by Joey W. Hill
"Touch her again, and I'll break that fucking arm," Mac murmured, never lifting his head.
Mark froze. Conversation around the table stilled, for though the threat had been delivered in a low voice, Mac had enunciated clearly. As Violet suspected he had intended to do.
Never mind that his words, blatantly expressing his desire to be sole provider of her wants and needs, ran frissons of pleasure through her vitals. On more than one occasion, Tyler had pointed out to her that she was more of a one-on-one Mistress herself, which was another thing that she suspected had attracted her to Mac. Like called to like in the subconscious.
However, his words were a direct challenge she could not leave unanswered. She had known he would go too far, and he had done so early, bringing the issue to a head.
Proof of the point, he had raised his head now and was staring at her, hard, defiant, a clear "what are you going to do about it?" look. His position made it easy for her to follow through on her response. She slapped him across the face, using her full strength, careful to hit his jaw line instead of his eyes or the sensitive area of the ear. The strike was hard, strong, but not painful, and the psychological impact was effective. Shock was replaced by fury, and something else, something that wrenched at her heart. She masked her response to that and kept her tone cold. "It is not for you to say who touches me and who doesn't, Mackenzie."
"The hell it isn't."
She struck him again, opposite direction, using the back of her hand this time. "Put your lips to my foot, and ask for my forgiveness."
He stared at her, five charged seconds. The stillness at the table was palpable, the only sound Leila's ragged breathing as the vibrator continued to stimulate her with a soft hum. Tyler gestured for more wine, casually, though his eyes were as intent as the other Doms on the struggle, and the nuances of control and trust that were working furiously below its surface.
Her willful sub lowered his head at last, and his shoulders curved forward, his hips rising from his heels, giving Tamara a view of his backside that Violet envied. She waited as he went lower, lower, and then she felt the press of his mouth come to rest on the toe of her shoe. "I won't say I'm sorry," he said, his voice muffled. "I want to be the only one who gives you pleasure."
She couldn't think of anyone more well-equipped to do a lifetime of that for her, but he wasn't finished.
"And I will break his arm if he touches you again."
Unexpectedly, she felt herself stifling a smile at the sullen statement. She heard Tamara muffle a chuckle, and appreciated the other Dom's understanding of the situation. "Stay in that position," she demanded. "Spread your knees two feet apart, let Mistress Tamara see those oversized balls of yours that are always getting you into this kind of trouble with me."
He trembled, his hand now curled around the arch of her foot, but he obeyed. Tamara purred in approval. Violet shifted her attention to the Dom twin. "Mistress, will you do me the honor of paddling this arrogant slave's ass ten strokes to teach him manners?"
"With pleasure." Tamara rose, went to the sideboard where an array of floggers and paddles were assembled next to the makings of after dinner coffee. She chose a paddle of one inch thick wood, nine inches long, with holes in it.
Violet had seen Tamara wield one like it before, knew that the splayed leg position was just to make the sub feel excessively vulnerable. Tamara would not come anywhere near the sensitive sac, but Mac would not know that. Violet laid her hand on his head, stroked his hair back with a deceptively light touch. "Proceed." She nodded to Tamara. Leila's breathing was getting louder, and the room was thick with sexual heat, every eye watching that muscular ass quivering in the air, waiting to take its punishment.
Whack! Wood paddles made a lot of noise and hurt like fire when wielded with strength, and Tamara had a good arm. Mac let out a grunt, his fingers tightening on her shoe.
"Do you apologize?"
"Only for causing you distress, not for my actions."
"Again," she nodded. "Three strokes in succession."
Mac might have been under the impression he could handle a spanking from a woman's arm, but Violet suspected he was rethinking that as his shoulder pressed into her calf with the force of the next three strokes. His buttocks were already turning red.
Violet caught her fingers in his curls, a painful grip this time, keeping his mouth shoved to her shoe. "You will apologize, Mackenzie."
"I can't, Mistress. I want to be the only one who serves you."
"Perhaps you will, if you learn to submit to me. Stop fighting me, Mac." She nodded. "Four more."
This time, his fingers tightened on her before the blow came, and she felt his breath expel sharply against the flesh of her ankle on the second stroke. Violet worried that she had chosen the wrong number, that she'd underestimated Mac's ability to bear more pain than he should. Given the power Tamara was putting behind her strokes, he should have been screaming.
On the fourth, he let out a hiss. Violet ran a hand down the curve of his back, slick with perspiration. "Ask forgiveness, Mackenzie. You know you stepped across the line."
Tamara landed strike nine at that moment, when he was unprepared, and he bumped hard against her shins, catching onto them to keep from being thrown to the floor. His breath rasped hard, in time with the rapid rise and fall of his shoulders. Violet bit the inside of her cheek, to let her own pain pull her focus from his. "Mackenzie--"
"I ask your forgiveness, Mistress," he mumbled, his fingers going around her leg like a manacle, holding her hard, fast, communicating his physical strength at the same moment he capitulated to her emotional power over him. "I spoke out of turn, without your leave, and deserve to be punished. Please do not spare the final blow, and if you think I deserve ten more, I will submit to your pleasure."
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Tyler's lip curl in grudging admiration. Kiera and Tamara looked as if they would have given Violet their Jag in exchange for a chance to have Mac in their dungeon for one night, testing his resolve against even higher levels of pain.
Fortunately, he was all hers. Stubborn, foolish, hardheaded jackass that he was.
"I think one more should be sufficient," she said, though she wanted to call an end to it now. "Mistress, if you please."
"My pleasure again, Mistress." Tamara ran her long nails down one curve of Mac's ass, digging into the angry red color, and he gasped. She pulled back and brought the paddle back into play, one loud hard smack to the contour of his buttocks, skillfully just above the joining point of his testicles so the sensation would sing down into them but not harm him.
"Sweet Christ," Mac muttered, though only Violet heard the whispered expletive. She wanted to soothe his pain, but that wouldn't drive the lesson home.
"Now sit up, put your ass against your heels so you feel the burn," she said. "We wish to proceed with our dinner." She caught his chin as he straightened, hauled him up the last few inches and was relieved to see the flash of temper in his eyes at her rough handling. "And if I wish to have Mark eat my pussy, and command you to sit there and watch, you'll hand him a towel to wipe his mouth after I come. Do you understand?"
He was bleeding where he had bitten his tongue. She rubbed her thumb at the corner of his mouth, gently taking the blood away. At the same time she forced her eyes to remain hard, unblinking, though tears threatened behind them. She sensed Tyler's tension just beyond them, but Mac wouldn't hurt her. She didn't know how she knew that, because her beautiful slave looked like he wanted to break her in half, but she knew.
"Answer me, Mackenzie," she said, in her softest, firmest tone.
"Yes, Mistress." He sounded like he was strangling on it.
"Yes, what?"
Kiera drew in a breath at her audacity. If she was pushing past the twins' boundaries, Violet knew she was in dangerous waters, indeed. But the rules be damned. She wanted him to surrender. To understand what serving a Mistress was, because she wanted him like she'd never wanted anything in her lif
e. She wasn't backing down. He'd accept her hand as his Mistress completely, or she'd call the game over. She knew the treasure that awaited them both under all his fear and stubbornness, and she wasn't taking half.
Mac swallowed, showed his teeth. "If you command it, Mistress, I will hold a towel for Mark to wipe his mouth, after he eats your pussy." His gaze lifted to hers, and his silver eyes were torn between fury and an aching desire so strong it blasted straight into her heart. "Though I would beg my Mistress's permission to wipe her pussy first, for a sub should never attend to his needs, or that of another slave, before the needs of his Mistress."
Violet could not take her eyes from his. She mutely offered her hand, glad she only had to raise it a fraction before he seized it, pressed his mouth hard atop her knuckles. She didn't want the others to see the way she was trembling, but he felt it. His fingers tightened on hers, somehow conveying chagrin and reassurance at once, in that protective way of his that spread a warm balm over her frazzled nerves, making it all right. For the moment.
Through the gesture, she could feel that he regretted causing her the conflict, but she knew regret didn't translate into victory. She'd only breached one wall. The ones that remained might be even more difficult. She was angrier with him than anyone she'd ever known.
Tyler was right. She was in love.
Chapter 10
After dinner, the Doms changed into preferred swimwear and adjourned to the pool house, a beautiful glass structure that overlooked the water. Equipped with a pool table, wet bar and bookcase full of reading selections, the room invited diversion and indulgence. Comfortable wicker lounge furniture, set up in private groupings buffered by the artful placement of tropical plants, allowed group or one-on-one interaction equally.
During the meal, it was obvious that the displays by Leila and Mac had ratcheted up the sexual tension of all the guests to a higher level than Tyler had anticipated for this early in the evening. The lingering touches bestowed on the subs, the frequent wetting of lips and shifting of bodies, the distracted tone of the conversations. The heavy stillness of the air hovering around the table, though the palm frond ceiling fan was going at high speed. When Violet fed Mac his meal from her fingertips, she completely lost the thread of anything going on at the table.
Always a skillful host for his D/s parties, Tyler rerouted the nature of the tension by suggesting to the Mistresses that the slaves could play a game of water volleyball while they took their ease around the pool and watched.
David, Mac and Collin were typically competitive men, but Leila's charming enthusiasm and relative inexperience thrown into the mix kept the testosterone level down and the tone of the match appealingly playful.
Violet discovered there was no better game than water volleyball to display a body to its best advantage. She watched as appreciatively as the other Doms as naked torsos stretched and turned. Genitals were generously exposed as the men came out of the water to spike a shot over the net or jump up high to return a volley. The white heart shape of Leila's ass entertained and stimulated them all as she lunged, laughing, after the ball. Her breasts, heavy and wet, nipples tight with cold, could not help but keep the men semi-erect, even in the water. Violet enjoyed the beauty of every form displayed, but her eyes kept coming back to Mac, savoring each time he dropped beneath the surface to rewet his skull and came back up, water sluicing off his body, muscles rippling across his back as he pushed his hair off his forehead.
"He's extraordinary, isn't he?" Lisbeth sat down with her White Russian and chose a chocolate-covered strawberry from the silver center tray left on the patio table between them. "It's something about him. Tarzan-like. He's not handsome. He's definitely not pretty. He's just primitive. Beautiful. Raw sex."
"Sounds like you miss him."
"Sometimes." The woman's green eyes were as pale frosted as her white hair, pulled back from her elegant features. "You don't like me, but you've refrained from cutting remarks about my age, which would be easy ground. I appreciate that, and as such, I want to tell you straight out I've no lingering designs on Mac. Mostly I enjoy breaking in the 'virgins', watching them discover their submissive nature, the awareness of what power and control really mean in sex. I like to watch them grow. When Mac was ready, I cut him loose with no regrets. I introduced him to his nature and trained him. That was all."
"You did a piss poor job with the training," Violet said bluntly. "He still hasn't accepted it. He plays with it, better than most subs fully embrace it, which is why so many Mistresses have let him get away with it. He hasn't let anyone break him down, move into his soul."
"Very astute. You get right to the point in a conversation, don't you? But you and I both know there's no way I would have accomplished that." Lisbeth reached over, touched Violet's hand in an affectionate gesture that surprised her. "You know the truth of it as much as I do. You're just worked up from dinner. He's a one-woman sub. And I don't mean he needs and prefers one-on-one play, though he surely does. I mean there's only one woman he's going to let be his true Mistress."
She leaned back in her chair, examined the tray to pick another strawberry. "When I look at Mac, I think of that perfect meal behind glass, accessible only if you know the combination to make the glass slide back. You can't shatter it to get to the meal. That will just ruin the feast." She paused.
Violet cocked her head, not saying anything. Part of her resented the woman's intimate exploration of Mac's mind. The smarter part of her knew she should hear the rest of it, and so her pride was relieved when Lisbeth continued without a visible sign of encouragement from her.
"He lets a woman hold the reins sexually, probably the only aspect of his life where he allows anyone to dominate him. However, the key is that he 'lets her'. His heart is that of a true sub, but no one's ever taught him that being a true sub means the only choice is surrender. I believe only one woman is going to be strong enough to do it, the woman. Though he barely knows it, he's waiting to possess and be possessed. He's following his instincts. As I said. Primitive. Raw. Animal."
Lisbeth made a humming noise of pleasure as she bit into the strawberry, the chocolate smearing across her upper lip so that her tongue came out, delicately brought the sweet into her mouth. David missed an easy return volley completely and she chuckled.
"I don't mind making you jealous," she said, flashing teeth at Violet. "Because what I got to sample of him was tasty. But from the sparks flying between you and him, I'd say you might want to try out being that one woman."
Violet watched Mac laugh at something Leila said, engage in a brief splashing match with her, palm the ball and return to the back line to serve. "So how many do you think he's auditioned?"
Lisbeth cocked her head. "I'd ask why that matters, but to the woman who wants the role, I can imagine it would matter a great deal." She lifted a shoulder as Violet turned her gaze back to her. "Not as many as you might think. He's done a lot of playing in the dungeons, one-night type stuff, but since me, he's resisted becoming someone's regular playmate. He's so charming, he's managed to stay a free agent without offending or insulting, but it's clear he's been looking for something he didn't even really know he was seeking. The more inexperienced Mistresses didn't get that, but it was pretty obvious to someone who's been in the game as long as I have. And to the person who might just be that lucky Mistress for him."
Violet raised a brow. "I haven't known him very long."
Lisbeth waved a dismissive hand. "Don't play games with another Dom. Do you know, in all the time we were together, he was never possessive with me? Never even used a possessive when he talked about me? Or any other Mistress I ever saw him with. But you, at dinner. 'My Mistress'. He said it, implied it, several times. He's never done that, not in all the time I've known him. Ever."
She had as much as she wanted to think about at the moment. Violet gave Lisbeth a courteous nod, rose. Mac's gaze was on her the minute she moved, and when she came forward, he stroked over. He caught onto the edge of th
e pool and crossed his arms on the concrete, curling them in a loose circle around her ankles.
"Hi," she said, squatting on her heels.
He smiled, a wary gesture that said dinner was not forgotten, but he reached up, traced his thumb over her lips and cheek. She let him, pressed her jaw into his hand, closed her eyes. It released the band of tension around her lungs, and she felt weightless. A moment later, she realized it wasn't an illusion of her mind. He had simply curled his arms around her coiled form and taken her into the heated water with him, scooped up against his body. She wound her arms around his neck, pressed her face into his throat, felt the pulse jumping there. He tipped back her chin, put wet lips over hers, and she let herself float, shifted so her legs were wrapped around his waist, feeling the strength of his hands pressed against her back, holding her curves, contained in a modest bathing suit, against his bare torso. The head of his cock bumped the crease of her buttocks.
"Take me back to the edge of the pool," she said, feeling both steadier and more messed up. She shouldn't be reacting to Lisbeth's familiarity with Mac, as it was obvious the woman was not a threat, but she wanted Mac to be hers, all hers. Though it was an irrational thought, she fervently wished she had been his first and last Mistress.
He took her to the side of the pool, lifted her out of the water and sat her back on the lip, her feet rubbing against his waist and rib cage as he stayed between her knees, watching her watching him. His silver eyes studied her face, jeweled with tiny beads of water. Coursed down her neck, over the tops of her breasts, visible in the scoop neck of the one piece, down, down. Further down. He began to sink, his knees bending to take him lower, his gaze staying level with her face, communicating what he wanted to do.
Though she could tell he was offering it out of hunger, and as a continuation of an apology for dinner, a way to make amends, she liked those reasons. Violet also liked the idea of having him serve her pussy in sight of his previous Mistress. A branding that, while outside the bounds of civilized behavior, loosened the tension within her further.