub uprising Linkin has always feared has begun!” Dillon announced in an overly dramatic voice. Eric ignored the rest of the men’s antics and tried to think like Elizabeth. What was she planning? And who would she plan it with?
“Anything she does has to be approved by Thea, right?” Eric asked the question to the whole room.
“Yes,” Flynn answered. “She has final say on whether the scenes are safe, sane, and consensual.” Eric nodded his head and began his own plans for the evening.
Chapter 18
“You realise this whole thing could go terribly wrong, right?” Calla’s voice held a hint of worry as she pulled on the stays of the corset Elizabeth had picked to wear tonight. It was a deep blue colour with swaths of black lace over alternating panels. The matching blue thong left her a bit more exposed than she wanted, but she was taking control of her life again, so to speak.
“Mistress Thea explained Eric was well within his rights to end the scene and take me home. Technically, we’re still working under the training contract we signed, and he’s in charge of my physical and emotion welfare.” Elizabeth had listened to Thea, she thought it was weird to call her Mistress Thea and hear her give her a speech about topping from the bottom and the peculiarities of Dom behaviour. “I still think this is the best way I can reach him.” Wriggling inside the confines of the corset she tried to get comfortable.
“You’re not supposed to be able to breathe, Elizabeth, stop moving.” Calla pulled on the ties firmly, and Elizabeth huffed out a few times.
“How do you think he’s going to react?” Feeling a bit anxious, Elizabeth tried to remain positive. She was doing this for Eric. He was a Dom, and he hadn’t been acting very Dom-like lately. He needed to get his mojo back.
“I think you’re going to be in very big trouble for topping from the bottom.” Calla nudged her. “I’m all finished.”
“So, she takes a spanking for her efforts. That’s kind of the whole point.” Delaney poked her head around the corner before smiling and moving to join them. “Besides, if he hasn’t noticed all the topping from the bottom that has been going on for the past few weeks, he’s not going to be too hard on
her.”
“Or he is going to realise she has been trying to manipulate him instead of asking for what she wants. Funishment spankings are not like disciplinary spankings.” Calla’s eyes held a faraway look as if she was thinking of something.
“I know,” Elizabeth sighed and closed the door of her locker. “But I needed to do something. The longer Eric goes without playing, the harder it will be for him to come back to me. I want my Dom back.” She just held off stomping her foot.
“At least we can agree on that.” Calla inspected her own appearance in one of the full-length mirrors. Elizabeth felt a stab of jealousy as the resident shrink always looked like perfection. “Would you try and top Linkin or Martin?”
“Hell, no!” Delaney swore on a bark of laughter, and Elizabeth looked at her like she was crazy.
“You’ve been telling me to take charge for weeks, and you wouldn’t do it yourself?” Betrayal snaked through Elizabeth’s gut as she looked at the woman who was becoming one of her best friends.
“Elizabeth.” Delaney wrapped her arms around Elizabeth and gave her a quick squeeze. “Have you met Linkin? He knows everything. Even the hint I might be trying to take charge, and I’d be staring at the floor with my ass in the air receiving the kind of punishment on my ass restricted to only the very naughtiest of subs.” She looked at Elizabeth with a half-smile. “Linkin, Martin, and I have our problems, but them being in their Dom space isn’t one of them.”
She thought about what Delaney said for a minute before feeling foolish. “You’re right, of course. I would never try and top Linkin. He’s a really scary Dom.”
“He’s a teddy bear.” Delaney grinned. “Let’s get out onto the floor and make sure Mistress Thea has set everything up properly. Elizabeth couldn’t disagree more with Delaney’s assessment of her Dom. He was the scariest Dom she had met so far. Actually, he might be in a tie with Flynn. Delaney’s other Dom, Martin however, was strong but seemed to have fewer sharp edges about him. Excitement filled Elizabeth, and she couldn’t stop the grin that spread across her face.
“I can’t wait to get back out there.” She practically danced up and down on her toes. “Aside from a few moments when I thought giving up the lifestyle would be safer, I’ve been dying to get back here.”
“Good.” Calla wrapped an arm around Elizabeth’s shoulders, and they started to walk towards the exit of the changing rooms. Several other subs glanced their way and stopped speaking when they saw Elizabeth. The action made her feel self-conscious, but then she realised most of them were smiling at her.
“Flynn tried to keep what happened with your psycho ex-boyfriend a secret, so of course, all the subs know what happened.” Calla’s dry voice made her smile again.
“Everyone’s had shit boyfriends and shittier Doms, Elizabeth,” Delaney said from behind them. “We’re here to support you.” A feeling of acceptance and warmth spread through Elizabeth’s heart. She had a tribe. Not all the women in this changing room would become her friends, but they all accepted her, as she was, a sub who was into some kinky sex.
Elizabeth nodded and smiled at the other girls, trying to be friendly. It was hard to come out of her shell after being alone for so many years. The lifestyle had given her this opportunity to not only explore her own sexuality, but to make friends as well. How could she think joining The Cage was anything less than amazing?
Pushing open the door to the dungeon floor, Calla let Elizabeth go out first. Everything hit Elizabeth’s senses at once; just as it had the first time she walked out and felt the same nervous excitement. Music from the DJ booth thumped through the warehouse, and kinksters went about their nightly business slightly swaying to the beat. Some of the stages set up around the walls of the dungeon were already in use, while others had been prepared for a night of debauchery. The sound of flesh on flesh, flesh on leather mixed with moans and cries of pain thrummed through the Friday night crowd. Everything felt exhilarating, and Elizabeth took a deep breath, inhaling the sex and leather all around her. This was her home.
Mistress Thea was waiting for them near the edge of the circular bar in the middle of the warehouse. Elizabeth admired the other woman’s tall frame encased in a leather cat suit complete with sky-high boots and a whip at her hip. She looked like one serious Domme. A man wearing only leather boy shorts knelt at her feet. Elizabeth watched as Mistress Thea patted his head. Mistress Thea waited until they had stopped in front of her before speaking.
“The three of you look like trouble.” Mistress Thea’s voice reminded Elizabeth of when she was in charge of the uniformed police investigating the break in at her basement suite. There was zero room for insubordination. “Do I need to go over the rules for subs with all of you again?” Her gaze focused on Elizabeth and Delaney exclusively, and Elizabeth felt the hairs on her neck begin to rise.
“No, Mistress Thea,” Delaney responded quickly. Elizabeth was still trying to find her voice when Mistress Thea spoke up again.
“I’m going to ask you one last time if this is really what you want to do.” Mistress Thea’s intelligent blue eyes felt as if they were boring into Elizabeth’s skull and trying to divine all her secrets. Instead of giving in to cowardice, she had come so far, after all. Elizabeth squared her shoulders and took a deep breath. “I’m ready, Mistress Thea.”
A smirk crossed the other woman’s lips, and Elizabeth felt all her hard-won courage deflate. Mistress Thea obviously knew something Elizabeth did not, and unease curled through her brain.
“What is your safe word, Elizabeth?” Mistress Thea asked.
“Rainbow,” Elizabeth replied with a further sense of disquiet.
“Shouldn’t Master Eric be asking her that?” Delaney pointed out from beside her. Mistress Thea turned her head to bestow a look of sympathy of Delaney.
“Oh, little girl, we are in trouble.” Elizabeth felt Delaney swallow hard next to her as her own heart rate kicked up a notch. “You’ll use the stoplight system this evening. Explain to me how it’s used.” She looked back to Elizabeth.
“Red is to stop, Yellow is to halt to discuss and continue, and green is keep going,” Elizabeth recited from her reading materials.
“Good girl.” Mistress Thea pulled gently on her sub’s hair, and the man stood up and bowed his head to her. She placed a hand on his neck and rubbed a thumb behind his ear. Even though the sub was a bit taller than Mistress Thea, he shuddered under her touch, completely compliant to his Mistress’s wishes. “Remember Elizabeth, if you don’t want the scene to continue, you may end it at any time without fear of reprisal. This dungeon takes the security of its subs seriously.”
“Yes, Mistress.” Elizabeth replied truly worried for the first time since she had hatched her plan. What if she had over-stepped the rules of being a sub? She didn’t think Eric would be very mad? But what if she had stepped on his alpha Dom toes? All these thoughts scurried through her brain as Mistress Thea turned and swatted her sub on the ass.
“Come, girls. Your evening awaits.” Mistress Thea led them through the dungeon.
The look on Delaney’s face matched Elizabeth’s as they followed Mistress Thea through the rest of crowd. Even Calla wore a worried expression as she followed behind us; the normally composed shrink’s mind was clearly racing to figure out Mistress Thea’s intentions. Ahead a large crowd had gathered in front of one of the stages, but Elizabeth couldn’t see through the bodies until they magically parted for Mistress Thea. The stage held three spreader bars dangling from the roof as well as three sets of ankle cuffs on the floor. Elizabeth frowned and looked at Mistress Thea who was doing little to curb the amusement on her face.
“I asked for a St Andrew’s Cross,” Elizabeth choked out quietly as she realised the crowd were all staring at her with open curiosity. This was not someone else’s scene. It was meant for her, Delaney, and Calla.
“You didn’t think you could try and top me and get away with it, did you, beautiful?” Eric’s voice drifted over her neck, his
body heat scorched her as she felt his bare chest contact her shoulders. The pitch of Eric’s voice meant she was in very big trouble. It melted her insides a little to hear her Dom had come back.
“No, Master,” Elizabeth breathed out.
“Really? Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you thought you were getting away with quite a bit over the last few weeks.” Eric rubbed his chin and 5 o’clock shadow against her cheek before biting her earlobe hard enough to cause pain. “Tell me the truth, Elizabeth.”
Her mind racing and her heart beating a staccato Elizabeth tried to think about what Eric wanted to hear. Numerous ideas came to the forefront of her brain, but she discarded them all. The truth. Elizabeth realised as she swallowed hard. The only thing that would save their Dom/sub relationship right now was to tell the whole truth.
“I didn’t think you’d noticed.” Elizabeth licked her dry lips.
“Perhaps I wasn’t as astute as I normally am, Elizabeth.” Eric’s hands came up the sides of her corset and she shivered, melting into his touch. He traced his fingers over the swell of her breasts, and her pussy became wet immediately. Need uncurled in her belly, and she wanted to rub up and down her Dom like a cat. “But I always see you, Elizabeth. Now you and your friends have been very naughty subs, and it’s time you were punished.”
Elizabeth started shaking her head; she wanted to explain away Delaney’s involvement in her plans. Calla had been against this plan right from the start! It wasn’t fair she should get a punishment. She opened her mouth to speak, but Eric had shifted positions to stand in front of her. His thick black hair shone in the light of the dungeon and his equally dark eyes held the promise of punishment and pleasure. Elizabeth held her breath as she peeked below his chin and saw his muscled chest.