by Leah Braemel
“Do you want to see more?” Thalia had asked. “I can teach you what excites Sam. Or perhaps you just wish to learn more about your own sexuality, understand your own triggers to arousal?”
At Rosie’s flustered nod, they’d left the security office through a door on the opposite wall instead of going back through the office area. Thalia wheeled through the Rotunda, slowing so Rosie could observe a Master and his slave who knelt on the dais in front of him, pointing to the way the slave presented herself. She slowed again to watch a Domme training her sub in the grotto, each time murmuring quiet notes of instruction to Rosie before moving on.
By the time Sam had picked her up that afternoon, she’d been hornier than a mountain goat and they’d spent the evening exploring her boundaries. Once he was safely ensconced in his office the next day, she’d phoned Thalia and gone back for private lessons. As she had the day after that. And the next day too. She’d learned where a sub should look, and where they shouldn’t, of how she should stand, how to kneel, tilting her pelvis to expose her pussy. But the main emphasis of Thalia’s lessons was centered on letting go of her inhibitions. Of embracing her body and her sexuality. Of granting herself permission to embrace the pleasure instead of repressing her arousal.
On the fifth day, Thalia opened a cabinet, revealing a dozen different styles of floggers. “As Sam’s partner, you must be trained in how to use one of these.”
Unable to visualize Sam ever submitting himself to a flogger, Rosie nodded and listened as Thalia explained the different types of devices—rabbit skin to moose hide, riding crop to bullwhip. Thalia then positioned a velour pillow on a strangely shaped bench that vaguely reminded Rosie of the one in Sam’s private suite. “Try imagining the place you want to hit before you strike. The tails will leave a track so you can see how accurate you are.”
It was tougher than Rosie had thought it would be. After she’d finally mastered the placement of her blows, Thalia called Spencer into the suite and ordered him to strip. Without saying a word, he’d obeyed his mistress, revealing a well-toned body with an elaborate ivy tattoo that trailed from his shoulder, down his chest and around his hip, its end embedded in the deep cleft between his buttocks. He knelt in the middle of the room, his thighs wide apart, his eyes discreetly lowered, his hands clasped behind his back.
“Spencer,” Thalia had said. “I understand you watched Mistress Grace and her sub at play earlier this morning.”
“Yes, My Lady.”
Thalia proceeded to question Spencer, determining that although he hadn’t specifically disobeyed her, he had allowed the sub to fondle him at Grace’s instructions.
“You’d only said I mustn’t pleasure myself, my lady. And as you instructed, I didn’t come,” Spencer had said proudly.
“But you found pleasure in it. And thus went against my instructions. For that, you will receive twenty stripes of the flogger. And I think I shall enforce your chastity.” Thalia handed him a strange looking device of acrylic and metal and ordered him to attach it.
Rosie watched, half fascinated half horrified as Spencer wrapped the acrylic ring around his scrotum, cinching it so his balls drew away from his body, then enclosed his cock within the metal chamber that would prevent him from having an erection.
Once Thalia gave her approval to his effort, Spencer bent over the angled bench that left him with his ass high in the air, and his head nearly to the floor, waiting passively as Thalia locked him in place. She then turned to Rosie and gestured to the flogger she’d been using. “Mistress Rosalinda will be administering your punishment today, Spencer.”
Rosie started to protest but Thalia shook her head.
“You must practice, Rosie. In a controlled environment.”
If it was possible for Spencer to look even prouder in that position, he did. “I would be honored to receive your punishment, Mistress Rosalinda.”
Gripping the braided handle, she’d brought it down across his buttocks and cringed at the sharp sound and the red trails that bloomed on his skin.
“Thank you, Mistress,” Spencer whispered. The bench had been designed with an opening for his cock, and she could see through the hole that his cock had inflated and was straining against its metal bonds. The device must be causing him even more pain than she was with her flogger.
By the tenth strike, Spencer’s ass was bright red and drops of liquid quivered on the end of his cock. And Rosie was so turned on, she was having trouble breathing. She looked at Thalia in confusion. “I have to go…”
“Don’t be embarrassed, Rosie,” Thalia said quietly. She took the flogger from Rosie’s hand, allowing Rosie to flee the room and seek the solitude of the office once more.
While she wasn’t prepared to be publicly paraded through the halls as Sam’s submissive, maybe it was time for her to experience more of what Sam might require of her.
Pity she couldn’t go back to Sam’s private suite and sneak out a flogger. Maybe Thalia might give her one. Except Sam would not recognize it and ask where she’d got it. And then she’d have to admit she’d left the office area that first day, and her subsequent visits.
But Sam had a secret store of things at home, didn’t he? That night he’d blindfolded her, he’d come up with leather restraints and what she realized now was probably the tails of a flogger. And before the party, he’d produced that butt plug and harness. So there had to be some sort of hidden cabinet somewhere in the apartment.
Ideas flitting through her mind, she called the office and left a message with Sandy that she was heading out to do some shopping.
After hitting a mall, and a few other specialty stores, she dropped her bags in Sam’s condo, then checked in with Scott, snagging the blueprints to Sam’s apartment.
It took her fifteen minutes studying the blueprints to notice how Sam’s apartment didn’t quite align with the walls in 1202. It took her another forty-five minutes to find the hidden panel concealing the keypad in the closet, and thirty more to crack the code to open the door.
The heavy bulletproof door swung open soundlessly revealing not just a cabinet, but an entire room.
“Holy crap.”
About the size of his bathroom, the safe room was equipped with everything needed to last out an attack including a bed that folded into the wall, a toilet and phone which was probably hooked up to a second line separate from the main one. But Sam had added a few extra touches, like a bench exactly the same as the one Spencer had been restrained on in Thalia’s suite. Hooks gleamed from various heights on the opposite wall and even on the ceiling. Several cabinets had been built in, but there were no floggers or whips in artful arrangements the way they had been in Sam’s private suite. Damn it, surely he had something here he could use.
The first cabinet held clothing. Leather pants with laces and zippers that extended all the way around the crotch, a variety of vests, some leather, some black satin. There were laced jock straps, harnesses and belts. She opened the first drawer of the second cabinet, revealing various sized dildos and butt plugs. The two drawers below contained numerous ball gags and bits, cock rings, leashes, and hoods both full masks and half masks, and all types of restraints. The fourth draw contained the motherlode—a collection of floggers, some furry—rabbit skin, others of soft leather.
Perfect.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sam worried when it was Scott who met them by the garage elevator instead of Rosie. Where was she? She’d put in a cursory appearance at the office in the morning before disappearing for nearly five hours. Which was lucky for him because it had given him a chance to duck out of the office to arrange his surprise. Hopefully Kris would keep his mouth shut about that trip.
“Rosie isn’t upset about something, is she?” he asked Scott as they rode the elevator to the top floor.
Scott shrugged. “No, she seemed fine when she got back this afternoon.”
“Do you know what she’d been doing?”
“Shopping from the looks of the b
ags she was carrying.” He grinned. “One of the bags was from Victoria’s Secret. Looks like she’s got plans for the night. Oh, and she grabbed the floor plans to your place, but she didn’t seem to be worried about anything. Why?”
He unlocked the door to Sam’s penthouse, a sure sign that Rosie was inside since Scott hadn’t felt it necessary to check it out first.
Sam closed the door and locked it, listening as Scott’s footsteps retreated down the hall. “Rosebud? You here?”
“I’m right here. Master.”
“Holy fuck,” he breathed as Rosie sashayed toward him wearing only a fire-engine red leather bustier and a matching pair of stilettos. And here he’d been expecting trouble. This type of trouble he’d take on any day.
“I take it I meet with your approval. Master?” She stopped in front of him and lowered her eyes, her hands demurely clasped behind her back.
Just like a properly taught submissive. Goddamn, if Rosie had managed to sneak past Andy and watch some scenes at the club that day, he was going to strangle them both. Unless Thalia had given Rosie private lessons in her office. His blood pressure lowered slightly.
“Rosie? You want to tell me what’s goin’ on?”
Rosie kept her eyes trained on her toes as she answered, “I would like to learn to be a good submissive, Master. Will you train me?”
From the immediate hard-on he got, his cock definitely approved of the plan. Did she have any idea what she was asking of him? What he might ask of her?
“Do you mean for the night? Or for the long haul?”
She looked down, frowning, before answering slowly, “Which would you prefer? Master?”
He didn’t want her just as a playmate for the night. He wanted this—her—for a lot longer. Except that would put her in danger from whatever psycho was stalking him. She was probably already in danger.
Maybe there was a way… He was getting ahead of himself anyway. She might not like what he planned for her. For tonight, it would be a game he’d play, then they could discuss the scene and decide if she wanted to take further or not.
“I don’t expect you to commit to the lifestyle based on one night. It takes a lot of discussion to make that commitment, Rosie. And we’ve barely scratched the surface. Let’s see if you feel the same way at the end of the night.”
“Yes, Master.” A question flickered across her brow. “Except if we did it long term, would I have to call you Master at work?”
He slid an arm behind her, flattened his hand over the small of her back as he pulled her hard against him. “I’d never do anything to embarrass you at work. I’ll only ask that you call me Master during our scene play. And we’ll save the scenes for special times—you don’t always need to be the sub. The rest of the time we can just be Rosie and Sam.”
Her body relaxed against him and the playful look returned to her eyes.
“But,” he continued, “should we decide to continue your training, I reserve the right to start a scene whenever and wherever I choose. And that’s not always going to be here in the privacy of the apartment. I won’t call upon you at work, but one day when we’re out with friends who may not know about our agreement, or when we’re at a party, or walkin’ down the Mall, I will call you Princesa and you will obey me, no questions asked.”
She tilted her head, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “So we could be sitting at a restaurant, and if you told me to slide under the table and go down on you, I’d have to or you’d punish me. Have I got that right?”
“Exactly.”
“I think I can handle that. I’ve always been a bit of an exhibitionist.” When she unzipped his pants and slid her hand inside to stroke his cock, he leaned his head against the wall, struggling to maintain control. “It’s nice to know you—Christ, that feels good, baby—won’t have any problems with that little scenario.”
She flicked her thumb over the head of his cock, smearing a dab of pre-come over it, before removing her hand. “What do you wish for your slave to do for you first, Master?”
Pity she didn’t still have her hand wrapped around his cock when she’d called him that. She would have felt it throbbing even more than it already was.
He held her by the shoulders, letting her feel his strength. Then once she got his message to stay in place, he strolled around her, slowing for a prolonged appreciation of her backside.
“You’re not my slave, Rosie.” Though Jill had preferred complete domination and referred to herself as his slave, he’d never believed in the Total Power Exchange of the Master/slave relationship.
He forced himself to concentrate. “With me as your Dom, you’ll always have a choice. And by choosing to follow my instructions, you’ll prove your obedience and loyalty.”
“Just so you know—while I’m up for almost anything, I do have limits.”
“So do I. That’s why you have your safe word. And before we begin I’ll give you a list of things that you’ll agree or disagree to do or allow to be done. We’ll write up a contract so there are no misunderstandings.”
“I’ve already filled one out—it’s on your desk.”
Thalia had to be behind tonight’s adventure. Tomorrow, he was definitely going to pay a visit to his former mentor and find out just what had happened after he’d left Rosie at the club that day.
He wrapped his arms around her, drew her against him, and rubbed her back. Her heart was racing but whether from fear or excitement he couldn’t tell. “Trust me, Rosebud, I’ll never do anything you don’t want to do. Everything will be safe, sane and consensual. And we’ll take it slow. I’m not going to expect you to understand and do everything that I will ask of you, but I hope you’ll trust me enough to at least try.”
“I know.” She rested her head on his chest. “So how do we start?”
“You still wanna use cochino as your safe word?”
She nodded. “It’s as good as any.”
“What’s the proper way to respond?” he gently reminded her.
“Oh. Yes, Master.”
“Once we start tonight’s scene, you will do what I tell you to do with no argument. If I tell you to crawl across the floor, you’ll crawl. Willingly. If I ordered you to answer the door naked, you would do it with a smile.” When she frowned, he amended. “We’ve already established I won’t demand anything of you around your co-workers, right? So I wouldn’t ask you to do anything like that around Andy or Scott, anyone. The point is, if I give you an order, you will obey me without question. And when it is time for your punishments, you will offer your pretty ass up to me with a smile and then you’ll thank me afterwards.”
“Yes, Master.” A hint of a smile crossed her lips before she bowed her head again.
What was she so pleased about? That he’d agreed to her terms? Or…oh, who knew? Whatever man could figure out the inner workings of a woman’s head deserved a Nobel Peace Prize. Time to regain control, because he had a feeling he’d just lost it.
“Just so you’re warned, if you disrespect me or ignore an instruction tonight, I will spank you.”
Did her eyes just widen? Yeah, her pupils were dilating and her breath was shallowing. Son of a gun. So punishments may actually be a reward to her.
He let his smile broaden. “And if you’re very disobedient, I will flog you. Maybe you’ll even beg me to punish you.”
“Yes, Master.”
Minx. “By the way, I should warn you. By agreeing to my terms tonight, you’re giving me permission to fuck that beautiful rosebud ass of yours again.”
She stuck one hand on her hip and struck a pose, her head tilted to one side. “Do you know what I think? I think you’re deliberately trying to scare me. But I’m still here, aren’t I?”
“Yeah,” he said softly, the predatory animal hidden deep inside leaping to the surface. Miss Rosalinda Maria Ramos’s reaction couldn’t have pleased him, or challenged him, more. “Yeah, you are. Now go into the kitchen, Princesa, and fetch me a beer.”
To his
surprise, she readily agreed. “Yes, Master.”
She returned less than thirty seconds later, Heineken opened and poured into a glass. He sat down on the couch. “Whenever we’re in a room together, you will always stay lower than me.” Considering her height compared to his, that wouldn’t be difficult.
She surprised him again when, instead of sitting on the couch beside him, she knelt at his feet in a supplicant position as if she’d practiced for days. Maybe she had. A niggling feeling started in his chest, wormed through his intestines. Where had she seen someone in this position if she’d stayed in the office? Unless Thalia brought someone into the office to demonstrate. Just what other demonstrations had Thalia provided?
“Take off the bustier.”
“Yes, Master.” He was rather disappointed that she didn’t fight him, didn’t yell about how he was from the dark ages. Push her, see what she might tell you. Because she’s obviously trying to push you…somewhere. But where?
With a smile suggestive of more, she undid the laces of the bustier and let it drop on the floor. Her hair draped over her shoulders, the curls pointing toward the dark brown buds of her nipples. Beautiful. Luscious. His.
How far should he test her limits? Start with something simple.
“Go stand in front of the window, facing out.”
Her glance darted toward the picture window and the first sign of hesitation appeared. “But the people in the condo on the other side of the street might be able to see that I’m bare-assed naked.”
“That’s the point.”
He wouldn’t tell her that he knew exactly who would be watching, or how they reciprocated for him.
He waited until she was in position before saying, “And questioning me has earned you your first punishment.”
“Cr—” She started to protest then stopped. She straightened and gave him a regal nod. “Yes, Master. Sorry, Master.”
Like hell she was sorry. She looked like the proverbial cat with canary feathers stickin’ out of her mouth. But what was her game?