“You okay?”
“Yeah. No. I'm not sure,” she says. Her voice is shaky.
I step in front of her and lift her head with my finger under her chin. Her pupils are all fucked up. I step closer and smooth my hands over her shoulders.
“Breathe. In and out.”
She closes her eyes and drops her head to my chest. We stay like that for a few minutes until she lets out a deep sigh and straightens up. Her eyes are almost back to normal, but her breathing is still a little shaky. I touch the side of her face and her neck.
“Sorry,” she says.
“You don't have to apologize. Are you alright?”
“Yeah. I’m not sure. Maybe it was the sound. It got really loud up here all of a sudden. I wasn't expecting to see other people up here.”
“Are you afraid to run into other people up here?” I ask. Anything she says will make sense. I just want to make sure I understand.
“I'm… I can't explain it. I just got—I just freaked out.”
“I got what I need so we can head back and we don't have to come back out for the rest of the week if you don't want to.”
“No, no.” She waves me off but she still lets out another deep breath. “I just wasn't expecting to see people.”
“We can head back anyway. You want some breakfast.”
“Yeah. Food would be good.”
“Come on. You got, Titus?” I ask. That seems to shock her back to her senses.
She looks down at her hand and looks at her grip on Titus’s leash. “Yeah. Yes, I got him.”
We take our time heading back down the trail. She doesn’t say a word the whole time.
Food seems to help. She tells me after she eats that she thinks she had a panic attack.
“I’m not ignoring it,” she says. “I just—yeah. I’m okay. Really. I just need to figure out what that was all about.”
She lets me hold her and kiss her since I have nothing helpful to say. She sits with me while I upload my images. She gives me her email so I can send along the pictures I took of her. I try not to stare at them for too long as I transfer the files. She knows she looks good, but she doesn’t know how beautiful she is. She doesn’t know what her beauty does to me.
She texts the pictures she took of us to my phone. I glance at them to make sure they came through. I won’t look at them again until she’s gone. I can’t. I have a conference call with our dev team. After, I explain to Claudia more about what I do. She watches TV while I spend the rest of the day working.
At 2:30, Carla from the post office calls to let me know my stuff has arrived. I tell Claudia we’ll head into town at four. She nods off after my second meeting and then I wake her up so we can leave. She seems one hundred percent back to herself when she tells me to hold the fuck on until she can brush her teeth.
She’s chatty on the ride down, telling me on the way about a group chat she’s in with some friends she’s known since high school. One of their husbands is cheating and they are trying to decide whether or not he should die slowly and how much of an accident his death should look like. She cusses me and the mountain for the shitty service when I tell her she should get a signal once we get back into town, in another fifteen minutes.
“He could be dead by then!” she yells at me and then she laughs.
“Sorry. You’ll just have to miss out on all of those counts of conspiracy.”
“You are no fun.” When we reach the bottom of the hill, her phone starts vibrating like crazy and I’m getting the full play by play of their plan to deal with Brendan, the asshole, soon-to-be ex and possibly dead husband. She stays in the car while I run into the post office.
“I just don’t understand how you cheat like that,” she says once I’m back behind the wheel.
“You got me,” I say with a shrug. I glance over at her and smile even though her face is glued to her phone. I leave her to it until we pull up to the store. I park and slip my hand around the back of her neck. She’s typing frantically. I realize she’s only really been in contact with her friend Liz. I wonder if her other friends know she’s here.
“You want to come in or you want to tell me your shoe size and I’ll surprise you?”
She looks up from her phone and stares at the large sign hanging over the double wooden doors right in front of my truck. The noise she makes is part cackle, part hacking cough. “Doug Wilmer’s Sportsman’s Gear Emporium?”
“The Wilmer name has been a staple of Quinten County for over seventy years.”
“And I’m sure Doug the seventh is working the register right now.”
“Close. The fourth.”
“Not the same. Let’s go get me some boots.” We head inside and Doug Wilmer’s great-great grandson, Dougie the fifth, is actually working the register. Claudia calls me a liar when she learns the truth. We head to the back and she picks out a pair of boots. Dougie grabs her size and leaves us to try them on.
I know she doesn’t need me to, but I squat in front of her and pull her knee-high boot off. She’s wearing these white knit socks that make her feet look adorable and dainty. I feel her eyes on me as I take her heel in my hand and help her wiggle her foot into the less sexy hiking boot.
“My prince,” she says with a smile.
“How does that feel?”
“I never thought I’d buy another pair of these things again.” She turns her head to the side and looks closer at the boot, but I can tell her mind is on her brother.
“I take it you didn’t pick up gear here before?”
“No,” she shakes her head. “Miles gave me a list of woodsy things and I picked everything up in the city before I came out here. He took care of everything else, like the tents and stuff. Damn that lightweight technology.”
“We will not be camping. I promise.” I run my hand up her leg and give her calf a little squeeze.
“I know,” she leans forward and kisses me. “They fit great.”
“You want to wear them out?” I say as I reach over and pick up her other boots.
“I probably should. Break them in a little. Are we getting dinner next?”
“Yep.”
“Should I leave my bra here just in case you want easy tit access?”
“A bra isn’t likely to stop me.” We head up to the register and listen as Dougie tells us at length that Claudia made a great choice in boots.
“If it was warmer you could hike down to Doe’s lake, but it’s a little too cool to take a dip. Unless you’re into that sort of thing.”
“No,” Claudia says with a little laugh. “Polar bearing is not my idea of a good time.”
Dougie nods in my direction, but keeps his eyes on Claudia. “Have him take you up to Dixon’s Peak. Great views from up there. And you can be up and back in a day. No need to camp.”
I look at Dougie as he glances between us and I realize that he at least has an idea of who Claudia is. I’m tempted to skip dinner and take her back up to the house.
“Well thanks, Dougie. We’re gonna head to the Notch tomorrow actually.”
“Oh another great spot. Enjoy.”
I take Claudia’s hand and walk her out to the car. “Everyone knows, don’t they? They know I'm the girl who almost got murdered and now I'm back.”
“You’ve been here a few days and people do talk. Especially Jad and May-Bell. And no one has seen me with a women in three years.”
“I guess that’s to be expected in such a small town.”
“Doesn’t hurt that you’re so beautiful either,” I say to distract her even though it’s the truth.
“Ugly girl would breeze right through this place, huh? No questions asked?”
“Pretty much.”
“Like I said, such a prince.”
I wink at her and nudge her toward the passenger door with a hand on her butt. We head over to Connie’s. It seems pretty quiet, but I almost slam my truck into reverse and floor it back to my house when I see Sarah’s Tahoe in the parking lot. I pul
l in between it and Connie’s truck. I take a deep breath. I’ve seen Sarah more times than I’d appreciate since she moved back to town. I can stomach it. I can, but Jad opened up some old wounds and I can’t pretend that everything between Sarah and I is completely okay. I know I will be, but I don’t want to act civil.
“That’s Sarah’s car,” I say.
“Oh. Do you want to go somewhere else?”
“The nearest place with real food this time of day is forty minutes away and I really want to crack that box open.”
She glances over her shoulder at the massive box of kink related devices and apparel. “Let's go in.”
“You're sure?”
“Yeah. I got this. Plus, we don't have to sit with her.”
“True.”
She flashes me a big grin and hops out of the truck. I'm right behind her and wait for her to come around to the other side so I can take her hand. Just as we cross the short distance of the gravel lot, the door to Connie’s swings open and out comes Sarah with a takeout bag in her hand. She takes half a step and then almost trips down the stairs. Claudia and I both stop walking at the same time.
Sarah quickly recovers though and lets out a manic laugh. She waves. “Hi. Hey!”
“Sarah,” I say.
“Hi.” She comes down the stairs with more success this time. She glances at our hands. “Claudia, I didn't know you were still in town.” I know she's lying. Her voice gets really high when she lies. “What are you two—what are you two up to?”
“Uh we just came down to run some errands and grab something to eat,” Claudia says.
“Cool, cool! How long are you in town? Thank you again for the flowers. They're on my dining room table.” Another lie. She lives with her sister and they don’t have a dining room table. My best guess is that she threw them out the second someone in town told her about us.
“Oh, good,” Claudia says. “It’s an open-ended trip right now.” She looks up at me and smiles. “Didn’t seem right to fly cross-country, drive all the way into town just to see this guy for like five minutes, so I’m hanging out for a little while. I finally got another pair of proper boots so we can explore a little.” She lifts up her foot and I think Sarah is going to throw up or her eyes are going to explode.
“Oh wow! Cute. You're going hiking?” she says, nervously.
“Just a little in the morning. I know. You'd think the woods up there would be literally the last place I'd want to be, but Shep here knows what he's doing and he’s proven I can trust his aim with a shotgun.” Claudia's voice gets really tight at the end. Sarah blinks and almost takes a fraction of a step back.
“Too true,” she says. “He is pretty protective.”
I've had enough at this point. I gently squeeze Claudia's hand. “You ready to eat?”
“Yeah,” she says. “Thank you again.” She lets go of my hand and hugs Sarah. I'm not sure what to think. Neither does Sarah, from the look on her face.
“Oh! You're welcome. Just doing a nurse’s duty.” She pulls back and gives me a tight smile. I keep my expression blank. “Enjoy your supper.”
“Thanks,” we both say at the same time in a way that I know unsettles Sarah even more. I can't drag this shit out a second longer. I lead Claudia inside.
I'm sure Connie knows all about what happened between me and Jad, but she greets us with her usual smile and gives us the booth in the back. The few people in there don’t pay too much attention to us.
“That was interesting,” I say once we’re sitting down.
“Whatever. She’s not my fucking therapist and she fucked with you. She's not gonna comment in any kind of way on how either of us are coping or how we spend our time.”
“Is this you pissed off?”
“No, just mildly irritated. Why, does me being pissed turn you on?”
I shake my head. It's doesn't. “No. You sticking up for yourself was hot, but not the idea of you being worked into a frenzy or the idea of something upsetting you. Just wondering.”
“No, I know it’s not my business per se, but I don’t like what she did to you. You might only be mine for a limited time, but you’re still mine. You don’t fuck with what’s mine,” she says with a little shake of her head.
“You need a moment with the menu?” I ask.
“Yeah give me a sec.” She flips it over then unzips her jacket. Then pulls up her shirt and pulls her tits out of her bra. “Okay let’s see. How’s the BLT?”
I know she’s leaving at the end of the week, but in that moment I want to marry Claudia Deja Cade.
Fifteen
I tell Claudia to put her tits away so I can enjoy my meal without distraction. She gives me lip for ruining her fun. I ignore her and go back to my food. My cock is hard under the table the whole meal and I’m not in the mood to even fuck with foreplay until we get back to my house. Once I get started I have no intention of stopping. We finish our food and Connie sends us back up the mountain with a fresh apple ginger pie. She doesn’t say anything, but I’m sure it’s partially a peace offering from May-Bell.
Claudia accepts it with a smile and a thank you. I thank Connie as well, but she knows I know. I can tell by the bashful grin on her face. We head back up to my place and I'm a little shocked that Claudia is so quiet. I don't complain though.
I also try not to notice how strange it feels when she offers to open the gate to my property and hops out before I can stop her, or how comfortable and normal it feels when she grabs the pie and my keys and opens the front door for me while I carry the big box inside. She asks if we should take Titus out before we get started. I kiss her before I say yes. We take care of Titus and then it's time for us.
I put my gear away in the office and then heft the box up on the dining room table. I pull out my knife and hold it out toward her.
“You want to do the honors?” I ask.
“Nah, you do it.”
I shrug, then flip the blade open and slice open the taped seal.
“Should I record this and we can post a haul video?”
“What?”
“Nothing. Show me what's in your big box.” I pull everything out item by item and Claudia takes her turn picking up and handling everything. She picks up one of the large dildos still in its plastic packaging.
“You want to sit on that now while we get ready?” I ask.
“Sure. Let me just bend over and you can shove it right in. I won't even take off my pants.”
“You think that won’t work but I'm stronger than I look and those pants look pretty thin.”
“Ha! No. We’re not using all of this tonight are we?”
“Yes. All of it. It's all going in your various orifices. Even the box.”
“Shit, I really should stretch.”
“Here's what we’re going to use tonight.” I set aside the rope, the lube, the body oil, one of the floggers, the ball gag, the wrist and ankle cuffs. I consider the blindfold, but skip over it. We’ll use that tomorrow. “How do you feel about this?”
She considers the new pile for a moment. She grabs the box of condoms and adds it. “I really need you to fuck me tonight.”
“I need to fuck you tonight, so good call there. Anything else you want to add?”
She stares at the table for a long time before she turns to me. She bothers her bottom lip with her finger nails. Then she reaches for one of the three butt plugs and adds it to the pile. It’s the metal plug with a blue jewel at the base.
“You ever used one of those before?” I ask.
“Can’t say that I have, Master Shep.” She’s being sarcastic, but I can hear the nerves in her tone. A small bit of pride swells in my chest and something else, maybe a bit of possessiveness. I like that she’s taking this seriously. I pick up that plug and switch it out with a small silicone one.
“I’ve been told that the metal ones aren’t as comfortable for long wear or if you’re moving around a lot.”
“Oh, why’d you get it then?”
> I shrug. “Thought we both might like the look of it when it’s shoved up your ass.”
“We’ll save that one for a more glamorous photoshoot later on this week.”
“Deal.” I turn to her and run my hand over her shoulders. “Do you have any more questions?”
She lets out a deep breath. “No. I think I’m good.”
“Okay. Go hop in the shower and I’m going to get everything set up. When you’re done, call for me. I’m going to dry you off and help you with your lotion.”
She swallows before she answers. “Okay.”
“Go on.” I watch her until she closes the bathroom door behind her. I look over at Titus who is watching the bathroom door from his bed. “You like her too don’t you, buddy.” He glances at me and then focuses his attention back on the door. We’re both pretty hopeless at this point.
I box up everything we’re not using and stash it back in the office first and then I rig up the ropes. I take my time securing them over the exposed beams. I test the ring hook on the far wall. I haven’t used it in years, but it’s still soundly embedded in the wood.
Then I tear the butt plug from its secure plastic wrapping and wash it with hot water and soap. I unscrew the caps from the lube and the lotion and throw away the safety seals. I grab the remotes and turn on the stereo and then find my favorite artists playlist of ambient music. I adjust the volume and then I wait.
I remind myself to focus. Claudia isn't Sarah. She isn't Meegan. She's none of the women I've been with since I started to discover who I really am. She's unique to me and to this experience and I have to make it great for her. I go over to the sink and get us each a glass of water and set those on the table. I grab a few spare dish rags just in case.
I wait some more.
I take a few deep breaths. I stretch. I pick up the flogger and run the leather between my fingers. It's been a while, but my hands and my wrists know the way. I snap it through the air and my nerve endings instantly react to the sound. We’re going to have a good time.
I set it back on the table and pace some more. I'm not in a rush, but I can't help but watch the clock. Ten minutes later the door cracks open. Claudia sticks her head out.
HAVEN: Beards & Bondage Page 16