If only she'd never come to the house. If only she'd never gone to Lindsay. The ad had said Kink-friendly sex therapist. His office was in a high rise in a very nice part of the city—so inviting and safe. She'd thought that was what she needed. But it had only been a crutch. She could have moved on from her last master on her own. She might have had a chance to find someone else, to have something real.
The tears began to flow freely. Let him think it was the cane.
Before she could fall down another self-pity spiral, the cream reached its full effect and suddenly all she could think about was the throbbing need between her legs. It was such a confusing cluster of feelings. Hatred, regret, need. And the only person there to sate that need, the very object of her hatred and regret.
“Please...” she whimpered. The urge to say “Master,” clawed at her throat, but she stopped herself in time. She wouldn't embarrass herself like that. He'd only laugh at her. She knew as well as he did that word meant something far deeper than what he wanted to give her.
She was sure she'd never utter that word again, except in her own mind in feverish fantasies under the cover of night.
“What is it you need, Shannon?”
Less than an hour ago, they'd been sitting at the kitchen counter, him asking her this same question. She wasn't going to tell him. She wasn't going to fuck him. But he wasn't playing fair. The cream was a very persuasive tool. It had a way of making you see the world differently—of changing priorities in an instant.
Pain and arousal. Twin catalysts the house used to get whatever it wanted. What was it exactly that the doctor wanted from her to break out these tools?
“Tell me,” he said.
“I need to be touched.”
“It's not just the cream,” he said. “We both know that. You've needed me to touch you for a long time. It practically radiates off you.”
Shannon shook her head, somehow finding the will to resist him, however limp the effort. “No. Not you. Never you.”
The cane sliced through the air and came down hard on her ass.
“Ow! Motherfucker!”
“That's for lying,” he said. There was another short painful snap of the cane against her thigh. “And that is for the language. You call me Sir. Not Lindsay. Not motherfucker. Are we clear?”
“Y-yes, Sir.”
“Good. I remember the way you used to look at me when you came to visit my office in the city. I remember you used to wear those too-short skirts and heels. Your legs seemed to go on forever. And then when you sat and crossed your legs, the silk skirt slid up your thighs exactly the way you wanted my hand to slide up them. Isn't that right? Did you imagine that whisper of fabric moving up your leg was my fingers teasing you? Did you think about it when you were alone in your bed at night after our sessions?”
Shannon felt the blush creep up her neck and into her face. “That was then,” She said, fighting the need even as she continued to writhe and squirm against the table, seeking contact that just wasn't there.
“And earlier tonight? When you got out of the shower? What was that hungry look about?”
“Your imagination,” Shannon said, knowing she was playing with fire. This wasn't the Lindsay she thought she knew, and yet she couldn't let herself admit the truth to him. She didn't trust him.
Suddenly that large warm hand was pressed between her legs, exactly where she'd always wanted it. It felt as good as she'd imagined it would—better even. Especially after such a long stretch of denial.
“Tell me to stop, then.”
Shannon pressed harder against his hand. Her hips began to move without her conscious effort.
He pulled his hand away, leaving her humping the air. “You're right. We should stop. It's inappropriate and you said you didn't want...”
“Please.” The word came out desperate and strangled. Not her finest moment if she wanted to resist him.
Lindsay picked up the cane again and moved to the front of the table. “Lick.”
She licked the length of the cane, not sure where he was going with this. A moment later it landed in a sharp wet sting across her ass. Oh. That was where. It had been too long since she'd played this way with someone. She could barely remember how any of it was done. The rules. The protocols. The creatively nasty signature styles and habits of the master in question. The personal private rituals, unique to him—to the two of them ensconced in their own private world. A world she used to live in.
Slowly he ran his fingertips over the welts he'd left. How disappointing it must be for him to have so little fresh unmarred skin to play with. If he flogged or whipped her back, he'd be competing with another man's marks in a game he could never win.
She realized suddenly that she was still crying. This agonizing sobbing sound was coming out of her, so foreign she kept forgetting it was her. How could she make those sounds? She was sure she'd cried every tear, felt every regret, ruminated and obsessed over every grudge. She'd thought she was empty, done.
It was that emptiness that had finally brought her to the brink of her own demise. Yet here she was, the emotion spilling out, a never-ending fountain bubbling over with rage and pain. She flinched when he started to stroke her back. She flinched because she expected to feel him flinch when he touched her. She expected his fingertips to stutter and halt against the scars in revulsion. But they didn't.
He touched her as if she were unbroken.
“What do you need, Shannon?”
“Something you can't give me.”
“You don't know until you ask.”
She shook her head. “It can never be you.” Even though he was the only offer on the table. Even though he was the only one she'd wanted back when things were simple.
The arousal cream continued on in its mission to drive her crazy, but her mind had become so far removed from sex that it acted as a dull background throb which she kept forgetting how to define because all she could think about was how this couldn't happen with the doctor.
She couldn't give herself to him like that—not in the way every last insane ounce of her wanted to. She couldn't give in to the id. She'd made that mistake once. He'd already proven he wasn't a man she could trust.
He pressed warm soft kisses against her back, trailing up to her neck. He quietly untied her, then he sat beside her on the leather table and pulled her into his arms, his mouth finding hers, lingering there, softly at first, then hungrily as if he might devour her whole. She didn't resist him. It felt too good. Even if she hated him. It was so late. She was so tired.
He carried her up the stairs to his suite and laid her down on his giant bed in the plant room. Ralph was asleep in his cage though the parakeets still twittered quietly to each other. He covered the bird cages with a blanket, turned on a thunderstorm white noise machine, and then climbed into the bed with her.
Shannon barely breathed as he pulled her against him and wrapped an arm around her.
“What are we doing?” she whispered.
“We're sleeping.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Sleep, kitten.”
She knew what he'd said in the dungeon about wanting her, and the kiss had felt real enough. And they'd shared a moment—she thought—but she couldn't help thinking this was all some strange unconventional therapy that meant nothing beyond keeping her from killing herself. She couldn't let herself believe it was anything more.