Subspace

by Sierra Cartwright

  Jax retreated, throwing up her hands. “Point taken. I won’t say another word on the matter. Just…take it easy, okay?”

  “You think he’s a serial killer, don’t you?”

  “My lips are zipped, mate. I don’t think anything.”

  “Good. So if he turns up at our place, you’ll be cool with it?”

  “Like a chilled bottle of beer, Ail. Speaking of which, do you want to come to the pub after work?”

  “Thought you had no money? But no. I’ve got something I have to do.”

  Ailish’s legs often felt weak and her chest constricted during the short walk to Kinky Cupcake, but today the magnitude of weakness and constriction had increased tenfold.

  She had so much to say. But would Rod want to hear it?

  Getting to the top of the stairs was like climbing Kilimanjaro, but she made it up to the cafe, where Rod, punctual as ever, sat at their usual table with two cups of coffee and two blueberry muffins.

  His face was inscrutable, neither welcoming nor off-putting, so she walked over, sat down and launched into her well-rehearsed words of apology.

  “Rod, I’m so sorry about last night. You threw me. I wasn’t expecting it and I didn’t know how to react. But—”

  He cut her off, pushing the cupcake towards her on its plate. “Honestly, Ailish, it’s cool. It was just an…experiment, really. I’m happy to carry on our arrangement on the previous terms, if that’s what you want. I won’t think any worse of you. My heart isn’t broken or anything like that.”

  The way he pinched his fingers together at the word ‘broken’ made Ailish want to cry. The brave speech was a front, she was sure of it, designed to deflect him from dwelling on his public humiliation.

  “Oh,” she said.

  “Unless you want to call the whole thing off. Which is also absolutely fine.”

  Too much emphasis on the words. It was far from fine, clearly.

  “That’s the last thing I want to do.”

  She reached for his hand, but he withdrew it.

  “What do you want to do, then, Ailish? Do you want a secret Dom, or a relationship of equals with a bit of domination and submission in the bedroom? I’d quite like the latter, but not in secret. Not hidden from your friends because you’re ashamed of me. I won’t be your mad sadistic bastard in the basement.”

  “I don’t want to keep you a secret any more. This is what I’m trying to say. I regretted what happened last night the instant you got up and walked out. I want to make amends.”

  “Amends?”

  “Amends.” She whispered the word. “Any way you want.”

  He sat back, appraising her.

  “I have two challenges for you, then. Tests.”

  “Experiments,” said Ailish.

  “If you like. The first challenge is for you to invite me round for tea with your flatmates. The second is for you to come to the Kinky Cupcake Dungeon Ball with me next weekend. I wonder which you’ll find more difficult. Public acknowledgement of me in your vanilla life, or public play in your kinky one.”

  “Public play? Really?”

  “Do you think you’re ready?”

  Ailish looked around at their fellow cupcake-loving kinksters. They all knew what she liked. It would hardly be an admission.

  She shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”

  Rod smiled for the first time all day.

  “Good girl,” he said.

  Chapter Five

  The tea with the flatmates had been interesting, a little awkward, full of suppressed giggles and furtive eye contact, but Ailish had survived and the teasing was starting to subside.

  No mention had been made, of course, of their common interest. Ailish wondered how her flatmates would react to that little tidbit of information. They could hardly be any more shocked than they were when she announced Rod’s visit. But it was hard to second-guess people. Sometimes the friends who seemed the most relaxed and liberal were the most outraged when it came to BDSM. She thought of all the conversations she didn’t want to have—‘You let a man beat you? What’s missing in your life that you would enjoy that?’—and put the possibility of discussing it out of her mind.

  Instead, she stood in front of her bedroom mirror, rouging her nipples in preparation for the Dungeon Ball. Outside the room, she heard the noises of her friends getting ready for a typical Saturday night. Loud music, yelled requests to borrow hair straighteners, coathangers being yanked from wardrobes. She checked her labia for any rogue hairs and, finding none, put on the underwear that had been a present from Rod—a black rubber cupless bra-and-suspender set. She clipped her fishnet stockings to the metal snaps and turned around in front of the mirror.

  Everybody was going to see her like this. Clothed and yet naked, all the important parts on display. He had forbidden the wearing of knickers and stipulated she had to wear the ridiculously short skating skirt that showed her bare thighs. When she buttoned it on, she found it showed more than her thighs if she bent over even fractionally. Her perky arse cheeks peeked out from the hem, inviting attention. She would have to remember to stand straight if she didn’t want to give everyone a show.

  But she did want to give everyone a show. That was the whole idea.

  She slid a hand up beneath the tiny flimsy skirt, palming her smooth mons and parting the lips beneath. God, she was wet. Already very, very wet. How many people would see her like this?

  She buttoned up the sheer voile shirt and noted how her nipples dented the fabric, clearly visible through its mesh. She left the top button undone, knowing Rod would have a little something to put round her neck later, a little something she was longing for.

  She made her makeup heavier than usual, remembering Rod’s advice to use waterproof mascara.

  “One day I’m going to whip you until you cry,” he had said.

  Would this be the day? Not if she safeworded first, of course. Would she have to safeword tonight?

  Luckily she had remembered to bring her coat up to the bedroom. Walking downstairs dressed like the whoriest whore in Whoreland wasn’t on the agenda, though the idea of it was quite titillating. She wrapped the knee-length mac around her, belted it and slipped on a pair of ballet pumps. The heels could come out later.

  “I’m off out now,” she shouted from the front door. “Have fun.”

  Jax popped her head around the kitchen door.

  “Bloody hell, Ail, what’s with the vampire lipstick? Where’s he taking you?”

  “A lecture,” said Ailish vaguely. “Some science thing.”

  “Boy, he knows how to live. But you’re a bit dolled up for a lecture, aren’t you?”

  “Just fancied a change. Anyway, see you.”

  “Take care.”

  All of the windows at Kinky Cupcake were obscured by blackout blinds and the converted warehouse building looked slightly sinister in the meagre lamplight. The door was locked and Ailish had to knock and show a ticket to gain entrance. Rod was meeting her in the cafe upstairs—anything unsuitable for innocent eyes would be mostly happening in the private rooms.

  The large room had been cleared of tables and chairs except for trestles around the edge laden with buffet food and bottles of champagne. Ailish was swept along on a surging tide of Masters and slaves, Dominants and submissives, women in domino masks and men in leather. She looked hard for Rod, but the oiled flesh everywhere was distracting and eventually it was him who found her, taking her elbow and drawing her aside to a slightly less crowded area of the room.

  “You look great!” she said, impressed by his costume of riding boots, jodhpurs and big white shirt, accessorised by a horsewhip.

  “Thanks, so do you. Or at least, I assume you do, underneath that coat. Take it off.”

  Keeping her eyes severely fixed to the ground, she did so.

  Rod took the coat from her and made a growling sound at the back of his throat.

  “Perfect,” he said. “Now you need to change your shoes.”

&
nbsp; Ailish looked around anxiously. “Can I do it in the ladies’?”

  “No. Do it here. Go on. Take off those flats.”

  Keeping a straight spine, she used her toes to push the leather over her heels and release her feet from the shoes.

  “Now take your heels out of your bag and put them on.”

  The heels were dropped on the floor, landing awkwardly on their sides. She nudged her right foot forward and tried to slide it into the shoe without bending, but it was a complicated and laborious process.

  Rod chuckled. “Whatever are you doing?”

  “I can’t bend down,” explained Ailish. “This damn skirt’s too short, and I’ve nothing on underneath.”

  “Oh, so you haven’t. I’d forgotten about that.”

  Rod, never one to accept a statement without evidence, moved a hand up Ailish’s thigh until it was underneath the flippy little skirt, fingers pinching her bum.

  It took a while, but eventually Ailish managed to manoeuvre her feet into the strappy shoes without showing too much too soon. Closer to Rod’s eye level, she felt more confident and smiled up at him, putting a hand to her bare throat.

  “Something’s missing,” she whispered.

  “That’ll come later,” he replied softly, dropping a kiss on to her forehead. “First things first. Are you ready to go downstairs?”

  A clutch of fear tightened her heart. Was she ready? The entrance to the staircase was decorated with a red and gold flame-effect archway so that it really looked like the access point to Hell.

  A long line of debauchees filed downwards to who-knew-what?

  “Will it be okay?”

  “I’ll make sure it is,” said Rod. “You’ll be with me.”

  She nodded and made a move towards the stairs. His reassurance was good enough for her now. She would make him proud of her.

  ‘Their’ room—the one they hired for their play—had been transformed into some kind of eighteenth-century salon, complete with ornate furnishings and nearly naked servants. Around a large circular table, a group of dandies and their bosomy companions appeared to be heavily involved in a card game.

  “We’ve missed the start of that one—strip poker with forfeits for the submissives,” said Rod. “Perhaps we can come back for the next round.”

  They moved on to the chamber next door, which heaved with writhing bodies, flesh on flesh, moving and moaning like one homogeneous mass of lust.

  Ailish shook her head.

  “The Orgy Room,” said Rod matter-of-factly. “But we need to get to the lecture theatre or we’ll be late for our audience.”

  “Lecture theatre.” Ailish knew what was coming but still felt unprepared.

  “That’s right. Are you ready for the display?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You know you only have to say the word…”

  “I know.”

  The lecture theatre was the last room in the row. Three rows of spectators sat waiting for their spot, which was about halfway down the programme, between How to Carve your Ginger Fig and Effective Use of Violet Wands. Rod had entitled his lecture The Science of Submission, and it seemed to have drawn quite a crowd.

  Spontaneous applause greeted their ascension to the podium, which held just a wooden chair, a desk and an interactive whiteboard. Ailish glanced at the whiteboard screen, depicting a number of graphs and a diagrammatic representation of a female bottom.

  “Stand to the side, facing the audience, with your hands on your head,” Rod instructed her, then moved to the front of the stage and commenced his address.

  “Good evening, Masters and Mistresses, and thank you for your interest in tonight’s lecture. My name is Dr Rod McRae and, together with my submissive and lab partner, Ailish, I want to conduct an experiment which I hope you will witness and find valuable and informative.”

  Ailish couldn’t look into the faces of the crowd. Instead, she stared at the floor, sensing eyes, dozens of them, on her tiny skirt and the expanse of naked thigh it revealed. She let Rod’s words swirl around her, not listening to them but knowing roughly what they were. They had already rehearsed this twice. Her thighs dampened and her nipples grazed the crackly, sheer material of her shirt. She knew what was coming.

  “…our first experiment, which attempts to find out how long and hard you need to spank in order to create the optimum shade of red. Now, we have tried this with a number of implements, all of which obtained different results. For tonight’s purposes, I’m going to use a medium-weight riding crop. Ailish, please assume your position.”

  She removed her hands from her head and moved towards the desk. Grateful that she wasn’t facing the audience for this, she pivoted forward at the waist and began to bend, feeling the hem of the tiny skirt lift, revealing more and more of her bum. Once her elbows were braced on the walnut wood surface, a spotlight clicked on, with her arse at the centre of it. Rod let his hands travel purposefully over her exposed skin, demonstrating its whiteness and flexibility, took an approximate temperature reading, then flipped the skirt all the way up. Ailish knew what the audience were seeing—her plump white globes, framed in black latex, curved and slightly parted to hint at the mound of her cunt beyond. They saw what Rod saw just before he raised his hand to mark her. They knew what Rod knew. Knew that this was what she needed.

  “Not all subjects will mark identically,” Rod explained. “Ailish’s bottom is relatively tender as she is new to spanking, so she reddens rather earlier than you might find your submissives do. Her skin is soft and, though she has a cushion of extra flesh, it isn’t enough to really protect her. When you conduct your own experiment, make a note of the time it takes to achieve this effect. If it takes a long time, you might find that you need to pay more attention to your submissive’s skincare routine.”

  Ailish snorted. Skincare routine. He sounded like someone from a beauty salon. “Because I’m worth it.”

  Her snort turned quickly to a surprised grunt as he raised and flicked down the leather without warning, snapping it onto her bottom to the accompaniment of a low buzz of ‘woah’s from the crowd. He continued to ply the crop, slowly and methodically, keeping up a stream of commentary as he worked, describing the lines of pink, then red that glowed in response.

  “At fifteen strokes, we are moving from deep pink to a scarlet. The skin begins to shine—do you see? At this point, Ailish is showing signs of discomfort. Note how she moves her legs and lifts up her feet in turn with each stroke.”

  He laid on five more, harder, or so it seemed, though perhaps she was just losing her tolerance. She whimpered and swivelled her hips, but the strokes kept coming and her bottom kept heating.

  “This is hurting now,” said Rod, quite accurately. “The pain will be sinking down below the skin and into the tissues. After the next ten, I predict we will have reached our preferred shade of crimson.”

  Ailish bit her lip. Ten. She could handle another ten. She tried to count, but the fierceness of the sting and Rod’s relentless commentary muddled her thoughts. Instead, she fell away from her self-consciousness and immersed herself in the knowledge of her absolute submission. The lashes that fell were what she was owed, and what she was for, and it was right that Rod should deal them, and that they should be seen to be dealt. It was right that everyone should know what she was.

  Her rear sizzled gloriously as the last, hardest stroke hit home. Her skin was tight, like localised sunburn, and she winced when Rod took the second temperature reading, approving out loud the shade of her arse.

  “This is the hue I always strive to produce,” he explained, moving his fingers lightly over the sore flesh. “A deep red that doesn’t fade for at least an hour. This time it took thirty strokes of full strength with a riding crop, though in the past it has taken five minutes of solid hand spanking or ten to fifteen with a light flogger. You can get this with only a few strokes of a paddle…but I don’t like to peak too soon, I don’t know about you.”

  Ailish floate
d on the chuckles of her audience.

  “Does anyone have any questions before we move on to the next stage of the test? Yes, you, Sir, with the pitchfork.”

  “Does she take the cane well? I’d love to cane her.”

  “She does indeed. Perhaps at the next ball we’ll have a caning demonstration. Yes, Madam in the purple silk.”

  “You mentioned a skincare routine. Would you care to elaborate on that?”

  “Yes, Ailish is instructed to moisturise her bottom morning and night to keep the skin soft so it’s easily reddened. We often use arnica after a heavier implement, and she exfoliates with a mitten every time she showers.”

  “Great, thanks.”

  “So, to move on from the spanking side of things…we need to test the level of arousal this riding crop has produced.”

  Ailish, no longer caring who watched or what they saw, spread her thighs at the instigation of Rod’s hand, letting his fingers reach up to her wet, displayed pussy and rub in her juices. The soreness of her bottom, her humiliating position, the sense of being owned and used and watched, all combined to fling her out of her inhibitions and into the vast reaches of subspace, where she let it all happen, let her body ride the waves, kept afloat by the profound pleasure of her abasement.

  He flipped the slideshow to display a scale of arousal, putting her at the top end, then he took a vibrator from the desk and switched it on.

  “Earlier this week,” he said, “we performed a control experiment, in which Ailish was masturbated to orgasm unspanked. I wish to test the hypothesis that her time from instigation to climax will be shorter post-spanking. We have three minutes to beat. Count down with me, ladies and gents.” He set a timer off and applied the vibrator to Ailish’s clitoris.

  “See how engorged it is,” he commented, spotlighting her clit.

  The blunt bulb of the vibrator buzzed around her most sensitive parts, moving between her opening and her clit while Rod fondled her sore bottom. Ailish, almost at the first touch of the intruder, gasped and squirmed while the audience laughed along. They would see her come. They would know what a slut she was. Every time she saw them again—and she could see them anywhere, she wouldn’t necessarily know it—they would remember how her arse had looked under the crop and how quickly she had come with a vibrator shoved inside her for all to watch.