“What time is it?”
“Breakfast time.” He reached over to the dresser and then slid her glasses on her. “Thought you might like breakfast in bed.”
She focused her eyes reluctantly. She could smell bacon. And a subtle, musky cologne. Two good smells to wake up to. Maybe, just maybe she’d forgive him for waking her up at this hour. She sat up, glad she’d put on the blue chemise she found in one of the drawers. It wasn’t flannel PJ’s, but at least she wasn’t indecent. “Breakfast in bed is nice,” she allowed. The tray was on the dresser. It looked as if there was an omelet and a big glass of orange juice on it as well. Yummy.
“You’re overdressed. Take it off.”
“Huh? I just have this and panties.”
Carter grinned. “Panties too? Those definitely have to go.”
Even though he’d seen her naked, she hesitated.
“Food smells good, doesn’t it?” he asked. His expression implied he had all morning. “Could get cold though.”
“Bastard.”
“Doctor.”
She blinked. Where did that come from. “Huh?”
“You have a PhD in biology. I was going over your file last night. You’re smart. Smarter than your actions yesterday evening, for sure. Want to tell me what was going on? Because if you want breakfast, you’re either going to have to tell me or strip. Your choice.”
Well, she certainly wasn’t going to tell him. If she hadn’t been so distracted overnight, maybe she would have come up with a more plausible story. She sighed and pulled the chemise over her head and looked at him, hoping she’d get her food. His gaze swept over her breasts and then back up.
“Panties too,” he said.
“Damn.” She’d hoped he’d forget. She pulled them off, keeping herself under the covers. He put out his hand. She made a face and put the blue panties, bunched up, on his palm.
“Good. No more panties without permission. Understood?”
She’d never responded well to being given orders. “I thought Tom was in charge of me.”
“Master Thomas, to you. And he can be, if you prefer it. Shall I get him?”
Well, that was the wrong card to play. “No. That’s okay.”
“Thought not.” He reached for the tray and positioned it on top of the covers on her lap.
Smug bastard. She picked up a fork and started in. The bacon was perfect, crisp but without any trace of being burnt and not as fatty as she was used to, and the omelet was delicious, full of cheese, red bell peppers and greens. She couldn’t knock the food. “Did Tom—Master Thomas make this?”
“No, I did. Everyone’s getting a different breakfast this morning, and you’re the only one getting breakfast in bed. I’m actually expecting an argument to break out and I thought it might stress you. Especially with the headache you got from dinner last night. If,” he eyed her speculatively, “that was a real headache.”
She tried to breathe normally. “Oh, it was a real headache. I don’t deal well with crowds. I’m a very private person.” Maybe he’d take that as explanation for her desire to wander. It was worth a try. It wasn’t totally untrue, although she wasn’t so much of an introvert that sitting with six people at dinner was going to give her a headache.
“Curious. You didn’t put that anywhere in your application.”
Better to keep it simple. And not embellish. “So what did you have for breakfast?”
“I was thinking I’d eat here.” There was a teasing glint in his eye.
She looked for another tray but didn’t see any. “Hmm? Oh. Sorry if I’m being selfish. Want some bacon?”
He shook his head. “No, my dear, all that’s for you. This particular big bad wolf is not after any pig. Besides, I already had some. But,” he added with a grin, “I’ve got a taste for little red riding hood, and I’m going to eat you all up. Finish your breakfast.”
He expected her to eat after that comment?
But she did, aware of his eyes on her with each morsel she brought to her mouth. She suspected she was blushing all the way down to her chest by the time she finished. Once she swallowed the last swallow of orange juice and set the glass back down on the tray, he took the tray off her lap and put it back on the dresser.
“Need to go to the bathroom first?”
“Yes. Don’t suppose you’ll let me have a whole shower?” The thought of him between her legs was heavenly, but she wanted to be clean and fresh for him. Would he be able to tell she’d been aroused all night by tasting her?
“I’m a patient man, but not that patient.”
“Worth a try.” She hesitated but she wasn’t sure what good it did her. He wasn’t going to chivalrously turn his head. She slipped out of bed on the other side from him and walked to the bathroom.
“Nice ass,” he remarked.
Normally that would have pissed her off, but she gave her hips a wiggle before shutting the bathroom door behind her.
His gaze was on her when she emerged again as well. She didn’t know what to do with that. When she’d had boyfriends, they’d been interested in “doing it”, but they never looked at her so intensely. She didn’t know where he wanted her either. It seemed awkward.
“Maybe we could like, fuck, instead?” His cock would feel good in her. A few hours ago she’d been stroking herself, thinking of how it would stretch her.
“Maybe you need to learn that you’re not setting the rules.” He pointed to the chair in the corner. “Sit down there.”
“Yes Sir.” It was clearly an order, and her legs moved to obey before she’d even made a conscious decision about it. She sat down and rested her hands on the wooden arms of the chair. The leather seat was sticky on her bare butt, but she was thankful for the cushioning.
He pulled open one of the dresser drawers and got out some black rope. She’d noticed earlier that there was rope in black, red, green and white inside. All in slightly different thicknesses too.
“Why that one?” she asked.
“Because the black will look lovely against your pale skin,” he said. “You do want to look your best, don’t you?”
She did, but she wasn’t going to admit it. “What about the thickness of it? Doesn’t that make a difference?”
He chuckled as he walked over to her. “You’ve found me out. But for what I had in mind, that narrowed it down to the black or the green. Now then.” He took a utility knife out of his pocket and cut the rope twice, giving him two lengths about five-feet long each. She watched. The knife made her feel uneasy, and as easily as it cut the rope, it had to be razor sharp. It was longer than a normal Swiss army knife too. She breathed easier when he snapped it shut and put it back in his pocket.
“Not comfortable around knives?” he asked.
“I’m fine with them.” It was the truth, normally. She usually carried one herself, and she had no qualms about using a scalpel although she hadn’t had occasion to pick one up since she got her degree and started focusing more on botany than zoology. Still, she wasn’t squeamish. He’d think she was a mass of phobias if she didn’t calm down, but she couldn’t explain her behavior of the night before. She was anxious though, that he not think she was crazy. “Just in this situation. And that one was a bit long.”
“I won’t hurt you, Natalie. No one here will cause you injury. You’re safer here than you would be going to work every day.”
“I don’t trust Kyle.” And she didn’t think any sane person would.
“I get that. Master Kyle likes it rough, a lot more than Master Thomas or I do. But he won’t hurt you either.” He moved her hand so her arm was perfectly parallel with the chair arm and then wrapped the rope around her wrist and the chair arm several times. “He’s intense, I’ll give you that. And not the warmest person. But he has a sense of honor and integrity to him that I’d stake against anyone. No one I’d rather have with me in a foxhole, as the saying goes. He saved Tom’s life once. He’d dive in and take a shark on barehanded if he saw someone at risk in
the water. But personally—I’d like his odds better if he had a knife.” He smiled and moved on to the other wrist.
“How’d he save Tom—Master Thomas?”
“Tom was transiting what was supposed to be a cleared area of Basra but wasn’t. Apparently the SEALs had been given some bad intelligence. Kyle heard about the operation and took two men with him to try to clear a bunker he knew was still occupied with Republican Guard units. Got there just in time too. Kyle took a shot from a sniper that scarred his face. Roger, who you’ll meet later, was in on the action too.”
“Wow. And when did you meet them?” She moved her hands instinctively to talk, only to find that she couldn’t. She’d hardly noticed him tying the second one to the chair. The rope was coiled around her wrist thickly enough that it didn’t cut into the skin at all, but she wasn’t going anywhere without dragging the chair along with her.
“I did the investigation afterward into what went wrong. Apparently Kyle had been told not to go. A typical mess where desk jockeys get in the way of people who have a job to do. I had to get to the bottom of it. And, Natalie?”
“Huh?”
“I always get to the bottom of whatever I’m investigating.” He fixed her with a stare. She believed him. For a moment it felt as if he could see through her.
I’m in big trouble.
Then he reached down and pulled her left knee to one side. He tied first one ankle, then the other to the chair legs. Then he pulled her forward so that she was at the edge of the seat.
She clamped her legs shut. She couldn’t get them all the way because of the way her ankles were tied, but she still had a little leeway. For the first time in her life she was glad to have extra fat on her thighs.
He chuckled. “Still resisting, hmm?” There was plenty of rope left from tying off her ankles and he pulled the knife out again and cut a few new lengths. He pulled her legs apart and he was too strong for her to resist. He tied her thighs to the supports for the chair arms so that she was displayed lewdly open at the edge of the seat and she couldn’t close her legs.
“Perfect.” He stroked her with a single finger. He rubbed upward, gathered moisture from her pussy and used it to let him glide slickly across her clit. The act shot sparks straight to her core.
It was clear that he was making a mission of finding out what she was up to, but he sure had a weird way of going about it. He was pampering her rather than punishing her for not telling him. She didn’t know what to make of it.
He knelt on the floor, his head between her legs, and inhaled. He looked as if it was the best aroma in the world.
“Have you been touching yourself, Natalie?”
“Yes.” She’d been ready for an interrogation, but not that question. And even though it was personal, she automatically told him the truth, without even thinking it over. She couldn’t afford to be caught off guard like that.
“Good girl.” His hands stroked her thighs, his touch light. She closed her eyes so she could take in the sensation of his fingers without anything else to distract her. Then something wet touched her clit and her eyes jerked open. She’d have jumped out of the chair but she couldn’t because she was too tightly bound. She wanted to stroke his hair while he licked her and she couldn’t do that either. She was helpless.
His tongue licked along her folds, making her tingle.
“Shouldn’t it be me pleasuring you?”
“Not if I decide otherwise. You think it’s submissive to enjoy another’s pleasure and Dominant to take without giving? It has nothing to do with that. You and I are not very different, I suspect, in the desire to give.” He chuckled. “The difference is that I’m in control. And I can choose to lick you here—or here—or there.”
The last lick was centered right on her clit. He knew what he was doing too, swirling the tip of his tongue on the center of her pleasure. It was almost too much, but it made her want more.
He thrust two fingers into her pussy. They slipped in without resistance. He curled them until he found her G-spot then looked up at her. What he wanted to see was beyond her. She was trying to keep her head but she was pretty sure she looked glazed. It felt so good. If he were to touch her clit while he was doing that, she’d come for sure. A tension was building in her core, wanting to be released.
This is when he’ll ask a question. Right when I want to come. That’s how he’ll try to control me.
Instead though, he kissed her pussy lightly and then flicked his tongue right where she wanted it. Her orgasm uncoiled from her center and lashed her body. She always trembled and flailed when she came, and she could hardly move. Somehow that made it more intense, as if she needed to move to help it escape. She wasn’t able to recover from the first wave when the second wave hit, triggered by a subtle adjustment of his fingers inside her.
She screamed. She tried to bite her lip to hold it back, but it didn’t do any good. Her cheeks flushed with the embarrassment of it, sure that the whole island could hear. The scream turned into a moan, at least as the aftershocks rolled through her. He was kissing her pussy again. She didn’t think she could take any more of his tongue directly on her clit. It had become too sensitive. He seemed to know it too. She didn’t have to tell him.
He looked up at her and grinned. “You’re lovely when you come. I’ll be hearing that scream for a long time.”
“Oh my god, I can’t believe I— How will I face the others?” She wasn’t entirely sure that she could even face him after his comment about the scream, but given that she was tied up in a chair, she really didn’t have a choice.
“Considering what they’ve probably been up to, I doubt it will be a problem. Leave that embarrassment for the outside world. Sex is no sin, and taking pleasure from it is a gift. Here on Submission Island there’s no need for shame. This is paradise before Adam and Eve realized they were naked.”
“I wonder when people did start worrying about that sort of thing.”
“Hmm?”
“When did we decide we couldn’t just have sex out in the open? Why did shy people thrive at the expense of exhibitionists? It’s not that way for chimpanzees. I suppose it has something to do with the evolutionary advantages of monogamy.” This was much safer ground than talking about her orgasm or her embarrassment and she warmed to the topic. “Sex outside the monogamous relationship has to be furtive, to avoid complications over whether the man is protecting his own genes or someone else’s. And that desire to protect only one’s own children becomes connected to jealousy, and jealousy to violence, and violence over sex to more furtive behavior. People who had sex in public were probably increasing their chance of getting killed by someone.”
“Or maybe it’s cultural?”
“Maybe.” Most cultural things had some sort of biological advantage, in her opinion. Especially if they were connected with sex.
He smiled. “And did you come here to enjoy yourself, or to study the biological imperatives behind Dominance and submission?” He undid the ropes around her legs.
That was too close to the truth for comfort. She shrugged as well as she could without moving her hands. “Enjoy myself,” she said, as firmly as she could.
“Just checking.” He freed her thighs. “Although if you make any progress on the other question, be sure to let me know. I know what I am and what makes me tick. And I’m very grateful there are women who enjoy it. Maybe that’s biological reason enough.”
She’d enjoyed it all right. But she was better off keeping the discussion about science and not about her. “Maybe so. I’m guessing though, that a big Dominant man is a good protector, and so being such a man’s natural counterpart has some evolutionary advantages.”
“Doesn’t explain submissive men. Or Dominant women.”
“It doesn’t, does it?” Maybe it was a more complicated puzzle than she’d thought at first. A few papers in that for someone. Someone else, because she wasn’t interested enough in Dominant women or submissive men to explore it. Humans were to
o socially complicated for biology alone to hold the answers anyway, even if it could point in the right direction. Orchids, on the other hand, were right down her alley. And she still needed to find a way to get to hers some night.
How long has he been staring at me? She wasn’t sure when he’d unbound her wrists either. She’d gotten lost in thought again. He massaged her wrists, which felt lovely.
“Want to explain what you were really doing last night?” he asked.
“No.” She knew a simple no was admitting she had something to hide, but she’d run out of remotely plausible explanations. If he’d asked her when she was on the edge of coming she could have made a game of it, holding back the answer as if he was doing an interrogation scene. Now though, she had nothing but a straight denial. She worried about what he’d do next.
“Get up and stretch,” was all he said. He didn’t even seem particularly perturbed. More disappointed, which made her feel worse than if he’d been mad. Angry was his problem. But she didn’t want to disappoint him for some reason.
She got up and stretched like he told her to, aware of his gaze on her. He’d done a good job with the ropes. She didn’t feel the tingle of loss of circulation she would have expected. He’d had plenty of practice, she supposed. The thought of him tying up a whole series of other women made her stomach clench. Jealousy. She’d just been talking about that. It didn’t serve a biological purpose here, that was for sure. He was only hers for the duration of the vacation, if for that long. Partner switching seemed the mode here. Maybe she’d get into that at some point, but she sure wasn’t now.
“We’ll go downstairs and join the others. When you’re ready to tell me, let me know. You’ll find I’m a very good listener.” He turned and walked toward the door.
“I’ll be there in a moment,” she said. “Should I find something to wear or do you pick something out?” She was skating close to the edge enough without screwing up on protocol. “Um, Sir?”
“You can cover your secrets or your body, Natalie. Not both.” He opened the door and gestured her forward. “After you.”
For a moment she thought of using her safe word. She really didn’t want to walk down to join the others stark naked. She couldn’t even pretend her lack of clothing was like being at a nude beach after they’d heard her scream.
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